So… after a pleasant few days in Northampton we finally arrived in Geraldton, the first major town since Carnarvon. By this point the Seagulls were firm travelling companions and lifelong friends as we headed south down the West Australian coast together.
We setup camp at Geraldton Caravan Park, which was a few kilometres out of town in a semi-rural area. It was a rustic park but perfectly comfortable and a little bit quirky. The Seagulls van site neighbours were a couple in their late 70s. They told Gary their life story and were struggling to get a mortgage to buy a house in Geraldton after having outlayed $180K to patent their tent peg driving device. They were having a protoype batch shipped to Adelaide so that they could do the Caravan Show circuit and sell them… We’re all thinking this thing is never going to be a success but good luck to them! That aside it was a pleasant caravan park that was good value for money.
Geraldton was a bit of culture shock as we reacquainted ourselves with the concepts of roundababouts, traffic lights and road rules. The town itself is quite large and spread over a large coastal strip centred around a sizable port facility.
Despite its size, Geraldton is another town with a bit of a reputation for social issues but none of this was appararent to us. If nothing else it was a little exciting to see Aldi, Woolies and KMart again instead of small IGA’s and General Stores. The beaches at Geraldton were quite surprising. Beautiful turquoise water along the white strips of sand deepening further out into a deep sea blue.
There was a lot grassy foreshore behind the beaches and one spot had a large glassy sphere (filled with water) that acts as a lens, which inverts the scenery behind it both vertically and horizontally. It was quite unique and unusual, especially on a clear sunny day.
Geraldton also has a lighthouse, the Point Moore Lighthouse, so we made the obligatory visit to see it. At 35m high it is the tallest ‘all steel’ lighthouse and the first of its kind in Australia. It’s quite striking with it red and white bands and is also distinctive because it is across the road from the beach and not perched up high on a headland or bluff like most lighthouses. The lighthouse was prefabricated in the U.K. and operated a Fresnel Lens (like most lighthouses). The Museum of Geraldton has a working example on display which we viewed when we visited.
Whilst in Geraldton we also took the opportunity to reacquaint ourselves with a cinema experience, our last having been at the open air theatre in Broome. We settled on Avatar 2: The Way Of Water in 3D. We both enjoyed it but felt that it was about one hour too long, a bit too predictable and badly cliched in it’s storyline. That said, the visuals were stunning and the 3d effects did make for a much more immersive experience… and it was good to sit in the dark, eat Twisties and do something a little more normal for a change.
We had previously visited Quobba Station which is directly east of the location where the HMAS Sydney II wreck is located. Upon reaching Geraldton the first thing you notice is the magnificent HMAS Sydney II Memorial that stands proud on a hill overlooking Geraldton and the Indian Ocean where the wreck lies at rest.
We drove up to the memorial and luckily discovered that we were there at exactly the right time for the daily tour conducted by a local volunteer. This proved to be one of the best guided tour experiences we have ever experienced. The volunteer brought the sad story of the ship’s sinking to life and described every intricate detail of the memorial, which would have to rate as one of the most thoughtful and respectful war memorials in the world.
Every single aspect of this site has some form of symbolic significance to the ship and it’s lost crew from the interlinked seagulls forming the cupola to the size and alignment of the Stele that represents the ship’s bow, the seven pillars beneath the cupola, to the statue of the ‘Waiting Woman’ who stares forlornly out to sea hoping for the ship’s return.
Eerily… the statue of the Waiting Woman was placed before the wreck’s resting place was found and the Waiting Woman statue is looking in exactly the direction where the ship’s wreck lies.
There is far too much symbology to explain in this post and if you read this but don’t think you will ever visit Geraldton then I strongly encourage you to visit the HMAS Sydney II Memorial website and take a moment to learn about Australia’s worst naval tragedy that cost the lives of all 645 crew.
And if you do visit Geraldton then you absolutely must visit this memorial and make sure that you do so at the time of the tour. The tour is free but like us, and the Seagulls, a donation to the volunteer helps to keep this memorial as a sacred and cherished site dedicated to the men of the HMAS Sydney II.
The HMAS Sydney II Memorial was an unexpected surprise to us knowing very little about the ship’s sad end. Equally surprising and somewhat exciting was the Museum of Geraldton…
Jo had given Rob a copy of Peter Fitzsimons book ‘Batavia’ for one of his birthdays. This was a gruesome and horrific story of a voyage and shipwreck that ended in debauchery, carnage and slaughter. It is a little known part of pre-Cook history when the Dutch East India Company (VOC) ships regularly sailed alog the coast of Western Australia pursuing the spice trade.
The Batavia was wrecked on the Abrolhos Islands west of Geraldton and the museum holds a number of magnificent arefacts from the wreck of the Batavia. Rob, having read the story was very eager to view these relics and was thrilled to be able to actually touch the canons that were retrieved from this infamous shipwreck saga.
An absolutely stand-out exhibit was the full size replica longboat from the Batavia that floated in the dock area beside the museum. This small open boat carried the Batavia’s commander, Francisco Paelsart and small number of crew and passengers from the Abrolhos Islands to Batavia (Jakarta) where a rescue was arranged for the survivors of the monstrous slaughter that occured after they left. It truly was a horrendous and tragic voyage.
We had hoped to take a trip out to the Abrolhos Islands but alas the tours were only focussed on fishing and snorkelling with no real accress to the historic Batavia sites. So we had to suffice with the museum exhibits that brought the story to life as well as all the other Dutch shipwrecks along this stretch of coast, including the ‘Zuytdorp‘, which ran aground off Kalbarri.
It is believed that the Zuytdorp survivors climbed to the top of the cliffs and may have ‘intermingled’ with indigenous Australians in that region but to date it has not been conclusively proven that this happened.
The shipwreck exhibits in the Museum of Geraldton were absolutely fascinating and riveting in their misery, brutality, suffering as well as the survivors stoicism, ingenuity and in some cases heroism. They were made of much sterner stuff than we.
The museum also housed a number of more contemporary exhibits including a travelling exhibition of costumes, props and storyboards from the ABC series ‘Cleverman‘. The show was loosley based on indigenous stories brought into a contemporary setting featuring an indigenous ‘super-hero’ character. It was a show that flew under the radar but is well worth watching if you can find it on streaming sites.
All in all the Museum of Geraldton was an absolute gem and manages to pack an awful lot of historical and contemporary exhibits under one roof without being cluttered or stuffy. Like the HMAS Sydney II Memorial, it is relevant, well kept, well presented and a credit to the town.