Chapter 18: A Camping Christmas
Our time in Lucky Bay included the typical elements of a 21st century Australian Camping Christmas: waking to the sound of the beach, birds and people percolating their coffee; a trip to the beach, cricket, nonsensical conversations, various board games and barbecued meats, a sprinkle of sexist country music, the four Ps: pancakes, panettone, pate, and pavlova; too much sugar and way too much alcohol.
When we booked it, seven days in Lucky Bay seemed an excessively long time to stay in one place. Sure, we wanted to spend time with family and the cousins wanted to hang out together. But when we got there, between the high winds, the rolling clouds, the haze, and sporadic showers, seven days was what we needed to see Cape Le Grand National Park in all its changeable ways.
I’m now beginning to realise why people spend several months on the road travelling around this country. Yes, it’s really big and it takes a long time to get anywhere. But the reality is that’s also how long it takes to make your holiday look like the pictures Australia likes to use on all their promotional materials.
Fortunately for us, Christmas Day was one of these glorious blue sunny days. The wind even dropped off for a few hours. While the rest of Australia was freezing, scorching, pelted with hailstones and/or rain, Lucky Bay turned on all its magnificent charm.
We spend the morning at Thistle Cove, a two kilometre walk from Lucky Bay; playing cricket, chatting and even going into water so cold it feels like glacial melt. It was slightly more sheltered than Lucky Bay and, more importantly, you can’t drive on the beach. A big drawcard of this area is that the sand is so firm that you can drive your car on it. Sometimes people just drive on to the beach and park their car 20 metres from the carpark, just because you can. Other people drive to the end of the beach, turn around and come back, never even getting out of the car.
At Wharton Beach on Duke of Orleans Bay — a really spectacular beach — you can hire quad bikes and tear up the beach with your baby on your lap clutching a can of Emu Export. It’s cool if you’re into that and have a couple of spare kids and cans but at this time of year, it’s like trying to sunbathe on a road.
After a pleasant morning at Thistle Cove, we return to the Campground, crack open the chips and champagne and settle in for a sunny Christmas afternoon.
Fly Esperance Scenic Flight
The volatility of the weather was very evident when it came to my Christmas present to my family: a scenic flight over Cape Le Grand and the Pink Lakes. I booked it for Boxing Day but with sporadic thunder and lightning, rolling dark grey clouds, the pilot deemed the weather too risky.
We rescheduled to the next day: windy, hazy and overcast but at least without the chance of being struck by lightning.
The flight took us over Esperance, around Cape Le Grand and to see the Pink Lakes. These are situated on private land so are not accessible from a road. At this time of year many of them are dried into salt lakes but there were still a few pink ones to be seen.
Although it would’ve been nice if the weather was clear, it was still quite magnificent and everyone enjoyed it.
Next, we head to the Fitzgerald River National Park where it is forecast to be … windy.
