Augusta
Leaving Drafty's we stopped in at the Pemberton Swimming Pool, an outdoor river pool, for the kids to swim while I had a work call. Our next destination was Augusta and Alexandra Bridge camp on the river had come recommended. When we pulled in to check it out it was bumper to bumper with weekend campers and boating enthusiasts. We already had Munday Camp lined up as an alternative, right on the edge of town, which turned out to be a great option. It was a private residential block that backed onto some bushland. Not particularly secluded but it was small and had showers, power, camp kitchen and games for the kids.
It was here that we snagged our fourth mouse. After mouse number three I got to searching the travellers' Facebook forums and it appears that mice and long-term travel go hand-in-hand. One family, also in a camper trailer, have even bought themselves a cat, who regularly catches mice (and lots of other things too I imagine...). So, I'm less worried now that we're doing something wrong and more resigned to regularly setting traps in the car at night and being vigilant about keeping doors shut and food away. Let's see what our mouse tally reaches in 12 months and just hope they don't make it into the trailer!
We toured the Cape Leeuwin area south of Augusta starting at Granny’s Pool where the kids went for a dip. On a sunnier, still day it would have been a perfect spot to spend a whole day paddling and exploring the rocks. We moved on to the Cape Leeuwin Lighthouse which was all wrapped up under scaffolding but a good spot for lunch. We walked to the Water Wheel where poor Claire stacked it and put her tooth through her lip. No dental damage luckily. The Water Wheel offered a trip down memory lane for Matthias who, 15 years earlier, was cutting his teeth as an aspirational marine ecologist collecting water samples and monitoring at risk populations of fresh water microbes. The kids were more impressed by the big black snake we spotted curled up, head raised high on the beach.
Hamelin Bay is one of the must see spots in the area and we loved it. We were there to see giant sting rays come right up to the water's edge. We didn't know that we'd also get so see sharks cruising the shoreline. The whole spectacle was really awesome. We weren't the only ones that hadn't expected sharks. We watched a snorkeler casually make her way along the edge of the weed while from our vantage we could also see a shark approaching from the other direction. The two came face to face before both proptly turned and fled, the snorkeler with a touch more urgency. A family of kayakers also left the water with haste when two sharks passed under their boats.
The last time Matthias was in Hamelin Bay he was trying to return 85 beached whales to the water. We continued to track his former marine pursuits down the coast to a lookout over Cosy Corner Beach (not the Cosy Corner we’d camped at south of Denmark) where he’d monitored a population of small conical snails.
We spent our final afternoon in Augusta exploring the shoreline of Hardy Inlet by bike and watching kite and windsurfers exploit the windy conditions.
