Third Weekend: Third Great Southern Roadtrip

 I don’t know if I would call it a routine, but for the third weekend in a row, we have spent a lazy Saturday enjoying the backyard sun, reading, cleaning, and nursing a Rocky Gully Pub’s ginormous-burger-calorie-ridden lean-over: there’s nothing lean about it. For the third weekend in a row, Sunday, the day of rest, has been our day of action. This Sunday we decided to be a bit more touristy and visit the Valley of the Giants outside of Walpole along the coast of the Southern Ocean. We drove to Denmark for our obligatory $100 shopping trip – we’ve almost come to terms with the fact that we just can’t get away with spending any less – and then on further another 50 kilometers or so to the Valley of the Giants Road which winds through the Walpole-Nornalup National Park. According to the books, Valley of the Giants is Western Australia’s most visited spot. Its 600m tree-top walk is multi-award-winning: of course it is.

We were cautiously advised to be prepared with appropriate hiking gear (sneakers: check. Water bottle: check. Sunscreen: check. Australian pie as a snack: check) and to allow 40-60 minutes for the walk.
We were done in 10, maybe15 minutes and could have worn thongs (aka flip flops). 

Looking down wasn't bad. It was the shaking that made me hold on.

In less than an hour, we even walked the Ancient Empire Boardwalk, a boardwalk to protect the fragile wildlife through the karri and tingle tree forest, as well as, stopped to eat our Australian pie snacks on a bench, visited the gift shop, rest rooms, and had a smoke-o. So much for the warnings and so much for the $12.50 we forked over for our less-than physical less-than-anticipated-full afternoon.

Reached the highest point!

We followed the signs to the tree-top walk and up we went. A slow incline on a slightly-shaking metal pathway led us up to the highest point of 40 meters above the 400 year old trees in the forest. The heights weren’t as scary as I thought; it was really just the swaying and bouncing of the walkway that was a bit nerve-wrecking. There were posted signs warning of maximum capacity of people on the walkway, which probably means that during high-season it can be quite busy, therefore taking 40 minutes not 10. There were only 3 elderly people in front of us. 

looking down 40 meters.

The weather was cloudless and warm but the canopy of the tall trees kept us cool. We probably took more pictures than number of minutes spent on the walk – actually that probably is a definitely – and so we wandered on to the Ancient Empire Walk, the walk below the tree-top walk. 

see the people?

From the base of the eucalyptus forest, we could see the hollowed out red tingle trees. These tremendous trees can grow up to 75m high and 20m in girth. The hollowness is caused by fire, fungal diseases, and attacking insects. The karri trees are the tallest tree species in Western Australia. They can be identified from their slim posture, a smooth shedding bark, and contrasting surface colors on the different sides of the leaves.

Don’t get me wrong, I am glad we went. It felt accomplished, almost, to cross off one of the remote region’s hot spots. I think we were anticipating more of an intense hike, more impressive views, more feelings of anxiety over the tree-top heights, but what we got were more shots of trees than we’ll ever need to look at again and more than anyone will ever be interested in looking at – “you had to be there!” So yeah, you can’t describe the heights, the pictures don’t capture it, so you will just have to go for yourself and cross it off your Western Australia sight-seeing check list.

What made the day of driving worthwhile was, not only this picture, but a stop at Peaceful Bay. .

We decided that despite the tourist spots, the places we really appreciate are the places we’ve been recommended to by locals. Peaceful Bay wasn’t exactly that peaceful, the wind was quite rambunctious as it was caught in the bay, but sitting on the sifted-soft floury sand that would make any baker want to dig his hands in and start making bread out of it, was receptive enough for us. We commented on how spoiled we actually were being able to see the ocean once a week on our day off. It may take about an hour to get there, but it’s always appreciated and can always be broken up with a stop to a local brewery with a view.

The Denmark Brewery – I’m not sure if it’s actually a brewery – has spectacular views over looking neighboring farms and the blue ocean breaking up the contrast between the rolling-green fields and the sun-setting sky. Sitting there, absorbing the view, imagining what life would be like there, planning our post-vintage self-indulgences, and sipping on a cold brewed beer: now That, was peaceful. 

And yes, I do have a ton more pictures of trees, more so than anyone will ever want to see or are worth framing for myself to see again, but just serve as a reminder of the futile attempt to capture the feeling felt by the height of the trees and the forest surrounding us. You will just have to go see it yourself. 

First Weekend: First Great Southern Roadtrip

After a pretty work-intense, but not-that-bad-manageable first week of work, Friday finally arrived. We were presented with a variety of different options to start the weekend: pizza with Hunter and his family – a chance to get to know them outside of work; a night at the Rocky Gully Pub for a ticket-per-beer raffle and $10 burgers; or a trip to Denmark on the coast, about an hour away, depending on when we get out of work. By the time we got out of work and had our daily internet dose, we decided on the homemade pizza and would leave for Denmark the next morning. It was a good decision. The pizza was delicious and the hospitality was even more welcoming.

We left the next morning in our dinky car. I can’t complain, as we are lucky enough to have any sort of transportation out of this remoteness. The drive there wasn’t too bad, pretty straight forward, but our dinky little car was a bit of concern. It didn’t like to go above 100km (speed limit is 110km) and kept veering to the left. Talk about high-performance-vehicle-coughmonkeymiacough. It took us about an hour to get to Denmark and we were both pretty enthralled with the fact that we were in civilization again!

 Denmark seems like a nice town, pretty small with a  main street running through it, but a bit lively. The shops all seemed to be pretty eco-friendly: cafes with free-trade coffee, award winning bakeries, environmental agencies, boards with notices of shared-lifts and food drop offs, sustainably sourced and organic food stores…We had been told that Denmark was a bit alternative.  I like it.

It was drizzling rain, overcast and chilly, so we decided to skip the beach, obviously, and head towards the wineries, obviously. We followed the tourist scenic road signs with no clear direction of where it was going to take us, but we were on a loop road that seemed dotted with vineyards. We stopped at one called Kerriview (apparently, Frankland Estate used to own them, “disastrously - it was like making wine in the Sudan. But, we do still grow the grapes for their Pinot Noir”). The inside seemed like a safari lodge with a nice but typically-Australian-expensive food menu. We tasted their wines:  their bubbly was good, but there was no production facility on site and most of the wines were made elsewhere – in Frankland and in Swan Valley. That sort of lost its appeal of visiting a winery, and Felix thought the vines outside were probably just plastic for show.

  We next drove along the loop road onto Harewood Estate as I had thought I had heard of them and they were definitely acclimated with lots of awards. The wine maker, James Kellie, used to work at Howard Park/Mad Fish and is also the wine maker at Moombaki. I was driving so I didn’t taste too many and the lady informed us of a meadery where we could have a honey tasting so we set off to find that. We came across another winery (Duckett's Mill - apparently also James Kellie) with a sign for fudge and homemade cheese and since I was driving of course I veered towards the cheese. I LOVE CHEESE. The cheese was all made on site from local cows’ milk. They had their own label jams and mustards, a huge display fridge of different types of cheeses, cured meats, pates, and vacuum-sealed roasted vegetables. We tasted the cheeses on offer and decided to buy a Morroccan marinated feta along with a small bit of hot chorizo, slices of smoked kangaroo, and an emu pate – how very Australian!

We never found the meadery and ended up around the loop back in Denmark so we decided to check out the ocean. Despite the weather, it was a successful first road trip, filled with things that we like: a perfect outting! I feel as though although we may have missed a couple things we wanted to see, but we saw a lot and there are more weekends to go back.