Just got back from a trip across Aus and back again , what a fantastic country we live in BUT what a rubbish tip it is . Does the brown signs with the T on them stand for
toilet or trash ?????? . A certain Nullarbor
cave which has large pool of water at the bottom with a small island in the middle has empty beer bottles dumped on it ! Collie in WA has a river drive from town down to a
Blue Lake ( Diamond Lake a old open cut coal
mine ) every site along the river is full of
toilet paper , tins , bottles , syringe disposal packs , fast food wrappers ,
Wellington Dam , great place but when trying to find a clean place up the back to have a fish we gave up ( its currently marron season and people are every where chasing marron ) after navigating a kilometre or so along the shore line and still not clear of
toilet paper , bottles ,chook pellet bags. I finally pulled up to have a fish but the area I chose to stop was a bad one " a dead roo ( marron bait ) and other crap made it quite unpleasant .
Below
Wellington Dam a beautiful river ( excellent tail race fishery and marron stream and reasonably clean except for the camping areas where
toilet paper is every where in the bush . The Honeymoon Pools a truly great spot with some nice fish , gin clear water . Started the trip around the SW but every where there is rubbish . WA still allows alot of beach driving but believe it or not people will pull up on a beach and have a fish / swim / picnic/ fish and drive off and leave every plastic plate , empty tin , bottle and bait packet on the beach .
Bunbury had the greatest crabbing ever and we had a few feeds of succulent Blue Swimmer . As we worked our way South camping it was the same story , every
camp-site we chose was littered to some degree of
toilet paper and trash . The huge dunes near where the Warren River meets the Indian Ocean is a unbelievable place and you can
camp in a number of
places but just
check out the trash . So many National Parks and so much
toilet paper and junk . Got to "
The Gap "
Natural Bridge " and the Blow Holes . On the walk down to the Blow Holes a group of Banksia on the left provide a large protected area , it is reeking and full of
toilet paper , faeces , bottles , cans and a few skinny angels ( Ultra Thin with Wings ) , Maybe it gets better as you get further out ????? No it is basically the same every where .
Cape Arid National Park is simply stunning but the
camp areas are full of
toilet paper and crap , beaches have flotsam at high tide mark that carries every thing with it , we are choking on plastic . Seal Creek , caught some Salmon and Flat Head here , walked to the head land east of us to find campers near us had fished there last night and left all their empty beer bottles and bait packets on the beach .
Israelite Bay , same thing even though signs implore people to keep the bay clean , head land on the southern extremity of the bay good fishing ( cracks in the rocks here hold bottles and cans ) from here to Mount Ragged , very remote , decide to climb Tower Peak ( wonder if any one has taken a dump on the top ??? ) about 1/2 way up a packet of Pizza Shapes looks out of place in this litter free place , I revert to my Filthy Habit of picking up other peoples junk . A bit further a long is a discarded pair of " panties " looks like they have been used in place of
toilet paper . Made it to the cairn at the top and no other rubbish . Eventually hit the tar again at Balladonia and head East again , turn off at Cocklebiddy and head South Again for
Twilight Cove 30 kms South , people at the road house warn it may take three hours . What a spectacular place but the rubbish here gets worse ,
camp-sites littered with every sort of garbage and of course the now expected
toilet paper ( don't know if I mentioned it but its just not on the ground but also in the bushes like decoration's . Also the tides here dump huuuuuuuuge amounts of rubbish in this cove at the end of the cliffs . Caught some Salmon here and blown away by the beauty of the place and the wind . Australia Day Eve and a warning of a bad storm going to hit . Decide to
camp in a big
cave under the cliffs at the Western End of the Cove out of the Rain and Winds . Fresh tracks out side show the one other camper here visited here the day before . I
check out the
cave " old mate has taken a dump here in the
cave and didn't bury any part of it and the
toilet paper litters the floor of the
cave along with a oil bottle , a couple of plastic bottles , a plastic hair roller and a fluro object which I think might be a fishing float . Rubbish along the base of the cliffs here every where , the Southern Ocean is concentrating piles of plastic here .
A great night was spent watching a ferocious electrical storm from the haven of the
cave and went to sleep with the rain belting down and the interior of the
cave being illuminated by the hundreds of lightning strikes occurring , thoughts of Stuart Diver came to me as I lay under the huge
Limestone Cliffs and I also wondered if this
cave was where Alby Mangles spent some time many years ago . Next day found a strange object in the scrub above , wonder whether ith may be part of Skylab which crashed between here and Balladonia ???? . South Australia is remarkedly BETTER , wonder whether it has any thing to do with the Government here have a refund on containers purchased here ??????? . A large dark patch among the white dunes here invited inspection , what I discovered was stunning , the area had taken a massive hit of lighting in years gone by and the dunes were a mass of FULGARITES , some as big as a leg and up to one and a half meters high and one of the most remarkable to my was no beer bottles , alcho pop cans or
toilet paper . A lot of the FULGARITES were still vertical in the sand .
Stopped at a
Parking area near POOCHERA , the Blue Signs with the P on them , woke in the morning surrounded by
toilet paper , tyres , pallets , wrappers and radiator coolant containers . This P areas was the same from one end to the other and it wasn't until back in NSW I could find a worse one ,
check it out for yourselves its the one between
Molong and
Wellington on the BELL River , S 32d 54'41.05" E 148d53,26.62" maybe its actually the local tip and the
Rest Area Sign is out of place .
Any one rember the " Take nothing but photo's leave nothing but foot prints " or " Leave a place in the same condition or better as when you found it " or " bury your
toilet waste " seems there's a lot of people who go to the extremes to get to the unique
places we are so lucky to have in Aus and to enjoy them and then crap on them and leave !
Its still a great country and its not until you leave it and come back do you realise how lucky we are , I cant believe we are a nation of dumpers ? Maybe I am mistaken and am looking to hard , just look at the obvious beauty and DONT LOOK TOO HARD around you .
Cheers
Ken