Kinross and Fremantle

Here we are again, sorry its been a while. We have been at my Aunty Vicki and Uncle Macs for nearly 3 weeks now. Due to my knee troubles we havent done as much as we would have liked, it has been many visits to doctors, specialists etc, as its 30klms to Subiaco where the specialists are we have covered many kilometres.

I have had the knee operation, the menial miniscus was basically shredded so hopefully all is well now, specialist believes it will be about 90% back to normal. Now it is exercise time, boy do they hurt and Tony is a hard taskmaster, however I know it is for my own good. All being well we will be on the move by Thursday or Friday, there just wont be any running up and down the sand dunes for a while.

We have had a few day trips, went to Fremantle, a beautiful city full of old buildings. The Round House was the Swan Valleys first gaol and is Fremantles oldest surviving building, it was completed in 1831, there is a tunnel built to access a whaling station in the 1860's.



The new Maritime Museum was very interesting, the Australia 11 is hoisted high among the rafters. A drive up to the monument gave us a birds eye view of the area, including the very busy docks. Unfortunately the markets werent open, only on weekends but we were told that parking is a nightmare anyway so we weren't too disappointed.

There will be plenty more markets to see. Perth is a lovely city, Mac and Vicki took us for a drive to Kings Park where there is the Memorial, a beautiful view over the city and the Swan River, we then drove round Peppermint Grove which is the rich area of Perth, we saw where Alan Bond used to live. Absolutely gorgeous homes with beautiful gardens.

We were lucky that the Caravan and 4x4 show was on so spent a day looking around, a large number of the Vans are trucked over from the eastern states, a long way to go to sell a van I reckon.

Driving around the city we saw more amazing buildings, the Royal Hotel, down to the WACA, St. Marys Cathedral is being renovated so covered in Scaffolding, then to the Swan Bells Tower. This is one of the largest musical instruments on earth, it houses the 12 ancient bells of St. Martin in the Fields church London. These bells rang to celebrate the destruction of the Spanish Armada in 1588, also the homecoming of Captain James Cook in 1771 and the coronation of every British Monarch, so they have quite a history dont they?

We also had a lovely drive north to Yanchep and Two Rocks only about 45 minutes away. We couldnt believe the wild Fennel growing along the side of the road, we picked a huge bunch and dried it out, great in cooking. Also there are huge forests of Black Boys or Grass Trees as they are also called, they are everywhere. Unfortunately they are not saved when new development goes in just razed to the ground with everything else. The orange grevilleas are flowering now and really stand out among the green of the bush.

Thats really all we have been up to, Tony has been doing bits and pieces on the truck and van, also doing stuff with Mac, my knee has prevented us doing a lot of things but we have been lucky to see what we have. Weather has been good and a few very hot days over 38 degrees, its a different heat to home though. The flies are still very bad, dont think I will ever get used to them.

Will keep you all posted on how things are going