Day 18

We were slow to pack up and move on this morning; the accommodation was so comfortable.

We did a tiny more sight seeing around the Mt Clarence area of Albany before the rain came and spoilt our day again, then found a cafe up the main street.

At the suggestion of the big brown tourist sign we took the Lower Denmark Rd to Denmark instead of the main highway, just for something different, though it turned out to mainly be a slow back country road more than a scenic tourist route.  Feels strange going to Denmark without a passport.

When we pulled in for a pit stop at Denmark Morgs picked up on something on the map between here and Walpole: "Parrot Jungle Exotic Bird Park".  She was very lucky because our other map called it "Denmark Dinosaur World" and the brown tourist sign on the intersection with the road stated the same thing.  Had she not seen the "P" word on the first map we would have driven straight past without realising.

After arriving at the bird park we got out of the car and was greeted with "Hello Darling" from a cocky in a tree over the fence.

At the counter there was a little parrot (Morgs: musk lorikeet) behind the desk on his perch.  When we went to pay our entry fee I noticed the eftpos machine had a cover over it and sure enough the buttons had been chewed! 

Morgs walked straight past the dinosaur bones and reptiles and went outside to the menagerie of birds in cages and trees.  There were about 15-20 birds in trees or in cages just by the door to the reptiles shed.  Syd, the sulphur crested cocky was keen to say "Hello" to the couple he saw getting out of the landcruiser over the fence.  He was also keen to chew the soles of your boots (remind you of anyone??).  There were a pair of red-tailed black cockatoos, two pairs of eclectus parrots, two sun conjures (though they weren't a pair and had to be kept separated), a pair of rainbow lorikeets, a pair of scaley breasted lorikeets, a dusky lorry and a cockatiel... all within arm's reach within 10m of the reptile shed door, and all happy to hang out with each other.

On top of that list, there was a galah (western sub-species, of course) and a couple of western slender billed corellas in the trees nearby.  Most of these birds are hand-tame and will sit on your hand/arm/shoulder and are all very well behaved. 

There were also a bunch of blow-ins who were scabbing all the left over seed on the ground, including Australian ringnecks (28 parrot/Port Lincoln parrot), as well as a number of "straight-beaks" (pigeons, etc).  After about 15 minutes outside with the parrots it started to rain.
That was all within the first 10m of the shed door.  Out the back there was all the aviaries, which contained even more parrots!  When Morgs and I meandered through the gardens (in the rain, which wasn't letting up) we were being followed around by a long-billed corella, who obviously wanted to step up - he kept standing on Morgs' foot which was very cute.  Eventually he stepped up, and was escorted around the park on Morgs' arm. In the aviaries there was a blue and gold macaw, green winged macaw, .... more galahs, more corellas, yellow-tailed black cockatoos, more red-tailed black cockatoos, Carnaby's cockatoos, Baudin's cockatoos (long-billed version of Carnaby), even a red-capped parrot, whom we saw the previous morning at Bremer bay.

The dinosaur and reptile exhibits were also interesting.  The reptile enclosures were set up well - when you looked in you could actually see the animal that you were trying to find, unlike the enclosures in so many zoos.  The dinosaur exhibits were also interesting to compare the relative size of some popular dinosaurs like T-Rex, Triceratops, Stegosaurus and Velociraptor.  Morgan's face fitted into the nose of the Triceratops.  Morgs also took up the opportunity to swap parrots for a python on her shoulders!  She said it felt like wearing a very warm scarf, but was creeped out when it kept moving.  I valiantly declined the offer.

After experiencing the whole park, which was really just the operator's back yard, we both felt thoroughly impressed by their setup.  I think that by the number of exhibits/animals you got much better value here than you would at a zoo - the reptiles could be seen, you could get up close to the dinosaur models, and the parrots were hands-on, although they don't usually do this when there are many kids around.  Still, they usually have hands-on activities at certain times of the day during peak periods.

Right, well moving on to other things now.  We had lunch at Nornalup on the Frankland River arm of Nornalup Inlet.  The rain was starting to die off by now so we went back down the road to the Valley of the Giants and the tree top walk but by the time we got there the rain was still on-off so we passed on the tree top walk but still had a look around the visitor's centre.  There is the story of an old tingle tree that had a huge hollowed section at it's base that was a big attraction for tourists who would come up to the tree and get their photo taken with their cars parked inside the hollow.  The impact from all the people walking around it's base and compressing the earth around it's roots ended up killing the tree and eventually it fell over in 1990 when two British tourists were having their photo taken!  (They were OK).

After doing one more tourist route around Walpole we checked into the first caravan park we found, rather than having Morgs spend half an hour on the phone researching the places first for a good deal.  Big mistake.  For $135 for the night we got a cramped cabin that did not have a couch and the bed & kitchen were the same room.  That was the "deluxe" cabin with the ensuite & bedding; the "budget" cabin for $76 would not have included either of those.  On top of that, the cabin only had a crappy 1980's air conditioner/heater which sounded like a 747 landing over head and barely worked. 

By the next morning we had also found that the bed had the thinnest of thin doonas and even with the extra blanket from the cupboard we were barely warm enough during the night.  Then to top it off the kitchen had ants, which found their way into our food boxes!  Those food boxes are well travelled and have done lots of camping, but have never had ants in them until now.  We will not be staying there again and if you're thinking of staying in a caravan park cabin in Walpole just give me a call and I'll tell you which one not to stay at.