Days 18 + 19: Denham / Monkey Mia
Finally we struck gold!! Sure, it hasn't been raining every day of our trip, but certainly every destination that we've stopped so far has had its fair share of cold and wet weather – but not Denham!
Denham is approximately 833km North of Perth on the Peron Penninsula – some may know the area as Shark Bay or Monkey Mia.
The drive from the coastal highway towards the penninsula is world heritage listed. I have to say when we first saw these signs we thought it was a little overrated as there wasn't a whole lot to look at. As soon as we got a glimpse of the stunning water though, we knew we were in for a little treat.
Denham is hub of the penninsula and we reckon the best place to stay. We stayed at a caravan park really close to the water and were in close proximity to the shops, food and information centre. Sadly Nick once again missed out on going on a charter boat (not enough people booked) but the area was great all the same.
There were a number of highlights from this part of the trip including attending the dolphin feeding at Monkey Mia (approximately25 km out of Denham). The sun was out, but the wind was freezing so stepping out into the water was a little bit chilly but certainly worth it.
After visiting the dolphins I dragged Nick out to the Ocean Park Aquarium for some shark feeding! It wasn't the fanciest of aquariums around, but we both agreed that it was definitely interesting and worth the trip. It wasn't just all sharks, they had fish and some invertebrates as well. The tanks weren't fancy (ponds in a tin shed) but the guide was great and made the whole tour very informative and enjoyable. Unfortunately they didn't have any tiger sharks in the shark pool at the time, but the others were definitely worth a look.
I don't know how we missed getting photos of the sharks, but this little guy was in one of their other tanks, he's missing a flipper so he'll probably see out his days in the aquarium.
There's some great national parks and 4wd tracks around the penninsula. We were a little hesitant to venture out on some of these 4wd tracks on our own after our Cape Arid experience, but we're very keen to return at a later stage with a second vehicle to get to some of the more remote sections.
The Wrap Up:
Glad we had: Somewhere to watch the 3rd State of Origin match – Go Maroons!!
Wish we had: Friends!! (To drive out on the 4wd tracks with us and boost the numbers for the fishing charter – and to keep us company of course!!)
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