Friday we were on the road again, destination Shark Bay and the town of Denham and a visit to Monkey Mia which is famous for the Bottlenose Dolphins who come in to feed every day.
An early food note: We stopped at the Overlander Roadhouse near the turn off to Denham for a bite to eat. Sausage rolls on the menu today. Not just any sausage roll, the most enormous, I mean hard to get your mouth around enormous, and delicious we have ever eaten. One would have probably satisfied the both of us but we soldiered through!
110 kilometre drive to our base for five nights at the Denham Seaside Tourist Village and such an interesting drive catching views of water on both sides of Shark Bay and a change of scenery with flowering bushes on the roadside. Spring has sprung and we are hoping to see lots more wildflowers down the track.
The history is so interesting. Dirk Hartog, the Dutch explorer, landed in 1616 at Cape Inscription on what is known today as Dirk Hartog Island. He was the first recorded white man to set foot on Australian soil. William Dampier named Shark Bay in 1699 due to the abundant shark population. The French also laid claim to the Great South Land here in 1772, but as we know the Brits had claimed the Colony for Mother England in 1770 when Captain Cook sailed into Botany Bay. A long time after, in 1858 a Captain Denham chartered the whole of Shark Bay; in the1860's the pastoralists settled; in the 1870's the pearling industry established. The pearling industry died off at the turn of the century and has now been re-established off Monkey Mia with tourism and fishing the main industries today. A little geography lesson in addition to the history, Steep Point on the southern side of the bay is the most westerly point in Australia.
I enjoyed an interesting and informative couple of hours learning about the natural and cultural features at the Discovery Centre . My favourite little Aussie, who I had never heard of before, is the Sand Hill Frog and he looks just like a frog who has been covered in sand. He also lays little white pearl eggs in the sand - no tadpoles for this little fellow. He is very special along with a multitude of other threatened species. Two thousand Bilbies have recently been released on the Peron Peninsular which thanks to an intensive programme is now safe from feral foxes and cats who once threatened their existence. Shark Bay qualified for World Heritage Listing in 2008 and is in good company with places such as the Great Barrier Reef, Galapagos Islands and Grand Canyon. There are only twenty sites world wide satisfying the criteria of Natural Beauty, Earth's History, Ecological Processes and Biological Diversity.
An early food note: We stopped at the Overlander Roadhouse near the turn off to Denham for a bite to eat. Sausage rolls on the menu today. Not just any sausage roll, the most enormous, I mean hard to get your mouth around enormous, and delicious we have ever eaten. One would have probably satisfied the both of us but we soldiered through!
110 kilometre drive to our base for five nights at the Denham Seaside Tourist Village and such an interesting drive catching views of water on both sides of Shark Bay and a change of scenery with flowering bushes on the roadside. Spring has sprung and we are hoping to see lots more wildflowers down the track.
The history is so interesting. Dirk Hartog, the Dutch explorer, landed in 1616 at Cape Inscription on what is known today as Dirk Hartog Island. He was the first recorded white man to set foot on Australian soil. William Dampier named Shark Bay in 1699 due to the abundant shark population. The French also laid claim to the Great South Land here in 1772, but as we know the Brits had claimed the Colony for Mother England in 1770 when Captain Cook sailed into Botany Bay. A long time after, in 1858 a Captain Denham chartered the whole of Shark Bay; in the1860's the pastoralists settled; in the 1870's the pearling industry established. The pearling industry died off at the turn of the century and has now been re-established off Monkey Mia with tourism and fishing the main industries today. A little geography lesson in addition to the history, Steep Point on the southern side of the bay is the most westerly point in Australia.
I enjoyed an interesting and informative couple of hours learning about the natural and cultural features at the Discovery Centre . My favourite little Aussie, who I had never heard of before, is the Sand Hill Frog and he looks just like a frog who has been covered in sand. He also lays little white pearl eggs in the sand - no tadpoles for this little fellow. He is very special along with a multitude of other threatened species. Two thousand Bilbies have recently been released on the Peron Peninsular which thanks to an intensive programme is now safe from feral foxes and cats who once threatened their existence. Shark Bay qualified for World Heritage Listing in 2008 and is in good company with places such as the Great Barrier Reef, Galapagos Islands and Grand Canyon. There are only twenty sites world wide satisfying the criteria of Natural Beauty, Earth's History, Ecological Processes and Biological Diversity.
Bottlenose Dolphin Mother & Daughter
We visited Little Lagoon an almost perfect blue circle nestled in the sand dunes, which was once land locked before the sea inundated the area several thousand years ago. Other amazing places here include Shell Beach and as the name implies, it's made up of trillions of tiny shells heaped in piles up to 10 metres thick. In Hamelin Pool, Stromatolites which exist in hyper saline water are found and are the only living marine fossils in existence.
Dolphin Feeding at Monkey Mia
We missed the ritual morning feeding of the Bottlenose Dolphins at Monkey Mia on our first visit but a mother and baby came into shore (must have seen the disappointed look on my face) and it was just so special watching them swimming in the crystal clear shallows. There are thirteen dolphins who come into the bay daily for feeding which is strictly supervised to ensure the animals survival in the wild. I am told there are 1500 dolphins and 1200 can be identified through the markings on their dorsal fins. Dugongs feed on the abundant seagrass meadows found in the bay and manta rays and turtles make their home here as well.
Sea Lab 1
My other favourite experience here was to sail on the catermaran, Aristocrat 2, from Monkey Mia out to the Blue Lagoon Pearl Farm pontoon known as "Sea Lab 1" for a tour. This is a family owned operation and it was fascinating to watch a demonstration of how the cultivation, seeding and harvesting process produces pearls. The Pinctada Margaritifera (black lip pearl shell) oyster is the species farmed here in the cooler waters to produce the black pearls. The colour of the completed pearl is cultivated from the outer rings of colour on the inside rim of the pearl shell. Not all pearls are perfectly round and the odd shapes are known as Baroque Pearls.
Sea Lab 1
My other favourite experience here was to sail on the catermaran, Aristocrat 2, from Monkey Mia out to the Blue Lagoon Pearl Farm pontoon known as "Sea Lab 1" for a tour. This is a family owned operation and it was fascinating to watch a demonstration of how the cultivation, seeding and harvesting process produces pearls. The Pinctada Margaritifera (black lip pearl shell) oyster is the species farmed here in the cooler waters to produce the black pearls. The colour of the completed pearl is cultivated from the outer rings of colour on the inside rim of the pearl shell. Not all pearls are perfectly round and the odd shapes are known as Baroque Pearls. Inside of Pearl producing Oyster
We were in good company at Monkey Mia with A Current Affair filming the "Farmer wants a Wife" farmers feeding the Dolphins; Jamie from the Pearl Farms has been one of the farmers in the current series. Women's Weekly and Women's Day were doing stories as well.So much more to see and do than we can experience and I would say to anyone who plans to visit, take it all in, it's such a special place.
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