Exploring Esperance

Esperence is the last port before the Great Australian Bight when heading east. It is the gateway to some of the best cruising grounds in the world. By Roger McMillan.

I sailed into Esperance intending to spend three days there - and stayed five months. It wasn't just the beautiful cruising area, the balmy summer weather and the steady south-easterly winds that caused this radical change of plans - it was mostly to do with the incredible hospitality shown by the locals.

Unfortunately, most readers won't get to sail on Esperance Bay. Unless you are circumnavigating or delivering a boat from one side of the country to the other, you will have no call to sail into the sheltered harbour. And at this stage there are no charter boats available, so fly-in to sail isn't an option.

However, from time to time the Esperance Bay Yacht Club holds a nationals or even a world championship there. Ask any Flying Fifteen sailor who was at the 1999 Worlds about Casper's Barbecue and you'll be regaled with tales of the beer being chilled in the club Pelicans and the extraordinary hospitality of the locals.

Just last summer, the club also hosted a successful 125 Nationals, so if your class is ever thinking of Esperance as a venue, vote for it and start saving your money. It's an expensive place to get to but worth it for the chance to visit one of the most beautiful sailing destinations in the world.

Short history

The Dutch explorer Pieter Nuyts on board Gulde Zeepard in 1627 was the first European to sight the Recherche Archipelago, which stretches 230km from west to east and features 105 islands and more than 1500 rocks and islets. However, it was Bruni D'Entrecasteaux and his crews on board the French ships Esperance (meaning "hope") and Recherche who were the first to go ashore while sheltering from a storm in 1792.

Mathew Flinders comprehensively charted the waters of the area in 1802, and some of his soundings are still used on charts today. That's one of the reasons why I chose to enter the harbour via the main channel in 2008, rather than taking the shorter route inside Gull Island.

I was sailing solo and at night towards an unknown landfall and the sight of those terrifying words "insufficient data" on the chart were enough to convince me that another hour or so wasn't going to matter.

There is still debate about whether the best route is inside or outside the islands of the archipelago. While cruising to wonderful spots such as Lucky Bay, Cape le Grand and Middle Island, as well as racing around many of the inner islands on club race days, it soon becomes apparent that the electronic charts are very accurate and most islands and rocks have very steep sides, meaning you can approach them closely without any danger.
I would now take the inside route every time.

Once inside Esperance Bay itself you are in very sheltered waters, although the south-easterly does blow pretty hard all summer - which makes for fun sailing.

Indigo blue

When I show people photographs of Esperance, I am often accused of Photo-shopping the water colour. Believe me, Photoshop is not necessary. The sand is incredibly white and incredibly fine - in fact Lucky Bay in the Cape le Grand National Park has consistently been voted Australia's whitest beach. This whiteness causes the clean, clear ocean to appear such an amazing blue.

The strong winds and the many islands mean the Esperance Bay Yacht Club has one of the most interesting racing programs of any club in the world. The first week will see them racing windward/leewards in the inner bay, hurtling along the shoreline marked by towering Norfolk Pines that were planted to provide spars for sailing ships, and dodging the Tanker Jetty which protrudes 842m into the bay and is home to sea lions and other sea life.

The following week will be a "short island race" - a two to three hour race around some of the closest islands, where seals bask in the sun and dive for a feed. The third week will see a long island race, heading off at 10am and delving a bit further out into the bay, where dolphins could appear unexpectedly to laugh at the land-lubbers. Finally, there is the annual offshore race around Remark Island, which carries as its prize one of the most sought-after trophies in the cabinet above the bar.

As I said, the hospitality at the club is extraordinary. In many ways this is typical of country towns anywhere, but I think Esperance takes it to a higher level. I can recommend Friday night drinks and a meal at the clubhouse, and if you wander down on Saturday morning and ask if anyone needs crew, you're almost certain to enjoy a great day out.

There is a small but very active cruising division, a fleet of Flying Fifteens, which is keenly contested, and members also sail National 125s and Javelins. The kids sail Pacers and Pelicans, when they're not being used as eskies.

If the above words and the accompanying photographs tempt you to put Esperance on your bucket list, I know you won't be disappointed. While summer temperatures are usually perfect, the winters are a bit too cold, otherwise those three days I planned to spend there could easily have turned into a lifetime.