Endless monstrosities.

OMG.

Just did a training session with a different trainer on site at work.

I hurt and am sooo shaky!

Lots of interval running and boxing and some weights too.

There will be pain in the morning I think.

Shows the importance of mixing it up.
I've not done a huge amount of cross training recently, down to a mix of laziness and Bridges training.


And on that note: Photos from the Bridges Run:

I'm floating!

And also this monstrosity! This was when I was firing through the last km to try and get a 55:XX.
I'm putting it up small, but I think it will enlarge if you mist click on it. On the positive, my legs look good. :)

So I wont be buying any of those!

The other monstrosity if that they didn't record mat times.

They were all gun times. 

Which is s**t. Thanks to CoolRunner djc42 for summing it up nicely:
They also need to get onto the net times for events of this size ; people in C & D will really be penalised and (a) it's not fair and (B) it encourages people to jump their category...
There was no mat at the start - so all times will be gun times. The mat 100m before the finish is for the benefit of the announcer so they know who's about to finish. I think i feel stronger about this than I thought - not having net time is not good enough. People expect it now, given that every 'big' race has them - it leaves a sour taste ....


I thought I heard them reel off my name as part of a huge list as we streamed through the finish but I just assumed I'd heard wrong. What do I care if they quickly get my first name out. I'd rather have had a better idea of my time.
Official time 57:11. I'm sticking with my 56:15.

I think I will drag the boy along to the free group training for the R4R. When he's better!

And also have decided to go to WAMC interval training on tuesday nights. It starts at 5:30, so that gives me an hours worth of interval training then a quick dash down to the airport to pick the boy up at 7.

Sorted!

Battle Collossal IX - Muay Thai for the uninitiated

So on saturday night I went to watch one of my good friends in her first Muay Thai fight. I was scared, I will admit it. Not for s second did I doubt Sophies abilities, but its still not a pleasant idea- paying to watch a friend get beaten up...
I'd never been to a fight of any description, and avoid watching things like UFC. They make me cringe.
So I wasnt too sure how I'd deal with this!

We got there at 5:45. Doors were emant to open at 6 and Sophie was first on, a warm up match for a massive tournament with a prize fund of 2,000,000 Baht ($70,000 ish) and a spot representing Australia in some HUGE Thai tournament. It was close to 7 by the time they actually opened the doors. Some mess up with the food and drink delivery. But I would have rather been inside and thirsty than outside and freezing! Winter is definately on the way to Perth. Then a nervous wait for the fighting to get underway.

Once it did, I was hooked. Muay Thai may be fighting, and it is violent by nature, but it definately isnt as viscious as I was expecting.

In the first round Sophie seemed slightly dazed, and her opponent had the upper hand. But once Soph was over the shock of being in the ring for the first time, she came into her own. The other girls kicks just didnt seem to make contact, Sophies did. At one point I'm sure I saw the other girl with tears in her eyes, and her face was puffy and swollen, whereas Sophie looked normal, if tired.

In my understanding, Muay Thai is won by scoring the most points. You get points for a clean contact, more if its above the waist, more for your opponent falling over etc etc. And its scored by a number of judges (3?) at different points around the ring. If the majority of the judges think you scored the most points, you win.

Just like Sophie did!

Proud of you Sophie :)

We stayed on after Sophies fight to watch some of teh main Tournament, to get a better idea of what is involved in Muay Thai. Mainly, we stayed to support one of Sophies friend defending his Welterweight title in the break from the main tournamant (it was a draw! after 5 rounds and lots of blood...) and to wtach the heavyweights...

All the guys in the main tournament weighed 67kilos. Thats the same as me, which is very strange to imagine. The heavyweights weighed 100-110kg. No upper limit and no need to have equal weight fighters. So the guy challenging the Perth heavyweight was a good 5 inches shorter and 10kg lighter. It was never going to end well, but good on him for trying! KO in the first round. And the first time I felt uncomfortable watching the fighting, mainly because it was so unevenly matched.

