Ningaloo ho-Le-day
Who starts an equine photography business coming into winter?? That would be me. Rookie error, but here we are, so for those horsey nuts who love adventuring, wildlife and landscapes, here’s a little sneak peak into my other life.
Who starts an equine photography business as it’s coming into winter??? Me. Let’s just clock this one up as a rookie error and look forward to spring.
Thankfully I already had something else planned for June. And hopefully (surely??) we have a few horsey nuts on here, who also enjoy a bit of adventuring and the beauty of landscapes. Turning 40, I decided to run away to a far away destination all the way across the other side of Australia. Exmouth to be exact. 4,456 kilometres away.
My first tip would be book in advance… well in advance. Don’t do what I did and think “we’ll just arrive, and sort it out from there”. Luckily the husband suggested I should just double check the tours I wanted to do… specifically the whale sharks, and 3 months out, nearly all the tours were already booked! In short… book accommodation atleast 6 months prior, whale shark, diving and snorkelling tours atleast 3 months prior, and book a hire car atleast 3 months prior. My second tip is book a 4wd. So many of the spots are only accessible with one. We booked a 4wd for the whole trip and while expensive, don’t regret it a bit. It gave us the freedom to explore where, when and what we wanted. Ningaloo is a 30 - 60 minute drive from Exmouth, and the closest canyon is 20 minutes.
We spent 1 week in Exmouth and it was the perfect amount of time.
There are only a couple options flying in to Exmouth and we had to do a stop over in Perth. After a couple of delays, we flew in around 3pm. The airport is something off an Australian movie. It is a big tin shed with louvres to let the breeze through, one conveyor belt for the suitcases that went in and out of the shed wall and a sign cautioning everyone of dingoes in the area.
We spent the rest of the afternoon doing all the adminny things like picking up the hire car, checking in, unpacking and getting some food essentials. Exmouth is quite an expensive location. There are plenty of cafe and restaurant options for breakfast, lunch and dinner (and coffee) and two IGAs. The IGAs are almost opposite each other and not even the locals could tell me why there were two… If you know, pleeaassseeee spill the beans! My third tip is Bamboo do very good (and early) coffee and Whalers Restaurant has amazing dinner and cocktails.
We stayed at Exmouth Escape Resort and did the 10 minute walk to Town beach to watch the sunrise on a few of the slower mornings. I was surprised how many came to do the same thing, except everyone else drove and sat in their cars. I feel that the bitter wind and sand stinging your legs was part of the experience though.
We had to cancel a couple of our tour bookings due to (very) high wind, namely the manta ray tour and scuba diving. I’ve included where we would have done this in the itinerary. We used the extra time we had to do some extra snorkelling and ended up seeing an octopus!!!
Itinerary
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Whale shark tour. We went out for the full day with Ningaloo Blue. They were one of the more expensive options, but included free photography and a smaller group of people. After a lot of googling and searching, all of the tours up there are top notch. You won’t be dissapointed whichever you go with.
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Vlamingh Head, Lakeside and Turquoise Bay. We stopped at the light house (Vlamingh Head) and had a little looksee and then carried on to Milyering Information Centre and then Lakeside to snorkel. Lakeside is full of bombies, coral and hundreds of thousands of fish. We then went down to Turquoise Bay and did the famous drift swim. The current is surprisingly strong, but we saw a snoozing green turtle, 2 stingrays and lots of fish.
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Jurabbi Sand Dunes, Yardie Creek and Sandy Bay. The sand dunes are a bit tricky to find, but worth the effort. They look straight into the ocean and standing on them we saw a turtle swimming by. The dunes would be cool for a sunrise or sunset photoshoot with someone in a big floaty dress. We did the Yardie Creek hike and boat tour and recommend both. It’s definitely worth seeing from both above and below. Yardie Creek is a bird haven, we saw flocks of cockatiels, ospreys, corellas, galahs, doves and seagulls.
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Charles Knife Canyon, Shothole Canyon, Badjirrajirra Loop Trail. We got up for sunrise and watched it rise out of the ocean over Charles Knife Canyon. It is an easy drive from Exmouth, with plenty of parking spots. It is quite the popular spot. We then went on the Badjirrajirra Loop Trail and did the 8km hike. It was amazing and the views over the Shothole canyon were incredible. On our way back, we did the 4wd into Shothole canyon and it literally feels like another world. Such a cool experience. If I had my time again, I would do Badjirrajirra for sunrise (at the Thomas Carter lookout) and Charles Knife for sunset.
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Mandu Mandu Gorge and scenic flight. The gorge is another Level 4 hike with beautiful views out to the ocean. We saw black flanked rock wallabies and a little joey jumping about the rocks. The scenic flight was a great way to see the canyons, Ningaloo reef and the ocean from above. If hiking isn’t your thing, I would definitely recommend.
You could definitely fit a snorkel in at your favourite spot on this day, or combine with Day 3. I like my days jam-packed with minimal downtime
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Coral Bay (Manta Ray Tour). We drove to Coral Bay and the scenery on the drive down was unexpected. Beautiful golden grasses surround hundreds of termite mounds! Coral Bay is much more of a sleepy town. We had a lovely walk along the coast and lunch at one of the pubs and headed home. We had booked a manta ray tour for this day, but unfortunately was too windy.
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Jurabbi Coastal Park and snorkelling (scuba dive). We had to come up with something else to do on our last day as our scuba dive tour was cancelled due to strong winds. We had a look at the beaches on the Gulf side of Exmouth, Jurabbi Coastal Park (we saw 4 turtles swimming in one spot!) and then did some more snorkelling. Lakeside was our favourite so we finished here and saw an octopus! Like wow.
While scuba diving Muiron Islands or the Navy pier would have been epic, seeing the octopus made it the salt sting a little less.
You can see some more videos of our time here.