Day 63 - Perth to Busselton

  Busselton, Australia
Sunday, November 4, 2007

After another late start we called Katie's Uncle Peter, who lives in the Perth area, and arranged to meet him & his wife Jan for lunch in Fremantle, a very picturesque town just south of Perth.

"Freeo" is famous for its charming old buildings and a very agreeable breeze which blows through from the coast every afternoon, called the "Fremantle Doctor".

We left the house with strict instructions from Si & Lisa to be back at the house for 4pm LATEST, because we needed to drive down to the Margaret River area in time for dinner, and Si had taken a few hours off work to make that happen.

We had to take the local train into Perth, and then another train to Fremantle, so we arrived in Freeo at about 12:30pm, it was just over an hour away all told.

We were due to meet Peter & Jan at about 1:15pm, so this gave me some time to quickly whizz around the town and show Katie the sights as I remembered the town fondly from my first visit back in 2002.

It was a gorgeous day with bright blue skies, absolutely perfect.



Last time I was here was when I'd visited Perth on my Oz/NZ holiday just after Katie & I met, when I stayed with Pete, one of my Dad's friends from school.

Pete took me out and showed me the local area, including a very nice fish & chips lunch by the harbour here in Freeo, so this is where I took Katie. It was lovely in the shining sun, quite busy (being a Sunday) and it had a real buzz to it.

 

Katie was extremely frustrated that we couldn't stop for some fish & chips in the sunshine (Asia isn't exactly famous for its fish & chips!), but I managed to drag her away by assuring her that I was sure our lunch venue would have fish & chips on the menu too!

On the way back into the centre we went into a fantastic micro-brew pub near the water called "Little Creatures", which was incredibly nice considering it used to be a crocodile farm. Actually to call it a "pub" is a bit misleading, it was more like a brewery with a bar inside! Very cool.



We then walked across the park and through some of the quiter streets and into the centre.



We'd arranged to meet Peter & Jan in the Sail & Anchor pub, which was another 'brew-pub', which seems to be all the rage over here on the west coast at the moment. I'm certainly not complaining, being a real lover of dark beers & ales, it is absolutely amazing for me and long may it continue ;)

The Sail & Anchor is the building on the left below:

 

We met them at the bar, then walked up to the first floor balcony area, which was perfect for watching the buskers/street entertainers, who we all know are global players these days, travelling the world with their acts. 

As a result, their performances are usually finely-tuned and always fun; we had a pirate with a little boat complete with mast, who performed various gymnastic feats and managed to be quite amusing.



Jan knew a good place to eat called The Norfolk (being a Suffolk lad it was lucky that I missed the name!) which was very good, and absolutely chocked full of young people, so fair play to them for knowing where to take us.

Fortunately Katie was able to have her fish & chips, while Jan & I had a couple of really tasty salads. And before any of you start worrying, they both came with roast chicken and I had chips with mine! ;)

I'm sure Katie's Mum & Dad would like to see some photos of Peter & Jan, so here you go!





The dark beer was excellent again, and Katie was really enjoying her red wine, so we realised that although Oz is going to be MUCH more expensive than Asia, we're definitely going to enjoy the drinks more over here!

We were chatting away with Peter & Jan while watching the time, but you know how hard it is to leave when you're having a good time, especially when you're catching up with 'distant' relatives who you probably won't see again for a long time...

Peter & Jan kindly picked up the bill, which allowed us to sprint to the train station and narrowly miss one of the Perth trains, which run every 15 minutes.

As a result we arrived back home late (after a worse journey home thanks to some drunken kids in our carriage), but we packed in record time and were in the car 10 minutes later.

Simon wasn't too impressed with our late arrival - I wouldn't have been either if I'd left work early especially - but didn't make a big deal about it, top man that he is ;)

Once packed we headed off for Busselton, which is co-incidentally the town where Si will be moving to in a few week's time, as he completes his "country posting" for the Western Australian (W.A.) Police, a mandatory 2 year stint outside the city.

"Busso" is supposed to be a very chill town in the 'Margaret River' area a few hours south of Perth. Margaret River is renown for its wine, food, beauty and relaxed atmosphere.

The landscape on the way down was lovely, and it took an hour less than we'd planned, so we made up the time that we'd lost with our late arrival.

We found Si's cousin's holiday home where we were staying for a couple of nights, then headed off to walk up the famous Busselton pier, which is apparently the longest pier in the southern hemisphere. Admittedly that's not the most impressive of boasts, but it certainly is a rather, errr.... long.... uhm.... pier. Voila!



In fairness it may not look much but it curves round at the top of this photo, it's nearly a mile long; it used to be used for the boats which moored here with provisions before the road network was good enough. Remember that Oz is a VERY young and MASSIVE country, so its road and rail infrastructure isn't great now, let alone back then...

We timed our arrival at the pier perfectly, as the sun was just about to set. I guess if you're going to be anywhere for a sunset, you may as well be on the west coast of a country, and it was a pretty spectacular event.

Naturally it was nothing special to the locals because it happens every day, but to us it was just beautiful...







After savouring the sunset we drove to the main street and chose a nice bar/restaurant for dinner.

Katie managed to resist another meal of fish & chips, while I went for the steak. It's so nice to get stuck into some proper meat and veg after all the rice & noodles in Asia, but we'll need to cut back soon because we can't afford to have big meals in nice restaurants every day over here, sadly!

After dinner we went back to the house, where we tackled the Nintendo Wii which was conveniently hooked up to the tv. We worked our way through games of tennis, baseball, tenpin bowling and golf before deciding it was time for bed.

We were all really looking forward to tomorrow, and the main reason for our sojourn south: a guided tour of wineries, breweries, chocolate and cheese factories!!!!!!!

As our old friend Joe Mangle would say... YOU BEAUTY ;)

Lots of love,


Al & Katie xx