Deepdene to Cape Leeuwin

Mileage: 17.6 km

Cumulative: 128.2 km

I had a sleep in this morning to a rather luxurious 5.30 AM before the final day on trail. The campsite was very humid and the tents were all saturated with condensation but there was no time to dry them out before hitting the trail by 7 AM and climbing back out through the dunes back onto Deepdene Beach.

The sand was very soft underfoot but the morning light was really beautiful and the air very crisp and cool. We could see the lighthouse at Cape Leeuwin ahead which still seemed so far away.

The beach walk itself seemed to go quite quickly but, as we reached a headland at the end of the first section of beach, we rounded the corner to a section which was far more rocky and involved some trickier sections.

The trail then exited the beach and followed some sand dunes before heading inland and following the line of coast through the coastal scrub. Every so often we would catch a glimpse of the lighthouse which was getting ever closer.

Then, rounding a corner we reached the southern trail register. Unfortunately, none of the pens worked but luckily Matthew and Lynne arrived right behind us and came to the rescue. Prok had already passed through on his way to the end.

The trail ran down from here onto a rocky beach and the official end of the Cape to Cape Track at the Water Wheel. We walked up to the end and touched it and felt a great sense of achievement. Matthew and Lynne walked through behind us so we gave them a clap as they finished.

The ‘unofficial’ end is, of course, the lighthouse itself so we walked up to this and touched it just as we had touched the start at Cape Naturaliste days earlier. It felt like it brought the trail to completion and it felt wonderful to have finished the trail.

We caught up with Prok at the lighthouse and we all caught a taxi together to Augusta, which is 8 km from the lighthouse. We reached Augusta and had a great lunch and waited for our transport back to Perth.

The Cape to Cape was a wonderful trail through some incredible coastal scenery as well as the nice stretch through Boranup. It is definitely a challenging trail but the effort was well worth it!