Family Travel
everything on holidays
and travel with kids
 

Reports
News
Search this site
About this site



the good web guide.co.uk

Australia

Attitudes to Children
Eating
Finding Out More
Getting Around
Getting There
Health
New South Wales
Northern Territory
Queensland
Reader Reports
Safety
South Australia
Standard Itineraries
Tasmania
Tour Operators
Types of Holiday
Victoria
Western Australia
What to Do and Where to Go
When to Go

Holidays by Destination Australasia Australia Western Australia 

Western Australia Tourism Commission http://www.westernaustralia.net

c/o McClusky International, 4 Vencourt Place, hammersmith, London W6 9NU
tel: 020 8237 7979

Taking up almost a third of the whole of Australia, this is the least known part of the country, with Perth the only city of any real size. Along with some as yet seriously unspoilt coast, there are unpretentious small towns, and some extraordinary Outback scenery.

Perth

Geographically closer to Asia than Sydney or Melborne, but still with something of ‘50s Australia about it. The climate is Mediterranean, the atmosphere laid back. The minerals in the state have done much to keep the local's standard of living up and the isolation means that the city has to make its own entertainment with a lively arts and music scene, though locals often look for entertainment out of town.

Out and About
There are beaches just a few miles from the city including City Beach, Cottesloe, Floreat, Scarborough and Sorrento, all known for surfing. Note however that most beach swimming is for strong swimmers only. Others should stick to river beaches or one of the many suburban pools.
There are cruises on the Swan river, with wineries lying upstream.
Kings Park with its walking trails and 12-hectare botanical garden is famous for its spring wildflower displays and gives a taste of the bush without leaving the city. Bikes are also available for hire.
Perth Zoo is 100 years old but does not keep the animals in small cages.
Freemantle (Freo) at the mouth of the Swan river, is the nearby port, 19th century with a lively weekend market, cafes, seafood and period architecture.

Scenery

The southwest of the state is the gentler part, known for spring wild flowers, the quiet Blackwood river, and forests of giant Karri trees in Tall Timber country. The Valley of the Giants in Walpole - Nornalup National Park, is known for buttressed tingle trees and offers a tree top walk to discover life in the canopy with a 600 metre loop structure at its highest 40 metres above the forest floor.

Albany and the Rainbow Coast are being unostentatiously gentrified, being weekending distance from Perth. Margaret River, even closer, is seeing a similar pattern.

North of the state is where you find increasingly raw bush. The Pinnacles, thousands of fossil remains of an ancient forest, up to four metres tall, rising out of a landscape of yellow sand, part of the Nambung National Park.
Up towards the border with the Northern Territory are the ancient landscapes of the Kimberley - Australia's last frontier - with empty cliffs and gorges, fine sandy beaches, gum trees and boab forests. The area is bigger than Britain but home to just 25,000 people, fewer per square kilometre than almost anywhere on earth. It's known as the Land of Wait a While. The King George Falls on the King George River drop from a plateau 100 feet high. The Bungle Bungles are echoing canyons and beehive-shaped mountains striped with orange and black bands.
Roughly inland from the Ningaloo Reef, Karinjiri National Park is slightly more accessible than the Kimberley and offers fine dramatic scenery, with deep gorges in the Pilbara highlands. The downside is that there was asbestos mining here until the mid ‘60s, which explains why the main centre (Wittenoom) does not promote the area more.

Coast

Ningaloo Reef is considered by experts to be a preferable option to the more famous Barrier - just as thrilling but more accessible - once you've got to the northwestern coast. It's only 260km long so about an eighth the length of its east coast counterpart, and is sometimes just 100 metres from the shore. And because it is so isolated (1,200km north of Perth) it's far more peaceful. The waters are warm most of the year and beaches white and pristine.The Marine Park covers more than 4,000 sq km and extends about 10 nautical miles to sea. It is the longest fringing reef and one of the last relatively pristine major coral reef systems in the world. The reef supports some 500 species of fish, 200 types of coral, are home to whale sharks, dolphins, reef sharks, giant clams and the likes of clownfish and lionfish, huge manta rays May to November, and humpback whales with their calves June to November with busy whalewatching trips August to October. Loggerhead, green and hawksbill turtles can be seen laying their eggs or as hatchlings October to April.

Coral Bay is the southern gateway to the marine park, a small holiday resort, very close to the reef. Exmouth on the northeast of the NorthWest Cape peninsula is bigger (pop 2,400, the largest town for hundreds of miles) now a tourism centre and point for visiting the Cape Range National Park which takes up much of the west side of the peninsula with its rugged limestone ranges, eucalyptus woods, man-size termite mounds, canyons, gorges and much wildlife. The town itself however is sprawling and dusty.
Shark Bay a World Heritage listed area because of the isolation of habitats, is home to dolphins, dugongs, humpback whales, manta rays, sharks, fish and turtles, the bottle-nosed dolphins known for being friendly, coming in to the shallows each day at Monkey Mia - despite idiot behaviour by some visitors.

Broome up on the north coast, is an attractive town, one-time centre for pearl buttons (at its peak with 400 pearling vessels based here, now on display in the town centre) now the source of 80% of the world's finest cultivated pearls and seeing some tourism, for example a bird sanctuary and crocodile park. There is also the option of camel riding.
On the far northern coast of the Kimberley is the Buccaneer Archipelago http://www.derbytourism.com.au/buccaneer archipelago.htm sometimes described as the Thousand Islands, offers a spectacular coast including huge whirlpools and horizontal waterfall, results of 11 metre tides, and best seen from scenic flights.

In the southwest the port of Bunbury is Western Australia's second largest city, home to wild dolphins which come into Koombana Bay. Natural attractions include the Gap, a 24m drop to the sea, and the Natural Bridge, a huge, granite suspension bridge.

History and Culture

Warlayirti Artists Aboriginal Corporation in the Balgo-Wirrimanu Aboriginal Community is considered a particularly good place to see artists working and buy Aboriginal art.
The Kimberley area is known for Aboriginal rock art including paintings found near permanent water holes, some more than 17,000 years old.


(updated 08 April, 2006)
         

© FamilyTravel 2006