Denmark to Port Lincoln
Feels Like We're Heading
Home
Back To
Basics .... After spending time in a house with
enough space around us to get lost, we returned to our cosy caravan home of the
last four months and set off for Albany
only 54 kms down the road.
Albany, What A Pleasant Surprise ....
We arrived in Albany
on the most perfect day we had had for quite a few days. No wind, no
showers, no clouds and just blue skies and sunshine. This made Albany look
perfect. We settled ourselves at Middleton
Beach just a couple of kilometres out
of Albany city
and set out sightseeing. The scenery around Albany is picture postcard stuff. The
waterways are just perfect for sailing, fishing, swimming and any water sport
you fancy. There are numerous islands off the mainland that make the
place look like paradise on a sunny day. We took short walks from Torndirrup National Park
to see some of the attractions including the Blowholes, The Gap and Natural Bridge where the big seas of the
Southern Ocean crash onto the cliff face and make for some good
photography. Two Peoples
Bay was another National
Park with just fantastic views.
Whale World, What A Name ....
A visit to Whale World was really interesting. This whale museum has been
created from a working whaling station which operated until its closure in
1978. In its heyday the chasers took up to 850 sperm whales in a season
operating at the edge of the continental shelf 35 to 50 kms offshore. The
museum is well worth visiting and a lot was learnt on the cruel whale industry.
We even managed to watch the whales and a group of eight seals just of the
shoreline. Whale watching is just a great way of wasting time. They
really are fascinating beautiful creatures.
After one fantastic day of weather, it was a change back to much cooler and
wetter weather, so we spent time touring the town and updating our web site in
a cosy little restaurant. We have found that some internet cafes
are really good while some have been challenging either because of poor quality
computers or modems or slow lines that make uploading photos slow and unreliable.
Moving Eastward ....
Again, it was time to move on to Esperance. Esperance is nearly 500 kms
from Albany.
This was a big drive for us so an early start saw us having a breakfast of
bacon and eggs 150 kms from Albany
in an off road camp spot and arriving in Esperance early afternoon.
Esperance is located on the shores of the Bay of Isles
and you look out towards the islands of the Recherché Archipelago. Again
the beaches would have to be some of the best in the world. There are
also six national parks to visit and this area is very popular with holiday
makers.
Gold, Gold, Gold, Yes Kalgoorlie .....
We decided it would be crazy to do a right hand turn at Norseman and head
across the Nullarbor, without visiting Kalgoorlie
so we continued straight ahead. Another reason for this decision was to
watch the opening ceremony of the Olympics on the telly. Fancy allowing
the television to dictate what we do! Kalgoorlie is the "Gold Capital of
Australia" with a population of 30,000. The Kalgoorlie Cup was being
run on Saturday, so the town was hyped up about this big event. Kalgoorlie was a
swinging town on Saturday night. It has some beautiful old
buildings, and the some of the pubs in the town have been renovated and are
very attractive. Even one of the brothels has had major renovations to it
at a cost of $3 million. To recuperate some of the costs the madam runs
tours of the establishment and museum at $20 per head.
That's A Big Hole ....
Back to the mining and a visit to the Super Pit owned by Kalgoorlie
Consolidated Gold Mines Pty. Ltd. which is the biggest gold producer in
Australia. 600,000 ounces of gold are produced annually. The Super
Pit has swallowed many of the historic workings which once made up the famous
Golden Mile. It is a huge "hole in the ground" with 200 tonne
dump trucks and giant face shovels which scoop up as much as 40 tonnes of dirt
in a single pass. When the mine is completely exhausted of gold it
will be 2 km long, 1 km wide and 650 mtrs deep. This certainly is a
big hole in the ground.
Just Turn Left, The
Nullarbor .... An early start before breakfast gave
us a good start to reach Norseman and turn left to cross the Nullarbor along
the Eyre Highway.
