So,,, after the relative quiet and restful five days in Port Denison / Dongara we hitched up and headed south again with the Seagulls to Cervantes and the start of the school holidays… We pulled into the RAC Cervantes Holiday Park, got ourselves set up, hooked into the ritual setup beer and took stock of all the families camped around us. It was a big holiday park chock full of kids screaming, crying and and yahooing all over the place. Aside from that it was a good park with good facilities… just infested with kids.
Cervantes itself is one of a number sub-1000 people holiday towns along the southern edge of the West Australian coast. It has a semi-remote feel to it despite only being 200km north of Perth. It is basically a fishing village and stepping stone to the fabulous Pinnacles in Nambung National Park.
Although we were camping with the Seagulls, they had been to Cervantes before so we mostly did separately at this location but coming together at the end of the day over a bottle or six of red. Cervantes would be our last camp with the Seagulls before they headed down to Perth to fly back east for a month. But after enjoying spending so much time together travelling down the west coast from Point Samson we were already planning the reunion after their return and travelling across the Nullabor together. But that’s for the future…
Jurien Bay
So it was that we took a day trip up to the larger Jurien Bay, 20km north by ourselves. Jurien Bay, in contrast to Cervantes has a more energetic feel to it and seems to be going through a bit of a renaissance, with a shiny new looking jetty pushing out from the pristine white sand beach.
We also had our first really good coffee at the Jurien Bay Beach Cafe after many ‘adequate’ cups of coffee in towns and villages on the way down from Broome. It was nice to just sit on the edge of the beach overlooking the water , tuck into a muffin and enjoy a velvety smooth long black without having to add sugar or milk to kill the bitterness.
In hindsight, the Jurien Bay caravan park looked a little calmer and quieter than Cervantes but that might have been an illusion because of the time of day. In any case, it was a nice coastal town and probably worth a stay if we ever come back this way.
Back to Cervantes
We drove up to Thirsty Point Lookout for an elevated view of the area that, once again, reinforced the beautiful aqua coloured waters of the West Australian coast. You can never tire of looking at natures water colours over here. It was also one of the first places we found with fine white sand in abundance as opposed to the rocky ledges, cliffs and bluffs further north.
The Lobster Shack
One thing we made sure we did with the Seagulls before we left Cervantes was to have lunch at The Lobster Shack. From the front it looks like the entrance to a small… well… shack. But once inside it expands like a Tardis into a massive and very slick water front restaurant with a massive deck area overlooking an open water marina and the fleet of lobster boats.
It was a beautiful sunny day and despite the huge number of people dining there the food came out fast and fresh as did the drinks. Although we were spoilt by our DIY lobsters back in Kalbarri, the food at The Lobster Shack was excellent and quite reasonably priced. We spent a very enjoyable couple of hours with the Seagulls eating lobster rolls, grilled lobster, chowder washed down with some nice wines and cocktails.
Entertainment was provided by the ever-present (real) seagulls who dived in to clean up any leftovers as soon as the customers vacated a table and before the wait-staff could get in and clear it off.
We did enjoy our stay in Cervantes but after three nights of school holiday kids roaming the caravan park we were ready to move on to Ledge Point despite this being a temporary parting of the ways with the Seagulls…
It must be said that The Pinnacles are just simply a stunning natural formation that can only be fully appreciated by being there in person. Only 20km from Cervantes, they are easily accesible from the Discovery Centre, which is extremely well presented with an excellent range of exhibits about the formations and local wildlife.
From the Discovery Centre you self-drive the one-way track around and through the pinnacle formations that come in all shapes and sizes. There a large groups of formations as well as solitary pillars. Some are distinctly phallic in their proportion whereas as others look like gothic thrones or small fortresses. In any case, they are all stunning in their own right.
We opted to go early in the day, which proved to be a winning strategy. We had the track through The Pinnacles all to ourselves save one car a long way in front and one a long way behind. Every corner and every hill crossed produced set after set of amazing formations and vistas. The track had plenty of stopping bays so that you could get out and walk amongst them with the feeling that you’re on a different planet.
There’s something almost supernatural about The Pinnacles and this is reinforced by the fact that there areat leastthree different theories about how they were formed. There is still not a definitive explanation and it is quite amazing to find out that they only became widely known about in 1967.
The Pinnacles left us with a lasting impression, similar to Kata-Tjuta, Uluru and Kings Canyon. Although not as individually grand, they cover a large area and there are hundreds of them. Our only regret was that we didn’t go back to see them at sunset, which apparently adds yet another dimension to them. Perhaps next time…
Unbeknownst to us there was another natural feature at Cervantes called Lake Thetis, which is also home to a number of living stromatalites. We had previously seen the stromatalites at Denham, which were a bit harder to see because of the cyclone damage to the boardwalk. In Contrast, the Lake Thetis stromatalites exist on the edges of a circular lake sourrounded by a path with a boardwalk that takes you right amongst them.
We walked the circumference of the lake stopping along the way at a lovely little spot between the trees with a shady seat. You could look across the lake and also watch the birds that frequented the area.
The walk took us back to the viewing boardwalk where you can get right up close to the stromatalites without disturbing them, fragile as they are. The boardwalk was a perfect spot to send the drone up and get a birds-eye view of these rare formations.
When viewed from above the Lake Thetis stromatalites fascinating, almost geometric, appearance looking a little like crop circles in the brown band of water at the edge of the lake. Living stromatalites are quite rare and only found in a handful of places around the world. We were privileged to see them in two different places and also to be able to get close to them.