Exmouth. Words and images by Jonathan Camí. Published in Vogue
Words and images by Jonathan Camí. Published in Vogue
Desert Meets Sea
Guided by his friend, author Tim Winton, writer and photographer Jonathan Cami discovers the wondrous beauty and precious marine life of Western Australia’s Exmouth Gulf.
“I live where the desert meets the ocean, in a place still intact, filled by marvels and wonders. I go swimming every day, surrounded by whales and sharks.” These are not my words, they belong to my friend Tim Winton, the beloved Western Australian author.
“Give us a call if you come to the west coast,” he told me, while we were enjoying a coffee at the National Gallery of Victoria after a photo shoot in 2015. I was a younger man at the time, newly arrived from Europe.
Years have passed, and the thermometer shows 33 degrees outside the Learmonth Airport terminal in Western Australia. I’m catching up with Winton again, to learn more about the Exmouth Gulf.
Until the small terminal has emptied of tourists, all flocking to the nearby resort town to go whale watching, I don’t recognise him. His hair has grown longer, whiter, and he’s more rugged than I recall. He’s dressed appropriately for the local weather – thongs, shorts, a white T-shirt and shades.
We walk together through the car park, an odd couple under the excruciating sun. I’m wearing my sempiternal uniform of long black trousers, a long-sleeved T-shirt and my beloved Akubra hat. My rental car looks like Winton’s own. I discover that a LandCruiser is the only option in the Exmouth peninsula. This is no land for luxury suburban European vehicles.
Winton proposes we take a small detour on our way to town. Halfway from the airport there is a bitumen road to Charles Knife Canyon, a vantage point from where we can overlook Exmouth Gulf and understand its geography.
From the top of the range, he points to the gulf in front of us and to the glorious expanse of Ningaloo Reef along the East Indian Ocean behind us. No cars, no airplanes, no houses – the dry rocky gorges of Cape Range National Park are the perfect film set for a John Wayne movie, he says.
Standing up there, with no one else for company and a breathtaking landscape, we chat about the next few days. Winton’s plan is easy. He has a list of locations in mind, places unique to this remote peninsula that he wants to share with me. He suggests we discuss them over a cold beer at Froth Craft Brewery, one of his local hangouts. After the long flight from the east coast and with the hot, dry weather, I’m easily persuaded.
Exmouth is about 12 hours’ drive north of Perth and was established in the mid-60s to support a nearby United States Naval Communication Station. The station’s antennas – the tallest one higher than the Eiffel Tower – are an inescapable part of the Bundegi Coastal Park landscape.
Winton refers to Exmouth as “Byron Bay by the desert”, and when you walk around you understand why. Many accents and languages can be heard here. Wealthy tourists, backpackers and European travellers who circumnavigate the country in their jam-packed SUVs are the nomads. Locals, tourism entrepreneurs and environmental activists who are fighting to protect this pristine corner of the country are the residents.
The town landscape definitely differs from a regular mining outpost in this region. Streets are dotted with local breweries, gourmet pizzerias, organic groceries, barista coffee and, of course, tour guides offering whale watching, snorkelling, kayaking and more. Every house has a boat parked in the front yard, and fishing seems to be the favoured recreational activity.
This story, however, is not about the town and its inhabitants, it’s about the gulf and its wonders. After the refreshing beverage, Winton insists on showing me the other side of the peninsula, the reef side, from Vlamingh Head Lighthouse, north of Exmouth.
From the promontory, it’s easy to spot the whale’s ‘blow’, the cloud of moist air expelled when the whale breaks the surface to breathe. “Mate, do you want to get on the boat and see them closer?” Winton asks. “The whale sharks are not here now, but I’ll take you to see the humpback whales the day after tomorrow, if you are interested.”
Back in town, on the way to my accommodation, I suddenly ask Winton to stop the car. I’m overexcited about a mob of emus crossing the street. He laughs while I’m chasing them with my camera. “There is no hurry,” he says. “These big birds are everywhere, and definitely not shy.” Later on, he is proven right. I had to retreat quickly, in an inelegant manner, from an emu deeply interested in pecking my camera’s lens. I hope nobody witnessed my running escape.
The next day, with a list in my hand, I begin my solo journey by watching the sunrise at Pebble Beach, an oddity in Western Australia and its ocean sunsets. In the warm dawn, awaiting the sun, I was looking at a pelican when I heard the distant sound of whales breathing. It was impossible to capture the magic of the moment with my camera: the ocean caressing the pebbles, slowly rocking them up and down, the resonance of the whale breath from afar, the colours changing as the sun rose – and the day had only just begun.
