Exmouth - Coral Bay (Day 6 & 7)

We were up earlyish this morning to maximise the time we had at the beaches around the Ningaloo Reef. First port of call once we got going was to pull in at a beach not far from the campsite where there was a young humpback whale beached on the sand partially eaten by sharks. It was here that we saw our first 'do not enter the water there are sharks signs' of the trip. From there we moved to a lookout point that allowed us to hunt the horizon for whales jumping about. We saw a couple off in the distance frolicking about making a splash.

The next stop was a flying visit to the Cape Range National Park Visitors Centre. Here we picked up some info on what fish we could expect to see and the do's and don'ts of snorkeling. Driving through the park we saw wild kangaroo bounding around along with emus and bush turkeys.

We drove on through the park stopping at Turquoise Bay for most of the day where we snorkeled, sunbathed and chilled out. I took to snorkeling pretty quickly with my only real difficultly being when water leaked into my goggle thingy. It didn't happen too often but did seem to happen when I was out in the water trying to manoeuvre my way around. A lot of the group spotted sea turtles (Una included) but I didn't manage it myself. I saw a good few different types of fish, a lot of coral (though none of it as brightly coloured as I expected given how many times I've watched Nemo) and a hell of a lot of sand...lots and lots of sand being swept back and forth by the waves.

When we had our fill of snorkeling we headed onward to Coral Bay where we stayed for two nights. The first night we arrived in the dark. The hostel had a BBQ with damn fine burgers for us and we were shown to our 10 bed dorm. Two nights in a 10 bed...nice...NOT!

We had been given a list of optional activities that were available to us for our full free day in Coral Bay – these were mainly water based with snorkeling tours, scuba diving, swimming with manta rays, glass bottomed boat etc and a quad bike tour of the place done at several times during the day. Una and I signed up for the manta ray swimming tour in the morning, and the quads tour for sunset. It was going to be a long day but with the weather already a bit colder than Broome we wanted to make the most of the sunshine while we have it.

The manta ray tour was sooooo good. We headed out around 9am and had 30 minutes to snorkel in an area called 'The Maze'. The water was between 4 and 5 metres deep where we hopped in and we were told to stick to the sand channels only (easier said than done!). The coral out here was so much cooler than what we'd seen at Turquoise Bay, more colourful, bigger and just all round better. We saw an incredibly large selection of fishes floating around there too. It was immeasurably better than the snorkeling the day before. From there we moved on to an area called 'Bateman's Bay' where we going in search of manta rays to swim with. We sat sipping tea/coffee and eating cinnamon raisin cakes as Tara (of of the crew) explained a bit about mantas to us. They grow up to have a wing span of up to 6 metres, they are solitary animals that don't travel in packs, they are resident all year round in this area of the world (one of only 3 places that is the case), they feed on plankton and other microscopic sea matter so we were safe and weren't going to be eaten, and the final fact I remember that shocked me was that they can swim at speeds of up to 60km per hour! The first group got into the water and gave chase but could catch the manta that had been spotted for us (by the spotter plane doing loops above us). They swam hard and fast but the manta was obviously spooked and took off at speed. The boat picked them up and went in search of another one where they tried again. This time they managed to get in quietly enough not to frighten it and they got to swim with it. Next up it was our turn...having heard how much difficultly one of the girls had had in keeping afloat in the waves we took life jackets to keep us afloat. We slipped in as quietly as possible and kicked our legs as hard as we could to catch up with Tara who was following the manta in the water and directing us with her arm held up above water. I kicked like a crazy person but didn't seem to be getting anywhere and was losing the pack falling behind pretty much straight away. This was one of those time I wished I was a stronger swimmer. Then, by a pure fluke I saw a huge manta under me when I looked back down into the water. I popped my head over water to see what was happening and discovered that Tara was now nearly on top of me..the manta had changed course and was conveniently swimming along at a nice pace under me with the rest of the group kicking like mad to catch up with it. I followed for a while taking one picture and a short video before calling for the boat to taxi me. I could have got dropped off closer to go back in again but I was breathless from all the kicking and the amazement of how graceful the manta had been. It was a very cool experience to have had.

After the mantas we headed back to the outer area of the reef where the ocean waves were crashing in. We had another opportunity to snorkel here before heading back to base. There were a two options, go in by yourself and explore around the boat or do a guided swim. The guided swim sounded pretty amazing but given how much trouble I'd had keeping up with the mantas and the fact that the current where they were going was at least twice as strong as anything I'd struggled in so far and the water was twice or three times deeper than where the boat was anchored I thought I'd better pass. They were swimming out beyond the outer rim of the reef into the ocean to see a shark cleaning station (it turned out there was no shark there at the time – but still cool to see). I almost chickened out of getting back into the sea (the water wasn't cold cold but wasn't the warmest either) but thankfully I sucked it up and dove in. I have never seen anything like the sight of all the different fishes that were swimming around at the back of the boat. I lowered myself into the water and was immediately surrounded by all sizes, shapes and colours of fish. I paddled a little ways back from the boat to leave room for people to get on or off and then just bobbed about on the surface watching the fish come closer and closer to me to see what I was. It was AMAZING! The coral there was even better than what we'd seen in the Maze earlier in the day too with more brightly coloured stuff there and the water was much deeper so I felt a lot safer knowing I was unlikely to be unable to accidentally hit off some of it (ashamedly I must admit that I think I hit off something in the Maze..either that or there was a person behind me when I tried to kick my way back to the boat – my flipper definitely connected with something :( ...not good).

I didn't think it was possible to top the morning we'd have and was wrecked before we even got back to the Eco Tours office to get started on our Quad Bike sunset tour of Coral Bay. Because they require driving licence information from anyone who wants to drive the quads (there's a tiny portion of road involved on the route) Una braved being my passenger for the tour. Having only driven a quad once before on snow while on holiday in Austria I was a bit nervous about taking on the beasts they had at Coral Bay. They have to have been twice the size! Off we went and after a couple of minutes of bumpy riding while I got used to the throttle we were in business. We were flying around the dunes at top speed with a few hairy moments when I took turns a bit too quickly or didn't see an upcoming hump in the track until we were launched over it. It was such great fun that it kicked the morning's snorkel tours ass!! We watched the sunset and headed back to the hostel absolutely shattered ready for a good sleep (in bed by 9.30pm).

The time we had in Coral Bay and the activities we did made it one of my favourite places in Australia thus far. It was such a beautiful place and was surprisingly normal and not really trashy touristy. They've only cottoned on to how popular it could be as a destination in recent years and are starting to build it up. I hope they manage to do that while retaining the charm the place currently has.