1st of Jan 2016

Drove off from Bunbury fairly early and Arrived at Busselton at around 10:00 am.
Good decision to get up early and drive to Busselton because at 11:00 am all the free parking spaces at beach area were taken by eager families wanting to soak up the sun and play with their kids in a nearby waterpark especially set up for the day, celebrating the first day of a new year.
I had some lunch at a cafe in Busselton (my first ever chicken parmigiana) and left the town at around 2pm driving to the town called Dunsbourough. Another nice small costal town which was very popular as well with beach goers coming from every direction wanting to occupy the picnic tables and benches with picnic baskets and blankets.

Next stop was Yallingup, I only had a very short stay here since I had to find some accommodation for the night and nothing in the area had vacancy so spend the night in a forest house on the hills near Nannup (7 km west of Nannup). Wow, I'm glad I did. The view from the house was beautiful and the owner (Karl) was really nice.
In the evening after having had a shower I sad at the balcony and suddenly heard a big bump from the roof. I thought that it might have been a branch from a tree but Karl told me that it was a possum mum and her baby. They had a small 'cottage' on the top of the roof and in the evening they would come down and get their dinner - just sad there watching the possums gather their food and disappear back onto the roof via a big tree, and then I went to bed.

I joined Karl and his girl friend for a forest walk the next morning at 7am, a great way to wake up :) Afterwards they provided free breakfast (eggs, cereal, fruits and coffee). Was sad to leave this tranquil spot in the forest but I had to keep moving since I didn't know how long this overall journey would take and I knew that I had a lot of kilometres to cover (calculated between 2000-2500 km in total).

2nd of Jan 2016:
Drove from Nannup to Margaret River and stopped at a small farmers marked which was located at what looked like a school area. Bought a freshly made Italian Wrap and went on to find a Servo (service station/to buy petrol). Then my journey continued to Augusta where I spend a few hours driving from one nice spot with a view to the sea to next nice spot and finished with a trip to the lighthouse. I couldn't find any accommodation in the area and therefore had to drive to Pemberton for the night and stay at the YHA hostel. Had hoped that I could have stayed in the area and do I wine Tour of Margaret River the day after but the accommodation was either too expensive or none at all.

3rd of Jan 2016:
This morning my trip would take me from Pemberton to Walpole where I did a Tree top walk amongst some very tall trees and a short walking trail. I bought a cap with the signage "Valley of the Giants" at the front and "Western Australia" on the back. Had to buy some sort of souvenir proving that I did a walk 40 meters up in the air ;-)
After the beautiful trip to the forest I proceed to the township of Denmark and stayed overnight here.

4th of Jan 2016:
Today I drove from Denmark to Albany and checked in at the hostel around 2pm. I then drove to Mount Clarence and Mount Adelaide where I did a bit of easy walking and saw a war exhibition and a war monument. Next stop was Middleton Beach where I did a short walk along the beach and had dinner at a nice restaurant called 'The three anchors". Then drove back to the city and walk around for a bit to get familiar with the location of the supermarkets etc.

5th of Jan 2016:
Woke up to the smell of pancakes and not just any pancakes, freshly made pancakes with orange provided free of charge by the hostel. Yum yum, had 3 and felt guilty for eating so many but they were just that good! ;-)
Spent the day with Kelly a girl from the US who stayed in the same dorm room as me. We went for a walk in the city, our mission was to find a travel towel for Kelly and other travel stuff, and we also managed to squeeze in a lunch at a cafe :)
Originally I had only booked two nights at the hostel but my body told me that I needed one more day of rest = no driving and just relaxing so I booked an extra night.

6th of Jan 2016:
Morning started off with yet another batch of pancakes :)
Then I went to the library to check emails and send a dispute form to my bank because some idiot had hacked my credit card details and I had to confirm in writing that 'no I did not buy 2 computers online + some stuff for mobiles + fitness things whilst being in Australia'...

7th of Jan 2016:
Today was a big drive or not that big a drive when you think about it being Australia.. But had a 3 hour drive from Albany to Ravensthorpe and then another 2 hours from Ravensthorpe to Esperance. Arrived at Esperance around 5pm and checked into the YHA which was probably the worst kept YHA I have experienced so far. Didn't really want to spend any time there so had some dinner, drove into town (5km) and went to the movies to see the new Starwars movie. When I came back to the hostel some girl had taken the bed I was supposed to sleep in so I had to find another empty bed (I almost woke her up but couldn't be bothered for just one night).

8th of Jan 2016:
Yeaah today was the day that I drove to 'Cape Le Grand National Park in Esperance :) The most beautiful park with lots of animals, pristine and unspoiled beaches and pretty views of the mountains. I'm not kidding when I state that it has some of the most beautiful beaches in the world.
I had hoped to stay in one of the caravan parks or maybe the free camping areas in the park but there was no vacancy anywhere and I did not want to stay at that awful YHA one more night, and the only other vacancies in Esperance would cost me the equivalence of 4-5 nights hostel accommodation for just one night :( So I had to drive back to Ravensthorpe where I rented a cabin with cooking facilities for the night.

9th of Jan 2016:
I had done some research online and it stated that the trip from Ravensthorpe via Hyden (wave rock) to Perth would be roughly 10 hours in total and since I didn't have any pre-booked accommodation I thought that I might just go ahead and drive to Hyden and see if there was any availability after seeing Wave Rock.
It was 39 degrees at Wave rock when I arrived around 11am... I did a short walk around the rock and on top of the rock, took some photos and drank what felt like all the water supply that Hyden could provide.
There wasn't really much to see or do in Hyden other than 'Wave rock' and some hiking trails but it was too hot to go hiking so I decided to drive a bit further and see how far I would be able to get before it got dark.

I drove for 2 hours and had a rest stop to stretch my legs and back and buy some coffee and water and then continued onwards. Suddenly after driving one hour further all hell broke loose and a storm was catching up with me quite rapidly, before I knew it there were branches flying through the air and leaves and dirt hitting the front window of the car. I didn't know wether to continue driving or pull over and stay put. But there were too many things flying through the air where I was and I could see blue skies ahead so had to get away from that area where the sky turned grey, then black and lightning began to strike down a few kilometres back (looking in the rear mirror).
I wondered at one point if I should stop the car and take some photos because it actually looked very pretty, like a scary pretty painting across the sky but better to continue and get to safety ;-)
I drove all the way to Fremantle where I arrived just before 6pm and stayed at the YHA - which is actually and old prison used as a hostel now. And there are photos on the walls of the building telling stories about the prison.

10th of Jan 2016:
I started the day off with a short walk to the Fremantle markets where I bought some cheap breakfast and lunch. Stayed in Fremantle for a few hours and did some research for areas close to the airport where I was to return the car and catch a flight to Melbourne the next day. Found out that a location/town called Midlands was only a 15-30 min drive to the Domestic airport which would suit me very well since I had to be at the airport at 10:00 am the following morning. So drove to Midland and stayed overnight at a nice little caravan park called Midland Holiday Park.

11th of Jan 2016:
The road trip had come to an end and I had to return the car at Perth Domestic airport and get on my flight to Melbourne.

Itinerary Road trip:
Day 1: Bunbury
Day 2: Busselton, Dounsborough, Yallingup (Nannup)
Day 3: Margaret River, Augusta (Pemberton)
Day 4: Walpole, Denmark
Day 5: Albany
Day 6: Albany
Day 7: Albany
Day 8: Albany, Esperance
Day 9: Esperance
Day 10: Ravensthorpe via Hyden to Fremantle
Day 11: Fremantle to Midland
Day 12: Midland to Perth Airport