I’d scheduled a half-day tour of Fremantle and a Swan River cruise for Friday April 19th, so I did short walks and rested my knee for two days after my day on Rottnest Island. I got up early on Friday, had breakfast, then left the hotel around  7 am to meet the bus at the pick up point. The bus was already there and waiting when I arrived so we left the pickup point early and drove around downtown, picking up a number of other folks with tours booked for the day. The driver, Bill, drove us over to the Crown Casino near Perth Stadium where most of the people left the bus to pick up buses for different tours; there were only five of us for the Morning Perth and Fremantle City half day tour. We passed through the Perth central business district – the CBD – and got a history lesson from Bill about the first Australian Mint building, Perth Town Hall (built by convicts), the Barracks Arch and the settlement of Perth. Although the area had been found by the Dutch in the late 1600s, the Swan River Colony was not founded until around 1829. All the Europeans who saw the area between 1697 and 1829 thought that the land was too swampy for settlement and were content not to disturb the Noongar people who had occupied the area for at least 48,000 years. I had this notion that much of Australia was settled by convicts, but the Swan River Colony, which became Perth, was one of several free settlements in Australia which began without convict labor. The colony was initially was founded and built by free settlers in 1829; they did not have convicts for labor until around 1850 when convicts were sent there to ease a farming and labor shortage.

Bill kept up the historical commentary as we drove through Perth. It struck me that the founding of the United States and the settlement of Australia were occurring at about the same time. British colonization of Australia began in 1788 with the establishment of the penal colony of New South Wales and the American Revolutionary war ended in 1783. The tour stopped for a good while at King’s Park which is one of the world’s largest inner-city parks. The park is bigger than Central Park in NYC, full of indigenous plants, walking and biking trails; it also had a very fine cafe with pastries – I needed the caffeine and corn muffin.

After the park, we headed down the north road to Fremantle, the port at the mouth of the Swan River on the Indian Ocean. Fremantle was founded as a sea port for Western Australia and became Australia’s primary destination for convicts in the 1850s. After the transportation of convicts to Australia ended in 1868, the port became the gateway to the Australian gold rush at Coolgardie and Kalgoorlie. We passed by statue of Perth native Bon Scott of AC/DC fame and a statue of C.Y. O’Connor who directed the construction of Fremantle Harbour and the Goldfields Pipeline. Finally we parked by the Fremantle Prison – an UNESCO World Heritage Site, built by convicts for convicts. I walked to the Fremantle Market and saw several other historic buildings, including the Sail & Anchor Hotel and the Norfolk Hotel dating back to pre-gold rush days. I needed to rest my knee and had a light lunch and coffee at a coffee house with an outdoor patio, Kokomo’s Livid Skate Cafe (love the name!). It was a good place to just hang out and people watch.

I returned to the bus by noon to get a lift to the pier where I caught my river cruise back to Perth.  I found a nice seat in the back of the boat and just stayed there for the whole ride up. Just as on the Bosphorus, it was pleasant to be out on the water with the wind and sun, looking at the homes along the river. There was a young fellow riding some sort of pumping hydrofoil board surfing in the wake of the boat for nearly a half hour. I’d never seen one before so I had to look it up right then (https://www.barts.com/blogs/news/hydrofoil-surfing-the-ultimate-beginners-guide). It looked fun to ride but a lot of work. The boat dropped us off at Elizabeth Quay in Perth. I had to go easy on my knee after the day of walking so I caught a TransPerth bus back to the Hyatt – it was all within the CBD, so the ride was free.

Blogger’s note: Well, it’s been over 110 days and I am safely home, adjusting to the culture shock. I returned to the US in May via Honolulu – it rained most of the time I was there. Visiting family and friends in SF, Half Moon Bay, Pacific Grove, and Seattle was really wonderful. And some day I’d like to go back to Whitefish MT to see and fully enjoy Glacier National Park. I will continue with blog entries about my overseas travel; this means there will be entries on my travels in Australia and ending in Auckland, New Zealand and maybe a post about lessons learned during my travels.

One comment more about Fremantle or Freo, as the locals call it: This is a photo of some street art in Freo. I would call this photo, “Aussies Understand Immigration”