Western Australia – Part I

Touching down at the Perth airport on a cold winter day after a 5-hour red eye flight was surprisingly refreshing. The airport itself definitely did not make it into my list of “top twenty glitzy airport I’ve seen” but the warmth and friendliness of the custom officers give the old airport a new lease of life. We decided to hail a taxi instead of hopping into a shuttle bus after getting some travel tips from our bubbly custom officer.


It must have been a very lucky day for us. I have never been able to check-in into a hotel at 7.25am but the folks at City Waters were extremely nice. Well, technically it is a motel and I was skeptical and hesitated for a while before making my booking for 7 nights after reading some negative reviews. I took my chances anyway and it was all worth it. For A$125 per night, we got a large room that sleeps 3 pax and a kitchenette that has more utensils than my home kitchen and to top the perks, it is overlooking the beautiful Swan River.

City Waters Motel, Perth, Western Australia. Very friendly reception, old building but spacious room.
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View from opposite the City Waters Motel, Perth, Western Australia, overlooking the Swan River.
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As we stood by the sidewalk waiting for a net friend of mine that I have never met before, a jogger passed by and stopped. He introduced himself as Rex and started chatting to us and I did my standard line of “oh we are from Singapore…yadda, yadda, yadda”. Yes, I do have a standard operating procedure permanently edged in my mind and specially catered for such touristy encounters. At some juncture, Rex’s neighbour, a young chap, probably in his 20’s, joined in the conversation but the topic of discussion shifted to “material possessions and afterlife”. I was beginning to wonder if Perth has some kind of hocus pocus that makes the people so friendly.


A red car stopped and out came my net friend Elton. Lo and behold, if looks could kill, I would not have been able to write this! The rest of the day was spent in Fremantle, fondly known to the locals as Freo. With its rich history in maritime activities, it is not surprising to find museums and galleries displaying maritime related artifacts. I have never been much of a museum person but the Shipwreck Gallery is worth a visit. Aside from the old coins and ceramic artifacts excavated in the 1970s from the deep sea, the major attraction, at least to me, was the reconstruction of part of the Batavia ship. Be prepared for a creepy treat – a skeletal remains of one of the people murdered on the Abrolhos Island is also on display.

Panorama seaview of Fremantle from the Round House. Print available for sale as limited edition. Click here to purchase.

Anyone who fancy getting into a submarine for real should definitely visit the Maritime Museum which houses the HMAS Ovens, an authentic Cold War era vessel. Some physical climbing is required to get into this humongous sub so be pre-warned! The darling of Australia, the Australia II yacht that snatched the America’s Cup from the USA in 1983, is also on display in this museum as one of the main attractions.


Solution for a rumbling tummy? Fish and chips of course! The choice was either Cicerello’s or Kailis’ and for all I heard, I had to pick the former and Elton went “Are you sure?” and I confidently said “Yeah!”. The verdict – always take the hint from the locals! For one moment, I thought Elton was pulling my leg when he said to eat the fish and chips with bare hands until I looked around me, indeed he was not joking. The fried fish was piping hot for Pete’s sake! Not to mention I had to pay for the lemon slices and tartar sauce (technically, Elton bought it from the counter while I wondered where they put the lemon and tartar sauce). Well, that did not happen in Brisbane or Melbourne so it was pretty much a culture shock, not to mention a total embarrassment! 



Best thing to do after lunch was a casual stroll along the seaside with a clear blue sky, soft white sands and refreshing breeze, overlooking the Indian Ocean and at some point, we reached the Whaler’s Tunnel built in 1837 just below the Round House, a gaol that was built by the convicts in 1831 with a grand total of 8 cells. I would say nothing much of an interest to me here except to understand the history of the early settlement in Freo.

