Husband is not a traveller really.....I don't know why I persist. He is now in his 60's and I suspect he is an undiagnosed ADD sufferer. He was born before ADD had been invented, but he cannot sit still and cannot watch a movie on the TV all the way through and he HATES having to sit on a plane.......so are you all getting the picture. Once we got there it was better....I kept him walking and doing stuff the whole time, and when he had done all those things I bought him bottles of wine (Margaret River wines are excellent) - so he was happy. But, I have decided, there are two sorts of people - Tourists and Travellers. The Tourist wants to go and see places and do things but does not really want anything to be any different from home, whereas the Traveller wants to experience a different part of the world as the locals experience it. The Traveller wants to step out of their own lives and into someone else's. The Tourist wants to drag almost all aspects of their own lives with them, they want predictable and neat and tidy, and everyone speaking their language. Sad to say I have married a Tourist....I love him, but he does not have the explorer spirit, no yearning to extend the edge of his comfort zone....took some persuading to get him to ride a pushbike on Rottnest Island!
I give you Exhibit 'A' |
Detail from the Statue |
Australians love to shorten names so we have cricket grounds the Gabba and the WACA and the SCG and the MCG - Brisbane, Perth, Sydney and Melbourne respectively.
I am rather partial to signs and here are a couple that took my fancy....how advanced a city is Perth.....Ladies have their own Darts Club!!!!
Did not test out this little bit of advertising hype.....but it is a wonderful name.....I wonder how many ornathologists go there for a beer? |
Here is a lovely statue near the Old Law Court Building.....the pen nibs are about 10 feet tall and engraved....just stunning |
This is the Swan Bell Tower, right on the Swan River. |
For some reason the City of Perth was given 12 bells from London....here I have shamelessly cut and paste from Wiki......
Twelve of the set are historic bells from St Martin-in-the-Fields church in Trafalgar Square in London; six others, cast in recent times by the Whitechapel Bell Foundry, round off the set. The St Martin-in-the-Fields bells were donated to the State of Western Australia as part of the 1988 Australian bicentenary celebrations; the additional bells were cast with a subsequent donation of metals mined in Western Australia. The six newer bells include five which were presented to theUniversity of Western Australia, the City of Perth and to the people of Western Australia from the City of London, the City of Westminster and a consortium of British and Australian mining companies, and one bell commissioned by the Western Australian Government.
Can anyone tell me why St Martin-in-the-Fields gave away their bells.....no fields anymore and no bells.
But it is a beautiful city with lots of new architecture and thankfully they have preserved a lot of the old. It is set along the edge of the beautiful Swan River - named after the famous black swans of Western Australia
This last picture is inside the Burswood Casino. We wanted to see this place....one of those tourist things, like the Eiffel Tower and the Hoover Dam I guess. Not being a gambler I found it rather sad - a great expensive palace, full of rather desperate glazed-eyed people forking out quite a lot of money to the roulette wheels and blackjack tables and Keno and Poker Machines. I am sure there were some there who never saw the sun from one day to the next...because it is open 24 hours....lots of flashing lights and alcohol.....of dear. Maybe I am more of a tourist than I like to think. It was not a part of Western Australian life that I felt able to immerse myself in. Too much Scottish blood to put too much of my hardearned into a machine with very small chance of it being returned!!
Happy stitching to all my followers and visitors!!