#rndtheworldn44 - Days 7 and 22-23 - Fremantle and Perth

On November 27, we flew from Auckland to Perth, and then caught a ride to the historic seashore resort town of Fremantle.  A friend of Katie's had recommended that we stay at a BnB here, and we weren't disappointed!

Fremantle is an old sailing port, and buildings in the historic section date back to the late 1800's.  In recent years, tourism has become the main industry (although Perth itself has a huge industrial and shipping harbor on the Swan River just upstream from its mouth at Fremantle).

The town commissioned a piece of public art that we found spectacular.  When you stand at the level of the entrance of The Roundhouse (an historic military building) and look up High Street, you see a series of yellow circles - all painted in tromp l'oeil fashion on the streets and sides of buildings facing The Roundhouse:

The entrance to the harbor is marked by two lighthouse - one green (below) on a jetty to the south, and one red on a jetty to the north:

The view of Fremantle's seafront, with its shops and restaurants, with Bathers Beach and Bathers Bay in the foreground, is quite pretty:

The night of our arrival, we walked down to the seafront for dinner.  Kathy had heard about the tasty local oysters and couldn't wait for her plate of raw oysters:

We only had one night in Fremantle before catching a flight on to Alice Springs for our Outback adventure, but it was an afternoon flight, and we had time in the morning to walk down to the dog beach directly down from our BnB.  The puppies were having a sporting time:

We walked some ways down the beach, and spotted two riders and horses getting their exercise in the water:

The BnB itself was cute, a cottage of Dutch architectural design, with a beautiful sun room, where we could take tea and breakfast:

After our Outback adventure and our drive back from Adelaide to Perth (more on those in the upcoming blog entries), we stayed again at the BnB for two nights, which gave us a whole day to visit the three museums and other historic sites in Fremantle.  We walked our feet off doing that.  The Maritime Museum was the most impressive, being built in a shape resembling the prow of a ship, and large enough to house many sizeable boats, including the famous sailing yacht Australia II which won the 1983 America's Cup.  Other boats in the museum were equally impressive, however:

Fremantle Prison, a World Heritage Site, had been used by England beginning in the 1850's to house convicts shipped to Australia, and was built by convict labor.  Some of the prisoners earned their freedom and went on to become productive citizens of Perth, and greater Australia.  The prison still stands and looks very imposing:

For our Outback adventure, we needed to leave our large duffel bag with the BnB owners while we traveled the Outback and the Southern Coast of Australia.  We could only take one large daypack each.  So the packing and unpacking this required during each stay in Fremantle was quite daunting:

On our last day in the Perth area, we decided to explore Perth's King's Park and Botanical Garden before heading on to the airport for our flight on to Bangkok and then to Yangon.  One of the highlights of the botanical garden is this DNA-styled observation tower that permits you to climb above the trees and get a 360-degree view of the Perth environs:

From our lofty perch, we could see across the Swan River to downtown Perth in the left background, and get an eagle's eye view of South Perth in the right midground in the photo below:

We didn't give ourselves much time in Perth, and we might have spent a few more days exploring all it has to offer - but we had to make choices, and the Outback was calling to us, so on we flew to Alice Springs.