Albany to Esperance 2/12 to 13/12

Nestled around King George Sound and the surrounding inlets and bays, Albany is West Australia’s busiest tourist town. There are all the usual shopping opportunities and we took the time to stock up as well as have the car serviced. Today the port is quite busy with grain and woodchips being two of the prominent commodities passing through. In times past one the major maritime activities was whaling and Albany was the last shore-based operation in Australia, only ceasing processing in the 1970s. A visit to the award winning Whale World is a definite must do and if, like us, you are fortunate enough to have a tour guide who actually lived and grew up at the station, all the gruesome details of it’s existence will be revealed. There are a number of coastal drives and walks around the bays and harbour all revealing wonderful views of the spectacular scenery and well worth the effort. We would strongly recommend a visit to the war memorial on top of the main hill overlooking the town. Albany has a particularly special place in our wartime history, as it was the place of embarkation for most of our troops heading off to the battlefields of WWI, and for many, the last piece of Australia they saw. It is also the first place ever in Australia to hold a dawn service on Anzac Day. Another interesting thing to do is visit the wind farm, where there are viewing platforms, and walks that take you right up to the towers of the massive turbines. Along the way you can stop off at a number places to view the rugged coastal rock formations, with the blowhole and the gap being most impressive. We also visited the Mount Romance sandalwood factory to learn about the process and to purchase some of their excellent products at factory prices. Being the fortunate types we are, our time in town coincided with the annual Christmas pageant and we certainly enjoyed sitting in the gutter of the main street with hundreds of locals as we watched the parade of decorated floats and community marching groups pass by. The evening’s celebrations culminated in the switching on of the lights on the enormous Christmas tree in the town park.

On the way to Esperance we stopped off in Bremmer Bay for one night and it was certainly worth the detour. Like much of the southern coast of W.A. the scenery surrounding this quiet little town is just fantastic. After passing through Ravensthorpe we spent the next night at the small highway town of Munglinup before taking the dusty unsealed road out to Quagi Beach. There are less than a dozen private individual campsites nestled into the coastal Banksia heath and with plenty of fresh water, a composting loo and outside cold showers for just a couple of dollars a night it was a great place to relax for three nights. The Banksias and Mallee type eucalypts were all in flower attracting a myriad of nectar eating birds that buzzed and chirped around our campsite all day long – very pleasant indeed. We enjoyed rock hopping around the point and swimming at the sandy beach right in front of the camping area. A long walk in the sand to the southeast led us to discover the remains of an ancient petrified forest slowly being eroded by the pounding waves of the southern ocean. It was hard to tear ourselves away but we needed to travel the 70 or so Km into Esperance to re-provision and collect some mail.