A bit further down the coast from Rockingham is the town of Bunbury, Australia. Only 25,000 folk live in Bunbury, but it has a nice café strip, some good shopping centers and offered us a great place to hang out for a few days and relax. We've only planned to stay a two or three nights but ended up staying for five primarily because we were so comfortable at the friendly Wander Inn backpackers run by manager, Mark. After having spent a few nights in "not so great" places, the Wander Inn was social, fun, friendly, clean and just what we needed to recharge the batteries.

The Sunday after we arrived was Anzac day in Australia (April 25^th), the national day of remembrance for those who have died and/or served in the defense of their country. The 25^th of April is chosen because it was on that date in 1915 when the Australian and New Zealand forces landed on the beach at Gallipoli. Each town will have some sort of memorial service on Anzac day and we decided to attend the one in Bunbury. The parade and service were really nice and it was interesting to be a part of something that shows national pride as an outside observer. We were glad we went.

However, the big draw card and reason for our travels to Bunbury was the dolphin discovery center just several blocks from the hostel. The center is all volunteer run and has a nice little museum where you can learn about the bottlenose dolphins that swim in Koombana bay. We did that and enjoyed the film but that has the indoor education center has absolutely nothing on what you can see outside!

When you walk outside of the center, you see an area on land that is called the "Interaction zone."  Basically it looks like a roped off area of the water that could be used for anything... swimming, fishing, whatever. But, dolphins have been coming to visit humans in this location for quite some time! The center doesn't feed the dolphins and they are truly wild creatures so there is no guarantee of a visit or of a set time when they might show up. After sitting on the beach for around 2 hours on the morning of our first trip to the center and having only seen one little sting ray, we thought perhaps this was all some kind of funny joke! But, we were assured by the volunteer staff that dolphins do actually visit and that one had been there the previous morning for and had stayed for around a half an hour.

Just as we were starting to think about leaving, a dorsal fin appeared off in the distanceEand it wasn't just one! There was a big one and little one!! A mum and baby were making their way towards the interaction zone! We later learned that the Mum was named Jet and her three week old calf was called Stream! (Pretty clever names, 'huh?) and they ended up staying to visit with us for a little over an hour. It was absolutely incredible!! They would swim right in front of us, clearly as curious about us as much we are about them. You could almost reach out and touch them with your finger tips (although touching is forbidden!) but they were that close! And remember, they are completely wild creatures! We had to visit a second morning and we were treated to an even more amazing day at the beach. Dolphins were feeding, jumping and splashing off in the distance of the bay. It was a wonderful show! We got to visit again with Jet and Stream and also met Big Nick for the first time... and it was still as exhilarating as the first time we saw them!

From here we head back to Perth to catch our bright and early Friday morning flight to Bali!