Melbourne, Australia

The alarm went off too early at 7am, but we headed out after a shower and cuppa to get a quick bite at mccafe across the road. Problem one, our new eftpos card PIN number didn’t seem to be working (we have an Aussie account). No worries, there is always uncle visa for a cash withdrawal. But by then we thought it best to check our bags and grab something at the airport. The morning was quite brisk, but it was nice to see the sun rise and hear the crows and lorikeets morning song and smell the eucalyptus oils in the fresh air.

Check in went smoothly and we had a nice toasted Turkish breakfast roll with egg, bacon, cheese and spinach with good coffee before completing our hop, skip, and jump to Exmouth. The plane we were on was a Fokkor and seats about 100. It was quite roomy and comfortable for a smaller plane. We actually got served a breakfast of eggs, bacon, tomatoes, creamed spinach and fried potato, onion and mushroom which was delicious except of course we picked out the offending fungus. The flight was 1.5hr long and became more scenic as we got closer to Exmouth with Aqua and turquoise seas and a colourful mosaic reminiscent of Morocco of richly coloured soil ranging from apricots, brick, red-maroon and almost a pink.

The airport at Exmouth is an active Australian defence site called Learmonth. On approach you are advised that no photography is permitted etc. interesting situation that it is shared or used by the airline, but I guess that explains the limited flights and connections in and out. We quickly received our bags, got our hire car and headed off left at the entry 35km to town. Straight road most of the way, undenied with apricot coloured sheep roaming. They are not a special breed, but just stained from the dust of the orange soil.

We are staying at the Exmouth escape resort which is the newest accommodation in Exmouth, so new the landscaping is not yet finished. It’s basically a group of holiday park self contained 1 and bedroom cabins. Our car rental is with them, included as a special package. We quickly dropped our bags and headed into town, a 5 minute drive to see if we could sort our eftpos card at the local Westpac. Surprisingly it was re- pinned no problem. I say surprisingly as this technological efficiency is not our experience in Australia. Yay for progress.

Next stop was checking in with our tour for tomorrow which is exciting and terrifying. Exciting for Vern and terrifying for me…. More on that later. Then to the supermarket for a few essential items for breakfast and the meat looked lovely so we got some porterhouse and lean meaty Italian sausages and salad for dinner on our bbq. Travel tip #2 a lot can be done with a small salt grinder, pepper grinder, extra virgin olive oil and a lemon. The range of items up here is really good, including paleo and GF items, not to mention organic and native Australian food. We also called into the pharmacy to get some sea sick pills, and bug spray. The latter I got a funky cartridge the size of a playing card with totally natural ingredients. Prices of food was pretty normal with some things more expensive than home and others less, certainly not as expensive as I anticipated being so remote.

Exmouth is a surprising and charming little red dusty town, very white and semi affluent yet very country friendly. Everyone says hello or gidday as you pass and has a smile to share. Nice. I am not sure of the population but there would only be about 15 retail shops, including a good bottle store where I also picked up some great imported and oz ciders to enjoy the balmy evenings. It was about 27 degrees when we arrived and this is forecast to continue whilst we are here. More nice.

Before we headed home for dinner we took a short 15 minute drive to the tip of the peninsula to a lighthouse to watch the sunset. There is more defence force presence on the way there and some huge VLF antenna – not sue for what, but the look quite dramatic against the mostly flat landscape. The straight roads make their way through the brick coloured earth which is dotted with termite mounds ranging from the small to 8ft large and little mounds of grey green grasses and small shrubs no more than 1m high.

We didn’t end up staying for the final sunset as we wanted to avoid the kangaroo at sunset as much as possible and the 4hr time difference and busy day yesterday was showing. Our bbq was delicious and we hit the pillows early with the alarm set for another early start for our big day on the water.