Tuesday June 22
We flew to Perth on the 10:30am flight - business class using AA points - flat beds all the way with a nice lunch and an excellent movie selection. On arrival we caught a taxi to the newly opened Westin (of course our “new Australian” taxi driver had no idea how to get there). On check-in we found out our Club Room also had a $50 dining credit - so after a walk around the town and a rest we hit the lounge then had dinner the restaurant. To our surprise the restaurant was very busy - it is a bistro with a hip-hop and happening ambience but the food was a bit of a disappointment.
It was then off to bed.
Wednesday June 23
We taxied back to the airport bright and early for our flight to Exmouth - arriving around mid-day. We collected our hire-car - a 4WD drive Prado with over 90,000 K’s on the clock. We drove the 30 K’s from Learmonth to our hotel in Exmouth - the Mantarays Resort - to our surprise our room, a “one-bedroom bungalow” was nothing more than a room with a mini-fridge - we had been expecting a kitchen.
We had a quick lunch at the hotel’s restaurant - where Dieter’s burger set a new world record for price - $30 !!!
Nevertheless we settled in - did a bit of shopping at the local IGA then had dinner at the hotel restaurant - food and service was pretty good but it was pretty much “Sydney prices”.
It was off to bed early for us as we wanted to be on the road early for the long drive to Karijini National Park (KNP) - estimated at over 8 hours. We had bought some cereal and yoghurt for breakfast and made some wraps for lunch.
Thursday June 24
We were up very early and on the road at 6:30am for the drive to Karijini - we made great time - 7 hours instead of the estimated 8+. We checked in to our “luxury tent” which was a bit under-whelming particularly the bathroom. We checked out the area then had dinner at the camp restaurant - which had a limited menu but was OK.
It got pretty cold after sundown so we snuggled into bed very early - like 8pm.