The South West Edge in 6 Days - Britz

Five nights and 1,500 kilometres from Pemberton to Perth in a campervan, east along the Southern Ocean before turning back inland.

Pemberton starts it in the karri forest, where the trees reach seventy metres, then Walpole and William Bay National Park, with Greens Pool, a sheltered bay behind a line of granite boulders, and the Elephant Rocks beside it.

Denmark and Albany follow, with Torndirrup National Park on the granite headlands, where the Gap is a sheer-sided inlet the swell drives into and a steel platform hangs out over it. The Stirling Range comes next inland, a line of peaks rising out of flat farmland, then Fitzgerald River National Park, a UNESCO biosphere reserve, Hopetoun, and Esperance with Cape Le Grand and Lucky Bay, where the sand squeaks underfoot and kangaroos lie about on the beach.

Britz supply the camper and the day-by-day plan, and the hire is priced live per vehicle rather than per person; campsites, fuel, ferries, park fees and activities are all extra, with a nil-excess insurance pack available at booking. Six days for 1,500 kilometres means the final run back to Perth is a long day, since Esperance is a full day’s drive from the city. Everything is sealed. Spring is the season, when the Stirling Range and Fitzgerald River are both in flower, and each holds plant species found nowhere else on earth. Lucky Bay at Cape Le Grand is the stop people remember, and the campground there books out well in advance over the Western Australian holidays.