Awesome Australia

Perth

I have been to Australia twice in three years. It’s such a large country with something for everyone. I have travelled to Perth & the Margaret River, Hamilton Island, Darwin & Melbourne, and have had fantastic experiences in all locations.

We landed into Perth on a beautiful sunny afternoon and had a tour around the city, which is a modern, clean & vibrant place. We then had a wander around Kings Park, which has magnificent view of Perth and The Swan River. We then travelled down to the Margaret River where we spent our first night. Whilst we were here we helped ourselves to some of the fantastic food and wine on offer, being treated to a sumptuous smorgasbord of everything from chocolate to cheese to olive oil.

The landscape here is very different to home with the tall eucalyptus trees and bustling colourful bird life. From here we travelled down to Albany and Pemberton, on route we went to Mammoth cave and the Gloucester Tree towering above the landscape at over 180 foot tall! The tree is an old look out point to watch for fire, we were given the opportunity to climb the tree ourselves. Albany and Pemberton are very laid back towns with an incredibly welcoming homely feel.

This area has some wonderful places to visit, and I can tell you all about the places I managed to squeeze in!

Hamilton Island is one of the Whitsunday Islands, and about a 2-hour boat ride from the Barrier reef. I stayed at the Reef view hotel in the 15th floor, which with its high altitude offers up some amazing views. There are many different hotels and apartments catering for all budgets on the island. The best way to see the beauty of the islands is for a boat, or if your budget allows, a scenic flight. We went out to the reef in Fantasy - a large catamaran. When we arrived we saw some wonderful fish, corals and even a turtle. I can highly recommend a trip to Hamilton to recharge you batteries, as trips to Australia can be busy and this is a welcome break on a laid back island.

Hamilton

This year I have been to Melbourne a wonderful city of new and old. We stayed at the crown Metropole hotel and had breakfast in Gordon Ramsey’s restaurant, which was a great way to start our first day. We then went for a bike ride around the city, which is a fantastic way to see the sights. As with a lot of Australian cities, Melbourne is on a river, so we started by riding along the river see the football stadium and where the Australian tennis open are held. Sport has a massive part to play in Melbourne. Melbourne is such an arty city with most big designers living around the city, so the shopping is second to none.

From Melbourne we travelled to Wilson’s Promontory, which is the most southerly point for Australia’s mainland and has some spectacular views of rainforest and fern gullies. The following day we went to the koala sanctuary on Phillip Island and then in the evening we saw the little penguins make their nightly trip from the sea to feed their families, and what a sight it was to see 400 waddling up the beach. On our final day in Victoria we went to the old gold mining town of Walhalla, which was one of the richest in Australia. At its height the town had 3500 residents, but today the town has only 12. We stayed at the Walhalla star hotel, which is a very homely place. The owner, Michael gave us a tour of the town, the mine, and the spooky graveyard where he told us some fantastic stories from the towns history. Melbourne and the surrounding area have wonderful things to offer weather it’s your first time or whether you have been before.

Darwin is a fantastic little city. It has a very big aboriginal community, which make for a very authentic stay in Australia. We stayed in the Holiday Inn Darwin, which was a fantastic standard. While we were here we were lucky enough to go out to Kakadu National Park, which really put this area on the map when the film Crocodile Dundee was filmed here. We started the day seeing the Ubirr rock art site, which is some of the oldest in the region; we also did a wilderness walk. In the early evening we went on a billabong cruise where we saw some fantastic bird life and then some very scary crocodiles. Also during are stay we saw the sunset on the beach and walked around the wonderful Mildil sunset beach markets with it wide range of food most of which has a Asian feel rather than western. This is a fantastic region of Australia. One best visited it their winter.