Installment 6 Freemantle - Northampton - Perth

My friend Emu Bitter

We received news that Neil (Hamburger) and Wayne (Wayno) my HP colleagues where in Perth on Monday night on some kind of junket, so we decided to stay and see if we could swap entertaining beard stories for a feed.
Getting to Perth was a piece of cake from Fremantle, but I decided to leave the mobile on the temporary connecting bus, notice it was missing at the first stop on the train, run back the 3Km to try and catch the bus before it left, made it just as it pulled away, translated my mistake through a fence that inexplicably blocked my access, had the bus searched (to no avail), rang the number (sadly the phone was set to vibrate), the bus left and a conductor gave me a number to call, his radio told home the phone was found, the bus was stopped about 200m’s away, and a chap ran back with the phone saying that he had seen it poking out the lady in front’s ass. Phone returned, and it was nicely warm to the touch. So, I got back on the train to go back to the first stop, no sign of Siobhan and realised it was not the correct stop, waited to next stop and realised the first stop was the one, ran back 3 Km to this stop, sat on platform confused, and then another train turned up with Siobhan on it, so off we went having only really wasted about 1 and a half hours.
Anyway, it turns out Burger and Wayno were having no better luck and had been stuck in Melbourne airport by fog, something of a rarity, and so we were far from late, and spent an entertaining evening despite duck being off the menu.

Next up – time to get down on the farm with Jo’s sister Donna and her husband Todd (and Daughters) So we headed up North via the Pinnacles and some other stops and camped by Coronation beach.
This one was slightly more popular than others we have visited and the old boy in his mad max style motor home and trailer next to us, actually had a satellite receiver propped up with bricks. I wanted to ask him about it, but he beat me to it in the morning as I set off for a quick run up the beach I was passed by said gipper heading in the direction of the toilets.
“Morning”
“G’day mate, can’t hold it in forever aye?”
On returning from my run and swim he enlightened me to my madness, and then as Siobhan stuck her head out of the tent, which admittedly is front opening and triangular and as such could me construed as a canine abode;
“She don’t bark, do she?”
Unfortunately his generator was stuffed, and after checking that:
“You’re not a certified Nissan generator engineer are ya?”
He packed up and moved to another site, because his back up generator was unsociably loud.
6 Years they have been on the run / move.

Next up was time to get down on the farm. Jo (Malane’s) sister Donna and her husband Todd and family have a farm about an hour and a half north of Geraldton. We got up there and spent a really nice time being shown around the farm and were fed a roast from a freshly killed lamb, which after our fairly limited menu (chilli > curry > steak > chilli etc) was manna from heaven. Fascinated by the goings on of the farm, it’s certainly a world away. Unfortunately the all important rains had not yet come, and were close to being the latest rain they had ever known. They looked like being at least 2 weeks away. Up until the realisation of the absolute dependence of things like the weather I was thinking that it really looked like the life for me (It’s in the blood – but I suspect farming in Wales has more rain (good) but is also cold wet etc, etc, etc) so methinks I’ll stick to bits and bytes.

Coincidently their farm bordered the hatstand ‘Prince Leopold’ lording over his divine kingdom – The Hutt River Province. Due to a constitutional loop hole, Prince Leopold decided to make his farm an independent country. Basically the Australian government tried to break him, and after he was almost bankrupted the government conceded that he was harmless and let him become independent. This done, he was free to create his own set of laws, and instead of setting up a casino, or any other money spinning ventures he built a post office and a church, the church being adorned with paintings in which the Prince and his family are depicted in a number of biblical scenes.
One Friday afternoon, perhaps after a can or 2 of Emu Bitter, he phoned up the ministry of Defence and declared war on Australia. Perhaps due to lack of resources against the might of the RAAF he wisely withdrew the declaration on the Monday. Presumably he is now an ally and I must check to see if he is considered a member of the coalition of the willing, and hence and Al Queda target.
Anyway we did the done thing and sent a postcard, bought a T-shirt and sat in the ceremonial throne.

We headed up the coast a bit and dropped in to the Kalbarri national park to do the Loop walk. I think both of us were a bit surprised how nice this was, basically a gorge walk following the river in a loop. We met our first feral goats and had a bit of a swim, all terribly pleasant.

At this point we did a bit of a U turn and headed back to Perth. A few reasons – Melissa was coming over from Melbourne for the weekend to see a mate, and we needed a TV for the world cup. We pretty much knocked over the drive in a day and cruised into Perth for early Friday evening. We checked into a backpackers and headed into town to meet Mel and her mate Jamie. I think we were a bit behind them in the drinking stakes and in Jamie’s own words he doesn’t get out as much as he’d like to and hence led the charge. By the time we met them Jamie was running around using a Kenny Everett gag that he’d seen on DVD the night before.
This involved running up to a woman, normally in mid conversation, and yelling in their ear;
“Do you like cocktails?”
“Sorry?”
“DO YOU LIKE COCKTAILS?”
“er, yes…”
“WELL, I’ve got one for you.”
By the time we’d got to the, (we are after all technically backpackers now) the elephant and wheel barrow, he had acquired a group of 3 women who had the uncanny knack of appearing 10 years older for every step nearer you got, and close up resembled salamis.
Anyway we watched some of Germany Vs Costa Rica and called it a night.
The following day we met up with Mel and Jamie at the casino for the Richmond Kangaroos game. I enjoyed recounting the nights events to Jamie‘s horror. Goodness it was a refreshing change as you well know, as normally it’s me running around like a headless chook
Richmond won and all we had to do was stay conscious for a further 6 hours in the pub and then we could watch the England Paraguay game. Despite listing badly we managed to stay up right, and I even managed to get through to Prys in the stands.
You can ask Siobhan what happened the next day, use “ceramic mug” as a reference.
Any way we managed to get out on Monday and drove to Denham near Monkey Mia, getting in about 8.00. Anyone would think the campsite hadn’t received visitors after 4 pm the way they kept referring to the lateness of the hour.
This is what we then discovered:

1. It is Australia V Japan, the first game Australia have played in the world cup for 32 years.
2. No pubs in Denham are open beyond 9.30 tonight.
3. The game starts at 9.00
4. Our portable television (purchased for just such occasions) does not pick up SBS in this spot.
5. The radio is only giving out the score every 30 minutes after the news.

So we sat and wondered what happened when at around midnight several caravans started making a lot of noise.
Turns out Australia once again prove their sporting prowess and genuine desire to win against all odds etc.
Come on England!
Oh and I eventually got too upset with my beard, and so off it came, but not before I shaved it into a religious Belgian for Bruce.