Dianne, Donnybrook and Margaret River 3 to 10/10/15

Bunbury and Donnybrook 3 to 7/10/15

landscape around Donnybrook, apple and cherry orchards

We drove south towards Bunbury where we wanted to meet Dianne, who is visiting her son. It was a bit too far for a days drive and we thought we take it easy. So we took the detour from Armadale through the Midgegooroo National Park. It took us a while to find the free camp and it even though the area is nice there’s not much to report. After a cool and fairly loud evening we drove on early next morning. Just after lunch we arrived in Australind/Bunbury and Sarah had a happy reunion with Dianne. It’s great to see that it only took her 2 min to connect with her again. We had a lovely afternoon until some nice neighbor called the Ranger. Despite it being Sunday and School Holiday no one is allowed to park in a public school park ground - or at least not a caravan. Apparently the public school parking ground is private land. Well, long story short, instead of staying with Dianne for dinner we had to find a caravan park. Unfortunately, Dianne was ill the next day and we couldn’t meet her again. (sorry, we didn't take any pictures here)

We spend half a day in Bunbury, shopping fruit, veg and deli in a fantastic, permanent farmer markets and looked at the Catholic Church because Sarah wanted to see it. After lunch we drove to Donnybrook, which has the largest free playground in Western Australia, the Apple fun park, donated by apple farmers. The region is big in apple and pear growing and we saw a lot of trees starting to blossom, with cherries already in full bloom. 

We bought some apples and pears from a local farm and talked to the young farmer’s woman. They have reduced a lot of the apple orchards, as it is too labor intensive. Instead they produce more pears and especially avocados, which have a huge export market and therefore the prices are much better. They have to pay casual workers $22/hour. At least there is no shortage in backpackers trying to find work.

Gnomesville

Sarah and the Gnomes - Sarah und die Gartenzwerge 

From Donnybrook we drove a few km to ‘Gnomesville’ – a bizarre roadside gatherings of thousands of garden gnomes. At least Sarah had fun looking, and walking through all those gnomes. 

Mon, I didn't know you've been here before ;-) the last picture is for you!

Apple Fun Park

Sarah had a lot of playtime on the big playground together with our camp neighbors’ kids, Mia (6), Cloe (9)  and a 4 y old boy (she mainly played with Mia). It was good to see her completely ignoring us and having so much fun with the other kids.

Giant Jarrah tree

Next day, after another long session on the playground we headed to Bridgetown to enjoy lunch and cider tasting at ‘The Cidery’.  It’s a small, boutique cider factory, which produces about 5 very different, all very palatable ciders. They also make 2 kinds of apple juice, so Sarah could enjoy a tasting as well. We stopped for the night at a nice National Park campground called ‘workers pool’. It was great to have a quite camp after those full on days at Donnybrook.

 Big Valley campground in the Margaret River region 8/10/15

 working sheep farm, different quality wool, shearing, sorting, compressing, naked sheep, back to the pasture

The Magaret River region is full of wineries and deli shops, from cheese to chocolate. There is a lot to see, caves, lighthouses, mazes and we figured out that it won’t be easy to drive around with the big rig in tow. We decided to set up camp at a working sheep farm (2500 sheep), around 7 km from Magaret River (town), in the heart of the region. It’s a lovely camp ground and the day we arrived they started their annual shearing, gathering the sheep with motorbikes, rattles and a dog. The lambs were separated from the mothers for the shearing. 3 men were shearing, 2 of them did about 10 sheep/h, where an 44 year old english guy did about 15 sheep/h. They work 4 x  2 hour shifts with 30 min breaks. This particular shearer is shearing for 26 years - travelling the world depending on season from Europe to Australia to New Zealand. In some years he sheared more than 60,000 sheep and more than 1 million in his lifetime! There are about 12 people involved in the process - getting the sheep in, cleaning the floor, picking up the fleece and sorting it according to quality. And one person is operating the press which compacts around 40-50 fleeces to approximately 1 m3 packs that weigh 200kg. The sales value is around $2000. Sarah liked watching the whole buzz and excitement, she picked up wool and looked at the sheep, some with bleeding injuries from the shearing. It was a very interesting experience and exactly what we missed on the Gibb River Road with the big cattle stations - getting close to the action.