Life's a Beach!

Greetings from Lucky Bay, reportedly Australia's whitest sand beach.  Not sure if that's true, but I can tell you that southern Western Australia has spectacular coast line, perfect beaches, protected bays, wind torn rocky capes and towering forests just inland.  It reminds me of the little I have seen of Vancouver Island in Canada.  Which is ironic because much of this part of the world was explored by Captain George Vancouver, for whom Vancouver Island was named and who played a large role in the mapping of British Columbia.  Small world!

The other thing this part of the world has in common with Canada is that it captured the interest of those pesky Frenchies.  Many parts of the south coast have French names because this area was initially explored by the French (this came after Dutch exploration in fact, but the Dutch pretty much sailed on past and dismissed Australia as a land without much merit, so much for the Dutch eye for real estate!).  Anyway, as soon as the French started to show a serious interest in this part of the continent, the English immediately claimed it for their own and sent a ship from Sydney to settle the area.

On leaving Augusta we had an exciting drive through the towering Karri forests just inland.  An interesting feature here were the lookout trees.  For some reason which escapes me now they had difficulty building fire watch towers here, so they came up with the solution of cutting off the very top of the tallest karri tree in the area and putting a sort of wooden nest at the top.  Metal posts were then hammered into the tree to form steps so that rangers could climb to the top of the tree quickly and check for fire.  Needless to say this was something I felt I had to climb and it turned out you were allowed to do so.....but completely at your own risk, and yes, there had been a few death.  Anyway, I climbed, Dennis watched and we both were amazed by the shear size of the tree!

From Pemberton we headed to the coast, where we have been beaching it ever since!  First stop was Mandalay Beach (near d'Entrecasteaux National Park), then on to Shelley Beach (near Albany), then Starvation Boat Harbour, then Lucky Bay (in Cape Le Grande, near Esperance).  The weather hasn't been hot enough for swimming, but we've driven on the beach, had picnics in remote corners of the beach, gone fishing from the beach, had morning walks along the beach, watched our neighbours paraglide onto the beach and generally soaked up the roar of the ocean and the fresh salt air.  All exceedingly good for the soul!

Some highlights:

* The big news from the beach was that Dennis caught his first fish off Shelley Beach.  A herring that, frankly, tasted like crap.....but still a vey proud moment. 
*We really enjoyed being in the company of paragliders at Shelley Beach and spent hours watching them take off and sail into the skies.  We met one guy in particular who Dennis dubbed "fly boy" - a German travelling with another German mate and a French girlfriend (couldn't stop Dennis from saying "cherchez la femme") - we enjoyed some cheap vodka and very expensive rum with these great neighbours.
* The whaling museum in Albany was fascinating.  I had no idea that the whaling station there was operating as recently as 1978.  The death of the industry had a terrible effect on the town, but it's interesting that the town has recovered largely on the strength of tourism generated through whale watching.
* The drive into Cape Le Grande from Esperance involves a 21k drive along the beach.  Absolutely magic stuff.

* Dennis demonstrated his new fitness levels by climbing Frenchman's Peak in Cape Le Grande.  He climbed 340 metres of sharp ascent and back down in 40 minutes....and claims he could have done it faster if he hadn't had to wait for me all the time.  The top of the peak has huge caves from which you get great views of the beaches and the ocean below.
* The beaches in and near Esperance are a highlight in themselves because they are just so breathtaking  I'm told it has something to do with the very white sand combined with the clarity of the water, but the colour of the ocean is just the most startling shade of azure blue.

Having given you the overview, I thought I would treat you to some special interest reports to give you a more in depth feel for some aspects of our recent travels.

The Relationship Report

It has occurred to me that I haven't updated you on how our relationship has been progressing since those very early days of fighting constantly.  Well, I'm pleased to report that overall this year that could have been a make or break is bringing us even closer and enabling us to get to know each other in whole new ways.

In our quarterly voting (which I reported on briefly in a previous blog) we had a section on "most important thing we've learned about ourselves or each other".  (I know, we really are strange!)  The winning entries speak alot about the role of stress in one's relationships.  The most important thing that Dennis had learned about me is that I'm friendlier than he thought.  I was somewhat offended by this at first, but realised that when I am under alot of stress I tend to retreat into myself....so being friendlier really meant that I was far less stressed. 

The most important thing that I had learned about Dennis is that this man who has always managed to be as cool as a cucumber is actually capable of having outrageous hissy fits (just like me)!  Now this says alot about how far Dennis has been willing to travel outside his comfort zone on this trip.  Turns out that for Dennis, being on the road with me is far more stressful than working for a living (even at Coles).

Now this interesting fact leads us back to the subject of fighting.  While we don't fight all the time like we did at the beginning of the trip, there remain certain flashpoints that are pretty much guaranteed to lead to discord, and sometimes to big fat hissy-fits.  One flashpoint is setting up camp.  We've pretty much mastered packing up in the morning, and we've certainly got most things figured out when it comes to setting up.  But unfortunately setting up usually comes at the end of a long day, so it brings out the worst in us.  As a fly on our wall at this time of day you can be pretty sure to hear cries of "Dennis, you're not the boss of me" or "Stephanie will you just get out of the f'ing way".

