Roadtripping Western Australia - Part 1 - Perth to Wave Rock

You are probably more familiar with literature on road trips that detail journeys across the USA.  
Who hasn’t heard of the iconic Route 66?  It wouldn’t be iconic if nobody had heard of it.  
And if like me you enjoy Beat literature, you will no doubt have followed Jack Kerouac’s Sal Paradise
and Dean Moriarty as they travel west, along Route 66, to California.  
The same route the Joads took in Steinbeck’s timeless classic, Grapes of Wrath.  
Don’t get me wrong, the States, and particularly up the coast from California, on Route 101, has
some amazing roads to travel on.  

Bessie

But, if you ask me, not that you did, I think the country just made for road tripping is Australia.  Great distances between places.  Vast tracts of nothingness in between, bar the obligatory roadhouse, for refuelling both your vehicle, and your passengers, with decidedly dodgy meat pies.  And towns that you will struggle to pronounce, such as Jerdacuttup, Munglinup, and Coomalbidgup.  All these towns house at least one obscure museum.  What is it with small Australian towns and their museums?

Hyden (or specifically Wave Rock), which turned out to be our first overnight stop in Bessie,
had the “Memories of Yesteryear” museum, where you could step back in time and “see an Austin car,
a bottle collection, and so much more”.  My italics.   At only $4 entrance fee, try and stop me!!  
Once I had done that I could spend all of 5 minutes visiting the “Lace Place”, and marvel at
the “magnificent world renowned lace collection”.  World renowned people.  No italics needed.
The fact it is world renowned may explain why it was more expensive than the "Yesteryear" museum,
at $5 to get in.

It wasn’t just Hyden.  Every small town we drove through had at least one museum advertised.  
If we didn’t have somewhere to be maybe we would have stopped.  At least once.  Just maybe.

So it was, this December saw us doing our second Aussie road trip, after driving the East coast a
couple of years ago.  In the same size campervan, Bessie, we were this year going to drive through
South West Australia.  This was after we first had a few great days enjoying Perth, which as it always
does, looked after me very well.  It is a great, compact city, that seems to grow more on me each time
I visit.  The food and drink options were the best I can remember, and apart from an erroneous
visit to Durty Nellie’s Irish bar, for which I blame a fellow expat from Halifax, we got to
experience some of them.  

The highlights included an excellent Indian curry at Sauma in Northbridge, an amazing old school
cheese toastie, at Toastface Grillah, and at Petition on Barrack Street in the CBD, probably the
best bacon, egg, and black pudding butty I have ever had.  In the evening Petition becomes a very
good bar, where we managed to escape the unseasonably cold, wet weather, and sampled a few of
the hoppy ales on offer with some friends from Sydney.  Guys, we need a catch up back home, if
only to return the cardigan :-)

Perth CBD and the Swan river as seen from Kings Park

Kings Park remains a beautiful oasis just on the edge of the city.  Swan River seems to get more beautiful each time I visit.  And Elizabeth Quay just keeps expanding, which is fine with me, as long as they continue to fill the space with outlets like Gusto Gelato.  Am I back in Italy?  Beautiful.  And for novelty value, for my English friends, I can’t leave Perth without mentioning that we had a great afternoon, catching up with family, and new friends, at the Lucky Shag.  It is a shame that by the end of the year it will be completely overshadowed, literally, by the completion of the development next door of the Hilton DoubleTree.

Lowlights of the city break?  Well, none really, but watching England “play” in the Ashes, the last
one at the WACA, was debatable enjoyment.  The least said about this summer’s ignominious
Ashes series the better.

But, faster than we would have liked, I was saying goodbye to Michael Atherton, who was also staying at the Alex Hotel, as the city side of our trip drew to a close, and it was time for us to hit the open road in Bessie.

Unlike the previous few days, Tuesday dawned with weather that immediately put a smile on my face. After two days of heavy rain and winds, the sun had come out to play. Taking an Uber ride with our driver Sujan, out past the airport, we started the day at Apollo motorhome hire where the smile soon disappeared. We had a long frustrating wait. Not even the sunshine could keep the smile on my face.

We waited so long I thought I would just need to drive a lap of the building when I finally got the keys, and drop them straight off back at the office, as it felt my 2 weeks were already up. Watching plane after plane come in to land next door at the airport I was full of the frustration of the stranded traveller. Bags packed, yet going nowhere.

When we finally hit the road we decided a cheeky wine might help our moods, so we took the very short drive north to the Swan Valley wine region, where we stopped for lunch, and a tasting at Ugly Duckling winery.  Despite having had several trips to Perth over the years, and wine tasting being one of my favourite things in the world,  I had never made it to the Swan Valley.  This despite it being so very close to the city.  The long wait to pick up Bessie in the morning did mean that we needed to start heading south relatively soon, but we did sneak in one more winery, the fabulous Sandalford. We proceeded to have a quick tasting, make a purchase, and then were off.  Next stop Wave Rock.