It was a good thing it was over so soon, because while I wanted to see how the big boys fought, it was 11 o'clock already and I needed my sleep before the 10km race the next morning!

All in all a fun night, though I can't say I'll be going again apart from to support Sophie. But its always good to try new things, especially when they seem out of your comfort zone!

Bridges 10km - Race Report.

After a late night (boxing start was delayed, so didn't get home til 11:30! but more on that here) it was an early start.
Blue skies and sunshine, and less humidity than we've had over the last week. They said it was 15 degrees on the radio as I drove to the start (no public transport that early in Perth on sundays) but felt warmer in full sun!
  
The start was well organised. Many racers had had there numbers sent out to them, so all they had to do was show up, people like me who were late applicants collected their numbers with ease. There was a 5km race starting from the other side of the river, planned so the first across the line would arrive with lots of support from the 10km people, so I hung around the finish line and cheered the first 3 guys and a girl across the line. My guess is they were done in less than 20 minutes. 

Then it was time to line up to get going.
I'd put myself into group D, 55 minutes and over. I was hoping for 55, so turns out this was a big mistake! You'd think I'd have learnt by now that since everyone else puts themselves in too high a group, maybe I should too!
I spent the first 3 kms dodging and weaving. That was all the way across the first bridge until it opened up on the South Perth foreshore and there was more room for people to find their own space. SERIOUSLY PEOPLE! If you're walking at 2km, there is no way you can run 10km in less than 55 minutes so why did you start in with the group C and make me dodge around you?
I was doing well. I was definitely not going to let myself take more than an hour, so I was watching my splits for 6 minute kms and doing pretty good. Would have been better with a clean start, but could have been much worse.

By 7km i was getting hot and my shoulders started to ache which was very annoying. Must have slept a bit funny? So took out 30 seconds to stretch them out properly and relieve the tension building up across them.
8km and we were up onto the Narrows bridge and heading for home.
At this point I saw that I might just about make 55minutes, but it would be close. I put in everything I still had and over took a gazillion people on the home km, but it wasn't quite enough and my watch time was 0:56:15. Grrr! We'll see if the mat time is any better. I wasnt quite sure where the "start"was... so maybe I started my watch too early?! But probably not 15 seconds early... and definitely not 1 minute 15 seconds...
I felt good though. Sweat was pouring off me, but my legs felt Ok. Not "lets do this all over again now" OK, but Ok. My HR averaged at 180, so I was giving it all I had. I'm happy about that. No slacking off like in last years C2S! I'm definitely going to aim for the C2S HM again this year. With a build up in distance over the next 6 months and more speedwork, I hope I can smash the 2:15 barrier of my previous two HMs.


So, things to remember next time:

1. Don't go to a boxing match the night before and get home late.
2. Start in the group you want to be in, not the one you used to be in. 
3. Start further forwards!
4. Figure out the splits for the time you want to finish in, not the one you don't want to be over.  
5. Stretch shoulders more!

Hopefully should be some decent photos to put up soon. I remember seeing a few photographers right in front of me as I powered past, especially on the last km. Fingers crossed. 

First race of the season tomorrow!

My season anyway. WAMC don't really stop, but around now it gets busier.

The Bridges Run is once around the foreshore, 10km. Or a short 5km from one of the jetties on the other side. 

I'm doing the 10, and hoping for a time under 55 minutes. Fingers crossed. I've been running at my old race pace in training runs, so hopefully all the enforced treadmill running has picked up my pace potential.

As for the rest of the weekend, its pretty packed too! Off to Deep Aqua this morning, might stay on for Body Combat but will see. Deep aqua is usually enough in itself, and don't want to over work before tomorrow!

Tonight a big group of us are going to watch a friend fight. She's been doing Muay Thai for a few years now, and its her first public fight, so we're going for moral support. I'm really intrigued. I've never been to anything similar before, but I'm not sure how well I'll be able to watch because I'm not sure how well I'll deal with watching one of my best friends get beaten up! She loves it, so I will be there to support.