The other major flashpoint is 4 wheel driving.  It turns out that Dennis and I have completely different attitudes to risk.  As a result Dennis thinks that I am a raving lunatic and I think that Dennis is a complete wimp just about every time we set off on a 4 wheel drive adventure.  Now, I must admit that Dennis does have some evidence to support his side of the story....like for example the hundreds of nasty scratches in the side of the car, or the fact that I got the car bogged at Broke Inlet and we had to be rescued, or the fact that I jackknifed the camper trying to turn around in a tight spot.  But honestly, I don't see how any of this warrants a hissy fit.....do you?

The Wildlife Report

We continue to be amazed by the wildlife we are encountering on this trip.  The birdlife is astounding and we are getting better at identifying them with our bird book.  I've really come to appreciate that there's more to Australian birds than the colourful parrots!  We've seen quite a few snakes, but (thank God) we've mainly spotted them (and frequently killed them) from inside the car.  There are resident kangaroos at our campsite at Lucky Bay, and this is certainly the first place I have seen kangaroos on the beach.  We also had a "pet" bandicoot at Shelley Beach.  I was almost run over by two HUGE emus yesterday when out walking.

No camping wildlife report would really be complete however, without talking BUGS!    I've spoken before about the moths eating our clothes, the flies and the mosquitos.  The latest addition is cockroaches which seem to be prevalent in this part of the world.  Now just about every time you open a drawer out pops a friendly (and usually enormous) cockroach.  At Starvation Boat Harbour we encountered the killer wasps.  We came back to our campsite after one of our eventful 4WD excursions to discover that one side of the camper was absolutely swarming with buzzing things (Dennis says they were bees, I say they were killer wasps).  We decided to get outta there - but naturally the killer wasp side was "my side" when packing up.  So, in the middle of a rather hot day I put on long pants, a long sleeved top, my fly net, socks and shoes...then faced those wasps head on and emerged victorious.  I'm telling you this living with the wildlife is not for the faint hearted!!

The Bush Fashion Report

Regretfully I must report that bush living has completely (and possibly irrevocably) destroyed any sense of fashion that I once had.  Gone are the expensive sunglasses.....I've discovered that you can buy perfectly good sunglasses for $6 at the Reject Shop.  Now I can't bring myself to spend $19.95 for a pair of pharmacy shades!  Gone is the Longines watch.....replaced with a perfectly good timepiece from Target, cost $15.95.  Gone are the Jimmy Choo shoes......recently found a pair of excellent plastic shoes (great for the shower, and to wear when you have to pee in the middle of the night) for only $4 at K Mart.  Gone are the days of discussing my Carla Zampatti wardrobe......yesterday at an afternoon drinks session I found myself with some fellow campers discussing the 50% off sale at the Op Shop!!  How will I ever be able to hold my head up in Melbourne again????

A Word on Grief

I was determined when I set out to write this blog that I was going to be upbeat - who wants to go on talking about or reading about grief.  However, I would be misleading you and lying to myself if I said that this past month has not been affected by grief.  I have found it very difficult to come to terms with.  I am someone who wants to get on with things.  So I find that as soon as I wake up and feel good about life, I think "that's it, grieving is over and now I can get back to the rest of my life".  So needless to say I am shocked to discover that the grief returns when you least expect it.  I am now feeling somewhat more at peace with grief and have realised that it is not going to just "go away" and I'm not going to be able to go back to the way it was and just "get on with it".  My mother got a letter from a friend of hers who had also lost a daughter and she said something that I thought was perfect:  "remember you are not trying to "get over" it but learning to put Julie's memory in a special place so you can take her with you with love and comfort".  So that's what I'm going to try and do!

Late breaking, important news flash!!!  Dennis Moore     has won the men's comp at Esperance with 43 points.  Just in time to completely ruin his handicap for the Bagwana.  Let's here from the champion himself......

Well done Steph, leaves me little else to mention apart from you guessed it GOLF.  While Steph is hiking
I have had a few games of golf, the highlights being more sand greens in Denmark a great layout at Albany and of course yesterday at Esperance. The thing that I am enjoying most with golf is the opportunity to meet so many interesting people and to share in some moments of their lives.

Last Saturday I played at Esperance golf club and was welcomed as a visitor. I met and was shown around by a life member Vern Sharpe (pictured) and invited to play with him the following Thursday so we stayed on for another day and went back to the course. Vern is a foundation member, lived in Esperance most of his life, built a lot of the course with his brother and has filled many of the positions on the committee, even today at his age he cuts the rough when he is not playing. We had a great day with Vern giving me some of his experience around the course explaining where he built up fairways because of flooding and many of the initiatives implemented over the years. If you think he is proud of this club you are right and he took great pleasure in showing me the way. Vern played to handicap and with his course management I had a good score and as reported won the comp and probably did some damage to my handicap.

Don’t believe everything you read about the fighting, we really are getting on great and enjoying the time together. 5 Months on the road now and 20,000 Klms.

I will go now as we head off for more adventure to Cape Arid National Park and Israelite Bay, then on to the Nullarbor, bye for now.