Final post on Perth (time to move on to other stuff)

Our last day was spent at King’s Park in Perth. The park is so huge that you need a car to drive to different spots.

In 1895, Kings Park was officially named “Perth Park” and managed by a committee with Premier John Forrest as President. Western Australia became a State in Federated nation in 1901. The Duke of York arrived in Perth, en route to England, after opening the new Parliament of the Commonwealth.

Perth park was renamed ‘The King’s Park’ to honour the accession of King Edward V11 to the throne following Queen Victoria’s death.

We went to Synergy Parkland with a big playground for kids;

and a big open area to play bubbles.

Perth Lookout.

So cute.

Contrast of emotions. Thought it was interesting. Ryan refusing to take pictures.

Perth City, where it’s expensive to eat and shop. I didn’t experience retail therapy at all. Most of the time, it was shock therapy; ouch! There was nothing I have found that was really cheap, even their local products. I think it’s cheaper to buy in Singapore the same product than in Perth.

The Justice Court. I like their mission; or whatever it is called: To do right to all manner of people, according to law, without fear or favor, affection or ill-will.

Our flight back to Singapore. Blogging about my trip has seemed rather draggy, sometimes can be quite tiring to remember what I have been through. Not sure whether you can tell from my writing that excitement is slowing dwindling..haha. Still, it’s nice to reminisce about it, do miss some of the places I went…

Mandurah

Mandurah! A town near Perth where we can see dolphins and for free!

Well…at least the fin..

I dunno whether is this normal tourist behaviour: During the trip when we were near water that were highly likely to be inhabited by whales or dolphins; you can see all our eyes lit up and immediately we will be on high alert, squinting and looking towards the water in hope of seeing something that resembles either a whale or dolphin. You could really feel our enthusiasm from our excited jabbing motion.

Well, that was our free dolphin watch; which already made us super thrilled. We stood near the walkway. They were quite close.

My lunch at Cicerello’s Fish and Chips. Supposed to be quite well-known for their fish and chips. But I was not impressed with their service attitude. However, the boss or manager made up for it. I forgot what happened.

We went to Dolphin Quay, expecting to see dolphins. We were very determined huh.

Actually there were one or two but I think they decided to swim far away from the maddening crowd.

Rather disappointing. Had to comfort ourselves with ice-cream.

This is Hokey Pokey. The 1st time I tried Hokey Pokey was in NZ and I loved it ever since. Was quite excited that Australia has too. It’s vanilla ice cream with small lumps of toffee. I miss NZ…

Bubbling with joy.

I thought this was interesting. There were a few of these art pieces outside a museum. Not sure what this represents; can’t find any information near it.

Ice cream, chocs and nuts go very well together

I realise I eat a lot of ice-cream when I am overseas; especially when I go mission trip, almost one a day.
This is quite a well known ice-cream place in Perth but at some ulu location.

I had waffles again! With Ferrero and Pink grapefruit ice-cream. I would have become rounder and plumper after the trip if not for my asthma. I lost my appetite during that 2-3 weeks in my asthmatic condition. Quite a blessing in disguise; even though I did not think it was when I was sick.

Chocolates! Yeah! I love chocolates, more so dark chocs. The Margaret River Chocolate Company has some real good tasting dark chocolates.

The array of jams, chutneys and flavour infused cooking oils made me wish I am a homemaker…then I can buy all these back and cook to heart’s content.

Macadamia nuts from MacNuts. I am not really a macadamia fan but these are good. The BBQ and Wasabi coated nuts are quite addictive, you can’t stop at one.

Can buy one pot home and start a macadamia factory too.

Caversham Wildlife Park

Caversham Wildlife Park at Perth; quite a fun place for kids.

We went to the farm show. These are the wool sheared from the sheep. I wonder why they shear sheep in winter. Won’t it be cold for the sheep?

If you heard of the song “Waltzing Matilda”, you would know about billy tea. We were shown how to make billy tea from a billy can.

The guy grabbed the handle and swung the can quickly in a full circle three times. The reason for doing this is to sink the tea leaves to the bottom of the pot so you can pour a drink without filling the cup with tea leaves. The amazing thing was not a drop of tea spilled out even when the can was in mid air.

Shearing a sheep. With the machine, the shearer can shear more sheep and so takes lesser days to complete the whole flock. The contraption that is around him is to protect injury to his back. It’s like a spring and will support his weight while he bends and moves about. Invented by a shearer for the shearers.

Looks so clean and adorable. But its wool stinks. The body will secrete lanolin to keep the sheep warm. And the lanolin can also be used for dry and chapped skin.

Rabbit pen. The rabbits really enjoy eating. Look how fat they are.

Isn’t he/she adorable?

But none can be compared to this grossly overweight wombat. Do all wombats grow so big and fat? Both of them look quite miserable huh…strangely with the same kind of expression.

