Esperance to Perth

1st to 16th April
The coastal township of Esperance was a green oasis after trekking the arid Nullarbor.
We stayed at the caravan park for the first couple of nights to restock supplies, walk the jetty and have a chineses meal...

Condingup field

On the way to  Cape Le Grand National Park we free camped on a sports oval at Condingup... a short walk to the tavern for a quick meal, so the locals are happy.

As seems to happpen to us frequently, even though there was plenty of space for camping in the huge vacant field, a couple of back packers decided to camp right next to us... perhaps they felt safer with company?


The beaches and national parks in this South East Corner of the state are a mix of granite outcrops, banksia and wind blown low growing plants.

Hellfire Bay

We camped at Lucky Bay, a very windy few days, which is known for kangaroos on the beach, they were there every day, and seemed to enjoy getting their photos taken.

With coastal walks and white sand clear water beaches we had plenty of choice for swimming.

Kangaroos on Lucky Bay beach

After Esperance we headed to Perth for a few days to get the Land Rover serviced... 220,000km and still going strong. Whilst in the big smoke we did all the tourist things... including  Fremantle and the maritime museum.

During WW2 Fremantle was the biggest submarine base in the Southern Hemisphere with over 160 subs based there.. Dutch, British and USA as well as the Aussie fleet.

The skiff ‘Evelyn’, maritime museum 

The Nullarbor

28th March to 2 April
The Nullarbor is the iconic 1,670km drive along the Great Australian Bite from The Eyre Peninsula in SA to Norseman in WA.

Koonalda

Until the 1970’s it was still a gravel road, and although now bitumen there are no towns, or clusters of farming properties, with only Road Houses every few hundred km’s for refueling.

It really is a treeless plain, with salt bush and red dust filling the landscape for most of the drive. First night we camped beside the road, as there are plenty of places to stop along the way.
We spent  a couple of nights at the abandoned Koonalda Homestead now part of the National park,  but until 1986 a working sheep station on the old eyre highway.

Kevin and shovel

The building are still there along with a car graveyard of vehicles that didn’t make the Nullarbor journey. We heard dingoes howling at night, which was a bit spooky.

Along the bite the cliff tops where steep, and the winds blew straight from the Antarctic, rather windy when camping and trying to cook outside on gas.

Plenty of kangaroos and salt pans along the roadside, and the ancient limestone sea bed that is the Nullarbor is sprinkled with blow holes, sink holes and caves.

It was a starkly barren but beautiful landscape to drive through, very remote, and by the time we reached Norseman we had a greater appreciation for the explorers and early pastoralists.