Tomorrow is the race, then an attempt to see a friend who is moving over to Germany. Shes having a barbeque on the foreshore, so hopefully I will have time to get home, get changed, get back and see her, then we're due to meet a friend that we havn't seen for a long while. He just got a job for a junior exploration company up in my neck of the woods, so thats going to be interesting. The joys of confidentiality!

All clear.

We spent the morning in A&E because there was no improvement over night.

After a while waiting, though not as long as I remember back home, he was seen by a supervised student Dr, then another, then a second opinion after X-ray to make sure he wasn't liable for compartment syndrome (where the internal pressure stops the blood flow from the capillaries, so while overall blood flow is still good, individual patches of tissue can die).

And then off we toddled, with a prescription of ice and elevation and ibuprofen.
Only took 90 minutes.
No exercise for a fair while, and he's warned work that he might not be much use, but we'll see how he goes by Monday.

Fingers crossed for a quick recovery.

Another one bites the dust...

The Boy had a tumble on his bike today. 

Not good at all, but also very lucky.

He went a new way, adding a loop of Kings Park into his usual loop down to the river and around. Unluckily, there are lots of roadworks in Kings Park after the storm, so he decided to cycle around the outside on the main roads. Nearly back to the start again a woman in a rush to get to her dentist appointment opened her door without looking in the mirror [properly], right into the path of an oncoming Boy.

From the sounds of it he crashed straight into it, not even time to swerve. Went over the top and rolled a few times, landing in one lane of traffic with his bike in the other. Heres the lucky part. The other traffic stopped in time. Other wise it would have been so very much worse. I don't even want to think about it.

I got a call asking for a lift home because he hit a parked car... He sounded shook up, but I assumed he'd dinted a nice Audi or something while avoiding a small child in the park.
Got there to find him sitting at the side of the road on his own (he told the woman to go to her appointment after getting her details, all she was doing was fretting anyway) looking sorry for himself. Then I saw how nasty it was. Not much blood this time, but all the side of his leg is bruised and battered and swollen, plus a fair amount of grazing and bruising all over.

I gave him a once over, checked for concussion even though he said he hadn't hit his head. He looked really bad in the car. I was tempted to go straight to the hospital, but he kept refusing. He was mainly just hot, dehydrated and in shock. So once we'd sorted that out he perked up some. I thought he was going to cry when I cleaned up his main graze. Poor boy. But better that than getting an infection from having gunk in it.
If its still as bad tomorrow we'll head to the docs and get an xray, but it seems more general brusied muscle pain than acute fracture... but maybe its both.

So now he's sitting there with a bandage around his poorly leg trying to stop the swelling. And ice before, but he got bored of the TV once he was feeling better and wanted to go install the new RAM in his computer that arrived at lunchtime, and is now happily playing his game and reaping the benefits of said upgrade and its hard to ice a whole leg and play games at his desk... Priorities :)

I think it was all fate.
I was meant to go out for a run this morning but I woke up really dehydrated and massively tired. We went to see Men who Stare at Goats last night and didn't get back 'til way after 11. So I was only just up when he rang. Otherwise, I would have been out and no chariot would have speeded to his aide.
Also, we have a run coming up on Sunday, the 10km Bridges Run. So now he has an excuse not to run. And I am safe for a while, because if he's not running he can't beat me and show me up. ;) We'll have to postpone that til May and the Run for a Reason!
He was meant to be helping a friend move house tomorrow, but thats not going to happen any more. Can't move sofas when you cant really move your self too well.

I've been playing with the idea of getting ID tags for a while (years, in fact) and this has spurred me into actually doing it. If it had turned more serious, there was no way they'd know who he was or who to ring. Sure, he had his phone to map his ride, but if he was down badly, chances are that would be out too. And when I'm out I currently carry nothing apart from a lone key. I used to have a slip of paper when I was running around the dark empty streets of Kambalda, but nothing in the City. So two shoe RoadIDs are coming our way. Learn from my pain. Don't wait for it to happen to you!

