Blogs from Margaret River, Western Australia, Australia, Oceania - page 5

One of the great things about visiting Australia is that we’ve had friends in each major city that we’ve visited. It’s great because it gets you out doing things that the locals do rather than just the touristy stuff. In Perth, we started off with a nice walk in Kings Park, assisted at hockey practice (field hockey, that is), and went for dinner at a nice micro-brewery in Freemantle. We were also treated to a game of Aussie Rules football which was very entertaining, and were recruited for the HBF Run for a Reason where we walked 4.5km raising funds for various charities. It was a lot of fun and they had about 14,000 people turn out for the run. True local experience! Next we headed south to the Margaret River area. We had full intentions ... read more

Friday 15th – and we were rather sad to be leaving Walpole. We loved the caravan park and the area and we know there is much more to see should we ever return. The journey today was almost 300kms and, for much of that, the road wound its way through tall karri trees. The more windy roads meant slower progress but there wasn’t too much other traffic around to worry about. Signs warned of large timber lorries but we hardly saw any. We stopped for a break in Pemberton, a pleasant small town in amongst the trees, where we had a very enjoyable train trip last time we were there. The town’s income revolves largely around timber with a huge saw-mill and tourist attractions, like the train trip, detailing the history of timber production over the ... read more

Pemberton to Margaret River via Augusta This day was to be the day of hell for our quad muscles – as we embarked two vertical climbs above the land, and two massive descents below the ground level. We started at Glaucester Tree – climbing our way up around 200 feet (58 metres), hanging on to the steel pegs that had been rammed in to the side of the tree. These were our steps. No security railing, no nearby hospitals, clearly not safe – but this was the daily walk to work for a fire-spotter before fire planes were in use. Sheree overcame her fear of heights and made it to the top in around 7 minutes, white knuckled but proud as punch. We explored Cape Leeuwin waterwheel and hiked our way up 176 steps to the ... read more

Tuesday 8th February One of the areas that we had wanted to visit was Margaret River to visit the wineries. Graham had advised us that to see the area in comfort without being in too much of a rush we should take three days, a day to get down there, a day to explore the area, and a day for our return journey. We had booked accommodation at the Margaret Forest Holiday Apartments, we found the place on the net, Graham said we would get a better rate if we phoned, which turned out to be the case. We had booked a car from Hertz when we were out sightseeing the previous day. Graham gave us a lift to the Hertz office in the morning of Monday 8th Feb, and gave us detailed indstructions as regards ... read more

This morning we went to check out the Margaret river surfing beach. The waves weren’t so good and no one was out surfing. So, we headed to the Aboriginal culture centre. Our guide took us around the bush and showed us all the different uses of the different trees. It was amazing to find out all the medicinal uses of these trees. What I really liked is that instead of killing the trees they just took what they needed from the trees. After the bush walk we got to learn about all the tools aboriginals used. He explained about boomerangs and how they used all kinds of stuff from nature to make knives. It was really cool. He showed us how easily he could make a fire without any matches. That was really cool. He then ... read more