Stroll along the soft sandy beach while the gentle breeze caresses your skin in Fremantle. Just around the corner is the Round House.
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The Round House, an old gaol that houses convicts in 1831. 
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Be sure to check out the Freo market and stock up the food supply as eating out could be quite costly. Mom was so engrossed with the “much larger than Asian’s” fruits and vegetables that I swear we could have loaded 10-15 kgs into Elton’s car! Coincidently, I bumped into my fellow countrymen, a Singaporean couple who migrated to Perth more than 20 years ago, running a shop in Freo market selling souvenirs and we had a little chat on migrating to Australia and came to the conclusion that the best way for me is to marry an Australian. I knew I should have majored in accounting or medicine back then.

Day two was booze day! Started off with a cruise along the famous Swan River on the Captain Cook Cruise where coffee and muffin was served as breakfast. When everyone is wide-awake, wine tasting started with a platter of cheese and cracker and pickles to go with the glasses of red and white wine. If you get lucky, you will be selected to model the wine and strut down the aisle and no, you do not get to keep the bottle of wine after your catwalk.

Cruise along the beautiful Swan River on Captain Cook Cruise.
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At some point, we got off the ferry and boarded a mini bus that chauffeured us to boutique vineyards. For the next six hours or so, we hopped around four vineyards, one beer factory and one chocolate factory. Wines were a little pricey at these vineyards except for Windy Creek Estate where I bought two bottles at A$10 per bottle.  Of course, price is just one of the determining factor but I do like its light bodied fruity taste.

Lancaster Vineyard - a boutique wine producer. Naturally, pricing of wine is slightly on the high side.
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Windy Creek Vineyard in the Swan Valley region. They have more range of light bodied, fruity taste wines that I've got accustomed to and they are priced very competitively.
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Lunch was at one of the boutique vineyards and by this time, I was very tipsy that I could hardly remember much. There was a Japanese guy who claimed to be the employee only, greeted us, gave us a little prep talk and suddenly asked me to read the kanji embroidery on his sleeve. The whole tour group of about 20 people stared at me, waiting for an answer. Feeling embarrassed, I answered him that I could not read kanji and this was when mom happily chipped in with her brilliant answer. So we had lunch at a vineyard whose name translated to English to be “turtle’s dream”.

Beer and chocolate is not really my favourites so I was not jumping in joy during this field trip but I would if I could witness the making of beer or chocolate. Unfortunately, only sampling of the final products was all I got. Obviously, the beer was too bitter for me and the chocolate was a tad too sweet.

Although most of the tourist attractions are located out of the Perth CBD area, there are a few places that ought to be given some credits.  I am always fascinated by the architecture of places of worship, especially churches and cathedral. The St Mary cathedral, although not entirely breathtaking, is still a worth spending some time exploring. Nothing beats the excitement of having a picnic at the Queens Park in the winter (not as huge as Kings Park but still with decent greenery and mandarin ducks swimming in a lake reflecting the blue sky above it). Less effort was used to chew my sandwich since my teeth were chattering naturally and I was jumping around to generate body heat – an effective way to burn calories while consuming calories.

The St Mary cathedral located in the CBD of Perth.
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In the event of having some extra time in hand and wondering what else to do in Perth, the Parliament House is a good way to kill time. By now, this would be my third visit to an Australian Parliament House so the enthusiasm sort of died a little but it was a joy killer for barring photography in the building (again, this was not the case for the Parliament House in Queensland and Victoria).  If there is spare cash on top of the time, Perth Mint may be the place to go to. The only two things that managed to raise my eyebrows were the gold pour where pure gold was heated to molten temperatures and transformed into a solid gold bar and a weighing machine that I got on it to calculate my worth if I were a piece of gold. I am worth a whooping A$1.7 million! Now, talk about being expensive.

Western Australia - Part 2: Follow me to the eerie Pinnacles, sand boarding in Lancelin, up close with quokkas in Rottness Island, enter the marine world at UWA and sheep sheering in Caversham Wildlife Park.

This article and the photos are copyright materials and may not be reprinted or reproduced in any part or any form of media without the writer’s prior consent. Views expressed herein are based on personal accounts of the writer and should be taken as a reference only. The writer could be contacted at jen@lamjennifer.com

Published in SCENE Magazine, Issue 5, Singapore.