Wanderung 33

Drive to Margaret River

Rather reluctantly, because we were very comfortably ensconced and there were still many things to see and do around Perth, we packed our bags and prepared for the drive South to Margaret River after breakfast (Australian: brekky). We took Freeway 2 southward from Perth, and since it was Sunday morning the traffic was light and I could concentrate on re-adjusting to driving on the left side of the roadway. I slowly got used to using the turn signal stalk on the right side of the steering wheel rather than on the left, although occasionally during the day I would still hit the windshield wipers rather than the turn signals, which just doesn't do anybody any good!

But the most curious thing to re-adjust, which I had totally forgotten about, was changing my visual scan pattern for situational awareness. In a left-hand drive car as in the USA and Europe, I sit on the left side of the car and have to scan from the central rear-view mirror (traffic behind) to straight ahead (traffic ahead) to the left side rear view mirror (traffic in the passing lane). That means my eyes shift from the upper right quadrant for the center rear view mirror, to straight ahead through the windshield, to the lower right quadrant to catch the left side rear view mirror.

To get the same traffic information in a right-hand drive car such as those used in Australia, I sit on the right side of the car and have to scan the central rear-view mirror in the upper left, then straight ahead through the windshield, and finally scan for the passing lane traffic in the lower right position where the right-side rear view mirror is located. So the scan is in diagonally the opposite position as for USA and European cars, and that takes a few scan cycles to re-train. Curious that I had forgotten about that shift, though, when advising Shannon about his upcoming drive in New Zealand.

But a solid 1/2 hour of driving put that all to rights, and I even found the cruise-control buttons on the steering wheel and could engage that for a bit when the traffic was really light. Soon it was time to get off the interstate and put those skills to use! We branched over toward the seashore at Mandurah and followed a more scenic roadway that ran between the estuary and the Indian Ocean seashore for many miles. We did not see either shoreline during that part of the drive, but when we took a `tourist route` to the town of Australind, we finally reached the seashore and could stop and take a picture.

We also had lunch in a chicken place, and serendipitously found an Aldi next door, so we went in and bought some whole-rain bread and Apfelschorle drink for me. The lady said that Aldi had another store in Perth and was opening one next Wednesday in Bunbury, so clearly Aldi is expanding in Western Australia also.

We continued to take the `tourist routes` whenever they appeared before us, and we were treated to some much more interesting roadways than the Freeway, although admittedly much slower roadways also. But I enjoyed seeing the tree canopies arching across the roadway, which just can't happen on a Freeway, and seeing the occasional house or farm more closely. The combination of sandy soil, odd dry-looking trees, and small houses reminded me of the highways in rural Florida for some reason, I think because that is where I have seen the same combination of factors.

Our next stop was in Busselton where they have a mile-long jetty out into the Indian Ocean that has a train line along its length and an underwater aquarium at its terminus point in the deeper water offshore. The reason such a long jetty was built is that the sea floor slopes very gradually downward from the beach front along Busselton`s shoreline. This makes swimming in the calm waters offshore very pleasant, and we saw youngsters swimming almost 1/2 mile out from shore, jumping from the jetty into the water just like it was a local swimming hole!

Our timing, however, was bad in that when we walked out to the end, an aquarium, the tour had already started! We would have had to wait almost an hour for the next tour and, worse yet, in order to see the aquarium we would also have had to also purchase train tickets to get back to the beach, and the delay for that ride back would put us back to well after 5 o`clock. I was NOT anxious to repeat my driving in the dark of night to reach our B&B that I had done a couple nights back when we arrived in Perth, so we put off the aquarium visit to another day and walked back to our car to proceed on our way to Margaret River.

As we approached Margaret River, the landscape became a bit more of a rolling landscape with small hills and dales, and we started to see really large vineyards. Some of those vineyards were much bigger than ones I had seen in Virginia or even on the Murray River in Australia, and I had to wonder what type of wines were being made in the area. Once in Margaret River, we took Willmott Avenue straight through the CBD to get to Riverview Tourist Park, where we had reserved a cabin for 3 nights.

The curious thing that happened after we had signed in and parked in our assigned space and were walking up to our cabin, was that we were greeted by two multi-colored lorikeets. I suspect that they were looking for a handout, but they appear to be rather intelligent birds, like some parrots that I have met, and I found myself introducing myself and Monika to these two, big, colorful, birds who were sitting only about 3 feet away and staring steadily at us. They even stayed long enough for me to get some portrait shots with my camera before apparently giving up on us and flying off, leaving me to wonder if they were really somebody's pets or alternatively some wild lorikeets who were smart enough to try to get handouts from the tourists. Don't assume that because birds have small brain sizes they are also dumb, because some birds like parrots clearly have some degree of intelligence. Look at the pictures of these lorikeets staring at us and see what you think!

Our cabin was a small ensuite efficiency appartment, almost exactly like the one we stayed at in Alaska during Wanderung 29. But this one was fully equipped including a gas stove and frying pan, and we put those items to good use to cook eggs over the next several days! Slightly tired from the drive, we rested a bit and then drove back downtown to Woolworths for some groceries, including eggs, and then had fried eggs on toast for dinner, and turned in for the night.