Today was a
reasonably early start (8.30 ish) for the 60 odd km drive east to Cape Le
Grande and Lucky Bay. To say that this particular place has held high
expectations and anticipation for us is probably an understatement. From the
outset of the planning for this trip we have mulled over this location, read
travel info and magazine articles, which only fuelled our determination to go
there. We had, initially, intended to free camp there but with school holidays,
a long weekend and ordinary weather interfering we ended up basing ourselves in
Esperance. The trip out was interesting with the farmland giving way to some
interesting landscapes once inside the national park area. On the way in we
passed a replica of Stonehenge, which we had been thinking of going to see,
glad we didn’t now as the view from the road was uninspired. I guess there
will be people out there that think it’s great but not us.
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| Landscape on way into Cape Le Grande |
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| Rock formations |
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| Whispering rock near Hellfire Bay |
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| Wild flower |
Once in the national
park there are heaps of natural formations to keep you busy and some very
interesting monoliths dominating the landscape as we wound our way into the
Cape. We stopped at the Hellfire Bay lookout and saw some spectacular coast
line and decided we would call in to Hellfire Beach on our way back. First
major stop was Lucky Bay which was and would be a nice spot except for the
seaweed, in fact the whole coastline in the South West is suffering at the
moment with huge amounts of seaweed deposited on the beaches from the recent
storms. I estimated it to be over a metre deep in some places. We took a short
drive along the beach and then headed for Rossitter Bay which is about 6km
further on by dirt road. Same issue here with the whole spectacle dulled by the
weed.
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| Hellfire bay |
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| Lucky Bay |
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| Hellfire Bay looking west |
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| Hellfire Bay |
Don’t get me wrong the sites and the pristine nature of the place is not
to be underestimated but the smell of rotting seaweed is not for everyone. We
returned to Lucky Bay for a spot of lunch and we were entertained by a family
of kangaroos and the humans annoying them. Lunch over we headed back to
Hellfire Bay and as it turned out the highlight of the day. This is an
incredible little bay and was one of the few not impacted by seaweed. We spent
a little time here getting our feet wet and enjoying the place. Next stop was
Cape Le Grande and whilst not disappointed I think our expectations may have
got a bit skewed. Again don’t get me wrong, it is still a wonderful place but
the pick for me was Hellfire Bay followed by Lucky Bay. It sometimes difficult
when writing these blogs because you have so many ahhhhh moments it all becomes
a bit blasé. There is no doubt for me we are the lucky country and are blessed
with a magnificent country and its trips like these that just reinforce that
reality for me. The sites and beauty of this area are no doubt some of the best
I can imagine and we have only scratched the surface. So it was after a pretty
full day of white sand, a bit of sun, sea and surf it was time to head for
home. We tried our luck again off the tanker pier late in the afternoon,
yesterday I had caught a king George whiting just on 30cm and Gaz got a nice
size Calamari and apparently there have been some good size catches off the
pier. It was reasonable successful with another calamari and a whiting. Bit of
bad luck for Gaz as he hooked a Calamari which let go of the squid jig just as
he pulled it out of the water. There was I fair bit of tension on the line and
when I looked around it was imbedded horizontally in Gaz’s forehead. A bit of
an “Oh shit” moment, Laura managed to extract the jig without much pain but a
lesson for all I think. Tomorrow is our last day in Esperance and officially
the start to our return to reality – homeward bound
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