Albany Part 3 - Desert Mounted Corps and Albany Museum

We visited the Desert Mounted Corp Memorial, which pays tribute to all mounted servicemen who died in action in Egypt, Pallestine and Syria in WW1. It commemorates the men of the Australian Light Horse Brigade, as well as the New Zealand Mounted Rifles, the Imperial Camel Corps and the Australian Flying Corps. I had never heard of the Imperial Camel Corps before and was interested to know it existed. Greg's grandfather was in the 6^th Lighthorse Brigade so we wanted to visit the Memorial. There were some interesting aspects to the Memorial but it was all about Gallipoli and not the other action that the Desert Mounted Corp saw, so in that regard it was a bit disappointing. One of the interesting parts of it was the statue. It was originally erected by surviving members of the Mounted Corp in Egypt but was destroyed in 1956 during the Suez War. It was salvaged and a replica of the original was made using the salvaged materials.

I think, for me, the most emotional part of the whole memorial was the information about the Anzacs. King George Sound was the final staging port for many of the ships and soldiers that sailed off to Gallipoli, so this was the last part of Australia so many of those men saw. I was quite teary looking out over the Sound and thinking about all of the ships in the convoy as they awaited the command to sail. I think, for me, it was much more real to be in a place that played such an enormous role in the formation and send off of the Anzacs than it was when I was at the War Memorial in Canberra.
We didn't pay for the National Anzac Centre (again it was quite expensive for a family) but we explored the Convoy Walk, a small museum, some of the historic buildings, the armament storage and the guns. We could do all of this for free, which was really good.

The harbour where the convoy awaited sailing orders

Albany Museum

We explored the Albany Museum which was interesting given the long history it has, being the first European settlement in WA. The kids had the most fun at the historic school, where they could write on the blackboard, sit in vintage desks and Tilda learned to stilt walk. I am embarrassed to admit the Rory beat me at outdoor noughts and crosses, as I wasn't paying any attention to what he was doing. It was worth exploring but the kids had had enough in our busy day and so we didn't get to explore too much.

Albany Part 2 - Torndirrup National Park

Torndirrup NP is home to many beautiful natural features, beaches and coastline. Two of the key features are the Natural Bridge and The Gap. The Natural Bridge is exactly what it sounds like. We have seen a few of these now throughout Australia. I think the one near Kalbarri was much more impressive, but as it is right near the gap you can check it out easily enough, and there is an interesting story about the rescue of a guy who tried to climb it and got swept off by a big wave. Having said the Gap is a bit ho hum, I have to say the coastline to the west of it is magnificent. The seas were long, rolling swells the day we were there, the water a beautiful blue (actually all of the water in WA seems to be a beautiful blue) and all of that coupled with the coastline was just stunning.

The Gap was something else. It is simply a slight tunnel within the rock coastline but what makes it so interesting is that they've built a cantilevered platform over the gap, and so you can stand on the platform over the mass of churning, pounding, surging white water. You get a very real sense of just how powerful and terrifying the sea can be. Having seen, and read about, so many shipwrecks of the WA coast, and then standing over this maelstrom of water, it brought home to me just how terrifying being on those shipwrecks would have been.

We also checked out some of the beaches that you can visit in the NP. My favourite, which is the only one we actually played at, was Misery Beach. I have no idea why it was called that, although there is a small island in the Harbour called Misery Island and I am guessing the beach is the closest to the island. It had a big granite face towards one end of the beach that would have been great to climb, without the kids. It was probably just that bit too risky with kids. I'm sure other people do climb it but I just wasn't interested with Rory in tow. We didn't play in the water because it was cold and we didn't have swimmers, and there was a bit of a churned up/rip area that wasn't worth the risk.

Albany Part 1

By the time we got to Albany I think we were all a bit “travelled out”. We'd done so much over the past couple of weeks, and moved every 2-3 days, and it was starting to get a bit tiring. We had some things we needed to do at Albany, including getting the car serviced, the windscreen replaced and catching up on school work, so we treated our 5 days there a bit more like being home, and a bit less like travelling. By that I mean we did some touristy things but not as much as we had at other places.
Albany is the first European settlement in WA and is located on the King George Sound, which is an amazing body of water, dotted with granite islands. The Sound is very beautiful and also comprises Princess Royal Harbour. These water bodies combine to create a massive, sheltered body of water. I don't think I took any photos of it though. I think the travel fatigue translated to a lack of interest in photographing things. I tended to just absorb what we were doing, rather than also trying to remember to take photos so we could look back on it all.

Albany is quite a nice town with lots of shops and services. I checked out all the possible camera purchasing options but the 2 camera places in the town had very limited options (one had 2 compact digital cameras – a $99 one and a $585 one). There was a Harvey Norman but their prices were excessive ($30-$50 more) and we didn't discuss price matching, which in hindsight I should have done.

