Margaret River Holidays

Our two weeks in Margaret River have been amazing - a perfect combination of relaxing and lazing around and also plenty of outdoor activities (hiking, surfing, canoeing and swimming). Everything is nearby and everyone is so friendly and helpful. The only problem is that now we feel like we could spend a few more easy weeks here except everything is filled up for the summer holidays. All of the kids will be on their summer holidays until February but apparently around Christmas and New Year’s are the busiest.

One of the first things we did was have a belated Thanksgiving dinner – actually we had a whole Thanksgiving day where we cooked, watched a movie, and remembered everything and everyone for whom we were thankful. It was pretty easy to find everything we needed – the one confusing thing was the turkey. They have the turkey by sizes, size 32, 34, 36, 38, etc., not by weight. I am sure that somewhere there is a Rosetta stone to translate the sizes but there was nothing helpful on the wrapper. I figured if we just cooked it until we could pull a leg off, it would probably be good enough. It was and we had just enough leftovers to be sick of turkey after a few days.

There are loads of hiking trails around Margaret River to explore. We took one through a eucalyptus forest and where an old train line had run. Along the trail, in a dead fallen tree was supposed to be a geocache. We hadn’t done any geocaching since we had been with Erica in Hong Kong and we still had a little surfboard key ring that we needed to drop off.

This was easily the toughest geocache yet. The GPS on Dylan’s phone didn’t work well because we had weak reception and then eventually died! All we knew was that when it died we had been about 200 feet away from it and that it was in a dead tree. We walked up and down the section of trail we thought it might be, crashing through brush to various dead trees all the while slightly freaked out by the prospect of deadly spiders and snakes. Finally, as we were about to give up, we decided to try an upright dead tree (rather than one lying on the ground) and… bull’s eye! We were pretty excited and would have stayed to read the logbook longer except that we were quickly being chomped by bugs of all sorts. We learned a whole new respect for navigating through the Australia bush – it is wild!

As a family Christmas present, we signed the whole family up for a three-day surf lesson. Emma and David have been on the surfboards before but haven’t really had a formal lesson. Also, up until we went to Hawaii, neither of them were particularly excited about getting washed around in the waves and didn’t like getting saltwater in their mouths or eyes.

After going to the surf shop to get kitted up (Aussie for getting your gear on), we met instructor, Jarrod, at Red Gate beach. The beach was absolutely beautiful with powdery white sands and clear turquoise water. The waves were pretty small. Jarrod took the kids and got started with them and Dylan and I played in the small surf and watched the lesson. We were so glad we didn’t try to teach them – they listened to everything Jarrod said, did it without any complaining and had a great time. It was also so fun to watch them get excited about catching the waves.

Jarrod invited us to come down the beach early the next day as he was going to be teaching a bunch of kids in a holiday camp. He thought it might be fun for Emma and David to join in the fun. It was madness! There were about 25 kids with their surfboards all in the water at once with about five instructors racing from one to the other.

Dylan and I were on the standup boards that day, so we paddled away from the chaos out to the quieter water. The wind had picked up and as soon as I stood up on the board I was blown nearly out of the bay. It was no comfort when Dylan yelled out to remind me that the next land was Antarctica over 1,000 miles away. I managed to get back in and was feeling pretty good on the board until we started trying catch a wave. I kept running right off the end of the board as soon as the wave started pushing it, which I am sure was entertaining to watch.

I never ended up catching a wave, but I got some good practice. Dylan rode a few and made it look easy. By the end of the three days, Emma caught a few waves on her own and rode them all the way into the beach. David could catch them but once he stood up he’d be so excited he’d jump off the board!

There is a beautiful river that runs through Margaret River to the ocean (big surprise). We took a guided canoe trip up it to learn about local history (aboriginal and settlers), the natural history, to eat Australia wild food (kangaroo, emu, grub hummus, berries and seeds), to explore caves and to swim in the river. Our guide was a big friendly Aussie guy who cracked jokes left and right throughout his stories and clearly really enjoyed what he did.

