The Eyre peninsula – an unexpected surprise

Not to hurt anyone’s feelings, but we didn’t really plan to stay long in Victoria or South Australia. I confess we viewed these states as merely stepping stones to get us where we really wanted to go. This was a mistake we soon rectified. Instead of spending only a few nights on the Eyre Peninsula, we stayed for over a week!

We had had a hot and dusty drive along the backroads from Mildura to Stockyard Plain (for a night surrounded by nothing but mallee scrub and stars) and then a few days at Mt Remarkable. We were desperately in need of a fresh sea breeze and a swim! The scenery towards Whyalla was striking – the flatness of the red plains, distant low hills, and the sea just to the side made the big blue sky appear all that much bigger. Grand country.

We had seen some beautiful pictures of the new circular jetty at Whyalla. When we got there it was not quite so postcard-perfect as there was a whipping breeze blowing! But it kept us cool and certainly the colour of the water was the brilliant aquamarine we were going to come to expect from our time here on the Eyre Peninsula. Whyalla not only has a circular jetty, but is also where giant cuttlefish come to breed every year. We weren’t here at the right time, but the girls went searching for them anyway!

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It was thanks, really, to the information office that we ended up enjoying so much of this beautiful part of South Australia. We popped in to ask about where to find some lunch, and walked out with several colourful brochures that looked just so lovely that we immediately rethought our plans!

We had fish and chips by the beach (tucked in out of the breeze) and an ice cream at the Whyalla ‘wetlands’ – a rather sad looking lagoon with a cycle track around it (and a cyclist in training for le Tour doing loop after loop and nearly knocking Maddy over in the process!) – perhaps a place to visit some other time of the year and not in the dry and dusty heat of late summer?

On we drove to our caravan park at Lucky bay, near Cowell, for a refreshingly cool swim in the pool and a beautiful sunset feeling the sea breeze on our faces.

There wasn’t much to keep us at Cowell the next morning (sadly the Turner oyster farm was closed) but we pulled in to Tamby Bay to have a wander and eat an early meat pie for lunch…and, wouldn’t you know, there happened to be a quilt shop in town!

I probably need a bumper sticker saying ‘this Nissan Patrol stops at craft shops’. Even the girls were excited – they had found a few coins on the ground so were feeling flush – the owner in the shop kindly sold them 6 fluffy pipe cleaners for 20 cents so of course I had to round out that grand purchase with one or two things for myself!

We reached Coffin Bay in the late afternoon. I think we must have been tired and hot from the drive, because our first impression of the Yangie Bay campsite was of minor disappointment. It overlooked a very shallow inlet that was muddy and weedy, and not the brilliant sandy white we had anticipated!

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At moments like these, it’s best to take a step back and go for a swim. Usually cooling off in some salt water does the trick of refreshing the mind and the perspective!

And so we drove to the ocean side of the National park, and stopped at the first beach we saw for a scramble around the rocks and a shallow dip. This vista was much more enticing – lovely clear water that was cool and clarifying. Things weren’t so bad, after all!

Back at the campsite the girls set about making new friends and we set about having a beer. Chatting to fellow campers, we got tips for which beaches to try, what bait we needed for fishing (for Australian salmon off the beach you don’t use bait, just a lure), and which dunes to tackle.

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We had four lovely days in Coffin Bay. There’s not much at all in town, and the best/only oysters we could find were from the general takeaway store (these were, however, fantabulous!). Everyone kept telling us to ‘buy them at the shacks’ but try as we might (and we drove around the point several times – did we miss a magical street somehow?) we did not find a single shack selling oysters!

Almonta Beach was our little piece of daily (or twice daily) heaven. We tried a couple of other beaches, but this one ticked all our boxes.  Beautiful white sand led on to turquoise surf without much of a rip. We were, astoundingly, always the only ones there. We could fish (see below!). And the girls, well, once they had had a little dip they ran back up into the dunes to play.

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One morning we set off after breakfast for an explore over the dunes. We had driven on beaches and Fraser Island in Queensland, but not big rolling sand dunes. Could we manage? Six months ago we would not have even thought ourselves  capable. Now we barely even hesitated!

We dropped our tyre pressures right down (18 psi) and set off. What fun! It felt like we were in the Sahara, except always with the inviting blue sea just ahead of us.

Of course we got bogged! All part of the fun (at least, looking back it was!) Thankfully it was not a major disaster, and we quickly leapt out of the car to assess how deep we were in rather than continue to rev and dig ourselves deeper. Well, we brought MaxTrax for a reason, right? Out they came and really they were as good as everyone had told us they would be. We jammed them under the back wheels, and Richard drove off to the slightly less soft sand, with me running behind!

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The dunes led down to the beach, and we were some of the first people there – we parked up, set up the awning, and ran down into the surf for a dip.

The rest of the morning was spent relaxing in the shade, taking the boogie boards down a couple of the dunes, and fishing!

Dr Dick and I discovered that we love surf fishing. It’s a little more active than just sitting on a pier waiting for a bite. For a start, both of us had to wade out into the surf to get to the deeper water – trying to stay upright while waves crashed around us was all part of the fun. We used a lure and cast out as far as we could, either in the rip or just beyond it, and then slowly wound it in to entice a big one onto the hook. Sometimes we could see the grey shadow of fish just beyond the breaks. Tantalisingly close.

There weren’t many bites that morning, but that afternoon back at Almonta Beach we felt our luck was (almost) in – both of us hooked salmon only for them to jump off at the last moment! The drama and excitement of it all – it’s addictive!

Despite not falling in love with Yangie Bay on my first impression, it did win me over when it came time to take out the paddle boards. We took our two iRockers out one morning at dawn, and, ah, the serenity was magical. The samphires and saltmarshes made little channels for the tide to filter through, and the water was still and reflective. It was just us and a seagull. A great way to start the day.

