Kalgoorlie & Esperance

Our four days at Kalgoorlie were very busy, we did a 200 km outback pub crawl that took us to some unusual pubs as the pictures show. The circuit took us north towards Laverton and back through Coolgardie mostly on red dirt roads.

The Kalgoorlie Super Pit is a huuuge open cut gold mine that operates 24/7. They extracts gold at the rate of 16 ounces per ton of rock. I tried to count the number of trucks that were crawling like ants out of the pit and work out the figures at $900 per ounce. I gave up after a while as there were too many zero’s.
We stood at the viewing area over looking a hole in the ground that defies description. While we were there they set of a rock blast that shook the ground so much I was getting ready to run.
The huge machinery that started to work on the recently blasted rock looked like little Tonka toys from where we were.

No visit to Kalgoorle is complete unless a visit is made to Australia’s oldest working Brothel.
Jacquie wanted to go in and look but I refused on the grounds that there is no point going into a cake shop unless you indend to buy cake.

The wealth of the town in the gold rush days shows in the opulance of the old buildings in the main streets. The pictures show a couple of them.

We left Kalgoorlie about 7.30 am Monday morning (4th May) and arrived at Esperance just after midday. The Seafront Caravan park reccomended by Peter and Norma was a great choice.
Our site is in the front of the park overlooking Esperance Bay through a row of Norfolk Island pines.
It’s great sitting in front of the van having a quiet sip before tea watching the waves breaking on the shore and the birds diving into the water.

The coastal road west of Esperance is their version on Victoria’s great ocean road. It follows the coast around the cliffs to some spectacular lookouts and little rock surrounded bays with snow white sand and aqua marine coloured water. The road then circles back to the town past a big pink coloured lake.

On Wednesday we packed lunch and drove out to Cape Le Grande national park.

It’s a round trip of about 160 Km. At Cape Le Grande beach we drove along the beach for about 10 km and stopped for morning tea beside a little creek the flowing into sea.
It’s funny how the tea and biscuits taste much better on a secluded beach sitting on the tailgate of the 4wd looking out to sea.
The road continues around to Hellfire Bay, Thistle Cove and Lucky Bay. There are camping places at Lucky Bay and Cape Le Grande beach. If we come here again we will bring the van down here to camp for a few days.
There are coastal walks and trails to the top of Frenchmans Peak and Boulder Hill that would be a real challenge.
Lunch time and we discuss which would be the best place to eat. Hell Fire Bay won the ballot so we drove back there and carried our chairs out to the rocky outcrop overlooking the bay and polished off the rest of our roast beef sandwiches.

Tomorrow we head off to spend a few days at Hopetown, Bremner Bay and Albany before heading North.

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