Always on the move...: Perth, Australia

Our family took a trip to Perth, Australia. Aaron has always wanted to go to Australia

so he was very excited. With only 5 days to spare, we decided on Perth because it

was a closer flight for us.We hope to visit Sydney sometime in the near future :)

Picture above was taken at the Penang Airport.

It is an advertisement for the 3D museum in Penang.

Just a couple blocks away from our hotel was Target!

Of coarse, we found out that it is actually not the same company as the one in the U.S.

Statues of businessman that had made Perth successful.

One of the first things we did on our trip was visit the Temple. We love to

visit the many temples around the world. We helped a family with

their family file names in performing baptisms.

There is a small walking street in Perth that is designed like a medieval village. This is the entrance to that street. It reminded us of Diagon Alley from Harry Potter.

We visited the Perth Mint and watched how gold ore is

melted down and turned into gold bars.

This coin weighs 2 tons and is worth 50 million U.S. dollars.

On Sunday morning of our trip, Melynn had an appointment with the local Stake Patriarch.

We came to his home and visited with him and his lovely wife before he gave

Melynn her Patriarchal Blessing. It was a very special event in her life

and I am so glad we could participate in it with her.

The Patriarch's name is Davidson Joseph of the Daniella Stake.

Afterwards we attended sacrament meeting at the local church house.

We found this great Mexican place across the street from our hotel and ended up eating there twice! We don't get good Mexican in Malaysia so we always take advantage when we can. On other days we had some great barbecue, hamburgers and some big breakfasts. We ate a lot! I miss western food!

Sunday afternoon we switched gears and headed south to the Fremantle Prison. This prison was part of the convict era in Australia. This is when criminals from England were given the opportunity for shorter sentences if they would serve their time in Australia. While in Australia, they would work for the government building roads, water systems etc... After this era, it was used as a normal prison up until 1991. There was very little change to it from its beginning. Up until it closed there was no indoor plumbing in the cells. The prisoners had to use buckets for their waste.

We found a Krispy Kreme on our way back from the prison! Had to go inside!!!

This was our dinner...Oh Well :)

We found this esplanade area across from the city and we strolled around a bit.

Then we drove up to Kings Park for an even better view of the city! It is a beautiful park.

We always like to try the local treats.

We did not eat all these in one day!

Monday was our big day out. We drove over two hours north to the Pinnacles. On our way we found many dead Kangaroo on the sides of the road. So sad!

There were many warning signs.

We spotted these Emu's on the side of the road.

I didn't take any photos of the dead kangaroos though.

The Pinnacles are a natural phenomenon in the desert of western Australia.
No one is quite sure exactly how they formed but there are several theories.
Some people think they are ancient forest of trees that have petrified.
Others believe they are the remnants of an ancient reef.

Either way, they are pretty cool!

The Pinnacles are very close to the ocean as you can see in the photo above.

Found this creature walking along the sidewalk.

There were lots of flies out and it was quite annoying!

They seemed to like to land on you if you had a dark shirt on for some weird reason.

After the Pinnacles we drove south about 30 minutes to the sand dunes in Lancelin. It is a very small town near the ocean. We stopped at a nice little pizza place before coming here and found the people in town very friendly. On our way to the dunes, the car behind us could tell we were not sure where we were going so he pulled up along side us to ask us if we needed help with directions.