Smiths Beach Yallingup: Everything to Know

Ask me my favourite beach and I'll say Smiths Beach. I've been saying it since 1982. I've never felt the need to change my answer.

I've watched a lot of beaches change in that time. I've watched the dunes shift, the carpark double in size, the resort go up, and the cafe open and close and reopen under three different names. The beach itself, though (the sand, the headlands at either end, the way the swell wraps in off Indian Ocean and runs straight up onto a long crescent of white) hasn't changed. That isn't going to change.

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

People sometimes lump Yallingup and Smiths together. Don't. They're five minutes apart and they're completely different beaches.

Yallingup is a reef break with a small bay tucked behind it. Smiths is a long open sand beach with a famous offshore reef called Supertubes sitting out the back. You can swim at Smiths in conditions where you wouldn't swim at Yallingup. You can walk for an hour south along the coast from Smiths and not see anyone. You can have breakfast at Smiths without having to walk uphill. They're sister beaches, but they do different work.

For most visitors, Smiths is the beach you want. For surfers chasing the heaviest reef the region can offer, Supertubes is the wave you want. Different days. The wider Margaret River beaches guide puts Smiths against the rest of the coast.

Supertubes is not a beginner wave. I want to be honest about this. It's an outer reef that holds size, breaks in front of a slab, and on a six-foot southwest swell it is one of the heaviest waves on the West Australian coast. Without the skills out there, you'll get hurt.

The inside section, closer in to the beach, is gentler and more forgiving. On a smaller swell, beginners and intermediates can have a good time there, particularly at the south end where the reef tapers off into sand. But "smaller swell" is the qualifier. Check the forecast. Don't paddle out blind.

The bigger the swell, the longer Smiths is your beach. The smaller the swell, the more it belongs to everyone.

This is the part I tell every gallery visitor. Smiths is one of the better swimming beaches in the Yallingup-Dunsborough stretch, particularly at the north end of the beach near the resort. Sand bottom, no reef under your feet, gentle enough on a moderate day. The middle of the beach gets rip currents. You can usually see them as the darker, smoother water running back out. Don't swim where the water looks calmer than the water around it. That's a rip.

The south end is where the reef starts to come in. Beautiful for snorkelling on a flat day, less ideal for kids paddling. Pick your end based on what you're trying to do. The serious snorkel spot at the Aquarium sits one beach north.

For Smiths Beach Yallingup general info, the tourism site has the basics. For real-time conditions, the surf forecast sites are better than anything else.

This is the bit I'd put on every visitor's list. From the south end of Smiths there's a track that climbs up over the headland and runs along the cliffs toward Injidup. It's roughly five and a half kilometres each way (two to three hours one way at a walking pace) and it's part of the Cape to Cape track.

You climb out of Smiths, drop down to a small unnamed bay, climb again, and the next two hours are granite headlands, exposed coastal scrub, and views that don't quit. You pass Canal Rocks. You pass Wyadup. You arrive at Injidup, which on a calm day is one of the most beautiful places in the South West and has a natural rock spa at the north end that genuinely feels like a free luxury.

A few practical notes:

• Take water. There's no tap anywhere on the track.
• Take a hat. There's almost no shade.
• Don't walk it in midday summer. Early morning or late afternoon.
• The track has rocky steps and exposed cliff edges. Don't try it with very young kids.

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

To skip the walk back, leave a second car at Injidup. Or the Injidup natural spa walk for the practicalities of doing it as an out-and-back day.

The car park at Smiths is large and free. Toilets and an outdoor shower at the south end. The cafe at Smiths Beach Resort café and accommodation, Lamont's, does breakfast and lunch, and on a good morning the deck out the front is the best place in the region to sit with a coffee and watch the swell. They open at seven for breakfast.

Directions: turn off Caves Rd onto Smiths Beach Rd. It's well signposted. From Yallingup town it's about five minutes. From my gallery on Blythe Rd it's about eight minutes: straight up Blythe, left onto Caves Rd, right at Smiths Beach Rd.

Most beaches in this country face west, which means you get sunset and you compromise on sunrise. Smiths is a south-southwest facing crescent, which means at sunrise you get extraordinary side-light running across the dunes and lighting up the headland at the south end. At sunset you get the sky going pink behind you while the beach itself goes into shadow.

I'm a sunrise person. Always have been. The beach belongs to no one at five-thirty in summer, and to almost no one at seven in winter, and you can walk a kilometre south along the sand with nothing but the swell for company. That's worth getting up for.

Photo: Western Australian Government, CC BY 2.5 AU · via Wikimedia Commons

For the broader ranking of beaches in this part of the coast, the beaches ranked, with reasons is the longer view. Canal Rocks is ten minutes north, different again. And the the Canal Rocks sunset guide is the move for a free late afternoon.

I've sat on this beach more mornings than I can count. The thing I notice most these days is how the light catches the dune grass on the north end at exactly the same angle as it catches a piece of marri on the workbench around eleven in the morning. It's the same light. It's the light that made me a furniture maker, even if I didn't know that at the time.

We're eight minutes from Smiths Beach on Blythe Rd. Come by after your morning swim — the workshop will be open and you'll see what the same light does to a piece of jarrah. Google Maps sometimes misdirects via Wildwood Rd — stay on Bussell Hwy, turn at the Carbunup store, then Blythe Rd.

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