Osprey Bay Campground, Western Australia, AustraliaOsprey Bay camp site.
We move into Osprey on the 1st
of the year and will be here until the start of March.
The photo shows the map of the Ningaloo
coast and Marine park as well as the Cape Range National Park. I have
marked the campsites on the map , I hope you can read them.
Things do not always go as planned and
we have to make a trip 1270km to Perth as I have torn ligaments
holding parts of me and have prolapsed some lady's parts. The surgery
to fix it can not be done in Exmouth hospital so we have to go to
Perth where the surgeon operates.
I thought of flying down but I would
not be able to fly back for some time and I had to be picked up by
somebody from the hospital . So it even ruled out me getting the
coach back. Then we thought we would both fly down stay and coach
back but because of it being Cyclone season nobody wanted to look
after our car and caravan. Then Larry had to have his yearly ECG
anyway so that was that, we would take car and caravan ,we found the
camp hosts who had finished their stint and where still in the area
would fill in for us for 2 weeks. Any turtle monitoring was also
covered for us by other monitors.
The first half of January is as normal
we look after Osprey camp ground , turtle monitor and walk and
snorkel every where as usual.
In January we did our rostered days of
turtle monitoring and on the last Sunday 13 jan before we left we had
an eventful morning.
Leaving Osprey and driving very slowly
the 40km to the monitoring beaches we came across a pack of Dingos.
We drive slowly because early morning the euros[ wallabies] are all
over the road.
Just outside the entrance into Mesa and
Neds campground in the semi dark and early morning sea mist we saw
some Dingos. We pulled up to take a better look and found not the
small family group we new was around here but 12 in total. An old
male with a limp and what looked like an old female with another male
and lots of what looked like lots of teenagers . We managed to get
ten in one photo with two still behind us . They are not in the least
bit worried about us and keep doing what they would normally do.
They are of course protected here.
When we were in Mesa camp in December
we had had the 1 or 2 come into camp -just passing through checking
for a easy meal. One that came through passed me one night in the
dark and looked more fox like or pet like than a dingo . Pet dogs are
not allowed in the national park. Another lady saw the same one so a
camera trap was placed in the bushes just out of camp, where they
usually went. It only showed a couple of different young ones which
probably belonged to the family group we had seen tracks of on the
beach.
Anyhow we still got to our meeting
place for the pick up of our back pack -tablet GPS etc by 6 am.
So Our Beach this monitoring is called
Graveyards you walk the 1.4km beach and back to the car. Sounds
easy but no its named Graveyards because the lady turtles leave the
water and head up the beach to the sand dunes looking for their place
to nest. This is chosen on her memory, how many plant weeds are in
the way, the moisture of the sand, the warmth of sand and if its
good digging sand.
Well her memory could be of a flat
beach the last time she was here or if this is her first time laying
she could be looking for where she hatched 20- 30 years ago. Things
change storms ,cyclones move sand around making new dunes or
uncovering rocks where there was not any in site.
So these ladies head off into the
dunes and some go for a kilometre , get lost, get stuck and if not
found die some do not go far and just make a nest.
This morning had us walking all over
the dunes following turtle tracks. The number still to lay eggs is
dropping but this was a busy morning. Then following one track up a
very steep dune we found a large older green turtle had slipped down
the other side and was stuck between dunes of very soft sand.
You could see she had tried to get out
with no success and there were dingo tracks into here little valley.
We called the lead monitor for the day a ranger on our radio for a
rescue.
We started to finish the monitoring of
the rest of the beach while we waited for help, but I had to go back
to our stuck turtle as too many people were on the beach and some had
kids running up and down the dunes disturbing the turtle. She needed
to rest as much as possible. As she has not nested and even though we
were going to make sure she made it back to the sea, she would
probably return tomorrow night and try again, if she was not that
exhausted that she did not abort here eggs in the sea.
