Wildflowers WA

We have just returned from a road trip around Western Australia's Wildflower Country. We followed the Wildflower Way inland and then carried on North to Kalbarri before turning South and returning to Perth via the coast. On our way we passed through New Norcia, Australia's only monastic town. "Town" is a very grand description for this tiny place where we admired the architecture of the convent and monastery.

We stopped at several reserves on the wildflower way to admire the spring flowers and we were lucky enough to find some orchids.

 

We camped at the beautiful Coalseam Conservation Park which is covered in wildflowers. The children enjoyed looking for marine fossils and coal in the river banks.

The camping area

Mining Coal

Bird's nests on an overhang in the riverbank 

Building a dam

Probably a kangaroo pelvis

 

In Kalbarri we stayed at Murchison House Station which offers very rustic camping along with miles of 4WD trails.

This huge field of flowers looked beautiful but apparently they are weeds. 

At the nearby Kalbarri National Park we took the walk down into the river gorge and also some spectacular trails along the coastal cliffs. We even managed to spot some whales.

Nature's Window

Rock formations formed from fossilised worm burrows. 

We moved South along the coast past Pink Lake to Sandy Cape campground - the perfect combination of no running water or power, pit toilets, and a bacon butty serving coffee van!

We stopped along the way at Central Greenough to explore the National Trust colonial village.

School

Courtroom

Lockup 

We explored nearby Lesueur National Park and Stockyard Gully Caves. This area has a massive diversity of wild flowers along with a great variety of ways to kill yourself within the caves!

Bees' nests

 

We survived the quicksand, bees, flash floods, slippery rocks and cliffs and emerged from the downstream end of the cave. Our next stop was The Pinnacles. Here the children found and identified many different animal tracks in the sand including kangaroos, lizards and emus.

Local wildlife (stuffed) in the visitors centre

A little bit of pinnacle found on the ground

Since we hadn't yet broken the new 4WD we thought we'd give it one more try with a beach drive.

Bogged, panicking and reducing the type pressure again with only 20 mins until the tide turned.
Everyone else helping by laughing.

Needless to say we returned back to civilisation safe and sound having learnt loads about botany, geology, wildlife and the limitations of the car.