On the Road, Version Australia: Fremantle, Yallingup, Margaret River

Hi everyone! We're in Margaret River, one of Australia's wine-growing regions. The last four days have been so civilized!

After our last post from Perth, we drove 19 kilometers up to the mouth of the Swan River and stayed the night in the relaxed town of Fremantle, a much-beloved suburb made famous by the America's Cup, which reminded Justin a little bit of Austin. We neglected to take photos, but we really enjoyed our walk into town from the caravan park and the chili-tomato mussels and wood-fired pizza (sorry, Brandi, we eat other pizza!) that we scarfed down at Little Creatures brew pub.

The next day we got on the road down to Australia's southwest corner. The first thing I'll say is that this place is really, really pleasant. There are tall trees everywhere, shady roads, emu leather farms, black-and-white spotted cows, and all manner of tourist attractions along the side of the road. Australia's charmingly quaint boosterism is apparent everywhere; there are road signs for every possible thing that might be of interest to someone. We have actually, no joke, passed signs indicating that we should turn left in 500 meters if we wish to see things like Bella's Pottery Shack or Dwellingup's Famous Crafts or an Emu Fence. It's so darned adorable.

You know what else are adorable? PENGUINS.

We stopped in Rockingham on our way south from Freo to visit Penguin Island, an offshore sanctuary for these Little (or Fairy or Blue) penguins. They are mostly nocturnal and very hard to see, but the sanctuary has adopted ten penguins that were injured or orphaned and feeds them a couple of times a day, much to the delight of the sanctuary's visitors.

CUTE OVERLOAD. These things waddle around and eat a ton of fish and have an adorable way of communicating with their caretaker, who obviously adores them. And they are really surprisingly fast in the water.

We also took a tour to a neighboring island to see the Australian sea lions that live in the marine sanctuary. These improbable beasties -- all of whom are male, for complicated migratory reasons that I can't quite remember -- go on massive three-day feeding frenzies and then laze around like blubbery lumps for three days. We saw them in their blubber lump phase.

Lazy bums.

Behind them you see a pod of Australian pelicans, which have the longest beak of any bird in the world. (Side note: one of my favorite seaside images, which I saw ages ago in Kalbarri, was a fisherman at sunset casting his line on the beach; right at his side, keeping him company and observing his every cast, was a gigantic pelican. Two fishermen, hanging out together.)

From Rockingham, we sailed south through giant eucalyptus trees to the tiny town of Yallingup, which has a reputation for world-class surfing. The drive there had a world-class sunset, I can tell you that much.

From Yallingup, we popped down here to Margaret River, "Margs" to the locals, where we have spent the last two days. (Another tangent: have you noticed that Australians have an adorable habit of shortening everything? Fremantle is "Freo." Afternoon is "Avo." Breakfast is "Brekky." That doesn't even save a syllable.) Margaret River reminds us of Sonoma, except that everything in town closes at 8:30pm. No matter; yesterday we had our fill of tipple on a tour of six well-known wineries in the area.

I particularly liked Pierro, which has an old-school buttery chardonnay and a delicious pinot noir.

I am utterly sober in this photograph.

We found nothing to eat last night after our post-wine-tour nap except the Australian equivalent of Pizza Hut, but excellent lunch and someone else driving us around made for a great day.

From here, we're headed down to Cape Leeuwin to see where the Southern and Indian Oceans meet, then to the karri and jarrah and tingle trees near Walpole and Denmark. It should continue to be a pleasant and civilized journey until we return our Improbable Chariot to its Perth home on the 27th.

Cheers!
Meredith & Justin