Driving from Perth to Margaret River: 5 Stops Worth Pulling Over For

The drive from Perth to Yallingup takes about three hours without stops. I never don't stop.

Photo: Public domain, Public domain · via Wikimedia Commons

I've driven the Bussell Hwy more times than I can count. Trips to Perth for materials, trips back home with the car loaded, weekends running visitors down to the workshop. Over forty years you learn where the good stops are. Not the ones on the tourist maps. The ones that actually earn the extra time.

Here are the five I'd pull over for. In order, from Perth heading south.

Most people take the Kwinana Freeway south out of Perth, which turns into Forrest Hwy, which turns into Bussell Hwy at Bunbury. Three hours, maybe a little more with traffic out of the city. The drive itself is mostly flat farmland until you get past Busselton, when the country starts to change and the trees get bigger.

If you're heading to my workshop specifically, Google Maps sometimes misdirects via Wildwood Rd. Stay on Bussell Hwy, turn at the Carbunup store, then Blythe Rd. I've had visitors arrive ninety minutes late because they trusted the phone over the signage. The Carbunup store is the landmark. You can't miss it.

The drive down is part of arriving. Don't rush it.

Mandurah is about an hour south of Perth and it's the easiest stretch break on the drive. Pull off the freeway, head to the foreshore, and walk the boardwalk for fifteen minutes. The estuary opens out in front of you. There's coffee. There's a fish and chips place I've stopped at more than once.

I don't linger here. It's a leg-stretcher, not a destination. But it breaks the freeway monotony in a way that makes the next stretch easier. Driving with kids, this is the one to stop at.

About two hours from Perth you hit Bunbury, which is the biggest town between the capital and Margaret River. The Dolphin Discovery Centre at Koombana Bay is worth half an hour. Wild dolphins come into the shallows most mornings. There's an interpretation centre, a small cafe, and a beach you can actually swim at if the timing is right.

Not into dolphins, the Back Beach stretch of Bunbury (south of the town centre, facing the Indian Ocean) is the swell side of the same peninsula. Better surf, more wind, fewer people.

Photo: Michelle Corcoran, CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikimedia Commons

Past Bunbury you start hitting the country I actually know. Ludlow is a small farming community between Capel and Busselton, and the Sunflowers Animal Farm is signposted off the highway. Sheep, alpacas, ponies, the lot. It's a half-hour stop, it's cheap, and after three hours driving with kids in the back of the car it might save your sanity.

For grown-ups travelling without kids, skip this and push on. But for families, it's the one stop that makes the drive feel manageable.

Busselton is twenty-five minutes north of my place and the jetty is the stop I make every single time. It's nearly two kilometres long, built in 1865, and the longest timber-piled jetty in the southern hemisphere. As a furniture maker I have a soft spot for old timber that's still doing its job after a hundred and sixty years. If you're stopping the first night here, where to actually stay in Busselton covers the hotels and caravan parks.

You can walk the whole jetty for free. Takes about forty minutes return at a relaxed pace. There's a train for non-walkers, and an underwater observatory at the far end for the paid upgrade. The observatory is genuinely good. Coral reef in temperate water, which doesn't happen many places.

the jetty, properly visited for the long version of how I'd spend a full day here.

The town itself has decent coffee (try The Goose on the foreshore) and a few good lunch options for the right timing. The full list of things to do in Busselton is worth a glance if you've got a couple of hours. The water in Geographe Bay is calm and shallow. Warm day after three hours driving, swim before you keep going.

Photo: SeanMack, CC BY 3.0 · via Wikimedia Commons

Carbunup isn't a town so much as a pull-off on the Bussell Hwy. There's a general store, a couple of houses, and a turnoff that becomes Blythe Rd. The store does coffee, basic groceries, and the best vanilla slice I've eaten on this side of the country.

I'm including it as a stop because it's the landmark for finding my workshop. Turn at the Carbunup store, head down Blythe Rd, and three minutes later you're at the gallery. Left Perth at 7am, stopped at the four places above, you'll roll in around 1.30pm. That's a good time to arrive. Light's right, the workshop is open, and Pamela has the kettle on most days. For a plan for the rest of the day once you've checked in, a single-day plan for the region folds in a cave, a beach walk and a sundowner.

The gallery is on Blythe Rd in Yallingup. The walls are jarrah and southwest limestone (I built it in 1988) and the workshop is open behind a viewing window so you can watch what's being made. Free entry, no booking, and the easiest possible last stop before you settle into wherever you're staying.

There are other places people will tell you to stop. Harvey has the cheese factory. Donnybrook has the orchards. Quindanning has a pub that's worth a detour if you've got the time but is well off the direct route. They're all fine. But if you're trying to make the drive in one day and still arrive with the light, the five above are the ones I'd commit to.

You'll notice I haven't suggested wineries on the drive down. That's deliberate. The Margaret River wine region starts after you arrive, not before. Don't burn an hour at a cellar door on the highway when there are a hundred better ones an hour past my workshop. the Caves Road write-up for what to do once you're here.

Leave at 7am on a weekday if you can. You'll miss the school traffic out of the city and you'll arrive in time for lunch somewhere good. Friday afternoons in summer are the worst. Every second car heading south, and the freeway slows to a crawl past Mandurah. Sunday afternoons heading back to Perth aren't much better.

Autumn is my favourite time to do this drive. The light is softer, the heat is gone, the kangaroos are out at dawn and dusk in the paddocks past Capel. If you can pick your weekend, pick a clear day in April or May.

Photo: David Stanley, CC BY 2.0 · via Wikimedia Commons

That's the drive. Five stops, three of which you can do in under thirty minutes each, and one (the jetty) that's worth a proper hour if you've got it. Get to Yallingup with enough light left to walk down to the beach and you've done it right.