St Patrick's Day

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Annie's little sister Trish & her daughters Shauna, Kelly and Lauren all arrived safely on Sat evening 16th March.
We obviously all couldn't stay at John & Andrea's so Annie and I had booked into a backpackers hostel in Northbridge in central Perth.
We checked in and dumped our bags during the afternoon and found a strange mixture of older travellers like us and partying youngsters.
It was mostly full of Irish people, lots of them appeared to be working in local bars and building sites and staying on the cheap at the hostel.
They were all friendly though and it had a bar, swimming pool etc.

We travelled to the airport to welcome the rest of the famiy but their flight from Dublin had been delayed for a couple of hours at Dubai.
Meanwhile John, Andrea, Tasha (Andrea's daughter) and her boyfriend David - Annie and I were waiting not so patiently in arrivals!



But when they eventually emerged from arrivals they were looking remarkably refreshed, in fact they were virtually the last people out .... we later discovered that they had all gone to the washroom to freshen up before they came through customs! Just like her BIG sister!!
Annie had said that Trish wouldn't want to meet her public without touching up her make up first although they were four of the whitest people I have seen since we arrived! We set off back to John & Andrea's house for a few welcome drinks before Annie and I headed off back to to our accomodation.

Sunday 17th March - St Patricks day - John had pre-booked a table for 10 people at 'JB O'Reillys', an Irish Pub for breakfast 10.30am so we were up bright and early.
We wandered down through Northbridge and into Leederville passing hundreds of people dressed in green... and there were thousands more lining the parade route.
It looks like most of Ireland has gone to Perth. We met up with the others and found the pub already rammed....Complimentary champagne, live music, a few guinesses and a big brekkie! By early afternoon the place was heaving and the queue to get in stretched around the corner. There was a 2 hour wait in 30 degree sunshine to get in.

John had done well booking a table!

Annie was looking great in her green and white outfit but was missing the gold. She then spotted the table cloth decoration which was a large piece of orange material and took to wearing it around her waist. We thought that it was very funny but the staff explained that she had to put it back as all the decorations were on hire.
But, Annie loves a challenge and walked out with her head high and her orange sash still in place and walked off still wearing it!

We headed off back to Ellenbrook for a couple of beers and stocked up on BBQ provisions and then moved on back to John & Andrea's.
It was a lovely hot day and we had a great St Paddy's day, BBQ, beers and the girls managed to see some kangaroos at dusk on land near the house. A Paddys day like no other!!!

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Photos

Rose of Tralee
St Patrick's Day 2013 in Perth

JB O'Reilly's Pub - West Leederville
St Patrick's Day 2013 in Perth

The queue into the pub
You'd need a drink after that 2 hour wait!

St Patrick's day
Back in Ellenbrook