Tag: Food and Drink

Fremantle Favorites

One of our favorite places in Western Australia was Fremantle. Freo, for short, is a coastal city with history, culture, beaches, and more. We spent a week there, exploring the city streets and coastal paths, enjoying the nightlife, food, and history. Here are our Fremantle favorites.

About Fremantle

Located 22km south and west of the city of Perth, Fremantle is a city of its own with a population just over 36,000. In fact, while we were in Freo, we didn’t visit Perth, knowing we would have time there at the end of our month in Western Australia. We found plenty to do in Fremantle for such a small city. For context, it has fewer people than Port Macquarie, but feels much bigger because of the amount of activities on offer.

Sunset in Fremantle
A sunset from a Freo rooftop

With lots of preserved Victorian historic buildings, waterfront walking paths, and bars and restaurants, Fremantle is a great place to visit for a long weekend. For us, a week was a good length of time to experience our Fremantle favorites and still relax.

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What to Do in Darwin

After a year and a half in Australia, our last stop was Darwin. The capital of the Northern Territory, it’s a small city. With a population of under 150,000 people, it’s even smaller than Cairns. This is the Australian tropics, and we felt the heat and humidity daily. Darwin is also home to lots of crocs and croc tours, and seeing the crocs is on our list of what to do in Darwin, Australia.

Arriving In Darwin

For us, just arriving in Darwin was interesting. We sailed there from across the top of Australia, with good wind pushing us west from Thursday island and east. Once we arrived in Darwin, we had to wait to get into the marina because of timing the tides. You see, tides in this part of the world are pretty extreme, with differences up to almost 8 meters. With those big tides, we didn’t want to anchor out and then wait all day to leave or return to our boat.

Instead we made a booking at Cullen Bay Marina. To get into the marina, we had to navigate a lock, which we haven’t done since the Panama Canal. It was a much shorter trip, but still stressful. We put out lots of lines and not enough fenders and got bumped and jostled. On both the entry and exit, the lockmaster was very helpful, but we ended up sweaty from the stress and the heat. Darwin is a hot place!

lock, Cullen bay Marina, Darwin
Approaching the lock exiting Cullen Bay Marina

Getting Around Darwin

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Visiting The Hunter Valley

The Hunter Valley wine region is the birthplace of Australian wines, and is a beautiful area. A top day tour from Sydney, the region has scenic landscapes, gourmet food and drink, parks and other activities. I recommend an overnight visit. We liked visiting The Hunter Valley so much, we went twice.

About The Hunter Valley

The Hunter Valley is one of Australia’s oldest wine regions, and the most prestigious in New South Wales. With over 150 wineries, breweries, and cideries, it’s a very popular weekend destination. The number and variety of quality restaurants is just as big, another reason to go.

kangaroos in a Hunter Valley vineyard
Kangaroos in a vineyard in The Hunter Valley
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