Hi everyone, I hope you and yours are doing well.
The last few weeks, I have shown you some of the walks near where I live. Today I will share another.
Back in 2017 I shared a walk around a walk around the Leschenault Inlet in Bunbury - the city near where I live. On the map below you can see the Leschenault Inlet which I wrote about in that post.
The last few days we have had beautiful sunny winter days - perfect for walking. Last Thursday we went into Bunbury and walked along Koombana Bay from the Dolphin Discovery Centre to the old gantry crane. When I looked it up on the internet the distance showed 2.5 kilometres, but that was via the roads. We walked along the beach front. You can see the route on this map. The blue line shows the drive route - but look closer and you can see where the land meets the water - this is where we walked along the walking paths.
We parked at the Dolphin Discovery Centre and walked west. Opened in 1994, the not-for-profit Dolphin Discovery Centre was established to allow tourists and locals to interact, learn about and enjoy the local wild bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops aduncus) that regularly visit the area. There is a dolphin interaction zone on the beach, interpretive centre, swim tours, as well as a cafe. You can learn more about their work here: Dolphin Discovery Centre
You can't see the dolphins very well in these pics below, but as you can see people have gathered to see them. You should not interfere with them or feed the dolphins.
From here we walk past the 62-Thirty Cafe and the Koombana Bay Yacht Club. Many of the boats are parked up in the yard for the winter.
From here we just keep walking around past all the restaurants until we reach the breakwater going out to the old gantry crane. In this photo below you can see where we have just walked by. You can see the walk bridge where we walked over "the plug" on the left hand side.
It is a pleasant walk out to the old crane. Big boats are moored in this sheltered waterway I think some people live on them. In the second photo below you can see an overall view of the boat harbour with the walk out to the old crane on the right and the land-backed wharf of the outer harbour on the left. This photo was taken a few years ago - I need to take a new one.
The old jetty is gone now, replaced with this rock breakwater causeway jutting out into Koombana Bay. The original jetty was constructed by convict labour employed by local contractor, William Forrest in 1864. Previously people and goods were transferred by boat from ships anchored offshore. The jarrah and karri decking was supported on piles of jarrah, blackbutt and wandoo. The jetty was decommissioned in 1982 and despite an intensive campaign the jetty fell into disrepair and its demolition was completed in June 2013.
From here we turn back down the causeway, passed another restaurant and the Jetty Baths playground and picnic area.
That's it from me today. I hope you have enjoyed this walk along Koombana Bay and the Bunbury waterfront. Do you have a favourite waterfront walk? Perhaps you would like to tell us about it in your comments.
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