After leaving Margaret River, or Margs as the locals call it, the self-described 'capital' of Western Australia's southwest region, Steven and I headed toward the shire of Nannup. In the 1960s, there were no wineries in the region, as Margs was a dairy and logging town. What a delight it was to meander past world-class wineries and bucolic pastures. Luckily, no road trains roared past us on the country lanes to disturb the peace and quiet.
Set amid bushland along the Blackwood River, the attractive historic township of Nannup was an hour away. I guess it was too early for the lawn bowlers to be enjoying the Nannup Bowling Club.
Perhaps Nannup was looking for something to lure tourists to the one-street town after the timber mill closed in 2023, because we saw signs promoting the elusive thylacine, or Thylacinus cynocephalus, the largest-known carnivorous marsupial. People were encouraged to hunt for the 11 sculpted tigers hidden along the Stripes in the Forest Trail! If the signs were to be believed, Nannup tigers were a remarkable animal that once roamed mainland Australia. The marsupial tigers also belonged to the same family as the kangaroo and Tasmanian devil.
Titled Living Sculpture, it was part of a community arts project in 2015.
Signs around Nannup portrayed the thylacine as about the size of an adult Labrador dog, with a massive head and jaws and a long, stiff tail. It was described as mustard-yellow with distinctive dark stripes and a footprint unlike those of dogs, cats, or foxes.
In 1896, early settler James Kearney bought this lot and built this brick home, naming it Templemore after a town in his native Ireland. It was the town's first brick home.
The historic Nannup Hotel was a classic two-story country pub located in the heart of Nannup,
Nannup's All Saints Anglican Church:
I was bummed that I hadn't been fast enough to take a picture of a kangaroo before it darted into the Karri Gully bush en route to Bridgetown.
We entered the region's so-called grandest town, Bridgetown, by St. Paul's Anglican Church, consecrated in 1911.
What an innovative way to think of one's town, as a privilege and responsibility. To the people of Bridgetown, the concept of responsibility was described as follows: "Never before has there been a time in our history when we need to nurture what remains of the precious natural environment. Habitats are under threat from our insatiable need for natural resources. Deforestation for furniture, building materials, and firewood. Damage from feral animals and the use of poisons all affect their future. It's time to recognise, educate, and make change."
A sign in the town's bakery made me smile. Tell me what you really think!
Bridgetown's pretty streetscape of 19th-century heritage buildings sprang up during the 1860's gold rush. The town was nicknamed Fridgetown because of its reputation as being one of WA's coldest towns during the winter!
Just outside town, the Perrier Sculpture Park displayed works by acclaimed artist Kim Perrier. Steven and I always gravitate to places like that, and this one kept our interest for a good long while. I've chosen some of my favorites or the most interesting ones from the many photos I took, and I hope you enjoy them too.
Only later did we learn that Kim had recycled the ring from a jet-engine flange! I think this attempt to turn back time was called Fractured Time.
I included this image not because it was among my favorites, but to give you a sense of the park's size.
What a shame I captured Kim looking rather severe, as he didn't come across that way when we chatted. Lina and Sarah: I thought you both would be interested in knowing that he said his grandfather's brother, Joseph Perrier, was mayor of Hull, Quebec, across the river from Ottawa. However, that didn't appear to be the case when I tried to confirm it just now.
Again, not one of my favorites, but I marveled at how different it was as we walked around it and 'discovered' another sculpture. The two sculptures came together as one.
As few others were visiting the park, Kim seemed to delight in telling us about many of his works. Born in Alberta, Canada, he graduated from a high school in Vancouver before his family emigrated to New Zealand, and he later moved to Western Australia.
Kim stated that many of his sculptures were part of the carbon nature style.
I could sympathize with the title of this piece, My Dress is Too Tight!
When we walked around his workshop, Kim declared that was where "the magic happens."
As an avid landscaper, Kim was so proud of the rainforest he created next to the house to spray plants when the temperature hit 40°C, dropping it by two degrees Celsius.
We could likely count on the fingers of one hand how often an artist escorted us around his 'gallery' and told us about his works. It had been very special.
Returning to Bridgetown, we found one of the most unusual sights anywhere: a jigsaw puzzle museum. Even though Steven went through a puzzle phase years ago, he wasn't keen on visiting the museum. If we'd ventured inside, we would have spotted unique 3D varieties and giant wall-sized puzzles.
The town's Freemasons Temple dated to 1910.
In downtown Bridgetown, we found Twenty Faces, another of Perrier's sculptures. I recommend clicking the photo to see it more clearly.
