Cain Manor

28 November 2010, Perth, Western Australia.

We’ve booked a tour to take us to Wave Rock. It’s a long day – leaving at 8 AM and returning at approximately 8:30 PM. The Great Ocean Road tour we did was equally as long, so we didn’t think too much of it. We were picked up early – 7:20 AM, and taken to the general starting area for all the tours that Pinnacle Tours has. Talking to our bus driver, we found out we’d be on the road for 750KM or 466 Miles today. Yikes!
Continue reading ‘From Perth to Wave Rock and back again’ »

We were walking along Hay street yesterday (the 26th), when we saw a bike shop advertising bike rentals. We popped in and briefly spoke with a lovely gentleman about our desire to bike to the Indian Ocean. He said it was a leisurely 2 hour ride, and we figured we could do it in 90 minutes. We were wrong.
Continue reading ‘Bike ride from Perth to Fremantle’ »

We flew into Perth somewhat early in the day – around noon. On the way into town, we were stopped by a temporary blockade. While waiting, there was a Formula race car that went down the streets that were closed off from stopping us. Oddly enough, we never saw any other evidence of Formula cars, or races, or anything else. There were quite a few photographers for the cars short journey, so they knew something about it. Our hotel was on Hay Street, which was the main shopping stretch in Perth. After checking in, we walked down a side alley and found a sushi restaurant where we ate a small lunch. We then walked along the Swan river, found a place that rented bikes (see Biking to Fremantle) and took a short visit to the Perth Mint (but didn’t pay $12 to go in.) We then bought some booze, had an early dinner (5:30 – too late for old people special, but too early for any attractive people), and turned in kinda early.

Melbourne was a short flight from Sydney. We had transportation to our hotel, and arrived early in the evening. Our hotel was quite nice and quiet, which was a change from Sydney’s noisy street. We walked to a restaurant called Rare Steakhouse, which I’d guess to serve steak. It was a very nice place, but service was a bit odd, especially given this was a moderate to expensive place. Our waiter was French, and didn’t speak great english. When I asked what vodka they had, it started a minor dust up from the waitstaff. First he looked confused, then he walked back to the bar, started looking around, then someone else came over, they talked a bit, and kept looking back at our table. When he came back without much of an answer, I just said “water, thanks”, which only caused him to look more confused, but then we were able to order. Eventually another woman came over and told us our waiter was new, and in training, and apologized for the trouble. When I asked her what vodka they had, she knew, and I ordered something on the rocks. She ended up being our waitress for the rest of the night, with the french guy bringing us the occasional water or bread.
Continue reading ‘Melbourne’ »

As our time in Melbourne was limited, we tried to find a few of the highlights to do. We’d talked about renting a car and driving this Great Ocean Road, or maybe driving from Melbourne to Adelaide, but that seemed too risky. We’d had some issues with flying by the seat of our pants, and figured more plans were better than fewer.
Continue reading ‘Along the Great Ocean Road’ »