4 Stray Katz: Armfuls of fish at One Arm Point

Cygnet Bay, Dampier Peninsula, WA

Sunday 1st - Thursday 5th October

After Pender Bay we spent a night with our friends back at Beagle Bay where we had a fun filled afternoon watching the AFL Grand Final. The kids loved the pre-match entertainment, KISS, so much. After Ned stared at the screen, mouth agape, and stated ‘That’s what I want to be when I grow up’, Em offered to paint all their faces like members of the band. They all looked so good and spent the afternoon doing the rock 'n' roll sign with their fingers and sticking their tongues out! The face paint lasted until they played a game of cricket and the sweat caused it to literally drip off their faces!!

The next day Daniel and Jackson went with Em, Elia and the kids to Banana Well to go fishing and crabbing whilst Emilia and I took advantage of air-conditioning and internet to catch up on some blogging. We said our final goodbye after lunch and headed as far north as you can camp on the Dampier Peninsula, Cygnet Bay Pearl Farm.

The infinity pool was a saviour as we were all hot and grumpy after setting up in 39 deg heat combined with high humidity. We spent the afternoon cooling off in the pool looking out onto Cygnet Bay and over the next few days we certainly made the most of the pool.

The next few days at Cygnet Bay (we ended up staying for 4 nights) were spent:

Doing the Brian Lee tagalong tour (we did so much that day that it deserved its own blog post)
Visiting Ardyaloon (also known as One Arm Point) where we watched the huge tidal change from Round Rock (this area has the 2^nd highest tides in the world- up to 12 metres). We spotted heaps of turtles coasting down as the water gushed through the channel between the mainland and a series of islands close by.
Looked through the saltwater pools at the old Trochus Hatchery. These contain fish, coral and turtles that are found in the local reefs. It is too dangerous to dive/snorkel the reefs around here unless you are very experienced as the current is just too strong. The hatchery was used for around 15 years to grow trochus (a type of sea snail) and release them back into the reefs to increase the population, which was dwindling. Trochus shells used to be harvested for buttons, with trochus shells from Ardyaloon sent all over the world. This was the main source of income for the Community before the market for shell buttons declined. Tours of the hatchery, and the sale of jewellery and souvenirs made from trochus shells, now provide revenue for the Community in the dry season. The tour was excellent and we learnt a lot about local marine life. Jackson found a huge trochus shell at Round Rock which he is now polishing up to make his own souvenir.
Attempting to see the Staircase to the Moon – a phenomenon that occurs in certain places (mud flats) in WA when super low tides coincide with the rise of the moon. If everything aligns you see a ‘staircase’ of light (the reflection of the moonlight) up to the moon. Daniel and I went to the lookout and waited and waited but the low-lying cloud cover and the smoke haze meant the moon wasn’t visible until it was too high up in the sky to produce the staircase effect. This just means we will have to come back to WA another time as we still haven’t been lucky enough to ever see it.
Fishing off Round Rock at One Arm Point (Ardyaloon). This was the best fishing we have had on the trip. The boys stood up on the flat rock where you peer down into the ocean and clearly see schools of fish, squid, turtles and sharks. They started off catching 3 huge tiger squids and then schools of mackerel began swimming past. I stood even further up the cliff and was able to tell them the best spot to cast towards. They literally cast out and were hooked on within a few moments. It was all pretty exciting as they had to quickly reel their catch in as the sharks were following closely behind. They ended up with 4 large school mackerels to go with the 3 squid. They had so much fun that we stayed an extra day at Cygnet Bay and they went back again for the 2 hour period before high tide. This time they came back with a metre long Spanish Mackerel, a big school mackerel and a large Queenie. Jackson had a ball getting the Queenie in as it jumped out of the water several times and put up a good fight. By the time Daniel had filleted all the bounty we literally had a freezer full of fish, as well as a few meals of fresh fish.

We had a funny experience at One Arm Point. When the boys were fishing some locals and their kids came to jump off the rock and have a swim. We had a chat with them and showed off the fish the boys had caught and they left about 20 minutes later. When we eventually left Daniel couldn’t find his thongs. He searched everywhere until we eventually found a pair of black thongs near the top of the rocks that were the same size as his. We think that one of the locals must have also taken his thongs off at a similar place and accidentally put Daniel’s ones on when he left. There is no way anyone would have purposely taken Daniel’s thongs as they were really on their last legs. So Daniel just took the pair that was left (otherwise he would have been thong-less) and we had a good laugh.

The infinity pool at Cygnet Bay Pearl Farm

Looking out to the islands off One Arm Point at low tide

A hawksbill turtle at the Hatchery

A pencil urchin - this was the first one I have ever seen.

The huge tide flowing in off Round Rock.

Jackson is down on the rocks cleaning the squid he and Daniel just caught.

2 of the 3 squid they caught

Double hook up!! Both Daniel and Jackson got a fish at the same time but I was too slow to video it before Daniel had to run under Jackson's rod and around the corner to get his fish up and away from the approaching sharks.