So for my 30th birthday, Neil planned a surprise trip to Margaret River. One thing worth knowing about me is that I can never truly let anything be a surprise, I won’t get into it, but let’s just say I found out where we were going sooner than he would have hoped.
Regardless, I was stoked. Not only had I never been to ‘Stralia before, but we were going to one of the best wine regions this side of the globe. #winning
The flight was at 3am, so I snuck in a cheeky nap before heading to the airport. Neil has this thing, about having to be at the airport early, so we were actually there around 1am despite having no bags to check in, but thank goodness we were as we had an absolute nightmare getting our boarding passes.
I wrote out the whole sorry tale, and then realised that just the airport saga would take up this whole blog post, therefore in an attempt to keep this short(er) here are the highlights:
… The fancy electronic machines, which we were forced to use, weren’t working…
…so we queued up to the one open human counter with its 15minute line…
… where they wouldn’t give us our boarding passes as we had a balance to pay on our fare…
… which we couldn’t do at this desk, therefore having to leave the queue and start again at a different payment desk to pay an additional balance (for extra leg room, we learnt after asking 5 times)…
… who then made us go back to the original queue for boarding passes…
… where after another 15 minutes wait we were told we need visas before they can issue boarding passes…
Stop, wait. What?! VISAS!!! … insert panic stricken Neil shouting at me to complete my visa form on my phone and opt for the speedy 30 minute service…
…then 20 minutes later, we receive confirmation of our visas… well at least one of us does…
…add in an additional 30 minute panic time as one of us figures out we have wrongly input our passport number and needs to reapply for the visa…
… note: the airline staff have zero sympathy and advise they will be closing boarding in 10 minutes, with or without the visa...
…visa has still not arrived, with one minute before check-in closes…
… visa arrives, check-in closes, not before the airline staff casually hand over the boarding pass, WHICH WAS ALREADY PRINTED AND SITTING NEXT TO THEM THE WHOLE TIME!!!!
Moral of the story: Jetstar – genuinely one of the worst customer service experiences we’ve ever had. Granted we should have known about the visas but the staff looked at our passports 3 times (and took additional money from us) before informing us we needed them, and kept the time ticking the whole way through!
Thankfully, the flight was rather uneventful (although freezing) and we arrived in Perth around 9am the next morning. In one rather smooth process, we collected our rental car and after a quick squabble about who would get to drive, we hit the road, with Neil in the driver’s seat and me zoning in my DJ persona.
Neil happy he won the argument...
Margaret River is a scenic 3-hour drive from Perth, and we plodded along quite happily until we reached our hostel “The Edge of the Forest”. Hotels aren’t really a thing in this part of Australia, but we had nothing to worry about. This was the perfect places to spend our nights and just around the corner from the pubs and restaurants. The room was pretty standard with a nice bathroom and comfy beds!
The real highlight were the owners – who were insanely helpful as we had only arrived with a vague plan of what we wanted to do. They helped turn this into reality with some great suggestions of things to see along the way.
Sightseeing
Now on to the good stuff, what did we actually do in Margaret River? Here’s the highlights!
Caves Road
There are various caves you can go and see, mammoth cave, lake cave – but to me the most impressive thing we saw was the on the journey to the caves. If you’re driving down Caves Road, you will see these ginormous Karri trees. Not many things have made me gasp upon sight, but this was surely something. We parked ourselves on the side of the road and went all Bear Grylls and out in to the woods… I mean LOOK
Leeuwin-Naturaliste National Park
On Gnarabup Beach, Leeuwin-Naturaliste National Park has a beautiful walkway and such picturesque views. It was a little chilly when we were there, but that didn’t stop us from watching the sunset over the sea. The sun glittering on the sea was beautiful.
Bushtucker Trials – Wine Tour
So being in wine heaven, there are numerous tours we could have done to taste the wines of the region. There was honestly so many different wine tours, but with some useful tips from the hostel owners, we decided on the one which was for a “younger more vibrant” crowd and went with Bushtucker Trials. It was brilliant.
We were collected from the hostel, and along with about 10 other people, we started our tour of vineyards, breweries, chocolatiers and cheese houses. Amongst them were some rather famous ones, Knotting Hill Estate Vineyard and Woody Nook Wines being the most widely known.
At each winery we were given 3 (small) glasses of red wine and 3 of white. That is a lot of wine. In addition, we tried beers, ciders, chocolates and cheeses. This is literally my idea of heaven. No joke. It’s times like this, I know I married the right person, I mean a whole-day of this to celebrate the next decade in my life… amazeballs.
The day was made even better, as the group we were with were great! Super friendly, varied tastes and some excellent chat. There was also a guy who was a Vietnam war veteran, which pretty much blew my socks off – and so many people who had relocated to Australia from the UK. We all got on so well that in the evening, decided to carry on with the drinks and grab dinner together.
Bunkers Bay
There are numerous beautiful beaches and they all seem so untouched. We stumbled upon Bunkers Bay, which was so picturesque, we actually sat in silence for some time, taking it all in. Silence and I, are rarely ever considered together, so this was clearly a huge wow moment for me.
Closing thoughts on Margaret River
This was my first ever exposure to Australasia and I wasn’t sure what to expect. I’m not entirely sure why, but I’d never had a pull to go visit Australia – this trip was a lovely surprise. It was short, and for a milestone birthday which could be why I look upon it with rose tinted glasses, but I thoroughly enjoyed the trip! It was so different to our normal Asia trips and gave us a bit of variety, without an insanely long flight.
Closing thoughts on turning 30
So I am officially into my third decade now, actually that’s not accurate, I’m commencing into my FOURTH decade into this planet now. I was super excited about turning 30, mainly due to the celebrations, the age thing didn’t really play a factor (any excuse for a party I say).
But let’s be real, there is no difference! Maybe I am a bit more sensible now, and perhaps it’s nice to play the “I’m too old for that” card, when really I’ve been feeling “too old for that” for about 3 years now, but that’s kind of it.
Happy, healthy and in my thirties, what more could a girl ask for! Oh a video from my loved ones, sending me birthday wishes – got that too (almost but didn’t cry FYI).
