A Roo'd Encounter
17-June 2006: After being passed by another driver and with the sun finally uncovering the veil of the winter darkness, I decided that perhaps we were getting close enough to Perth that I could go a little faster than the 20-below-the-speed-limit rate we were going. While my thoughts were on the task ahead as we had planned to see at least three waterfalls around the city's suburbs, I increased the cruise control to 100km/h, which was still less than the 110km/h. Suddenly... Julie and I expected to get much accomplished before settling in to Perth today. We figured we were going to come back to Perth for a whole day of exploration on the very last day of the trip. So this first go around was to see Serpentine Falls, Lesmurdie Falls as well as the pair of waterfalls in the John Forrest National Park. So we checked out and left the Cervantes Pinnacles Motel at 6am. Still wary of kangaroos, we took our time driving east towards the main highway (the Brand Highway or Hwy 1). Even though we still had about two hours to go before arriving at the city of Perth, I was anticipating a break from constantly worrying about them running in front of the car. Even though we had seen many of them hop around the rounds throughout the Outback regions of Western Australia, I actually looked forward to seeing the city for once. By 6:45am, we had arrived onto the Brand Highway and headed south for Perth. I maintained my pace of going 90km/h in a 110km/h zone, but I was getting passed several times by cars and trucks on the two-lane highway. After being passed by another driver and with the sun finally uncovering the veil of the winter darkness, I decided that perhaps we were getting close enough to Perth that I could go a little faster than the 20-below-the-speed-limit rate we were going. While my thoughts were on the task ahead as we had planned to see at least three waterfalls around the city's suburbs, I increased the cruise control to 100km/h, which was still less than the 110km/h. Suddenly, a kangaroo hopped right in front of the car... "There it is!" I said instinctually as I slammed on the brakes. I had this sickening sense of deja vu (after all, I had hit a deer three years prior to this) as if I knew somehow this was destined to happen. Julie looked up from her laptop and gasped. And before I finally put my foot on the brakes, the car had already hit the kangaroo. The kangaroo rolled in front of the car before it finally went underneath it. I immediately pulled over to the next available shoulder. "F**k!" I screamed. So with a pause as I tried to get over the shock and the recurrence of my bad luck, both Julie and I got out of the car to survey the damage. Clearly the kangaroo didn't make it as it lay slumped on the road. The front of the car had some denting to it and the hood (bonnet) was slightly propped open from the deformation of the front body. Julie and I weren't sure what to do at this point so we eventually decided to keep driving and hope that the car would make it to Perth. And to our amazement, the temperature gauge remained steady and the engine seemed to be fine. Still, I proceeded to drive slowly and even big rigs were starting to tail me. We were still about a little over an hour from Perth. Eventually, we would make it into the city by 8:30am. But seeing that the car was still able to run, we decided to try to salvage the day by visiting at least Serpentine Falls and Lesmurdie Falls before returning to the Perth Domestic Airport to turn in the hire car.
[Back to top] Still, she insisted that the map said so and I continued driving. Eventually, the road started going away from the falls and we knew it wasn't it. So we headed back down to the highway and went towards the Jarrahdale Rd since it looked big and headed to some reservoir area. But as we drove the road, there was nothing that said Serpentine Falls. So we ended up spending another hour driving on a mix of unsealed roads and empty forest roads futilely searching for the falls. I was dumbfounded as to how this waterfall could be so difficult to find. Finally, we pulled out the Perth City Road Atlas that was in the car complements of the Thrifty Rent-a-Car. And upon examining this book, we quickly realized that the falls were at the end of a short and easy spur road. Had we continued going south on the main highway for another minute, we would've seen the Serpentine Falls Road! Given this snafu, I had this sense that it was going to be another one of those frustrating days.
The falls itself wasn't flowing particularly well but it still kept its rather serpentine shape as the name of the falls suggested. There also appeared to be a gate before the falls as if they didn't want people swimming here. Anyways, we took our photos and left. We saw some picnickers feeding a pair of tiny kangaroos in the park. But both Julie and I were now fearful of them and wasted no time heading back north towards Lesmurdie Falls. As we confronted the increased traffic of the Perth suburbs, we had trouble figuring out exactly where we were supposed to stop the car for the falls. At first, we stopped at an unassuming car park area with graffiti on some building facing us. We weren't sure if this was it and we thought there was a better way to the falls so we followed the Hwy 35 up a hill and eventually through some residential streets before arriving at the other car park for the falls at 12:30pm.
