The beginning of the end - Back to Perth

Perth

We returned to Perth and this time were finally reunited with our beloved Cool George caravan.  But at the same time a shadow was hanging over our family - David had to fly back to see his Dad whose illness was progressing steadily (for those following this blog - and over a great deal of time I should say - you may remember we returned to Cowra from Cairns to visit Davids' parents as his father was ill and it was his birthday).  Fortunately, my Mum and her partner had joined us in Perth and Margaret River and after David left, we parked our caravan for an extended stay at one of our best caravan parks ever, Karrinyup Waters Resort.  So this made for a happy group that stayed on in Perth and managed to take in the sights. Firstly those at our back door - did I mention how good our caravan park was?

Mmmm - this one’s too hot, this one’s too cold – this one’s just right.  There is a pool here for any taste.

And there was a billabong with resident cute babies. 

 

 

We explored then local sites of Perth starting with:

Kings Park - we loved Kings Park with its range of activities and flowers (which you can see on the previous blog page):

Swan River - We cruised the Swan river one fine afternoon and through to sunset.

 

Perth Dining – we had a lovely Chinese dinner on the side of the river one night

Fremantle – we met up with some old travelling friends from the Kimberly and had a lovely day in Fremantle visiting the maritime museum and eating fish and chips:

Its hard to believe these kids only met on this trip a handful of times– travelling brings people together quickly.

A visit to Fremantle isn’t complete without a trip through a sub – well maybe not all of us.  

 A couple of Mums might have opted for the coffee option instead.

And a final fish and chip dinner sitting on a Perth beach watching the sun set over the sea for the last time: 

Found some gorgeous looking young men hanging out on this beach.

My mum and her partner headed back to the east coast travelling in luxury on the Indian Pacific.  For us we hopped back in our 4WD with our caravan again in tow – although after David returned from Cowra we knew we had to return home.  We had originally planned another 2 months on the road – but family needed us so we were now homeward bound and heading east.

Paluma - Rock Slides and Paradise (lost?)

So we had more rain and more wind (but hey we're getting good at that).  The boys tried to watch an outdoor movie at the caravan park (most are too late but this was at a good time).  They sat huddled on their camping chairs under their blankets (the breeze was cool and strong) but even with their valiant efforts (it was Speedy Gonzales after all), they couldn’t make it.  They couldn’t hear the movie for the wind and were more than a tad chilly when they returned to the van.  The next day, because of the weather, we opted for a mostly driving vs walking day and headed for the township of Paluma.

The road is a narrow windy road which wends its way up through the rainforest – it reminded me very much of the road to Dorrigo National Park.  Part way up the road you come across the first of the crystal creeks – little crystal creek.  With no rain falling we jumped out of the car to explore and were glad we did. It was a beautiful area.  Firstly, the bridge over the creek which was constructed between 1930 and 1935 as part of the Unemployment Relief Scheme during the Great Depression. The bridge was constructed with concrete but faced with stone and has a Roman quality about it. At the point the creek flows under the bridge there are cascades and rock pools you can swim in (not the right day for it).  It was absolutely lovely and I can imagine on a hot summer day many people would want to escape the Townsville heat and come here.

We continued our journey up the mountain and arrived in the very small and very quaint village of Paluma.  We were greeted by this sign and were glad we didn’t break these rules as neither of us had a pound on us.

We stopped for a yummy afternoon tea – Mr L had a slice of apple pie almost the size of his face and finished it (impressive).  And then we explored some of the short rainforest walks in the village. 

 Gotta say I love a good fungi - I am really such a science nerd

 Really they are happy, they did enjoy the walks.  Please believe me.

We also explored the village (which was very small and didn’t take long).  There were a couple of cafes, some holiday rentals, and some local artists. In particular Mr L wanted to visit Paluma Pottery which we did.  The kiln was set up in the front garden (actually took up most of the front garden) with the show ‘shed’ down the back.  We liked many of the pieces we saw (especially some of the bigger ones which would have worked beautifully in our garden) but alas budget and carrying anything big in the caravan prevented us from buying anything but a small rememberance of this village in the clouds.

Not the pieces we wanted to but of course, but they did match the spirit of this village

Big Crystal Creek

The next day, the rain had eased so this time we had our swimmers on as we set of to investigate Big Crystal Creek and two cool sounding places, Paradise Waterhole and Rock Slides.  We drove past Paradise Waterhole and headed straight for the rock slides (at the insistence of our boys).  After a short walk from the carpark we arrived at a sensational stretch of the creek which cascaded and cascaded over magnificent rocks falling into crystal clear pools – eminently swimmable. We worked our way up the cascades and found the rock slides which the boys enjoyed as much as they had thought they would.  David and I less so because we kept having to haul them up from the bottom of one slide back to its top to slide all over again. The next day I remarked to David that I must have slept very strangely as I had such a sore right shoulder until he reminded me of this very activity which was of course done with the same arm and shoulder for so very many goes.

After our swim here we were really looking forward to Paradise Waterhole and had even brought our snorkel gear to check out the fresh water fish that apparently you can see here.  We leapt out of the car eager and keen and with every step towards Paradise it rained harder and harder.  If I had been there by myself I would have been in like Flynn (but my family knows that at sometime I probably had some dolphin genes inserted).  The rest of the clan were less than keen, actually they were keen only to get back in the car which we did.  So in summarising our trip in the future I can say we did amazing and super cool things – but we did miss out on Paradise.  Maybe we might have to add Crystal Creek into a future winter holiday in Townsville (mmmmmmmm?????).