In a nutshell
- Rockingham is a small town about 50 kilometers south of Perth. There isn’t much to see in the town itself — but it’s your gateway to swimming with dolphins and seeing penguins in the wild.
- Just off the coast lies Penguin Island, where hundreds of little penguins come ashore every year. The best way to reach it is by boat, and you can combine the trip with a sea lion and dolphin cruise.
- Rockingham also offers one of the most animal-friendly dolphin swimming experiences we’ve found — wild dolphins, no feeding, no crowds. You can book the dolphin swim online via GetYourGuide.
- Read on for everything you need to know about things to do in Rockingham — from Penguin Island and dolphin swimming to getting there and where to eat.
The Starting Point: Rockingham
Rockingham is a suburb of the City of Rockingham LGA and the best base for visiting the popular Penguin Island. You can stay overnight here or make a day trip from Perth.
Here are our hotel recommendations for Rockingham:
Read all our tips for Perth:
Penguin Island
Penguin Island is a small island just a few minutes from the mainland by boat — and one of the best things to do in Rockingham.
Every year, hundreds of little penguins come to the island to hatch their eggs and raise their young during the first months of life.
The entire island is a protected area for the penguins, so they can raise their young undisturbed. Since the little penguins hide among the shrubs, visitors have a very hard time — or no chance at all — of actually spotting them in the wild.
There is, however, a Discovery Center on the island where penguins are nursed back to health after injuries. You can always see a few penguins up close there. Daily feedings take place at 10:30 AM, 12:30 PM, and 2:30 PM.
How to Get to Penguin Island
Technically, you can walk to Penguin Island when the tide is low. However, since there have been some serious accidents here in the past, this is strongly discouraged. It’s not officially prohibited, but there are large warning signs everywhere alerting visitors to the dangers.
The best way to reach Penguin Island is by boat. There are two options:
Option 1: Simple Boat Ride to Penguin Island
The crossing takes just under ten minutes. The ferry runs daily between 9:00 AM and 3:00 PM, departing on the hour.
For the round trip including admission to the island and the Discovery Center, you pay 35 AUD (approx. 24 euros).
Option 2: Boat Ride with Sea Lions and Dolphins
You can combine the crossing to Penguin Island with a 40-minute cruise around the island.
This option is only slightly more expensive but offers significantly more — and it’s the one we chose. We’d absolutely recommend it.
A glass-bottom boat first takes you along the coast to where the local dolphins hang out. A sighting isn’t guaranteed, but it’s very likely. On our trip, we saw quite a lot of them.
Next, you head to a small island right next to Penguin Island. This island is a resting spot for sea lions, who lounge on the beach before heading back out to hunt.
Admission to Penguin Island and the Discovery Center is included with Option 2 as well. You return on the regular ferry.
The tour runs daily at 10:15 AM, 11:15 AM, and 1:15 PM. A visit to Penguin Island including sea lions and dolphins costs 65 AUD (approx. 43 euros).
Since space on the boat is limited, we recommend booking online in advance. The price is the same as on-site.
Book tickets for Penguin Island incl. sea lions and dolphins
Swimming with Dolphins in Rockingham
Swimming with dolphins is a bucket-list experience for so many people — and in Rockingham, it can actually happen. We tried it ourselves and want to share our honest experience here.
Is Dolphin Swimming in Rockingham Animal-Friendly?
Unfortunately, dolphin swimming experiences often need to be approached with caution.
It’s not uncommon for dolphins to be kept in captivity, hand-fed, or manipulated in some way. That was obviously not what we wanted, which is why we thoroughly researched the options in Rockingham beforehand.
The operator Rockingham Wild Encounters struck us as trustworthy — partly because the experience involves encounters with genuinely wild dolphins. They are not fed or harassed in any way, and only a single tour runs each day, so the dolphins aren’t dealing with people in the water all day long.
It’s strictly forbidden to touch or feed the dolphins. If they aren’t in the mood for interaction with snorkelers, they simply swim away and are not pursued.
So it can absolutely happen that on a dolphin tour in Rockingham no dolphins show up at all, or that encounters are very brief. They’re wild animals — nothing is artificially engineered, and that’s exactly what makes it special.
How Does Dolphin Swimming in Rockingham Work?
We were picked up from our hotel in Perth in the morning — you can select the pickup option when booking, which is super convenient. Traveling there independently is also possible.
After about an hour’s drive, we arrived in Rockingham and headed straight onto the boat. We received snorkeling gear and wetsuits, which we definitely needed — it was genuinely bitterly cold.
The air temperature that morning was just under 50°F (10°C). The suits kept us reasonably warm, but we wouldn’t do it again in May. Australian fall is lovely, but not quite lovely enough for that. In the Australian summer months, the whole thing is surely much more fun.
After a brief orientation, we were off — and the boat crew quickly spotted the first dolphins. We were divided into four groups of five people each, with only two groups allowed in the water at a time.
Around our wetsuits we wore belts that we used to hold onto each other. You’re not swimming around chaotically — you move in a line, with a guide at the front holding a small propeller.
We really loved that setup, because it means you just float very calmly in the water and are truly more of a quiet observer.
On our tour we had a total of five dolphin sightings. Each time we were in the water for between two and five minutes, watching the dolphins swim past us.
One more thing: you don’t need to worry about sharks. The guides carry a Shark Shield — a small device that emits electrical impulses to keep sharks at bay.
Prices and Booking
Swimming with dolphins in Rockingham costs approximately 300 AUD per person (180 euros). With a transfer to and from Perth, it costs a bit more.
You need to book in advance — just showing up on a whim isn’t possible.
Book dolphin swimming in Rockingham
Getting to Rockingham
For the dolphin swimming, we used the operator’s pickup service from Perth. It was super convenient and worked perfectly.
For our visit to Penguin Island, we drove to Rockingham in a rental car. The drive from Perth takes about an hour; from Fremantle it’s about 30 minutes. There’s plenty of free parking on-site.
You can also get to Rockingham by public transportation.
From Perth, a train runs to Rockingham Station in about 35 minutes. From there, it’s another 25-minute bus ride to the Penguin & Watts Road stop.
Restaurant Tips for Rockingham
We tried two restaurants in Rockingham that we can both highly recommend.
- Latitude 32 (1/7-8 Railway Terrace) – Right at the pier where the dolphin swimming boat departs. They serve really tasty fish dishes, among other things. At first glance it looks very touristy, but the quality is genuinely good.
- Bayside Barista (Penguin & Watts Road) – A completely gluten-free restaurant. We don’t have any issues with gluten ourselves, but the reviews were so good we had to try it. The food was delicious — especially the cakes (many of them vegan too!) are fantastic. Totally worth a visit, not just for those with dietary needs.
