Lap Around Australia: Rock Lobster Tour

Rock Lobster Tour

The Geraldton Fisherman's Co-Operative was established in 1950 with a vision to market their own quality lobster worldwide. Today Brolos lobster is one of the largest processors and exporters of lobsters in the world. Most is sent live to China and other Asian markets and a rather small quantity sold locally. It's a $350 million per year industry, so is very important to the economy of the area.

Nothing to do with lobsters, but we like the
(council encouraged) street art around the town

Ah.  That is a lobster

The blue and white pipe (centre right) is the seawater
feed to a truck loading to go down to Perth

They do tours only three times a week (Monday, Wednesday and Friday morning at 10 am if you intend dashing over to WA), costing $8/head (Seniors' rates!) for a one hour tour of the processing plant right at the harbour. It was really interesting even though John doesn't eat seafood of any kind - Barb loves it!

We were lucky with the timing of our visit as we got to witness each stage of the process. You had to wear closed in shoes and head covering for the tour, and the workers inside had all the personal protective equipment on when handling the lobsters, comprising wellington boots, hats, gloves and long plastic aprons. It's a good look!


Cleaned crates - next stop Perth packed with live lobster

We said they had PPE ....

.... yea even unto white boots

First we saw the cray fishing boats come into the harbour, unload their catch and then pick up more bait for the next day's fishing. Next we saw them weighing, sorting and measuring the live lobsters before they go into holding tanks. That's in readiness for shipping to Perth on special trucks that keep them sprayed with seawater where they are exported by aeroplane to China. The whole turnaround time from being caught to being on a plate in China is only about 48 hours. Yep, they're fresh!

Our guide Annie

A lobster boat entering harbour

PPE seemed not to extend to boat crew - at
least not when hauling pots

Pot winch on one of the boats

The boats we saw are very clean and modern, almost yacht like

See? No shoes!

More cleaned crates awaiting packing

Sorted live lobsters - the storage ...

.... and the sorters

Er .... lobsters

John feeling so glad he won't be eating one of this lot

Loading a truck bound for Perth. It's chilled to 5° or 12°C,
depending on the final market, and then sprayed with
seawater all the way to Perth.
These lobsters are cared for before being eaten!

The truck

We were allowed to hold a lobster, taking great care not to damage any of the legs or tentacles. The Chinese are very particular that their lobsters are intact and meet size and colour requirements. If they're charging $200 per kilo to their customers it better be good.

We were very impressed with how very clean and efficient the whole process is. It runs like a well-oiled machine. They operate 365 days per year too, so maintenance and cleaning has to be fitted into the schedule as a regular thing.

Ah, the gulls. Everywhere!