Dateline Down Under – PerthMonday, February 4 through February 6, 2008
Whoowee! Woke up last night to a HUGE thunder and lightning show here! It is 93 degrees (F) and about 80% humidity. They have thunder bumpers here like we experience on summer Sierra days at home.
Woke up this morning to a nice exercise session and then watched the final two quarters of the Super Bowl on Aussie television. Steve bet on New York to win so lots of smiles around here today. We are looking forward to some Aussie Rules Footie and Cricket later today. The television commercials here are as inane as ours, and the term “fan” equates to about the same sort of craziness one would find in the States. Folks fly their colors and are pretty vocal about their teams. The Super Bowl (other than the economic facts) was a pretty much “ho-hum” deal here, however. There is more news about “Super Tuesday” than football. However, Carol did hear Steve mumble something about “pitchers and catchers” reporting for Spring Training under his breath after the Super Bowl…
The folks we traded houses with have a nice little garden, so Carol has been out in the yard tending to a TON of strawberries and herbs. Doing a little weeding as well. Today was our first venture out of ‘hood in the car, and we headed down to Fremantle to get our first look at the Indian Ocean. We are settling in nicely and beginning to plan a few longer trips up and down the West coast of Australia. Our travel agent (thanks Matt!) and the folks here have left us a ton of information about the local area and a bottle of wine, and our exchange partners a nice big road (Royal Automobile Club) Atlas to find our way around with. The switch to the left side of the road driving is not nearly as scary here as it was in England a couple of years ago, mainly because Australia’s roads are a lot like ours, nice and spacious. Steve read up on “Roundabout Etiquette” on the Internet so has that pretty much down. As stated before somewhere along the road, Australian drivers do not hesitate to let you know you’ve screwed up with their horns, but it has been minimal (so far). They are also about as crazy as Yanks. We saw one guy cut across the road (with a long trailer no less) and just missed getting T-Boned by a car going the other direction. We witnessed and accident right in front of us leaving the city. This poor guy in a small car like the one we are driving (see photos at the Perth City photo album on Google Picassa.) rear-ended a SUV, and the whole front of his car was gone. He was pulling his front bumper and headlights off the road in the middle of traffic.
Tuesday, February 5, 2008:Tuesday dawned cloudy, HOT and HUMID, so we decided to take a chance on our first visit to downtown Perth. Perth is a very modern city. It is not quite as hectic as Melbourne, but it is the largest city on the Western Coast (Western Australia) of the country, and it is spread out a long way (think of a smaller version of Phoenix or Tucson). Our house is in the southern portion of the suburbs, about 10-12 klicks from the city itself. The freeways are very nice, easy to get around on, and as we have noted everywhere else on this trip, public transportation IS used here, BIG TIME. Caught a free bus service to get an overview of the downtown sights and it was loaded with commuters; many of them wearing long sleeved shirts and neckties in this brutal weather. Man that is something Steve does NOT miss one bit! He felt sorry for the men sweltering in monkey suits. The women dress nicely, but a little more casual. Steve has always said he’s like to meet the ass hole who invented the necktie in a quiet alley someplace for about 20 seconds with a ball bat…. Not sure whether he is really kidding about that or not.
The weather was so brutal in downtown Perth, we checked out the possibility of long-term bike rentals, a trip out to Rottnest Island (“Rotto” to the locals – more on this later when we go), wandered through a cooler garden area, and headed for home. We just did make it home before the thunder and lightning show began, and … and … NOT A DROP OF RAIN! Man, the thunder was RIGHT over us, and it was loud! All of the neighbor’s dogs are going nuts, so we decided to stay indoors and read books while riding out the storm. We expected what we call a “Yellowstone Downpour” based on our experience in the back country there, but nary a drop yet. Smells like rain, but no wet stuff as yet.
We will be watching the American tellie carefully tomorrow, as according to our computer clock Super Tuesday has just arrived in California.
Wednesday, February 6, 2008:Up and at ‘em early today as it is our first trip to a local beach for our first swim in the Indian Ocean. As Carol keeps track of Starbucks, Steve tracks “Oceans Swum in (or at least got feet wet in).” We are now working our way around the world: Pacific (both sides), Atlantic (both sides) Southern Ocean, and now Indian Ocean! Throw in the Saragossa Sea, St. Lawrence Sea, Irish Sea, Philippine Sea, Sea of Japan, Sea of Okhotsk, South China Sea, etc., and you get the idea!
