Around Oz the First Time - Chapter 70 - Geraldton Day 2

A day to explore the northern area around Geraldton. Robyn has head Kalbarri is more than worth a visit, her sister having visited the area in a previous adventure.

My phone, the great image collector, is playing up. The sensor in the power adapter is supposedly sensing moisture, and it wont charge. It did last night, but only after I had turned it off. For now it is fully charged and ready to collect the colours, if not the textures of the landscape.

The plan is to head north, back to Northampton, the turn towards the coast, perhaps take in Horrocks and Port Gregory and the Pink Lake before Kalbarri, being back to Northampton for lunch in what looks like an old “traditional” pub and then Geraldton before 5.00pm for Forbsy to pick up huis Cruiser which is in for a service. The best laid plans of mice and men.

First issue, we turn at Northampton and there we are smack in the wheat belt. Crops stunted through insufficient rain are sprawled out in front of us. The others want to know what types of grain there are. We stop between two crops, one of wheat and one I am not able to identify, although I think it is barley, again a poor crop. None of the crop we see are at optimum, but the early ones are ready for harvest, and some have already been stripped.

Further along as we travel between the cops, first we notice that as we get close to any water course, the crops changed from wheat and barley to oats and they were much greener and a long way from harvestable. There might have been Lucerne on some of the river flats,  but I cannot be sure.

What there also is are wildflowers. We spend a lot of time travelling up an incline taking pictures of grevilleas and other wildflowers present in the road verge and just inside the paddocks. The mature flowers we are advised by Silver Leader are nothing compared to what we might see further south, but we are all agog with “snapitis”. Particularly, there are the white ones we saw so many of yesterday protruding from the base bush, yellow ground coverage and bottlebrushes, splashes of red and the blacks of spent seed pods in bushes looking to regenerate the bush.

Into Horrocks, I take a picture of the general store for sending to a staff member with a similar surname. We are wandering around and I am almost driving out when Silver Leader suggests we take a left rather than a right. it takes us to the boat ramp and beach. The diversion has taken us to a great vista, and shortly everyone is out and snapping shots of it.

With the events of the past few moments, we know we need to investigate every nook and cranny that presents itself. The next opportunity is Point Gregory, the home of the Pink Lake, this must be a furfie, a pink lake, what will be the next thing they will want us to perceive, Unicorn Poop?

Point Gregory is a small settlement, not far off the road from Northampton to Kalbarri, is the home of the Pink Lake. This is not the only pink lake in the world. Evidently, they are caused by a certain algae. BASF have a plant here, “mining” the colour. The lake is in fact quite pink. Robyn is wearing a pink T-shirt from our jaunt on the Nullarbor Golf Course and I take a picture of her in front of the lake. I send it to our daughter, Kirsten, saying I thought she would disappear except for the exposed hands and face in the picture with a “lol”.

Significant snaps taken of not just the lake, but wildflowers here. Robyn notes there are no birds in the pink lake, but they are evident in the clearer areas. The lake fully snapped, it’s time to check out the actual town. The caravan park here has a significant number of fixed structures. Some of which are for sale at $295,000. Robyn wants to check them out, but we cannot find them.

This place is suitably explored, its now time for Kalbarri, about 60 kilometres away. Firstly, we travel around the lake, unable to take the spectacular shots of the reflection across the lake at the sand dunes, perfectly reflected in the pink water. We pass the BASF plant as we speed towards Kalbarri.

As we come across the last hill into Kalbarri, there are a number of roads towards the coast with interesting names on signs, but it is lunch time and, rather than try and get back to Northampton, we will need to run the gambit here, keep an eye on the time sand leave enough for the return trip. With this in mind we head down into Kalbarri, snapping view sots all the way. Jillian, Robyn’s sister was right, this place is spectacular and well worth the effort we have put in.

We go all the way to the end of the bitumen, having seen a number of eateries. We settle on a bistro, although we actually were going to hit a fish and chips shop, but when we stopped, Forbsy wanders directly into the bistro, and sits down ordering a beer on the way. I think he has settled on where lunch will be consumed.

This bistro has a good selection of foods. I order a prawn tortilla and Robyn and Silver Leader and Rosalie are into the seafood baskets. The food is ample and better than normal pub food. We wash it down with Lemon. Lime and Bitters drinks. Silver Leader and Forbsy have beers, they are not driving, and Rosalie is having a Margarita, which is on tap.

Getting everyone out of the bistro is not easy but we are on a time limit. Forbsy offers to complete Rosalie’s drink, and skulls what is about half that cocktail.

Silver Leader wants to see the point break at Jacques Point, but there are a number of roads to check out before we go there. Many of these roads go to high vantage points to see the Kalbarri Cliffs, along with beaches, reefs and inlets they protect.

Jacques Point is not pumping at all, although there are a couple of surfers out on the point. The swell is very low and breaking directly onto the reef. An old guy is walking back across the rocks away from the surf, Silver Leader is unable to work out what he is doing. If he is attempting to enter the water, where he is will give him nothing but grief. The he plants himself into the water, still going away from the swell and gets out only a short time later. Most confusing.

This place done, Red Bluff is next, and Pot Alley, Rainbow Beach, Yellow Gorge and any other road that sticks itself in front of us. By the time we check these out, time is becoming short, but before we go Forbsy needs to create a cairn, a stack of rocks. I video the last of the effort, then Rosalie points out a much larger stack closer to the cliffs edge. Forbsy is not worried, he has “cairned” and taken shots of his handy work. This, and his dad joke ramblings, apparently are caused by the skulling of the Margarita at lunch. We wonder how long this will last.

With the time getting away, I am looking to plant the pedal to the metal but there are a couple of wildflowers we are yet to photograph, and I know I have seen them just out of town. Driving at less than half the speed limit, we cruise along until I see what I want to shoot. With these shots taken, its 150+ kilometres back to Geraldton and I have plenty of time.

Having said that, a chance to plant the pedal to the metal, is never wasted. Everyone but Robyn snoozes on the way home, only waking at times when the GPS speaks, or I have to slow down for road changes. Forbsy of course, sleeps more soundly than the others giving his skulling exploits, having taken one for the team.

Robyn is unhappy with my 130kph cruise in the 110kph zone but only has one dig, she knows better.

We make it back into Geraldton and drop Forbsy off at the Toyota dealership who were going to call when the Cruiser was ready, they didn’t, so he assumes it is not ready as yet. Of course it was, another great piece of customer service – not.

Promises need to be kept in the service industry, don’t big business understand.

We arrive back to the van and Robyn stick her phone on the charger as hers is flat. I sleep after the long drive, Robyn works.

When I awake, I try to charge my phone, but the alarm about moisture is setting off again. We head out to investigate the late-night shopping options in this provincial Western Australian town. We have been caught before when we were here in WA last. In Kalgoorlie we arrived at around 5.00pm and needing some provisions, headed to the local Woolworths but were denied entry as the shop and the local commercial centre was closing for the night. Its late night shopping on a Thursday so we may be in luck.

In a normal sense there is late night shopping. A shopping centre is open but only the larger stores are open, Woolworths, K-Mart and BWS in the shopping centre we get to. Woolworths have what looks like the charger we want, but I am unsure.

When we get back to the van and check it, it is the wrong one of course. It looks like Perth might be the only answer to what seems to be a phone issue, not a charger issue.