Shelley Beach (West Cape Howe)

Shelley Beach is the rare south coast salmon beach a normal car can reach, and that is most of its appeal on a stretch of coast where everything else demands a 4WD, a long walk or a granite platform with a body count behind it. It sits inside West Cape Howe National Park, under thirty minutes from either Albany or Denmark along Lower Denmark Road, in country made of sea cliffs, limestone outcrops, karri forest, heathland and white sand. The park also holds Torbay Head, the most southerly point of Western Australia, at the end of a 15km return walk or a rough 4WD track. Above the beach the lookout has purpose-built launch platforms for hang gliders and paragliders, so you fish under people who have decided the sensible way to deal with the Southern Ocean is to fling themselves off a hill above it. The page covers three waters, not one: Shelley Beach on a moderate day, Cosy Corner when the swell is up, and Torbay Inlet when it is really up.

On Shelley Beach the method is the standard autumn one — read the gutters, fish first and last light, and throw metal fast and erratically at anything working. Salmon are what the beach is known for, with herring and skippy on the same water year-round on lighter gear. Cosy Corner, 5km north and outside the park boundary, is the sheltered beach with a headland and Migo Island in front of it, and it holds herring, skippy and whiting while people wait for the salmon to show. Torbay Inlet, north-east again, is the light-tackle water — black bream take soft plastics, hard-bodied minnows and vibes, and none of that cares what the swell is doing. Blue groper come off the granite around the park and are the fish most likely to land someone in trouble with the rules, at 500mm minimum and one per day.

The beach's reputation rests on Australian salmon from March to May, at 300mm and four a day. Herring carry no size limit and a bag of 20, and skippy are 250mm with a bag of eight, both year-round on the same sand. Black bream at 250mm and six a day are a Torbay Inlet fish, not a Shelley Beach fish, and the drive between the two is the price of that. Mulloway are on the park-wide species list without a season or a platform attached to them, so treat a jewie as a rare bonus at 500mm and two a day. Whiting are caught along this coast too and, King George aside, have no minimum size and a bag of 30, with Cosy Corner in particular carrying a local reputation for shore-caught King George at 280mm and 12 a day. Western blue groper is the trap: 500mm minimum, one fish per day, and it is a different species from both the baldchin groper and the blackspot tuskfish that people call a bluebone.

Work the ladder in order. Shelley Beach when the swell is moderate, Cosy Corner when it is not, and Torbay Inlet when the coast is a write-off — that is three fishable options inside twenty minutes of each other. Camping inside the national park is at Shelley Beach only and campfires are not permitted at the campground, so bring a gas burner rather than an argument. Cosy Corner has toilets, barbecues, picnic benches and camping spaces in the bushland dunes, which makes it the better base for a family, though no fee or stay limit is published for it — check with the City of Albany before planning a night there. No pets are permitted in the national park at all, and that extends to leaving one in the car, the car park or on the beach.

Lower Denmark Road runs between Albany and Denmark and puts the park under thirty minutes from either town, with Shelley Beach Road heading south to the beach and Cosy Corner Road doing the same further east. Shelley Beach has easy access for all vehicles, but the beach sits below a lookout-height car park, so treat carrying gear down and back up as moderate work rather than a stroll. Standard park entry fees apply in West Cape Howe National Park, currently $17.00 per standard vehicle carrying 12 or fewer occupants, $10.00 concession, $8.00 per person for a large vehicle and $10.00 for a motorcycle, and a park pass covers it. Camping inside the park is limited to Shelley Beach, where campfires are not permitted. Cosy Corner sits outside the park boundary on a sealed road 5km north of Shelley Beach and has toilets, barbecues, picnic benches and camping spaces in the bushland dunes, with no camping fee or stay limit published. No pets are permitted anywhere in the national park, and nothing at either beach is described as wheelchair-accessible, so plan around soft sand and a slope.

Shelley Beach faces south-west straight into the prevailing swell, which is what cuts the salmon gutters and also what shuts the beach down when a serious Southern Ocean system arrives. Cosy Corner, 5km north and tucked behind its headland with Migo Island offshore, is generally sheltered and is the fallback on the same day. Torbay Inlet is swell-proof entirely and fishes on light tackle in weather that has closed the coast. Prevailing south-westerlies expose Shelley and are partly blocked at Cosy Corner, and a strong easterly reverses that arrangement completely. The tide runs one small cycle a day, which leaves swell and wind direction deciding everything. The department's own line for this coastline is worth taking literally — a notorious record for accidents and deaths from people slipping or being washed into the ocean by unexpected waves, gusting winds or extra-large swells.

The department's own line for this park is the one to build a day around: the southern coastline has a notorious record for accidents and deaths from people slipping or being washed into the ocean by unexpected waves, gusting winds or extra-large swells. People have died rock fishing on this coast: a man in his 30s died at The Deep, about 2km west of Lowlands Beach and 30km west of Albany, on 2 April 2018 after falling from the rocks while retrieving a fish, and a thrown lifebuoy did not reach him. The rocks near Casey's Beach, east of Albany, took an 18-year-old on 26 April 2015, again after a slip while fishing. Nothing in West Cape Howe National Park is a gazetted mandatory life-jacket site, but the department's own advice for this park is to wear a personal flotation device when fishing, that rock fishing on this coastline is extremely dangerous and not recommended, and to fish from the beach. None of these beaches is patrolled. Torbay Head is steep and its 4WD track is rough, and the walk out is 15km return.

Shelley Beach is inside West Cape Howe National Park, under thirty minutes from either Albany or Denmark along Lower Denmark Road and then Shelley Beach Road. It has easy access for all vehicles, which is unusual on this coast. The beach sits below a lookout-height car park, so carrying a full surf kit down and back up is moderate work. Standard park entry fees apply, currently $17.00 per standard vehicle.

Camping inside West Cape Howe National Park is limited to Shelley Beach, where campfires are not permitted. Cosy Corner, 5km north and just outside the park boundary, has toilets, barbecues, picnic benches and camping spaces in the bushland dunes, with no fee or stay limit published — check with the City of Albany before you plan a night there. No pets are permitted in the national park at all, including inside cars and in car parks.

It is the sheltered half of this trip — a generally protected beach 5km north of Shelley Beach, just outside West Cape Howe National Park, looking out at Migo Island. It fishes for herring, skippy and whiting, and it carries a local reputation for King George whiting taken from the shore. It is the calm-water option on the day Shelley Beach is blown out, and the toilets and bushland camping spaces make it a workable family base. This is the Cosy Corner at Kronkup between Albany and Denmark, not the Cosy Corner Beach near Augusta, which is a different place entirely with different rules.

Torbay Inlet, north-east of Cosy Corner. It is a light-tackle bream water fished with soft plastics, small hard-bodied minnows and vibes, and the bream there will take most lure types. It is not a Shelley Beach fish — the inlet is a separate drive and a separate fishery, and it is the one water in this area that is unaffected by swell. Black bream are 250mm with a bag of six.

Western blue groper is 500mm minimum with a daily bag of one fish, and that individual limit sits inside the demersal mixed bag. It is a different species from the baldchin groper, which has no minimum size and a bag of two, and from the blackspot tuskfish that many anglers call a bluebone, which is 400mm with a bag of two. Getting those confused on this coast means being wrong about both the size and the number.