Clippers

The yachts from the Clipper around the world yacht race arrived in Geraldton in mid December. They had sailed from South Africa and they are now on their way to Singapore in the fifth leg of the 56,000km race which began in Hull, UK in September.

The presence of 200 crew members and their families was a real boost to the local economy over Christmas while surrounding towns recorded a dip in visitors.

The race was supposed to stop in Fremantle, but the council there didn't think it would do anything for their economy so refused to host them. Our win!

They departed on Sunday afternoon. The race goes for 10 months, but each crew only does one leg of the race on the 68 foot yachts.


<--Spitit of Australia yacht

More info can be found here on the official website

and in our local paper

Yachts race passed the Sun Princess cruise ship

After having been on this ship the morning I went to see the yachts, the 68foot-ers didn't look so big!

Denmark's main attraction

The little town of Denmark in SW WA is but a little spot on the map. It is surrounded by beautiful forest, has an award winning bakery (best known for its pies), is mainly populated by hippies and has the World's Largest Barometer.

This is the 12m high Bert Bolle Barometer in the barometer museum in the Denmark visitors centre.

According to the tourism website Bert and his wife moved from the Netherlands to this town (perhaps they got a bit lost?) in 1999 and couldn't part with his beloved barometer, so brought it with him.