Pinnacles Tour

We were due to be collected for our pre-booked Pinnacles Tour at 7.20am, so you know what that meant.  Once again, we had to set the alarm clock so we were up bright and early to be ready in time.  The big blue bus from Adams Coach Lines rolled up and we were on our way.  It was going to be a long day, 11.5 hours and covering  500kms.

First stop was the Caversham Wildlife Park where  the tour guide took us around to check out the animals.    Some of the kangaroos had Joey's in the pouches so we could see legs or heads sticking out as Mum hopped around.

Next stop was the wombat enclosure where one of the keepers was sitting with a male wombat on his lap, and we were invited up to have our photo taken.  The wombat was perfectly content and didn’t move at all, as one after another, the bus passengers filed up for their photo opportunity.

Posing with the wombat

Then it was on to the koala enclosure, where, sure enough, a young koala was waiting with the keeper. As we were allowed to gently touch these animals, we  had to use hand sanitiser as we entered each enclosure, to protect the animals.  Koalas are such beautiful animals.  Nearby were some adult koalas, all snoozing away, and we were told that they sleep for most of the day, in between eating and mating!

Time with the koala

Time and coach tours wait for no one, we boarded the bus again and went on our way.  Our lunch stop was at the Lobster Shack, on the coast at Cervantes,  where we had a tour through the processing factory.  The information wand told us what we were looking at as we walked along the viewing walkway.

Lobster processing factory

The price for our coach tour included fish and chips for lunch, with the option to upgrade to a lobster meal for an extra cost.  And why not, I thought, it isn’t often that I get an opportunity like this! Robin was happy with his fish and chips, as long as I gave him a little taste of my lobster.

Lunch for the two of us

The Lobster Shack is a family run business The rock lobsters are fished off the coast and the company export  much of their catch overseas.  Their fleet of modern boats were moored up by the jetty.

Next was a visit to the amazing Pinnacles at Nambung National Park.  It seems that the experts cannot agree how these formations came to be, and there are several theories trotted out.  Whatever the real answer is, the Pinnacles were certainly amazing to see, stretching out into the desert as far as the eye could see.  Some were brown, some grey, big, little, jagged and broad.  We didn’t expect there to be so many, they stretched on and on.

Plenty of Pinnacles

Our last stop was to the gorgeous snow white sand dunes at Lancelin, where we changed vehicles to a grunty 4WD bus, specially built for these conditions. 

Our guide invited us to have a go at sand boarding down the dunes, and gave instructions.  The hardest thing, he told us, is walking up the slope, it’s much easier sliding down!

Several of the younger ones took up the challenge, and really enjoyed themselves.  Not us though, it was fun enough just to stand by and watch then as they trudged up to the top of the dunes, and whizzed down on the dune boards.

Here they come

The white sands aren’t really sand at all, we were told, but crushed coral from eons ago.  Our guide had fun driving up and over the dunes, bouncing us all around – just one more hill, he told us on our way back to the blue bus.  As Robin commented, this is a man who really enjoys is job!

The white dunes of Lancelin

Then it was back into the big blue bus for the long trek back to Perth, and I’m sure that most of us nodded off in the coach on the return journey.  Doing the tour was certainly the easiest way to see these amazing sights, and  it was a most enjoyable day.