Follow the blue trail above.
Porongurup Range Tourist Park 19 June
As our next destination took us past the turnoff to the van park, we decided to drop in and introduce ourselves. It turned out that the owners, Fredy & Ulli were in Perth visiting a sick friend. Their friends from Mandurah, Sue & Colin had been left in charge and made us feel very welcome. We loved the bush setting of the park and looked forward to spending a couple of months here.
Cambinata Yabbies Farmstay 20 June
A great camp spot for $10 a night with showers & flushing toilets in a renovated shearing shed where they host the silver service Cambinata Extravaganza. This event celebrates the diversity & fabulous products of Heartlands using regional foods. Their yabbies are sold to restaurants in Australia & around the world. We found the tour of their processing facilities very informative.
Drove up to Wave Rock at Hyden from the farmstay. By the time we got there, it was bucketing down. Glad we keep wet weather gear in the car. Shame we forgot to put it on. We did the walk around the breakaways that is just off the road before arriving at the Wave Rock car park. We ended up totally soaked even with the umbrella. Never seen Sammy jump in the car so quick. Usually we have to pick him up & put him in the car as he is still hesitant after being so car sick in his first 12mths. We decided to give Wave Rock a miss. We had camped at Pildappa Rock in SA which we had been told was just as good and it was free. Besides the path leading up to Wave Rock was flowing well after the down pour.
Dumbleyung 24 June
Lake Nunijup 25 June
This is a great free camp with clean flushing toilets. Lots of firewood & a fire pit. Locals are very welcoming & happy that the camp is being used. You are able to park on what was once the tennis courts with the use of the verandah of the club house to ponder on how good life is, while watching all the black swans enjoying life on the lake. This became one of our favourite camps when in the area.
Mount Barker 27 June
Before heading back to Porongurup we decided to stop the night at the free 24hr rest area in Mt Barker to stock up on food & liquid supplies. Also decided to do our “pay it back” for the free camp & had dinner at one if the pubs. The recommended one (The Top Pub) was booked out unfortunately.
Porongurup Range Tourist Park 28 June – 13 Sept
While in Tassie we applied for the position of caretakers for the Porongurup Range Tourist Park from July to September 2015 and were lucky enough to get it. The owners, Fredy & Ulli were taking a well earned and long time coming holiday to Phuket & visiting family in Germany. This was a new experience for us and thoroughly enjoyed it. We did all aspects of managing a caravan park – telephone enquiries, bookings, cleaning of amenities, camp kitchen, gazebos & cabins, grounds maintenance – which was an ongoing battle with the so called “honky nuts” (gum nuts for us easterners:). Fredy said they would be slowing down over winter – yeah right😏. The black cockatoos and parrots thought it was great fun dropping them on the amenities roof. The community was very welcoming with being provided with local eggs, fruit, homemade jams & chutneys & wines. Thoroughly enjoyed all the wines that we managed to taste – a bit of a hardship, but we had to be able to advise fellow travellers staying at the park😉. This wine region is older than Margaret River and must say I much preferred their wines. Porongurup is well situated for day trips to Albany & the Stirling Ranges. We didn’t manage any walks at Stirling Ranges but did the scenic drive through the centre. From the distance it looks like one long range, but is actually made up of lots of ranges/mountains. There was a couple of snow falls during our time there on top of the Porongurup & Stirling Ranges. We opted to look at photos that some energetic people took ⛄️ We managed to do the Granite Skywalk & Devils Slide walks in the Porongurup Range – each taking approx 2 and a half hours including lunch and lots of pics. And would you believe we had forgotten to do the caches that were hidden on both walks 😕. Beginning of September we said our farewells to people who we had grown fond of. It’s sad that we are meeting and making friends with people we may never see again , but definitely adds to our travelling experience.
Granite Skywalk
Devil’s Slide
During our stay at Porongurup the element had died in our third hot water system since moving into our van Dec 2013. So we had arranged for a replacement in Albany when on our way to a house sit in Walpole.
Glen & Debs Travels 
Obviously still doing it tough guy’s 🙂 keep it up!
It’s hard work, but doing our best😉.