Day 15

Saturday 21st March 2015

Kalgoorlie to Esperance

We get away at 7:15 and already it is 23 degrees. We back track to Norseman and continue south to the coast. There are salmon gums and salt lakes and warning signs for wild horses, we‘re secretly hoping to see some.

Yesterday we learnt that outback soil is red because of the iron content. In future I’ll consider it as mining when I’m trying to get the stuff out of our socks.

Esperance is pretty. It was originally built as a port for the goldfields and someone had the forethought to plant hundreds of Norfolk pines along the curving arc of the bay. The beaches are pure white powdery sand. The town is large and as busy as it can get here on a Saturday arvo, ie quiet, very quiet. We forget how spoilt we are with unrestricted trading at home. Walkways and gardens stretch for kilometres along the foreshore. To the west of town there is one surf beach after another with great expanses of granite headlands that are like the hides of elephants. This is known as the Bay of Isles and the Recherché Islands are strewn about in the distance. It would provide perfect conditions for sailing. In fact the bay is awash with spinnakers. There are several large ships either in port or waiting to be loaded.

There is a wonderful wall in town that is a storyboard of the town’s history. It is beautifully written and one can almost hear the voice telling the tale. “Another war, 11 of our men went. It was Vietnam this time.”

Accom: $40.50 Esperance Seafront Caravan Park

Travelling Kms: 386Kms