Blue tongue lizard.

Forgot the name of this species. It was trying to eat a nut by breaking it’s shell.

White kangaroo. Not afraid to come near us for food which I had none. We were warned at the entrance not to run as the kangaroos may start running after us. It’s not hard to imagine how fast kangaroos can run, how strong their tails and hind legs are, not to mention the male ones can box too. Some parents allowed the kids to run still, which made a group of senior people quite upset. Thought they did the right thing by going to the parents and remind them.

Koalas. They are so cute with their beady eyes.

Only one was awake for photography and petting.

Bats. They seemed rather active for nocturnal creatures.

The kids enjoyed it; much more than the adults. It’s a place where they can touch, feed and take pictures with the animals. They were so reluctant to leave, thought it was too short a time spent in there. I think for me, it was enough. Most of the animals are caged, so not very interesting. I still prefer our Singapore Zoo.

Back to Perth

Not sure where we stopped for lunch, only know somewhere near Williams River.

Lunch is spent taking some pictures. Not much scenery at the park where we were at.

Ryan’s double cowlick. Both runs in opposite direction and right smack at the centre of his head. Interesting huh? He is the first person I see who has such unique feature.

Ryan and Clara. They play very well together.

Ryan can sleep anywhere and anytime which is a good thing for a long car journey. Even more so after drinking milk. He is a milk monster.

One moment he can be declaring to us he is very sleepy and wants to sleep, next moment he will be sound asleep. Sometimes can be just within minutes. I admire his amazing ability. Think the 3 kids have been trained from young and will not be stirred easily by noise.

His long and slender fingers, very attractive.

Our Perth Hotel, Alderney on Hay. Looks nice on the outside but not so on the inside. But definitely better than Goodearth Hotel, the first one we stayed in.

Awesome Albany

I made my own breakfast and lunch for the day.

My breakfast. Smoked salmon with salad greens and mayonnaise spread. Yum. Recently I am quite crazy over salmon especially sashimi.

My lunch was even more exciting; fried rice with chicken, spam and pea shoots (dou miao). I realise spam is a great substitute for luncheon meat. I seldom see luncheon meat sold in Singapore nowadays; especially Ma Ling luncheon meat from China, which is my favorite. I think it’s banned due to some carcinogen substance found.

Today’s itinerary is very cool…in all sense of the word. Albany Wind Farm and then to see natural landforms: the Bridge and the Gap.

In a gentle breeze of just 7km per hour, the turbines begin to turn at their minimum rotation speed of 10 revolutions per minute (1 full circle every 6 seconds). At this slowest possible rate each blade tip is doing 130 km per hour. The turbines have a maximum rotation speed of 22 revolutions per minute (1 full circle every 3 seconds). Should the wind increase to 125 km per hour, the turbines will automatically shut down in order to protect themselves. They are built to survive storms with winds of 220km per hour.

The turbine tower has a base circumference of 13.2m. You would need to gather at least 7 friends to be able to link hands around it. The 65 metre towers carry blades 34 metres long making these wind turbines the tallest structure in Albany.

Another potential whale watching location. But well….guess if it is so easy, people would not fork out few hundreds to go whale watching. But the scenery was breathtaking.

Doing a head count..

Feeling grouchy and not happy that I took his picture.

Off to Gap and Bridge where the edge of Antarctica is.

The continents of Australia and Antarctica were bound together along this rugged coastline for more than one billion years, forming part of the super-continent Gondwana. The ancient continents were formed mainly of gneiss, a rock created deep in the Earth’s crust. Pressure and friction at the base of the two fused continents caused rock to melt and slowly rise up through the gneiss (Think of a lava lamp). This molten rock slowly cooled, hardening into granite and helping to cement the continents together.

The granite which forms the Gap and the Natural Bridge was created when the molten rock rose from deep in the earth’s crust. It hardened 20 kilometres below what was then the surface. Water and wind wore and eroded away the softer layers of rock which lay above the granite. No longer held down by this weight, the granite expanded and cracked as it slowly rose to become exposed at the surface.

Driven by wind and waves, water and air pressure wore open the cracks, quarrying the granite into block shaped sections. Waves relentlessly pounded against the coast, eventually tearing away loose blocks of granite to create the Gap and the Natural Bridge. Sometime in the future, the Gap will widen and disappear….the Natural Bridge will collapse and become a new Gap.

The Gap.

The Bridge

The scenery.

The cameramen. Ryan asking me to pose with a victory sign so he could take my picture.

Being a sea lover, Albany is my favorite destination in this whole trip. The stunning rugged coastline and landscape are of spectacular beauty. It makes me realise how small man is and how majestic and powerful God the creator is.

Albany’s Whale World

Before I went, I was rather excited. My perception of a place like Whale’s World is one I can get to see live whales. To see these big mammals breaching is an amazing and awesome experience. And some forum my sister went to said it’s a must-visit place.