Across the street was the Bridgetown Police Station and Lockup, built in 1880 and used until 1973. Because we had many more stops to make, I only took a few minutes to learn about the colonial treatment of the local Bibbulmun Aboriginal people while Steven waited out front.
It was a shock seeing the ruts in the cell floor caused by the chains connected to the wall in the hallway. The chains were used in the treatment of Aboriginal people during colonization.
Several murals around town alluded to Bridgetown being the site of the state's Original Blues Festival. Photo courtesy of Christine Lucas, Facebook.
As we continued the short hop to the bigger town of Manjimup, considered "the big cheese" in the area, we whizzed by a mailbox disguised as a wine barrel in front of a winery and an old-fashioned metal milk can used as a mailbox in front of a dairy. They would have made for amusing photos, but they'll remain memories.
These soaring native Australian forest trees were a type of eucalyptus known as karri.
Northeast of town was a 600 m-long bush walk to see the ancient King Jarrah tree. The enormous tree was estimated to be 500 years old, with a diameter of 26 m and a height of 45 m!
When settlers started exploring the region in the 1830s, Aboriginal people from the local Noongar tribe helped show the way and how to survive in the forest. They not only shared their traditional lands, but also demonstrated hunting and survival techniques, teaching settlers about edible plants and how to remove toxins from some palm nuts. They also passed on the valuable skill of preparing kangaroo skins for warm winter clothing. Most important to early settlers was finding the best water sources.
Noongar people from this region had a remarkable gift for tracking, largely because of their finely tuned awareness of the natural environment. Their tracking ability left many pioneers in awe. One said that Noongars could "track a dog over ironstone." Stories abound of Noongars aiding lost and disoriented settlers in the forest. One pioneer told of a Noongar man finding a lost settler's child near Bridgetown, even though it was dark and the tracker had only a lantern. Noongar people also sometimes tracked fellow Noongars who had broken traditional laws.
While reading about the glowing attributes of the Noongar people, all I could think of was how cruelly they were later treated by the white settlers.
Curious about learning more about jarrah trees? You can learn all about them here!
Nearby was a section of Queejup's Birth Tree, beneath which Queejup, a legendary Noongar stockman renowned for his exceptional skill and flair as a horseman, was born. Road crews later cut the tree down and salvaged part of it to transport here.
For those interested in truffles straight from the source, the place to head was Hound & Hunter Fine Foods in Manjimup, the heart of Australia's black truffle region. It combined a deli, test kitchen, and café experience.
Inquisitive enough to learn more about the expensive delicacy, we drove down a long dirt road to Australia Truffle Traders. If we had checked ahead of time, we would have known it was closed and saved ourselves the trip.
I hope the company didn't pay much for security, since their canine security team knew we were coming well in advance!
About ten km south of Manjimup was the Diamond Tree Lookout, a 52-m-tall karri tree and one of eight trees in the area used as a fire-watch lookout dating from the 1930s. Diamond Tree, which began life as a seedling about 1795, had its lookout built in 1940. It and the other seven trees formed a network of firewatch points through the southern forests. Once the tree towers were established, foresters could pinpoint a fire's location by taking bearings on 'smokes' from two towers and cross-referencing them. Tall trees around each tower were felled to provide an unobstructed view of the surrounding forest.
When planes took over fire surveillance in 1972, tree lookouts were discontinued. The problem with 'eyes in the sky' was that they were not always in the air when fires began. As we know all too well here in fire-ravaged Colorado and other Western states, fires can begin and gain hold while planes are on the ground. In very windy conditions, planes can't fly. That was why tree towers, including Diamond Tree, were used again in the mid-1990s to protect southern forests.
Brave tourists could climb Diamond Tree until recently, when three meters of the upper limbs were removed due to fungal rot. Note the climbing pegs were still there!
This cute animal sign notified us of the presence of quokkas, the normally nocturnal animals we'd seen on Wadjemup, the stunning island off the coast of Fremantle several days earlier.
Driving along the Southwest Highway National Route 1, we passed signs for Jane National Park, Boorara-Gardner National Park, and then Mt. Frankland National Park, en route to the Valley of the Giants. We had never come across so many national parks in such a small area before! Thank goodness, neither of us suffers from car sickness, as the road was one giant rollercoaster after another.
After reading that there was no more memorable way to experience the south's ancient forests than the thrill of viewing them from the treetops, we could hardly wait to begin the superb suspension walk.
One of the few remaining mainland populations of quokkas was living in the Valley of the Giants. Known as macropods, they belonged to the same family as kangaroos and wallabies.
