Lancelin is Perth's most recognised road-trip fishing town — 125 km north, an hour and a half if the caravans cooperate. A chain of outer reef led by Edwards Island shelters a clear shallow lagoon, the jetty gives you calm-water access for bait-and-wait species, and the back beach faces open water with gutters that stack up tailor and salmon on the right day. Pink snapper cruise close enough that beach-casting them is genuinely on the cards in the cooler months.

For bread-and-butter: fish the jetty at dawn, dusk or after dark — whiting, herring, flathead and squid all hold around the pylons, with the occasional mulloway and small kingfish for people fishing live baits at night. For the back beach, walk south to the gutters and South Point — metal slugs and poppers in autumn for tailor and salmon, retrieved fast. On the lagoon side, small soft plastics worked on the shallow flats are the go for whiting and flathead on calm mornings with an offshore breeze.

Herring, whiting (sand and yellowfin), squid, tailor and salmon (autumn, back beach and South Point), flathead on the lagoon flats, mulloway and occasional yellowtail kingfish from the jetty, and pink snapper beach-cast in the cooler months. Samson fish around the deeper reef edges for anglers willing to walk and wade.

No fishing licence required for jetty or beach fishing, but you do need a Recreational Fishing from Boat Licence if you cross the outer reef. The back beach gutters shift after every big blow — walk the beach and read the water before committing to a spot. Westerly swell can make the back beach unfishable; the lagoon and jetty usually still fish. West Coast Bioregion demersal closures apply to pink snapper and dhufish — verify current dates with DPIRD.