Hewitt's Hill bush camping

Yesterday we went for a spot of impromptu hiking/camping in the bush, as our new lightweight camping mattresses arrived in the post and we wanted to try them out.

We jumped in the car, and parked in a nearby picnic area and then hiked 4km to one of the camping huts along the Bibbulmun track. I didn't fancy much more of a hike than that being 6mths pregnant!

There are two long distance trails in Western Australia; the Bibbulmun track for walkers and the Mundi Biddi  trail for cyclists. Both of them have, at regular intervals, camping huts that are completely free to use and inaccessible by vehicle. There are also areas next to the huts to pitch tents.

Rather than use the hut we took along our little tent. We didn't originally have space in our suitcases for the tent when we first came over to Australia. But we couldn't find anything comparable here to replace it with so we had it shipped all the way from England for us by Nick's kind parents. Shipping the tent out should have been easy but it wasn't. Won't be using Parcelforce again.

Once the tent was up, we got a brew going with our trusty Trangia stove that we also brought over from the UK. They do sell them here (because they are awesome) but they are a bit pricey.

Here are our new Thermarest mattresses. They weigh a whopping 350g each!

We had a little campfire by our tent, then headed down to the hut where there was a bigger fire going and we sat around it with the other campers using the hut. There were three younger guys, and an older couple who had all walked from Kalamunda (about 11kms away).

We awoke to another beautiful day. Very pleased with the mattresses, both comfy and warm.

Time for a quick brew and we packed up to make our way back to the car.

This little hut is the drop dunny - essentially a toilet on top of a big hole in the ground.

We spotted a kangaroo foraging during the morning. You can just about see it to the left of the the closest tree.

Demonstrating one of our new mattresses, fully packed.

The camping hut, called Hewitt's Hill.

The fire pit by the hut had an ingenious metal arm you could swing over the fire to hang your billy can or kettle on. It also had a metal plate to use as a cooking surface.

There is no drinking water at these campsites, but they do have large rainwater tanks. All the other campers were boiling the water before drinking it. I decided I didn't want to risk catching something so we brought all our water with us.

It's a beautiful experience waking up in the Australian bush, surrounded by bird calls and kangaroos and I'm sure we will be doing lots more in the future.

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend.

E&N x