There’s a place on the map called Point Sinclair. It’s south of Penong, off the Long Straight Road. About 20km. But if you have been touched by the surfers of the world, or you actually live in their world (that’s me), then you know it as Cactus. It’s a bunch of waves that are yet another Holy Grail. The road here passes more huge sand dunes. You could be forgiven for thinking you were in Saudi Arabia. There’s a causeway across a lake – one side is pink with algae and the other isn’t! Belligerently, it’s called the Blue Lake.

The Blue (and pink) Lake

Back in the 70’s, soon after the waves here were discovered, surfers would flock here for weeks at a time. The area along the coast and the dunes became feral, with no toilet facilities, and no tracks to contain the campers. The place was in danger of being loved to death. In 1986 Ron Gates bought the place – 550 Ha of the whole cape – and has created a clean and well maintained place to camp, which will preserve the dunes and the fragile eco system. He has hand built numerous toilet shelters and wind shelters out of local stones, made roads and fenced off sensitive areas. He cleans the toilets, delivers fire wood, and empties the bins himself. He likes a chat too. In just 45 minutes we learnt about his fight to create a marine sanctuary reserve, a recent visit to Cactus by Kelly Slater, what he thinks of the mayor in Ceduna, what is was like there in the 70s, and his divorce. And there was more.

Our camp at Cactus, with one of Ron’s hand built wind shelters and fire places.

But back to the waves. The wind was not cooperating today, but the swell was there. Maybe tomorrow.

An uncooperative Cactus.

We did some relaxing, if you can believe that. Fergus and Harry spent ages scouring the camping area for lizards and skinks. They found this stumpy tailed lizard and brought him back to camp to show us.

Right on the point is Port Le Hunte. It’s a beautiful protected bay with a netted swimming enclosure. This was built after a young boy was taken by a white pointer shark while swimming here. Sharks had never been seen here before that.

In fact, the sharks here have a bad reputation. A surfer lost his life here to a shark in 2000 at Cactus beach. The numbers of surfers visiting dropped off immediately, and is now only back to half of what the visitor numbers were before the attack.

The bore water shower is a cold one, but it was just what we needed to wash away the dirt. We finished the day just like the nomads, with a sundowner or two.