Tilda, Rory and I had a lovely afternoon on the beach near our caravan park. It was nicely sheltered, which was good, as the wind was blowing pretty strongly the whole time we were there. The sand was a lovely white and there were shells galore. We made a sandcastle covered in shells. We could have covered the sandcastle 4 or 5 times over with the number of shells Tilda found.

Albany has a strong whaling heritage and I remember going to the whaling museum when I came to WA in 1985. We didn't go to the museum as it was pretty expensive for a family and we had been to the whaling museum in Eden. I didn't think the kids needed to go to another one, at the price being asked.

The Brig Amity

We did the audio tour of the Amity, which was the ship that carried the first settlers to Albany. They have built a replica that we toured. The kids had a great time exploring the different decks. It was amazing to think they housed 63 people in the mid deck, although they were obviously on different watches but how the heck they slept them all under there was incomprehensible. I was impressed by how much ore luxurious the officers space was. There was so much more fancy work on the wood work and a couple of the officers and captain had their own rooms, although they were not much larger than a modern toilet! The beds certainly weren't full length by any means. It was interesting to do the audio tour and hear what the journey was like and to learn about what supplies they brought with them to establish a new settlement. It wasn't as good a location as hoped and so Swan River (Perth) became the main settlement in WA.

The Officers area

The Captain's bedroom (kids are sitting in the bed)

Denmark

My last couple of posts have been all about the amazing forests of WA's southwest but the shift to Denmark (around 75km... or 65km depending on which way you went) brought about a big shift from a focus on forests to the beauty of the beaches. The body of water we stayed at, at the Rivermouth Caravan Park, looked a lot like Neranie on the Myall Lakes at home. It was kind of weird to look out the window of the caravan (the wind was too cold and blowing for me to sit outside) and see something that looked so familiar.

Denmark is close to William Bay National Park which is home to some incredibly stunning beaches, namely Green Pool, Elephant Cove and Waterfall Beach.  We left our caravan at the Information Centre so that we could go and explore the area without worrying whether we could take the van or not. All three beaches are close together, with Green Pool and Elephant Cove on opposite sides of a headland, and then a short 4WD to waterfall beach (I don't think it is in the National Park).

Green Pool was popular when we were there, even though it really was too cold to swim. The sun was shining but the water temperature was probably 18-19 degrees and the onshore wind was cold enough to make you want a jacket... totally not swimming weather for any of us. There were a few people who decided to brave it but it was obvious they weren't enjoying it and were probably just ticking a bucket list item. Green Pool is very sheltered from the ocean by granite (or granite like) rocks which create a beautiful, crystal clear, calm bay for swimming. It would be perfect for swimming in warmer weather and I am disappointed we won't be there to enjoy it. I can't think of any beaches back home that would rival it for crystal clear water and calm, sheltered swimming.

Elephant Cove is so named as there are a number of rocks that, when looked at from the right location and angle, look like 3 elephants. It is a beautiful, sheltered cove too and much less popular that Green Pool.

Waterfall Beach is named because there is a small waterfall part way down the beach, which I am guessing is spring fed. The water is very clear and very cold. We had lunch here and spent some time exploring the rocks and rock pools on this beach and headland. Tilda and I had a great time spotting all sorts of interesting things, like 2 different types of nudibranchs, 2 incredibly red anemones and some broken sea urchin shells. We also found some interesting fish, that were very hard to get good photos of, as they were perfectly camouflaged. I am so glad my little girl loves exploring rock pools with me. Rory does too but he has a tendency to stick his finger in pools and holes and that's not the safest thing to do so having him with me causes me too much worry.

The water looked so inviting but was very cold

2 red sea anemones

one of the nudibranchs we saw

The other nudibranch we saw

Denmark is also a good place for foodies to visit. There are wineries, at least 1 cidery, a honey place, a toffee and cidery place, a chocolate factory plus more. We stopped at the toffee place. It is a pretty interesting little business. They sell toffee and brittles, ciders and a mix of sauces and spice rubs, all made on site. They also sell ice creams that looked very yummy and have recently started doing burgers as well. We sampled some toffee and came away with a mixed bag that included choc mint toffee, peanut popcorn brittle, wattleseed and sandalwood toffee (I'll have to check that when I go to eat it as I'm not sure if that's what it actually was called) and more. We also taste some of the sauces. There were a few I liked but give that we had bought some at The Berry Farm in Margaret River, we didn't buy any more. Greg came away with some apple ciders.

On our second morning we paddled the canoe up river to the town, for a bit of fun and adventure. It was an easy paddle, of around 1.5km to town. We pulled the canoe up on to the river bank  and wandered the shops of town, getting some morning tea at the bakery. It was quite calm and peaceful (if you tuned out the kids constant chatter) on the river and something I would like to do more of as it is a great way to explore.