We first stopped at Norseman for bacon and eggs and then hit the highway doing
over 600 kms on our first day. The landscape changes every so often from
light vegetation to not much vegetation at all. We stopped for petrol at
Balladonia where the price was $1.30 per litre and heard that it was dearer further
on. It was then onto Caiguna a further 182 km down the highway and spent
our first night off road 44 kms east of Caiguna. Another early start saw
us travel onto Eucla where we had breakfast overlooking the Great
Australian Bight. - petrol here was only $1.25 per litre. We had
many stops from here on as the scenery of the Great
Australian Bight is really spectacular. Vertical cliffs just
drop down into the ocean and on one of these stops we sighted the Southern
Right Whales who visit the warmer waters of the Bight from April to
October. During this time they calve and breed before returning to
the sub Antarctic feeding grounds.
Our Journey Continues .....
Our next night stop off road was 30 kms west of the Yalata Roadhouse, a very
uneventful night with just the odd road train beeping its horn to say
hello. The Eyre Highway
from Norseman to Ceduna is 1213 km long and very straight but not boring as the
landscape is continually changing and there are many different things to see
along the way. The highway is in very good condition which makes for easy
driving. 
The
Eyre Highway
was built in 1941 with a labour force of 150 men. These men worked
10 hour days, 6 days per week and for 7 pounds per week. It was sealed to
the border on the WA side by 1969 and the final 400 km was completed in
1976. We were nearly across and the next day saw us approximately 350 kms
from Ceduna. There are many tracks which lead down to some great surf
beaches and are popular with the surfers, but are also popular with the great
white pointer sharks. We arrived at Ceduna around lunch time and stayed
in a caravan park on the foreshore. A very interesting town where oysters
are the selling point along with good fishing. We enjoyed a beautiful
home cooked meal of fresh local oysters, prawns and King George Whiting with a
nice bottle of wine.
The Eyre Peninsular....
From Ceduna we continued our eastward journey to our next planned stop at Streaky Bay. This small coastal town is
aptly named as it is situated right on Streaky Bay
and if you lived here, a boat is essential. There are some 4 WD drive
scenic tracks that give some views of the spectacular coastline.
Frequently you see on the roads in South
Australia stumpy tail lizards and this friendly one
we found during our coastline drive decided to entertain us although we think
he may have been a little annoyed at our interruption of his journey. We
left Streaky Bay the next morning for Port Lincoln
along with Wendy and Lester who had been following us for the last three
months. We caught up with them in Perth and then
again in Streaky Bay. We then travelled on to
Port Lincoln calling into some of the small fishing towns along the way.
A Boating Mecca ....
Port Lincoln is a town of 13,000 people situated
at the tip of the Eyre Peninsula and is
surrounded again by water, a haven for fisherman, yachtsmen and boating
enthusiasts. We had a very interesting visit to Constantia Designer
Craftsman furniture manufacturers. Constantia was commissioned to design
and build the Table for the House of Representatives and the Hansard Table, the
main tables for the new Parliament House in Canberra. 
We
toured his workrooms and saw the process from the raw product to the finished
product. Some of the imported timbers he uses cost $20,000 per cubic
metre so don't expect to see his furniture in K Mart.
A pretty seaside town 44 kms from Port Lincoln is Coffin
Bay and the Coffin Bay National Park so the four of us packed a
picnic lunch and toured around the National Park which is 4 WD only. The
coastline around here is so rugged but spectacular and the sand dunes at Gunyah Beach
were stunning. We had a seafood night and ate the pink snapper that Wendy
and Lester had caught at Shark
Bay and the prawns we
bought at Ceduna and on our last night we taught Wendy and Lester a new card
game. We decided that there will have to be a rematch. The
next day saw Wendy and Lester move on to Adelaide
while we continued at our leisurely pace heading homewards.
The
highlight of this section:
Has to be crossing of the Nullarbor. Whilst it may
sound a bit daunting to travel such long distances towing a caravan it's really
not a chore. The continually changing scenery, the spectacular
Great Australian Bite and shear vastness of this area make it a very
interesting journey.
No
further updates to this page.