Escape from Collie

 After three months of being grounded because of my knee replacement we decided to pack up the van and head south for a week.

After visiting friends in Bridgetown, we decided to free camp for a one night at Muirs’ Bridge on the Franklin River. Not a bad area for an overnighter with a large level area suitable for half a dozen vans with several tables and seats available for use. We were the only ones there for the night, so it was light the fire, drinks, Yahtzee (I hate that game – always getting flogged), and dinner by the fire – nice to be back on the road again.

Camp on the Kalgan River

We booked into Kalgan River Caravan Park just outside Albany for four nights. We had stayed here before and it’s a great little park where you can camp 30 meters from the river. After four months of not fishing, I was keen to wet a lure or two so got up an hour before sunrise to flick some lures around wading the shallows.  Unfortunately, the icebergs floating down the river got tangled in my lure – bloody freezing! 

As it was our 34th wedding anniversary on the Saturday we caught up with some good friends from Collie (who were also caravanning down south) for a celebratory dinner at one of the local Indian restaurants. Called the Albany Indian Tandoori Restaurant – great food, reasonable pricing and I would certainly recommend.

Plan for our stay in Albany was to visit the National Anzac Centre and do some tourist things around the area. 

Chainsaw cockatoo

One unusual display in Albany was the “chainsaw” art carving exhibition which for a gold coin donation you can do a drive through tour of some pretty good artwork created by using only a chainsaw.  Takes a good 10-15 minutes to do the loop – and well worth a look.

Old HMAS Torrens 4.5" Turret

Late in 1914 - 41,000 Anzacs and 13,000 horses departed Albany in two convoys at the start of WW1. The National Anzac Centre records the departure of the convoys and the story of the Anzacs in all theatres of conflict in WW1 and history of some of those lucky enough to return home. It has a brilliant interactive display, and the main display building is surrounded by military memorabilia – including the 4.5” gun turrets from HMAS Swan and Torrens (which during my Navy career I had certainly been in and on – shows how old I am). Linda and I spent an enjoyable but sobering 4 hours out at the centre. The severe hardship endured with a joke and a smile, and mateship that those young Australian’s and Kiwi’s displayed was unbelievable.

At the Gap platform

Day three in Albany saw us heading out towards Frenchman Bay to take in the wild coastline at the Gap, Natural Bridge, Blowholes, and then to the whaling station for coffee and scones. Unfortunately, the blowholes weren’t “blowing” due to the low swell – but the coffee and scones were great😊.

Cheynes Beach

After leaving Albany we headed east to Cheynes Beach Caravan Park – it was a long and arduous run of 55Km, but we made it! Friends had told us that this was a special spot, and I would have to agree. The beaches are that pure white silica sand (that makes Lucky Bay at Esperance famous) and almost as hard as bitumen. It would be a mecca in summer with at least 15km of beach easily accessible by 4WD.  We were lucky to visit when the Southern Right whales were in the bay with their calves. There were three mother calf groups in the bay when we were there and they quiet often were within 100m of the shore. photos we took didn’t really do justice to the whale action and my drone was playing up. Reckon Cheynes Beach beats Lucky Bay anytime. This same beach was where the huge pod of Pilot Whales beached themselves recently with all of them dying on the beach despite a huge effort to get them back off the beach – sad. 

We tried the famous “fish and chips” at the Cheynes Beach Take-away and were disappointed - 5 out of 10. Oh well could have been worse – pilot whale pie?

On the way back to Collie we took a diversion through the Porongurup Ranges -as the whole southwest had received above average winter rains everything was green and lush. Funny thing – when you get up very close to the Porongurup’s you can’t see anything of the ranges unless you go into the park. So, the sights of the Stirling Ranges in the distance dominated the scenery.

Great to get away. A short video is HERE. I have just brought some new video editing software - so some of the effects in the video might not be that great.

Footnote: Regular readers of this blog might have noticed no photos or mention of our little dog Molly. Sadly, in a devastating and tragic series of events we lost her in June this year. We miss her very much.