Not exactly the Australian welcome I was looking for!
So, our first few days in Australia didn't exactly go as planned. I woke up
after our very first night in Australia to see that I was eaten alive by bed
bugs! I've been told by some that they have never seen so many bites on one
person before. The bites are so itchy that I've been doped up on extra
strengh anti-histamine the past few days. We still managed to get out an
explore the city, but we also needed to find new accomodation ASAP, as I was
not sharing my bed with bed bugs anymore.
We managed to find an absolutely lovely hostel, Governor Robinson's that
cost only $5 more than our original one. It's very clean (and for those of
you who know me, you know that I set the standards of cleanliness very high)
and the owner is very friendly.
As I've said before, the city of Perth is quite nice. It's a city of a
million and a half people. Although, I'm pretty sure they are including the
suberbs in this number. We've managed to walk around the entire city even
though they do have free buses within the city centre. One thing that we
didn't expect was the cost of everything. Everything here is VERY expensive.
And for those of you who know Mark, you know that he's freaking out about
the cost especially since the Australian dollar and the Canadian dollar are
now at par - in fact, the exchange rate is even worse when we exchange
money. We are paying $55 dollars for our hostel now which is a double room
with shared bathroom. We don't know how the Aussies afford to go out to eat
or drink here either. A six pack of beer costs $15! Main dishes will run
anywhere from $10 and up. Even in Chinatown it's expensive. We've paid much
more for sub-par Chinese food than we ever would pay back in Toronto. And
there is a very large Asian population here. Even the Asian grocery stores
are expensive. We've been taking advantage of the kitchen facilities in our
hostel, but buying the food at the grocery store and cooking it hasn't come
out to be that much cheaper than eating out. From what we've seen in our
lonely planet guide book, prices are not going to get much better throughout
the rest of Australia either.
We have managed to have a good time though and we've rented a car so that we
can see the sights in the surrounding areas.
We visited Yanchep National Park the other day. It was quite nice, although
most of the property was destroyed in a fire that came through a couple of
months ago. That prevented us from doing some bushwalking. However, the did
have koala bears!! You couldn't touch them, but you could get pretty close
to them as they were in an area that was uncaged. They aren't the most
exciting animals, especially during the day when they are sleeping. But they
are just so cute. I love how they just hang off the branches while sleeping.
We also got up close and personal with a black swan. Black swans are the
symbol of Perth. For those of you who know me - you know that I've been
attacked by swans on numerous occaisons. I was very hesitant to approach the
black swan the other day, but it actually came right up to me. It was taking
food from my hand and I got to pet it! I reckon that because this is the
southern hemisphere everything is opposite here therefore, the swans here
like me.
Yesterday, we visited Rockingham and Freemantle. These are towns that are a
bit south of Perth. Rockingham's main attraction is swimming with dolphins
and penguin island. Seeing as the dolphin swim is very expensive, we opted
for penguin island. There are supposed to be 1,200 penguins living on the
island. We saw none! We only saw the captive ones they have that can't be
released back into the wild because they have been raised in captivity. We
did have a nice walk around the island and enjoyed spotting pelicans. As we
made our way to one of the beaches on penguin island, we see an injured sea
lion laying on the beach. It was still alive, but looked like it was on the
verge of death. We made our way back to the info centre to let them know
what we saw and apparently this sea lion has been there and injured for 4
years! They are monitoring it and giving it antibiotics, but all attempts to
rescue it have failed. It seems to like hanging out by itself.
We also spent the afternoon in Freemantle. Since we couldn't afford to hang
out on the "cappachino strip" we made our way to the marina and hung out at
a brewery there. We thought it was much cooler than the cappachino strip
area as it was right on the water.
Then, last night, on our way back into the city, we stopped at Harrison
island which is not far from the city centre. Harrison island houses a
kangaroo sanctuary which the public is welcome to visit for free. We got
very very close to 5 kangaroos. They were quite curious about us and had no
problems coming up to us at all. I got to pet one too! But eventually they
got bored of us and hopped away!
Today is our last day in Perth. We are catching up on email and heading to
the beach this afternoon. Tomorrow we catch a flight to Melbourne. It looks
like we will be cutting our time short in Melbourne seeing as the prices to
stay in a hostel there are pretty ridiculous.
That's all for now!
Take care,
Nicole
Pictures of Perth and surrounding areas (March 6-12, 2005):
posted by Nicole @ 10:59 AM
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