WE'RE IN OZ

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We left Bali airport at midnight and made a 2 hour 55 min flight to Darwin where we had to change after a 2 hour wait and jump onto a much smaller plane to fly to Alice Springs. The flight there only took a couple of hours but we were so shattered we slept for most of the way. It was also morning in OZ and just getting light so we could see just how remote the outback really is. We had to get off the plane again in Alice Springs for about 30 minutes, then board to finally make our way to Perth. We had been wondering about whether or not to go to Ayers Rock as we only have 2 months to do Australia and flights cost an absolute fortune, we certainly dont have time to drive there and back. Just flying across Australia made us realise how much nothingness we would have to drive through in order to get there. Thankfully we had the fortune of flying right over it so we at least got to see it with our own eyes! We know its not quite the same but its better than nothing. It was just like we had imagined but it also made us realise that we would most certainly not spend all that time and money going there. We landed in Perth at midday and caught a bus which took us straight to our hostel which we had booked several weeks ago in Thailand. Perth was blue skies, sun beaming down (although it was still quite fresh) it was perfect weather! Its a shame we could not say the same thing about our hostel. The booking had been completely mixed up and we got a manky room with no bathroom like we had requested. The hostel itself was quite nice but not what it stated on the website. We had a mooch around Perth city centre and found a really cheap hotel which was a pittance more than the hostel so we moved (again). We even managed to book a flight to Cairns for the 10th January so we could now relax and enjoy. We were amazed at how fantastic Perth is, we had decided within the first afternoon of being here that we wanted to live here FOREVER! We had a wicked Japanese meal before going back to our hotel to mong! We were shattered and fell to sleep almost straight away zzzzzzzzzzzz.

The following day we didnt wake up until midday - we obviously needed it! We packed our beach bag and went down to the bus station to make our way to Scarborough Beach. We got there, had a quick nibble and made our way to the beach. WOW! It was certainly different to Bali thats for sure. It was great to be back on a nice beach again. It was very blustery but still not a cloud in the sky. We lazed there for a couple of hours and people watched.

The beach was full of mostly students and the odd family. There were a few surfers and kite surfers there tackling the waves and lifeguards in their trucks (Baywatch style). We headed back about 5pm and got a bit of cheese for our room - tasty!

We woke slightly earlier the next day as we did not want to waste what little time we had in Perth sleeping. Yet another fantastic hot day. We were hoping to go on a wine and cheese cruise down the Margaret River whilst we were here but it is quite expensive if your on a budget so we decided to bok ourselves on a similar cruise down the Swan Valley. Kerry called the make the reservation for the next day - we are both at our happiest with a glass of tasty wine and sampling some tasty cheese so you can only just begin to imagine how excited we are about tomorrow :-) We caught a bus at about 10.30am and made our way to a different beach called Cottesloe. It is definitely more of a family beach than yesterdays but it was still fantastic. The waves are great, the sand is white and the atmosphere along the esplanade is buzzing. We spent most of the day here sunbathing, jumping waves, eating, and watching the world go by - so stressful :-) We headed back to the city to find what looked like Perths version of Cream Fields. A massive outdoor event with some extremely loud grimy beats being blasted out. Kerry got a little over excited about going there - until we saw it was $100 to get in! Needless to say that huge bottom lip was dragging along the floor for at least an hour after. We decided instead to go to the cinema and watch Blood Diamonds which was a great film. We headed back to our hotel via the kebab shop and tucked into the box of wine we bought on our first day. God knows we are going to be drinking enough of it tomorrow!

Today we decided to do what we promised ourselves we would do - went and booked ourselves on a WINE & CHEESE tasting cruise!  Our tour was called “The Swan Valley River Cruise and Vineyard Experience”. We caught our boat from the harbour, sat out on the front deck and got covered in black soot from the boat next to us - nice start to our day - TYPICAL! Anyway, we moved back inside to the captain making the introductions on behalf of the crew and awaited our complimentary coffee and muffins! (Kerry got a little excited about the muffins). We got underway and soon the captain was giving us an expert commentary on the sights of Perth from the Swan River. We reckon the highlight of this commentary was when he pointed out Rolf Harris’s old house and told us he used to be a champion swimmer and swam five kilometres up the river to the local swimming baths everyday to train for the Commonwealth Games back when Adam was a lad.

