Fremantle, Australia (Day 2) 2026

     After a pretty intense day of exploring Perth we spent our second day here, February 21, on a fairly relaxed walk around Fremantle.   A railroad separates the cruise port from the city but on our last visit in 2018, which you can see here:  https://baderjournal.com/2018/07/09/freemantle-australia/ , there was a large metal overpass for pedestrians to cross the tracks.  For some reason that is now gone but there was a shuttle bus to downtown.  So about 10 AM we boarded the bus with our friends Karen and Donna to ride in to the Town Hall.

     The Fremantle Library is in the Walyalup Civic Center building next door, so of course that is where we headed.  The Fremantle History Centre was exhibiting an interesting collection of  old photos of Fremantle in the library and we spent some time looking at it.

     After looking through a few stores for some items Karen and Donna needed we headed to the Fremantle Markets.  On the way we passed the Old Courthouse, built by convict labor and opened in 1899.  It served as a courthouse from 1899 until 2001, then was renovated and reopened as a bar in 2021.  The Fremantle Markets are only open on weekends so when we went there on a Wednesday in 2018 they were closed.  This time it was Saturday and the markets were jumping.  By the entrance a colorfully dressed woman was painting (pictures, not the building).

     Originally opened in 1902 as a wholesale food market, this building complex served as a packaging and distribution center until the 1970’s.  Restored and updated to accommodate retail spaces, the Fremantle Markets opened here in 1975.  The space now has some 150 stores and vendors’ stalls selling food, crafts, tourist items, clothes and pretty much everything else you can imagine.  On Saturday a lot of folks were there.

     In contrast to the inside, the outside of the Markets was mostly red brick and Victorian style stone entrances, each one a slightly different design.  And inside near the front entrance was Big Red, a 6 foot red Kangaroo.  We had a very good time at the markets.  The only disappointment was Mary’s inability to find a baseball cap that said Fremantle.  All they seemed to have were Perth hats.  We thought that indicated a certain lack of local pride, of which we had seen no other sign.  But now we know that Fremantle is actually considered one of the 30 areas that make up Perth, so that must explain it.

     Most of our group (ie. all three other than Rick) wanted to visit a yarn shop so we set out to find one after we left the markets.  We walked past the Warders Cottages, small rowhouses built in 1851 to house the Warders (we think this means guards) at the Fremantle Prison, which we toured on our first visit to Fremantle.  The prison was built in the 1850’s as well after Britain decided to transport convicts to Western Australia (they had previously been in the eastern part of the country).  These cottages were used for prison staff until 1991 when the prison closed.  Today they are part of a hotel.  After this we did find a nice yarn shop called Yarns on Collie (it’s on Collie street).  The shop was nice and the lady running it was very helpful.  Everybody but Rick found something to buy!

     After the yarn shop it was time to eat, so we stopped into a restaurant nearby called The Rustic Spoon (not the rusty spoon!) for some fish & chips.  The large dining room was mostly empty, so you had to wonder, but the food turned out to be really excellent and made to order from scratch.  And what do you need after a good meal in Australia?  That’s right . . . gelato.  Swan River Gelato was conveniently located next door to the restaurant and their gelato also was made from scratch.  So of course it was really good.   Feeling quite satiated, we walked back to the town hall to meet the shuttle back to the ship.  The area on the side of the town hall where we met the bus was sort of a small paved park.  Among other things there, we saw a statue of John Curtin, who was Prime Minister of Australia throughout most of World War II.  There was also a memorial fountain built in memory of “Comrade Tom Edwards, Working Class Martyr,” who was killed in 1919 on the Fremantle wharf during what we assume was a strike.  And finally there was a very colorful ping pong table with rounded sides instead of legs that upstaged everything else.  After a while the bus came and we drove through the streets of Fremantle one more time to reboard the ship, after two very enjoyable shore days.