Rotto Trip

We had a holiday recently. Had been planning to visit Sydney but with the airfares costing just under $2k thought better of it and holidayed locally at Rottnest Island. Managed to obtain some accommodation although the chalets were booked and only one night out of the three was available at the Rottnest Lodge. So, we put up with a family room at the hostel.

Bought the missus and The Boy new bikes as about half of the expense of buying them would have been taken up with renting bikes anyway. I wasn’t too concerned with paying $12 for each bike to be transported to the island. The trip over wasn’t too bad although the missus suffers badly from seasickness and she had to find someone else to sit. The water was reasonably calm though.

Finding our accommodation was pretty simple and it was only 1.5 kms out of town. Had to wait an hour and a half for the reception to open and then they were rather slow at processing guests. Never mind. Our room was spacious enough and clean so that was a good start. After unpacking we rode into town to grab some lunch. Spent a bit of time there before heading back to the hostel and down to the beach. There were a number of sandcastles that had been built and with quite a bit of detail. Some of the kids must have taken hours to do them. I did a bit of snorkelling but it was fairly cold. When we arrived back at the hostel there was a bunch of Irish backpackers sitting out on the verandah just drinking, smoking and talking. It’s what the Irish do best. And they sat and drank and smoked and talked until who knows what hour. Inconsiderate pricks.

The Boy rode some 62 laps of the quadrangle in the evening. We also kicked the footy around for over half an hour.

Next day we rode around the south part of the island and visited Salmon Bay with an osprey stack ventured up to the Wadjemup Lighthouse. Nice view of the island from atop the hill. Ride back into town was a bit of a killer. The Boy, even with his new gears bike, found the going too tough. His mum put him to shame on the hills. He'd done too many laps the night before. Almost ran into four guys who parked their bikes in the middle of the road and said a few choice words to them. I mean, what idiot parks his bike on the road which a bus and other cylists pass through regularly? The funny thing was whilst The Boy and I bought our lunch the missus found a table and who should it be next to? And she didn’t even notice. And she'd yelled the most abuse at them. We ended up shifting as we had no intentions of sitting next to them.

Spent the afternoon down at the beach splashing about and building sandcastles until the rain became too heavy and we had to head back. The Irish backpackers had emerged about lunchtime to continue their drinking, smoking and talking. Even though they were supposed to checkout at 9am they didn’t leave until about 3pm. And they didn’t take any of their rubbish with them. The Boy and I kicked the footy again even in the light rain. It became badly shredded on the hard surface after becoming wet.

I guess the lack of consideration provided by many people was the most disappointing aspect of the holiday. The communal kitchen was left in a mess and people just left their dirty dishes in the sink for someone else to clean. The lounge room was covered in bits of paper, noodles and chip packets in the morning. Quite disgusting really. And the closest shower was quite a disappointment also with the head not being able to be fixed into position as it was broken.

On Tuesday we rode around the northeastern tip of the island and visited the Basin, Geordie Bay and Little Parakeet Bay before riding past Pink Lake on the way back into town. Stopped for lunch before heading to the Basin for a snorkel. The Boy only lasted about five minutes before the urge to build sandcastles took over. I snorkelled for 45 minutes but apart from a few samson fish and a wrasse and the seaweed there wasn’t a lot to look at. So I sat on the beach and soaked up the sun. We’d been quite lucky with the warm weather, even though it had rained for half of the previous day, as it was rather pleasant.

On Wednesday the missus didn’t feel too well so she caught an early ferry home. The Boy and I visited the museum and wandered around The Settlement viewing the old houses. I heard about the oarsmen on the pilot boat having to work for 24 hours straight to bring ships into the port of Fremantle. I’m glad those days are over. We headed up to Bathurst Lighthouse for a look and then back to town for a late lunch.

The ferry ride back was a bit exciting as it wasn’t too calm in the late afternoon. Made it back to Barrack Street jetty by 6pm. Had to wait about 10 minutes for a maxi taxi, one that could fit the bikes, and some old lady was adamant that it was a taxi for her because the cruise company had called for one. Well, I booked a maxi taxi, usually used for wheelchair-bound passengers, as I required the space for three bikes. You pay one and a half times the going rate of a normal taxi for the privilege however.

Ah, nice to be home. Warm, powerful shower, familiar bed, computer, etc.

Rottnest Island Holiday 2009 Photo Album