The Blows

After we left Warroora, we drove to the Tropic of Capricorn and

(Alaska Grown at 23° 26′ 16″ south of the equator!)

a place called the blows. There is a big blow hole there, but the sea was really calm so it was more of a gurgle hole for us :P

The sign in front of the Blows, dumb tourist have a tendency anywhere to do stupid things to kill themselves. Australia is on of the few places willing to put up clearly marked warnings to try to save them from themselves. So be warned...King Waves Kill.

Wild Warroora

The rest of our time at Warroora was spent exploring the 4x4 trails, bogging the utes, sitting on the beach, admiring the wild life, and of course eating! We had some awesome meals while out, beef skewers, prawn cocktails, and several kinds of sausages just to name a few. I really wanted to share with you some of the cool animals we saw. A big change for me from moose, geese, and beavers.

A stick bug, we used to keep some of these in a tank. Here they live outside, this one was outside the homestead house.

A bush turkey, it is big, but not as large as an emu and they can fly.

Giant termite mound, it was taller than the truck and hard like rock. The bugs are nocturnal so none to be found in the bright sun.

Sheep and a roo in the backyard of the homestead.

Look how close this guy came! We could hear them most of the evening coming in to drink. They make a funny coughing sound.

Warroora 2

There was a big coral shelf on one section of the beach. There were several pools with cool stuff in them. I also went with Justin for a walk out across the shelf. the water was so clear you could see bunches of fish, live coral and seaweed off the edge of the shelf in the deeper water.

We got to the beach late, and so decided to stay past sunset. It was amazing to watch the colour develop over the water. Slightly dark shot of Jessie and I, but I couldn't resist posting it for the smiles.

"Hi" from sunset on the the Indian Ocean!

So amazing, a perfect day :) We drove back on the wild 4x4 roads in the dark and tried not to cream too many Roos. Terry's ute got stuck and had to be pushed off a 'curb' on the side of the road. We came back to make supper and found a 'welcoming committee'!

If I remember correctly this is a huntsman spider, and not a very big one either. But it was giant to us Alaskans! Luckily Justin saved us and knocked it down and smooshed it. It was the scariest bug we saw, besides the wasps that stung Mom and I, not too bad for visiting a land that grows lots of scary bugs!

Warroora

Pronounced "warra" was where J&J and Terry took us camping. It was amazing! We love to camp, but I was a little worried about the wildlife while roughing it. Warroora was closer to glamping than truly roughing though, about perfect for us Alaska newbies. Warroora (LINK to their website) is about 190 K (118 miles) from Carnarvon. It is a large working station, we mostly saw sheep but the website says they have cattle too. Our family had rented out the old homestead for us, it sleeps 12 so we had plenty of room and is fully furnished with everything from beds and linen to BBQs and dishes.

On the drive there, still so flat! This is after turning onto the station road, I think, we saw lots of sheep and dead things on our drive.

The sign out front of the office, if you would like an idea of where things are layed out, click the map on the homepage of their website.

The view from the kitchen onto the patio, there is a water hole where you can see the sheep in the background. It is a short(ish) drive through the bush to the beach, of which there are several.

I'm not sure which beach this is...but notice the lack of people or even foot prints. Let alone trash, other people camping, annoying dogs or any other sign of humans. I could get used to this kind of camping!

A cool crab on the edge of the surf. More in the next post....

one more from 24 May

I just had too many good pictures to share from this day!

This is the antenna by Jessie and Justin's house. It is 29 meters, even bigger than the biggest one where Kyle works. It is very funny to me, but they re-dedicated the thing the month after we visited and even had Buzz Aldrin come to town for it! Link

Our collection of goodies from visiting plantations (not pictured, a pumpkin)

For dinner, Terry invited all of us over. I had flashbacks to watching Gram Garnet and her sister Auntie Opal cook when I was little.

Yum! We had antipasti pasta with salad and bread, with cookies and paw-paw with lime for dessert.

Harvesting Bananas

Justin used to harvest bananas when he was younger, so he gave us a run through of how they are grown.

Carnarvon is known for their variety of bananas, they are smaller and sweeter than the ones we usually see. These pics are all a little blurry, is was very dense and dim in the rows of naners and I didn't take the time to re-set my camera.

So the banana bunches grow from flowers that look like this. The bananas grow in a spiral down the stem from the flower. The flowers are broken off the bottom when the bunch is long enough.

