And here we are in Perth! Who would have thought that this clapped-out old van that goes under the name of ‘Hostile Takeover’ would have made the journey all the way from Darwin without major mishap or breakdown particularly given such an inauspicious start. The gods must have been smiling on us! Perhaps the epithet emblazoned on the back of the van had an element of truth ‘Without order nothing exists; without chaos nothing evolves’. But ours was definitely not the most provocative or entertaining slogan we have seen along the way. Some of the huge number we have come across include ‘If I were you I would have sex with me’ (South Park), I’m a schizophrenic and so am I’, ‘ Lord knows I just want to break free’ (Queen), ‘Stinky Bum’, What’s wet, pink and likes dark holes?’, the words to Strawberry Fields (The Beatles), ‘Sometimes you just have to pee in the sink’ and the one I like the best ‘If only men were as satisfying as chocolate’.
We are now into our last week in Australia and have a number of things to sort out before we leave. Not least, booking our flight out of Indonesia otherwise we could be refused entry, getting some more anti-malarials to see us through to the end of the trip, cleaning out the van in readiness for it’s return on Wednesday, booking airport transfers and accommodation in Bali, collecting our passports from the Indian Consulate plus a number of other little jobs. All of which will keep us pretty busy for the next couple of days at least.
After booking into the campside in the suburb of Redcliffe about 8km out from the centre we drive into Perth and make an appointment at the Travel Clinic for later in the afternoon. We then walk 20 minutes to West Perth to the Indian Consulate office on the edge of Kings Park only to find it closed. It’s opening hours are 12.30 to 1.30 pm Monday to Friday! Back at the clinic we have more success and for a mere £140 including consultation fees we have secured 11 weeks supply of doxycyclin anti malarials.
It’s too cold to sit out after dark so we retreat to the MacDonalds up the road to avail ourselves of the warmth and, just as importantly, the free wifi. They also do a rather nice ‘Mr Whippy’ type ice cream with a flake for a mere $1 – so who could resist! Yes, we know how to live the high life! It allows us to book a couple of night’s accommodation in Ubud on Bali – another job done. Still no progress with Amex though and the connection isn’t good enough to support Skype in order to make a chase-up call. That will have to wait for another day.