Sunday, Oct 12 - North to Geraldton

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(pics: coastal scrub, Kangaroo Paw, wildflower, at Regan's Ford Roadhouse)

More great eggs and bacon for breakfast. We tried to book the Pension for our last two nights of our trip, but they are full due to an air show coming to town. Finally found a place with a vacancy called the Woodman Point Holiday Park in Fremantle which is very inexpensive for a “deluxe family chalet” and paid for it out of desperation…so we shall see what it’s like!

We checked out of the Pension at nine and set off for Geraldton, 250 miles north. Partly cloudy, cool with a few sprinkles. We drove through vineyards north of Perth with busloads of holidayers trekking from winery to winery. We found our way onto Rt. 1, the Baird Highway, a two-lane high-speed trucking route for the scary Aussie Road Trains - trucks with three or even four trailers attached. Mark pulled off suddenly onto a dirt road through highly disturbed scrub woodland: semi- cleared with lots of trash. But we found amazing wildflowers! Deep pink Gladiola-like flowers, red and green kangaroo paws, orange and yellow peas and even a plant with black flowers. We also got good views of the Western Corella, a large, white, crested parrot with scarlet on the head and breast.

We continued on through sandy low scrub and farmland, stopping occasionally to find completely different and amazing flowers each time. At one pm we stopped at Regan’s Ford Roadhouse, a grocery/bar/gas station in the middle of nowhere and I had a bright red hotdog with bacon and cheese and tomato sauce on it. Australians completely misunderstand the hotdog and hamburger! They are always weird.

We later came to a screeching halt when Bob spotted a huge flock of very large black parrots which we identified as Short-billed Black Cockatoos. They landed on a shrub and started cracking open huge seed pods. Behind them flew a beautiful flock of pink and grey Galah parrots.

At 5:30 we reached Geraldton and got our first glimpse of the Indian Ocean. Mark dropped us off at a nice Best Western and he continued to the Geraldton B&B which was not at all as pictured on the website and not the bargain he had hoped for. After cleaning up we set off for an excellent dinner at the strangely-named Conversations at Indigo restaurant overlooking the harbor. I had oysters on the half shell with vermouth and lime sherbet, Mark, a chicken and pecan salad and Bob lamb on polenta. Rhubarb Crumble and ice cream with pineapple Carpaccio completed dinner and we collapsed back at our hotels.