Winton’s list was extensive for Ningaloo Reef, on the east side of the gulf. There were many beaches to visit, like Dunes Beach on Mildura Wreck Road, the local surfers’ hangout, or family-friendly Wobiri Beach. I stop at Tantabiddi, the assembly point for tour boats, just behind a lagoon. The tourists are visibly excited at this early hour of the morning, awaiting to board a vessel for a whale watching tour. As I keep driving, heading south, I enter Cape Range National Park – unspoiled turquoise beaches on my right, red dirt on my left. I don’t encounter another car until I arrive at Milyering Visitors Centre, just behind Lakeside beach, which is a favourite destination for snorkelling. Near the beach, I see an osprey balancing on a pole, holding a large fish in one of its claws. The feathered hunter was not bothered by me or my camera until I was close enough to be a threat, and it flew away.
As I continue my way towards Mandu Mandu Gorge, I have to stop my roaring truck. A handsome dingo is walking in the middle of the road. He has no fear; this is his land. Suddenly he spots something, invisible to me, in the distance and with a jump he disappears through the scrubland. Sitting in the car, with my Leica in my hands, my mind flies back to that day in Melbourne when I first met Winton. He told me that this continent hasn’t been tamed by humans yet, being too wild and harsh to be shaped by us: “We just live with it.”
The road on the west side finishes in Yardie Creek, the only gorge with water in it. I’m trying to spot the black-footed rock wallaby on top of a cliff, when the silence is broken by the laughter of kids kayaking in the distance. Strange and familiar at the same time, it sounds out of place in the land of the whistling kite or the wedge-tailed eagle.
The next day, before meeting Winton, I go to Graveyards. It’s a beach on his list where turtles are easily spotted. On top of a sand ridge, the mist coming in from the ranges mirrors the ocean on the other side of the dunes, creating a beautiful symmetry. Down at the shore I feel like I’m the wildlife, the turtles popping out their heads from inside the water to have a peek at me. Every time I raise the camera to take a photograph, they go under until I put my arms down again. We play this game for a while, but I eventually give up – the clock is ticking and I have to get on a boat.
Navigating the gulf, looking for humpback whales, I accept a masterclass from Captain Winton, who is a leading environmental campaigner for the region. I begin to understand how important Exmouth Gulf is to sustaining the World Heritage-listed Ningaloo Reef, how many species call it home, and how threatened it is by human greed. I learn how whales sleep, how big their eyes are, and why they breach. Our conversation is interrupted every now and again by a whale sighting, and the subsequent race to get near it. We don’t get very close, so there’s no chance to swim with them today. Although Winton insists it is absolutely safe, I’m not sure I would like to get in the water with a mammal the size of a bus. Feeling the splash of water when these creatures jump next to the boat is mesmerising enough.
Before our farewell, my cicerone takes me to the bottom of the gulf, to Heron Point and the Bay of Rest. He drives on the sand, to show me the mangrove area that is so important to keeping the gulf and coral reef healthy. This is the side of the gulf where engineering company Subsea 7 has proposed to develop a 10-kilometre pipe fabrication facility. In person, standing on such a remote and magical place, I understand the magnitude of the tragedy that this would entail, the reason for Winton’s long battle to protect this unique and natural wonder from yet another oil and gas development.
The current pandemic has meant our country feels even further away from the rest of world, obliging us to look more deeply at our own backyard. The whales, whale sharks, manta rays, turtles and dugongs, all the amazing wildlife, which today inhabit the Exmouth Gulf and the Ningaloo Reef, may not be there soon. It’s not just that our environment is changing due to global warming; the threat of a pipeline facility development at Exmouth Gulf is imminent and real.
In these photographs, Winton and I agreed to portray Exmouth Gulf with humility. Not with aerial drone photography or images taken with underwater cameras; we wanted to show what can be seen from simply driving around or jumping in a boat for a few hours, to show how magnificent and easy it is to discover this land.
After visiting Winton, walking through where the desert meets the ocean, wandering across a place still intact, filled by marvels and wonders, I comprehend why he fell in love with the place, as my heart has been captured by this land, too.
The gulf, as an inherent part of the Ningaloo Reef, should be protected, as well. It’s a sanctuary for many species, like the iconic whale sharks or the humpback whales, which use it as a calving ground. Seeing one breaching close to you is a life-changing experience, but how long will this opportunity last?
