Bunbury and Busselton Area

Safety Bay (South of Fremantle)

We were looking forward to the south west of the state as the travel distances between towns and places of interest being much shorter than the north. Also, the scenery down here is much different to the north and west, a bit like that in parts of NSW and Victoria.

Safety Bay and Carpark

There were several nice spots on the coast on the way down from Perth. We were able to call into many of these to see the fantastic views and scenery. We stopped 2 nights in Bunbury on Koombana Bay. Bunbury is a large city of about 51,00 people in the area. I think it's the 2nd largest outside Perth. They cater pretty well for tourists in all these towns and there are many walks including one along the waterfront near our park.

Koombana Bay Bunbury from Marlston Lookout

Unfortunately the weather wasn't the best when we were in Bunbury so we couldn't appreciate the place at its best. You can get a good view of the city and coastline from Marlston Hill lookout in the middle of the city. As in most places on WA's coast, there are lots of boats in their harbours. The Western Australians must be a rich lot!

Diane and Peter on Windy Busselton Jetty

From Bunbury we drove down to Busselton, which is only 60Km away. We didn't stay long in Busselton as the weather still wasn't the best. We did, however, go out on the famous Busselton Jetty which is probably the most well known attraction here. At 1.8Km long, the jetty is the longest timber jetty in the southern hemisphere. It was built 145 years ago to enable goods to be shipped into and out of this region. They have an underwater observatory at the end of the pier and a small train ride out to the end. Due to the poor weather both of these were closed.

Busselton Jetty and Heritage Buildings

A lot of the town's activities are on and around the waterfront which would be a great place to be in good weather. There are also many good restaurants here and are visited by local, tourists and many people from Perth due to its location.

1.8 Km Long Busselton Jetty

We were told that there are 30Km of white beaches with crystal clear water around Busselton but it wasn't like that for us. We had to take their word for it as the water was pretty rough when  were there.

Busselton Jetty Shorebreak

Busselton is a resort town and also the gateway to the Geographe Bay area, Cape Naturaliste and the Margaret River region. There's enough here to spend several weeks visiting but we only had a couple of weeks. Busselton also has possibly the best caravan park in Australia. We didn't stay there but the people we spoke to who did raved about it. It's called the Mandalay Tourist Resort.

Surfing at Yallingup (near Dunsborough)

From Busselton we drove another 30 Km to Dunsborough, and stayed another 2 days there. The wet weather was still with us but still managed to get a few glimpses of sun and made the most of them. Although the weather didn't stop the surfers, we didn't venture into the water. I think we'll have to wait till summer now.