Perth revisited - Up up and away we go!

We were headed north to Yanchep National Park. I’ve heard loads about it even during my studies (about how the wild flowers bloomed during the season) and this my chance to see it for myself. It’s odd how they segregate national parks in Australia. Where are the exact boundaries? How in the world could animals differentiate one park from another? For example, Yanchep contains a large amount of Black Cockatoos (supposedly at the brink of extinction) but you don’t find those frisky black birds in any other national parks. Weird and intriguing!

The park was a pleasant visit. Standing amongst banksias and Australian grass trees, I envision Rangers having our camps here. We stumbled upon wild kanga’s in an open field with an unperturbed Aussie practicing his boomerang tosses. What an authentic Aussie sight!

Moving on from Yancep we went further north to Lancelin a small town nestled between the ocean and white sand dunes. I was leaping in excitement when I saw the endless snow white dunes. We rented 2 sandboards from a local store and trudged into the colorless desert. I felt as if I was transported into another world, the sand was silky fine, it kind of felt like we were walking on pepper hills. There was no horizon (just white hills and blue skies). Our destination was the tallest peak among the dunes. Terence raced his way up only to realize that it required a lot more energy than he thought. Dragging the board up, he bulleted down with a loud “WooHooooooo!!!!!”. Esther and I looked at each other and raced to the top for our turn at the adrenaline rush. It was pure bliss. I frankly don’t remember how many times we climbed up the dunes only to find ourselves back at the foot of the dune in mere seconds. Climb up – slide down – dust off the sand – climb back up – slide down – dust of the sand… After one hour of unconscious exercise, it was time to go before the sun had the better of us. Lancelin – I’d be back!

The drive to the Pinnacles seemed never ending. I thought to myself, it better be worth the drive, since I heard both good reviews and bad reviews about it. Having tasted (literally) white sand, we found ourselves staring at acres of yellow sand with natural ‘stalagmites’ sprouting from the ground. What beauty, although quite eerie if you actually stand amongst the towering rocks.

With Terence and his cowboy hat – give us two pistols and we’d have a shoot out there. Or better yet, paintball with all the obstacles in place!

Our pit stop for the day – Orchard Glory Farm. We inched our way to the farm and finally reached before sundown. The only problem was, we had no dinner. We had cozy farm house with every necessary facility at our expense but no food to cook! The nearest eatery was 22 km’s away and we were sick of sticking our bum to the seats. So we tried our favor at asking the farmer is he had any provisions to spare. He gleefully gave us 2 cups of rice, potatoes, bread, eggs, milk and some packets of cereal. He even threw in 2 bottles of wine but we returned it back. You guess is right… We had a simple farm dinner (or so I call it).