Sand Dunes, Caves and Deserted Beaches: A Picturesque Road Trip from Perth to Jurien Bay (and Geraldton)

You’ll need a car to explore Western Australia. The beauty of this region is its vastness and incredible freedom and space – it’s not an easy place to travel, but the reward is in the challenge.

Fortunately, getting a car is the easy part – you can book and manage your car rental using the Avis app, which gives you flexibility to adjust your rental as plans change. The app also lets you choose to pay when you travel, with no change or cancellation fees, and you can shorten or extend your rental easily.

Once your hired car is sorted, the big question is: where should you go? For us, the answer is a road trip from Perth (starting at the airport to pick up your car) to Jurien Bay – the drive there is an unforgettable experience in itself.

Pull in to see the ethereal rock formations of the Pinnacles, sand board down the wild sand dunes of Lancelin, explore the caves at Stockyard Gully, take a dip in one of the stunning, deserted beaches along the Shipwreck Coast, and sample some of the state’s world-famous rock lobster at the Lobster Shack. Here’s how.

The Lancelin sand dunes offer a fitting welcome to the harsh beauty of the west. Pure white sand piles up to three storeys tall, with some of the dunes sloped at steep 45-degree angles. Hire a sand board or quad bike to ride down the mounds, or climb up to the top for panoramic views of the Indian Ocean and the offshore limestone reefs that sank many an early explorer’s ship.

There’s no better place to eat fresh fish than a fishing town. Enjoy grilled fish’n’chips, greenlip mussels or garlic prawns at the Endeavour Tavern while watching the sun set over the ocean they were caught in. It’s not all seafood, though – you can also order pub classics like burgers, chicken parmigiana, schnitzel, scotch fillet and pizzas from the menu.

Pubs play a big part in any regional town, and for much of Lancelin’s colonial history the Lancelin Sands Hotel has been its centre. It offers boutique hotel rooms equipped with a minibar, air-conditioning and ensuite bathrooms, and is just a stone’s throw from the white sandy beaches that have earned Lancelin its reputation as a West Australian tourist destination.

No trip to this coast is complete without sampling the western rock lobster endemic to the region. Enjoy a cray tail at this beachside restaurant, then take a tour of the Lobster Shack’s live processing plant for a first-hand look at part of the region’s multimillion-dollar lobster industry.

The Pinnacles are an ethereal rock formation, estimated to be 100,000 years old. To local Aboriginal people, this area was a dark place that was to be avoided; the story goes that young men who ventured through here disappeared into the sand, and the rock formations are their fingertips reaching above the ground. Whatever its origin, it’s an otherworldly place that will make you feel as if you’re on another planet.

Call into this comfortable, well-appointed bed and breakfast on the edge of a desolate town that could be straight out of a Tim Winton novel. Many of the Perth-based author’s books are set in locations inspired by these coastal towns.

After the sparse scattering of crayfishing towns you pass on the way up the coast, Jurien Bay may seem like a bustling metropolis in comparison. Fuel up for the day at Meraki, a cafe that brews Dimattina coffee and serves dishes like a big breakfast, smashed avo, eggs Benedict and buttermilk pancakes for breakfast, plus sangas, burgers and salads for lunch.

Set a little way back from the beach, the Hill River Nature Reserve offers a different view of the region and a welcome reprieve from the strong sea breezes WA is known for. The six-acre bush block backs onto a nature reserve and features one of Tiny Away’s signature small homes, with kangaroos and kookaburras on your doorstep.

As you head north, the reefs that hug the coast move further offshore and the beaches become longer, more desolate and beautiful. So beautiful, in fact, that many have been used as film sets. Some of Aussie road-trip rom-com The Naked Wanderer was filmed right here in Sandy Cape.

If you’ve got time, take a tour to swim with sea lions in Jurien Bay or call into the Stockyard Gully Caves, just north of Jurien Bay, on your way out of town. From there, you can extend your road trip and keep heading up to Geraldton. There’s an Avis location at Geraldton Airport so you can drop your car off then fly back down to Perth (or wherever else you’re traveling next).

This article is produced by Broadsheet in partnership with Avis. Book and manage your car rental with the Avis app, making trip planning easy. Choose to pay later when you book, with no change or cancellation fees as you plan out your trip. Even when you’re on the road, you can extend your rental or change the return date of your car easily in the Avis app. (Changing your trip details or car selection will affect the total cost of your rental).