One of the highlights was paddling through the paper trees on Boonaloongar Island in the middle of the river. This island, also called Sorry Island, was a sacred place for the aborigines. Apparently they would come to the island to unload all of the mistakes they had made or things they were sorry for. They would hug one of the paper trees, the trees would absorb all of the mistakes and they would be unburdened. The water in the river would rise and the trees would be submerged and the water would “wash” all of the mistakes away into the ocean. Needless to say, we all took turns hugging and unloading.

Another highlight was exploring the limestone caves about the river. Huge rooms went back into the stone and had been lived in for an extended period of time by shipwreck survivors in the early 1900’s. There was graffiti on the cave walls with dates of 1920 and 1913 written by the survivors. There was also a tunnel that went back through the cave and came out near the entrance. Dylan, Emma and David explored the tunnel (the diameter ranged between 2-3 feet) while I waited with the camera at the end. I was glad I did. It was pitch black and probably would have taken about 3 minutes but took closer to 5-6 minutes waiting for the others to make it through. Too claustrophobic!! The kids loved it and did it twice.

Christmas was a huge success. Santa found us and managed to fit down the chimney of the wood-burning stove. The kids played with toys, ate Christmas cookies and read books for most of the day. We took a little break and went down to the beach for a Christmas swim. The currents at the first beach we went to were too strong and started pulling the kids out almost as soon as we got in. We were all a little spooked so we moved on to another where it was much more mellow. It was a great Christmas celebration - Happy Holidays to all!

Rice Bubbles and Budgie Smugglers*

We arrived in Perth after almost exactly five months in Asia (almost 1/12 of David’s life!). On the plane here it was strange to think we wouldn’t be getting off in another Asian country but in one with more familiar elements. Our first couple days were filled with culture shock going from Asian to Western but also trying to sort out the cultural differences between American and Australian/English ways. Everyone is so friendly and helpful but is frustrating when you know they are speaking English to you and you still can’t understand them!

The first biggest thing we noticed was how empty it seems here. Perth is the largest city in Western Australia (WA) with a booming population of 1.5 million (WA itself has only 2.2 of the total population of 21 million). Compared to the huge crowded cities we have been in (Shanghai, Singapore, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Bangkok), where hundreds of people are around 24/7, it seems like a ghost town! We were staying in the main downtown area which is busy during the day but completely clears out around 6pm as everyone heads back to the suburbs (kind of like downtown LA). Even during the day, we still have been walking down streets and been the only ones on the whole street.

As a treat for David especially, we decided to take a trip the Perth Mint, which is touted as a great tourist attraction (there isn’t THAT much in Perth). The Mint was founded in 1899 by the British to refine the gold discovered in WA during the 1890’s and send it back to the motherland. They don’t mint regularly circulated coins anymore, but they do still make all sorts of commemorative coins (apparently the Japanese love them – they had special Hello Kitty ones) and the silver medals for the Sydney Olympic Games. The big highlight of the Mint tour was watching them melt, pour and mould a 25-pound solid gold brick. You could also try to pick up a 25-pound gold brick that was housed in a big plexi-glass box. David was in seventh heaven.

There were also examples of gold bars from around the world. There was millions of dollars worth of gold with what seemed like relatively little security. I don’t know why I do it, but I started scheming how you could knock the place over. I would never do anything like that, but I seem to always gravitate to scheming it. I was just feeling guilty for my scheming when Dylan pointed out how it seemed an easy place for someone to rob. I felt so much better that it wasn’t just me!

As a treat for all of us, we decided to take a ferry down the Swan River and over to Rottnest Island. The island is about 10 miles off shore and is Dutch for “rat nest” island. There are these creatures called quokkas that are found all over the island and look a lot like HUGE rats. They are actually much cuter. Aside from looking for quokkas, which isn’t too challenging, we spent the day at a beautiful white sand beach. We tried some snorkeling but there wasn’t much to see where we were and the water was unexpectedly cold! We were feeling very spoiled from our Indonesian adventure. We still had fun splashing around.

