Coronation Beach is just outside Geraldton. The road in is bitumen and there’s no town or shops, just the campground and a beautiful beach.

A full time caretaker lives on site to collect the small fees charged, no bookings, first in first served. There is no water or power but it does have a dump point and rubbish bins. The toilets are clean drop toilets and the showers are rooms with drain holes and a hook to hang your water bag, it’s BYO water.

The wind at Coronation Beach is relentless, thus it’s a very popular place for wind surfers and kite surfers.

Sunsets were lovely.

Fishing at sunset with the high tide was lovely.

Going fishing and ending up with salad, the only fish I caught was snagged in the side.

Tim wasn’t so keen to join me in the wind so I found another friend.

We went into Geraldton for the day to stock up on supplies. Geraldton, at the peak of the mining boom had a population of 75,000, it now has 25,000. We visited the museum and the art gallery. The art gallery building is beautiful.

The only display at the gallery was pieces made from repurposed plastic objects: “Divine Assembly” by Louise Paramor. It wasn’t really our  type of art.

The memorial to the loss of HMAS Sydney (II) with all of its crew overlooking Geraldton is very moving.   For those interested, the WW2 battle and the monument are explained  in the photos below. Well worth reading. Each of the 645 seagulls in the dome represents one Australian sailor killed. They came from all over Australia, most of them only 20 years old.  I think of my own sons when I see these kind of monuments and I would want their names remembered for all time.

Heading north again. Cheers till next time, Helen and Tim.