We probably took off too quickly and without thinking from Kalbarri. As we got a couple hours down the road, I noticed that I was running low on fuel and had no cell phone service. I turned the air conditioner off despite the tremendous heat and slowed down (I've heard you get better gas mileage if you drive slower). I was still quite a ways ahead of Rick and definitely out of range of the walkie-talkie.
Cutting to the chase, we ran out of gas and found ourselves in the 95+ degree heat, stranded on the side of the road, literally in the middle of nowhere. I guess I should have been more aware that there wouldn't be more than one gas station every 3-4 hours of driving and I needed to fill up whenever I got the chance. I had 3/4+ of a tank when we left Kalbarri and assuming that would be sufficient was obviously not the correct guess.
Luckily Rick still had fuel and he picked me up on the side of the road and 5 minutes later we were at a petrol station. The damage was much less than it could have been (a $53 empty gas can and 15 minute time delay). Lesson learned.
We stopped at Shell Beach and enjoyed an amazing few hours there. The sun was hot and setting quickly. We could walk out into the bay more than a kilometer and the water was less than knee deep. Zander loved it. He was running, laughing, and splashing in the water, amazed at how far out he could go and still touch the bottom. We buried Nash and Harvey in shells on the beach and enjoyed the uniqueness of the spot.
We stopped to eat in Denham and arrived at the Monkey Mia Dolphin Resort (fancy name for an RV park) well after dark.
We got up early to see the famed dolphins that swim into shore every morning. They didn't disappoint. All of the kids got to feed the dolphins a fish from the shoreline. Wild emus roamed freely around the caravan park and tried to take our lunch from us as we ate in our camping chairs and picnic tables. We caught some small fish from the shore and fought off the seagulls as they stole most of them from our buckets. We caught over 100 hermit crabs and had them race to the ocean.
We hung by the pool and ate "icy poles". The well water turned the kids swimsuits rusty orange.
Next stop Coral Bay.
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