A roadtrip to Esperance and Albany – Part I
The drive to Esperance takes one through the so-called Wheatbelt. One of the nine regions of Western Australia, this area surrounds the Perth metropolitan area and extends east to the Goldfields-Esperance region. It’s, as its name suggests, an area rich in agriculture, covered in fields and farmland. The region is relatively flat and at this time of the year, it’s very dry and incredibly hot. Due to the lack of hills, we could see for miles. In the faraway distance, we witnessed a bushfire blowing up plumes of smoke into the otherwise clear blue sky as we were driving nearly 400 km through the heat and the rolling fields while towing our boat with the camping stuff in it.
Esperance is about an 8-hour drive from Perth in total, and we stopped bang on mid-way, in Hyden, home to the famous Wave Rock. A day trip from Perth for many, I had never been there before. We were due to camp for most of the trip, so we decided to treat ourselves to stay in the Wave Rock Motel for the one night. That also meant we wouldn’t have to go through the hassle of putting the tent up for one night only.
Despite our best attempts to leave early on the Friday this time around, we had once again only made it out of the house by 4 pm. This meant it was almost 8 pm by the time we got to Hyden. Having spent a large part of summer in Perth already, I didn’t think it could get any hotter than in Australia’s most remote big city, but it turns out I was wrong. When we got out of the car, the wind felt like it was coming right out of a blow drier, despite the late time of day.
The kitchen of the motel’s restaurant closes at 8:30 pm, so we only just made it on time for dinner. There’s a choice of dishes available but we went with the option to barbecue steaks ourselves and help ourselves to the yummy buffet, which featured creamy potato gratin, lasagne and a variety of salads and other side dishes.
The motel itself is a bit rustic but we found it very charismatic and great value at the same time (150 AUD / 83 GBP / 95 EUR per night per room). The place features spacious interior, an outside pool, terrace, and a bar. We ended the night with a game of darts and a few pints while chatting to a friendly local who couldn’t have come across as more “Australian-outback-cliché” if he’d tried. Sitting at the bar, downing cans of Emu Bitter, he wore a vest which showed his tattoos of the southern cross and a Koala. On top of that, he featured a tan and a mullet that would have made every 80s Australian surfer grey with envy.
The next day, we just missed the motel breakfast ending at 9:30 am so we swung by the little bakery in town, called the Bush Bakehouse. To our surprise, we were able to get a cooked breakfast there, which we devoured. We had opted for the small version, which, together with drinks, came to an incredibly cheap 22 AUD (12 GBP / 14 EUR) in total. In fairness, the small version really wasn’t massive but we were impressed with the value for money all the same. Also, the bakehouse is a very cute place with lots of little details (e.g. the teddy bear alphabet on the wall), a variety of food to choose from. It’s definitely worth a visit.
When we arrived at Wave Rock, getting out of the car felt like even more like hitting a heat wall than the night before. It must have been well over 40 degrees, not exactly the best time to be wandering about the place for too long. This suited us just fine as we wanted to get to Esperance as soon as possible. We took the short walk to the rock and wandered about the place for a little while, admiring yet another weird and wonderful place that nature has created in Australia.
Wave Rock is a so-called granite inselberg, which is shaped like a breaking wave. It forms the north side of a solitary hill, which is known as Hyden Rock and it’s a spectacular example of what geomorphologists call a flared slope. These flared slopes are argued to have formed by the concentrated chemical weathering around the base of an inselberg by groundwater. Wave Rock is about 15 metres high and around 110 metres long, and there are several walkways within the Hyden Wildlife Park, where Wave Rock is situated.
There’s more to see in Hyden, such as the salt ponds, caves and indigenous tours. Check out waverock.com.au to learn more.
