During the 1980s Two Rocks was home to Atlantis Marine Park and the Sun City Marina. Atlantis Marine Park was constructed in 1981 in the small fishing community 60 km north of Perth. The owners had hoped Perth's rapid expansion would be accompanied by an equal growth in tourism. During the six months prior to the Park's opening, 7 bottlenose dolphins were captured from the local coastal population. They were trained and maintained as performance animals for the next 10 years. Unfortunately, the dream for Atlantis was not to be, and the park was losing money.
With the birth of 3 female calves in 1988, the changes in regulations for holding marine mammals meant that Atlantis would have to construct larger dolphin enclosures, but the owners decided to cut their losses, and Atlantis closed down in August 1990.
one of the Seal statues still left.
At that time it was home to 9 dolphins: 6 wild born adults (3 males and 3 females) and 3 captive born juvenile females. A program was implemented to reintroduce the dolphins back into the wild, but unfortunately was not very successful with some of the dolphins having to remain in captivity in Hillarys Underwater World; they have since died from (from memory) poisoning.
As a kid this was the place to go. With the dolphins, seals, rides and the huge statue of King Neptune it was a great place to take the kids. I have great memories of this place but now 20 odd years later what’s left are the remnants of a once great Marine Park and many child hood memories.