After a few days in Perth, we finally got our bearings together and headed down the coast to Margaret River. We were really looking forward to it, not only because there is great wine and really good surfing, but also because we rented a vacation house for two weeks for Christmas! We have been staying in hotels and eating out since we were in Japan. Cooking our own food, doing our laundry and hanging out in the backyard all sound really good.

On our way out of Perth we stopped in Fremantle, a port town just across the river from Perth. While we wanted to go to Fremantle for it’s pretty downtown with Victorian buildings and the fish and chips shops on the harbor, we really wanted to see the statue of it’s most famous resident…. Bon Scott. I am sure there are a few non-Australian hard-core AC/DC fans that would have known this was his hometown, but we only found out when we arrived in Perth.

We stopped to have some fish and chips on the harbor before seeking out the statue when we looked just across the street and saw it there. I don’t know if the statue was life-size, but he sure looked small. It was funny to watch all sorts of people stopping to take their picture with the statue. The best were these two older Italian couples. I had to wonder if they knew who he was or just figured he must be someone important if there was a statue of him and might as well take a picture with it. Apparently they also offer a special Bon Scott tour of Fremantle, which we would have done if we had time, that included his boyhood home, his school, the jail where he was incarcerated, and his grave.

A few hours after leaving Fremantle and being in the car for the first time in five months, we headed southwest and arrived in at our hotel in Bunbury. We had decided to spend the night here because it was home to the Dolphin Discover Centre that offers boat trips out to swim with wild dolphins. The town is on a protected bay and a river runs into the bay. The dolphins come in the bay to feed, rest and play.

The early the next morning we headed over to the Centre. They suited us up with wetsuits (Emma and David each wore two) and snorkel gear and then loaded us up on a small pontoon boat. There were about ten other people onboard with us. We saw the dolphins swimming all around and our guide, a marine biologist, talked to us about their behavior and identified a few of the dolphins. When we saw 5-6 playing in the water, they stopped the boat and we quietly slipped into the water. Our guide told us not to swim towards the dolphins, as that would scare them, but to make them interested in us by singing and duck-diving down underwater. We did this for about a half-hour and while they circled nearby, they never got very close.

We got back the boat to warm up and head towards another spot when they came back. Our guide told us we could quickly and quietly get back in the water. Most people were still warming up (including David wrapped in blankets) so Dylan, Emma and I got back in. I saw a dorsal fin in the distance but figured it was pretty far off when all of a sudden I was face-to-face with a dolphin!! He came within a foot of me, just checking me out. Emma and Dylan were right behind me and also got a close-up view too. I had an underwater camera but I think I was too dazzled to even get my wits about me enough to take a picture. As quickly as he appeared, he was gone, but it made the whole excursion worth it.

After the dolphin experience we got back on the road and headed south for Margaret River and our house. The drive was beautiful and took us from dry desert scrub to rolling fields, vineyards and huge eucalyptus forests. We were a little nervous about the house at first, but it has ended up being all that we were hoping. It has nice big kitchen and living room area with huge windows that look out into the yard, which is filled with tall eucalyptus trees. The town is nearby and consists of about three blocks of shops and restaurants.

There are about 70 wineries in the Margaret River area. We have made it to two so far. They are particularly famous for their cabernet sauvignon and chardonnay. We haven’t had any cabs we were crazy about but had a very good chardonnay, Evoi 2008 reserve Margaret River chardonnay (in case you can track it down at home).

The chardonnay was enjoyed last night with our belated Thanksgiving dinner. We put together quite a feast with turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy and green beans. We even set the whole day aside to pretend it was Thanksgiving and spent the day hanging out around the house - Dylan played his guitar, David played chess and Emma made Christmas ornaments. We were all very thankful for our special meal together and thankful that next year we’ll get to have Thanksgiving with our family and friends.

Emma and David have been working very hard to get the house ready for Christmas. We made a cardboard tree and have decorated it with candy canes and origami balloons and cranes. We are gearing up for Christmas cookies and even have most of the presents wrapped – I am more on the ball here for Christmas than I ever have been at home when I am furiously wrapping all my presents on Christmas eve!

*Rice Bubbles=Rice Krispies, Budgie Smugglers=Togs=Bathers=Swimsuit