Day 127 28/07/2011 Leeuwin Naturaliste National Park (exploring the Margaret River Region)

Day 127 28/07/2011 Leeuwin Naturaliste National Park (exploring the Margaret River Region)

Well, when we woke this morning all was OK. The big storm came and went and we survived!! Yippee.  We decided today we would explore up around Dunsborough and maybe visit a cave or two.

After a leisurely breakfast of pancakes we headed to Cape Naturaliste Lighthouse.  Cape Naturaliste Lighthouse offers panoramic views of the Indian Ocean, Leeuwin – Naturaliste NP and Geographe Bay.  Today on offer was the spectacular 6m swell that gave us mountainous Indian Ocean waves smashing up against the rugged coast line.  Once we climbed to the top of the lighthouse we were able to go out on the balcony. This was only for the brave hearted though, due to the 70km per hour winds that were buffeting the lighthouse.  The kids had a great time fighting against the wind as they ran loops around the balcony. I was so windswept I didn’t get a chance to look down and worry about the height!!

The guided tour through the lighthouse was informative and enjoyable.  After the tour we took the leisurely stroll on The Lighthouse Loop track.  Well this would have been leisurely if we were still not being buffeted by really strong wings, one gust blew Claudia over.   Overall though, it was a successful morning. 

We stopped for lunch at Sugarloaf Bay, here we were treated to some spectacular king waves crashing over the rocks and smashing into the coastline.  The boys were transfixed as they had never seen the ocean so tumultuous!! I’m not sure Pete or I had either.  The wind was so strong that we ate lunch in the car, thankfully though it wasn’t raining so we could watch the ocean at her best.

Given the weather had not improved we headed to Ngilgi Cave. Beneath Cape Naturaliste lies Ngilgi Cave, one of the most popular limestone caves in this area.  We chose to explore the cave in a semi self-guided tour.  The cave took us 38m underground and took 350 stairs to get to the bottom and unfortunately 350 stairs to get back to the surface. We did get to see a stunning display of stalachite’s, helicite’s and shawl formations.

After wandering around the cave for a few hours we headed back to the surface and back to the caravan.

Now you may be wondering where all the fabulous photos are from the last few days, photos of Busselton Jetty, Cape Naturaliste Lighthouse, maybe a few of the pounding surf or even the cave are, well umm unfortunately when extracting the photos from my camera to upload on to my computer I pushed the delete button instead of the cut button!!  I couldn’t believe it, in one press of the button over 100 photo’s gone!! I was very cross with myself, hence no photos!!