Daintree National Park

The most visited national park in Australia. We can understand why. The lush tropical green of the park is beautiful. Add to that warm climate, magnificent beaches and flowing water.

The tip of Cape York

As someone said to us, as you walk to the tip you can see the water on both sides, with the land getting narrower and know that you are right at the pointy bit at the top of Australia. It's a thrill just being there.

The whole of the Cape York Peninsula

We really enjoyed travelling up the Cape York Peninsula. Probably this was partly due to doing this with Oz Tours and a small group of nice people. Possibly the tour being such a different experience for us contributed. However, being able to see a part of Australia that is remote and has remained largely unchanged by white settlement is a marvellous experience.

Kakadu National Park

While this has been included as a highlight, it really wasn't one of the highlights for us. We're pleased we went, we wouldn't bother going again. We think that it would be much more interesting in the Wet. However, we did acquire a much better understanding and appreciation of early aboriginal culture and lifestyle.

The Kimberley

It has to be seen. Photos can't tell you what it is like. Those magnificent red escarpments rising out of flat plains, mixed with purple when seen from a distance, are an unforgettable visual experience. Close up the craggy red rocks are equally impressive in a different way. We saw only a small section of the Kimberley. It is the place we would most like to revisit.

The boab trees

'The tree that grows upside down'. They are deciduous and lose their leaves when they are short of water. They stand out among the vegetation because they are so large. They can't be dated but many are clearly centuries, and probably millennia old. The aborigines had a use for every part of the boab. We found the young roots delicious.

The helicopter flight over the Bungle Bungle

We were told that this was the best way to see the Bungle Bungle. We agree. There are only two points to drive to, and then you would be looking up at canyon walls. No doubt this is spectacular but the unique feature of the Bungle Bungle is the beehive mounds. In a helicopter these are most easily appreciated, particularly when there are no doors. A plane would fly a lot higher.

Wolfe Creek meteorite crater

Really, it's just a circular ridge of earth, not spectacular at all. However, standing on the top of the ridge looking down into the crater and thinking about a piece of rock falling from space and creating this hole many thousands of years ago creates a sense of wonder. Add to that the 150 km along the Tanami Road to get there and its remoteness increases the fascination. We will never be able to remove all the dust that got into the Musso on this trip.

Gantheaume Point (Broome)

Aboriginal people believe that this is where they originated, and they spread outward across the land from here. After death their spirits return here to await rebirth. Visiting Gantheaume Point it is easy to understand why they would believe this. It is a magical, mystical place. The dinosaur footprint adds additional interest.

Dampier and Burrup Peninsula

It's the boulders, broken down from the original solid rocks, that make this place so amazing. Imagining the eons of wind and rain that are necessary to create all of those rounded boulders is mind boggling. Almost as mind boggling is the planning that went into creating the processing plant for the North West Shelf project.

Coral Bay

If you want to see coral, this is the place to go. All you need is a snorkel and you can walk into the water and view coral. We were taken to a place which also had a significant fish population (helped, no doubt, by multiple feedings each day).

Steep Point

Cape Byron was crowded. Cape York probably has several dozen visitors each day. The day we (four of us) visited Steep Point it seemed likely that we were the only visitors for the day. It appears that only a handful of people visit each day. It's a thrill to stand at the top of the cliffs at the most westerly point of the Australian mainland.

WA wildflowers

These are magnificent. Barrie has compiled a slide show of more than one hundred photos of wildflowers, and we by no means took a photo of every different flower that we saw. We started taking photos at Port Hedland, where we saw our first Sturt Desert Pea, and continued taking photos for the remainder of our time in WA.

The weather

We could hardly have had better weather. We left home on a calm, sunny day, and continued to have calm, sunny days for most of our 12 1/2 weeks away. We drove in rain only one day, as we left WA, with a couple of other short periods of rain, conveniently at times when we weren't sightseeing (apart from being caught by a shower at Shell Beach).

Discovering that we really could do what we set out to do!

Prior to our departure we had had only three nights away in our caravan, so we set out as very inexperienced caravanners. We learned a lot very quickly, fortunately without any disasters befalling us. Still, this is by no means the first time we have tackled a major project with no experience. We had no serious mechanical faults, not even a flat tyre, in 21122 kilometres. Our Musso did us proud.

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