While we were in this diverse World Heritage listed neck of the woods, we decided to venture out to Cape Peron. The peninsula was first visited by Francois Peron, whose name the National Park bears. He recorded the state of the environment at the time of his visit, and today, Project Eden aims to rid the peninsula of feral animals allowing the reintroduction of native species that once lived here such as the bilby, malleefowl, and bandicoots returning the region to the way it was before the Europeans arrived.
The whole peninsula west of the road to Monkey Mia was a pastoral lease which was returned to the government and declared a National Park in the early 1990s. We visited the old (not quite historic yet – but one day it will be) homestead. The wool sheds were really interesting. They aren’t that outdated really, and they look like the shearers just walked out last week.

There’s also an artesian bore fed hot tub. The water was about 40 degrees! It would be just awful on a hot day, so lucky we were there on an overcast, cool day.
Once you leave the homestead, the track is deep soft sand. So it’s 4WD only and very low tyre pressure. We drove right to the end of the peninsula – Cape Peron. There’s a short walk to do called Wanamalu Trail from Skipjack Point to Cape Peron. The views are just sensational.

The red, red sandstone cliffs against the blue water and white sand are stunning.
There are cliff top lookouts where you can see down over the water below and see the marine life of sharks, dolphins, dugongs, turtles and the thousands of trevally – called skipjack here, hence the name of the point.

From the cliff top walk, we could see down to these cormorants (hundreds of them) lined up along the water’s edge.

The boys found time to stooge around for the camera…….

We finally got to the turnaround point – Cape Peron – after longer than it should usually take to walk just 1.5km. The sand was soft and slow, and very unkind to a walker’s gait. We paused for a rest above the beach.

John suggested we walk back via the beach (instead of back through the thick sand), and claimed he’d seen a path leading from the beach to an earlier lookout. So we descended to the shoreline and wandered back this way. It was here we met with all those cormorants. Actually they call them ‘darters’ in these parts. Same thing.

And yes, Fergus and Harry ran up to them and made them all fly away. Who wouldn’t?
We also saw dozens of crabs zipping across the sand. One didn’t zip fast enough to avoid Harry.

We finally came to the area below the lookout. This is where John claimed there was a path to return to the top. There is no path here. He now says he saw a “navigable route”. This meant scrambling up an insanely steep slope of spinifex and sand (read: no hand holds) with no definable route except to progress up the not quite vertical side of the cliff, rather than down. Anyway, we made it. But we trust John just a little bit less.
We camped at one of the three areas available in the National Park, a spot called Gregories. It was a nice quite place. The boys took the kayak, dive gear and spear gun out to the edge of the reef. It turned out to be just an exercise in unpacking and packing the gear. Say no more. Chicken for dinner.
Wildflowers are everywhere here, and I snapped a heap more photos for my collection. When the sun had gone down, we could see the beacon flashing from Skipjack Point and hear the ocean smashing the shore. Another cool place to camp.