Introducing the JPP Raptor Mob!

Eagles of James Price Point:

Leading star: BSE Baby Sea Eagle

OMG I am in absolute heaven!  This is the land of the ocean raptor they are everywhere, or many different breeds!  I remember many years ago when we lived in Broome (back in the per-Derby days, about 10-12 years ago), reading something about Photography and Bird watching tours, which I am sure where held here at James Price Point.  Does anyone know if this is so?  They should be!  The scenery is amazing, why wouldn't you want to learn about photography here?  I am!  But more importunately the eagle, well birds of all type, but we are right on the water, so see the ‘sea’ birds mostly, are everywhere!  I have had many up close and personal moments, especially with the youngest Sea Eagle, who is getting very used to us, and flying VERY close.  Heart pounding stuff.  I was constantly running for my camera.  Now I have so many GREAT photos when they fly over I just sit back and enjoy the moment.  Loving every moment of it here!

Regularly seen here:
Two Brahminy Kite’s, + 1 young.
2 mature Sea Eagles, + 2 young (one older, possibly 2nd year)
2 Osprey Sea Eagles. (not so regular, but have seen together.) + 1 young, took me a while to work out what it was, but am now sure it is a young Osprey.
At least 3 other small kite’s of different type
Kestrel (when driving, not on beach)
Regular brown kites.
Crows
LOTS of Willy Wag-tails!
Oyster Catchers.
Plenty of sea birds: Boobies, ….. Etc
Nice clean Sea Gulls
Herron

I guess I either start a new ‘Positive Twitchers’ Blog, or re-name this one ‘Fishing Twitchers’?  As it is becoming apparent I have a new obsession: Eagles!  Oh, and I’m going to keep sharing my new love with you all.

  I spent all afternoon today following them around, getting Johnno to catch bait fish for me to fed them, and this is not new, I’ve been doing it more and more regularly.  The closer I get to them, the closer I want to be, and I’ve been getting pretty close!  Maybe I’m missing my birdy loves from Aussie (our Corella parrot we gave to friends when we left on holiday), but I think it’s more that I’m so star/feather struck with their beauty and grace.  I’m fascinated with them.
 

Finally have some great up close Brahminy photos

Later… after 3 weeks here:

The eagles are getting very used to us now.  I’ve had some wonderful up close and personal moments.  The BSE (Baby Sea Eagle) come’s straight for us and very close, looking at us and obviously knows where the dogs are all the time.  We are now at the most amazing stage of being able to call them, sometimes even if we can not see them.  The first time it happen we knew it was no coincident.  The regular mature visitor (most likely male from it’s smaller size) had circled us, as they always do now, checking out if we had left out any fish for them.  We hadn’t so he flow off, heading straight out to sea.  He was a few hundred metre off when Johnno whistled to get his attention, then we both started trying to do a Sea Eagle ‘Quack’.  He turned instantly, flying back straight towards us.  We through a fish carcass onto the beach, he swooped, picking it up without hesitation, flying off over the dunes.

Mature Sea Eagle turned when called from a few hundred meters away, starting a long distance dive to pick up fish carcass off the beach.

The dogs still hate all birds, especially the big Sea Eagels, not helped from the Trevalley stealing incident. YouTube link here!
 Running out of what ever shade they are sleeping under when they hear us doing the Eagle Quack, heading straight for the beach where they know I am going to throw the fish bits, or looking over the sand dunes where the Eagles always fly off to…but not usually from??  Dogs haven’t worked that bit out yet!

Johnno holding dogs back so I can get some good photos when the eagles come close.

The very first time I was able to get close to BSE (Baby Sea Eagle), he had caught his own lunch; a rather large, for the size of the bird anyway, Queen fish.  The fish was still flapping around as BSE ripped into it’s innards.  He (BSE) looks so young in those photos now, he has grown and darkened a lot over the last 3 weeks.  I was able to get very close, I actually think he was having trouble flying with his catch.  I sat on a rock as close as I dared, stopping when he looked like he was going to fly off, taking a million photos.  I could hear him crunching into and ripping off lumps of flash, that’s how close I was.  He kept a close eye on me, but was more worried about the other birds who were bomb-barding him, trying to steal his meal.

