Esperance WA, a nice town of nearly 15,000 people. Looks like there is money here. Tidy, clean, lovely beaches, pretty as a picture and a climate that’s pretty easy to take, mostly.

The weather forecast looks a little dodgy for today so we’re a bit flexible with plans. First job is breakfast and Dome gets another run, pretty easy option really, room to sit down, warm, food and coffee ok.

First tourist option is visiting Esperance Stonehenge. A full size replica of Stonehenge proper, only the 137 local granite stones are erected as a fully complete Stonehenge  just like 1950BC. How the f… do we know what it looked like then? Anyway, I take the pamphlets information as correct and trust they aren’t pulling my chain. There’s hundreds of tonnes of granite. The project was conceived by some people, who went broke (my interpretation of the term “deal fell through”). There is a price on everything, no discounts for seniors, and the owners drive twin late model Range Rovers with matching personalised number plates, so they clearly drag enough through to make a dollar or two. All the same, it’s an impressive structure, Bill Baillie, the pommy comedian thought so was well when he shot part of one of his travel shows here.

*** The Spell Nazi’s – a heads up – I know how a forest of trees is spelt, ok, its ” forrest”. Or is it, I clearly wasted Mum and Dads investment in my education, I fink.

We move on to the coast line west of the town, the rain starts, lightly at first, then when The Captain, The Don and Pauolo get out of the car at Twilight Beach, Mother Nature suddenly drops a bucket on us, like walking under a Waterfall, we’re soaked in 5 seconds of rain. The waves are big, crashing on to thin white sandy beaches with huge bald granite rocks holding it all in place. No doubt there are some Noah’s Arks swimming around there as well.

Next is the non pink, Pink Lake. Should be called Lake Disappointment, or nothing at all. There is a story to it but recent development has kept the water non pink.

We then head to the Cannery Gallery, which, when we manage to find the door in, is a little underwhelming. Its OK, I don’t want to seem negative, but I reckon it’s a nice place to bring kids on a wet day to get a bit of art guidance, some Lego time, or write down a bit of poetry in a book. A break for mum while the brats scribble on somebody else’s paper with free crayons.

Lunch is a Dome, the bakery can’t fit us, followed by some retail therapy and the a few of us get a look at the insides of the eye lids. Not me, I go shopping with The Navigator, and she manages to find something to buy, strange that! I’m remaining unaware of how the inside os my eyelids are looking.

The local newspaper usually sheds a little light on local culture. Here are some things I read;

A woman fell off her balcony and claims she was saved by a magpie who woke her up. I call bullshit, magpies are murderous vicious  buggers of things and would not save you, unless she fed it meat and fluffed it’s feathers every day. I’ve got scars on my ears from magpie attacks. And anyway, how did the magpie save her, peck 000 on her phone after putting to her eyeball to get access to the home screen. I somehow doubt it!!!

An electrical contractor (I’m not mentioning their name but the paper did) was fined for dodgy Multiple Earth Neutral work – Harve will tell you this is a real thing. The acronym is MEN. Who ever heard of MEN causing trouble?

There was a tradesmen’s get together organised by the council. My guess is the mob that f…d up the MEN stuff were not invited.

A walk back along the beach in town is very pleasant, the rain has stopped for a little while.

A little quiet reflection before the “Kings” card game gets into action. Now it might be just me, I dunno, but I feel like there was a sub plot to bring The Navigator and Pauolo back to earth a bit. We struggled, Wally was out of the blocks faster than Gout Gout, followed by Smurfette. Performance unenhancing Kit Kat chocolate distracts a few of us and unintended retention of the Joker devastates a couple of players rather average start anyway. Round two of the card champion ship goes to  Wally.

Dinner is at the Pier Hotel. Food is good, The Don and Harve act as advance party and do a quality check before we finalised the card game. The Ginger beer on tap is expensive, I’ll be careful next time.

Home to electric blankets, air con on 25 and get ready for an ETD of 9am tomorrow for Kalgoorlie. Two golf holes before Kalgoorlie are on the agenda tomorrow.

Ciao and arrividerci from Esperence.

Pauolo