Joined
·
2,896 Posts
Managed to have a little overnighter over the Chrissy break. It wasnt nearly as much time as i was planning, but with a young family i'll take what i can get.
Me and a mate (lets call him J) decided we'd take a quick canoe trip down the Pallinup River which is about an hours drive east of Albany, WA. It was a bit of a last minute deal as we were planning on canoeing out to Cheynes Island 1.3km off Cape Riche, but when we arrived we saw the swell made it too risky to try in a canoe. No probs though we jumped back in the ute and headed towards the Welstead Bridge where we planned to set off.*
We stopped at Welstead to pick up some supplies. The heat was really kicking in and the chick in the shop said it was 40 degrees already, it was only 11 in the morning!
We arrived at the bridge and it seemed it was under going some kind of repairs when we arrived which was excellent as they had filled in under the bridge and it gave us a perfect place to pack and lanch the canoe.*
![]()
We had a traditional Bourbon and Coke in the shade before setting off and settled into an easy paddle. It felt a lot cooler on the water and we enjoyed the serenity of floating down a slow river.*
It wasn't long before we came to our first obstacle. It wasn't unexpected as the river was low and we imagined we'd have to drag the canoe a bit.*
![]()
Dragging a canoe full of gear over rocks through the heat of 40+ day is not generally something i would of thought of as a fun past time, but we were really enjoying ourselves. Exploring around each corner, paddling more, dragging more, stop for another 'traditional' bourbon & coke, more paddling... we were having a blast!*
![]()
Eventually though as we came around another bend we realised that to continue it'd be mostly dragging and little paddling as the river was too low. It was time to find somewhere to set up camp for the evening.
![]()
At this point of the Pallinup River we had around 100-200m of scrub on either side of the river. Beyond that was barren, stubbly pasture with a few miserably looking sheep and the occaisional watchful crow. The dry heat felt like it was sucking the life out of us so we headed back into the scrub to seek shade. We found a few trees capable of supporting hammocks and set camp. I was trying out my home made hammock and J had a Hennessay Hammock i'd sold to him a couple of years back.
![]()
I did a recce around the area and looked for scats, tracks and burrows. Saw plenty of roo, sheep, rabbit and fox sign, but couldnt locate any rabbit burrows which is what i really wanted.*
We were sure there'd be fish or at least yabbies in the river so we improvised a yabbie trap out of a head net and some bendy sticks and through it in what was left of the river.
I had a hand line but neither of us had bait as originaly we had planned on spear fishing on the coast. So we picked up sticks and wandered through the grass looking for bugs for bait. In no time*we caught some grasshoppers and volunteered them as bait.
![]()
Say 'CHEESE'.
To no avail though. Not even a bite. Further up river we had seen fish jumping out of the river and pelicans gliding across the water. Here, everything was dead. No luck with the yabbie trap either.*
We headed back to camp and settled into the late arvo talking crap and sinking alcohol. I found a tick crawling up my leg and annouced proudly 'Tick!' and then i saw J *had one on his leg too and over the course of the remaining 2 hours or so of sunlight i reckon we cried out 'Tick!' about a dozen times. Then as the sun went someone poured a bucket of mosquitos over the camp. They were thick as thieves even though we were 100m from the waters edge.
We hit the sack and i settled into my experimental hammock. I still only had shorts and a king gee shirt on as thats all i had bought. I put on a head net and attempted to hide the rest of my body from the mozzie onslaught by hiding in my sleeping bag. The heat hadnt lifted though as cloud cover had moved in during the arvo so i sweated like a pig for several hours listening to the mozzies trying to break through my head net.
Around midnight i'd had enough and pulled out my Integral Designs Bugliner and climbed inside that slept with the night air on my skin with fear of being eaten by mozzies.*
![]()
J had slept like a baby except for once falling out the bottom of the hammock after having a 'Death Adder' dream. We had breaky and after the 5th cry of 'Tick!' we unamimously decided that this place was sh*t (at least in this heat) and decided to head back and drive to the coast.
Dragging the canoe back was surprisingly easy and as we settled into the long paddle back in the morning sun we both agreed it had been worth it just to experience the river like this. We arrived back at the bridge and were pulling out the canoe when J let out an almighty 'Ow! Jesus H Christ!' he lifted his shirt and scraped something away from his side and we looked down at what had bitten him. It was a fricken scorpian!
![]()
We laughed our asses off over that (well i did anyway) and drove to the beach while J told me he had a perfectly good reason to get a scorpian tattoo now. I said we should probably get tick and mosquitos tatts while we were at it.
We finished the trip with a swim and a snorkle in Cape Riche which is a beautiful beach and i'm assured has good fishing. Although i failed to even see a single fish while snorkling.*
![]()
We polished off the remaining bourbon and headed back home tired but laughing.*Not the most successful camping trip i've ever been on but fun none the less. We plan on doing the Pallinup River again when its full and following it down to the inlet.*
Should be a laugh!
