Week 25- Perth

I woke shortly after 05:00 on Monday morning thanks to the combination of heat and jet lag. Thankfully Jemma’s family were early risers anyway and it was all hands on deck on their small farm. As I was shown around I thought it was more of a zoo than a farm as I met Pepper, the pig, Will, the ferret, their three dogs, kangaroo, two rats, frogs, sheep, horses (both miniature and regular) and the new foal. I also met Jemma’s brother, Ben. Apparently I did quite well to get more than one word answers from him. I was very impressed to see that Jemma trims her own horses feet and does much of her own veterinary work because the cost is so high in their area. Once the animals were all fed we went for a walk up Mount Brown. Despite only being a short walk the temperature was quickly reaching 40°C so I found it surprisingly tough. The main thing that stood out from the view was just how vast everything is.

Once back at their home we went into York, the local town. It reminded me of an old Western but it was also very stereotypically Australian. We visited the town hall where films used to be shown and they had large posters about the town’s history, dating back to the late 1800s. Our last stop in York was an old car museum which included a 1946 VW Beetle, a 1956 three-wheel Italian police car and a 1980 rocket powered go cart that broke the land speed record at 405km/h along with many, many more. One of the joint owners had done up his own classic car which was open topped with wooden wheels and no lights. We were very kindly allowed to ride around town in it and a picture taken of us ended up on the front page of the local newspaper. I was very kindly treated to lunch before we came back, fed the animals, I met Jemma's sister, Sally, and then I stayed inside for most of the rest of the day looking at photos from the tetrathlon trips, reading my write up of it and looking at photos of Jemma's 1008km run. Jemma's mum, Liz, cooked us delicious BBQ noodles for dinner and as we were tucking into a cheesecake dessert I was firmly told to go to bed as I looked terrible!

Thankfully a good night's sleep had me feeling fresh again in the morning. Jemma and I drove to Narrogin (two hour's south of York) where she works on her uncle's farm for the harvest. The farm is 1000 hectares and mostly arable farming so the harvest takes several weeks. Jemma's job is to drive the chaser (tractor with the trailer behind) so that the header (combine harvester) can run continuously so as not to waste time. When we arrived the header was broken so after a quick bite of lunch we were sent to fix fences. I was just amazed by the lack of green and the amount of wire fencing! We had a swim in their pool with Jemma's cousins to cool off before Jemma was called to the wheel. I joined her for about 15min (which was a very cool experience) before her aunt, Sarah, (who also ran the 1008km trail) drove me to the train station. The train brought me to Perth city centre. On the way I met a man who asked about my traveling and said how he hated it in Perth but couldn't afford to leave. I thought perhaps he lacked drive. I certainly wasn't going to let that bother me. I caught a bus to the area called Nedlands and walked to the home of ‘Aussie Pete's’ parents. Aussie Pete was doing a masters in UCD last year, lives in Perth and very kindly arranged for me to stay with his parents for a night. I brought a bottle of Graham Norton wine with me, as he is Irish and it was made in New Zealand, as a thank you. Margaret and Bob were very kind. They gave me a plate of delicious food which I ate with Bob's brother and sister-in-law and Pete's brother. At the table I learnt about a travel accommodation group where members put up other members all around the world for free (bar a €50 registration fee). I was very glad of a shower and an air conditioned room as I slept soundly.

On Wednesday morning, I had breakfast at Margaret and Bob's, printed out some forms for the tournament and said goodbye to my hosts before catching the bus back into the city centre. While I waited for the team to arrive at the accommodation I visited the library and watched some tennis in Brisbane on a large screen outside the library. The new accommodation was a back packers called ‘old swan barracks’ which consisted of many sweaty rooms, an airhanger type social room and a kitchen plus a few cockroaches (one crawled out of the sofa onto me). It was wonderful to get to see all my friends and teammates again. We played plenty of table tennis when I first arrived. I proved one of the strongest which I think was due to the many hours Sam and I spent playing. Most of us went to a park that evening to throw for an hour or so before we went to a bar for dinner as they had a $5 deal. It was probably worth no more than $5 but welcome nonetheless.

We were all up early for a training session from 08:00-11:30 on Thursday morning in a local park. I wasn't playing but I did plenty of throwing and I was doing my best to be loud on the sideline. We bought food for lunch and met up back at the accommodation. Some people went to watch Canada vs Australia women's play in a warm up game but I went to the library to read my book and have a quick snooze in the air conditioned building. I’ve read three Agatha Christie books at this point and she gets me every time. We moved from the backpackers to the tournament accommodation (the student housing for the university of Western Australia) on Friday morning which involved completely taking over one of the public buses. Once we were all settled in we walked down to the local park where we were due to play the New Zealand team. I warmed up but my leg didn't feel right so I didn't play. It proved a close game in the wind but we ultimately came out on top. While we were grabbing dinner we bumped into Reyer, Shannon and Sage who I met in Poland. They then brought some snacks to our team meeting. That evening we found a giant jenga set in the rec room and played handstand jenga. This is where you play jenga while doing a handstand (with someone holding your legs). It went on for an incredible length of time!

Breakfast was provided at the halls but we had to be up early to complete 200 throws, starting at 08:00. We heard New Zealand were due to play Canada in another warm up game but we couldn't find it and instead watched Austria play a club side. As there was a half basketball court at the accommodation we bought a basketball and played a knockout game where you're out if the person behind you scores before you do. During dinner the Canadian women asked to borrow the ball. When we went back out we were told we would have to play them for it. The girls were definitely better, certainly for the amount of effort we were putting in. Sadly it all ended when Steej poked a Canadian in the eye. We then played hotseat among ourselves but were were outdone by the three Aussie girls. Clearly basketball isn't our sport.

Sunday was the opening ceremony for the tournament. We were collected by the bus and brought to the pitches in all our playing gear at 10:30. We ended up waiting quite a long time for the start so I strung up my hammock and read my book. Eventually all the teams were gathered behind the main tent and there was much singing and chanting. We were brought out team by team onto the show pitch before everyone dispersed again to watch the showcase game between Australia and India in the mixed division. Australia took the early lead and went up 7-1. We were distracted from the game when Costello's inflatable chair began to split but we regained focus to watch India go on a 7 point run to take half and then go on to win by 1 point. We were fed at the pitches and watched the first round of women's games before we were eventually brought home at 20:00. There was a nervous buzz in the air, knowing that the tournament would start for us the next day.

You can see all the photos from Perth here.