Jurien Bay

As much as we appreciated how good Toodyay had been to us we were glad to be heading back to the Coast as originaly planned.

Jurien Bay is a seaside resort town devoted to recreational fishing, tourism and professional cray fishing. It was a very sleepy coastal village until the 1950s when the town became a major port from rock lobster fishing. This led, inevitably, to holiday makers and today it is home to an impressive marina and popular with travellers wanting to enjoy the attractions of the area. The town is situated at the southern end of Jurien Bay which stretches over 9 km from Island Point at the south to North Head. The waters of the bay are sheltered by a string of islands and reefs which lie just off the coast. The town has been built on low lying sand ridges beside the beach and is characterised by cottages built for holidaymakers and weekend anglers.
In 1801 a French expedition led by Thomas Nicholas Baudin and Louis-Claude Desaules de Freycinet mapped and named much of the coastline. Two ships - Le Geographe and the Casuarina - sailed up the coast of Western Australia mapping and collecting samples of the local fauna and flora as they progressed. Freycinet, a brilliant cartographic surveyor, took soundings and surveyed Jurien Bay which he named after Charles Marie, Vicomte Jurien, of the French Naval Administration.Read more