We were up with the sun at 5:45 a.m.. I was toasty and warm all night but the canvas exterior of the swag was really wet.
The first stop was to the hospital for Claudia to complete the paperwork for last night’s emergency visit; then as we were ahead of schedule Annelies took us to Yallingup beach for 10 minutes. The weather is quite changed and I am wearing just about everything I brought in my backpack for this trip!
The highlight was our Ngilgi Cave tour. This was a a cultural tour conducted by someone of Aboriginal heritage who introduced us to the spirituality of the cave, the creation of man and how he came to be charged with taking care of everything on earth, the animals, the trees, and the plants. We went 360 steps down into the cave and saw all the stalagtites which grow at the rate of 1 cm per 100 years. It was a powerful experience being that far down in the earth with all the weight of the rock up above you and all the spirits of the “others” around you. Then we sat around the fire at the meeting place while Josh explained all the hunting utensils and showed us how to light a fire with the fire stick, and played three different types of didgeridoos. A fascinating experience which left us with tons of questions about the history and culture of the Aboriginals.
We had a lovely 15 minute drive to Meelup Beach for lunch. After lunch we strolled armong the rocks, said good-bye to friends on the other tour, and headed off to Simmo’s Ice Cream. Ray had a strawberry ice cream but I am ice creamed out – I think I have had 2 or 3 in Australia!! Had a cappochino instead and talked with the “ice cream eating emu” who stretched his long thin neck aggressively through the wire netting fence to attempt to grab your ice-cream. But, I foiled him!!
The last leg of the journey to Perth started about 2:00 p.m. and ended somewhere around 6:00 p.m. Annalies dropped us off right in front of the hotel. We checked in and headed up to the room on the 4th floor. What were the things we most longed for? First, the thought of being able to relax in the shower without a queue of people waiting; second, the thought of having clean sand-free feet and not walking out the door of the shower into more dirt; third, the thought of being able to go to the loo in the middle of the night without a walk and the possibility of getting lost!!
We had a quick shower, and then walked over to the restaurant we were all meeting at for dinner. The hotel receptionist suggested we not walk, but Annelies had told us it would be a max 15/20 minute walk at our pace....so since she had been walking with us on various walks...we trusted her information!! We arrived at the Brass Monkey which was "alive" with activity....after 10 days in pretty remote territory it was quite a "shock"!! We had a good dinner and headed home around 9:30 p.m. with the potential of a nice walk through the centre of the city. What we saw was a ton of police cars and police all over. We couldn't figure out what was going on. We came across a large "paddy waggon". We wondered what it was all about. There didn't seem to be anything untoward going on, but all these police??? Anyway, we made it safely back to the hotel and the next morning I asked one of the young guys on the desk what was going on. He told us that sadly, this was the norm every Friday and Saturday night. Things just go so wild downtown, mainly due to all the drinking and drugs, that the only way to keep it under control was to have the police presence. Really!!! He told us that it was dangerous to walk around in the downtown area on those nights.....during the week was fine. Really!! We have walked around many South American cities which everyone tells you is "unsafe" to no avail. Maybe we have just been lucky. Anyway, it was quite an eye opener. The downtown Perth is really quite lovely with pedestrian malls, interesting buildings, and other fun stuff going on.
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