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We spent most of the first day en route, arriving in port in late afternoon.  Freemantle is the port, located near the mouth of the Swan River, and Perth is farther upstream, but by now they are contiguous. 

Our resident guitarist for much of the trip, called ‘Minky G’ (see photo from yesterday), is from Fremantle and disembarking; some of the passengers went hear her and her band in Fremantle the first evening.  There was a performance of local Aboriginal dancers and musicians on board as well, but we went to bed early because–

Our excursion began at 5:45 am (! Not my favorite time of day…) and journeyed a couple of hours north along the coast to the Nambung National Park, home of interesting rock pinnacles.  Though they don’t rival those in the Utah national parks, they were interesting and it was fun to walk across a bit of desert.

The land near the coast is all sand underneath the vegetation with large, very white sand dunes along the sea—and sometimes, surprisingly, huge dunes of white sand a few miles inland. 

Lunch was, what is known locally as crayfish but exported live as Australian rock lobster, at the Lobster Shack, which is not only a restaurant but also a huge lobster fishery and processing plant.  We were given a tour, complete with video and audio commentary to accompany our movement through the plant, and shown a large live ‘crayfish’ by our hostess. 

Several fishing boats go out each morning at 3 am (and I thought 5:45 was early…) operated by the third generation of the man who founded the operation.  The lobster are sorted by size before being exported live by plane, mostly to Dubai, Japan, and China.  Interestingly, Dubai and Japan prefer the smallest size and thus pay a premium for those, while China prefers the largest size and pays a premium for them!  I’m always a little squeamish about new tastes and it doesn’t taste exactly like Maine lobster so I didn’t eat much of mine—something that was appreciated by one of our lecturers who accompanied the tour because apparently he ‘didn’t rate a lobster’, something I thought quite inexcusable, and ate mine gladly.

It was a good trip all in all, but when I heard from friends who had gone on a tour of  the Perth Mint and Bell Tower, I thought maybe I should have stayed closer to port (and slept in…)  At the Mint, they were, among other things, shown gold being smelted down and cast.  At the Bell Tower they were allowed to ring the large bells (I’ve forgotten what they are called, but those you ring by rope from a floor below because your ears couldn’t take the loudness if you were next to them.)

Upstream from Perth, the Swan Valley is a major (and wine producing) area—watch for Swan Valley wines. 

I found it interesting when two of our guides during our time in Australia mentioned that voting is compulsory in Australia.  If you don’t vote, you are assessed a fine.  The amount of the fine increases each subsequent election in which you fail to vote.

In the Albany post I included a photo of an ANZAC day tribute. ANZAC was the name for the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps fighting in the world wars, and April 25 was designated as ANZAC day to commemorate the soldiers in the Gallipoli campaign in World War I. Now it is to remember all who served in all wars, conflicts, or peacekeeping missions. People in both countries take it very seriously. The photo I included shows a display in the Albany cruise terminal and is covered with handwritten messages of remembrance.