Esperance - Day 1 (Recherche Archipelago Cruise)

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A once in four years day today with it being a leap year! Perhaps I won’t manage as much detail today as we haven’t spent any time in the car, we’ve been on a boat or on foot exploring Esperance and surrounds?

The day started with a power outage. We were all getting ready to head out for our Recherche Archipelago cruise when the fridge stopped humming and an emergency light came on over the dining table. Oh dear, is it an Esperance-wide outage or is it just the townhouse? Bernie checked the fuse box and couldn’t see a problem there, so we started Googling for information about the power being out in Esperance.

There didn’t seem to be anything that applied so then the big question was - do we bother the owner about this now? or - take a wait and see approach and contact the owner if we still have no power when we return from the cruise? Opinions were divided! Cathy decided to investigate further and found another power box at the end of the driveway and discovered that the isolating switch for Townhouse 2 had tripped in that box. She flipped the switch and, voila, we had power again but not before a pan of water was boiled on the gas stove top to make coffee.

We left the townhouse shortly after the power crisis had been averted to walk down to the Taylor Street Jetty for our cruise with Esperance Island Cruises. The weather was perfect for a three-hour cruise so there was no chance of us being stranded on one of the 105 islands that make up the Archipelago of the Recherche!

After skipper, Col, delivered our safety briefing, we left the jetty to motor out to the first island on our itinerary, Thomas Island, where we saw some Australian Sea Lions and a White-bellied Sea Eagle. Small females apparently because they had cream-coloured bellies.

With Rog doing his best to provide commentary after the PA failed, we continued past Gunton Island from which we could see Woody Island. Our cruise didn’t venture to Woody Island as that is a separately operated Woody Island Eco Tour. Never mind, we were doing well on the wildlife front anyway with a pod of dolphins arriving to frolic by the boat and a New Zealand Fur Seal relaxing on one of the 1,200 ‘obstacles to shipping’. According to Rog, if it has vegetation, it’s an island, if not, it’s just a rock!

During our 55-kilometre cruise we also made our way past Cull Island and Charley Island. Cull Island so named because sheep farmers would cull sick sheep from their herd and take them out to the island to benefit from the minerals. Charley Island named for a fisherman who fell overboard and took refuge on the island until he was rescued days later. Other wildlife sighted included a second sea eagle, Cape Barren Geese and Oyster Catchers and, of course, gulls!

We started heading back to town before anchoring in Blue Haven Bay for morning tea (delicious, fresh blueberry muffins) and snorkeling for those who wanted to experience swimming in some of the world’s clearest water. We had one young man (from Estonia) who was quite happy to leap off the top of the boat repeatedly into the very cold water. It was much too cold for the four of us to consider swimming. Are we getting old and soft?!

From the bay we motored back to the jetty via Blue Haven Beach, West Haven Beach, Lovers Cove and the Esperance Port and Foreshore. Rog gave us a bit of a rundown of the Esperance economy pointing out the sheds storing iron ore for export, the ones storing sulphur (an import from Canada that is used in the mining industry) and the silos storing wheat.

Back on shore we walked back ‘home’ and used some of the supplies that we thought we would need for lunches on the Nullarbor to make our lunch today. We were pleasantly surprised by how civilized the food offerings were all the way along the Eyre Highway. Even though there had been supply disruptions caused by the fire emergency, by the time we passed through all the roadhouses were well stocked with a tasty variety of food. Knowing this we will not stock up so much on the return trip, we will support the local businesses.

With lunch eaten and some more washing on the line we walked down to the Esperance Museum housed in the ‘Bonded Store’ built in 1895 and extended in 1896/97 and later the ‘Goods Shed’ after further extensions circa 1900. From 1927 the building was taken over by rail services which continued until 1962 when the building ceased to be used. It reopened as a museum in 1976.

The museum houses an extensive collection including: maritime and natural history, art and music, military memorabilia, railway carriages, telecommunications, audio/visual and medical curiosities, an old shop and household display and items relating to mallee history and early agricultural equipment and a large section housing more pieces of Skylab. The museum aims to make the experience interactive with seek and find treasure hunts for children AND adults. Cathy was keen to find all the items on the sheet we were given and found all but one of the items. After a clue from the staff, I got on board and helped her find the final piece of the puzzle.

We walked along to the Esperance Visitor Centre to check that our plans for the next two full days that we have in town will cover the best of what the area has to offer. We were reassured that our visit to Cape Le Grand National Park is a must, and we can include Esperance Stonehenge and Lucky Bay – recently voted the world’s best beach - as part of that day trip.

It was also confirmed that the 40-kilometre Great Ocean Drive will fill in half a day and introduce us to a wide range of stunning beaches, rocky headlands and steep cliffs in the local area. And, as we believed to be the case, the Pink Lake is not pink. We were told it hasn’t been pink for about 18 years! Col and Rog had told us much the same this morning. What we hadn’t quite understood before arriving is that there is the mainland Pink Lake that hasn’t been pink for years, possibly due to chemical pollution, and then there is the pink Lake Hillier on Middle Island. BUT, at the moment, it’s not pink either because there has been too much rain and the salt concentration has been diluted. The brewery, the distillery and a number of galleries were also recommended.

Looking ahead to when we continue west, it was strongly suggested that we should not travel to Albany on the South Coast Highway because it is boring. We should instead travel from Jerramungup along the Jerramungup Road and then head south on the Chester Pass Road through the Stirling Ranges National Park. While we were at the Visitor Centre, we purchased four-week National Park passes that will cover our entrance to the national parks along the south coast. As long as we visit seven parks we will break even.

We walked along to the Esperance Whale Tail Sculpture on the foreshore opposite the jetty. Sculpted by artists Cindy Poole and Jason Wooldridge the sculpture, inspired by the tail fluke of a southern right whale, was part of the foreshore redevelopment completed in 2014. It is a very elegant work created from a variety of materials that have relevance to the area.

We walked back to the townhouse via Woolies picking up ingredients for a BBQ dinner. It’s still not really ‘home cooking’ but it did make a change from the roadhouse menus!

We played a game of ‘blobs’ after dinner with Bernie the winner.



Steps: 11,708 (7.66kms)

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