Back in the West

Well, we are now back in WA. We got here last Tuesday, the 4th October. We had a great time at home, but so busy. Preventative maintenance doctors appointments, catching up with everyone, Mum's 80th celebrations, out to lunch with Rays family and seeing the grandkids.



Mum, daughters, grandaughters

 On Wednesday we moved from the Adventist park down to Woodmans Point which is about 10km south of Fremantle. A nice park, a bit close to the main road from Kwinana to Fremantle but the traffic slows down after dark.


Storm clouds building up over caravan park at Woodman Point


Ray rang his cousin Colleen, who has lived in Perth for many years. She was originally from Forbes in NSW but moved to WA some years ago. I hadn't seen her since we met up with her in Geraldton in 1981. Ray has seen her intermittently in more recent times. Anyway she asked us to her place for lunch with Charlie, her husband, tomorrow, which is Friday. She now lives in an apartment in the centre of Perth. Parking is at a premium for something of our size, so we decided to drive into Fremantle and suss out the public transport option. After going to the Tourist Information and looking at the all day parking options we decided to go by public transport. More on that later.

After visting the tourist information we went for a walk around Fremantle and got lost. We had to ask a couple of different people how to get back to where we had parked the truck.
Anyway after that adventure, we drove down to the port and watched a couple of ship unloading and one coming in.



Sheep ship for live export



Quirky sculpturesat Fremantle Port

Another sculpture at Fremantle

Container ship coming in to port

Container ship getting closer



Container ship loading


Then around to the Fishing Boat Harbour whre we stopped at Kailis Cafe and Fish Market and had lunch. We knew their seafood was good as we have been eating their prawns whilst coming down the west coast. And once again they didn't disappoint.


Pink snapper, calimari and chips



Kailis fishing boats at Fremantle

Fishing boat harbour surrounded by restaurants. Each restaurant appears to have its own fishing boat.

 We even bought a kilo of Pink Snapper fillets as Peter Edler was coming for lunch on Saturday and we decided to BBQ some fish.

After lunch we went for a drive down to Rockingham via Henderson and Kwinana. Henderson is where all of the boat building happens and we seen an enormous nearly finished catamaran which is probably destined for the Mediteranean.


They have huge catamarans in Fremantle


Kwinana is very industrial and Rockingham was very busy as it is a seaside town and the WA school holidays are on.

Well, today is Friday and we are going on our big public transport adventure. First we caught a bus from the caravan park. Surprise Number 1, it only  cost us $3.70 each for all day travel on bus, train and ferry. That is because we are a little older. So we caught the bus from the caravan park to Fremantle Station and hopped on the train to Perth. Surprise Number 2, the trains are immaculate. Carpeted floors, comfortable seats, no graffiti. There are also security cameras and railway security everywhere. It took about 40 minutes to get to Perth. We then had a wander around and then caught a bus to Colleens. Surprise Number 3, the buses which go around the CBD of Perth are all free. 3 different routes and you can hop on and off wherever you like.

We had a great lunch with Colleen and Charlie. They live in a great garden apartment just 5 stops from the centre of Perth and opposite a park and very close to all of the theatres and entertainment venues. Later in the afternoon we travelled in the reverse direction back to Woodman Point.
On Saturday, Peter came out to us for lunch and Colleen and Charlie came for afternoon tea. We had another great afternoon.


Maura, Colleen, Ray and Charlie


Sunday 9th October we are moving on and we woke up to pouring rain. It rained on and off the whole time we were packing up and decided to stop when we had finished. We arrived in Mandurah before lunch and had afternoon drinks with Terry and Sue who we had originally met when they were crossing the Pentecost River up on the  Gibb River Road. We had come to Mandurah as Terry was turning 60 on Monday 10th October and they invited us out to lunch to celebrate this momentous occasion.

We went to Murphy's Irish Pub for lunch and then walked along the foreshore to have coffee and dessert at the Dome Restaurant. We were joined by Col and Mary, two friends who Terry and Sue had met last year while travelling in South Australia. Col and Mary live in Mandurah. We had a fantastic afternoon with lots of  laughs.

Ray, Terry and Col at Mrphy's Irish Pub, Mandurah

Terry and Sue

Mary, Terry and Maura

Terry, Ray and Col

Maura, Ray and Terry walking to the Dome Restaurant after lunch

On Tuesday we had a look around Mandurah, going down to the marina and driving south down the coast.

Mandurah foreshore

Sculpture 1 at Mandurah Marina

Sculpture 2 at Mandurah Marina

 We had a farewell happy hour with Terry and Sue and Col and Mary dropped around also. Next morning we followed Terry and Sue south. They were going to Bunbury and we headed on to Busselton.