Yanchep Lagoon & Crystal Cave, W.A.
TLWR (too long won’t read)? Watch the 4 minute video - Yanchep Lagoon and National Park Crystal Cave!
👩🦰 It was a long weekend here in WA, so my mate T and I decided to make the most of it and do a little day trip to Yanchep. Yanchep is a coastal town located 56 kilometres North of Perth CBD. There’s lot to see in Yanchep, with the main attraction being the Yanchep National Park where there are numerous hiking trails, a koala boardwalk, a golf course, Aboriginal experience sessions, Crystal Cave tours and more! We decided to start here.
Located within the Yanchep National Park are more than 400 different caves, one of them being the Crystal Cave, where you can have an unique experience of the underground world. We began with the Crystal Cave tour so we wouldn’t be too worn out from the hike! It goes for about 45 minutes and tickets can be purchased via the WA Parks and Wildlife website. There are some steep stairs to enter and exit the cave, and some sections that require crouching. The temperature is beautifully cool, it’s like walking into an air conditioned room on a hot Summer’s day!
The cave is lined with limestones and has lots of peculiar geological formations that were formed through centuries of geological processes, some of the formations that you’ll see may be up to 5,000 years old! During the guided tour of the cave, you’re given all of the history of the cave, including the discovery and the upkeep of it. The guide also discusses the creatures that inhabit this labyrinth as well as how the cave itself is formed. It’s definitely worth checking out, next time I visit Yanchep (I plan to drag Aaron up there) I’d love to see if I could do the adventure caving experience.
After we wrapped up the cave tour, we went straight to the Ghost House Walk Trail. To do any of the trails you have to first sign in at the visitor centre and fill out a form, then check back in on your return. The Ghost House Trail is advertised as 12.4km but the lady at the Visitor Centre let us know that we could take a shortcut towards the end if we’d had enough. The trail is fairly easy to follow, however there was one particular spot that could’ve been more clearly signed near the start around the lake, T and I took a wrong turn. Thankfully, it doesn’t take you too far out of the way before you realise and turn back in the right direction.
The walk is quite pleasant but the ghost house itself is a bit of an unexciting feature, it’s really just a doorway and the remains of ruined walls now. We stopped just long enough to take photos then moved on. It would’ve been nice to have a information plaque there with some information about the house, we were curious to know what it was doing there in the middle of nowhere with no other visible structures around. If we had more information as well, we might have known about the many caves that are apparently just off the track - I read about these after we had finished the track an wish I knew earlier!
We ended up doing just over 10kms, and I had to stop a few times because I thought I was going to pass out from the heat! I got so dizzy after we finished the hike and went for ice blocks that I had to sit on the ground because I thought I was going to be sick. It was definitely too hot for trail hiking! Still felt pretty good about the effort we made anyway! From here we left the National Park and took the 10 minute drive to Yanchep Lagoon. We originally planned to do some snorkelling, swimming and to check out the Alex T. Brown shipwreck, but we both decided we were beat from the hike, so thought we’d just take a dip instead to cool off.
Yanchep Lagoon is a natural wonder, impossible to miss owing to the gigantic 400m reef separating the shallow turquoise beach from the deep blue Indian Ocean. The naturally-formed rock barrier shelters the beach from large waves and big underwater predators, making it an incredibly safe swimming zone. Particularly important in Australia's sharky waters! 🦈🦈 The water was absolutely heavenly after our hike and the perfect end to the day.
I won’t say it was a fun day because the hike was pretty grueling haha! But I definitely plan to go back and do some more of the things that we didn’t get a chance to, like check out the shipwreck, do the adventure caving, do the treetop adventures and the indigenous experience.
Love you, bye!