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In Katanning we loaded up a third picture collection of this holiday on the Internet. More important, we got the text in proper format to post on the Web. The story was typed on the Nokia in a Word format, but this does not seem to be compatible with Word if directly downloaded from the memory card in a PC. It works wonderful with the Nokia program that convert it automatically during the transfer from phone to PC. Anyhow, after an hour struggling and tweaking the file with 4 programs, the text is in the Internet.

Spending so much time at the computer means only a few hours left for driving. We decided to travel Wagin via a detour to the Dumbleyung Lake, first sighted is 1843. This lake became world famous when Donald Campbell established on December 31,1964 the world record speed on water at 442,08 km/hr in his boat 'Bluebird'. Upon approaching the lake only gravel roads lead to the lake and our truck is supposed to drive on sealed roads. So we sadly had to enjoy the view at the lake from a distance.

Wagin is a typical agricultural provincial town. They claim their greatest attraction is a huge statue of a merino stud. Let it be. Other things are more interesting, like the emu farm.

We look at the map and se that our progress is slow, so we decide to take for a while the Albany Highway. We pass interesting lakes, south of Wagin. A flock of big birds fly away when we approach the lake. As always the landscape is very interesting. We pass often saline area's. Due to the agricultural activities at these low points all the run off is going, leaving white, saline flats on which trees are dying and only a few salt resistant plants can survive. Many communities have billboards erected that they fight saline lands. That is not easy as usually lots of fresh water is required for that and the salt water should be removed then.And this is only the to fix the problem and does not take a way the cause of it: too intensive agriculture in an area not suited for it. It did cost only 100 years to destroy the valuable nature here, it may cost many more years to fix the problems caused by humans. The Albany Highway let us go fast but at Williams we leave the highway for a visit to the Woolshed, which has an exposition of tools used in the wool business. Rather rudimentary woodcutters (poor sheep!) but as well a prototype sheep wool shearing robot built 30 years ago for 6 million dollars. It looks more like a tool in a abattoir and poorly manufactures and welded. This would never have worked satisfactory. Further tools like woolpresses, which formed the wool in huge cubes. The we took the way to Narrogin. It looked a prosperous little town and north of the town was an airfield, with all shining modern sail planes in an old hanger. Something for tomorrow? 120 dollar for a flight is quite a lot, but depending on the weather it's worth try. We could buy a durian, the King of Fruits, a extraordinary delicatessen, this one imported from Thailand, but (un)famous in Indonesia as well, as we remember from our trip there. This is a fruit like a huge, 3 kg fir tree cone with has inside white,3 soft kidney shaped bodies, the edible durian flesh, with a very sweet fine taste. But with a smell which something like you have a piece of cheese and a piece of fish for a week between your toes. To eat it you must have the courage of a bungee jumper. So definitely not every bodies taste. Birgitt hates it and durian is absolutely banned to carry inside and airplane due to the smell. Mariska is now good used to our life as gypsies. She is a lovely baby and can sleep relaxed while we drive and has so much impressions that she sleeps at 9 in the evening, till 8 o'clock in the morning. Due to the high temperatures she needs lots of fluid however and that means a bottle in the early morning.

She smiles to everybody and 'she winds everybody around her little finger....' . Suddenly she rolled yesterday, so we have to be extra alert that she can move quickly. We hope she soon gets her 3rd and 4th tooth.

We are now 3 weeks and 2 days travelling and another 5 weeks to go. Today we check out the Narrogin Gliding Club. They have a little airfield at their disposal, which is used by the flying doctors as well, as Narrogin has a large hospital. I made my first solo flight in a glider 45 years ago, so it was a nice occasion to celebrate that. And the conditions here are excellent. so why not a try?

The flight next day is with a Grob Twin Astir glider, towed by a former Piper crop duster. Rather expensive, 120 dollar for half an hour. Just after take off I took control of the sailplane and the tow flight went smooth. At 3000 feet we disconnected from the Piper and searched for thermals. Though it was more than 40 years ago that I had flown in glider in a thermal, it was still quite easy. Of course very different from flying a F-16, but very charming in its own right. I climbed to more than 8000 feet and then the half hour was over. I did not like to pay another dollar per 2 minutes, so I dived down with speed brakes full out and landed further uneventful. The instructor said he found it difficult to believe I did fly in thermals in a glider for the last time 40 years ago, but he forgot, what you learn young, stay forever with you. After this very expensive first flight, you may continue at much lower club rates but this was enough again for a while. Next on the schedule is the challenge of surf boarding and diving.

