Travel // Western Australia Part Two - Cottesloe/Rottnest Island/Perth {with a 6 month old baby}

March 09, 2020


Part two of our trip to Western Australia. {You can see part one around Dunsborough/Margaret River here and this post on travel logistics with a baby}. For the last week, we spent our days in Cottesloe - a beach suburb of Perth. It's a place that we'd visited all too briefly on our quick stopover a couple of years ago and really loved so this time enjoyed having more time to properly spend there. It was a bit of a different pace to our first stop which was incredibly relaxed but we really enjoyed being near to a city again and exploring all of the suburbs around Perth. Australia really is such a dream for beaches and brunch spots. There was also Rottnest Island for an epic day trip which was a huge highlight. We really loved Perth and it was the perfect end to our trip. Photos and our favourite spots below... 

Cottesloe //

We stayed in Cottesloe, a leafy upmarket beach suburb with wideeee beautiful tree lined roads, a little bay one side and incredible beach with the best sunsets the other. It has a 'village' centre with a deli/supermarket like no other called the Boatshed - this is a MUST visit to pick up picnic treats or even just browse around. Supermarket wise for the rest of your shopping, Woolworths is across the road in a shopping centre, and then the rest of the village has some really nice shops/coffee shops/a well equipped pharmacy. The houses around the area are totally dreamy, we just kept saying 'can you imagine being lucky enough to live here?!'. There's Vans Cafe and Grilld which are both highly recommended if you're looking for food around the village.



We rented an airbnb, this one, which I'd recommend. It was a really good price for the 6 nights, the owners were super accommodating of us checking in early and they had good baby facilities like a high chair/cot. It was in a perfect location, we searched hard for a good location that we could walk to both the village and beach from, it was around a 15 minute walk straight down across the railway line to the beach, and you could catch the train down to Fremantle or into Perth really easily from here. Cottesloe village was just a 10 minute walk the other way. 




The whole area had a real Californian kind of vibe that we loved. 



food at the Boatshed.



Bougainvillea goals



Loved these houses and pretty front gardens




This beach!




Food wise we really liked Canteen, a Neapolitan style pizza place on the front {although it didn't have high chairs!}, Daisy's - a buzzy coffee brunch stop set back a couple of roads from the beach, Vans cafe in Cottesloe village and Cottesloe Gelato Bar.




The sunsets were a real highlight in Cottesloe on the nights that Freya's bedtime worked out, or a couple of times we'd put her in the buggy asleep and go and watch them anyway! 











// Fremantle

From Cottesloe, Fremantle was just a fifteen minute drive down the Coast and we ended up here for a couple of days. It has a really cool vibe and is full of trendy shops, restaurants and things going on. One afternoon we even caught a free Aussie rules football game. There were a couple of stand out gelato places {always a seek out of ours!} - Kuld creamery but our ultimate favourite was Swan River Gelato. We didn't visit this time but Little Creatures Brewery is a must as is Bathers beach house and Bread in Common.





South Fremantle has a nice feel about it, more of a local/residential vibe rather than Freo itself being a bit more touristy/backpackery? There are a couple of cool cafes, bars and shops worth a wander around here and a beach too. 




// North of Perth -

The Little Bay was a real highlight food wise in such a beautiful beach cafe {it's owned by the people who have just opened Meelup Farmhouse down in Dunsborough} which overlooks Waterman's Bay, a gorgeous beach spot. In fact, that whole coastline is worth a drive along around Scarborough and Trigg. Trigg Island Market was on our list but we ran out of time/brunch days! As was Little H Cafe.






Slightly further north still, Hillary's Boat Yard is a shopping/restaurant outlet around a marina and a nice spot. Unfortunately the day we visited there was a rare seafog in! But we were there for the AQAW - Aquarium of Western Australia which Freya LOVED, sensory overload seeing all the fish, coral and lights. It was really well done and Ben and I found it really interesting too looking at all the marine species from around Australia. The shark tunnel was incredible with all the rays, turtles and sharks swimming all around us! 






Rottnest Island // Oh Rottnest Island, worth going to Western Australia for alone. I should have almost written a whole blog post on its own about this. But in essence you take a ferry from Fremantle B Shed docks, we booked online with the Rottnest Express - if you book online for a weekday you can take advantage of the Telethon saver deal. There's also another ferry company that operates now, can't remember what they're called but worth a google to see if they're any cheaper. Last time we hired bikes as it's such an amazing island to cycle around for the day. But this time with Freya and the buggy, we walked around to a couple of the beaches. It's an island that you can stay on or just visit for the day, but it has theeee most incredible beaches you could ever dream of. Along with it's famed quokkas - large rodents with really cute faces that everyone loves to get selfies with after the likes of Roger Federer started doing it. There's a little village on the island where we picked up lunch from then you can take your pick of beaches or activities. The water is so crystal clear and incredible. It really is a place like no other, very special indeed. We booked the early ferry to beat the real heat of the day then came back mid afternoon but it would be amazing to stay there for a couple of nights. Make sure you visit the branch of Simmo's ice cream to cool down before you get the ferry back. There's also a beach/pool bar club opened up called Pinky's. Our favourite beaches there = Little Parakeet Bay, Geordie Bay and the Lighthouse beach.















Perth // Perth is such a relaxed city. We loved visiting Kings Park with it's botanic gardens and views across to the CBD, Matilda Bay and food wise would definitely recommend HoodBurger if you want an American style burger {SO like our favourite In n Out from West Coast America} and Chi Cho gelato was *heart eyes*.  Lots more Perth foodie recommendations on this instagram and this website Perth is OK.







All of a sudden, we blinked and those three weeks were up already and we were headed back to the airport. A trip that we'll remember forever and ever. Have you been? Is it on your list?

R <3 xx

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