22 February 2009. Fremantle Village Campsite.

Well - we are back where we started off in the Ox but a lot has happened since then!

So, we left Bunbury for Freo and drove through Mandurah and Rockingham on the way. Mandurah was really beautiful. We stopped and bought some fruit here and sat out on the river which was lovely. The houses there were stunning. A lot of money here I feel. Didn't do much at Rockingham- just had a walk down the beach which was nice.

We arrived back at Fremantle village in the ox and we were so shocked that he got us all back in one piece. We had such a brilliant time on our south west road trip but we decided it was safer and better for us to sell him here and look for people going north to Darwin in a camper. We would so love to take Ox but the distances when you get up north between towns are huge and, if he broke down, we wouldn't have a clue what to do! Also we thought it would be fun for us to meet some new people and travel with them. Towards the end of the roadtrip we were feeling slightly cramped and needed to spread out a bit. We have been sharing that smaller-than-single air bed for over three weeks and were getting a bit agitated because we could hardly sit up straight in there!

Anyway, so our first night back at Fremantle village we treated ourselves to some $1 noodles and bought a box of goon. Within a couple of hours we had made some new friends and were playing cards with them! There is Rich who is from Edinburgh and Matt at Travis, aka Bill and Ted. They are Canadian and are just like Bill & Ted - all 'Yeah dude' and 'excellent' and bogus'. Ha - really funny!

Anyway Sar and I just happen to be writing our advert to sell Oxy and they mentioned they wanted to buy a cool car. Well - Ox is the coolest by far and, after showing him off and letting them try out the airbed, they were hooked! We were going to advertise him for $950 and hoped to get $900 but for the ease of selling him that quickly (and the spaghetti bolognaise and BBQ Travis cooked us for free!) we let them have him for $850. We were still happy with this as we bought him for $600 but spent another $700 on the service and work but he is a very old car! And the passenger doors don't work and the timing belt could snap at any minute but of course we didn't mention that!

We (me, Sar, Trav and Rich) went to watch the sunset at city beach one night which was nice and the night of selling the Ox (our last night sleeping in him) we were very sad so we had a bit of a party on the camp site and played loads of drinking games which was really good fun but ruined the next day! So - as bill and Ted have a tent but now they have the Ox which they are going to sleep in for free - they are lending us their tent to stay here in Fremantle village for $26 per night between us! So much cheaper than a hostel which would cost us $50-60 per night between us so its worked out very well. We miss the Ox so much though. He was the coolest car I've ever owned. I'll miss the weird looks we got in him.

Oh yes - we did manage to get another free night in Ox before we sold him! We parked him on south beach where we sometimes see other campers parked - and blew the bed up and put up the curtains etc, then walked back up to Fremantle Village to have a free dinner cooked by Trav! We walked back down to the car at about 12.30 and got in him to sleep. It was a little scary as we kept imagining the drunken abos doming to try to steal the car or mug us but we woke in the morning fine, thinking we'd got away with it. We went straight into the beautifully calm sea and had an early morning swim. Oh it was so nice! I wish every day could start like that! When we got back to Ox, we noticed a ticket which must have been put under the windscreen wiper earlier saying it is illegal to camp on south beach - camping includes sleeping in your care and if you do it again you will be charged $100! But at least we got one night free! Ha!

We looked on gumtree.com also for travel partners and ride shares and saw a message from an Italian guy called Manuel! We texted him and he is back in Perth on Thurs and we are going to meet him to discuss plans He is looking to ravel up to Darwin in his camper and has space for three more so that looks promising but he may be a weirdo so we are going to have another look today. So you are all up to date now. We are off out to some live music bar with Trav and Matt later so that should be good.
Emsx