Varun's Daily Diary

Thursday, 29 March 2012

Day 1 - Perth, Western Australia

Greetings from the "penthouse" of The Richardson Hotel ...

We arrived in Perth at 0200 ... and I finally got into bed at 0430. Immigration was of US-nightmare-queue-for-hours-proportions ... whereas Customs was strangely fun & efficient!

This morning was like a drunken haze ... lurching from exhaustion to perkiness ... from bed to high-carb food.

At lunchtime we were picked up by the lovely folks from the Tourist Board who drove us the ten minutes to the Royal Perth Yacht Club ... located next to the Swan River. Here I met with Skip Lissiman and the fabulous John Longley - who was part of the America's Cup racing team in 1983. He is (possibly) the only Britain to have "won" the America's Cup ... due to his passport being British.

Anyway - we all spent a fabulous afternoon on the Swan tacking ... and such like ... Perth is ideal for sailing ... the weather is mostly perfect and the wind is legendary ... it's a must for any sailor. We didn't get to the Ocean ... that's for tomorrow!

I got a bit hot in the sun ... there's very little ozone down here protecting us from the suns rays and when it shone ... it burnt! Thank goodness for sunblock!

After sailing ... with more added sailing ... and a bit more sailing AND watching the sun set, we headed back to the Yacht Club for a bar-b-cue ... where I cooked/burnt my own food ... I loved it ... but the boys were less impressed with my chargrilled efforts.

I got bitten by a mozzie. Ugh ...

A lovely Day 1 ...