I was relying on Scott McKercher’s forecasting skills to make the call on the weather map while I pensively stayed on-hold in the UK throughout February, waiting for the stars to line up.
Esperance, roughly translated in French, means ‘Hope’ after mariners took shelter from huge storms in the bay way back in 1792. Finally, towards the end of the month, my hopes were raised when a blip formed on Scotty’s radar and it looked like the west coast high pressure system was all set to drop into the Australian bight courtesy of tropical cyclone Rusty to the North. As luck would have it, two-time World Champion Philip Koester had also booked to be in Australia at the same time and, after four years of visits Down Under, Esperance was the rare jewel of Australian wavesailing he was yet to experience.