Kalbarri

 

Next we drove northward toward Kalbarri. Kalbarri is another town that I had visited before, but I knew of some great hikes in the area, and the weather looked promising for the next few days. We books a couple nights at a caravan park. What I didn’t expect, and was not an issue a month prior when I visited, were the hordes of flies. I have a high tolerance for the flies, they don’t bite, but they do trying to crawl into your eyeballs. It’s not pleasant, but as I had already experienced much worse in the outback parts I wasn’t really phased. Emma, however, was exceeding unhappy about this new installment. The poor girl screamed in frustration at them so many times and began spending all her time sprinting between screened areas. We opted for the pool eventually where the flies weren’t so bad before the sunset and we were finally free of the incessant crawling of critters. The next day I took Emma to the store first thing and she got a face net. A necessary purchase. I however, decided I didn’t want one, I’ve worn them before for work and hate trying to see through the netting. I’d rather have flies in my eyes than a net giving me a headache. I would come to regret this decision, but I felt strong in it at the time.

Every morning in Kalbarri volunteers offer food to pelicans a long standing tradition in the town that had started many years ago by a local fisherman, unfortunately for us, the pelicans were not enticed by the small offering and did not show up, so instead we watched a seagull offering which was much more chaotic.

Next we headed to nature’s window, at Kalbarri National Park. We decided to do my favorite hike there, a 9km, 800ft elevation gain trail. It’s funny how doing the same hike with someone is a completely different experience than doing it alone or with other people. You notice different things, walk different paces, appreciate different moments. The first time I hiked this trail I started before sunrise (5:30am) and hiked until 3pm stopping along the way to make coffee, draw, watch the birds, make lunch, and sit quietly. It was a slow and leisurely full day journey. Going with Emma was an equally enjoyable, but quite different experience, we did the hike in 3 hours. Emma’s very fit and a runner and tracks her walking speed on her watch noticing when it’s a ‘slow pace’. As we walked we chatted about life and travel and the wildlife we saw. There was one major downside to this hike though… as I commented earlier, my decision to not buy a face net was highly regrettable. The first ¾ of the walk was fine. In fact, I think our pace made the flies less annoying because our natural movements moved them off. Granted, both of us were surrounded by visible clouds of flies, but it was mostly ignorable, until the end. We turned the corner and the wind died… at the same time we began the final climb so were walking slower, but I was breathing heavier. Let me tell you, breathing heavily in a cloud of flies is not a pleasant experience. I had lots of bonus protein that day though. Yuck. I was walking with a hand over my nose and mouth and then having to stop to take a few deep breaths, before Emma searching in her backpack found me a surgical mask I could wear. Still hard to breathe, but at least I was no longer inhaling flies. It was an adventure.

After the hike we decided to do a few other short hikes in the area before returning to the campground to float in the pool and rest our tired legs. It was another lovely day.

The next morning we got up early and hit the bakery before continuing our journey north to Monkey Mia. Hoping for an escape from the flies.