BSE with his own catch, come to show off to us.

Now that BSE is getting bigger, feeding himself, or perhaps because he is not shy of us and gets the good plenty of good bits we leave out for him, we are watching the unfolding of what I think is him getting driven out of his family turf.  I’ve heard that the mother eagle, once the youngsters are older enough, feeding themselves, do that, drive them off.  Nature is so hard, but I do understand that she would need the food there for herself and next years young.  Seems there is plenty of food here though.  We don’t see much of Mum, assuming the White Belly Sea Eagles we do see regularly are all males, they are all the same size, even BSE.  Then ever now and then we see a larger one, whom we guess must be mum.  Remember I have no knowledge about these things and no internet service to look them up, I’m just making it up as I go along from what I remember, that might be right, or might be completely wrong, either why, ever now and then we see a bigger WB Sea Eagle.

The first ‘could be turf war’ we seen was when BSE picked up a fish carcass off our beach, then second year youngster tried to steal it off him, they chased each other over the sand dunes.  This happened a few days in a row, and I thought it was just a fight for food, since BSE is much gamer than the rest, and will come close to our camp to get any bits, while the rest hang back till we throw them further down the beach.   But then we seen have seen since them, fighting and chasing each other (usually BSE getting chased).  The day I seen the mature one constantly following BSE was when I started to realise what we were witnessing.  Mature would not let BSE settle anywhere, making it hard for him to rest or feed; I guess this is how they are driven off to a new stretch of beach?
Later that day they both return at separate times, and are both still hanging around…maybe they have worked out there is enough food for everyone here; or maybe BSE because he is much bolder than the rest is going to claim this beach as his?  Either way it’s a sad thought when you think too much about it, so I don’t, I just enjoy the beauty of them here with us now.

Mature Sea Eagle ’trying’ to drive Baby Sea Eagle off his beach.

I have millions of photos, lucky Johnno brought me a 2T hard-drive before we left on holiday!  And I could blabber on for hours about these amazing birds, but I’m sure you would all loose interest, so I’ll stop now, but share a couple more of my favourite photos…

Mature Sea Eagle sitting on rock in front of our camp.  Stayed there while I got very close, until the dogs came running out.

AFTER the Mackeral head, came back to say Thanks...surely he didn't want more??

I love the out stretched wings shot, as much as the up close sitting ones.

BSE landing on rock in front of our camp

Johnno got a photo of me getting up close to BSE.

Brahminy having a tug-of-war over bits the big eagles left behind.

LATER: After 4 weeks at Flat Rock:  Well I did state above that I am no expert on Eagles hay, that I just like to look at them!  Keep that in mind! Haha.  Turns out there are TWO Baby Sea Eagles up there!  I was thinking one morning how different BSE was acting, then started to think it was a different bird, so went back to check my photos.  Hard to say, but I was convinced they were two different birds.  The adults all seem to have markings that tell them apart, but the young were harder.  Anyway, next day I see the TWO BSE together!!  Playing/flying together.  Beautiful morning!!!  No photos of that, it was the morning we were driving up to the reef again, I'd put my short lens on 7d to video driving on the beach: Driving on Beach YouTube clip.

Fishing at Manari Reef

Manari fishing

My Biceps, shoulders and especially Rotator Cuffs are aching from catching so many fish!  It’s a tuff life, but I’m loving it!

...That is as far as I got with my Fishing at the reef Blog, because most of the time we were fishing ;)
6km's up the beach from where we were camped last week, Flat Rock, end of Manari Road, there is a beautiful reef system reaching right to the beach.

Here are the photos that I saved to go with the blog, but never got around to writing about.

Giant Herring

Mangrove Jack caught on Popper at my feet: exciting stuff!!  Lovely dinner!!

1 of the few Queen fish Johnno caught on fly

All that was left of Johnno's fly after the Queenfish had their way with it!

Johnno fly fishing the reef

Sunday Fishing Fun-Day!!!

Sunday 14th June 2015: 

 What an amazing day!!

Sunday evening meal

Sunday Fishing Fun-day on YouTube!