Would someone know who you were in an emergency?

Also, would you know how to help someone in an emergency? 

If not, why not?

Penguins!

Phillip Island was my favourite day of "Melbourne".

We went on a day tour with Go West down to Phillip Island, mainly to see the Fairy Penguins which return to the beach every evening.

The day started off at the Australian Garden in Cranbourne.  Not the most amazing place ever, especially since it was mainly a building site (for phase 2) and none of the water features were working. Which was a shame since part of it was meant to show the difference the presence of water makes to the plants... It would probably be of interest of keen gardener types who havn't seen much of Australia.

Then on down to Phillip Island, to the Chocolate Factory.
Now, officially I've given up chocolate for lent. That didn't last long! I fell at the first hurdle, as we walked in they handed us a truffle and I failed. It was a planned fail, so it doesn't count, right?
Its an AMAZING place! Think Willie Wonka. Ever wondered what a solid tonne of chocolate looks like? Ever seen 4 tonnes of liquid chocolate-fall? What about a giant mosaic of Dame Edna made out of truffles?

Then there were koalas...

And pretty rock formations...

Oh, and there was a snake too.

But mainly then there were PENGUINS!
We sat there in the freezing cold (for me...) in my many layers with millions of Asian tourists wearing even more layers, just waiting for the sun to go down so it was dark enough for the Little Penguins to dare come out.
But when they did it was amazing! We sat there, scanning the waterline for the little blobs.
Is that one?!

No, its a rock.

What about that?

Nah, seaweed.

That?!

Its the same rock, Ellen.

Oh.

Theres one!

And another, wow! Theres loads!

Want one!

That was pretty much how it went. 

As soon as there was one on the beach there were many, and they'd all group together, sometimes dropping back into the surf, sometimes just standing around, then eventually they'd make a dash for their homes back in the dunes. After a while, we went back from the main viewing area and watched them waddling around from the board walks. Totally amazing.

Some Fairy Penguin facts from the Penguin Foundation:

Little Penguins are amazing creatures that defy many laws of nature, let alone physics to swim, dive and live the way they do. We are proud to look after them and manage their habitat that enables many people from all over the world enjoy their incredible lives.
Did you know that ?

• The penguins at Phillip Island are the smallest of 17 species of penguins in the world (they are only 33cm tall) … their largest Antarctic cousin is the Emperor Penguin, standing up to 130 cm tall.
• Penguins are found only in the southern hemisphere; so you will never see a penguin and Polar Bear together in the wild!
• The name `Little Penguin` is now used instead of `Fairy Penguin` as it is a more accurate translation of their scientific name, Eudyptula minor.

Better in the water than Ian Thorpe !

• Penguins may swim 15 - 20 kilometres a day searching for small fish to eat. One penguin was recorded travelling 100 kilometres in one day!
• A Little Penguin has been recorded diving to 65 metres!
• A Little Penguin can actually sleep at sea, dozing as it floats on the surface.
• A Little Penguin can stay at sea for weeks, diving for fish, yet its waterproof feathers keep its skin absolutely dry.

The dangerous lives of Little Penguins

• Natural hazards for penguins are sharks, birds of prey, rough weather and fish shortages.
• Sadly, a penguin`s biggest danger is humans. They die from our plastic rubbish, oil spills at sea and on land from cars and introduced animals such as foxes, cats and dogs.
• A fox may kill as many as 30 or 40 penguins in one night. The fox is the penguins` main predator and keeps our rangers busy protecting the penguins.
• The Little Penguin`s dark feathers are not black like other penguins. They are a deep, rich blue. Their colour camouflages them from above and below the surface of the ocean.

I whole heartedly recommend going to see these little cuties.

If thats not possible, or you want to help more, why not adopt one?

