Perth, Fremantle and Witchetty Grubs

We flew from Alice to Perth and stayed with Kate's dad's cousin, Geoff.

We did the bus tour of the city and ended up in King's Park. We strolled around the park and along the 'tree top walk' to see the city from the tops of the trees.

We went to see John, a guy who Geoff helps look after a few times a week. He showed us his train set and where Geoff is going to build one round his garden.

We did a day trip to Fremantle and got on the 'tram tour' which was pretty interesting. We stopped off at the prison which was built by the prisoners that we sent over by the British and was used up until the late 1980's when the prisoners rioted because of the poor conditions and set the roof alight!

We had lunch at the Little Creatures Brewery (Little Creatures is a beer that is brewed in Western Australia) before heading into the main area of the town to explore the markets before getting the ferry back to Perth.

We decided to go down to Margaret River for a couple of days - to do a Bushtucker Tour and to try our hand at surfing! The weather was not the best but it didn't dampen our spirits!

We began with the Bushtucker Tour - we met our group at the Margaret River mouth and collected our canoes. There were 8 of us including our guide so Kate & I were in a boat with a couple - Anne & Vern. We had to paddle out to various sites along the river but since Vern had no experience of directing the canoe, we ended up all over the place!

We stopped for lunch and were able to try a variety of bush tucker - including a selection of berries and meats like Bush Turkey, Emu & Kangaroo. The highlight of the food was the Witchetty Grub - which Kate had been wanting to try ever since we got to Oz! Unfortunately she was left with the head part!!

We did a brief walk around the headland and then rowed back to the river mouth, going backwards at one stage as Anne decided not to row until Vern could steer properly and Vern thought Anne should row rather than tell him off for his steering!! We got there in the end!

Our surf lesson unfortunately got cancelled as, due to the bad weather, the waves were getting up to 10 foot and it wasn't the best conditions for beginners! So we headed back up to Perth.

On our last day in Perth, we got the ferry over to Rottnest Island. We hired bikes and set off round the island. We got a bit lost at first (the map wasn't clear!) but eventually we were on the right road! There were several gorgeous bays and we stopped at various points to take in the view (& to catch our breath!) Nobody had told us how steep some of the roads were!

We went up to the lighthouse for lunch and met the local inhabitants - Quokka's - from which the Dutch named the island after (they thought that they were giant rats but they're a bit like kangaroos!) We found this friendly Quokka who tried to climb on me as I was taking his photo. Later on, he tried to climb into Kate's bag! They are certainly used to humans being around!

We got the ferry back to Perth and packed our bags as our trip up the west coast begins tomorrow!