After the pinnacles we drove through Jurien Bay, stopping to send off (at last) Darren’s application for compensation for his assault. Our plan was to get as close to Geraldton as possible, and we chose a camp site on the beach about 100km south of it.
30km before the camp site there was evidence of a bush fire to the west of the road. As we went on it was very clear there had been a serious bushfire, which had even crossed the road in places. The area was desolate and blackened, with little vegetation left. Driving through such devastation really silences one, and we left each other to our own contemplations about what we saw. With the fires in Victoria almost exactly the year before, still fresh in all our memories, it was a sombre drive. The ash swirled up in eddies in the wind, but there was also evidence of the occasional area still slightly smouldering, and the last vestiges of smoke still lifting from the charred remains of the undergrowth.
Evidence of the fire had eased off when we reached our camp; clearly this was a small bit of land that did not get hit by it. It was a great spot, with large shady trees and the sea just metres away.
In the evening Darren came back from a wander with a camera he had found on the beach. Neatly nearby to it were a ladies’ and a men’s pair of thongs (flip flops). Darren said it was rather weird just finding them lying there facing out to sea. The owner, however, had brilliantly engraved his driving licence number into the side of the camera. We decided to contact our mate Dylan, a police officer in Queensland, who could track the owner down and ask them to call us. We hoped against hope they had not met with a sticky end – there aren’t meant to be man eating sharks in the area…but with the sea and the thongs, and no one about, it was a bit strange…
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