Australia Port Stops, Part 2 - February 2025

This is the second of two postings that share information about our Australian port stops. 

Busselton

Busselton is located in the South West region of Western Australia. The town is known for its one mile long wood-piled jetty - one of the longest in the world. We had a ship excursion that included a rail trip over the jetty to an underwater interpretive center at the extreme end of the jetty. We really enjoyed "going underwater" to view the fish and other sea animals swimming under the jetty or attached to jetty supporting poles. 

After leaving the jetty, we walked into the central business district. As our visit was on a Sunday, we found most stores closed except for two large supermarkets. After picking up some sundry supplies, we returned to the Viking Venus for the afternoon. 

Tender Arriving at Busselton Jetty

View from Interpretive Center

The Viking Venus is in the Background

Adelaide

The Adelaide cruise terminal was conveniently located next to the "Outer Harbor" rail station that connects to the Adelaide central business district. A 35 minute ride brought us to the start of an "on-our-own" walking tour. We left the station and walked past the Adelaide Botanic Park, towards the Adelaide Botanical Garden. Our visit timing was perfect for viewing Chihuly glass sculptures that were placed throughout the garden.  Chihuly is a glass artist and for 50 years has explored glass translucency, light and color.

The temperature was getting quite warm as we left the garden and walked on East Terrace to Hutt Street, considered a 'vintage heritage' street. Our overall impression was that this street reflected buildings with very mixed architecture - some new, some historic structures, some run down buildings and empty lots. 

After running a quick errand at Timm's Clothing Store to pick up shoe polish, we stopped for a light lunch at the Central Market. From the Market, we walked to the South Australian Museum to view the Aboriginal exhibits, describing the practices, culture and tools of early Aboriginal life.

We returned to the rail station and made our way back to the Outer Harbor rail station.

Adelaide Rail Station

Grey-Hooded Flying Foxes are the largest bats in Australia. They have a wing span of three feet and are found in the Queensland area. The species is vulnerable due to loss of natural habitat, power lines, domestic dogs and shooting. We noticed the foxes as we walked past Adelaide Botanic Park.

Grey-Hooded Flying Fox (Bats)
Hanging from Tree

Chihuly Glass Sculptures

Central Market Display

Albany

Through heavy morning rain and wind, we traveled by bus on a ship excursion to the Valley of the Giants Tree Top Walk, Elephant Bay Rocks and a lunch and wine tasting at the Lake House Winery. Luckily, as we reached our tree walk destination, the rain stopped and wind was light. 

The Valley of the Giants has a 120 feet high metal walkway through the tops of a tall forest of red tingle trees and red flowering gum trees. The forest was previously an area visited by thousands of walking visitors, which threatened the shallow tree roots and bark as well as created erosion. A metal aerial walkway was constructed in 1996 to help protect the forests by providing a walkway away from the tree roots. The walkway protects the impact of humans on the trees. There is also a short "Ancient Empire" hiking trail near the Valley of the Giants that permits visitors to walk among several Tingle trees.

The aerial walkway is composed of six lightweight metal bridge spans. The spans were designed to gently sway as you walk to create the sensation of being in the canopy of the trees. I found that holding onto one or both handrails was helpful as I moved along the Tree Top Walkway - some visitors avoided looking down from the walkway to the far away ground level. Of course, there were also visitors that walked along the spans without any concerns.

The walkway has proven to be very popular. By 2017, 3.5 million visitors have viewed the Tingle Trees from the aerial walkway. 

Ancient Empire Walk

Looks like a Hobbit House Door

Elephant Rocks and Cove is part of the William Bay National Park, in Western Australia. We made a brief scenic photo stop as we left the Valley of the Giants and headed towards Lake House Winery.

Elephant Rocks

Lake House Winery Lunch

Lake House Winery, Great Place for Food and Dining

Beautiful Winery Grounds

Melbourne

This port stop was another "on our-own" walking tour.  We had from 9am to 4pm to explore Melbourne. We started at Royal Arcade, continued to Queen Victoria Market and the remainder of the day was spent at the Royal Botanic Garden and Fitzroy Gardens. Riding the local trams helped us to move around the city and make the best use of our time. 

Edgar Wilson, a 77 year old retiree in England, constructed a model village and presented it to the City of Melbourne in 1948. It was sent in appreciation of Melbourne sending food to England during WWII. There are 28 buildings, representing a Kentish village. The model village is in Fitzroy Gardens.

Tudor Village Models

From 1931 to 1934, Ola Cohn worked on creating the likeness of dwarfs, fairies, gnomes and other animals and birds on the tree trunk of a Red Gum tree in Fitzroy Gardens. The tree trunk and artwork has been preserved even after the death of the tree. Ola Cohn wrote three books based on the Fairies' Tree.

Carvings in the Fairies' Tree, Fitzroy Garden

In the central business district, we visited Queen Victoria Market to purchase some lunch items for our later walk in the Botanical Garden. We also stopped at the Royal Arcade, the first shopping arcade in Melbourne. This Victorian building, characterized by arches, passageways, and shops, opened in 1869. It was designed by Charles Webb, an English architect.

Meat Counter at Queen Victoria Market

Royal Arcade

Royal Arcade Bakery

 Shrine of Remembrance, Established in 1918
Victorian Memorial for all Australians
Serving in War and Peacekeeping 
(We wished we had more time to view the many exhibits in this building).

Begonias in Conservatory, Fitzroy Gardens

Cook's cottage was constructed in 1755, in North Yorkshire, by the parents of Captain James Cook. The building was purchased and brought to Melbourne in 1934 by the Australian philanthropist, Sir Russel Grimwald. There is some debate whether Captain Cook ever lived or visited the cottage. 

Cook's Cottage, Fitzroy Gardens

Using balcony shadows, this building displays the portrait of 
William Barak, an Aboriginal activist and author

Burnie

I had made arrangements for a taxi to take our party of four to Wings Wildlife Park. This park is a sanctuary for injured animals. It is located about a 45 minute drive from the cruise terminal. Our young taxi driver drove rather fast and seemed generally unfamiliar with Burnie, other than driving.

 

The family-owned wildlife park has over 150 species to view, from reptiles, fish, birds and other Australian wildlife. Much of the park seemed more similar to a small zoo, with wildlife in cages. However, visitors could freely walk in the kangaroo area and feed them from food bags purchased at the entry desk.

Upon returning to Burnie, one travel lesson was unfortunately reinforced - confirm your taxi fare before you enter the vehicle. I had arranged the taxi from a non-local central reservation desk that told me the fare for bringing us to and from the wildlife park, with the driver waiting during our visit, was $200 AUD. Somehow the central office misquoted the fare and the driver told us we owed $250 AUD. We finally compromised at $225 AUD, but I can share that the driver was very displeased.

  

Eden

Eden was our last port stop on the 32 day cruise itinerary. Eden is a small town, about a six hour drive from Sydney, with a population of about 3,500. From the cruise terminal, we walked to the Main Street of the central business district. Along a two block length street, there were coffee shops, a grocery store, pharmacy, outdoor supplies shop, real estate offices and several clothing stores. We stopped at a meat pie store for a mid-day sausage roll and a beef and mushroom pie. By 12 noon, we had finished our walk and returned to the Viking Venus. We had an "all-aboard" time of 1pm as the ship was scheduled to leave Eden at 2pm

With a final disembarkation in Sydney the following day, it was time to start packing for our flight back to Northern California.