Christmas in Western Australia

Our flight was pretty good except my plan for a can for Victoria Bitter to enable me to sleep was almost foiled when the plane ran out before they got to us. Thankfully I happened to complain to the boss lady of economy class and she found us a can each in business class and as compensation we got a bag of almonds and cashews too !

At Perth, we are quickly through immigration (another stamp) and customs. We have to wait at the car rental desk in a queue but eventually are sorted with a Toyota Corolla Ascent by around 10am. We bung our bags in and head out of town, somehow (more luck than judgement) end up on the right road out of town towards York. We stop for a drink and a sandwich in York which is an historic town will lots of old buildings. Byron takes over the driving as we head on to Hyden. The scenery changes from greenish to wheat fields and dry arid, orange ground, similar to the true outback.  We eventually arrive at our motel in Hyden where we check in and head straight out to Wave Rock, the point of our coming, scared that if we don't we will fall asleep and that will be that. The Rock is impressive with various colours and we climb up on top to see the bird life and little lizards. after the hustle and bustle of Hong Kong the complete emptiness here is fantastic and much more our thing. Hong Kong was wonderful but we'd reached the end of our tether with all the people....we always seemed to be going in the wrong direction.  After some great photo opportunites we head back to the motel for a shower and a glass of whisky before a cook your own steak meal in the restaurant. The choice of veg and salad to go with it ensured we stayed sober despite a VB (Victoria Bitter) or two.  To shake the food down we take a slow stroll of the main road (no traffic whatsoever) and watch the Gulah (pink and grey bird like Susan has in Neighbours) and Rainbow Lorikeets preparing to roost for the night. The noise of them is a wonderful cacophony of noise and we head back to the motel for a good night's sleep.

We are rudely awoken at 5:50am by a very very very very very loud radio, my language is choice and Byron swears blind he hasn't left the alarm on his radio again...which to be fair he hadn't - it was some inconsiderate sod nearby. For two hours a dozed and listended to the news, sport, weather and some lousy music before it finally stopped just as I thought I might get up ! We got up and checked out, another long day driving today. By drives and things are going well passing through beautiful wheat fields. I tell him to make a left at the upcoming T junction but By decides it is a bend (actually our road becomes a dirt road and the T bit is the rest of the tarmac road). We approach the corner way way to fast and he loses it on the loose gravel, bringing the car miraculously to a stop before we zoom off the edge into a ditch. My language is again rather choice - he's not picked a good day for trying to kill us...he is very apologetic and blames the lack of sleep...luckily as the roads are deserted, he drives away without any damage to us or the car. We don't speak for some time but eventually we chat and all is well, from now on he has learned his lesson and follows my directions to the letter. We drive through Lake Grace past salt lakes and stop for photos of the birdlife. Suddenly there are clouds of bugs everywhere, they fly into the screen and just keep coming, later we learn they are clouds of locusts which are a huge problem in this region at the moment and apparently we should of stopped to cover the grill or the bodies can get stuck in the engine and cause a fire well at least overheat the thing....they didn't so we live to tell the tale !

We swap drivers regularly and have a short stop in the Stirling Mountain Range which are incredible after miles and miles of flat wheatlands. Amazingly when we reach Albany we find the youth hostel straight away. We pop for lunch and return to check in, we have a nice double room overlooking the sea. After a quick rest, we walk up to Mt Melville viewpoint which nearly kills us as not only is it uphill but it is much warmer here. Then back to the hostel to collect the car and we do a driving route of the ANZAC memorial on Mt Clarence, up all 80 steps ! Then on to Emu Point to take photos of pelicans, not emus ! We continue on to Dog Rock (yes a rock looking like a dog) and back to the hostel. We eat dinner at  a place called Dylans (Byron's guiding name).

After a healthy breakfast of fruit and coffee we git the road again for a tour south of Albany of the Gap (yes a gap in the rocks), Natural Bridge (you can work this out I think)....Frenchman's Bay, and Stony Hill. Each require a short walk but we are rewarded by stunning views of the coast, sadly the mist has come in and spoils the last few stops. Onwards to Denmark along the scenic tourist route which simply isn't scenic ! We arrive in Walpole in the mid afternoon and check in the hostel. We had hoped to do the Treetop walk but the mist is down, howver Geoff at the hostel tells us this is due to night time back burning and won't improve tomorrow, so we take his advice and do the treetop walk now. It's awesome, a 40m high walk between big poles in the treetops, the gangways sway like crazy and it's not even windy, we go around twice to make sure we saw it all. The trees are specific to this area of Australia and only grow in these 6000 hectares, they are huge wonderful trees and amazing to look at. We do a short walk around on the ground too before heading back to the hostel where we have a nice double room in a motel kind of style. We walk to the pub for a couple of beers before a nice meal and back to the hostel for the chore of laundry, which surprises us by taking just an hour to wash and dry....hooray we have clean clothes.

