Esperance and Flat Tyres

Our caravan site overlooked the beautiful Esperance Bay and Tanker Jetty, but all eyes on Thursday morning were firmly fixed on the caravan tyre. IT WAS FLAT AGAIN! Even the boys were starting to (slightly) lose their enthusiasm for jacks! Beaurepairs was just up the road so we treated the caravan to a new rim before heading out of town to Cape Le Grande National Park. Esperance is renowned for its beautiful beaches, regularly winning "WA's Best Beach", so we decided to check out a few.

Lucky Bay

Lucky Bay is a pristine white sand beach and is utterly gorgeous - except for the wind! The flies were thick there too, forcing us to swelter inside the Blunderbuss to eat lunch. Still, it wasn't far to the water. While we were lazing on the beach, a kangaroo bounded up and nonchalantly started feeding her joey next to us. We were spellbound!


The rocky headland was crying out to be explored, so we spent some time clambering over rocks and crags, enjoying the wind and the views.

Granite headland at Lucky Bay

Cricket at Hellfire Bay

Thistle Cove, named by Matthew Flinders, was equally beautiful but we drove on a little further to Hellfire Bay. How could we not, with a name like that! It was getting late so we didn't swim, but we did have a fantastic game of beach cricket in probably the most picturesque location we'll ever play in! Ella happily made another set of sandpeople (and cats!) before joining in with the game.


Tanker Jetty saw us arrive early on Friday morning as Lachie wanted to try his new fishing float and we all wanted to see a sealion. After some unsuccessful fishing off the jetty in very windy conditions, I decided to head back for breakfast. There, basking back on the beach, was an enormous sealion. We watched him for a while then went back to camp to get Ella and Marcus, who had chosen to sleep in, to come and see him.

What's for brekkie?

We had a quiet morning doing routine chores (and Dave took the spare off and put the new tyre and rim back on) before heading out to do Esperance's Great Ocean Drive to take in some more fabulous beaches. This is one place where the tourist blurb about the beaches does not lie!

Twilight Beach all to ourselves!

We stopped at Twilight Beach, voted WA's best recently, and lazed about in the crystal clear waters. The water was so clear and inviting that the kids could not resist looking underwater, resulting in saltily sore eyes. The last part of the drive took us past another Pink Lake, but this one was as blue as the sky. If we hadn't already seen a pink lake, we would have thought it was a con! It was time for some resting and relaxing after lunch as we are feeling the effects of far too many late nights. Ella and I washed the Blunderbuss and caravan and the kids had an enormous tidy up in their chair bags and inside the Buss. So it will be a sparkling, tidy rig that hits the highway tomorrow morning! Dave and the kids finished the day with a game of cricket with half the campground while I finished catching up on the blog. I'm glad so many of you are enjoing it as your encouragement keeps me (mostly) up-to-date!

We are going to test our high temperature tolerances in Kalgoorlie for the next few days, and then we'll be driving the Nullarbor!

Stay tuned ...