I was awake already when I heard Puppy shuffling around the tent.  About to get up, thinking he might want to go to the loo, I knew better though, so didn’t rush. He has returned to his morning routine of sleeping on the bed, but that’s ok, I do like morning Puppy cuddles.

So we were awake at very first light, up and about with the tide on the incoming, it was only natural that Johnno would be watching the ocean while the kettle was heating up.   Pre-sunrise is Mackerel time, he was telling me.  Nek minit: Fish jumping, Johnno running!
Grabbing his big popper rod, he was off and running, casting before he even got to the shore.
I couldn’t stand back and watch him catch all the fish.  Grabbing my GoPro, I was quick to follow.  After a few casts it was becoming obvious our poppers might be a little bit too big for the fish and bait that were so close to in.  I ran back to camp, a full 20 meters from where we were camping, to get my smaller rod with new favourite lure, the Sliver Vibe!  It’s been working a treat on Queenies and Trevalley down the beach, and proved to be an excellent choice this morning as well!!

First four casts I hooked, played and landed fish!  Queening, Mackeral, Queenie, Trevalley!  OH YAH!!!!!
It only took two fish producing casts from me, and Johnno was running back to camp for a sliver slice as well.  We quickly lost count of the fish we were catching, they were continual.  Keeping a few for the dogs dinner, and the mackerel for ours, the rest were going straight back into the water as fast as they were coming out.  Pup’s fish catching skills have been well refined over the last few months, he is very fast now, but I thought the fish were safe today, with the rocks in front of us slowing him down. One unlucky Trevalley didn’t get returned deep enough, Pup ever alert these days, was onto it straight away.  No hesitation, just grabbed it and run up the beach, making sure it could not get back into the water when he dropped it.  Ok, so he has an extra one for breakfast I thought.

I’d woke this morning (before Puppy jumped on us) dreaming that we had hooked a Sea Eagle, it flew under our line as we cast out.  This has happened a few times over the years with little Turns or Gulls, but I’ve never heard of a Sea Eagle flying that close it would catch on your line.  Today things got so crazy I told Johnno about my dream, so he was would be aware of the eagle.

It started with the Baby Sea Eagle circling, it had spotted Puppy’s Trevalley on the beach, but with the dogs still parading I didn’t think it would come anywhere near us until we went back to camp.  How wrong I was!  He swooped down right beside Pup and took the Trevalley!!!  I have some great GoPro footage, Pup was in shock I reckon.  Then the slightly older, but still juvenile (still doesn’t have full grey wings) Sea Eagle swooped the youngest one to get the fish off it.  They fought in mid air for minutes, right in front of us.  I had just said ’Neither of them are going to get to eat that fish’ when they dropped it into the sea.

Our fish, the mackerel and dogs breakfast Queenies, were between two rocks right behind me.  The eagles could obviously see them, but couldn’t get to them.  Charlie, having seen the stealing of Pup’s fish, was on high alert now, she hates all birds.  We joke that Kite’s swooped and tried to pick her up when she was a pup, but as the years go by we both really think this is a strong possibility.  She would chase kite’s at home in Derby, now she chases Gulls, kites and Eagles.

The two Braminie and another new bird, which I now think is a baby Osprey, also came to join in the Rapter Display once we started filleting the fish….when the schools of bait fish had gone out of casting range and we weren’t getting the constant takes.

The thought of coffee and breakfast crossed out minds, but only for a moment.  With so much fish action happening, we headed to The Rock instead.  The sun had only just reached over the sand dunes, and the tide was still coming in. 

Although not as fast and furious as in front of camp, (almost every cast), The Rock proved itself a worthy choice.  More Queenfish and Trevalley were hooked and landed, while we laughed ourselves silly.

With the falling tide the action again soon moved out of our casting range.  By this time we were both rather hungry and thirst, and tired.  Aching casting muscles, oh what a great feeling.

It must have been a big weekend at Manari reef/hidden creek.  We lost count of the cars coming back down the beach all day, almost as many fish as we had caught that morning!  The dogs were in overdrive, between the people and cars parked around us, and the eagles constantly flying over to see if we had any more fish, they didn’t get much rest all day.