Well…..we did see these big mammals but in skeleton form…SIGH.

This is a Pygmy Blue Whale. It beached itself in the albany harbour in 1973. The pygmy blue whale is a smaller variety of the blue whale, which is the largest creature to have lived on earth; up to 34m.

Sperm Whale, one of the last whales to be taken in 1978. The Sperm Whale is the only large toothed whale and can dive very deep for its food. It’s 11m long.

Hmm..I think this is a dolphin?

Basically it’s a museum with a guided tour on the history of whaling.

A whaling ship.

The Flensing Deck was where the whales were hauled up and stripped of their blubber with extremely sharp flensing knives. The Flensers were extremely hardworking men, up before daybreak and working under dangerous conditions. The blubber and whale carcass was stripped from the whale and taken to the upper part of the Cutting Up Deck.

The place simulated the sound of the Flensers working to make it more realistic. It makes you feel like you were brought back to the past. It was quite gory to see the pictures at the Cutting Up Deck, lots of bloody pictures of the whales. Makes me feel rather sad.

We went to watch this short play. It documents a whaler and his wife and their reaction to the news of the closure of the Cheynes Beach Whaling Station and the termination of commercial whaling in Australia.

The play uses Spectravision’s miniaturized projection technique so the actor and actress looked like miniatures on stage. Very interesting.

Must say it was very educational. Most of the time, we were not able to understand the guide because he spoke very fast. But the exhibits were informative so we did learn a lot from it.

Being budget trippers, it was expensive to pay to go whale watching as a family. Someone shared with us that they saw some whales over at the blowhole area in the morning so we decided to make our way there and watch them free!

Blowholes. Are there whales today?

Not that we could see; after straining our eyes and getting excited whenever we see some movement in the sea. And no blowholes blowing either. What a pity.

If you are interested about blowholes: Storm waves force air and water into cracks or “joints” in the granite creating pressure as forceful as an explosion. Together, water and pressure slowly widen the cracks. The Blowholes are enlarged crackedlines that are open through to the ocean’s surface. Under strong conditions, the spray can spurt over 3 metres high. The blast of air and spray sounds like a whale exhaling through its blowhole.

Sunrise at Middleton Beach

Dawn.

Waiting.

A series of seagull shots that I like.

“Our memories of the ocean will linger on, long after our footprints in the sand are gone.” - Anonymous

And my header image shot looks so different huh.

Sunset at Middleton Beach

If you are puzzled at the lack of pictures of the beach and sea, I will explain. As I was walking down the beach, I saw this border collie dog. It was playing catch with his/her master. It would have been a nice picture to capture until the dog SAW ME AND STARTED TO SPRINT TOWARDS ME. I don’t really have a phobia of dogs but when there was this big dog racing towards me with his owner screaming behind (who was not of a help by running so slow): NO! NO! COME BACK! GET DOWN! NO…..OO!, I started to develop a phobia: what is the dog going to do to me?? Do all owners shout such stuff to their dogs or ONLY TO THOSE FEROCIOUS ONES? Do I detect a note of panic in his screams? Is his dog going to EAT ME?? Is his dog xenophobic or what??!!

I knew if I ran, the dog would be able to overtake me and who knows what would happen…

Well, the fact that I can still blog shows that nothing happened. The dog came up and sniffed at me, then ran back to his/her master. ALL THE SCARE FOR NOTHING??!! That few secs sniff had made that prior few minutes of staying rooted seem longer and kill off many of my cells because of fright!

I decided to play safe and stay near to the exit because there were other dogs freely running about too. There was a golden retriever eyeing me..which was quite sad as I really liked the beach. Well…the wild grasses were not bad pictures to take too.

Albany Beachside Retreat

If Karri Valley Chalet is fantastic, Albany Bayside Ocean Villa is few notches higher. It is one of the nicest place I have stayed in all my travels. And the fact that the beach is 5 minutes walk away helps to score even more points. I love the beach and the sea. The sound of the waves, the expanse of the horizon, the long stretch of shoreline, the sand…everything just mesmerizes me.

Staying at this villa is like living in a dream house.

I did not take a picture of the laundry room, backyard where there is a BBQ grill, flatscreen TV, boardgames etc, but you can roughly imagine how self sufficient and homely it is.

And this is my bedroom and I have a PERSONAL bathroom. I love the bed and the blanket. It’s so soft and furry and when the night was freezing cold (all the time), it provided a lot of warmth once I snuggled into it. But I highly suspect this is one of the culprits that cause me to have asthma when I came back to Singapore. Ha ha! Think I am allergic to fur-like stuff.

If you ever go to Albany, try out this villa. I am so glad my sis sourced out this villa. Will show you the beach in my next post. It’s real nice that it must have its own exclusive post, or maybe even posts.