7/11 Frrrreeemantllllllle!!!

The sound of tiny rain drops on the windows woke us up; the room seemed pretty empty for such a watery morning. Everyone had their own work and duty. We were supposed to be heading to the far away beachside for some fish and chips but with the grey and cloudy sky above, I was having second thought. That’s when Roxie reminded me of the announcement that the city railway will be closed down for fixing from the 12^th to the 17^th, we will be leaving on the 15^th so this means that we only have today to pay Fremantle a visit otherwise it’s a see you later bro the next time we come to Australia, Perth!

Breakfast hadn’t changed much, toast with cheese with a cup of hot milk to warm the stomach. I still had shorts for my outfit, but included a denim shirt, my North Face jacket and the scarf that Roxie made for me. We shared an umbrella on the way to the CBD and ducked into the station for shelter. Fremantle is the last stop of the train and we will be taking a 16-minute trip to get there. Costing us 4 AUD each, I must say that the public transportation here in Australia are a bit of money lovers…

The landscape out of the window escaped from a couple of tall buildings to fields and green grass, but by the time we got to our destination, we were already surrounded by harbors, boats and sea water. There was no one to check for our tickets at the station so we were to enter Fremantle freely.

The sky was still dripping tears, smelly odor of fish and feces filled up our nostrils. Just think of Fremantle as a big town of fishermen and pubs; its main street is High Street, the rest were a little bit desolated so don’t even bother to get acquainted with them. There were several shops selling souvenirs, fish and chips on the main street, we even entered a store selling specific didgeridoos! The cashiers were two nice and cool young fellas and very friendly. They demonstrated the correct usage of those Native instruments and offered to teach us! First you have to cover the big hole of the top of the stick with your whole mouth, after making sure that none of the air leaks, the blower then either tremble or shake or vibrate their lips to produce sound that goes through the tube! Which was very cool except that I got my whole mouth on a lot of Australian saliva that belonged to the cashiers… it was an amazing experience though.

There’s also one art craft shop that sold animal models made from steel. There were so many types of animals and I love one of the orange lizards the most! The price was a little bit high and Roxie stopped me from purchasing the lovely reptile and that just made me a little bit sad. By the time we got to the harbor, the rain had weakened, through clean water you can even see gigantic crabs crawling among the rocks! The air here was better with less stinks, and taste different from the smoke and gas back in the CBD.

GPS was on, then off. Puff! Just like that, out of battery. Luckily we got the Wifi Sim card for the direction. With the help of Google Map, we went around the coast and came to the most worth restaurant that sells fish and chips, according to the Internet. It’s an enormous restaurant named Cicerellos that price ranged from 20 to 30AUD a set and that was just crazy! But we had come a long way just to taste these famous fried babes and how could we just let them slip out of our fingers?! So we got one set of classic fish and chips and a seafood platter.

The dining area was surrounded by rectangular fish tanks and you could see eels and king crabs, lobsters doing some swimming just by your side. There were even big fish tanks in the bathrooms making the whole place like a freaking aquarium! It was pretty funny to watch the starfish wobble while taking a piss. And there came our food! It was a big plate full of fried seafood and chips and a large paper covered package, with two big pieces of fried fish and more chips inside. We laid out the paper and spreaded it evenly on the tables, then we just pour everything out like everyone else does. But people around kept checking us out, maybe they doubt that whether two small Asians can really finish that huge pile of junk food? The answer was no. Roxie and I shared the food from the start: the first piece of fried fish was amazing, just to fill up the appetite, and then came the second one with a heavy taste. The third one, from the seafood platter was too much for us, we could only align it with some garden salad after we finished all of the Caesar sauce. There were fried crab legs, two prawns, squids, a lot of chips, and most oddly, a fried pineapple. We didn’t finish all the fries in the end so we wrapped it up for dinner. (it cost us 18 AUD each and felt painful, but that was a really special experience. Not even to mention the size of the meal!)

We went for a walk around the famous peer in Fremantle exchanging for a good digestion. We wrote words on the beach and took several jumping postures. There were a couple of teens swimming in the water not far away, despising the cold as if nothing. Afterwards we climbed on to a fort where people could get a spectacular view of most of Fremantle, there was also an exhibition about dive shooting (underwater photographing) going on and the pictures were wondrous. In the meantime the rain gradually stopped, and we took a hike back to the train station

Fremantle gave us a kind of touch and experiences much differentiated from Perth, and a lot of fries haha. Roxie bought some really sweet sundaes on our way home and they tasted rubberlike…We placed the rest of the fries on a long plate and poured ketchup on top sided with cheese slices, they were extremely delicious once they came out of the oven. A new foreigner joined us in the dorm today and the one that was here yesterday left. It was an amazing day today and I guessed I would have to go to bed early in order to replenish my era.