Neither did we!  Still hyped from the mornings fishing, we couldn’t settle, so went for a walk around the rocks at low tide to collect some fresh bait.  We haven’t been using bait, Johnno’s been mostly on fly, and I’ve been using lure all week.  Stashing the crabs in the fridge for morning fishing, we decided to try some occy around the filling rock pools with the tide coming in.  Another great choice!  As well as catching a few other reef fish, I bagged us a Bluebone for dinner!  Oh yah!  Haven’t had one since Quondong.

The sun was starting to go down when we got back to camp, so we called early sundowners, to sit and marvel at the most amazing day that was drawing to an end.  A fire had started somewhere towards Hidden Creek earlier in the day, and was now producing a wonderful smoky sunset.  We watched the last car for the evening drive down the beach, attempt the steep sandy hill (there is a rocky path off the beach, but most people attempt the sand dune for a laugh).  They failed, stalling at the top, as most people do.  Most people however reverse back down the hill.  We have watched many vehicles not make it up the dune, but none of them get totally bogged.  We saw the female passenger started walking down the track we knew she was coming to see us.  Johnno is well practiced at pulling other people out, he has done it plenty of times now, so off up the hill he went, even though she only asked for a shovel, not a tow?  He had them out in no time, and for his trouble they gave him a Mud Crab!!! OH YAH!!!

As all sunlight drained from the sky, while the stars where starting to come out, I cooked BlueBone, Mackeral and Mud Crab for our dinner!! No veggies needed.

I’m typing listening to the crackle of the bush fire.

Sunday bloody fun day!  What a wonderful day!

Johnno filleting fish early in the morning

Queenfish for breakfast

Bush fire behind us

Seems I like tea

Nothing like a nice cuppa tea!

I’ve always like herb (flavoured) tea, like lemon, ginger, raspberry or peppermint.  Couple of years ago I started drinking green tea.  Green tea with different herbs is rather nice too.  But I’ve never been a black tea drinker, until now!

I brought ‘Australian Afternoon Tea’ without realising it was a normal black tea.  It was on special with all the other little boxes of herbals.

Without drinking as much beer as normal, I’ve started drinking more tea again.  Like 3 or 4 cups per day, instead of 1 or 2 cups per week…one can only drink so much water!  Now that I’m getting low on the different flavoured teas, I thought I’d be daring, break out of my routine, jump out of my comfort zone, and have a cup of Black tea!!  Oh yah, it’s so good to try new things in life every now and then, you never know what you are missing out on.  

Turns out that I am rather found of a nice cup of tea.  Not too strong, I was worried I wouldn’t like it, so made my first cup very weak.  Fifth cup in less than 24 hours, they are starting to get stronger, but still not strong.  I’d normally leave my herbal bad in for 3 to 5 mins.  I’m still at the 1-2 minute mark for black tea.  I never thought about putting milk or sugar in it, I never do with herbal tea, so it never crossed my mind to.  Ya never know, one day I might try that as well; but not yet, I’m not ready for that much stimulation just yet.

Turns out a nice cup of tea is a wonderful compliment for photo taking at 6am, just as the sun starts to send it’s first light over the sand dunes.

Enjoying an early morning cup of tea!

6am at Flat Rock

A little something else to enjoy with your cuppa

Karen’s Big Fish; Part Two

Recognition of Johnnos awesome work!

It is advised that you first read the full story: Link Karen's Big Fish Part ONE

Karen's Big Fish on YouTube

The Battle of the The Beast was most defiantly a team effort, and it seems Johnno’s part was grossly understated in Part One of this blog.  Without his participation in this mammoth tug-of-war, it would not have been such a victorious result, with such splendid, vivid photos.

Johnno was drawn out of his sleepy afternoon daze early in the unfolding of events.  On the first run of line I had called back to the tent to let him know I was onto a Big Fish.  He came running with camera in hand, as is expected when a Big Fish is being played.  Getting photos of me straight away, rod bent, The Beast hooked, the battle begins.

His roll was not only of photographer, but also moral and technical support. “It can’t be a stingray, they wouldn’t swim back and forth like that”, “How’s your arms?  You are doing a great job”, and of course “Look out for that rock, don’t let your line go around it”, where all helpful comments that helped me to continue the long haul.

