Let the roadtrip commence - Down under in Down under

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I have decided to fly to Perth to see one of my good friends from University and drama days - Teresa - for a little Western Australia road trip!

Typically when people visit Perth they tend to head North to see sights like The Pinnacles and swim with the dolphins at Monkey Mia. The landscape gradually becomes drier, deserty and more barren.

We are not going to go with the crowd - the South is home to greener, lusher landscape with forestries and wineries as well as the opportunity to do some whale watching so we head to the South Westerly most point and Teresa's friends in Denmark have very kindly lent us the use of their beautiful - built from scratch - home for a few days.

We start our roadtrip by driving for a few hours to a little village called Margaret River. Its a beautiful picturesque drive down with a winding road surrounded by native Australian trees called Karra trees. Their bark is almond coloured, spindly and bare until the very top which erupts in soft green clouds of foliage. Margaret River is a small village famed for arty little shops and cafes. Although its pretty there are still some rather ordinary brands and fast food chains here so it doesn't quite have the quaint feel of an old fashioned British village. The best thing to do in Margaret River is sample some of the local wineries however we are going to continue our way down to stay in Denmark and Albany to do that. We decide to stay just outside of Margaret River in another small village called Augusta which in hindsight is a BIG mistake! We should have got the hint at the local hemp store when we asked for good places to eat in Augusta and pretty much got laughed out the shop.

“oh well girls” the shop assistant says

“its not the place that matters right...its spending time with good friends, cracking open a good bottle of wine.....”

We check into our hotel but its a bit of a dive for the price (around 60 quid each a night!) oh well at least we get a free breakfast...

Every single cafe in Margaret River and onwards shuts around 3pm so on the hunt for dinner we are left with two options. The only pub in Augusta is brightly lit with plastic table tops, 80s rock and filled with “Bogans.” Australian chavs.The menu is a typical pub menu of steak and fish with fries except they are charging horrendous Ozzie prices of between 30 and 40 dollars a plate -and there is only one vegetarian option – noodles. Which puts veggie Teresa into a mood.

The only other alternative is a Chinese which is BYO so we find the bottle shop just before it shuts and then make our way to the restaurant. Its a bog standard affair– we order all the vegetarian options and crack open the wine. The Chinese owner lets us stay and drink it all as she is happy watching "Australia's Got Talent." God we needed a drink and after a bottle each the woman from the shop is right – if you have the company of good friends and enough of a half decent wine it really doesn't matter where you are....

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