These two young guys decided to play in the sand.. if you look closely there is something wrong with the anatomy of this "Sand Person!" For more photos check out the Beaches of Australia photo album on Google Picassa.
We went to what all of the guidebooks and locals have called one of the best beaches in the area, called Cottlesloe Beach. It is about a 30-minute drive from the house and we have decided this will be our daily base of operations while in the Perth area. Long, pure white sandy beach, with ocean waters at about 70 -74 degrees (F), lots of nice people, and the most beautiful water we have seen since Hawaii. The ocean is REALLY salty here, which surprised us. We both came home with a lot of rine on the body parts. When you look at the photos, the dark areas in the water are neither cloud shadows nor kelp. They are the rocks and shells along the bottom of the ocean, and you can see them that clearly! Just a LONG, beautiful beach to walk along, and fairly quiet on the weekdays, especially now that the little ones are back in school.
We decided we’ll stay away on weekends (think of Tahoe on weekends for skiing and you get the idea).
Again it is HOT and HUMID today, and although each day dawns clear and blue, by about 11 a.m. the clouds begin building to a late afternoon crescendo, complete with thunder and lightning, but not a drop of rain as yet. We have learned to be done with our basic exercise program by about 10 a.m.
We learned something new today as well: do NOT screw with Australian School Children’s Crossing Guards, who come complete with bright yellow vests and bright orange flags that identify them as surrogates for the Western Australian Police Department. As we mentioned previously, school kicked off Monday of this week, and these crossing guards are EVERYWHERE. The Aussies in this neck of the woods have proven to be pretty much as crazy as American drivers with respect to lane jumping, taking chances, etc., and Steve is getting pretty good at mixing it up with them. He does always stop for pedestrians though, and it appears to take some of them by surprise. They just smile and say, “Thank You!” They’re just lucky they didn’t know him when he was a 20-something driver! However, everyone comes to a complete and immediate stop when these dudes walk into the street with their orange flags. Other than that if you are a pedestrian here, you can consider yourself pretty much road kill if you ain’t paying attention!
We drove about 160 klicks (call it 100 miles) on 4.2 gallons of petrol since we arrived Saturday. We stopped to get fuel, and it worked out to about $4.96 a gallon and 25 mpg. They have gas saver programs here (16 cents per gallon if you purchase $30 worth of groceries at a major chain store), BUT, the good old government charges you .91 percent on your total purchase if you want to use Mr. Plastic. Bottom line is good thing we have a car that gets good gas mileage -- we have figured about $80 a fill-up based on our experience!
Big news of the day is that Steve has lost his driver’s license somewhere along the way, which did not result in a very happy camper when he realized it this morning! Carol has now learned some Driver’s License Losing Words to go along with Putting on Chains in the Snow Words. He has no idea where it fell out of his wallet, but we know it was most-likely in Perth City yesterday. Again, thanks to Matt Knowles (our travel agent) who told us before we left, “MAKE TWO COPIES OF ALL OF YOUR IMPORTANT DOCUMENTS BEFORE YOU LEAVE,” and for HP printer at home. Unless they ask him to pull the license out of the wallet, that copy looks just as good as the original. We are betting some one will mail it back home and he’ll collect it when we arrive home (if he doesn’t lose his wallet or brain before we get there!). If not he pays the $25 “dummy fine” to get a new one. He is thinking about retaining the paper one to see how long it will last – that’s our boy…
Anyway, we had a wonderful day at the beach, swimming, sunning and just walking along the shore collecting sea shells (yes, you can pick them up here – Steve checked with the life guard first and he said, “No worries.”) Carol’s sea shell collection will have grown a LOT by the time we arrive home. We got home and found we had got an email from our friends Ken and Emilie up in Tahoe, some of the pictures included two story tall icicles… When we made the exchange with Sheena and Trevor we were concerned about the accumulation of snow. It seems Carol’s prayers to the snow gods worked..a little too well. We hope Sheena and Trevor are enjoying all of the snow and just know that we are enjoying our share of the sun!!!
The sun is BRUTAL here. They have “extreme UV Warnings” on the television news each day, so we have been keeping the Banana Boat people rolling in money since arriving.
We got home at midnight California time and were quite surprised to find that Hillary won in California and Barack in New York. We would have both bet it would go the other way. LOTS of interest here about the election, and when people realize we are Yanks, they ask us about it. It is all that has been on the BBC News all day – they are covering it as heavily as CNN and the rest of the American Newsies are at home….
Time to go and whup up a pot of spaghetti tonight with a nice bottle of red wine, so that’s it for today!
