Esperance 2015

Hubby and I escaped to Esperance in January for an adventure – it’s something we love to do together and it’s a completely different experience without our girls.

Wave Rock surfing...it's harder than it looks!

We drove via Hyden on our way south. I’ve never seen Wave Rock before and it took my breath away. It’s massive and impressive. It is a grand and mighty wave in the middle of the desert. The first thing I tried to do was run up the slope, of course. It’s harder to do than you may think and sturdy shoes are a must. We took the obligatory photos and then walked around and up on top of it – not something I thought we would be able to do. There is a dam to one side, an expansive view and wildlife. It’s a thriving community!

The next day we headed to Esperance and easily found our accommodation right behind the local dive shop. We even called ahead to book ourselves on to the boat dive, only to be told on arrival there were not enough divers for the boat to go out. So, we went exploring instead and what we found was magical.

You know when you unexpectedly see something absolutely stunning. That feeling of awe and wonder and delight? That was the experience when we discovered Lucky Bay in the Cape Le Grand National Park, 45 minutes drive from Esperance. The sand is bright, sparkling white and the water is clear, crystal blue.

Our stunning view when we discovered Lucky Bay

We chose a perfect day to explore and a gorgeous spot for a shore scuba dive. Fun, fun, fun!

We donned drysuits in the sunshine right on the beach and walked straight in to the stunning and rather cool Esperance water. After scootering out to the dive site we encountered fish and underwater life galore as well as 20metres of visibility. We couldn’t have asked for better conditions.

Afterward we chatted and chuckled about our dive while enjoying our picnic lunch on the squeaky sand.

The rest of the week held more amazing diving and new friendships. We discovered the local dive club and its amazingly generous members who shared about favourite dive sites; allowed us to tag along; spotted dozens of weedy and leafy sea dragons for us to oogle at under the water and even rounded up enough members to ensure we experienced a couple of boat dives. A big shout out a thank you to Karen, Gary, Steve and Rob. Our Esperance diving adventure was a blast thanks to these guys.

Intrepid afternoon explorers

The second week of our adventure involved work. Hubby’s colleague’s arrived Monday morning for a week of safety auditing while I sought our local cleaning operators in the area for articles in a magazine I regularly freelance write for – Inclean Magazine.

The afternoon’s involved more exploring and plenty of eating. The local food is sublime and there is an abundance of places to choose from. It took couple of days to discover the best place for coffee but rewarding when we did.

We also visited the Esperance Stonehenge, an impressive tourist attraction that is a life size replica of the original Stonehenge in the UK, as it would have looked around 1950BC. The structure was built using 137 locally quarried Pink Granite stones. It has awesome acoustics and an eery, old-world vibe, which we put to good use with some ‘magical’ panoramic photos.

This was a 'magical' place - check it out, there are three Kimmie's :-)

After a productive workweek hubby and I tackled the eight-hour drive back to Perth and reminisced on a special couple of weeks.