Perth, Australia

Under the olive tree, the warm rays of the afternoon sun warm my skin. In true Spanish style, the terracotta brickwork forms arches over the grass area. The trickling sounds of the fountain competes with the faint piano keys coming from within. Dark wooden floors, high ceilings, blinding rays of sun shine through the colonial style church windows. This place is truly beautiful and perfect for a place to relax as it’s perfectly situated across the road from Little Creatures Brewery, the port and the stunning WA coast line. With so many destinations on the Virgin Australia network, we chose Fremantle to go for a week long holiday with Mum and Dad. Our venture to ‘somewhere’ needed to meet just two criteria. The destination must have:

1. multiple flights scheduled per day – flying stand by
2. airbnb accommodation, central enough to house 6 people comfortably. With the chaos leading up to the end of the year, I literally only started looking for travel destinations 7 days before take off.

With the criteria in mind, we ‘limited’ our destinations down to somewhere in Australia, New Zealand, Fiji or Vanuatu. Although from an outsiders perspective that may seem like a very broad search, it was limited by there only being 1% of airbnb listings still available for the week between Christmas and New Year. With one mission for the whole week stop, breathe and read at least a chapter in a book, we chose The Russell House in Fremantle, Perth, Western Australia. Like every family holiday, we each chose a friend to bring along. I chose Mel, and Dave chose Jin.

In typical Julia style, I packed the morning of departure and we set off for our short flight just 6 hours across the country to the welcoming arms our very pregnant friend, Steph. You would think from the amount of travelling we have done packing would become less painful but the concept of having to narrow down which outfit to choose never gets easier. Anyway, I digress. One of the advantages of heading to WA was spending a night with Steph and Sam before the crew arrived. One would say we planned it quite well; a pregnant friend makes for the perfect designated driver after an afternoon of beers overlooking the stunning Scarborough beach while catching up on three years worth of travel stories.

By the time the crew arrived the next day we had already tested out the water to ensure I had enough evidence to get get mum into the water. However, I should know by now that the way to get her to do anything is tell her she can’t or won’t. It worked too. Both mum and dad joined us for a few of the swims at Cottesloe, Fremantle and Hillarys.

Thankfully Jin’s known me long enough to hide the fact he hadn’t been to Perth before, otherwise a fully scheduled holiday may have occurred. Even though it was a ‘list free’ holiday, we still managed to squeeze into the 5 days:

• train trip to Perth which included shopping with mum while Dave took the others to his favourite stop, the Perth Mint.
• venture down to Penguin Island so the boys could take the inflatable kayaks around the island – bike trip around the river
• day of beach hopping
• sailing on the Swan
• one of the highlights with Dad
• Swan Region tour of the wineries, breweries, distilleries, chocolate and cheese shops
• New Years at Little creatures brewery which was by far the better choice over The Monk Brewery which sold undrinkable beers and cider. (Is that even possible?)
• write a list! I just couldn’t resist the urge but it had only one item
• read a chapter in my book. That was my objective on this holiday and I exceeded it by three whole chapters so it must have been relaxing and we obviously had too much time to spare!

As I sit here on the plane, on the 2nd day of the new year, I’m excited by the year ahead. Excited to be starting uni in a month, finishing the two building projects and no doubt planning the next one, squeezing in a few holidays and finishing my book!! Let it begin…

Newyears

45 years of smiles

A book worth starting

Shopping with mum

At the first vinyard

BBQ with steph and sam

Bike adventures around the swan

Biking around the swan

Fish and Chips

Freo

Hillarys

Home time at the airport

Jin and I Olive tasing

Kayaking, Penguin Island

Penguin Islands

Little creatures round 1

Dad and I on the swan

Sneaky bevey by the rives

Mums squeezed in 4 books

Steph and Sam at Scarborough Beach

Sunset over the ocean

This one makes me laugh

WA Vinyard

With a broken elbow