But it was on the beach where Johnno’s help was of the essence, and without him I would never have got the all important ’photo’.  Johnno was ready and willing to run into the water with The Beast from below, in an instant.  His first chest deep walk was to guide my line from around a large rock sticking out of the surf.  Second time was to try and grab my leader to help pull The Beast to shore.  When this was unsuccessful the tail grabbing technique was employed.

We have named this beautiful creature ‘The Beast’ because of it’s amazing POWER, which Johnno experienced first hand as soon as he lay hands on The Beast.  She instantly thrashed her powerful tail, knocking Johnno backwards.  Leaving not only his pride but also his leg scared.

Photo of johnno leg here.

He (John) was determined not to give up.  It took 3 attempts of ‘Tail Grabbing’ before Johnno admitted that The Beast might simply be too powerful for this plan of attack.
Thankfully I was wearing my GoPro and was able to record Johnno’s display of man-hood in his attempt to slay The Beast.  Be sure to watch the You Clip: Link here.
Here are some ‘snap shot’ moments from the clip, so we can all marvel in Marven’s magnificence.

In case you missed it on the YouTube clip, because everything happened so FAST, here are photo’s of Puppy’s part in this action packed moment in time.
He was continually barking at The Beast, having his back turned to the ocean, and distracted by all the excitement.  When Johnno pulled The Beast from the ocean, Pup didn’t notice the next crashing wave.  When it broke directly behind him, he is seen jumping from shear fright.  In an attempt to get away from the wave, Pup almost runs straight into Johnno holding The Beast.  A very sharp turn averted a head on pile up involving all three of them.

Photos here.

Johnno was able to get The Beast high enough onto the beach for quick photos between waves.  Then again it was Johnno’s turn to play the manly role of wrestling  The Beast, when I requested hook removal from it’s mouth, for safe and healthy release.  Luckily Johnno is well practiced at hook retraction as The Beast was not at all happy about being turned over for the job.

Photo here.

Johnno also handled the final part of The Battle in a very caring and safe release.  Making sure she was in the water swimming safely and unharmed, while I stood on the beach shouting encouragement hardly able to hold my rod any longer.

Karen's Big Fish

Karen’s BIG Fish! (aka The Beast)

The scene where it all unfolded; from my seat in the sun, to fishing right in front of camp, the rocks I run up and down, and finally the beach where The Beast was slayed.

Finally!!

Karen's Big Fish on YouTube

As much as I’ve enjoyed the last two months of catching shit loads of little Trevalley, Queenies and Salmon, it was getting to the stage of obviousness that I hadn’t caught anything worth writing home about, or in this case writing a blog about.  I was contemplating changing my blog from ‘Fishing Letters’ to ‘Twitcher Letters’.

I got very excited when we decided to leave Willie Creek, as beautiful as it is there, my fishing results were not what I had planned for this ‘fishing’ holiday.  Two days of packing/shopping/unpacking were spent with us planning our assault on the fish of James Price Point.  With much anticipation we headed straight to ‘The rock’ first thing day one, full of recipe idea’s for tonight’s dinner, once we had caught it.

As is often the case with over excited fisho’s, we sat on The Rock the full duration of the incoming, and out going tide, only get sunburnt and dehydrated.  I’m sure you have all had such fishing adventures?  When all hopes and dreams are smashed to piece’s, and you wonder your reasoning for such initial excitement anyway?  We had sausage’s for dinner, and re-evaluated our fishing plan for day two.

Johnno was up early fly fishing the incoming tide.  By hide tide, still fishless, he was hiding from the sun in the tent.  With nothing better to do and the tide so high it was almost in the tent, I figured it was time to drop a line in from where I was sitting.

My seat I could almost fish from.

I took one leg of octty out of the fridge, dangling it in front of Johnno’s nose on the way past, only enticed a tired little laugh.  I baited my already set up rod and reel, walked 20m’s to the waters edge, cast out gently to where I guest-a-mated the rocks where, then sat on the black rocks to bake in the sun and contemplate my next twitcher blog.

