Day 50. Esperance

A glimpse of paradise

I woke at 5am this morning and couldn't get back to sleep, so I got on the net and booked mum her return airfare from Exmouth to Sydney. She is joining us in Perth late April, and will be heading back home from there. The airfares from Exmouth to Sydney are $400, a bit more expensive than the airfare I booked her to come across to Perth from Sydney at $200. I also started to look at Whale Shark swimming deals, as this is the main reason mum is coming over for this leg of our journey. We are all really keen to give it a go when we get to Exmouth, even Scarlett is practicing her snorkeling; trying to prove she is good enough to give it a go.

Today the weather was crummy again, I did a couple of loads of washing and hung it out under the awning. We then decided to head out and see Cape Le Grand National Park. We only have two more days here and can't keep waiting for the good day that may never come. So we packed a picnic, grabbed the swimmers (I know wishful thinking), and jumped in the car.

The national park is only 40 min down the road and driving in we saw so many wild emu's, more than I have ever seen in the wild; there must have been about 40. We purchased a WA national parks annual pass before we left at the caravan parks office for $80, so it was straight through the guards gate and into the park.

First stop was 'Frenchman Peak', and this is a huge rock in the middle of no where. There were people climbing it but with the bad weather and winds, it looked way to dangerous for us to attempt; so we took some photo's and watched in awe.

'Frenchman Peak'

There are some beautiful bay's here so we picked three and started with the most famous in the area; 'Lucky Bay'. We were able to drive down along the beach and find a secluded spot, (there was lucky to be a whole six other people here anyway). This bay is beautiful, I hope the photo's I took do it justice. The sun did come out for a few moments, so we took the opportunity to take a million photos while it was there. The sun made the sand look the whitest I have ever seen, and the water the bluest. The sand was so fine it was like walking on air, and the water looked cold but it was actually very mild. We took a long walk along the bay and collected some plastic bags we found in the washed up seaweed; we put them in the bin back at the car park.

'Lucky Bay'

Scarlett took this photo and said it had to go in the blog!

The next was 'Thistle Cove'. There were the most amazing rocky out crops here, we walked all around them and chased lizards all over them. Before we knew it we had walked right around the point and Shane had a great idea to take a short cut back through the scrub to the car park, he was sure we had walked almost right back around into. The so called track wasn't real good on our exposed legs and Scarlett and I were whinging from the scratches to turn back and go back around the long way. Shane caved in, and we did!

Shane and Scarlett hiding in a cave at 'Thistle Cove'

'Thistle Cove'

Last on today's list of bay's was 'Helfire Bay', it was just like 'Lucky Bay' very white sand and blue inviting water. Scarlett accidentally fell in...(yeah right). She had a ball anyway, playing with Shane jumping from rock to rock and chasing each other along the sand. I was a softy and didn't go in; the water was ok but the wind was really cold. This park is lovely; there is a small camp ground that you can get caravans in, and it looks so peaceful and tranquil. I would have stayed here had I known it was this lovely.

'Helfire Bay'

We hit the sand again with the 4x4 at 'Cape Le Grand' beach. There is a 22km stretch that brings you back out near Esperance. Scarlett's new love is to ride outside the car on the side step holding onto our windows when we are off the road, so we let her have a go here. Shane did a small water crossing with her on the outside, she loved it and laughed so hard I was worried she may fall off. Never fear though as she is such a big girl and I need to remember; I was doing all these things when I was her age with my dad (little did mum know).

Shane also agreed to let her have a drive of the car sitting on his lap. She did great staying in the previous cars tyre ruts, I reckon before we get home she will be able to reach the pedals and drive on her own. The beach sand was really hard to begin with, and a breeze to drive on, but after about 10km's it got fairly soft and it was a struggle to keep the memento up and not get bogged. A credit to Shane's driving as we made it all the way back, and had a great day and a lot of fun in the process.

Scarlett driving on Shane's lap