Esperance

 

 
Thursday the 12th November we left Albany. It is around 470 km from Albany to Esperance. I was planning on staying overnight at a free camp on the way but Linda wanted to push through. Guess who won.

That was the longest days driving we have done on the trip since the very first day when we went from Sydney to Dubbo. We drove straight to another CMCA Members Stop Over, the home of Phil and Margaret which was a 12.5 acre property. I'm sure you won't be surprised to hear that they were wonderful people, very welcoming and accomodating and allowed us to stay for five nights. Recently there was an annual rally of the CMCA at Albany and following the rally there was so many of them heading home. Before we got there,  there was a night that there was twenty motorhomes and caravans there. I never thought to ask if they had to knock anyone back with that many rigs there. These are a few photos of our position on their property. Phil built the house.

We arrived there about 4.30pm, having pushed through on a long drive, met Phil and Margaret and set up. They had expected us the day after. They had planned a roast dinner for that night with their other CMCA guests, ie three other motorhomes, being four people plus them, so feeding six, and what did they do, they made it stretch and included us for the roast dinner. Oh my gosh! It was a fun night. This is just another example of how good it is living this life on the road.

Next morning we went into town via the western beaches. The water and coastline is beautiful.

In town we went out on the jetty.

Next day we went to Cape La Grand National Park. This is the jewel in the crown of southern WA I reckon. The water is so clear and the sand is so white and you get beautiful blue colours in the water. This is Thistle Cove. There was an amazing rock formation called 'Whistling Rock'. There was a definite sound coming from it as the wind blew but not quite a whistle when we were there.

This is Lucky Bay. It is the main campground in the Park and it is currently closed while they are developing more campsites and infrastructure. They are going from 40 sites to 62 sites and they all have a view of the bay. They are doing a great job. As I mentioned in a previous post or two that I want to come back to this south coast area in summer to take advantage of the great swimming beaches here. The plan will be, when we return in a few years, to arrive here at Lucky Bay in early February which will be straight after the school holidays and spend a week or two here.

This is Hellfire Bay.

The next day we hit the beaches again and had a swim at Twilight Beach. Just amazing clear water and white sand.

After the swim we got cleaned up and went to the Taylor Jetty Cafe where we had a great lunch.

After lunch we went to the Mermaid Leather Factory where they make leather products from fish skins. It's interesting and clever what they do. There are only about six places in the world that do it and back in '91 this was the only place in the world doing it. There was a cruise ship in and there were people from the ship everywhere. A bus full of cruise ship people lobbed there and they were pretty rude and pushy, at least one guy was in particular.