Walker's Down Under: April 2011

Thursday, April 21, 2011

A Day In Harvey

Harvey Mosaic - Oranges, Dairy, Water, and Sunshine

Yahoo! I survived the first term. After 11 and a half weeks straight with only one 3-day long weekend in between and through the hottest summer on record our 15 day Easter holidays is well deserved. For our first break my parents came from Canada and we are also hosted Becky's mom from Canada, so our house is full and our days are booked with sights to see. First up.... Harvey, Western Australia. What to do in Harvey? Yesterday and today we found out.

Harvey Fresh Big Orange - climb it to view the orchards.

Stop number one - Harvey Fresh. The Harvey Fresh brand has sold fresh orange juice (and other orchard fruit juices) and milk for many years. Now it has expanded into wine and cheese , yogurt and other dairy products.

Ma and Pa Walker toasting to the tasting.

View from half way up the big orange of the surrounding orchard.

Stop number two - Harvey Golf Course. An excellent course just on the outskirts of town. I bought a 'gently recycled set of clubs' from the tip (Aussie word for dump). The green fees for 9 holes is $15 and wildlife sightings are free.

Ring necked parrots looking for my golf ball.

Nice and green for being a drought.

Can you spot the emu? Grandpa Walker did!

Stop number three - Harvey Visitor's Centre. Not all venues were visited this time as we were pressed for time to get to the dam for dinner and kangaroo spotting at dusk. But, below are two places of interest. Inside the visitor centre are an arrangement of locally produced foodstuffs, aluminum-bauxite mine site replica, plus excellent tourist information and local art and Australiana trinkets for sale. It is also the site of a World War Two Internment Camp. From 1940 to 1942 Harvey held 1000 men in this camp. Of those 800 were Italian men who were born abroad, but living and working in Australia for years and put behind barbed wire. Most felt it was unfair, but realized it was wartime. Many of these men returned to Harvey after the war to start fruit & vegetable farms and dairy farms and new lives. To this day many descendents and Italian family names are present in Harvey today.

Some of the local products produced in the region.

Internment Shrine built during the camp's operation from 1940-42.

Stop number four - Harvey Dam Sausage sizzle at the dam. Harvey provides much of the southwest with fresh tap water and irrigation to farmland. It is so, so low this year and many locals are praying for rain to fill it up this winter. Grandma Hughes, grandma and grandpa Walker enjoying the picnic - with locally bought Harvey cheese (sorry no picture of the cheese factory tasting), Harvey River Estate wine, Harvey beef sausages, and produce from Bunbury Farmer's Market.

Stockman Collin and his Whip

For your entertainment pleasure we have two videos for you. Both were taken at Perth's Caversham Wildlife Park last weekend. They have an Australian farmshow with sheep shearing demostration, petting barn, sheep dog trials, cow milking, and bull whip snapping. I volunteered to crack the whip. First 5 times to no avail, but the 6th attempt equals a sonic boom!

Monday, April 11, 2011

Captial City Perth

Perth has over 1 million residents and is called the remotest capital city on earth. Because it is so far away from other cities, in Australia and over the ocean. Like, several thousand kilometres away! But, residents make up for it with many, many events, festivals, parks, attractions, museums, wharfs, shopping, markets, beaches, cappacino strips, sports teams, food and wine. There is so much to see and do that I am sure not all sights will be seen in our one year exchange. The reason for our visit was to ride a camel and to pet a koala. Both checked off our list by 3 pm Saturday. Below are a few shots from Calammunda Camel Farm on the outskirts of the city.

I always knew that one day I would once again face burping camels.

Becky and her mom, Claire after their 1 hour ride.

Ships of desert transporting the Walkers into the bush.

Caversham Wildlife Park is a hands on zoo with scores of Australian mammals and reptiles, plus a farm show and plenty of animals to pet and feed. We could of spent a few more hours inside the park. We saw dingos and blue-tongue lizards, and a few more native wildlife to tick off our list. The wombat is noctural, but one was still available for petting and picture taking. What our boys will remember the most is that when it came to our turn, it started pooping and the handler said "Heys, guys free wombat souvenirs". That was repeated all the way home and the next day and the next day.

Grandma Hughes came to visit us from Canada and got her wish to pet a kangaroo.

Thumbs up for the owl.

Jill is one fat wombat! Souvenirs are below.

And Caleb's birthday wish... to pet a koala.

School Days

A few people have asked how is school down under? There are definitely more similarities between Canada and Australia schools than differences. Kids are kids anywhere in the world and no better way to prove this than to show a youtube video that the Japanese language teacher, Mr. Newton, created about the week long stay that 14 students from Sasebo Kita junior high school in Nagasaki Japan had at Harvey Senior High School and their host families throughout the community.

http://www.youtube.com/user/HarveySHS#p/u/0/is3Lu00etgc

http://www.youtube.com/user/HarveySHS#p/u/0/is3Lu00etgc

"A video I edited and put together as a memento for the students of Sasebo Kita Junior High School, during their week long 2011 visit to Harvey and Harvey Senior High School.
The song is called 会いたかった which means 'Wanted to Meet' in Japanese. It is sung by a J-Pop band called AKB48."

A few of the highlights in the video include: Japanese language classes at the primary school using chopsticks, recess and lunch break mingling with each other, the going away bbq, song and dance performance, Aussie rules football lesson, a drive in the senior school's 14 passenger home-made car, and the Harvey Show.

Margaret River - Surf the Seas, Drink the Wine and Splunk the Caves

Margaret River is probably the one of top tourist destinations in WA. There are 95 or so wineries, dozens of breweries, plenty of galleries, hundreds of caves, and THE best surfing waves Western Australia has to offer. Margie is a Top 50 surf destination in the world and this week she was host to the Surf Pro world circuit. On Sunday, we watched some excellent local and international amateurs trying to get one of four wild card spots to enable them to compete with the pros during the week.

Surfer's Point, Margaret River

If an 'old man' with a grey beard can do it.

So can I!

Hey, there's a prairie boy body boarding on some foamy surf!? Too bad the little girl in the shot actually out paced him! Caleb and Jackson enjoyed body boarding as well, but Becky was the one that wouldn't come in until after the sun had set. I think we might of found our favorite beach - Red Gate Beach, Margaret River.

Walker family at Red Gate Beach.

We must thank John and Annette, a generous Canadian exchange couple, who open their home to us and showed us such wonderful spots.

We drove to Hamelin Bay to see rays that come to scrounge leftovers after the fishing boats come in and fisherman clean their catches. There are 3 types of rays that some in and they swim right up to the shore line in mere inches of water and within touching distance of the wading photographers. Hamelin Bay is much calmer than Margaret River beaches, so swimming is nice and easy.

Jewel Cave. The area around Margaret River has many, many caves, with about 10 open for public exploration. Jewel Cave was highly recommended for us. It had a tour guide and an easy 2 km boardwalk underground [the 1000 or so stairs were not mentioned though - huff and puff] with spectacular cave formations and stalactites and stalagmites. Well worth the trip.