We've turned north around the south west corner of Australia and immediately noticed a 10 degree increase of temperature. Like Esperance, the Dutch and French were poking around here during the Age of Exploration, but no one took the next step to actually establish any settlements. During the Napoleon wars the English didn't leave that … Continue reading Busselton

Esperance is like Port Lincoln. Both are industrial ports but instead of fishing and farm products, Esperance deals with farm products and mined ore. Nickel, lithium and iron mostly. Our tour guide said about 99% of the farm products go to Asian countries. It was a bouncy tender ride from the ship. What jumped out … Continue reading Esperance

Port Lincoln is about 170 miles (280 km) from Adelaide by boat, but over an 8 hour drive due to geography - 4 hours north east around Spencer Gulf, then 4+ hours south. It is the entry into the Great Australian Bight. What is a "bight"? A bight is the water within a curvature of … Continue reading Port Lincoln

About 70 miles (110 km) away from Adelaide is Kangaroo Island. It is an island, and - perhaps unsurprisingly, has kangaroos (and wallaby). Kangaroo are not really known for swimming. Seems during the ice age that allowed humanity to cross the land bridge from Asia to North America also allowed the kangaroo to hop their … Continue reading Kangaroo Island

Adelaide is the capital of the state of South Australia, and the first freely-settled area of Australia (to separate it from the penal colonies). The city was named for the new wife of King William IV. The ship docked in the outer harbor, so my "highlights" tour had a 45-minute bus ride thru suburbs to … Continue reading Adelaide