Dogs and wildlife in Mungy

Leo the Wonderdog

After deboarding the Indian Pacific and a few restful nights at an AirBNB south of Perth, the camping leg of our Nullabor Crossing began in earnest. As the crow flies, we were 3500km from home, but our route would take us much further. 

In Australia, your travels are often dictated by weather and bush fires. Given the fires south of Perth, we decided to break through inland Western Australia and make our way to Munglinup, or as the locals call it, Mungy. On a tip from WikiCamps, we decided to set down our new tent for a couple of nights at a relatively new eco-camp just up the road from the beach.

Pastured horse in lingering bush smoke, Williams WA

It's a rough, dirt corrugated road that leads down to the Munglinup Beach Holiday Park, but nothing a standard car can't handle. The camp itself isn't flash. It's a down-to-earth sustainable setup with wind-driven power and composting loos. Each night the camp managers wrangle up visitors and long-stayers for a country sing-along. It's a very different park to the large-scale setups that speckle the Australian coastline, and a welcome change from the mass-consumerism and jumping castles that go with them.

When we parked, we were the only folks in the tenting section. We picked our site and another car rolled in. I'll admit they were a welcome sight, there's only so much you can say to your partner during a month on the road and 5000 kilometers of driving. Along with the neighbors came Leo - a boisterous and young Labradoodle. I went to say hello an he responded by happily peeing on my foot. I was wearing flip-flops. The warm splash also graced my pants. This was not the moment to learn the camp water was off for temporary repairs.  

A speckled and harmless frog in the campground, Munglinup Beach WA

Mungy is a beautiful place full of birds, wildflowers and animals of every sort. My mornings and afternoons at the camp were littered with nature walks. Craig headed down to the beach, swimming in the protected reef. It's somewhere to truly get away from it all.

I got away from everything except Leo. Still in the puppy stage, he decided I was his bestest pal. My shoes were still drying from our first greeting, so I trekked around the camp in gumboots. It was a good thing too. Leo spotted me in the distance and pulled up his stake, bolting through bush and scrub to come and say hello. Once again, he gave me a sticky warm greeting.

Bottle brush, Munglinup WA

Wildflowers, Munglinup WA

We enjoyed our stay at Mungy and would happily visit again. They even added some Johnny Cash to the singalong rotation as welcome to me, the North American in the group.

Third time lucky with Leo too. The next day we crossed paths again. I slowly stretched my arm out from afar, not giving him an opening to my shoes. He was so rapt by my petting that he rolled on his back for a belly scratch. 'I got this', I thought. 'What a good boy, Leo' echoed from both his owners and myself; but we spoke too soon.

I leaned in for a bigger scratch, and as he lay on his back he shot like a fountain with pee flying wildly in the air.

Cormorant, Mungy Beach WA

It wasn't the only lesson that I learned in Mungy. I also learned a thing or two about blindly following your partner through the scrub.

Craig leads the way on an explore.

There's a lot of great little sandy paths around the area - perfect for flowers and twitching. Craig led us on an explore through the bush. Perhaps a bit more lax than we should have been hiking through Australia, we ventured further and further into the scrub.

The hiss was close enough that I wanted to pee too. He nearly licked my ankle.

Thankfully it was a blue-tongue shingleback and nothing more sinister.

This is part 6 of our Nullarbor crossing camping trip. In part 7, we see the bluest beaches and whitest sad in Australia.