Western Australia Christmas

Without going back in time too much, I am posting today about my Christmas in WA. 8:30AM, breakfast at Maccas in CBD (only place open) with old pastries and the company of flies. 9:30AM, Drive from Perth to Bunbury only to find out that the Dolphin Discovery Centre was closed on Christmas day. HOPE that more tourists would convince the underwater Observatory personnel in Busselton to keep it open! Noon. Drive the 53 km from Bunbury to Busselton in the Geographe Bay. (These are coastline and beaches one would imagine the Paradise were embellished with them, so the trip and the walks were like floating in a warm and breezy white and blue land.) More disappointment… Busselton: the longest wooden jetty in the Southern Hemisphere has a big lock on the ticket booth. Walk the 1.8 km into the Indian Ocean, and find another big lock on the gate of the Underwater Observatory at the end of the jetty. I have a picture of that locked gate, but found it too sad to post! I hope all Western Australians who work in these places, and pretty much all places where we wanted to have a cup of coffee or something to eat but were closed, had a great Christmas and didn’t travel to any place where they also got disappointed with EVERYTHING being shut down. My lesson: don’t travel during holidays in Australia. My Christmas tree? The gorgeous WA Christmas tree, but if you read carefully about it, it’s a parasite to avoid as much as looking for coffee in WA on Christmas day…

White Christmas? YES! Let's see if this picture tricks you, too, into thinking that there is snow in the distance, the top of it being blown off by the wind... OR this is a dune of very fine and white sand whose top is being blown off by the coastal winds?

Finally, late afternoon, back in Bunbury, two cappuccinos and a milk shake, $22.50. I don’t even want to remember the name of this café where I got so ripped off… Best Christmas day event? A true gift and memorable surprise, Orfa Turkish Bakery! Open until 9PM and making the best kebabs and rose Turkish delight!