Catch Up take 2 - Part2

Day 23 - Albany

After leaving Bremmer Bay we got to Albany late, did a shop at the local Safeway and that was about it. Had Nicholas' fish for tea , the luderig was not that nice but the Australian Herring (also know as Tommy Rough) was very nice.

Day 24 - Pemberton

Departed Albany for the Valley of the Giants tree walk, that was brilliant (apart from the fact I don't like heights and was scared stiff!). The Red and Yellow Tingles are just astounding but I liked the Karri trees better. The feeling you get walking amongst the canopy is just brilliant and something you must do if you come down south of Perth. Speaking of down south if you ever get the chance to some down her you must I think you could spend three of four months here and not see everything, I will certainly be coming back!

We camped that night near Pemberton in a free camp near Big Brooke Dam, we arrived late and basically had dinner and that was it, the boys found some hot coals and made a fire but we were all in bed early as usual!

Day 25&26 - Busselton

I woke early the next morning as I wanted to do some work on the jacks of the van, they were squeaking so I wanted to put some grease on them, plus I had notice that the nuts were coming off as well. What I thought would be a quick job ended up taking a while (story of my life) so we didn't leave there till 9:30ish

We were heading to Busselton via Margaret River, at this point we have been traveling and only spending 1 night for a couple of nights so we were all keen to get out of the car and relax for a bit. We pulled into Margaret River and Tanya and I looked at each other and said "Is this it?". We stoped in a park and had some lunch and agreed to move on, we found out later you have to go to the river mouth which is (I'm told) spectacular, plus supposedly its more about the region than the town!

Finally we arrived in Busselton and found the oasis in the desert that is Mandalay Caravan Park. This is the best park we have seen by far, beautiful green grass, immaculate amenities, they even vacuumed the sealed roads.... HEAVEN we booked in for one night but once we had setup we decided we would stay for two! By now I had worked out we could do the whole trip and still have 8 days up our sleeve so we stared to relax a bit, mind you we still felt like we were flying!

When we checked in we were EXTREMELY disappointed to find out the pier was closed for repair, this was something we had been talking up with the kids and Tanya was really looking forwarded to, so got over our disappointment with a relaxing day in the park while the kids played in the pool.

The next day we headed into town on the bikes (on the 70.3 run course which had been on the weekend before), Busselton is a beautiful town but unfortunately we were there on a Saturday and town was chokers! Cars everywhere and not a friendly town for pedestrians, we grabbed some rolls and headed home.

We decided we had better head back to have a look at the Margaret River Region., first stop was the cheese factory which was a huge let down so we headed on to the Nut factory which was a bit better and then finally the Chocolate factory which was AWESOME free chocolate! Finally it had to happen we went to a winery my favourite (and I only found out the oldest in Margaret River) Vasse Felix, and the thing i love.... wine was more expensive here! WHAT THE!!

We went back to the van and I wanted to go for a snorkel, Lachlan wasn't keen but Nicholas wanted to fish (as usual!) so we headed for the beach, I went into the cold water and immediately felt a tinlgle all over my body, I assumed this was just the cold water, i keep swimming and the feeling didn't go away. There was nothing to see under the water so I came out and asked Nicholas if i had anything on my neck and he said there was a big welt, i started to panic of course and headed to to my personal nurse. By the time I got back I had assume that it was just stingers (which I thought would be gone by this time of year) and started to calm down. (note: Even now I have the marks on my neck and hip!) I was supposed to pick up some stuff for dinner which of course I didn't so we had Pizza.

Day 27&28 - Perth

Finally I had arrived in Perth its been way too long, after spending lots of time in Perth in the 90's since finishing with Ashton I have only been to Perth once. We were arriving on Mothers day which was probably not good planning but we managed to navigate our way to Helen's and drop off the van. We headed to Fremantle for a look around and catch up with Mark Vassallo who I worked at Ashton with. The kids imedatly spotted a busker called Matty Blade who looked alot like Jack Sparrow from Pirates of the Caribbean and his claim to fame is that Guinness Book of records has recognised that he can swallow 19 swords!