Perth Storms

On Monday, our drought broke in epic style.

Its been over four months since we had any real rain. Officially 0.2mm in February, and the odd very light unregistered shower, but basically nothing.
That all changed big style!

I was up at work, due to fly back. We saw that there was rain forecast but that was all. I fell asleep on the plane back, to be rudely awoken by some big bumps. Opened the window to see grey. Just grey. And lightening flashes. After the scary landing, and spending the whole time thinking "thank God I'm not in a Brasilia" (the 30 seater planes we used to use) we got to the terminal and heard the radio reports coming in of absolute chaos. And we'd just landed right in the middle of it.

We got 42mm of rain in a couple of hours. 150,000 properties were reportedly left without power. About 100 sets of traffic lights went out. Part of the cliff near Kings Park collapsed and sent a landslide ripping through houses at the base of the mount.

We got off quite lightly. A few small branches off the tree and a few ceiling leaks. And a scary hour landing and driving home through the rain and lack of traffic lights.

There was a very pretty sunset though, once the sun ducked under the storm clouds.

Always a silver lining.

Snakes!

Yesterday I did the snake handlers course run by Brian Bush. He's a bit of a legend in WA, and even has a monitor lizard named after him.

We started slowly, with general chat and myth debunking and things. Just to let the adrenaline subside.
Then moved on to the lizards...

And the legless lizards...

Then the nasties!

Death adder.

Some brown snake or other.

Shockingly fast Whip Snake

Out came the Pythons, for an up close and personal look and feel of snakes. These ones were definitely pythons and hence non venomous (but can still bite, I do believe, just do less harm) but a lot of snakes look the same, especially from a distance. So always assume a wild snake is venomous. If you're in Australia the chances are it could kill you, so why risk the odds!

Then we were put into the hot seat, learning how to capture and remove snakes from environments where they are causing a threat. Like in my swag or if one gets into our caravan and refuses to budge:

I now feel much more confident around snakes. Not to a stupid degree, but at least now I'm less likely to freeze up or do some thing stupid if I ever do run into one. Its only a matter of time really. I've been here 18 months and have only seen 1, and that was out of the car window... We generally scare them away, but one day there will be one who would rather stand his ground, and now I'm much more prepared for that fact. 

I'm even tempted to get my licence from the government to be a suburban snake remover. But I think that might be a step too far!

And Brian Bush is an amazing character. And that laugh! If you ever get the chance to meet him, especially if he's teaching about lizards and snakes, take it! You won't regret it (unless you're easily offended!)

Hitting the Streets

I figured instead of a true time-line I'd just group my thoughts on Melbourne together by activity.
Today being the general sights.

First thing that struck me was how uninspiring the skyline is. Maybe just because I'm so attached to Perth... I just expected more...

Then there are the trams. Remember to keep an eye out, they're not all as striking as the tourist ones! The tourist one was a good idea... free to jump on and off, bit of a commentry to let you know where you are and whats around. Its on the quiet side though, presumably to least annoy the regular people, but that menat if you were going over bumps or the traffic was bad the speach was lost beneather the rest of the noise.

I loved all the little alleyways and arcades. Some lovely architecture still hanging around, and some crazy shopping. Will definately go back without the boy in tow and really hit the shops. I just snuck in some early mornings and late afternoons around our plans.

I was really looking forward to the QV Markets, but I was underwelmed. The meat looked really good, and the deli section too. I bought some sausages (cornish, and mango!) for us to have for breakfast, and some bread and cheeses and fruit for lunch on the day trip, but otherwise was quite restrained.
The rest of the markets we just tat though. Not what I was expecting at all. The sunday markets at the Arts Centre and out at St Kilda were heaps better. Spent lots of money there, on pressed flower art and jewelry, wood stuff and the like.

I did like the old Baths just up the road though. Very cool brick work. 

And the old factory in the shopping centre. Very cool!

