23 July 2014

This morning it was bye to Perth and off for a drive down south to Bunbury and Busselton, though first of all I drove up to Kings Park so I could have a bit of a look around and still have a bit of an escape if it started raining yet again. It is a huge park and Botanical garden and it is in such a great location for views right over the city. It was actually not too bad and it managed to hold off with the rain, only a slight drizzle was all that it managed. So I wandered around and took a few pictures and then decided that I should probably have breakfast at the Botanical cafe, and if anyone is going there I can very much recommend the "Homemade “baked beans”; pulled beef brisket, fried egg & cumin salt", it was very good.

The it was off down the highway to Bunbury, which isn't really all that far considering the distances already covered, but it was certainly great having the new clutch, though it took some time to remember that I didn't have to back off when going up a hill, it actually keep going without slipping. Bunbury looks like a nice well looked after place and is a reasonable sized town, though yet again it looks like lots of money has been spent on it in very recent years. Everything was looking good, sunshine and I had managed to locate the visitor's centre with little problem, I parked up walked in and 10 minutes later it started a light drizzle, so up went the umbrella and off I went walking around the town, down to the beach and lighthouse and lookout tower, all very close and at the most about an hour slow walking and taking pictures. From the lookout you can basically see most of the town and to say that it is a place that embraces urban renewal, there isn't much of any old buildings left in town and most of the housing around it is relatively new housing estate type buildings, basically it looks like a manufactured town because of it. Walking back along the main street from the lookout it is amazing to see just how many shops are actually hair salons and eateries and there is no one in any of them. how do they stay open I wonder. Mind I did notice that the local Hogs Breath hasn't managed to make a go of it so it can't be too good, because those things never seem to close.

So as I had seen everything I was going to see walking around the town and as it had really started chucking it down again I decided it was time to move along and headed out for Busselton and actually by the time I got there it had stopped raining again which was great as I'd found the jetty and I thought I may as well go for a stroll along it at only 1.8 kilometres each way, sure a long jetty, though unfortunately the underwater observatory at the end of it was closed and probably will be for some time as the weather has churned up the seabed and as such the visibility down there is almost non-existant. First it was a visit to the visitors centre, which is really a glorified advertising centre and art sales venue, they have a tower that gives a bit of a view over the area though so it was up there and then over to the jetty for a walk.

Tomorrow I am off to check out the Cape Naturaliste and the Margaret River region...