Where to begin? It has been an exciting 24 hours since I was
last here. The rough seas with 18 to 20 foot swells that the captain had
predicted at noon yesterday finally rolled in between 10pm and midnight. By
3am, it was starting to get terrifying. I had to get up twice and knock myself
back out with Dramamine and then get in the center of the bed to keep from
being rolled out. We went to breakfast
downstairs at the GDR as it was still so rough. There we had fond memories of the
last time we left Fremantle in 2006 and Capt. Dag stopped about where we are
now and put the comedian off the ship in a small boat. We probably spent 2 hours
just sitting still near a freighter that exchanged gifts but would not accept
Kenny Smiles. The Indian Ocean that day was as warm and calm as a bathtub! What
a difference. I still haven’t heard what exactly is causing all the strong
winds and big swells. I know it is the tail end of monsoon season, but at this point
we should be too far south for that. I guess I could Google it if the ship’s
Internet could hold connection for more than 5 minutes. So, I don’t know what
is causing it.
Anyway, we were warned by last night’s Currents that we’d
not arrive before noon. This morning after breakfast, we were in the atrium
lobby area sitting around waiting to get back in our cabin. At about 9:45am
Julie the CD came over the loudspeakers with the announcement that due to
safety concerns about the sea and wind conditions that it had been decided
Sirena would overnight docked in Fremantle. We would spend all day here
tomorrow, Tuesday the 28th and sail away tomorrow evening. When she
next came over the speakers, she announced that we’d sail at 8pm on Tuesday and
Esperance, the next port, would be canceled.
So, some good news, some mixed news and maybe some bad news.
I only hope when we sail out of here tomorrow night that the seas have changed
dramatically! So, we had only loose plans here since we’d been before and we
weren’t impacted like some people have been. We had made no plans for
Esperance, so while we’re sorry to miss a new port, we aren’t really inconvenienced.
We definitely did not have enough planned here to last 2 days though. We got
back to the cabin and got on the Internet. Me through the ship and since only
one account is included. Clay had cell phone signal with the local sim/data
plan he bought for his phone. After some research and discussion, we had booked
things for tomorrow. We’ll take a train over to Perth early where we’ll take a
Segway tour, have some free time and take a Captain Cook Ferry boat back down
to Swan River to Fremantle. It won’t be a full day, but we didn’t know as we
were planning that all aboard tomorrow wouldn’t be until 7pm. We didn’t need to
spend all day out anyway.
We turned around after we got into the river/harbor area and
docked on the port side. We have a view of the fuel bunker boat and the container
ship docked across the channel. Oh well.
We stopped at the tourist info desk in front of reception to
pick up a better/different map of Fremantle than I had, a Perth map and instructions
to get to the train station. We walked first to the train station to get the lay
of the land for tomorrow morning. We would have gone ahead and bought tickets
but they were only good for the day of purchase. We’ll just have to go over
earlier to allow time to buy tickets in the morning. Trains run about every 15
to 30 minutes between Fremantle and Perth and tickets cost about $8 AUD pp each
way. The narrated one way scenic river cruise is $30. There is a ferry which
would be cheaper, but I figured the narration is worth something. I think the train
takes about a half hour and the scenic cruise takes about 1 and a half hours.
After we scouted the train layout, we headed back down river
and to the Western Australian Maritime Museum. We had heard great things about it
the last time we were here and missed it. It is such a striking building when
you sail in past it, that it was first on my to-do list. It was pretty much the
only thing on my to-do list here.
Though, a local woman we spoke to about some birds on the way back to the
ship sold us on the merits of Rottnest Island if we ever have another day here.
We did briefly consider it this morning, but I couldn’t face the thought of
leaving the river for the sea again and in a small boat, so I nixed it. She made
it sound like a great way to spend a day though. She was very disappointed that
it appeared no one from the ship was going over to Rottnest. I don’t know why.
Originally O had a ship’s tour to Rottnest Island, but it was canceled after we
boarded. I thought Destination Services might put it on in a slate of quickly
offered tours tomorrow, but they didn’t. When we got back to the ship we found
a single offering “Perth On Your Own”. It is a roundtrip bus trip departing at
9am and returning 8 hours later for $99 USD. I can’t imagine there’ll be much demand
for that when you can take local transportation for a fraction of the cost and return
sooner than a full 8 hours. Most of these people aren’t taking 8 hour tours.
So, we thought the Maritime Museum was good. They had a
temporary exhibit that we added to our admission. It was “Travellers &
Traders in the Indian Ocean World”. It was interesting and had great artifacts
on display. When we took the tour in Exmouth, the guide pointed out the caves
in the limestone ridge we drove up and she told us a shell necklace had been
found near there and it was one of the oldest manmade ornaments ever found.
Someone asked her where the necklace is now and she didn’t know. It is here! Clay thinks we paid about $25 each for both the
regular museum admission and the special exhibit. They also had an old
submarine outside you could tour but they only go so many times per day on
timed tickets and they were showing as all tours sold out. We did a submarine
tour in NYC and really didn’t like it as it is very close and we both got a bit
claustrophobic so it was just as well.
We walked around and checked things off a QR Code HeritageTour map I had printed from the Internet and that wasn’t as interesting as we
thought it would be. But, there are some great old buildings in downtown
Fremantle. Our original plan here had been to have lunch at Little CreaturesBrewery. We missed lunch onboard though I stopped for a frozen coffee and 2
caneles on my way out and counted that as my lunch. So, new plan we’d have a
late lunch/early dinner at Little Creatures and Clay could have a beer flight. That
worked out perfectly. We shared a wood-fired pizza and Clay got a taste of
every beer on tap today for a couple of dollars. That beat the $12 brewery
tour. I had a glass of local rose wine that was pretty good. Clay got a t-shirt
and bought 2 bottles of beer that he really liked to take back to the ship. We
walked to the closest free Blue Cat bus stop and rode back 2 stops to the train
station. Sirena is parked right behind it, though you can’t walk straight to it. Oh, on the way back we saw some parrot-looking birds eating grass. We had seen another parrot-looking bird up some kind of conifer earlier. The woman who worked at Rottnest Island, who I mentioned earlier told us these were galahs.
Our cabin hadn’t been serviced when we got back, so we
decided to drop off Clay’s pack and get jackets and go to the mall in front of the
train station. We’d seen a lot of people carrying wine back when we returned.
We needed jackets because we have finally gotten far enough south that we’ve
left the tropics. It was supposed to be a high of 72F today. It was beautiful
weather with bright sunshine but a cool wind all day so it was never
uncomfortable. But, as the sun set, that cool wind felt chilly. We’ll probably
have to take jackets when we set out early tomorrow too. So, we got to the mall
and found everything but Cole’s and its bottle shop closed. We also found a lot
of homeless and drunk or drugged people. It was quite a different part of town
than we’d seen all day in the historic waterfront area. We got my bottle of New
Zealand! wine and Clay got a cold Coke Zero and we hightailed it back to the safety
of the train station and cruise port area.
