Denmark & Walpole, WA

8^th November to 12th November

Our next stop was at a council run campground about 25km west of Denmark, it is unpowered, has flushing toilets, solar heated showers and fire pits. It is completely run and maintained by volunteer staff and is over half the cost of the caravan parks in and near town and for $5.00 you get a wheelbarrow of chopped wood!!!! Thankfully when we arrived just before lunch there were plenty of spots still available, our next hurdle though was seeing if the van fit under the height restriction bar, thankfully it did by a mere 10mls. Nik got up on the van to get the best vantage point to guide me through, then as we were slowly driving under people were yelling out to stop you’re not going to fit, with Nik yelling back at them ‘Nah mate,we’re right!!!!’ And yes we were right mate!!!!

After we set up and had lunch we jumped in the car and headed back to Denmark to the information centre to find out the must sees. From there we decided to do the Ocean scenic drive back to camp, so we drove along the Denmark River to the ocean mouth and the Denmark Life Saving Club, where we stopped for a while watching the locals surf and spotted many pods of dolphins near the mouth of the inlet. We continued onto a few look outs, checked out the ‘elephant rocks’ and Greens Pool and then headed back to the main road, stopping at the Denmark Chocolate Factory for a coffee and chocolate which was delicious. Just when we thought that we had eaten enough sugar we spied a toffee factory and of course had to pull in to check it out!!! And check it out we did, cutting a long story short, lets just finish by saying we made a considerable contribution to Denmark’s economy…….

 

Our next tourist drive saw us do the Scottsdale Scenic route just north of Denmark, we had 2 stops along here, the Denmark Alpaca and Animal Farm and the cheese factory. We pulled into the animal farm and based on initial looks figured we’d be in and out of there quick smart, but we were happily proven wrong. After we choked on the price we entered what can only be described as a menagerie of animals, there were goats, alpacas, llamas, kangaroos, chickens, roosters, hamsters, rabbits, racing pigeons, horses, cows, highland Scottish cows, emus, a camel, ferrets, sheep, lambs, ducks, koalas, 6 week old baby goats, galahs, turkeys and an orphaned 5 month joey. The kids had a great time patting and feeding all the animals with the hamsters and rabbits getting lots of cuddles but the highlight was the baby goats Cliff and Norm who would stand there and suck on Jesse’s fingers and the little joey who after a brief play crawled into its pouch (a pillowcase) and proceeded to suck its claws.

After the farm we went to the cheese factory and resisted too much temptation and only bought some yummy cheese. The scenic drive took us back into Denmark where we had lunch at the ‘award winning’ Denmark Bakery which was great as they did gluten free hot chips, the girls were in heaven as it had been a while since we had found a place that didn’t deep fry their chips with battered food.

Whilst in the area we also made a trip to Walpole and the Tree Tops Walk and Giant Tingle Tree, both of which we had visited some 7 years prior but as Jess was only one and Abby three at the time we decided to have another look. The trees were really massive and quite impressive up close, whilst the tree tops walk had us all hanging on to the rails as it was quite bouncy.

After playing busy tourist for a few days straight we decided to spend a few days around camp just chilling and also relaxing and fishing at the beach, the weather was not bad and the girls had fun swimming, while Nik fished, after which we packed up and headed off on our next adventure and destination on our OZLAP……..