Federation Square was also funky. I like the patterns and the tickers built into the walls (in our case warning people that while most things were still open the storms had caused some damage so watch out). Its good having an open area with good facilities and transport links that can be used for events. The modern Village Green!

 

 Oh, and the fire show outside of the Crown Casino! We'd been told it existed, but didnt know much about it. From the way I'd been told I expected fire jugglers and things, not massive flame throwers! We were sitting having a drink in Federation Square when the sky lit up. So obviously we had to go search out teh source. The Boy loved it. I swear I felt the heat on the opposite side of the river, I dread to think what it would be like underneath!

We went into the Casino while waiting for more fire. My money started to burn a hole in my purse. I've never done more than played on the Pokies, so decided that I would get $10 (big spender!) worth of chips and play on the Roulette. Cards aren't my thing, but randomly putting chips on a table seemed easy enough.

There were a nice couple already on the table, so we joined with them. I put the chips in the wrong spot to start with... I don't know what the couple made of us! So I looked at the boy, he said "half 21/28" so I did. And it was 21. So 17 to 1 on our first chip. $2.50 x 17 = a good return! I took out my original $10 and we played a couple more chips, but then cashed it in because we wanted to go watch the fire. We ended up about 350% on the house. No complaints from here! I can see how it can become addictive, but we stood and watched two guys lose a lot of money in a couple of minutes... one lost $100 in literally 10 seconds, the other lost $500 in 10 minutes. But then, I guess that makes the highs even higher... I liked all the signs, like "what are you really gambling with?"

Snake handlers course this afternoon.

Scared but excited!

Melbourne Travels...

Back from Melbourne!

Apart from the lovely people losing our bag somewhere between Perth and Melbourne, and ripping it once they did finally get it back to us the following afternoon, we had a great time.

We flew out of Perth on Tueday afternoon, a bit of a last minute dash... Getting complacent from flying so often! We turned up with 10 minutes to spare for close of luggage check-in, which would have been fine apart from the whole of the WA SES were heading over to Victoria to help with the flood clean up, and they had a lots of gear to check! They've re-modelled the airport too, so the Boy and I circled for a while trying to find security... straight through security (and explosives check, as usual!) and on to the plane. 

Qantas served us up some food then turned out the lights for a showing of Up in the Air. Seems like a pretty good film, nice balance of chic flick and not so chick-flick.  The Boy was rather angry with them for showing an episode of something (2 1/2 men maybe?) before, so the captain talked over the key moment of the film to announce the local time, weather, blah blah, then turned it off with minutes to go. So now we'll probably never know if the lovely George turns his life around or not!

After standing at the carousel for that bit too long, with the growning feeling of "oh oh" in both our stomachs, we reported our bag as missing and grabbed a cab into the city, hoping the bag would turn up and planning what we could say was in it if not ;) We both had our nice clothes in it (my only pair of heels, his only pair of shoes, my pretty new dress) and weren't really relishing the idea of spending fun Melbourne shopping time on boring restocking of existant clothes...

Got to the hotel (Oaks on Lonsdale) and got our lovely room - 1 bed apartment on the 29th floor with a wrap around balcony and view out over the Cathedral, parliment and suburbs.

And crashed into our lovely massive bed, to prepare for full on days of shopping, penguins, cupcakes and luggage chasing.

The day after the night before

Well, I was in bed at 8, fell asleep not long later, woke up at 10:30, and again at 3 (looked at the clock and smugly snuggled back under the covers for the remaining hour!)

Felt better this morning but still not right... Tried going caffeine free, but my lemon tea just made me feel ill.

So one cup of weak coffee is my limit today, tomorrow should be fine with none (driving day), same monday (busy day) and tuesday (home and busy). Might be tempted by proper Melbourne coffee on Wednesday though!

My caffeine addiction is purely psycological I think, so we shall see. 

