In June 2011 I visited Perth, Australia for a week.

Despite being based in Perth, I had a hire car so actually spent very little time in Perth itself (to be honest, I didn’t find Perth city itself very interesting).

I visited Fremantle several times – it’s a beautiful Port city on the mouth of the Swan River. In many ways it reminded me of more traditional English towns – but just much warmer! I could happily live in Fremantle. I visited the Round House (the oldest public building in Western Australia), Fremantle Prison, and even managed to find a local camera shop that managed to clean my camera when I got the sensor covered in dust (to much relief!)

Fremantle Prison was very interesting – it only closed in 1991, and had been left in the exact state it was when it closed. Our tour guide was fascinating, and promised his knowledge was either because he was “an ex-guard or ex-prisoner” – he’d let us decide which.

Just a short (but bumpy!) ferry trip away from Fremantle was Rottnest Island. If you’re ever in the Perth area it’s worth making the trip (many people I spoke to from Perth had never been!). It’s a beautiful small island (just 19 square kilometres), and an A-Class Reserve meaning it can never be spoiled. The only people that can live there are staff, the only vehicles are the odd tour-bus and there is no private ownership of land allowed.

As well as breath-taking scenery, it also has much wildlife including lots of birds (sorry, that’s about as much detail as I can give – but I think they were impressive ones!) and the famous Rottnest Quokka – a marsupial in the same family as kangaroos and wallabies, and about the same size as a cat. There are no natural predators of them on the island, so they are tame, can be walked up to, and very cute!

The island has a long history of being a prison, reformatory and military fort (during World War II, two 9.2-inch guns were installed near the middle of the island). Now, nearly 200 years of farmland clearing, firewood collection and bushfires has meant that most of the land is covered mainly by bushland – which is perfect for the Quokkas to live. The island is now mainly self-sufficient and has it’s own wind-turbine that supplies most of the power (they were very proud of this wind turbine!)

About 3-4 hours drive outside of Perth I also visited the Pinnacles in Nambung National Park. These are like nothing I’ve ever seen – they’re limestone pillars rising up out of the sand, for as far as you can see. A dirt track has been marked around a section of them, which you could drive around. It’s hard to explain, but it was a really nice place to be, especially as the sun set.

I definitely think at least half of the enjoyment of the trip to the Pinnacles was the 3-4 hour drive there along the Indian Ocean Drive. It was only finished in September 2010, and was exactly what I expected an Australian road to be like – long, flat and very straight! There was some breathtaking scenery along the way, and was nice to get out into the middle of nowhere away from all the cities.

There are more photos of the Pinnacles in the separate post I made about them here

I also visited Perth Zoo and Scarborough beach, but Rottnest Island, Fremantle and The Pinnacles were definitely the unmissable places for me near Perth, Western Australia.