Me and a mate (lets call him J) decided we'd take a quick canoe trip down the Pallinup River which is about an hours drive east of Albany, WA. It was a bit of a last minute deal as we were planning on canoeing out to Cheynes Island 1.3km off Cape Riche, but when we arrived we saw the swell made it too risky to try in a canoe. No probs though we jumped back in the ute and headed towards the Welstead Bridge where we planned to set off.*
We stopped at Welstead to pick up some supplies. The heat was really kicking in and the chick in the shop said it was 40 degrees already, it was only 11 in the morning!
We arrived at the bridge and it seemed it was under going some kind of repairs when we arrived which was excellent as they had filled in under the bridge and it gave us a perfect place to pack and lanch the canoe.*
We had a traditional Bourbon and Coke in the shade before setting off and settled into an easy paddle. It felt a lot cooler on the water and we enjoyed the serenity of floating down a slow river.*
It wasn't long before we came to our first obstacle. It wasn't unexpected as the river was low and we imagined we'd have to drag the canoe a bit.*
Dragging a canoe full of gear over rocks through the heat of 40+ day is not generally something i would of thought of as a fun past time, but we were really enjoying ourselves. Exploring around each corner, paddling more, dragging more, stop for another 'traditional' bourbon & coke, more paddling... we were having a blast!*
Eventually though as we came around another bend we realised that to continue it'd be mostly dragging and little paddling as the river was too low. It was time to find somewhere to set up camp for the evening.
At this point of the Pallinup River we had around 100-200m of scrub on either side of the river. Beyond that was barren, stubbly pasture with a few miserably looking sheep and the occaisional watchful crow. The dry heat felt like it was sucking the life out of us so we headed back into the scrub to seek shade. We found a few trees capable of supporting hammocks and set camp. I was trying out my home made hammock and J had a Hennessay Hammock i'd sold to him a couple of years back.
I did a recce around the area and looked for scats, tracks and burrows. Saw plenty of roo, sheep, rabbit and fox sign, but couldnt locate any rabbit burrows which is what i really wanted.*
We were sure there'd be fish or at least yabbies in the river so we improvised a yabbie trap out of a head net and some bendy sticks and through it in what was left of the river.
I had a hand line but neither of us had bait as originaly we had planned on spear fishing on the coast. So we picked up sticks and wandered through the grass looking for bugs for bait. In no time*we caught some grasshoppers and volunteered them as bait.
Say 'CHEESE'.
To no avail though. Not even a bite. Further up river we had seen fish jumping out of the river and pelicans gliding across the water. Here, everything was dead. No luck with the yabbie trap either.*
We headed back to camp and settled into the late arvo talking crap and sinking alcohol. I found a tick crawling up my leg and annouced proudly 'Tick!' and then i saw J *had one on his leg too and over the course of the remaining 2 hours or so of sunlight i reckon we cried out 'Tick!' about a dozen times. Then as the sun went someone poured a bucket of mosquitos over the camp. They were thick as thieves even though we were 100m from the waters edge.
We hit the sack and i settled into my experimental hammock. I still only had shorts and a king gee shirt on as thats all i had bought. I put on a head net and attempted to hide the rest of my body from the mozzie onslaught by hiding in my sleeping bag. The heat hadnt lifted though as cloud cover had moved in during the arvo so i sweated like a pig for several hours listening to the mozzies trying to break through my head net.
Around midnight i'd had enough and pulled out my Integral Designs Bugliner and climbed inside that slept with the night air on my skin with fear of being eaten by mozzies.*
J had slept like a baby except for once falling out the bottom of the hammock after having a 'Death Adder' dream. We had breaky and after the 5th cry of 'Tick!' we unamimously decided that this place was sh*t (at least in this heat) and decided to head back and drive to the coast.
Dragging the canoe back was surprisingly easy and as we settled into the long paddle back in the morning sun we both agreed it had been worth it just to experience the river like this. We arrived back at the bridge and were pulling out the canoe when J let out an almighty 'Ow! Jesus H Christ!' he lifted his shirt and scraped something away from his side and we looked down at what had bitten him. It was a fricken scorpian!
We laughed our asses off over that (well i did anyway) and drove to the beach while J told me he had a perfectly good reason to get a scorpian tattoo now. I said we should probably get tick and mosquitos tatts while we were at it.
We finished the trip with a swim and a snorkle in Cape Riche which is a beautiful beach and i'm assured has good fishing. Although i failed to even see a single fish while snorkling.*
We polished off the remaining bourbon and headed back home tired but laughing.*Not the most successful camping trip i've ever been on but fun none the less. We plan on doing the Pallinup River again when its full and following it down to the inlet.*
Should be a laugh!
