Loading…
Loading…
Loading departures from LEA…
Learmonth Airport sits about 35 kilometres south of Exmouth on Western Australia's North West Cape, and it plays two roles. It is the civil terminal for the Exmouth region and it shares its single runway with RAAF Learmonth, an air force bare base kept ready by a small caretaker presence in peacetime. For travellers it is the way in to Ningaloo Reef and the Cape Range, and a working link for the offshore gas industry along this stretch of coast.
It is a small, remote airport, not a hub. One modest terminal handles a handful of flights a day, and traffic splits between holidaymakers heading for the reef and fly-in-fly-out workers. Expect a quiet building, short walks, and a strong sense that the desert starts at the car park.
Qantas, flying as QantasLink, runs the network here, and the spine of it is the Perth route, a daily domestic connection on single-aisle regional jets. That Perth link is what most passengers connect through, whether they are tourists or rostered onto a resources job.
Beyond Perth the schedule is seasonal and thin. A direct eastern-states service to Melbourne has run during the cooler reef-visiting months in some years. The character is regional and resources-led rather than a busy multi-airline board, so the realistic plan is a Qantas booking through Perth.
There is one terminal and it is small. Check-in and security are quick by capital-city standards, the queues are short, and there is no airline lounge. Bring what you want for the wait, because the food and retail on offer is limited to what a regional strip can support.
Getting to and from the airport means driving the roughly 35 kilometres into Exmouth. Most visitors pick up a hire car at the terminal, since you will want one for Ningaloo and the Cape Range anyway, and shuttle and coach transfers also run to town. Parking is open-air surface parking next to the terminal, and there is no rail link. Allow time for the drive either way, particularly for the early Perth service.