Yup, that is Wave Rock

“Why on earth are you going to Wave Rock?” people asked.  Well, let’s be clear, Wave Rock is not, and never has been, on our bucket list.  But, we did need somewhere to sleep, and break up the journey to Esperance.  And Hyden was conveniently about half way.  And it had a very big rock as a tourist attraction.  How could we not stop?  Situated some 336kms (208 miles) from Swan Valley, the little town of Hyden, population 400, home to both Wave Rock and a roadhouse selling the aforementioned dodgy pies, would do for the night.  Regarding the pie, I lost count of the lumps of gristle I had to separate from the meagre chunks (pieces?) of meat.  Arriving in Wave Rock past 7.30pm is not advisable if you are hungry.  I was.  The shop, yes, only one, had closed for the evening.  With the roadhouse being the only thing open, my dinner options were said pie, a dry muffin, or a bag of crisps.  Strewth.  

Another reason to break up your journey south is to stop yourself dying from boredom en route.  
The landscape is like being in a gallery for hours, staring at the same picture.
A picture made up of every shade of beige and green, only punctuated by the vivid red dirt, and
numerous roadkill, which were also colourful in their own way, lining both sides of the asphalt.
The only thing to keep you awake is the concentration required every time a road train comes
thundering past on the opposite side of the road, almost sucking you into their path.  The road trains
are the enormous lorries, dragging three, or four trailers in their wake.  Trust me, you don’t want to
mess with them.  As you motor on, hoovering up the kilometres, the small towns pass you in the
blink of any eye. Corrigin.  Kondinin.  Small towns of small populations. But one thing in common.

Oh look, another bloody museum.

Signing off 2017

Most of you will know that I like to make lists.  And that I like to set myself goals for what I consider to be personal growth.  Personal growth will mean many things, to many people.  To me it simply means, did I learn something new, go somewhere different, or do something that I haven’t done before.  If the answer to any of these questions is yes, then, I have achieved some personal growth.  Even if the item is just to go to a restaurant I have always wanted to try, I like the sense of personal achievement when I get there.

No, I know that I don’t need an actual list to achieve this.  But for me, having a list allows me to keep focussed on what it was that I said to myself that I wanted to achieve at the start of each year.  It is my way of keeping myself accountable to, well, myself.  And, I just like the satisfaction I get from crossing it off my list.

Some of the items are recurring, and have been for many years.  The one item that is not actually on the list, but never leaves me, is the one where I tell myself this is the last year that I work in a corporate environment.  Over the years I have become the “accidental project manager”.  Without consciously choosing a career path, I have fallen into what I do now.  I think I do it well, but that doesn’t mean it fills my soul with joy.  Which has left the frustrated writer and traveller deep within me having to comply with the norms of working for large corporations.  How, and when I will ever escape isn’t known to me.  Yet.  Until that time, I will continue setting myself goals to make sure I am filling the rest of my life, and my soul, with things that make me happy.

Here is what I wrote at the start of 2017:

• Do a yoga class - result:  I didn’t get to do yoga, but did start doing reformer pilates, something I hadn’t even heard of at the start of the year.  Reformer pilates classes last for 1 hour, and isolate parts of your body in slow, controlled exercises.  Who knew it could be so effective?  So much so that I have already pre-purchased classes for the month of January.

• See lots of Italy - result:  I did see lots of Italy.  I wrote this knowing we would be going on holiday to Italy, and we took 3 weeks to travel the length and breadth of that beautiful country.  Along the way I brushed up on my rudimentary Italian, and tried quite a few Aperol Spritzs.  Whilst in Rome we were lucky enough to be able to eat at Aroma restaurant, which overlooks the Colosseum.  We had the perfect table, champagne (I am still scratching my head over the price), and fabulous food.

• Do a surf lesson - result:  I didn’t get around to this so it will be carried over to 2018.  What we did do was more stand up paddle boarding.  Even if most of mine was kneel down paddle boarding.  On a beautiful stretch of the coastline, in Rockingham, Western Australia, we hired a couple of boards and had a great hour paddling around.

• Drive from Perth to Broome - result:  Due to realising that driving north would result in us slowly cooking like xmas turkeys in the campervan, we changed our route and went south from Perth, which was a lot cooler in the evenings.  Along the way we discovered what I would confidently say are the best beaches in Australia.  I also found the best fish and chips in Australia, but that will be part of another blog.

• Visit Margaret River in Western Australia - result:  We did. This was included simply on the basis that we love tasting wine and visiting new wine regions.  Margaret River has a great reputation for it’s wine.  I can confirm that the wines are excellent.  And I tasted (drank) a lot so feel confident in my assertion.  Whilst in that part of the world we even got to another new wine region, the Swan Valley, just 30 minutes north of Perth.  I won’t tell you how much wine we bought as a result of all our wine tasting, but needless to say we have had to sell all our furniture to fit it in the apartment.

• Learn basic Italian - result:  I did, for the holiday.  And through the 3 weeks there, managed to pick up even more.

• One thing that wasn’t on my list, as I didn’t plan it myself, was a hot air balloon ride.  Something I have wanted to do for many years, since watching my Dad go off in one for his 60th birthday.  A recent Saturday morning saw us meeting up with Balloon Aloft in Mudgee, at 3.45am, for a sun rise flight, followed by a champagne breakfast.  All I can say is a big thank you, you know who you are.

I signed off the year another year older, and happy in the knowledge that I had managed to achieve most of what I set out to achieve, apart from the job.  That remains a work in progress.

Now onto the list for 2018.  What would be on yours?