Shark Bay World Heritage Area on the coast of Central Western Australia is a beautiful place to visit. After hours of drive across arid landscape, suddenly there are bright-blue waters and white-sand beaches, and lots of dolphins and pelicans. Many people come here for the famous Monkey Mia dolphin feeding, but there are also the world-famous Shark Bay stromatolites, the many species of birds of Shark Bay, and some history of Shark Bay in the François Péron National Park. Here is some information about Shark Bay Australia, and in the end of this page is a Shark Bay map.
Shark Bay Stromatolites Soon after the entrance to the Shark Bay area on Useless Loop Road, there is a turnoff to Hamelin Pool. Many travellers miss it but it’s a biologists’ and geologists’ dream – there are the world-famous Shark Bay stromatolites – a sedimentary rock that contains the oldest known fossils of living organisms in the world and have taught us how old the life on the Earth really is. It is of course not impossible that there is some older evidence that we haven’t found, but thanks to the stromatolites we know that the bacterial life on the Earth started at least 3.5 billion years ago.
Shark Bay Australia: Birds of Shark Bay Back on the Useless Loop Road, further west there is the turnoff to Denham-Hamelin Road which first goes past Shell Beach – a 60km long beach that instead of sand is covered in shells. Further north on the left hand side of the Denham-Hamelin Road is Eagle Bluff – a lookout point with good views over the water where you can see sharks swimming in the ocean – the place wasn't called Shark Bay for no reason. Around here you can also see many of the 240 species of birds of Shark Bay.
Denham and Monkey Mia Further north you come to the township of Denham – the biggest place in the bay with some eateries and tourist information centres, and the Ocean Park – a small marine park where you can learn about this marine ecosystem. Majestic Tours and Shark Bay Coaches & Tours take you to the attractions around the bay; and Shark Bay Air Charter will show you the area from the air. Places to stay in Denham are Bay Lodge and Blue Dolphin Caravan Park & Holiday Village.
History of Shark Bay: François Péron National Park North of Denham is the François Péron National Park – a 52,000 hectare national park with some beautiful cliffs and scheduled beaches and the old Péron Homestead where you can learn a bit of the history of Shark Bay. This used to be the centre of a sheep station before the area was turned into a national park in 1990. There are hot springs here, equipped with two self-pressure pipes that suck the water up to the surface where you can have a swim. The park is accessible by 4WD and there are three camping sites and one lookout point in the northern end of peninsula.
Shark Bay Australia: Monkey Mia WA South of François Péron National Park is Monkey Mia WA – the smallest but most famous place in Shark Bay. Monkey Mia is hardly bigger than Monkey Mia Dolphin Resort where there is Monkey Mia Dolphin Lodge & Backpackers, Peron Cafe and Monkey Bar, and a caravan park, but the beach behind the caravan park is beautiful, large pelicans walk around here and bottlenose dolphins come to the beach every day.
Shark Bay Australia: Feeding Wild Dolphins Once a day the bottlenose dolphins are fed by volunteers and you can join the feeding – don’t get your hopes up about getting a chance to have a go – the groups get large and the bottlenose dolphins are only fed a small part of their daily dietary needs to not to make them dependant on humans. But a few people, usually kids get to give the dolphins a fish each. Whether you get to feed them or not (I didn’t), it’s an experience having them swimming around you, they are curious animals and will check you out.
Tours from Perth to Shark Bay Australia If you are down in Perth and haven’t got your own transport, there are Shark Bay tours as Easyrider, Active Safaris, Aussie Scenic Tours, Redback Safaris, Planet Perth Tours and Australian Adventure Travel can take you here. You can stay at the Monkey Mia Dolphin Resort mentioned above.
Here's a map of Shark Bay Australia, where I have tagged the places that I mentioned on this web page. You can click on the tags to see what places they are, and double-click anywhere on the map to zoom it in and see the places closer. Drag the map to move around, and if you want to see the satellite image with Google Earth, click on "Sat" in the top right hand corner.
NOTE: This website is written in British English, which is the English we use in Australia. You will find words like "traveller", "harbour" and "realise", and they are all correct in the language used in Australia.