Within minutes I got my first bite.  Ever hopefully for a Mangrove Jack, Bluebone, or Cod, I took up the slack and waited for the next nibble….no more nibbles, my line just started pulling tight.  I struck and held tight, still hopeful for a bluebone, and thinking if it was, it would try to head straight into the rocks.  It didn’t, which I had mixed emotions about, I didn’t want it to swim into the rocks, but I had wanted a bluebone.  Once realising it was hooked, the line pointed straight out to sea and started peeling off my reel.  OH the excitement!!!  Finally a BIG FISH!!!  It felt like forever ago that I’d caught a fish the took line from me (I like a tight drag).

‘Johnno Johnno, I’ve got a big fish’  I shouted back to the tent, and started laughing to myself.  After a short stop, when I thought I was about to get line back, it took off again.  OH Boy, this is a proper big fish!!  Thumps on spool to slow it some more because if I didn’t it was going to just keep going, out to sea with all my line.  I managed to turn it’s head and felt it’s powerful tail kick back at me.  Thankful, realising it was not a stingray, but now a little intimidated by the power of The Beast pulling against me.  It was defiantly a pulling game; Tag Of War!   I had my drag hard the whole time, and had to many time’s jam thumps in reel to try and slow her down.  I would turn The Beast, running down the rocks to recover some line, only to have her turn and run off with my line screaming again.  This went on for a long time!  Time is very hard to judge when playing a fish, what feels like forever is often only moments/minutes.  When my arms started shaking I kept telling myself, ‘If you are getting tired Karen, then so is The Beast!’.  But I was fooling myself, The Beast was not getting tired.

Start of The Battle with The Beast

After 12 minutes of running up and down the same rocks, recovering line, only to have it turn and take it all (my line) back again, I was still…running up and down the same rocks!

By this time I had to face the fact that I was most likely playing a big shark, not a huge bluebone, but the chance is always there…what if it’s a huge cod, you do get them here.  I took as much strain as I dared, just to pull The Beast closer to the rocks, I just had to see it, to get an idea of what it was.  The long dark shape got dragged in, dragged so much that at one stage I called ‘log’; could I have lost The Beast and got snagged on a log, because that is what it felt like at that moment.  Once we could see the shape better I called shark…maybe with a few extra words not necessary for this blog chucked in there as well.  Johnno, ever hopeful, called Cobia, I was excited again.  One kick of the powerful tail turned The Beast and my line moved, it had been wrapped around a fin, now with The Beast moving more naturally we both recognised it straight away as a Large Shovel-nose Ray.  Not so bad I thought, not a shark or a ray, but both, and hence why I was having trouble working out what it was until then.

With 15 minutes of fighting behind us, I was feeling a connection with my Beast of a fish opponent, and thought it would be nice to get a photo, not just break the line, which at this rate was looking like what would have to happen anyway. Lets see if I can get it to the beach I called, thinking surely The Beast was getting as tired as me by now?

NO it was not getting tired!  We fought on again, line in, line out, recover line, loose line.  It got worse when I got to the beach.  I must have been thinking I’d just pull her up onto the sand, easy.  Not so!  Stale Mate, she was going no where near that beach, but I wasn’t giving her enough line to run back out to sea.  I could see her just sitting there behind the waves, laying in wait, getting her strength back, planning her escape run!  No time to loose, I pleaded with Johnno to get in the water and help me pull her onto shore.  Those of you who know Johnno, will know that it didn’t take much ‘pleading’!  I could read Johnno’s mind: ‘what you want me to wrestle with The Beast from the bottom of the ocean?  Hell Yes!!’  He was running into the waves before I had time to think about what we were going to do next.  As soon as Johnno grabbed The Beast’s tail, she realised she had recovered enough, and was going to make a break for her freedom.  Thrashing powerfully she pushed Johnno backwards as she run off, my line was screaming out of the reel again!  So the game of Tug Of War started all over again, a couple more times back and forth.  It was all good fun, but I now really wanted a photo of this beauty/beast, before she got too tired to return in a safe and healthy state.

Using the waves to get the beautiful Beast onto the beach.

Obviously the tail grabbing was not going to work, I had to just nose her straight into the beach and use the waves to keep her in close.  One big wave, she was on beach side, Johnno run out and grabbed her before she could get back into the surf.  She kicked, Johnno fell, same as the other times, but I couldn’t do it all again. ‘Hold her Johnno Hold her’ I shouted knowing, it was now or not at all.  Johnno must have realised as well, he was back on her tail before she had time for a second kick.  Up onto the beach she came, but with the waves still trying to help her back into the safety they offered, and knowing how tired she would be after such a mammoth fight, it was a case of quick photos, so we could release her unharmed to recover in the comfort of the supportive waves.