We went to what all of the guidebooks and locals have called one of the best beaches in the area, called Cottlesloe Beach. It is about a 30-minute drive from the house and we have decided this will be our daily base of operations while in the Perth area. Long, pure white sandy beach, with ocean waters at about 70 -74 degrees (F), lots of nice people, and the most beautiful water we have seen since Hawaii. The ocean is REALLY salty here, which surprised us. We both came home with a lot of rine on the body parts. When you look at the photos, the dark areas in the water are neither cloud shadows nor kelp. They are the rocks and shells along the bottom of the ocean, and you can see them that clearly! Just a LONG, beautiful beach to walk along, and fairly quiet on the weekdays, especially now that the little ones are back in school.
We decided we’ll stay away on weekends (think of Tahoe on weekends for skiing and you get the idea).
Again it is HOT and HUMID today, and although each day dawns clear and blue, by about 11 a.m. the clouds begin building to a late afternoon crescendo, complete with thunder and lightning, but not a drop of rain as yet. We have learned to be done with our basic exercise program by about 10 a.m.
We learned something new today as well: do NOT screw with Australian School Children’s Crossing Guards, who come complete with bright yellow vests and bright orange flags that identify them as surrogates for the Western Australian Police Department. As we mentioned previously, school kicked off Monday of this week, and these crossing guards are EVERYWHERE. The Aussies in this neck of the woods have proven to be pretty much as crazy as American drivers with respect to lane jumping, taking chances, etc., and Steve is getting pretty good at mixing it up with them. He does always stop for pedestrians though, and it appears to take some of them by surprise. They just smile and say, “Thank You!” They’re just lucky they didn’t know him when he was a 20-something driver! However, everyone comes to a complete and immediate stop when these dudes walk into the street with their orange flags. Other than that if you are a pedestrian here, you can consider yourself pretty much road kill if you ain’t paying attention!
We drove about 160 klicks (call it 100 miles) on 4.2 gallons of petrol since we arrived Saturday. We stopped to get fuel, and it worked out to about $4.96 a gallon and 25 mpg. They have gas saver programs here (16 cents per gallon if you purchase $30 worth of groceries at a major chain store), BUT, the good old government charges you .91 percent on your total purchase if you want to use Mr. Plastic. Bottom line is good thing we have a car that gets good gas mileage -- we have figured about $80 a fill-up based on our experience!
Big news of the day is that Steve has lost his driver’s license somewhere along the way, which did not result in a very happy camper when he realized it this morning! Carol has now learned some Driver’s License Losing Words to go along with Putting on Chains in the Snow Words. He has no idea where it fell out of his wallet, but we know it was most-likely in Perth City yesterday. Again, thanks to Matt Knowles (our travel agent) who told us before we left, “MAKE TWO COPIES OF ALL OF YOUR IMPORTANT DOCUMENTS BEFORE YOU LEAVE,” and for HP printer at home. Unless they ask him to pull the license out of the wallet, that copy looks just as good as the original. We are betting some one will mail it back home and he’ll collect it when we arrive home (if he doesn’t lose his wallet or brain before we get there!). If not he pays the $25 “dummy fine” to get a new one. He is thinking about retaining the paper one to see how long it will last – that’s our boy…
Anyway, we had a wonderful day at the beach, swimming, sunning and just walking along the shore collecting sea shells (yes, you can pick them up here – Steve checked with the life guard first and he said, “No worries.”) Carol’s sea shell collection will have grown a LOT by the time we arrive home. We got home and found we had got an email from our friends Ken and Emilie up in Tahoe, some of the pictures included two story tall icicles… When we made the exchange with Sheena and Trevor we were concerned about the accumulation of snow. It seems Carol’s prayers to the snow gods worked..a little too well. We hope Sheena and Trevor are enjoying all of the snow and just know that we are enjoying our share of the sun!!!
The sun is BRUTAL here. They have “extreme UV Warnings” on the television news each day, so we have been keeping the Banana Boat people rolling in money since arriving.
We got home at midnight California time and were quite surprised to find that Hillary won in California and Barack in New York. We would have both bet it would go the other way. LOTS of interest here about the election, and when people realize we are Yanks, they ask us about it. It is all that has been on the BBC News all day – they are covering it as heavily as CNN and the rest of the American Newsies are at home….
Time to go and whup up a pot of spaghetti tonight with a nice bottle of red wine, so that’s it for today!
Until next time, we remain:
Carol and Steve, Reporters down under
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