We set off at 10 and drove 3.5 hours back to Perth. Millie watched movies on her iPad and Nick and I spent most of the time talking about how much the area feels like Texas. It was an easy and pretty drive.

We arrived at our hotel and checked in. The lady working at reception asked if we were on holiday, which is a common question. We usually just say yes. She went on to tell us that she just returned from her first real holiday ever, which was a long weekend in Tasmania. It was her first time out of Perth and her first time on a plane. She told us how shocked she was that the air smelled so different there. It was a good reminder of how lucky we are to be doing what we’re doing, and not to take any little thing for granted.

We relaxed inside the room for a while. Millie did some book pages and made a whole mess while setting up a world for herself and Judy. I looked on Google maps to see what was nearby for us to do. I saw a place called “Academy of Taxidermy” a block away. Okay, yes, sign me up.

We walked over to it and it was a terrifyingly awesome funhouse of artifacts and taxidermied animals. We were greeted in the lobby by a Russian woman and a very still sleeping dog. It’s in an old theater and houses all of her husband’s “work”. Millie was horrified and I loved it.

We spent about an hour here and left just before they closed. The dog in the front room had not moved on our way out and only in that moment, despite all the clues, did I realize it was stuffed.

We walked back to our hotel via a park. Millie played for about 5 minutes but suddenly got terrified of ants. She hates bugs which does not bode well for our upcoming outback road trip. I have heard horror stories about the flies.

We had dinner at the pub attached to our hotel, which is apparently the oldest continuously running pub in Western Australia. It had a live musician complete with two didgeridoos.

Nick went to return our rental car so that we have one less thing to do before our early flight in the morning.

A silly observation… our last two Airbnbs had doors with very high door handles. How high? So high that I have a bruise on my shoulder from running into one. We figured it is some sort of Aussie thing. But the hotel we are staying in has comically low door handles. So, so far it’s been two places high, one place low, zero places normal. I’ll keep the stats going as we stay in more places.