Having flown from the tropical heat of Bali into the winter cold of Perth it was a relief to find our car had already arrived safe and sound several days earlier. We managed to get her cleared through customs and quarantine reasonably quickly and dig out our warm clothes again. We spent the next couple of weeks in Fremantle sorting things out, servicing the car and waiting for some spare parts to be send out from the UK.

While waiting for the parts we went off on a short tour of the south west. First stop: Wave Rock (left) and then cross-country down towards the coast.

We arrived at the Fitzgerald River National Park just before sunset and set up camp next to the deserted 'Four Mile Beach' (right). A very windy night, but beautiful to wake up to the peaceful sound of the sea and wander along the white sandy beach.

As we drove on through the rugged park scenery towards Albany the weather closed in and the rocky coastline began to feel more like North Devon than Australia. We got soaked at the blow holes and the natural bridge rock formations and opted to stay in a hostel to dry out (nothing to do with the fact they advertised free coffee and cake).

We stopped off briefly to climb the 'Gloucester Fire Tree' (60m) and fight off the parrots before driving on to Margaret River to visit the vineyards. By the end of the day we had acquired both an in-depth knowledge of the finer details of the wine making industry and a few more bottles than we'd intended.

We drove back to Freo via Bunbury hoping to pick up the spare parts on the way, but in true LandRover dealership style, it turns out that they parts could take months to arrive, so we 'decided' we could make do without them.

A couple of days later we were ready to leave Freo again and followed the coast north on an off-road track through the dunes. Having neglected to take our tyre pressures down we got stuck fairly quickly and were pulled out by some friendly and bemused Aussies.

We found a secluded spot to camp next to the sea and watched as the kangeroos appeared at dusk. Our 'Free Camping in the North of WA' book has already paid for itself - we've found some great spots and saved ourselves a lot of money.

We followed the track through the dunes and along the beach, stopping for breakfast at beautiful 'Hangover Bay'. At Cervantes we turned off towards the Pinnacles desert to see some more odd shaped rocks (below).

Our decision at this point to take a large detour away from the coast and along the 'Wildflower Way' wasn't one of our best. The area is supposed to be spectactular at this time of year and one of the highlights of WA. Perhaps it was a particularly bad year, but the lack of wild flowers was really quite remarkable.

Ironically once we headed back to the coast again, the fields were full of colour (below).

Slightly further up the coast, Kalbarri National Park was our next port of call. Characterised by its dramatic rocky coastlines and impressive gorges including the 'natural window' (below) and Z bend. We spent a while exploring (nothing too strenuous) and saw our first snake

Further up the coast we detoured to visit the infamous Monkey Mia to see just how contrived feeding 'wild' dolphins could be - we weren't disappointed!

The Peninsula itself is very beautiful - the white shell beach and the stromalites (calcious mounds created by cynobacteria, related to the original life forms on earth 3.5 billion years ago) were worth the detour.

The 4x4 track to the tip of the peninsula led us to a deserted red, sandy beach where we saw a couple of dugongs (sea cows). Apparently the Shark Bay area contains 10% of the world's dugong population so the chances of seeing one were quite high.

We contemplated driving the 'Useless Loop' 4x4 drive, but there just didn't seem any point...

Australia's wildlife has put on a good show for us so far - as soon as you step off the main highways you see all sorts of weird and wonderful creatures. We found this little fellow - a Thorny Devil - being attacked by a lizard at the side of our track.

Added to this we've also seen very large, spotted lizards, iguanas, euros (type of kangeroo) and a large number of birds of prey.

The next peninsula along the Shark Bay coast (Exmouth) was even more beautiful. We were able to camp amongst the dunes, some emus wandered into our camp at dusk.

Our next few days were spent in the Exmouth area. At the aptly named Turquoise Bay (left) we snorkelled with turtles and scarily large fish. The water was deceptively cold although we have now officially re-entered the tropics. We had hoped to dive at the Navy Pier as the marine life is supposed to be second to none, but unfortunately it was too windy while we were there.

However, we went whale watching instead and saw loads of humpback whales. It was a spectacular sight to see them breach right out of the water. For the first time in many years the numbers are actually on the increase.

From here we head inland....