In the cool, wet forests of southwest Australia, invertebrates, fungi, and plants had direct links to Gondwanan species. Although much of Australia has experienced significant climate change, southwest WA has seen far less, allowing these species to survive relatively unchanged for millions of years.
Known to live for over 400 years, red tingles, another form of eucalyptus, are unique to a small area around Walpole. They have massive bases with a circumference of up to 20m. Insect and fungal attacks have hollowed out some of the larger trees. The tingle name likely comes from a Noongar word for these trees.
The Tree Top Walk was built to protect the tingle trees and their sensitive root systems and to let visitors experience the tingle forest from high above the forest floor. The supporting pylons were designed to blend in with the surrounding forest. The bridge spans mimicked the shape of the sword grass leaf that the quokkas live in.
The walk was fabricated off-site, transported in sections, and bolted together on the forest floor. Winches and jacks hoisted the spans into position between the pylons, with every effort made to minimize the construction's environmental impact before the walk opened in 1996.
For once, we were glad we arrived near the end of the day, as few people were on the sky-high walkway, which had a limit of 35 people per span and 10 per platform!
Looking down between the cracks was not something I wanted to do more than once!
Even though this was the highest point of the walkway at 40 m above ground level, many of the tingle trees still towered above us, reaching heights up to 70 m.
We followed the Tree Top Walk with the ground-level Ancient Empire Walk, a fun stroll through the tingle forest, to visit its famous trees. Who ever knew there were so many named trees? Certainly not us before planning this trip! Likely designed for youngsters, old tree logs had been repurposed to hold tiny forest creatures. I must still be a child at heart, because I loved discovering the forest homes and finding out what was inside each one!
Behind another 'doorway,' a Brushtail Possum peeked out.
A quokka sculpture was resting inside this hideyhole.
Lichens and mosses grew together on fallen trees in the Ancient Empire Walk, helping create lush carpets and interesting textures.
This hollowed tree was now home to a lizard!
Fungi play an important role as forest recyclers by breaking down forest litter and debris to provide nutrients for plants. The Valley's wet forest was the perfect home for the fungi to grow and produce spores that disperse into the moist, humid air.
Tassel flowers have green, pointed leaves and small red flowers, which hang from the bush like tassels. Reaching from one to four meters in height, the flower is commonly found in the country's southwest forests.
The irregular knobs or burls covering the trunks of some tingle trees were caused by insect, mite, bacterial, or fungal attack. The burls triggered the production of plant growth hormones that formed protective growth around the wound, like a scab or scar on human skin. I think the burls gave the trees character, don't you?
As fire has always played a part in the tingle forest, the Ancient Empire was an excellent example of a forest shaped by fire. Even though the bases were burnt out, the trees continued to thrive because of a layer of living tissue under the bark. This was called the Fire Tree.
King Tingle was a majestic red tingle growing straight and tall among his gnarled neighbors. Unlike other ancient tingles, the king hadn't been burnt out inside his base. How I'd love to see King Tingle's crowning glory of small white flowers that bloom just once every four years!
Named the Walk-Through Tree for obvious reasons!
Beneath the canopy of tall trees, little sunlight reaches the forest floor, leaving the cool, moist environment home to mostly nocturnal animals. At dusk, quokkas emerge from the undergrowth, while possums wait a bit later to climb down from their hollows in the tall trees.
Once we'd seen a few red tingle trees, they were easy to identify by their large, often hollowed-out bases. They grow up to 75m tall and up to 20m in girth, and require over a meter of rain every year to thrive.
Was this our final animal surprise, I wondered?! A tiger snake lingered inside. How I wish our three grandchildren in San Francisco and two in Chicago could have been with us to marvel at these mostly cute forest animals hidden away.
To the unwary, the leaf blades of sword grass are razor-sharp and can be painful. Luckily, we'd been advised to stay on the path, as sword grass grew prolifically throughout the wet tingle forest.
Steven and I were the last ones to walk among the treetops and the only ones on the Ancient Empire Walk; it was little wonder we were the last visitors to leave the Valley of the Giants, with just six minutes to spare. Thank goodness, we had driven hell for leather on National Highway 1 to reach the exciting park before the last ticket was sold!
Photos from our rustic accommodation that night near the Walpole and Nornalup Inlets Marine Park:
Success at long last, seeing kangaroos stay in one place for long enough to be able to snap pictures of them!
Next post: The lovely William Bay National Park, the charming yet disturbing town of Albany, and yet more Aboriginal tragedy.
Posted on August 15th, 2026, from suburban Denver, where Mother Nature has blessed us with more than a few drops of rain and cooler temperatures at long last. Please take care of yourself and your loved ones.