There are only 4 glider sites in West Australia and only about 200 glider pilots, most of the in the senior citizen class. So lots of room for people who like to fly in these excellent conditions. )

After the flight I got a certificate of the flight, which can be compete for a high ranking place in my collection 'total useless and unimportant items'. We thanked Humphrey and the guys for the nice day, then we left to the North. The night we spend at the caravan site at Brookton, again a agricultural centre.

After a pleasant stay in Brookton and the morning run, we headed for Perth, to the Apollo campervan company to have a few things fixed. After that, we travelled to Fremantle, the harbour some 20 km from Perth. It was Sunday and full of tourists around the harbour complex. We made a nice stroll and left for the north.

@ We stopped at a beach to watch the surfers and the surfers who used sails to pull them at high speed over the waves. We prepared our dinner there and waited for the sunset to make some nice pictures

Later we went along the coast to Warwick, where we met the Neervoorts again.

On Monday we set course to the North. Via the beautiful built areas of Joondalup, we saw big build-up area's with only new, big and wonderful located bungalows along the coast. These area's stretch till 50 km fro Perth. Soon we left he area to the north and passes some wonderful located national parks,the Neerabub National Park and the Yanchep National Park. The last one has the biggest koala population of Western Australia. We continued along the coast to Two Rocks and turned then inland again. The area had partly a low mallee forest but area's with big trees. At the Windmill Roadhouse we stopped for the night. The temperature is now really hot, 42 degrees Celsius and the air-conditioning in the car works at full power and as soon as we are hooked up on power in the caravan park, the air-conditioning of the campervan takes it over trying to keep it cool inside. Tomorrow we move further North, closer to the Equator, where it is much hotter... In the evening we again make a stroll and we see that virtually all plants we see are different from the plants we see in Europe. They smell different too. An hour after sunset it start cooling off and the air-conditioning can be switched off.


STROMATOLITES.You have to pay to see the Pinnacles, but near Cervantes is the REAL magic, the Stromatolites. They are found at only a few locations on the world. These look like stones, but are colonies of micro organisms, who produce limestone like stone round structures, growing to about a meter. The tiny micro organisms, comparable to photo synthetic algae work together to form Stromatolites. They grow extremely slow, all the Stromatolites here in this salt lake are at least 1200 years old. But Stromatolite fossils are found not too far from here, dating 3500 million years ago. That means, about 500 million years after the earth was formed. Then about 3.000 million years later, other plants and animals were slowly emerging, So 3.000.000.000 years long only Stromatolite were reigning on earth. If you believe in evolution, here you find the Holy Grail of our existence. All questions might me answered by studying the the DNA of these micro organisms, the source of all life on this world. Only seeing the Stromatolites, the roots of every living creature on earth, is worth a trip to Australia. (Hi, terra-Grand Dad)
If we look for extra terrestrial life on other planets and in the Universe, look first for Stromatolites and not for green, bold headed, flying saucer flying creatures from Mars. Tourists seem not to be interested in this magic, you see nobody there and you have to travel there over a gravel road. You see more tourists in the bottle shops and hamburger joints. Lucky for us, who could enjoy the Stromatolites on our own. Further North we have another opportunity to see them again.

Next morning we had the chance to upload our pictures on the homepage and to save the pictures on our mobile harddisk. If we have very high speed Internet we park them in full size on a webpage, as an extra guarantee that they are not lost. It is amazing, when we leave, it is overcast with drizzle and a very nice 26 C degrees. On the way up we see lots of dazzling white lime sand dunes in an attractive rolling terrain, covered with shrubs. Lime sand is eroded limestone, blown by the prevailing winds to from dunes. Vegetation tries to fix it but often the fine lime sands takes control again. The lime sand is mined for agricultural purposes and even to make cement in a factory with a huge kiln near Dongara. It cost us a few hours and so we decide not to drive too far but only 130 kms further to twin town Dongara-Port Dennison, a modern fisherman's town, specialised in rock lobster. We are in the season now and a 1-person rock lobster tail costs about 15 dollars. We have an absolute beach front camping, with the Indian Ocean next to us.

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