Albany 2026: Menang teacher and tour guide Larry Blight excited to ‘brag a little bit about our Country’

Larry Blight has spent his whole life in Albany, and you would be hard-pressed to meet anyone as passionate about sharing Menang Noongar culture and history.

Often seen at events around Albany showing students and visitors his traditional tool-making craft and teaching different aspects of Menang Noongar culture, Mr Blight has become a well-known face in the community and a key advocate for teaching Noongar culture.

Mr Blight runs Aboriginal cultural tours around Albany alongside his mother, Menang elder Vernice Gillies, with their company Kurrah Mia.

Their tours take visitors out on country for a glimpse into Menang Noongar culture, history, stories and practices including bush tucker and medicinal plants.

Tours go to special places around Albany including Quaranup, to see ancient stone structures, waterholes, artefacts and engravings, the Oyster Harbour fish traps, to learn how Noongar people used the natural environment to live in the area for thousands of years, and to Mt Clarence, to walk through the bush Noongar people used for food, shelter, tool-making and storytelling.

“With Kurrah Mia, we’ve got about six or eight beautiful sites that we take people out onto, and we look at the ancient history,” he said.

“In some cases, over 50,000 years of occupation, and we can show visitors how our people have lived here and thrived on this particular patch of land for that long.

“We also look at the bush foods, medicine plants, some of the bush places we have around here are just beautiful, and some of it’s still quite pristine, it’s quite untouched, so we look at the animals and nature as well.

“I get an opportunity and the privilege to show that to people.”

When you meet Mr Blight, you get the sense that, through his boundless energy, warm humour, and obvious passion for his home, there is nothing he wants to do more than invite people in and share how incredible his culture is, and bring anyone who wants to come along on a journey of learning and understanding.

One of the Albany 2026 events Mr Blight said he is most excited about is First Lights Kinjarling, a series of three drone shows that will illustrate a Dreamtime story, as told by local Menang elders.

Mr Blight and his mother will voice the story of the Porongurups, exploring the mountain range as a “place of totems and rain, alive with Gondwanan species and ancient songs”.

They will tell the ancient story through the eyes of a granite peak, a trapdoor spider and the moon, bringing nature and people together to share a cultural story from the perspective of the landscape and its creatures.

The stories of Mammang Koort (King George Sound) and the Stirling Ranges will also be told through the light show, with Kim Scott, Iris Woods and Olivia Roberts, and Averil and Lindsay Dean.

The light show will run over three consecutive nights at the Anzac Peace Park from March 6, with the City of Albany describing the event as a chance to honour the stories that came before colonisation as the city acknowledges 200 years of settlement.

“It does give us a chance to showcase our ancient culture in different forms,” Mr Blight said.

‘With some of these big events, thousands of people are going to be witnessing these beautiful stories and the ancient dreaming stories that will be brought to life by means of this beautiful new technology.

“We’ve got some trails happening with the City of Albany as part of the event as well, which will be taking people to some new places and on night tours as well.

“I think, really, it’s an opportunity for us, our people, to work together, and maybe brag a little bit about our country and our history here.

“But it’s not just our people, it’s this amazing country that you see out in front of us as well.

“We get a chance for all of us to showcase this to the rest of the world.”