Francois Peron NP

The Francois Peron NP is an adventure in 4WD, if nothing else. The track is sand, beautiful red sand, and quite deep in some places. I love that National Parks have provided 2 air pressure pumps so you can pump up your tyres once you are finished and leaving the park. It took about an hour and a bit to drive the approx 40km to the tip. The drive is actually pretty good, with the road graded down to clay for much of it, although it is slightly corrugated. There are a couple of bits where the bumps are so big you really get bounced around, like some really bizarre ride at an amusement park. You got bounced so much your bum left the seat and your feet left the floor. I laughed and Rory slept through it all!

There are 2 car parks at the tip. One right at the tip gives you a short walk to the top of a sand dune to overlook Shark Bay. The wild flowers were beautiful and we all had a great time following animal tracks in the sand. We found definitely lizard tracks and the tracks of what I thought were some sort of hopping marsupial. (After a visit to the Homestead I think it is probably the Hopping Spinifex Mouse). Tilda found a burrow that had tracks leading away from it... she has great eyesight. She's always spotting interesting and small things.

We then drove to Skip Jack Lookout. This is more formed, with a boardwalk and 2 viewing platforms. On a good day you are meant to be able to see sharks, turtles, manta rays, eagle rays and dugongs from the look out. It was too windy when we were there, the sea was a bit choppy and the sand was churned up. I spotted 2 eagle rays, which was very cool. Unfortunately we didn't see any other sea life, but we did see an abundance of cormorants. According to the information sign, the cormorants normally go about their business fishing amongst the sea grass, but if they are up on the beach there are tiger sharks in the water. They were all on the beach, but it could have been a result of the time of day, rather than the presence of sharks. Who knows? Regardless, the views were pretty special.

Just near the car, TIlda spotted a little wren in the bushes. It was tiny, probably only 6-7cm from head to tail. As I watched it a second one came along and at first I thought it has regurgitated food to feed its bub but as I looked closer they were wrestling over a green caterpillar.

We also visited the Peron Homestead. This was originally a sheep station.... and looking at the vegetation I have absolutely no idea how they farmed sheep! It is so barren and dry and hostile, not to mention the fact it is covered in low scrub and the chances of ever spotting sheep in that must have been virtually zero! We toured the shearing shed, which was really well designed given the age and when it would have been built in the 1800s, the cook house, sheep yards and horse yards. You can't visit the old homestead as it is used privately today by Parks. There is an artesian bore on the site and they tapped it when the homestead was operating, using the water for everything except drinking. It is quite minerally, but they used it for watering the sheep and horses! They have capped it now to slow the flow and have a hot tub that the public can use to enjoy the 40 degree water. Tilda, Rory and I went in, but it really was too hot for the kids and almost too hot for me.

Old kerosene fridge in the cook house

Shearing shed

There were some wild flowers blooming. We had seen some at Karijini but I didn't get any photos of those as I kept assuming I would see more, so I took photos of these ones, just in case!