Western Australia- Perth (Freemantle) and Geraldton

On our last night of this cruise we said goodbye to our dinner mates. The waitstaff had prepared the usual special song and parade to stir the diners into a good mood in hopes of increasing their tips.

Jane and Sheila get into it

Jane led the napkin waving at our table and got everyone excited. We turned in after dinner with Freemantle and Perth awaiting us in the morning.

Our final port of call for this cruise was Freemantle and Perth. Perth is the major city and capital of Western Australia and Freemantle is the port city.

Old government building in Perth

We had planned on purchasing a shore excursion for this port, but the cruise line needed all consecutive cruisers to be off the ship so they could do an enhanced sanitation in an effort to bring the norovirus outbreak under control. So, all consecutive cruisers were offered a free Perth/Freemantle tour with an included box lunch. We had an early breakfast as our tour met at 0745.

Church in downtown Perth

We boarded our bus and were taken through the old historic waterfront district of Freemantle as well as some of the newer sections.

Overlook of Perth's rivers.

It seems like almost everything in Freemantle revolves around the harbor. Next we were taken to Perth and viewed the downtown area with its magnificent skyline. Our driver parked the bus and we were allowed to spend about an hour exploring the downtown area. We headed to a mall to pick up some items that we needed (pantyhose for Jane, Imodium for Capt. Larry).
We got some photos of Perth and headed back to the bus. Arriving at the bus, we learned that an older gentleman sitting next to us had taken ill in one of the public restrooms.

Dippin' in the Indian Ocean

The driver and tour guide would not allow him back aboard, so the cruise line had to be called to determine how his case would be handled. We left him and his granddaughter on the side of the street waiting for the cruise line to send a taxi.

Ancient Boab tree

We headed to Perth’s famed King’s Botanic Garden area and got some spectacular views of the city and its rivers that are its lifeblood. We got a box lunch and found a place to sit and enjoy our picnic. After our lunch, we met our guide for a walking tour of the gardens. Capt. Larry was able to get some great photos of the spring blooms, virtually none of which he could recognize. Our walking tour lasted an hour and afterwards we were met by our bus. We headed back to Freemantle and stopped at a beach where Capt. Larry got to stick his feet in the Indian Ocean. That leaves only the Arctic Ocean having walked in the Atlantic, Pacific, Southern, and Indian Oceans. And naturally, the Arctic would be the most difficult. We bought some ice cream cones and headed back to the Freemantle Historic District where we had an option to get off the bus to shop and walk back to the ship on our own, or take the bus back.

Inner harbor at Geraldton

We opted for the latter, since the sky looked like it might start dumping some rain. We were right about the rain which began heavily about 5 minutes after we left some of the other passengers. Back aboard, we got into our room and took a short nap before getting ready for dinner.

Our next port of call the following day was Geraldton. Geraldton has a population of around 38,000 and is an important port facility for mining interests.

Geraldton inner harbor

For some reason we got mixed up and thought we would have a sea day before coming to Geraldton and hadn’t made any plans or explored any of the shore excursions. After dinner and realizing our mistake, we went back to the room and goggled some information about Geraldton. We concluded that we would not be missing much if we did not go ashore the next day. Jane felt that a nice, relaxing day on the ship would do her wonders, so we decided to stay onboard and catch the next port.

Sunset over Geraldton harbor

Judging from the response of shipmates who went ashore, we made the right decision. Coming into Geraldton we did something we had not witnessed before. The pilot put the ship in a turning basin in the inner harbor and the passengers tendered from there. This took a major swell out of the tendering operation and allowed everything to proceed more quickly. We were delayed leaving Geraldton as one of the passengers had to be medically evacuated (our second such evacuation), but with a sea day tomorrow, the time could be made up.