The Zoo and Rottnest

Okay so I’m dwindling down to the last few days in Perth… This is the 29th and 30th. The 31st (New Years Eve) deserves it’s own post.

So here goes… The Zoo.

Louise and I had been talking about taking our girls to the Zoo after Camp Buma. Combined with the fact that my mum had been eating Mini Wheats all year to get the 2 for 1 entry to the zoo coupons off the back, I was not giving in on this idea, and so it was that Louise, Jacob, Sunny, Alexie, Bethanie, Lachlan, Jordan, Cameron, Miranda, Mama, Papa, Peter, Mayana and I set off to the Zoo on the 29th of December.

It was so much fun, especially watching the two little girls watch the animals, hearing Mayana refer to anything fury with 4 legs as either Jack or Cat, and generally just spending more time together. I have stacks of photos of this on my phone, because our stupid camera batteries had gone flat – but I don’t have time to recover them from there at the moment, so you’ll have to make do with ones I stole from my sister’s camera:

The Papas (Jake & Pete) and their girls watching elephants..

Definitely a favourite moment for me… watching the gorgeous lady elephant take a bath…

Some strange zoo attraction… oh no, wait, that’s just my brother and cousin… !

Sunny and Mayana riding a Galapagos Turtle.

Mayana wanting so badly to walk everywhere | Mayana falling asleep, exhausted from all her sight-seeing.

For more awesome pics of the day, check out my cousin Louise’s blog (and while you’re there, make sure you follow her… her blog is awesome and is about to get a whole lot more exciting!!!)

PART TWO: Rottnest Island

My mum is allergic to alcohol. As such, when the Margaret River leg of our trip was being planned, she mandated that if she has to be led around watching us taste wine at numerous wineries for 3 days, the she wanted to do a trip to Rottnest Island. And fair enough I say.

So it came to pass that on the second last day of our trip, my family, and another family of Buma’s, as well as another cousin headed out to Fremantle to catch the ferry to ‘Rotto’.

This part of our trip is disappointingly under-captured by me, as I suffered from a delightful bout of sea sickness, and ended up hanging over the back of the boat trying desperately to hold onto the contents of my stomach. Fortunately I won.

Upon arrival, we collected our bikes (cars are not allowed on Rottnest Island, and bikes are the main form of transport – much to the woe of my poor bottom), found somewhere that sold coffee and food, ate, and then the adventure began.

Cousin Miranda & Bethanie.

As it happened, after a short sojourn on our bikes, my mum and I discovered that the seats on our bicycles were not built for long distance – or maybe it was just the seats of our bottoms?? As such, we headed for a hire place, and got ourselves some snorkels for the day, and with a small entourage headed to a gorgeous beach for some chillax time. Mama all ready to hit the beach!

Mayana having a splash with my cousin Miranda

Man I’ve just realised how seriously lacking in photos I am of this day. My dad took some incredibly cute ones of Mayana in her bike seat on the back of Peter’s bike… I guess you’ll just have to keep an eye out for them, when I get access I’ll post them!

Later, we all met up again for lunch, then headed to another beach for more swimming. Before we knew it, it was 4pm and time to get back to the other side of the island to catch our ferries back to the mainland.

Papa had booked us on this crazy thing called the Eco something. The name has escaped me but the memory of the ride never will. It basically looked like an oversized blow-up dinghy. Mayana wasn’t allowed on (something their website had neglected to tell us when we booked), and thankfully my sister took her for me on another, safer, more stable boat. We should have been worried when they presented us with long, hooded, red rubber dresses to wear. We looked like a bunch of cheerios! We should have been even more worried when the skipper proceeded to don a pair of waterproof overalls AND a huge waterproof jacket. Hmmm. The skipper’s aim was to get us all as wet as possible, and get the boat airborne as many times as possible. I will be forever grateful that Peter chose to sit on the left hand side of the boat. My parents, my sister and her boyfriend were on the right hand side, and drenched doesn’t even being to describe how wet they got!

Even with their cheerio outfits done up so that only their eyes were peering out, water somehow made it inside their clothes, soaking bras, undies, socks, shoes… Poor dears were soaked through! I didn’t get wet, but still sea-sick. Blergh.

Once we were all safely back on the mainland, the decision was made to head to Hillary’s for dinner. Hillary’s is a boat harbour, kind of like an oversized Mooloolaba wharf – with little boutique shops and restaurants set on a boardwalk. It’s really lovely. We had a scrumptious (and massive) surf and turf meal, followed by delicious ice-creams at an ice-creamery further around the deck (mine was pavolva flavour, in case you were wondering). Again I have so many photos of this fun Hillary’s adventure, but they’re on someone else’s camera. Stay tuned.

It was around this time that we began to realise how much sun we had all gotten. Despite all of us repeatedly applying and reapplying suncream, we all somehow ended up looking like lobsters. Very uncomfortable, sunburned lobsters. Youch! The only one that didn’t get burnt was my aunty, and that’s because she was wearing long pants and a long sleeved top.

I had a killer sunglasses tan (oh so attractive), a strip across my back where my shirt had ridden up while I was riding my bike (worst place ever because your pants rub on it and it hurts sooo bad!), the backs of my legs, my arms, my hands, my knees…. I was pretty well red all over. We all were. This is why I’m not a beach person.

Anyway, despite the sun-burn, the bike-seat-bruised-buttocks and the severe soaking some of us got, we all felt very satisfied with our day, and were glad it was another thing we get to experience on our Big Trip.

Stay tuned for our New Years Eve story!!

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