Road Trip!!! Part 2: Margaret River - Albany

Today we left Margaret River to head towards the south coast of Western Austrlia and the little town of Albany. They're incredibly touchy in Albany about the pronunciation of the name - its not All-bany, but AAAAAAAAAAAHHLbany. Just in case anyone should ever venture close...

The main stop today was in the Kauri forests near the towns of Walpole and Denmark (no up!). The trees are up to 60 metres tall and have very few thick branches - which are all concetrated at the very top. It's truly impressive going from a dusty road to a meandering lane through the forest. They've built an elevated tree-top walk through some of the trees at a park called "Valley of the Giants". There is no way I could capture the enormous height on my camera, it was awesome (especially since the walkway bounced if you jumped on it a bit... which I did... obviously).

We drove on towards Aaaaaaahlbany and found the hostel with just a few wrong turns (not too bad considering we don't have maps, and only have the Avis mini map of main highways to guide us in our pursuit... then again, that's part of the ADVENTURE : Lost, in the Outback - the Marisa Way.)

The hostel is... interesting. Some of the finer points include murals of mermaids/mermen smoking weed, a completely confusing layout with 5 different sets of stairs through winding corridors leading up to our room (this is where I curse my bag with wheels and wished I had a backpack), and a female bathroom with a door that won't lock / only shower curtains covering the showers / a nice large window with diaphanous curtains overlooking the communcal garden-patio-BBQ area. Nice... so I guess part of the evening's entertainment is watching us shower. Though they did miss the red light, which would have just made it all feel a little more authentic...

Which brings me to our room, number 12. Nice and spacious, on the garden-side of the building, odd murals but nothing too worrying... until you notice the smell. Let's just say I had visions of PinkelBoy. Unfortunately, it was the last and ONLY room to be had in Albany, at any hostel or budget motel, so we had to make do. I'm hanging on for the resort in Bali!

Having installed the luggage, we ventured to the supermarket, at the same time that a firetruck pulled up to get snacks. When one of them said to me "hang on, I know you from somewhere" I thought: "here we go...blah blah blah, creep". But no, turns out he did know me from Manjimup where we had stopped for a restroom break. He'd been trying to get into the men's bathroom when I was trying to get my bag out of the car and thus unintentionally blocked the way with the car's door. We exchanged 6 words - (me) "Sorry" and (him) "That's ok, take your time". But it apparently left a lasting impression on one of us. We made a "date" to go see Darren at the fire station the next night so Kelly could get a picture of her in a firetruck (one of her dares from friends back home) and I could presumably spend quality time making unfcomfortable small-talk while she did that.

Luckily the next day was a Sunday (everything is closed, even the McDonald's) and it rained for most of the day, so we weren't distracted by the whole relax-on-a-beach-and-get-a-tan thing. The fire station date was even an exciting prospect! We went to see the main attractions in the area - the Gap (a gap inbetween 2 rocky cliffs where the sea pounds onto the land), the King Wave (a rocky cliff where the sea pounds onto the land making rather large waves), the Natural Bridge (a rock formation which has been carved out by the sea to form...a natural bridge). Exciting stuff, especially when you're wearing glittery blue ballet slipper shoes, its raining and windy, and there's little "dangerous!" signs all over the walkway!

We finished the evening off with yet another movie - it was so good that I don't remember what it was - before heading for the evening shift at the fire station. Darren was unbelievably helpful and let us borrow their maps for WA to plot the rest of the route. He also gave us lots of helpful hints for overtaking roadtrains, avoiding Kangaroo roadkill, while making repeated references to the fact that he owns several businesses besides being a fireman, has family in Holland, and is single... we left before he could tell me how much he identifies with ferns... :)