I did not go into Fremantle in the evening as there were no shuttles running and I wasn’t sure, in the dark, where to go. I was up and on the shuttle bus bright and early the following morning - around 9am infact, which may have been a little silly since the centre of the old town did not burst into life until around 10am !
I loved the place, the architecture and the ambience. It was a cluster of ornate stone buildings, old and new and a simple stone built church in the centre of the bustle. More beautiful even than the buildings were the enormous and convoluted tropical trees complete in their own well kept circle of earth which were almost more in number than buildings ! I can only assume they were centuries old as the girth of each base trunk was the size of a church tower !
I could not fit the whole tree in !
Perhaps this explains the preponderance of white parrots and rainbow laurekeets ( no idea about spelling.....). If one was a bit early morning dozy, the awakening was sudden and rather rude ! The screeching is beyond belief, the support and breath these tiny bodies must have in their vocal armoury is top notch ! The clear need to scrap all the time with other birds must also add to the decibels !
Note the white parrots ! Mercifully quiet for a few peaceful minutes !
I had, by now almost run out of bars and snacks which I could eat without lots of rising numbers so I first went to the tourist information building to try my luck at asking for the location of a health food type shop. As with everyone I have met in this part of the world, the lady could not have been more helpful if she were being appraised ! She googled, she telephoned and she read in order to find me somewhere to shop. In the end the local Chemist Warehouse ( which tells you everything!) was the low carb place to be, and I stood amazed at the plethora of bars, packs, and drinks which I could eat !! The prices for all these foods were a good deal cheaper than in the U.K. which is always a pleasant surprise, and even better, many of the confections were sweetened with stevia or xylitol and not the dreaded aspartame ! I love Australia!
After shopping I wandered around the lovely centre of the town admiring the way that buildings had been conserved, and how well the new ones fitted into the picture. There were many new builds but they had a look of the old frontier ones, so no visual shocks.
The church in the centre of town
A lovely old hotel
It was a warm day, around 73 degrees so instead of my usual coffee I had my first Aussie iced coffee with whipped cream ( not out of a can - I watched....) which was a welcome cooler and quite delicious. So there is a first ! This was before I ventured on the CAT Red Bus which did the ‘round the city loop’. These are such brilliant facilities, and free 😆😆, which means that one can, in the comfort of air conditioning see the centre of the city. It passed right by the ship, that is how closely we were docked to the town, and many tourists got off at the ship stop and went onboard. I went back to the centre as I wanted another look at this almost ‘Cathedral city’. After Fremantle we are leaving Australia so it was my final goodbye to the country and in a strange kind of way, Emily, Steven and Tom. Whilst I was on the Australian continent I felt as if I could still have got back to Melbourne - albeit a very long way - so this was a proper goodbye !
WORLD OF COFFEE 11
Iced Coffee in Colleys Tea Rooms with rapidly melting cream !
The ship shuttle bus was doing round trips every 10 minutes, so I sat and watched the world go by for awhile. Then up cycled four policewomen ! Clearly the equivalent of the London mounted horse police, but on swish racing cycles. They stopped and chatted with lots of folk sitting on the benches around the church and clearly were very approachable and friendly ! I have no idea whether or not we have policemen and women on cycles in the U.K. and undoubtedly someone will put me right in this, but I haven’t seen any ! Very eco and very efficient I thought.
Mounted Policewomen
I eventually caught the bus back to the ship and returned to my cabin with lots of wonderful memories of this amazing country. It is just a pity it is so far from home.........
Onwards by sea to Indonesia and a whole new ( and probably unbearably hot) world.
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