First off, my friend Tony in London had an odd bank holiday on Monday. He was sitting with friends in Hyde Park and Han Solo and Ally McBeal walked past him! I'd guess that they didn't realise it was actually Tony, but it was. I never see celebrities, and Tony always does. Humph.
Anyway. Anne and I went to the winery on Tuesday alvo, and tasted several wines. I was driving so we didn't tip too much back. We bought a bottle and our treaty day cost us over $50. Oh dear! However, I managed to justify it since the organised half-day wine tour would have cost us $110. Saving!
On Wednesday morning we left Margaret River and drove down to Augusta. On the way we visited CaveWorks - a display on caves that wasn't very good - and then went to Jewel Cave for an hour long tour. This is the second cave we've been down on our adventure, and Anne has decided that she likes caves. (I should hope so at $15 a pop for a tour!) Jewel Cave was quite impressive, with some unusual formations and big caverns.
We checked in to the Baywatch Manor Hostel in Augusta. This hostel has won 'Best Hostel' awards all but one of the last seven years, or something. Hmmmm. I'm not overly impressed. It's nice, I suppose, and it's clean, which is good, but it's noting special. And this is one of the few hostels we've been in where there's been no hot water for our shower. Grr! And a bunch of Japanese youths insist on having the TV on all the time and putting videos on for five minutes and then putting a different video on, despite claiming not to understand English when I tried to speak to them. Gits.
Today, Anne and I went whale watching. It was great. Some humpbacks had been spotted off the coast so once everyone had boarded the boat, we raced out to look for them. I was disappointed that we didn't find them, but we did see lots of huge Southern Right Whales and their calves. It's a humbling feeling being in the water with these things (well, being on a boat which is in the water). They also gave us sandwiches on the boat - bonus ball! The weather was a bit wet and windy, and Anne got cold, but the skies cleared for a while and the sun came out enough to warm us up a bit.
After the whale watching Anne and I raced out to the most south-westerly point of Australia, where the Indian and Southern Ocean meet. There's Leeuwin lighthouse there too, so we looked at that for a bit. We also saw an old waterwheel. Back at the hostel, after a soup lunch, Anne fell asleep on my shoulder at the dinner table. It seems the travel sickness tablet she took has made her drowsy. I put her to bed, read for a bit, and then snuck out to write this blog. Bless her.