wine, beer, chocolate tasting in swan valley

a great last day in perth! i wish it could have lasted longer. we took a tour of swan valley with out and about tours and had a ball.  we went to 5 wineries (pinelli, lancaster, windy creek, sitello's, jarah ridge) and then 1 brewery (elmar's, a german brewery), and 1 chocolate factory (margaret river chocolates)! we got to try 45 different wines and had fabulous cheese platters, chutneys, sausages, a lovely lunch buffet, yummy beer and incredible chocolate.  what a decadent day! and this was jose's first wine tour of course and i think he was rather impressed.  we got some wine and chutney to take back to derby with us.  caught the train home and cleaned up the place, packed quickly for tomorrow and then went out into leederville to meet his friend from the detention centre.  he no longer works up in derby and is in perth full time. it was nice to get to meet one of his colleagues and friends.  claire met up with us and we had a great time until i could no longer keep my eyelids open.   jose has really loved perth and since it is so much like california i think both of us could imagine settling here someday.  we both wished we had at least another week.  can't wait to see miski though!  more photos in the perth 2011 album

central perth shopping spree

today we took the very nice train to the city centre in search of some fun things to buy.  we walked around the several malls all within a few blocks, found a few good purchases and enjoyed seeing the big buildings.  lots of the stores were too fancy but there were some really nice ones.  after doing a bit of shopping we walked away from the river a ways to go to a very fancy cake/sweet shop...sadly it was closed.  instead we happened upon a crime scene with police everywhere and the street blocked off. apparently there was a man with a gun wandering around. we went around it and ended up eating at a vietnamese place called lodi i think.  this was jose's first experience with vietnamese food and he loved it! we got amazing spring rolls, veal and fried rice and i had an incredible beef dish with vermicelli noodles. it was heavenly.  walked by the police barrier again (they apparently ended up shooting the guy in the leg to get him out) and back into the city centre.  i bought some chocolates at a really nice grocery store (akin to gelsons) and then we continued to shop for a bit.  then we went to a little picadilly movie theatre and caught the 4pm show of Rango!  loved it. took the train back home where we ate left overs and watched social networking with emmett's brother's fiance.  many more photos in the Perth 2011 album.