We said good bye to Brett & Jo's Dairy farm. Our first stop was a short distance away, the Brusselton Jetty. Along the foreshore of the jetty area they have artistic bins, see pics. The Brusselton Jetty runs 1.8kms out from the shoreline, a Banana shape. We all walked to the end of the Jetty, at the end is a km marker indicating distances to specific logcations. We are 2723 kms from Melbourne, and yet still 1908 kms from Broome and only 227 kms from Perth! The boys fished unsuccessfully off the Jetty in a couple of spots, while I read my book.

Heading north, we pull off the freeway into Bunbury to have lunch on the beach. What a fantastic spot we stumbled on. There are dolphins swimming meters from the shore line. The boys (L & C) are so excited they strip to their jocks and go swimming with the Dolphins.

We spend the night at Owen & Jo's farm, another delightful stay. We are their first farm stay visitors and they offer us fantastic hospitality. Jo took us on a walking tour of their farm. They farm Dorper Sheep (they naturally lose their woolly fibre, however they have still sheered them, just not as regularly as other types of sheep they have had in the past). They sell the males off for their meat and raise the females for breading. They also sell peet, a naturally occurring, but not reoccurring substance that was in their dam. They dug it out, it sits around their dam, dry it and then on sell it. They call it black gold! It looks like super fine ash. They also have a few acres that they lease out to a market gardener, who is currently growing potatoes and pumpkin.

Onwards we move, this time spending the night at Gary's farm. We had such good experiences at the earlier farm stays and were really disappointed with this one, even Lach saying the next day he was uncomfortable. The location was great, 10 mins south of Freemantle, however the property is basically a house on a few acres with junk piles all over the place. A recent fire occurred on the neighbouring property (evidently a drug lab had been there in a camper trailer and some local Aboriginal set it on fire). I really questioned why we did not keep going. I was unable to sleep and woke Brad at 10pm and tried to convince him to move, but where would we go??? I eventually got some sleep and we woke up safely early the next morning and packed up. We are now staying in Karrinyup Water Resort, what a difference!!! We are in caravan suburbia, however there are plenty of kids for the boys play with and three pools to swim in.

Back tracking a bit… In between the rain, we spent yesterday afternoon exploring Freemantle. In many ways the waterfront reminded us of St Kilda, Station Pier & Melbourne Docs. We explored the old Whaling area, walking through the old tunnel where they used to store and sell the whale oil and bones. Close by, there were some terrace styled houses set up as artist studios and galleries, this gave the boys the opportunity to walk through the old houses, they were pretty much in original condition, with modern touches to the kitchens.

It's also taken us a bit of getting used to the highway/freeways over here. They have also set our hearts racing a few times. There are no onramps, we approach them (Brad driving and myself focused between Google maps and the actual streets) came racing up to stop signs. We then see we have to merge onto oncoming traffic at 110kms, thankfully we have the V8! It's only close into Perth where we actually see proper onramps like we are used to.

We have really enjoyed these last week or so, somewhat establishing ideas for the next time we can visit out this way… On the must stay longer list next time is Lucky Bay, Esperance, Denmark, the cape to cape region (i.e. Augusta, Hamelin Bay, Prevally & Yallingup), Busselton, Bunbury and Myalup.

Tomorrow the car is booked in for a service and we will explore Perth by public transport.