I spent 2 days in Busselton, it wasn't enough

I could barely fit in all of the new stuff on my 48-hour visit to this buzzing WA coastal city.

By the locals’ own admissions, Busselton/Undalup was never much of a tourist magnet in WA’s southwest summer playground. “Busselton was just a place you drove past to get to Dunsborough or Margaret River,” one tells me. “It was like a bathroom break,” says another. “For years, people just drove past,” a local chef observes.

But since direct flights launched in 2022 from Melbourne, and last year from Sydney, Busselton’s got a definite buzz going on. I can barely fit in all the new stuff on a two-day December visit to this coastal city 220km southwest of Perth.

From the compact airport I head straight to the new Hilton Garden Inn, a glossy, five-storey hotel facing the turquoise waters of the Indian Ocean and Busselton Jetty, the longest timber pier this side of the equator. Norfolk pines line the beachfront like native Christmas trees, fronting enclosed ocean pools safe from sharks and jimble jellyfish. It’s a spectacular outlook.

The hotel welcome is bright and friendly, the rooms fresh, 21st-century functional and hung with eye-catching photography. You want an ocean-facing room with a balcony above the nicely landscaped pool.

Across the road is the impossible-to-miss Shelter, a hangar-like brewery, restaurant and occasional concert venue with fermentation tanks at one end and ocean views at the other . The lofty beer hall – “It’s meant to feel a bit like Oktoberfest,” says venue manager Christian Marr– serves a full drinks menu headlined by their own craft brews (including a refreshing blueberry sour and best-selling hazy IPA) and beer-friendly plates such as salt and pepper squid and serious pizzas. (The same owners are opening a confectionery store, Little Otto’s Big Choc Shop, this year.)

From the compact airport I head straight to the new Hilton Garden Inn. Picture: Supplied.

To be honest I thought the jetty tour might be a bit naff, but it’s great. It starts with a toy train along the 1841m jetty, kids leaping into the ocean as we trundle past, and ends at an observatory where we descend 8m under the ocean to find pylons colonised with multi-coloured corals, sponges, sea squirts and seaweeds that attract hundreds of marine species. I watch schools of skipjack trevally glide past the windows and tropical species like zebra fish and cowfish cruise in on the Leeuwin Current. It’s a wild aquarium down here. The jetty’s trade officer and occasional train driver, Alecia Macdonald, recounts how, one time, a sea lion arrived and “ate three of our round-faced batfish”. Children screamed, I’m told.

The jetty also offers an underwater sculpture park for divers and snorkellers to explore that includes a 13-tonne octopus studded with glow-in-the-dark moonstones.

That evening I pop into South West Wine Shop, part of the new Busselton Pavilion development (where the old Target once stood). This sleek bottle store stocks around 150 labels – a global selection but very much focused on the southwest and Margaret River. I’m here for Friday Night Pours, when manager Hayley Ward invites local winemakers to showcase their wares. Tonight it’s Spanish-trained winemaker Josephine Perry from Dormilona pouring (for free) various iterations of chenin blanc, all of them sensational.

Across the road is the impossible-to-miss Shelter, a hangar-like brewery, restaurant and occasional concert venue. Picture: Supplied.

There’s a snacking menu supplied by the next-door kitchen of Busselton Pavilion, a capacious, sailing-themed dining space anchored by a rôtisserie that spit-roasts whole chickens, short-rib skewers and tiger prawns bathed in fermented chilli butter. That line-up, plus a thoughtful drinks list, is more than enough reason to visit The Pav.

On day two I switch digs to the Timothée Resort, a 33-room converted motel named for the French sailor Vasse, not the Hollywood actor Chalamet. It’s got the convenience of a motel – car parks at your door – and the polish of a retro boutique hotel complete with palm-fringed pool, tennis court and volleyball net. It has a riverside setting, a locally famous Indian restaurant and it’s only a few minutes’ drive into town.

At Inara, chef Daniel Johnson introduces diners to the cuisine of the eastern Mediterranean. Picture: Luke Latty.

Handy, then, to Inara, Daniel and Joanna Johnson’s smart Levantine restaurant spilling onto the lawns of the Busselton Central shopping precinct. Chef Daniel helmed top resorts in the Maldives and Middle East before coming here to introduce diners to the cuisine of the eastern Mediterranean, all of it beautifully presented. His mafghoussa, a Palestinian dish of charred zucchini smashed with coconut yoghurt, date molasses and mint, the grilled Beagle Islands octopus with taramasalata, and tender slow-cooked lamb with tahini and cured lemon are all highlights, paired with a WA-centric wine list and well-crafted cocktails. Daniel says the essence of Inara is “a shared experience and shared love of life” – a catchphrase that also neatly sums up the new-look Busselton.

Good spirits

Opened in 2023 by distiller Greg Garnish and former West Coast Eagles player Chris Masten, Beyond Distilling handcrafts characterful spirits – gins, vodka, absinthe, bottled cocktails – from 98 per cent WA ingredients. Tastings daily.

The writer’s visit was arranged by Tourism Western Australia.

Originally published as I spent 2 days in Busselton, it wasn't enough