Day 57 – Margaret River (Augusta, Cape Leeuwin)

Today we celebrated my birthday by spending the day underground!  Well, some of it anyway. Located about ½ south of Margaret River is Caves Road, on which there are about 6 different beautiful caves to visit. It is a little confusing, because 2 are run by the Department of Environment and Conservation, and four are organised  by the local Tourist Authority. As you may guess, the DEC ones are much cheaper, self guided, and really more family orientated. We started off at the Giants Cave, and after donning our hard hats, headlamps (kids), and hand torches, we descended down into the cave.

 

 

 

After climbing down a quite steep steps, we reached the cave entrance and climbed down inside. After a while we then needed to climb up a completely vertical ladder (in the pitch darkness, except for our torches). The kids loved it! We scrambled over rocks, hoisted ourselves down the side of rocky cliffs using a rope, and into huge caverns filled with beautiful stalagmite and stalagmite formations.

 After squeezing through holes, and around corners, we finally made it to the end.  A great adventure!

Next we drove the few kms down the road to the Calgardup Caves. Once again we donned hardhats and torches, and descended down into the cave. This one was a lot easier, and had boardwalks inside the cave (in two directions), and eventually we found beautiful colourful crystal, stalactites, stalagmites and walls of flowstones. 

After viewing the beautiful chambers, up we went up the huge vertical stairs back into the sunlight. The bushwalk surrounding the cave is also beautiful, and being wildflower season we enjoyed the orchids , flowering boronias and many other gorgeous flowers.

After exhausting ourselves with all the climbing and walking, we ate our picnic lunch to regain our energy, and then completed the nearby Boranup Karri Forest drive through the magnificent, tall, karri forest.

As we continued south through the pretty coastal town of Augusta, we made our way out to the extremely windy Cape Leeuwin lighthouse and calcified waterwheel. This is where the Indian Ocean and the Southern Ocean meet, and it is an extremely wild and woolly place. The beautifully colored turquoise sea was foaming and frothing today, but it would be a beautiful place in summer.

 

We looked around the newly built boat harbour, and watched a playful seal, coasting along near the shoreline.

 After our windblown experience walking around, we headed back up the Bussell Highway to Margaret River, where we spent the remainder of the afternoon walking around the lovely shops, trying a few more samples of food, (yummy fudge tastings here) etc and visiting the array of tourist shops and boutiques. A great way to spend a day.