Jonnymoon SW - Day 2 PM - The Gap

After the most beautiful beach in the world, we trekked back to Albany to have lunch, and then off to The Gap. The Gap is just a big gap in the rock cliffs. Because of the big storm the night before, the seas were very rough and the waves were absolutely pounding inside the gap. I got drenched just walking to the site. Salt + camera lens = Bad. One thing that is great (scary) about Western Australia is that there are no real safety precautions anywhere. There is a nice little recommended lookout for the Gap, but it is very easy to head for a new vantage point and find yourself walking off the cliff. We said that anyone going in The Gap would be going for their last swim. Also there was Natural Bridge.... It was alright.

Laura and JP at the Gap
Water flying up over the cliffs
Natural Bridge

Waves pounding on the rocks
The windshield when we got back to the car ... can you say salt?

After The Gap, we headed to the blowholes. The blowholes blew, literally. In 2 ways: First, a light whistling sound could be heard every minute or so, and secondly, it just wasn't very spectacular. Especially compared to The Gap. It didn't help that it was a kilometre walk to that site. The Gap wins this round.We then headed off to our next destination: Walpole.

Laura took over the driving. Before this trip, I thought Laura had never driven a manual car... She asked me not to comment on her driving.... :) I'm happy to be alive.

JP and I stopped at Matilda's Garden in Denmark to get a bottle of wine. Mmmmmm free wine sampling! Then we found a campground in Walpole.

Matilda's Vineyard

Camping Attitude

JP spots a rare woodchip and has to get a photo

A few visits from neat australian wildlife: Kookaburra's (more to come), blue wrens, bandicoots. One of the old ladies there got JP excited by telling us about a kangaroo that comes up ever morning with it's joey in the pouch to have brekkie. Let's just say, JP went to bed thinking it was Christmas Eve. Would he get to see this amazing moment......

MORE PHOTOS FROM THIS DAY: Click here

SW Jonnymoon - Part 1 - The Road to Albany

We have made it back to Perth from our Five Day adventure. For anyone interested in following our path, we went Perth to Albany to Denmark to Walpole to Pemberton to Augusta to Yallingup to Dunsborough to Busselton to Perth (1800km). Wow, say that one in a sentence. Anyhoo. As I took "heaps" of photos, I'm going to just slowly upload them along with stories (you'll have to wait mom!). I gotta have time to get my life back in order! Stupid ironing. Does anyone know any secrets on ironing the sleeves, i hate those things. Back to the photos. Part 1 can be found click here.

We headed off for the great Southwest coast of Western Australia on Wednesday. We were all smiles. JP got his first taste of driving on the wrong side of the road. Even with the coaching, he still put on the windshield wipers for his first turn. It gets us all. We did a last minute change of plans to the route. Due to unfavourable weather forecasts for Albany for the next 5 days, we decided to head to Albany first and hope for the good weather at the end of the trip.

Well, we certainly got some heavy rains. It's funny driving through these areas that have no green vegetation. Everything looks dead, yet it's pouring rain! Did we pick bad day or what?
After making it to Albany, we found out that they still have dinosaurs. Not only do they have these prehistoric creatures, but they are known to cross the street in certain areas. Thanks for letting us know Albany!

It was a bit chilly in Albany, but that didn't stop me from heading into the water on the first night. In actual fact, the water was warmer than outside, and I wouldn't get out as it was too nice just standing. I'm flashing 3 fingers to mark my 3rd Ocean i've been in: Pacific, Indian, Southern. Next up: Atlantic.... I'm not so sure on the Arctic.

We decided to make a wise choice and spend a little extra the first night for a cabin 80 metres from the beach. It was more than camping, but the heavy rains turned into heavier rains with thunder and lightning. Money well spent. For more photos from day 1 click here.

Back to work tomorrow .... Boooooooooooooo

Daylight Savings. You Fall Back, but I....

Spring Forward!!!!! Wahoo! I can't wait for Daylight Savings. I am aware of the fact that I already "sprang" forward in March in Canada, and now I'm springing forward again, thus losing 2 hours of my life. If I end up back home before March. Then I'll lose ANOTHER hour. However, the extra hour of sunlight in Perth is going to be life-altering. No longer will I come home from work, and have about 30-45 minutes of daylight left. It's going to be almost 2 hours of sunlight (for now). This means I will be able to bike down to the beach, and go for an evening swim. Or catch in a quick nine holes. Or take a leisurly strole to the grocery store to ..... wait, no, grocery stores close at 6pm.

Perth, and WA (Western Australia), is a little behind on the times. This is actually just the 2nd year they have ever tried Daylight Savings. It's the second year of a 3 year trial, at which point, Daylight Savings will go to a referendum. The previous 4 votes have all been unanimous in "NO".

I decided to read a few comments on a "Your Say" page on http://www.thewest.com.au/ . Here are some of the reasons Perthites give for being anti-daylight savings:

• The roads will get busier in the morning as people won't want to drive in the dark (remember that the sun will still rise at 6am).
• Kids will stay home and watch tv and eat junk food after school because it will be too hot (right, there is a big difference between the temperature at 3pm and 4pm)
• Kids won't know when to go to bed (never remember this being a problem back home)
• It will cause Perth to have 30 minutes longer daylight than the east coast (not sure who came up with that one)
• People will have to walk their dogs and exercise in the dark at 5am .... (what do these people do in the winter????? not only is it dark then, but it's cold)
• Criminals will prosper as everyone will be at the beach at night
• Too difficult to change all those damn clocks
• The curtains will fade due to the increased sunlight (my personal fav)

Perthites have come up with several suggestions. People might understand Daylight Savings better if its name changed:

• Clock Changing Day
• Daylight Transference .... because we aren't really saving daylight.
• Daylight Robbery ... since they have stolen our "cool" mornings

My absolute favourite though is one person suggested "why don't business just change their hours of work for 1 hour earlier. That way only the people working will be affected". Oh my, that wouldn't be confusing.

Well I can't wait for it to kick in. The only issue I have is that I'm flying to Meekatharra again on Monday for a 7am flight, which means it's technically at 6am, which means Jonny is going to be getting up very very early.

Golfing in Perth

Yup, that's a stick for a pin .... had never seen that before

I hit up a church garage sale on Saturday, and picked some cheap golf clubs. Cheap being 5 clubs for $15 bucks. One of them happened to be a very nice Cleveland wedge, that because it looked rusty, was offered at a shockingly low price of $3. Some of the clubs looked as old as my grandpa's. They had wooden shafts. Let's just say, they weren't big sellers.

I then biked to my local golf club. Biking with golf clubs is not easy on a road bike. The course was in awful condition. The greens were as harry as. There was one hole where the pin was actually just a stick. But it was fun to hit the links. The highlight of the day was holing out a shot from 50 yards. The low light, was realizing that absolutely no one else witnessed it, and it's very awkward High-5ing yourself. Photos click here.

I'm taking the day off work tomorrow and am going to bike north along the coast to Hillarys to visit AQWA (the aquarium of western australia). It should be a fun trip. I just hope that Jacques can make [Jacques is the name of my bike].