Back to the Other End of the World!

 We were so busy getting ready for this adventure that I forgot to the do introductory post before we left! But just so nobody misses a cat photo - here's Monte, who has to investigate every empty bag he sees:

We are now in Perth, Australia where we are spending a couple of days before boarding the Indian Pacific Railway for a 5 day journey across the continent to Sydney. After that we will be boarding Regent Explorer for a 19 day cruise from Sydney to Singapore. Getting here, however, was not the fun we had hoped.

Our flight out of Toronto was delayed as some weather-reading equipment had to be replaced on the plane. This took longer than expected, so our departure was almost 2 1/2 hours late. That translated into a late departure from Vancouver, as Air Canada uses the same plane that comes from Toronto for the Vancouver-Sydney flight.

By the time we reached Sydney we had about an hour and a half to catch our next flight, but then the luggage from Toronto was the last to come off the plane, leaving us with only a very short time to clear customs and immigration. We already knew we would miss the original 12:30 flight. Fortunately clearing customs was a breeze, and there weren't many people at Immigration. The Qantas customer service rep we dealt with was very helpful and booked us on an afternoon flight before sending us to the check-in to drop our luggage and get our boarding passes. 

So far, we had been in the air on the Air Canada plane for 18 hours and had waited in airports for another five. We were very happy to hear that our Qantas flight would be on a very nice 787. We just made doubly sure that the bags were tagged properly - that plane was going on to Paris after stopping at Perth!

This final flight was very comfortable, and our luggage came off the plane right near the front of the line. No waiting for a taxi, and after a 20 minute ride into downtown, we were at our hotel, a mere 37ish hours after we left home on Monday, taking the loss of Tuesday into account.

A couple of photos from the plane over south Australia:

After leaving the clouds of rainy Sydney behind

The coast of the Great Australian Bight

Crossing back over land in the south-west
corner of the continent

We are staying at COMO The Treasury, a small boutique hotel of the COMO chain. This chain doesn't have many hotels, but locations include Thailand, the Maldives, Bali, Fiji and London. This one is a redevelopment of the old State Building and Treasury of Western Australia. The hotel only has 48 rooms, so it is a truly intimate spot. It also has 4 restaurants, a Wine Bar, a Beer Pub and a Spa. The Coffee Bar in the lobby is also very popular in the mornings with people working in the State Court Building next door! We'll see what Thursday and Friday evenings are like while we're here. The hotel was booked as part of our Indian Pacific Rail journey; otherwise we would never have found it. It certainly is comfortable and the staff are very professional and helpful.

The front entrance of the hotel

Our room

Part of the bathroom. There are
separate stalls for the toilet and the shower

A gift from the hotel - hand made
chocolates from a chocolatier whose
shop is in the building

One of the restaurants, where breakfast
is served daily. This used to be where the
stamps were printed

Buttermilk pancakes for breakfast. They don't have a 
buffet, but serve a fruit plate and 2 courses. I started
with a granola and yogurt bowl before the
pancakes.

The Wine Merchant wine bar - very popular. There is
a phenomenal selection of wines here, and all from
Australia and Europe.

Our barramundi dinner at Petition, one
of the other restaurants

We walked down to Elizabeth Quay, the waterfront hub of the city, and then headed toward King's Park and the Botanical Garden. That was a fair walk, including a staircase of 242 steps to get from the waterfront level to the park itself. 

The Bell Tower at Elizabeth Quay

This interesting statue and the footbridge
across the Quay

 Some Black Swans working diligently on
their nest

This was the view after we climbed the 242 steps to King's Park, so you can see the elevation change.

The smaller of the war memorials in the park

And this is the official War Memorial where ANZAC Day is observed
every April 25. The Australia and New Zealand Army Corps
lost huge numbers of men in the Great War of 1914-1917
and every city has a memorial to them that extends now to
conflicts after that time as well.

Another view with the Eternal Flame burning in
the foreground

One of the odd trees in the Botanical Garden

After wandering around the area for a while, we decided to forego walking back in 29°C and took a city bus. Just like in Melbourne and Adelaide, public transport is free of charge in the Central Business District. We left the bus in a pedestrian shopping zone a couple of blocks away from the hotel, and I managed to find the Perth location of the store where I like to buy my workout clothes. Once the shopping was done, we headed back to the hotel to get something to drink and rest our weary feet.

The hotel is right across from St. George's Cathedral, which is quite beautiful both inside and out. We paid it a brief visit.

   

The main entrance to the Cathedral

This very interesting depiction of the Cathedral is in a
walkway between the church and a neighboring building

The organ loft and stained glass window. We've never seen
organ pipes set up like horns before

The interior of the cathedral is very impressive -
and the sunlight was hitting the windows
in just the right way to make them glow

And after that we strolled through the park across the way, which also houses the Supreme Court of Western Australia and the oldest building in Perth, which was the original courthouse. There is also a cute group of kangaroo statues in the park.

We're repacking some of our luggage for the train journey. We're only allowed a small bag each so we have to take what we need for the 5 days into the duffel bags we brought along, and will check our larger pieces to go into the baggage car. This should be a very interesting few days, although we may not be able to post the blog until we reach Sydney. There isn't much call for cellular service in the Outback, and I don't know if there are any plans to put Starlink WiFi on the train! Connectivity is very spotty according to all we've read and seen.

We'll be back with more as soon as we can!