Lots of the turtles get in here get
lost and if the wind covers their tracks they may never be found and
die with the heat of the day.
We are outside the National Park and on
public beaches and even though some of the locals and visitors help
some just come here to surf, wind surf , kite surf and some turn up
to see the turtles and the hatchlings and do the wrong thing.
The rescue is ,we have to get her onto
a sort of sling . A mesh like flat piece with 6 handles -3 on each
side. It takes 4 of us to lift her, we take the least steep slope
which is of course the longest way out . We get her close to the wet
sand of the beach, she has to walk the rest to the water so we can
see she is ok. It takes a while because on land they are heavy and
its hard work for them to move so go little way then rest , move
little bit then rest, even when they reach the water they do the same
until they are deep enough the water takes their weight and they swim
away.
We hope she ok she looks ok and we hear
nothing of any sick washed up turtles in the area the next morning
before we leave for Perth.
January 14 we leave for Perth its 1270
km from Exmouth but add on 78km to gt out of the park to Exmouth. We
take 3 days as its hot and we do not have to rush. We stay the nights
at places we have stopped before , 2 of which are very nice the
third close to Perth we stopped at so we could get into Perth in the
early morning to a caravan place that would take a look at our
stability control on the caravan as the light flashing red. After
that we pulled into the caravan park we had booked so we could be
close to shops and not too far from the hospital.
These pictures show the highway that
goes all the way north. It starts in Perth as a freeway then on the
outskirts of Perth it changes to this 2 lane highway in Perth known
as the Brand highway then its the North west coastal highway then
The great northern Highway into Broome then on across the top into
the Northern Territory. This stretch is of goats that roam around
from Carnarvon and north and of a small 2 trailer road train coming
towards us .
We had a couple of days stocking up on
some items from an Aldi store and Woolworths , only IGA in Exmouth.
Larry had his yearly ECG at a different hospital while we were in
Perth. The Idea was to stay out at Yanchep National park but we
decided for these first days it was easier closer to the shops etc.
even though it was full of kids and you could not get a look in in
the 3 swimming pools, I tried .
So the day after my opp and we new I
was ok , Larry took the van and moved out to Yanchep while had a
couple more days in the hospital. I had my crocheting to keep me
occupied.
I got out on the 3 rd day after surgery
and got to see Yanchep. This park has caves and an area were some
Koalas are kept safely. These are the only Koalas in Western
Australia that are not in Zoos or wildlife parks. They are in an
area that does have a Koala escape fence to protect them. They have
plenty trees and more leaves brought in daily and sprinklers in
trees they can sit in too cool off, which they do.
There is a board walk between some of
the trees so you can see them. I managed to walk and see some after
being driven to the car park from the caravan. Larry walked the
tracks without me a few times from the van.
Larry has put us in for volunteering
here, it will be good to seed the rest of the park when we return.
For now its 3 days back to Cape range
and Exmouth until March. I will not be doing much Larry will have to
do most things for me as well as volunteer duties. We are keeping
check of the weather on our way back as there is a cyclone brewing
between Onslow and Karratha , Port Headland about 300 plus km north
of Exmouth. Its a keep track of , at moment its heading south west
and no real threat just Blue Alert. Lucky it heads wast more and
only causes a bit of rain , thunder and lightening down as far as
Coral Bay . We have the night before we get to Exmouth with stormy
weather.
Back in Osprey campground.
Larry also gets to snorkel 2-3 times a
day insight of the caravan. I can not for a couple of weeks.
He takes a couple of people out
snorkelling to where we see the black tip reef sharks sleeping and
to the fish and turtle cleaning station at the edge of the coral.
They happy as they see turtles, sharks and lots of fish..
While i'm sitting here typing this a
young sand monitor I had seen early this morning comes to our foot
washing dish and gets a drink. We use it to get sand off our feet
before going into the van.
I could not move to get better photos
as I am still not moving too good, but at least I got photos , isn't
it beautiful.
2025-05-22