enni's good friends, Steve and Jenni, along with their two kids, Travis and Teneille, Bev and her adorable boys, Nick and Ben, and Maria and Tad and their son Trevor. We soon felt the outstanding hospitality of Australians as they provided us with places to sleep, food to eat, kids to play with, and entertainment.Steve and Jenni brought their ski boat along since Travis is into competitive trick skiing and slalom skiing. They were kind enough to take us out on the boat, giving us tons of time to brush up on our wake-boarding skills and improve our skiing. Soon enough, early mornings were routine, getting up as early as 5:00 a.m. to beat the other boats and take advantage of the flat water on the river. Some mornings there was mist above the water and it was an amazing sight. Dan, V, and I learnt to love these mornings, but Br
itt took a bit more to come around. It's a fact that she is not a morning person and she proved this to be true on these boat rides. While we were all waking up as we drove off with the boat, excited to get into the water, Britt would be bundled up in her blanket with her eyes barely open. Even the coffee and chai teas that Jenni prepared for us each morning on the boat couldn't wake her! She was a good sport, however and managed to somehow climb into the boat every morning. Steve would show off his bare footing skills, while Trav would capture all of our attention as he did tricks on the ski. V and I had a go at skiing, whereas Dan mastered slaloming...something she's definitely going to take home with her to show her parents. Most days started off with a couple hours on the boat and if we were lucky we'd get a second go in the afternoon with the knee boards and tubes. We will be forever grateful to Steve for taking us out on the boat...definitely one of our highlights of the trip!In between skiing and relaxing, we were kept busy playing with all the kids that were there. Teneille, at only 4 years has great aspirations to be a pediatrician and boy does she know her stuff already! She would love to play house and doctor and one time made sure that Dan went through all the steps when delivering a baby. Trav and Trevor were always keen on skiing and showing their mad skills. Ten year old Nick, already a ladies man, won over all our hearts with his dimples, meanwhile Benny, who looks all cute and innocent, surprised us all with his mischievous side, with heaps of plans to prank us. All of these kids are gems and we loved being around them, reminding us of ou
r younger siblings and cousins. In the early evenings the kids would take us out hunting for the kangaroos that took over the campsites. They are like deer at home as they would hop right into your campsite scavenging for any leftovers/garbage that was left out.Once again our backpacking skills came in handy as we had only packed a couple of shirts and shorts and soon ran out of clothes. We thought that since we were camping that it was no big deal to wear the same outfits over and over again, but it was quickly pointed out that we were always wearing the same things. They caught on quickly though and soon enough it was overlooked and instead they focused on rewarding us when we took showers. Our style of camping is a bit different than theirs. Whereas we were content with eating our canned tuna and corn cakes, we quickly got drawn into eating the amazing meals they made us, from curry to pizzas, we never went to bed hungry. Steve is a baker and challenged us to a bake off one morning after we told him about our
banana pancakes. Well, the contest was very close, but the baker did win in the end...I still think that the judges were a bit biased...maybe paid a bit of money on the side. With his bread maker in tow, Steve made us homemade pizzas one night, which were delicious, and a fresh loaf of bread would be waiting for us every morning. Let's just say that we never went hungry. I must point out that this was a bit of luxurious camping. Even though we were sleeping in a tent, that's about the only "roughing it" that we did. A cappuccino maker, TV, bread maker, and pizza oven are just a few of the luxuries that were available to us. From now on, we know who to call when we want to go camping. I mean, who uses little butane stoves and instant coffee anymore?A couple of the days we ventured off to explore and our first stop was at the Jewel Caves, were Marc, Erin and Amy joined us for the day. After doing some exploring, we then made our way to the Cape Leuuwin lighthouse, and made a stop on the way at Cozy Corner,
which is an amazing beach with white sand, turquoise waters ,just gorgeous. We made a little time for some leap frog and pictures and then were off. At the lighthouse we had a quick lunch and went to explore where the Southern and Indian Ocean meet. The path to the lighthouse was surrounded with high, dry grass, ideal for snacks to live in and on the way back we finally saw our first snake, a Dukeit. Well, at least those of us who weren't too petrified did. After much convincing, we managed to get everyone down the path and back to the carpark. Another amazing spot that we checked out down south was Meelup and Eagle Bay beach. Erin and Marc brought us out there with their family and introduced us to probably the most spectacular beach and water that we have seen. People aren't lying when they 
say that western Australia has the nicest beaches. We no longer felt the need to go to Bali or Thailand to find crystal blue water. It's hard to really describe it, but hopefully the pictures give you just a glimpse of how beautiful it was. We spent some time on the beach and then in the water floating on Marc's pimped out tube, which had an ipod dock and speakers and everything. Funny story about that though, our first experience on the tube was actually back at home at the Calgary Stampede, when Marc and Erin came to visit. Britt's sister Meghan had this tube and we floated down the Elbow River all afternoon on it. Marc loved it so much that he bought one in Canada and got it shipped out all the way to Australia. And the first time he used it was with all of us Canadian girls! I guess he felt that the best way to break it in was with those who came from the same place it did.We finally decided that it was probably time for us to head back into Perth and start looking for jobs and figuring out what we were going to do for the next little while. It's only a 3.5 hr drive from Augusta to Perth, but it ended up taking us 10 hrs to make it
back since we made so many stops along the way. We took Caves Road, which takes you along all the wineries of Margaret River and surrounding areas and made a couple of stops at some wineries for pictures and wine-tasting. One of our tastiest stops was at Providore, where in one building they have samples of dips and jams and recipes, and just around the corner is the chocolate factory, with heaps and heaps of different chocolate. The best part of it all though were the samples of chocolate that they had. They had 3 massive bins of white, milk and dark chocolate pellets that you could scoop out and snack on. We really were in heaven and kept going back for more and more until we started to feel a bit guilty...but that didn't stop us from all taking another handful on our way out! Back on the road we went but didn't make it very far before we made a stop at Yallingup beach and braved the massive waves. We made a few more quick stops in Dunsborough and the Busselton Jetty and finally we were back home in Perth. Going down south in Western Australia is a breathtaking experience and should not be passed. We were fortunate enough to be able to go down that way and spend it with 3 amazing families and had an incredible time. We cannot wait for what else Perth has to offer.Cheers,
Jod
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