When the bananas are big enough the harvesters walk through the groves hacking down the trees bringing the bunches closer to the ground, the next guy shoulders the bunch while another guy chops it from the tree. The naners are still green at this point and have to be stored in sheds to ripen. The new banana plant will grow from a sucker at the base of the tree, you can see some small ones on some of the trees already.

Very cool and interesting to me! Not something I have ever seen growing on a tree :) I will say it is a little scary in there, there is a lot of dead leaves on the ground and lots of live ones over your head. Also Justin delights in telling stories of the bad snakes and spiders you find in bananas!

24 May p.m.

After a tasty lunch of steak sandwiches we went to visit a few friends of Jessie & Justin that own plantations.

On the left watermelon field picked the week before and to the right pumpkins. Not the same as US pumpkins, these are flat punkin shaped but a mottled blue grey colour with orange flesh. Iron Chef (the owner) let us pick one, but we didn't get around to eating it.

Star fruits on the tree! Very sweet, not at all like the ones we get in the store, much juicier and not 'green' tasting.

Dog in the mango tree, unfortunately it wasn't mango season.

This is the next plantation we went to, basil grown for sale and some trial grapes. It was warmish and the smell at this place was divine!

These are wild passion fruit flowers in the second plantations home use area. We also saw, tomatoes (we got to pick and eat the early fruit), figs, hot peppers, green peppers, grapes, jack fruit, squash, oranges, and of course bananas! Carnarvon is known for their 'naners.

A brag

I had to brag a little, I made a quilt for Jessie and Justin for a wedding gift. I realized after we got back to their house, I had forgotten to take any pictures of it. (this is the living room couch looking into the kitchen, their house is set up on an open floor plan like ours)

I knew a traditional pieced quilt wouldn't really fit in their house, so I chose a more contemporary pattern.

This is the back side, I quilted it in lines that look like a topographical map. I like the softer curves with all the strait lines of the piecing.

24 May a.m.

So this day ended up being mostly about food. We went shopping for supplies for our up coming camping trip, stopped at a great local-grown market, toured a few plantations, and had dinner at Aunt Terry's.

Giant prawns! The sad part of this picture is we forgot to eat them :P

I have a lot more pictures of the grocery store, but I will just post this one. This is the kid lunch snack aisle. I was maybe a little too fascinated by the differences in things to buy in the grocery store...I think I drove Justin a little batty!

This is at Morells, they are a family run produce shop. Everything they sell is grown on site, so you can imagine the quality.

Strange fruits I have never seen before? Yes please! The smaller ones to the right are a custard apple, the others are sour sop. We tried these both frozen and fresh (frozen was better) the texture is mooshy and you have to pick out the seeds. The flavour is like an apple but sweeter and creamy, not unlike how a banana seems creamy. The sour sop is similar but with a citrusy tang.

These are the amazing frozen fruit bars we ate almost every day while in Carnarvon. Morells is way to convenient to stop by on our way to anywhere, but can you really feel bad about eating them? They are made of puréed fruit and nothing else (unless you get the chocolate dipped ones) and they are frozen. As the temps were in the 80-90 range, I was more than ready for an ice cream!

23 May

After a good nights sleep in Geraldton, we hit the road one last time on our way north. For those of you keeping track, Margaret River (the wedding locale) to Carnarvon (where my family lives) is about 1181 kilometres or 734 miles.

On the way we stopped at Billabong Roadhouse, one of the few places to stop on this stretch of road. Tiny and scenic, you kind of HAVE to stop there.

Another place you have to stop for a picture. The 26th parallel.

We also saw emus on this stretch of road. There is also a cow in the background of this shot.

Jessie and Justin's house!! Now I can picture where they are when we are skypeing! Yes, their house is on stilts, you could park a car in the section on the left of the stairs. Their laundry is also down there. The house is on a hill (the ONLY hill) overlooking Carnarvon with the ocean at the horizon. It was interesting to me how differently it is set up compared to Alaskan houses. The windows and decks are positioned to catch every tiny bit of wind to help keep the house cool. A big change from trying to keep in every bit of warmth.

Our day was capped by dinner at Robin and Jeff's house. Robin is Jessie's boss and friend who came here to Fairbanks for a visit last year. We had really great battered fried fish and chips with curried veg and a pavlova for dessert! A perfect treat after our long trek. I should also mention the dog...Abbie Rose gave me the stuffed dog to remember her by while I was gone. He kind of became our mascot for this trip, you will be seeing him again in more pictures :)