PERTH

We've had a great week in Perth. The city area itself is beautiful and we had a good view of it from the war memorial in Kings Park. Driving through the city is an interesting mix of very old and very new architecture. Just after taking this photo we listened to the WA Premier holding a press conference in the park nearby. The boys were intrigued by all the cameras and security guys.

We went for a walk through the botanic gardens - one part of Kings Park. Federation Walkway takes you throught the treetops.

My favourite part of the gardens was the wildflower section. We've heard a lot about the wildflowers in this part of the country and they really are spectacular.

The kids' favourite part of Kings Park was one of the playgrounds. It included statues of dinosaurs like this phytosaur - directly related to today's crocodiles.

The next day we discovered the annual Fremantle Festival was on - a week of different activities and events, many of them FREE!! On Saturday we went to the Kite Spectacular in the park next to the beach. It's a great spot for kites - very windy.

The day also included lots of entertainers. We were enthralled by a group called Erth from Sydney and their dinosaur puppets. It was informative and very funny. All the dinosaurs lived in Australia or New Zealand at some stage.

On Sunday we went to the festival's Kids Day. Again, there were many different entertainers and activities, but our kids spent most of the day at the circus skills workshop. Tara went straight for the hula hoops and didn't want to try anything else. I finally talked her into trying the spinning plates. She eventually mastered two at once and was quite pleased with herself.

Brodie, never one to rush in to a new situation, stood outside the ropes and just watched everyone else for about 45 minutes. When he finally decided to give it a go he had so much fun.

Casey tried everything, but was determined to master juggling. He's been practising ever since.

Tara has been counting down the sleeps until her birthday on the 14th. The boys both got to choose something they'd like to do or somewhere they'd like to go for their birthdays. We thought we'd better find somewhere to go for Tara while we were still in Perth because there were lots of options. She decided on Adventure World - a bit like Dreamworld but smaller (and considerably cheaper!) We thought it would be fairly quiet on a Monday outside school holidays, but it was almost deserted compared to the theme parks on the Gold Coast. No queues at all! Tara decided we should all go on the kids roller coaster first. She'd never been on a roller coaster before and I don't think she'll go on one again! It was faster and bumpier than I expected and she clung onto my arm the whole way. When it stopped she said, "Finally! I think I'm going to throw up." She was happy to have her photo taken afterwards in front of the ride.

Everyone's favourite part of the day was driving the go carts around the racetrack.