Perth to Broome - Day 4

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Today some of us signed up for the Eco-Tour which in theory included a snorkling session at Coral Bay, then viewing the turtles and right after that swimming with the manta rays. This was a separated tour from the one we are doing (Perth to Broome), there were other options like a quad + snorkling tour or just lay by the beach.

We were a bit unlucky with the manta rays, apparently in the last 4 days they had the chance to swim with them, but today there was no show, they even had a small airplane flying around to spot them but there was no luck in that regard. However, we did see some dophines and lots of turtles and while snorkling some of us got to see a small reef shark so it was pretty cool despite of not being able to see the giant manta rays.

Rob had one of those new acquatic cameras you can use to take snorkling photos... thanks to that I've managed to get hold of a few photos from the reef....

The water was quite shallow, maximun depth was probably about 4-5 metres with fantastic visibility.


There was some wind that was cooling down the hot day we otherwise would have had. In land the temperature was about 30C but in the boat with the wind and in the shade we probably were at about 14-15C which after coming from the water feels like getting into one of those large comercial freezers. I must admit, I was so cold that when they said we wouldn't have to go into the water to swim with the Manta rays because they couldn't find them I was secretely relieved...I was shaking and close to hipotermia...disapointed because that would have been the highlight of the day but relieved because I couldn't even think of getting into the water again!

Aída, Rob and myself drying up on the top deck, well away from the comercial freezer that was the bottom deck.

Another interesting thing that happened today is that we found another person we had been in a tour with. Rebeca did the same tour we did from Perth to Albany and now she was doing the same Eco-tour to see the manta rays...it was good to catch up.

I'm not quite sure why they called this tour the Eco-Tour...not much ecological when they used soap for the snorkling masks, but I suppose it gives people a warm feeling knowing they are in an eco-tour opposed to a non eco-tour???

We spent the whole morning and part of the afternoon on that tour and then it was time to hit the bus again, so we left Coral bay at aproximately 16:00 and drove to Exmouth (which was about 150 Km away) where we went to spend the night. Along the way you could see hundreds if not thousands of termite nests. The landscape was filled with them as far as your eyes could reach.

It looks like the cow just made a deposit but no, it's just another termite nest. 

Whatever you look at...all you can see are termite nests

And some even had some personality

And they were massive!

By the time we made it to the accomodation it was time to prepare dinner and today we had spagetti bolognesse and I have to say that in comparison with the one that Lee prepared in our trip from Melbourne to Adelaide, this one was pretty rubish...it obviously didn't help when the guide Murray added sugar to the meat...yes, you didn't missread that...SUGAR!!! Silvano (the italian guy) and myself raised our arms and started shouting almost instantly but we were too late and couldn't stop him... let's just say they weren't the best spagetti bolognesse I've ever tried. He still keeps saying they were made the Australian way we keep arguing they were made for the rubish bin nonetheless with the hunger we had today from the 3-4 hours of snorkling we did... we managed to eat it all.

Not exactly the best looking spaguetti... nor the tastier... :-P

We learnt later that night that our guide Murray is to be sent to a 4 day cooking course right after this tour...I couldn't help myself to make a remark about how much he needed it and I also gave him a hint that would surely help him in his cooking future...do not put sugar on the meat!!!

Today was also Simon's birthday! 20!! so we all put some money to buy a cake for him which we delivered with the traditional and very international happy birthday to you...

And that's how we ended our first night in Exmouth although we are to spend another more night here.


Tomorrow we have an easy day, the plan is to spend the whole day in Exmouth just snorkling about in different places, today we went to rent the equipment. Some other people, like Aída will attempt to see the whale sharks, she's been booked on a tour to see and probably swim with the whale sharks. Let's just hope it doesn't happen like today with the manta rays.



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