Noah's Birthday at 14 Mile Beach

14 Mile Beach, just South of Coral Bay

How's this for camping right on the beach?!!! Yes, that is the satellite set up for Foxtel.

Poppy, and many others, kept their boats just pulled up from the ocean on the sand, ready to jump into any time.

Pop took us out to the reef, out just a couple of hundred metres, for more spectacular coral & ocean life.
Mind you, the kids were happier with Poppy letting them jump from the front of the boat into the clear shallow waters.

We celebrated Noah's 6th birthday here. Gran made an ocean cake with a cut-out of Noah in his wetsuit & snorkel. We had a great time & played games also.

That afternoon, we went out snorkelling again, but "there was too many sea urchants" for the boys.

And at night, we went crab hunting along the beach with torches. There was heaps! Jeeby!

This was another wonderful place we didn't want to leave.

Ningaloo Reef

Osprey Bay, Ningaloo Reef Marine Park

We have been fortunate enough to camp right on the beach front, enjoying the clear blue ocean, up close & personal.

The reef was right at our doorstep. Beautiful corals & colourful fish. Very cold water, thus the wet suits.

Nat tried his hand at fishing, and caught this dart. At the time, we didn't know what it was, so we kissed it & released it.

Noah enjoyed feeding this roo, with a joey in her pouch, each afternoon.
There was heaps of turtles in the ocean. We were even fortunate to swim with a couple. We were swimming along with it, about half a metre above it. It didn't seem to mind either, until Nat reached out to touch it & the turtle shot off, with no chance of us keeping up with it.
This turtle was on a different beach. They were coming in close to shore to mate & lay eggs - very early this year. We could see at least 50 out in the water. (No swimming here!)
We ended each day down on the beach, either fishing or walking or swimming or enjoying a relaxing drink with the sunset.

This was probably our favourite spot of the trip so far. We stayed here 10 days.

Osprey Bay

Beautiful Broome

Anthony words, "I'll trade you 1000 Gorges for this beach!"
Yes, Ant is loving Broome & being near the Coast again.
We drove the cars down onto the Beach (past the Nudist Beach), and enjoyed dinner a swim & the sunset. Not bad!

The sunsets here are amazing... The sun actually sets into the ocean on this side of Australia!

Anthony's New Found Paradise - Broome

At Last... Beautiful Broome

Camel Ride along Cable Beach, Broome at Sunset.

Windjana Gorge & Tunnel Creek

We faced the grave & infamous Gibb River Road again... and this time conquered it!

Windjana Gorge

In the midst of the barren, dried, flat land, this oasis appears.
There were sooooo many freshwater crocs, all along the bank.

We couldn't get over how quiet they were.

We walked along the sandy river bed, just a few metres from all these crocs - out sunbaking. There were just so many!

Nat wanted to catch a baby one to take home for a pet.

They were so relaxed - just floating out under the sun.

Compared to the saltwater crocs, they were so much smaller & less troublesome looking.
Another gorge, and yet a totally different experience again.

Then, onto the "rough road" of Gibb River Road, another 40 km to ...

Tunnel Creek

We had been warned as to the water temperature, as to wearing shoes that could get wet, and as to taking a torch. Man, did we need to!

Ant helped each of us through the initial part, where the water came just over his knees (waist-height on Noah).

Even compared to the Croc-infested Windjana Gorge, Nat & Noah said that this was the best part of the day, here at Tunnel Creek.

The creek has carved a tunnel right through the mountain. Here, a cave-in has allowed light through to the tunnel about half way along.

The ceiling was low down in some places and yet, very high in other areas. On the return route, we noticed a small freshwater croc in the water. That is, in the water that we had walked through the first time.

Another wonderful day.

Horizontal Falls

The Highlight of the Trip so far ...

Horizontal Falls

(This photo probably would look better turned around, but I don't know how to on Blog, and this is the angle from the Plane).

We flew from Derby over the Horizontal Falls by the above "Kimberley Extreme" Seaplane.

Next we were taken over to the Horizontal Falls on the Kimberley Extreme Jet Boat.

It was so much fun! They came very close to the Falls, then past them, fast turns, then we couldn't believe when they actually took us through them! It was amazing!

Noah became less sure, and even a little worried, then started yelling, "Stop!" Nat yelled, "No, Keep Going!"

The amount of water passing through this gap was amazing.

The First Gap of the Horizontal Falls was approx. 22metres wide. This is the gap we rode through.

The second gap was only 7 metres wide, 40 metres deep, and had approx. 1 Million Gallons per Second passing through it. Needless to say, they didn't take us through it - we were a little worried at driving towards it, thinking they were going to take us through it.

This was heading back towards the first gap again - Backwards! Half way back through it, the driver throttled just enough so that we sat stationery and watched the force of the water pass by us. Fantastic!
We couldn't believe when we arrived back from the Jet Boat Trip, that these "Friendly Grey Nurse" Sharks were just hanging around the boat! Frank & Ralph they had been named by the crew.

After morning tea on a Luxury Yacht, we had another boat trip up one the beautiful surrounding creeks. It was beautiful. And of course, we saw another Saltwater Croc or 2.

Then back to the Luxury Yacht for a BBQ Lunch. Not bad outlook! The boys were mostly blown away by the Free Fanta!

Time to hang out & relax after lunch.

The boys just kept watching the sharks hanging around us.

Finally, the flight home. This time over Achapalago Buchaneer Bay & "Thousand Islands".

Nat was quite sad when it came time to leave. He said it was the best day of our trip so far - we all had to agree with him.

Geikie Gorge

Beautiful Geikie Gorge, Fitzroy Crossing
We enjoyed a wonderful boat trip up Geikie Gorge. We saw probably a dozen freshwater crocs.

The next afternoon, Lance, Cathy & Lis enjoyed a walk along the bank and were blessed to watch the colours change on the walls of the Gorge as the sun set.

We also all enjoyed having a powered site for a night, washing machines, recharging batteries, nintendos, computers, DVD players, phones, etc. As well as the wonderful long hot showers (that you don't have to bucket water from the creek & sit in the sun all day!)