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Next stop on the Eyre Peninsula was Lincoln national park – a bit of a backwards step on our journey towards Western Australia, but those tourist brochures had convinced us to drive an hour back the other way!

It was a hot day when we packed up in Coffin Bay, with a hot, dry wind. Sweaty work! It was just as hot, dry and windy when we reached Surfleet Cove in Lincoln national park, and as we started to unpack I looked up to see billowing clouds of brownish grey. Hmm, they didn’t look like weather clouds – they were smoke from a fire!

We were the only people in the whole campsite and were at a bit of a loss as to what to do. Thankfully (for us) it was a good distance away, but the wind was pushing it right in our direction and there was only one road in (or out). And, of course, the was no phone reception!

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We found a local radio station which had an alert advising where the fire was (it was a grass fire just outside of Port Lincoln – we had driven past the spot only half an hour earlier). It was a little eery and the girls were initially a bit scared. There was nothing left to do but take our lunch down to a shady patch on the beach and await developments!

Thankfully for everyone the fire seemed to come under control within an hour or two, and we watched as the black smoke drifted away.

Surfleet Cove was a lovely, quiet place to camp, with a short, fairly shallow, and well protected beach. It was a nice beach for a quick cool-off, but we wanted more! So the next day we drove to September Beach, a little further along the peninsula.

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We had a fabulous morning here, snorkeling off the rocks at one end of the beach. Lots and lots of fish, a nudibranch, swimming anemones… Terrific!

Our next point of call on the Eyre Peninsula was Venus Bay. We chose this small town because it seemed to be the right distance between Port Lincoln and the Nullarbor – no other motive!

We had booked two nights at the caravan park – it was one of those parks which offers only slightly more space than a car park, with caravans lined up neatly in a row with nary a tree between them – but we were headed for some long days of driving so needed a rest, and at least the toilets were clean, the beach was cool, and the neighbours were friendly!

That evening we watched the sun go down on the pier while Ruby battled it out with an enormous, hungry pelican and Richard chatted to everyone for fishing tips.

The next day we drove to Talia caves, not far out of Venus Bay, stopping off at the Woolshed Cave and The Tub. The Woolshed is a large cavern carved out by the waves, with the sea still pounding away below the edge; there’s a set of steps leading down from the car park onto the adjacent rock platform, with lots of rock pools. I think it was advertised as a place to swim, but we mustn’t have been there at the right tide.

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The Tub, in my opinion, was a bit more fun! It’s a massive sink hole in the side of the cliff, with a very narrow opening to the sea. There was an old tree stump with rickety steps carved into it, should you dare to climb down, which we did! Once down the base is a little slippery in places, but the cool breeze off the sea as it sucks in and out through the narrow cleft was well worth it.

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Our plans changed further the second morning we were at Venus Bay. As we were chatting to one of our neighbours in the caravan park we mentioned our intention to cross the Nullarbor over the next few days, and he shook his head, tutted a bit, and asked us if we’d seen the weather forecast? A big heatwave was coming!

We stopped and thought for a bit about what to do. Just go anyway? Or wait awhile? The benefit of driving across the Nullarbor was that we’d get to the relative cool of Esperance sooner, and staying on in 45 degree heat in a camper trailer was not really something I could stomach. However… Our trusty old Nissan Patrol did not have the most modern of air conditioning, and if anything were to go wrong on the drive we wouldn’t want to be stuck for hours by the side of the road in that sort of weather.

We couldn’t work out what to do. Until, that is, we wandered up to the only shop in Venus Bay to buy a coffee for me and an icy pole for the girls. Wouldn’t you know it, they had a sign out the front reading ‘accommodation: enquire within’. So we enquired and found ourselves renting out a two bedroom holiday house with air conditioning for three days!

So the next morning we packed up the camper trailer and drove not even 100 m up the road to our next destination! It was nothing flash, but to us this house was the height of luxury. Air conditioning!

We are so glad we stayed a few extra days in Venus Bay. Although it was very hot there (41 degrees), the rest of the Eyre Peninsula suffered much more than us (43-45 degrees!). Venus Bay town has both the sea and the harbour surrounding it on three sides, so that kept it on the cool side. We spent most of our days in the air conditioning, catching up on reading, watching a movie or two, and doing lots of craft. It felt great to spread out around an entire house – wow what a lot of space compared to a camper trailer!

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The other bonus to our extra time in Venus Bay was that we discovered the fantastic snorkeling available underneath the pier, which we would not have tried had we not stayed longer! Because it was so hot, the cold water seemed a little more bearable (and there were fewer people fishing above us). The wooden pier was bursting with life, with orange and pink fan worms waving around amongst sea weed and sponges of all colours and sizes. Fish galore swam against the strong tidal current. And the water was just so clear.

But all good things must come to an end, and so we set off very early one morning to get back on the road (it’s amazing how quickly you can get going when all you need to do is lock the door, and not pack away your home into a trailer!). We had mistimed our departure – there was still one day left of the heatwave. But we pushed on regardless.

There was still just a hint of cool in the morning air when we stopped at Murphy’s Haystacks. These are a series of massive boulders sticking up out of the ground (called ‘inselbergs’); they have weathered at a much slower pace to the surrounding fields, and the wind has shaped them most bizarrely – some looked like waves, others like mushrooms! And the colours! The warmth of the early morning sun really made this place glow. It really was stunning!

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And so ended our fabulous stay on the Eyre peninsula (I’ll save the story of the Nullarbor for another day…). We had such a great time and were blown away by the beauty and the isolation. Do put it on your travel list – you’ll be glad you did!