DAY 131 & 132 – CATCH UP DAY AND HEADING TO ESPERANCE…

Our last day in Albany today and we had a few things we wanted to get done before we take off.  Steve had booked our car in to Bob Jane to have our tyres rotated again, since we have clocked up over 10,000kms since they were done in Darwin.

I needed to get washing done and the van cleaned and mopped.  He took off at 8am to head into town whilst I got my work done at home…

 

Lovely juicy strawberries from the Strawberry Farm

He had a few little jobs he wanted to do on his way home, one being to drop in to the Strawberry Farm to pick up some more strawberries. 

Ian and Kathy took off together early to drop their car off also, and they headed off to do some shopping.

I was happy to get the work done back at the van first, and then when Steve picked me up we headed into the shopping centre in Albany, so that I could get a hair cut, and then do a little shopping.  We picked up a new mat for the van, and some more Crocs for Steve at K-Mart.  Cheap as chips at $7, but he has constantly worn the pair he bought in Port Hedland, so we figured it was worth us both getting another pair.  

We finished our shopping mid-afternoon and then just headed back to the van to relax and start packing down for an early take off the following morning…

Big drive today as we had planned to stay overnight at a roadhouse along the way, but it was only 100kms west of Esperance as we had arrived at the roadhouse by 3pm, thought we would ring ahead to Esperance and see if we could book in for tonight and just continue straight through….

Steve managed to book us into the Esperance Seafront Caravan Park.  Being a Top Tourist Park, we managed to score a 10% discount so actually made the accommodation reasonably priced to be right on the seafront.  

It was closer to 5pm by the time we arrived and set up our vans, and neither Kathy nor I felt like cooking, so in the end, we went for a drive into Esperance and found the local fish and chip shop.

It is obviously a good little shop, as it was packed and even the dine in section of the shop was packed.  We ordered our dinner, and were told it would be ready in 20-25 minutes, so we decided to walk down to the beach front where we discovered the Big Whale Tail in the Park.  

The waterfront in Esperance is a credit to them, with beautiful park land, picnic tables, bits of sculpture, and their beautiful big whale tail.  There were a couple of jetties that we walked out along.  The beaches here are just stunning, even in the evening you can tell that they are beautiful, with long long stretches of crystal white sand.

Ian and I found a picnic table whilst, Steve and Kathy went back to pick up our dinner and we enjoyed it sitting out in the fresh sea air whilst we had our dinner. 

Not long after that it was home again, shower time, and a relatively early night as we were all tired from the long drive today, and we had a full day planned exploring Cape Le Grand National Park tomorrow.