So here we are again in coral bay. At the moment we were meant to be inland at Karijini national park. However as the park is on fire, and therefore closed, we decided not to go!

After leaving coral bay a few days back we headed further north up the coast to Exmouth - the home of wild roaming emus and thousands of cockatoos. You might think that this would be nice, but when you are getting shouted at by locals for taking picures of the emus (as i did) and when the cockatoos are screetching in the tree above your campervan form 5 in the morning it tells a different story. Add to that the infinite number of persistently annoying flies and the searing heat (plus some pom-bashing thanks to our failing cricket team) then unfortunately Exmouth was not our favourite place!!

However, it was not all bad. Staying at exmouth gives you easy access to the cape north and ningaoo reef national parks, which were stunning. We spent a full day away from exmouth exploring these, seeing many beautiful beaches and gorges along the way. The highlight of the day was snorkelling along a drift beach at turquoise bay - so named because of the amazing colour of the water. A strong current runs along the length of the bay, so that you get in with your snorkel at one end and drift along the bay to the other end. Although the current was quite strong it was fairly easy to get back out on to the beach if you wanted to. It was off this beach that campbell took nearly a whole film of underwater photos, as the coral off shore was teaming with fish and large manta rays. I also saw a 3 metre long reef shark swim past in one of the shallow areas of the bay. All sense went out the window for a few minutes as i waded in after it to get a photo, before campbell got the snorkel on and took his camera to try and get a better photo - unsuccesfully im afraid, so you will all have to make do with the shark photos from the marine park at skark bay! On the plus side though, both of us have all 4 limbs intact and a healthy confidence that the best way to try and avoid a shark attack is to try and take a good photo of the thing!! Back in exmouth that night we decided to try out the local exmouth friday night disco - highly recommended in the book. The disco basically involved some people standing around talking and playing pool, with no dance floor and some random country music playing quietly in the background. Oh, and last orders were at 9.45! These folk sure know how to live it up!!

Due to the inland fires (i dont like fire, am sure youve all heard the story!) we have come back south to coral bay again. It is a great place to swim, snorkel and relax; and also has no cockatoos, a cooling sea breeze and far fewer flies! This morning we have both been on the beach, and also got some exercise by chasing kangaroos around the sandunes for half an hour - if they would stay still for a photo for 2 seconds then it would have saved them and us a lot of effort!!

Not sure where we are heading next then. Maybe back south along the coast to the 'blowholes', or maybe inland if the park has reopened. Tune i next time to find out where the obscene campervan has paid its next visit!