Our wine tasting experience started with an audience participation exercise. A bottle of each one of the four wines we were about to sample were given to four different passengers and when they were introduced one by one they had to parade their bottle up and down the boat to the beats on “Im too sexy” (Right Said Fred). This was quite funny. The first guy was a big fair haired 40 something Ozzie who hammed his presentation up to the max spinning the bottle around showing everyone all different angles of it. The next guy tried to out-do the first bloke by pretending to be pissed and staggered about everywhere. This proved to be his downfall. As he tried to stagger through to the front of the boat to show everyone his bottle he tried to grab hold of the door frame to steady himself, the only thing was he actually grabbed hold of the sliding door and nearly chopped himself in half. He very nearly covered it up too by pretending it was part of the act. Next up was a girl who got a change of music “You can leave your hat on” (Tom Jones) who just looked completely embarrassed and just go it out of the way quick smart. Then last but no means least there was a young Thai lad who proper minced and camped it up swinging his hips and wiggling his bum. The guy who was with him (obviously his partner, a thing greying 40 something Ozzie chap) mentioned that his partner had taken way too much notice of the lady boys back home in Thailand. Not bloody much!

We were given our first taster of wine and a plate of cheese and crackers at 10.30am to savour in between wines, needless to say this plate was devoured before we had even finished our first glass, OOOPS!

The wine continued to flow and we were well on our way when we got dropped off for the next part of our trip (we were on a different package to the rest of the cruise passengers apart from a couple in their 50’s from the Isle of Wight). We met our coach driver/tour guide who was a nice 50 something Ozzie lady called Sheree who took us to the coach and met up with four others who were on the tour. A Dutch couple also in their 50’s and two French ladies also in their 50’s who could not speak a word of English. We felt like spring chickens compared to this lot - it was great!

Our next stop was a quaint little winery called Riverbank where we had a further 12 samples of both red and white, the best of which was their Cabernet Sauvignon, a bottle of which, to our great surprise, was bought for us to celebrate our wedding so we shared it with our compatriots (who bought it) over our gourmet lunch.

Next up was a larger vineyard called Houghtons, yet another line up of wines came out and after a brief introduction we were told to help ourselves - big mistake. After tasting more of their samples we helped ourselves to a few more top ups of the “Cab Sauv” and the “Sauv Blanc” (as the Aussies call it) - we were steaming!

We staggered back on to the bus and set off to the next place which was called Carilley Place which was run by a ‘very nice man’ called Simon. Yes that’s right, he was. Anyway another wave of wine went down the hatch, best of which was what Simon called “the Ripper” their 2005 Shiraz . Kez also liked the 2003 which had a more smooth refined taste and Stu developed a liking for their red port (they also did a really sweet white port too). After saying ta-ta to Simon (strangely firm handshake for someone of his persuasion) we set off for our last alcoholic stop - a boutique brewery called Ferel Breweries. Here we had a brief introduction about their beers and we purchased a rack containing six different types of beers including Pilsner, white beer, a Belgian beer and a light ale. Kez wasn’t blown away by any of these beers apart from their alcoholic ginger beer! Last stop was a chocolate factory where they had huge bowls of chocolate drops - dark, white and milk, that you could sample for free. They could have left us there quite happily. They made all their own chocolate there and had hundreds of different types and flavours we could not even possibly start naming them all. They also made their own ice cream there so we indulged with a cone each. Kez had a very tasty mixed berry delight and Stu had a macadamia and amaretto crunch, also very very tasty! We set off back to the hotel and went straight to bed when we got in - we were absolutely wasted  We had a couple of hours in bed before getting up and going down to the internet café to put some of our pictures of the wedding on for everyone to see. We still didn’t get to bed until midnight!

The last couple of days were spent mooching and milling around the place. We decided that we liked this place and wouldn’t mind moving here if the chance came about. Next stop Cairns!

oh - sorry about the pictures, we didnt realise that we had changed the settings so they may be a little green.

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Comments

[GarryH]

Jezuz fuk
Wow, this blog sounds sooo familiar !! Take me back there now, hey guys you sound like you having a ball. Take it easy, watch out for the redback spiders !!