What a beautiful creature she was.  My first reaction of ‘oh it’s just a shovelnose ray’ was quickly replaced when I got to run my hand over her leathery grey skin. She was magnificent!  Not only as a powerful fighter, but as a stunner to look at.  I was in awe.  Then the next wave came over, Johnno lifted her head off the sand just enough for the water to flow underneath, nek minit, she was gone.  I was left awestruck and laughing on the beach, with muscles trembling from half an hour of continual pressure.  Man I love that feeling.

A very beautiful creature indeed!

Battle of The Beast on YouTube.

Thank-you NO GAS supporters!

Willie Creek wet lands

How blessed we are to be able to still enjoy this beautiful part of the world!

Thank-you to all the Broomies, Kimberleyites, Western Australian’s, Australian’s, International visitors and supports.  To everyone who said “NO GAS at JPP” I thank-you from the bottom of my heart to the goose bumps I get when in this amazing place.

To think that this pristine, remote wilderness was going to be taken away from public use.  The thought of never been able to camp here again breaks my heart, not to mention the loss of habitat for land and ocean wildlife.  But I don’t need to think about that, because you won, we are still able to fish, camp, photograph, paint, and just enjoy all that is here.

Yesterday we went for a drive.  WA Foundation Day, the perfect day to enjoy all the WA has to offer!

We found the fresh water hole at the back of Willie Creek, but due to the amount of Mozzies there did not get to enjoy that as much as I would have liked.  Perhaps I will go back more prepared at the end of the dry, it will be a lovely bird watching place.

Walking around the Willie Creek fresh water hole

When ever I stopped to take photos I got bombed by Mozzies, it was insane!!

We were on the hunt for a new camping spot.  I’ve totally loved it here, but after 5 weeks of catching little Trevalley and Queenies, I need a change of scenery and fish.  Our first stop was the other side of Willie Creek.  Yah we didn't get far, it will take us a lot longer than 2 years to get around Australia at this rate!  As soon as we pulled onto the beach, we saw 2 huge sharks right in the waves, what could have been sailfish or dolphins jumping out further, bait fish and birds everywhere.  Yip, we will come camp here.  I've missed being right on the beach.  We can see the ocean from our camp here but have the lagoon (which has had  no water in it all last week) between us and the big ocean, we are moving back to the sea shore!

Charlie enjoyed the beach the other side of the creek.

We were surprised at the amount of people at Barred Creek, we have in the past camped there for months on end without seeing a single other person.  Obviously the word is out that it isn’t ‘Barren’ creek, as it used to be called, and how beautiful it is there.  Mostly Broomies up enjoying there time off, it was cool to see so many families enjoying the great outdoors.  Anticipating not so many people there when everyone goes back to work, but plenty of space on the beach anyway; Yes we will camp here!

We drove the coast road from Barred to Quondong, because it’s such a lovely drive, only seeing a few holiday makers, it is much harder to get to the ocean over the large sand dunes.  Quondong Point is starting to fill up, but not as busy as we have seen it in the past.  Three large caravans were parked where we had camped last month.  We were glad we made the choice to go there early in the season, no need to come back to camping here for a few months.

Quondong Point would have been in the ‘buffer zone’ if the Gas Pipe went ahead, meaning no public access from there up.  So when we started on the road North of QP my heart was singing with joy.

Price Point and the surrounding area is still as awesome as I remember!  The Pindan rocks merging with the white sand, crystal blue water reaching for the sand in the opposite direction.  Heaven on Earth!  God’s country!  Another of my happy places.

I’m keeping all photos of this dramatic scenery until we get there, because that is where we are off to next!!  One more vet check (at the moment, it’s not fixed) on Thursday, then we are off up the coast!

Female Kimberley Red on drive between Barred and Quondong

Baby Sea Eagle at the very end of the road: I wonder if it's the same one I seen all the way down at Willie Creek a few weeks back?