We awake to rain and lots of it, we run across to the kitchen area for brekkie and then hit the road. Luckily the rain has cleaned most of the squished locusts from the front of the car which was looking pretty dreadful last night. We drive through wonderful Karri Karri Forests and although it is wet, it doesn't spoil to spectacular trees. We stop for lunch at Pemberton and then arrive at Margaret River in the mid afternoon where we have a crisis. We need to swipe a credit card at our hotel bu Byron can't find it, I hand mine over in annoyance and thus begins a manic search for his card, which basically is missing. I log on to the internet in reception and find no-one has used it and get the number to cancel it with. We drive into town and get a phone card so we can cancel the card which takes forever, I'm sorry little man in India you need to know what you are doing, not take 30 minutes when we are phoning a UK number from Australia. Anyway, card is cancelled and we commiserate / celebrate with an ice-cream in the Fudge Factory. The loss of the card is not the end of the world just an annoying inconvenience - bah. We buy some food for dinner and some beers and drive back to the hotel which is a little way out of town. The hotel is set in beautiful grounds so we take a walk by the lake and stream before dinner and an early night.

Up early and drive to Busselton to view the longest jetty in the southern hemisphere, we don't have time to walk it but have a look and jump back in the car. Are on a deadline to drive the car to the rental place in Perth city centre by noon and it's at least a 3.5 hour drive. We make it with 15 mins to spare and then await collection by Brian. Back at his house, we chat, drink tea and swim in his pool which is just great after our manic few days travelling lots of miles (1000 miles in 4 days to be exact but the petrol costs are less than fifty pounds).

A leisurely morning, breakfast and reading the paper by the pool before it heats up and then Brian takes us out for a few hours to Mandurah and to meet lots of the family members we will see over Christmas. Back to the house for a chat and a cold tin - it's 33 today and due to get hotter for Christmas...poor London is covered in fog, frost and goodness knows what, it doesn't feel like Christmas despite the tree - it's weird but will be fun regardless. Christmas Eve and Stuart is taking us out for the day...we spend most of the day travelling in his truck and see lots and lots of the area north of Perth including learning lots about the local wildlife. We see a bobtail skink and a bungara (not sure that's how it is spelt)....lizardy things anyway. Stuart takes us on bitumen and gravel roads, past farms and countryside before reaching the Pinnacles Desert Park. The pinnacles are random rocks that stick out of the ground from very yellow sand and there are thousands of them...very eerie and strange. We drive around the 3.5km route to see them all and stop to take photos and pose with them, we also see an emu strolling between them. Then we pop into the nearest town for a paddle in the Indian Ocean and fish and chips in the car on the beach which is wonderful. Stuart takes a different route for part of the ride back home and we stop off to buy some strawberries. All in all we are out for pretty much the entire day and arrive home in time to shower and change for Xmas Eve celebrations (German style) at Brigid's sister's house. We are introduced to lots more family members and have a great time supping beer and chatting with dips and nibbles before we have sausages and salads for dinner. It is a huge buffet and the evening has cooled down now from the 34 it was earlier so we spend most of the time sat outside. Collapse into bed late after a cup of tea by our pool back home. Christmas Day...we start by giving our gifts to Brian and Brigid and then the family arrive about 11am and the beer starts flowing. In the living room, everyone opens pressies and then it is back outside for nibbles and more beer before a huge lunch. There is roast beef, roast turkey and stacks of salads etc, we eat inside as it is 35 today and just too hot. After lunch is the traditional colouring competition which is very fiercely defended as they are determined the title should not go overseas so there is much complaining when I win !!!  Now we will either have to come back next year to defend my title or they will have to come to us or we will have to amend the rules and have a computer assisted / email competition. Next comes dessert, trifle and so on. The family go home around 5pm and we sit drinking whisky before a dip in the pool to freshen up. Some how we even fit more food and beer in though we are full to bursting. A fantastic day full of laughter and fun. Boxing Day sees us have a leisurely breakfast (I know more food - I'll be the size of a house soon). Then we go to Fremantle for a wander about and then a driving tour of the city which is great. The afternoon is spent chilling out and then Kirsten, Stuart and kids arrive for a few beers and a BBQ....so we have had our true Aussie BBQ now ! Off now to Cairns after a quiet morning around the house.