We have spent 8 stunning days at the Ningaloo Lighthouse Caravan Park, on the edge of the Ningaloo Reef and the National Park. It’s not hard to watch the sun rise each morning, creating pink and orange over the horizon, followed by clear blue skies each day, and then watching the sun set over the sea, again with stunning colours of reds and oranges, from Ningaloo Lighthouse.

Sun setting over the Lighthouse……view from ‘The Tent’

We have enjoyed daily swims in warm waters, amazing snorkelling over coral reefs full of sea life, and the occasional visit to Exmouth to stock up and sort out a few chores. In fact we don’t even have to leave home base to enjoy the wildlife. There are many emus in the area and babies are hatching….so its not uncommon to be sitting outside with a coffee and have dad (yes mum takes off once they are born and dad brings them up) and two tiny little ones wandering by.

The Ningaloo Reef Marine Park is world renowned for its wondrous sea life, in particular the whale shark. Unfortunately we are too late for whale shark season, so we have to ‘put up with’ large numbers of hump back whales (lots of pairs of mum and bub), dugong, stingray, dolphins, sea snakes and hundreds of different types of colourful fish. Life isn’t too tough! The best snorkel sites include beautiful Turquoise Bay (in my last blog, there was a photo of Steve sitting on the sand at Turquoise Bay, it is quite stunning),

Just a reminder of the delights of Turquoise Bay

the Oyster Stacks and Lakeside. We visited both Turquoise Bay and Lakeside and have to say that Lakeside is one of the best snorkels we have ever done – it is superior to the Barrier Reef (including Lizard Island), Tahiti and Aitutaki. The prolific and inquisitive fish life was quite astonishing. And it is quite remarkable to be at a quality dive/snorkel site and be the only ones there! Because the area has massive rains in April, you now have to walk through an ‘inlet’ to get there, and this can only be done at low tide. We tried at high tide and it wasn’t a success!

There’s another site we spent a whole day at, South Manlu. This isn’t publicised as a key snorkelling site,  yet it has some of the best and most colourful corals we have ever seen, in all shapes and sizes, and again an incredible number and range of fish life – including reef sharks! It was quite stunning.

The tidal flow on the reef is quite strong so when snorkelling here the technique is about ‘drifting’. You go further along the beach and then drift down to the area that you want to finish at. It certainly takes a lot of the effort out of it!

Our other favourite activity here was flying over the reef in a microlite. We had to wait for the right conditions and that was yesterday. Thankfully we knew from forecasts to book for Monday afternoon, and on cue the winds were right and it was another magic day. Off we went to the small aircraft airport for our briefing and Trainee Pilot Lesson before donning our flying suits (similar to a diving dry suit), putting on our helmets and gloves and climbing on board. I went with Tony and Steve with the very skilful 33 year old effervescent dreadlock business owner Gavin, who has 3000 hours under his belt….he started when he was 12, his father was a pilot. The flight goes from the airport over the ranges and over to the reef.

Steve with Gavin, over Ningaloo Reef

There were just a few fluffies over the range, and Steve and Gavin went over them and we went under them. Once over the reef we swooped and circled, watching hump back whales breeching and cruising alongside the reef, dugong feeding inside the reef, lots of stingrays, sharks, dolphins and sea snakes. The colours are just beautiful – light and deep turquoises and blues, water sparkling in the sunlight. Down at 500m the reef comes to life. After spotting and lots of ooohs and ahhs, it was time to return across the ranges, back over Exmouth and back to base. Steve couldn’t resist it, and pilot Gavin, who is so competent was keen…..it was time for Steve to take the controls. Yes the ex-pilot took the controls and flew back from the coast toward the airport before Gavin cut the motor and glided back down to land. Tony and I watched and flew in behind….but there were no motors cut. The microlite I was in wasn’t as powerful and nor was the pilot as experienced (albeit he is very competent and I was totally relaxed the whole time). Wow, what a blast! This is a must do. If you can’t swim with the whale sharks then this has to be the other absolute must.

Two microlites in flight over Exmouth – Steve in front and Jane below

We have really enjoyed our time here, and now its time to head just a little further south to the bottom end of the reef, to Coral Bay….for more snorkelling in warm waters. Okay, someone has to do it!