Still, we were unsatisfied with the view of the falls from here and we knew there was another way towards the base of the falls - and it was probably that spot we had originally stopped at in the first place. So we walked back to the car park and headed back down towards the original car park with the graffiti on the adjacent building.
At least the view from here was better, but clearly this waterfall had seen better days. I guess the winter had been dry up to this point. It was probably not unlike the dry winters we had received in Southern California that made its local waterfalls dry even in the winter!
Then, we drove off for the Perth Domestic Airport and eventually got to the Thrifty Lot at 1:50pm. Now it was time to face the music... After parking the damaged car in one of the empty spots at the Thrifty Lot, both Julie and I took the time to clear out the car and essentially repack everything. We left the repacked luggage in the trunk so we wouldn't have to carry everything to the Thrifty kiosk. With that, we walked to the nearest terminal and walked up to the Thrifty counter. Unfortunately, no one was there. So we picked up the phone on the counter and followed the instructions to call if no one was around. To our relief, A lady on the other side picked up and instructed us to go to another terminal where she was at. And as we finally got to the other terminal, there were a pair of women behind the Thrifty counter. One of them, named Natasha, greeted us as she was the person I spoke on the phone with. After telling her what happened, we had to fill out some paperwork. Once that was done, she handed me another set of keys for a different rental car. Then, she told us to meet some other guy who was already at the car park waiting. We also asked if we could keep the old keys since we still have our stuff in the trunk. She obliged. After thanking Natasha, she told us, "No worries!" It was a commonly used phrase we heard everywhere we went in Australia. Julie thought it was getting played out, and I wasn't so sure I could stop worrying as we both knew it wasn't going to be pleasant dealing with the insurance company and trying to stomach the impact to my wallet. So Julie and I left the Thrifty counter and headed out towards the car park where a well-built guy with a Scottish accent was waiting. "Are you the one who hit the 'roo?" he said. "Yep," said I. "Can you show me which car it is?" he inquired. And so we walked over to the car and showed him the frontal damage. "Aww yeah, that's definitely a kangaroo. I had never seen it in person before but you sure did hit it good." He then leaned closer to the damaged grill, took a whiff and smiled at us. "It sure smells like some of it got cooked in there." It wasn't exactly a pleasing thought, but we were amazed that this was the first time this guy had seen a kangaroo accident. We must've been either really unlucky or something. "It was a good thing he rolled under the car," he went on. "Why was that?" I replied. "Because they've been known to keep kicking through windshield until the driver eventually dies." "Really?!?" both Julie and I said together. So I guess maybe we were lucky after all. It depends on how you look at it, I reckon. Anyways, we got our stuff out of the trunk of the damaged car and put the stuff into the replacement car. I surrendered the old keys to the employee and said our good-byes. We then proceeded to East Perth where we were supposed to spend the night at the Comfort Hotel Perth City.
But the shops started closing their doors around dinner time. Geez they close early, we thought. So Julie and I struggled to find a decent spot here to eat. And after not being able to settle on a decent sit down spot, we walked back to our accommodation and settled on having some Chinese-Indonesian food in a hole-in-the-wall place. And after the meal, we returned to the Comfort Hotel, got cleaned up, and slept. Hopefully, the rest of the trip wouldn't be as traumatic and dramatic as this day... Have a waterfall travel story you'd like to share? [Back to top] [Go to previous blog: "Something in the Middle of Nothing"] [Go to next blog: "Too Little Too Late"] [Go to the Australia Travel Blog Page] [Go to the Australia Page] [Return from "A Roo'd Encounter" to the World of Waterfalls Home Page] |
Anyways, we got to the well-signed turnoff and consequently the reserve by 10:45am. After paying the day use fee, we arrived at the falls at 10:50am. 
But after we walked around for a few minutes, we ended up at the top of the falls. It wasn't the place to photograph the falls, which was trickling and not particularly doing well, but we did get nice panoramic views towards the city.
By now, it was 1pm. After a few minutes of flat walking along the calm stream and ignoring the lewd graffiti on a bench along the route, we finally made it to the base of Lesmurdie Falls. 
Finally at 3:30pm, we got to the Comfort Hotel and spent the remaining daylight hours walking around the city. It took a few blocks of walking westward before we made it into Central Business District (or CBD).
At first, we took some photos of an interesting glass building called the Bell Tower. Later, we headed towards some busy-looking promenade area. There were heaps of shops lined along the pedestrian-only street as well as upstairs and downstairs shops in the buildings. If you're a shop-a-holic, you could easily spend days here.
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