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Epic Gap Year Travel Adventures! - Stunning Photos and Articles! – This page is all about Monkey Mia, West Australia on our round the world trip.

Stop 2 - W. Australia > North Of Perth > Shark Bay

Monkey Mia - West Australia
Gap Year Travel Journal

Text By Jo and Pix By Mike

(28th - 31st January) Monkey Mia - First Visit
At 7.30am the next day we drove to the other side of the peninsula to Monkey Mia. This is simply a holiday resort (with all levels of accommodation including a campsite), a bar and a restaurant in the middle of nowhere! The main attraction here are the dolphins. And boy did we see dolphins! We arrived in time to see the first feed of the day. These are wild dolphins who are fed three times each morning in the shallows, right on the beach. Because there are baby dolphins, one born on Xmas Day called Yule, and one born 15th January (how cute!), we weren’t allowed to stand in the water for fear of frightening them, but the adults are so tame that they almost beach themselves and perform right in front of us. It is the most surreal feeling and we’re not sure who was looking at whom. It almost felt like they were in to check us out, the way they look at you! The dolphins are only fed one tenth of their daily fish requirement so that they are encouraged to go out and fish for themselves. Mike was lucky enough to be chosen and he stepped forward to feed a fish to Puck, one of the oldest females! Although we went three days running to three feeds a day, Jo was never chosen – shame! This is a trippy place and if you love wildlife it’s the best place to come to see animals in the wild. We saw emus wandering around the campsite, loggerhead turtles swimming off the jetty, sting rays, smaller rays, sharks and a baby shark (had to be in a place called Shark Bay!) and this is one of only a few habitats of dugongs (like manatees but with different tail fins). We went on a catamaran out into the bay and were lucky enough to see dugong, but they are more elusive than dolphins and were more difficult to spot because they don’t have a dorsal fin. We spent the afternoon on the beach and were lucky enough to be stood in the water several times as the dolphins returned to the beach and swam along through the shallows right by us. Mike was thrilled to be stood there when a pod of 7 swam right round him – he actually thought they were heading straight for him but they just swam either side of him – so close he could have touched them (although this is not allowed cause dolphins can catch human viruses). As the pod swam on down the beach Jo started to walk along side them. A small crowd followed them down the main beach and Mikey caught Jo up. People started dropping away but the dolphins kept going. We ended up the only 2 people walking alongside the pod of 7. It felt like we were taking our pet dolphins for a walk! This also happened on our third night and we felt so honoured to have this special time with the dolphins. This time, the sun was setting as we walked down the beach towards it and we had an entourage of two pelicans. We turned to walk back to the campsite but after a short walk we noticed that the dolphins had turned too so we waited for them to catch us up again and walked all the way back with them, but this time into the moonlight! How romantic was that? This is when we also saw the dolphins chase a baby shark and we saw a crab scuttle out of the water in front of us. We totally love this place and you cannot possible come to the West Coast without making the trip north from Perth. It was only the thought of windsurfing in Geraldton that dragged us back south again. But we’ll be back one day!

(17th - 19th February) Monkey Mia - Second Visit
We weren’t intending to go back to Monkey Mia again because we had had such an amazing time there before that we didn’t want to risk having an average time (does that make sense?). But we stopped to refuel at the junction with the turnoff for Denham and it just seemed to suck us back in again and neither of us could resist the temptation. On the way we saw several huge birds of prey – dark brown and cream in colours swooping down on road kill and flying above us. We looked them up later and found out they are Wedge Tailed Eagles otherwise known as “wedgies”. Stopped at Eagles Bluff again and saw loads of sharks swimming down in the bay from our cliff top lookout. Drove down to the beach and Mikey again went walking in amongst them – my new name for him is “He Who Walks With Sharks”. There were about 50 of them and he could see them much clearer than at Coral Bay. They mostly kept their distance but a couple made him step backwards a bit sharpish as they darted towards him. Checked in at Monkey Mia campsite and were very lucky to get a beach front pitch. Sat in the van that evening with the back door open just looking out to sea – how fantastic! Today we only saw a brief glimpse of 2 dolphins and one turtle but the best was yet to come. Sunday 18th February was the day of the dolphins! We made it down to the beach for the second dolphin feed of the morning and guess what – Mikey was chosen again to feed one. Being the gentleman he is he passed it on to Jo instead. She was so thrilled to have the chance and had a big fish to feed to Puck (the same dolphin Mike had fed too). Jo was so excited afterwards – hopping about and buzzing with excitement. It really is a special thing to do. We went for a boat trip on a different boat this time – the catamaran “Shotover”. We were under sail power for most of the trip which makes it a much more calm experience – no buzzing engine just the wind and the sea. We saw many more dugong than last time and up closer. Mothers and calves who raised their elephant type noses into the air and then dived down flicking their tails up into the air. Much bigger than dolphins. Back on land we’d just finished our lunch when we noticed that the dolphins had come into the shallows. Mikey went straight into the water in the clothes he was wearing and they swam either side of him. Jo walked along the shore the entire length of the beach and back with them. We then stood together in the water holding hands and the dolphins swam between us and either side of us – now that is a buzz you don’t get very often. Jo was squeaking more than the dolphins! We then got our snorkels and after seeing Mike do it once, Jo decided she didn’t want to miss out on the fun. We stood watching the dolphins approach us and then floated in the water as they swam towards us and past us. It is bizarre to see 4 dolphins’ faces appear in front of you and swim so close to you that you could easily touch them. The most surreal moment for us was when all four came towards us, they stopped in front of Jo, looked her in the eye, swam over to Mike, stopped again, look at him and then swam on by. We couldn’t believe it that they actually stopped and checked us out - we were so honoured! The dolphins stayed around for 3 hours that afternoon and we were up and down the beach and in and out of the water all the time. It is amazing to see a dolphin at all but to stand amongst them and then swim with them just blows your mind. We didn’t stop talking about it for the rest of the day! The dolphins we swam with were Piccolo, Eden (her calf), Kia (the teenager) and Berda (a young male who has just been weaned). It was almost as if the dolphins were people-watching cause they swam so slowly along the beach and kept swimming up to people to see them – there were so many beaming smiles that day. We didn’t see any turtles that day but Mike did see a giant ray leap about 4ft out of the water. The following day was much more chilled out and we shade-bathed under the palm trees but the dolphins didn’t appear that day until the evening when we were stood on the jetty turtle watching and we saw them swim below us. The following day (20th February) we drove back down to Geraldton in search of wind for Mike and we’ll most likely be here for a week or so.

Gap year travel journal from our round the world trip

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Monkey Mia, West Australia - Gap Year Travel Journal

MAP - Monkey Mia, West Australia - Gap Year Travel Journal

Highlights of our gap year travel adventure: