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Albany is not pronounced all-bany like the capital
of New York State, but al-bany like a man's name. However you
pronounce it, it was a lovely stop... It's located, as you can
see from this chart, on the southwestern coast. It took a day
at sea to sail across the gulf at the bottom of Australia. Our
next 2 stops on the planned itinerary are on the western coast.
(Itinerary)
As we approach, we saw a rocky shoreline.
We saw some ruins of stone buildings that had been built on
the rock, but wait... We heard a bagpipe. Were we in Scotland?
We finally spotted the piper in the scrub.
The Albany Entertainment Center is sorta like
a smaller and dark-colored Sydney Opera House. It took a while
to dock, but meanwhile the piper had moved in from the hills
to entertain us while we docked. Even though the baseball hat
had Scotland's flag, it clanked with the rest of his outfit,
but we enjoyed the performance.
We took a shuttle to the center of town. "The Man of Peace,"
which represents the Aboriginal people and how they welcomed
the Europeans is represented by this sculpture.
We asked this guy about the trail that we heard about. We were
to go to the bottom of the main street and turn right along
the water.
The oldest church in town...
 
We liked the large collection of mosaic squares set into the
sidewalks.
 
A park in honor of the Anzac (combined Australian
and New Zealand) military forces was at the foot of the street.
 
The Entertainment Center was to the left at the bottom of the
main street.
 
We passed the brig Amity as we headed for the trail. We stopped
for a closer look on the way back.
 
We walked along the edge of some ponds with good populations
of both black and black & white cormorants and countless
ducks. A mimosa shrub with its powderpuff flowers decorates
the area.
 
The head of the Albany Maritime Heritage Trail follows the 3
major shipwrecks in the harbor and is too long to hike its full
length, but still we persist while looking for a footpath along
the water that Dean heard about.
Looking back we see the Amsterdam...
 
A boulder-filled front yard is different...
We ended up on a bike path near the road, which was not what
we were looking for...
so we backtracked and finally found the rather
small trail markers near this Australian Wool Handlers building.
 
We talked to this horse with a fly mask covering its face when
another one with a full covering also came out to seek attention.
We followed the black snake trail and ended up on the trail
we'd been looking for. Delightful...
We spent some time watching the herons wading in the shallows.
The shell collection on the beach was incredible...
On the sand, critters left crooked paths.
We were lucky to get a couple of good shots of this variegated
fairy-wren with its iridescent blue head and rusty shoulders.
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