Yanchep National Park
Limestone caves turned Depression-era resort, with an underground ballroom carved by water, not architects.
Location
About this audio guide
This guide to Yanchep National Park, north of Perth, follows a limestone cave that outgrew its own name, from Milligan's Cave to Ballroom Cave to Silver Stocking Cabaret Cave, before the state's Gardens Board turned it into an underground dance venue during the Depression of the nineteen thirties. You'll hear about the grant that helped fund the resort above it, and the strange arithmetic of fitting two hundred dancers into a room carved by water. Listen near the cave mouth, where the cool air still rises from the old dance floor.
This audio guide was created using AI.
Similar places
John Forrest National Park
Granite railway tunnel on a heritage trail, with a dark history of chronic ventilation danger.
Rottnest Island
Former Aboriginal punitive prison island whose limestone quod cells later served as holiday lodging.
Walyalup Fremantle Arts Centre
Convict-built colonial gothic asylum turned artist studios, galleries and courtyard concert venue.
Bathers Beach
Sandy cove below a limestone bluff, once a Noongar meeting ground and colonial whaling shore.
Scarborough Beach
Popular surf beach with a beachfront strip once home to a legendary rock and roll dance floor.
Fremantle Prison
Convict-built limestone prison with reinforced cells once meant to hold an escape artist.