We are back in Freo

What a road trip!  Dave is now used to driving on the left side of the street and Jan's mantra is "Left, left, left" although Russ is trying to get her to say "Look right, stay left!".  We certainly covered the territory in the southern part of Western Australia.  On the way to our destinations, we took time to stop at some different wineries and partook of some of the wonderful tastes of this area.

Our first stop on Saturday was in Albany which is on the southern most part of Australia that jets out into the Southern Ocean.  We saw some magnificent surfs on the coast as we hiked around a wind farm ablaze with wildflowers.  Russ treated us to dinner that night at a local brew pub even though he himself was not feeling the best.  He still was suffering from the chills.   Needless to say, he did not mind spending his weekend with his two old folks and their early bedtimes since he was feeling under the weather.

The next day we took off along the southern coastline.  We happened to find out about a little spot called William Bay from the local visitors center and what a little gem it was!  Beautiful white sand, turquoise water, and great outcroppings of rocks which some of the locals were using as diving boards.  It was hard to pull ourselves away from such a beautiful place.  Luckily we got sick of the Australian flies which  love to continuously land on your face even when you shoo them away.   Onward to the Tree Top Walk and a walk through the Ancient Empire, a forest with 400 year old tingle and Karri oak trees.  Some of those trees were over 10 feet across and over 125 feet tall.  Some of them were hollow upwards into the trunk due to fire, fungus, and various other reasons.  The TreeTop Walk was intended to create a bird's eye view of the forest although it was hard for Jan to relax at those heights especially with the added swag of the cages.  Onward to Pemberton, the heart of the forest region.  Forests are very rare in Australia but we felt like we were in Wisconsin with all the forests we drove through.  Southern Western Australia is that only area in Western Australia that has a significant amount of forest. Imagine that and compare this to all the wooded areas in the US!  Our last stop of the day was to Augusta, where the Southern Ocean and the Indian Ocean meet.  Dave and Jan enjoyed traversing the massive rock formations by Australia's tallest lighthouse, Cape Leeuwin, while watching the sun set. It is interesting to note that Western Australia is more than 4 times the size of Texas.

Today found us heading north through the Margaret River area, which according to the Lonely Planet is one of the top ten spots to see in Australia.  It reminded us of Door County except when we drove out to the coast and saw some awesome surfers.  The waves there were again huge!  We saw 20" high swells!!!

So we now are back at Russ' apartment, doing some wash and getting ready to pack up for our flight to Sydney tomorrow.  We are invited to a "barbie" at Russ' boss' place tonight.  Russ' latest flame is coming beforehand to meet us.

That's about it for now.