Denham and Monkey Mia
William Dampier sailed into Shark Bay in 1616, naming the area after the abundance of sharks he saw. On a three hour cruise from Monkey Mia we saw none. But we did see a few dolphins and a handful of Dugong. Unfortunately it’s a bit early for the 10,000 Dugong who call Shark Bay home, to be active. That’s about 12% of the world population of these interesting animals. They live here because of the huge areas of sea grass in the bay.
While the cruise on the 18 m sailing cataraman was disappointing the area made up for it with two other attractions.
Shell beach is a 60 km long beach like no other. It is made up of billions, and billions of tiny shells of a unique cockle which thrives here in the ultra-high salinity of the water in this bay. It is one of only two beaches in the world which are made up entirely of shells - absolutely no sand at all. There are so many shells that they have banked up to 7-10 metres deep. An amazing sight. The older layers of the shells have compacted so much that they have been sawn into blocks for building houses. True! The cockle shells are only the size of your finger nail.
The other amazing and unique attraction is also here because of the ultra-high salinity in the Bay. Microbiological mats of interactive Cyanobacteria grow in the extremely high salinity. Several interactive communities of bacteria live in a state of symbiosis. These organisms are almost identical to those that existed 3.5 billion years ago and are the organisms that gradually formed the non toxic atmosphere which enabled our live giving oxygen- laden atmospher and enabled life as we know it. Some of these organisms compact into rock-like structures called stromatolites. This area is the home of the world’s best known colony of stromatolites. Amazing.
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