After my encounter with reef sharks and rays in Coral Bay, and standing in the sea with Snapper swimming around my feet, I was confident that I was on the way to cracking my phobia of fish. I therefore bought myself a snorkel mask and flippers in Exmouth and looked forward to spending several days snorkelling on Ningaloo Reef in the Cape Range National Park. We got a list of all the Department of Conservation campsites in the park and had strict instructions fr...

I think I've made an important medical breakthrough in the field of phobias. If someone has a phobia, all you need to do is buy the affected person an expensive piece of kit which will distract them from the source of their distress. For example, if someone - anyone at all, though for the sake of argument, Katy - has a fish phobia, then purchase them a waterproof camera. They will then snap away to their heart's content, unruffled by the presence of creatures...

You know how you wait ages for a bus and then three turn up at once? Well, having been deprived of toast for nearly two months the three campsites we've stayed at this week all have had toasters. Our cravings for jam/scrambled eggs/beans/vegemite on toast have been serviced. We have made our way down the west coast from Broome briefly stopping overnight at 80 Mile Beach and Port Hedland before spending a few days at Point Samson. 80 Mile Beach was exactly what ...

As those of you who follow this blog will know very well, the two of us lead a very stressful life. We are taxed to the limit by having to make difficult and contentious decisions daily, such as whether to buy Heinz baked beans in barbecue, cheese or the standard tomato sauce. So after the added strain of driving the Gibb River Road we decided we needed a holiday. Although the western end of the Gibb ends in Derby (pronounced Durby, not Darby) we continued on ...

Our next four-wheel drive challenge was the Gibb River Road which is a 670km stretch of unsealed road cutting through the Kimberley - a remote area of large cattle stations and where they filmed parts of the 2008 movie Australia. As well as negotiating the track one of the main obstacles is driving across the wide Pentecost River. The big question before setting off was what tyre pressure should we have? Our normal setting for tarmac roads is 40psi but we'd he...