I sleep so well out bush. I'll happily tuck myself into my swag at 7:30 when its dark and cold already, be asleep straight away and sleep soundly til the sun or the drillers reversing alarm wakes me up. Often 10 hours later. But I guess then I'm busy for the remaining 14, running around after the drill rig or the heritage mob or mapping or whatever., then doing follow up work and cooking.

Not long to go now!

Then all I'll do is complain about how much I miss being in the office :) 

So sleepy!

I am sooo tired!

I had a really fun break, but it involved lots of late nights (well, 4 in a row). And now I'm back up on site I'm struggling to turn off early enough to get enough sleep in. My alarm goes off at 4 every morning and I slowly wake up, get dressed and stumble out at 4:30, grab breakfast and lunch from the dining room/dry mess and carry on up to work for 5.

Which is normally OK, but I havn't been getting to sleep til after 10 so I just end up really tired all day.

Productivity is low.

Interest is low.

Care factor is low.

Mojo is gone!

I have a program on my phone that moniters my sleep pattern, and while I don't believe it 100%, its pretty interesting reading. My average sleep for the last few days has been less than 6 hours, and I spent most of that tossing and turning.

Last night I managed 1km on the treadie before giving up due to a stich. Which is pretty feeble. ANd I know that I'm only just finding my stride after 1km, and after than all problems work themselves out. But I just had no interest and no strength to carry on.

Plan tonight is to go for a swim after work, have tea that doesnt involve chips (its fush and chups friday!) and get to bed by 7:30. Even if I'm just lying in bed reading, I'm more likely to fall asleep than if I'm sat at the computer or watching TV.

I need to be doing more training if I'm going to get the HM done in August, and I want to be fresh for Melbourne, and I'm generally fed up of feeling weak and weary. So I will focus on my sleep for a few days and hope things improve!

Melbourne :)

So, finally, I'm going to Melbourne.
It was never high on my list of places to visit, it just didnt have as much WOW factor as visiting the Bondi Beach Rescue hut (love that show), swimming on the Barrier Reef (thats my Dad, BTW), or seeing Uluru.

But the more I look into it, the more Melbourne does have to offer. We've been planning a trip around now for months, but work has been so up in the air we havn't been able to book anything. But I decided yesterday that we should just go. Just for a few days. I found some reasonable flights (nowhere in Aus is cheep to fly to from Perth!) so we're going next week! Tuesday night to Sunday.

Exciting!

I want to:

1. 
   
   Visit the Queen Victoria Markets.
2. 
   
   Cruise around on a tram. Though I had this romantic image of old rackety trams, not posh new style ones like in Manchester... Hmmm...
3. 
   
   Visit Ramsay Street- I used to love Neighbours back home. My Gran first got me hooked when I was small when she'd look after me after school. I never watch it now because the times are bad (its on at about 4:30 on country TV, I work til at least 5, and country TV is behind Metro TV so there is no consistancy even when I do get a chance to watch.
4. 
   
   See Penguins, probably at Phillip Island.
5. 
   
   Go to the Zoo and Botanical Gardens
6. 
   
   Tour Parliment. It looks pretty and its free.
7. 
   
   Eat good food and people watch at trendy cafes.
8. 
   
   Shop in trendy shops which dont exist in Perth.
9. 
   
   Go to the Casino.
10. 
    
    Find an excuse to wear my new dress.

Did I miss anything?

Any suggestions of good food and/or good shopping?

Baptism by Fire.

Last night we gathered a group of people and headed to the beach for a swim, barbeque and fire party. Just because, and also for the last night of summer.

We got to Swanbourne about 5 for a bit of a paddle. The weather was perfect, warm but not too hot and breezy but not so much to be cold when in the ocean.

So after a dip to cool down it was time for a sunset barbeque.

Last sunset of the summer!

Then it was time for the real reason for the meet-

FIRE!

We were meant to be playing with the poi and staff, and testing out the OHs fire juggling balls that he got for his birthday. We hadnt conditioned the balls though, so we couldnt get them to light properly. Next time!

Here are some of the best pictures from the evening though.

My fire virginity ;)