Summer 23/34

01 Apr 2024 - Austin Shen

It was a long and warm summer in Perth. Occasionally too hot to do things, but for the most part it was lovely and sunny, and ideal for geting outside and enjoying what makes home so special. This was a packed one. Seeing many friends again for the first time in almost a year, family dinners, celebrating weddings, the usual camping trips, road trips, warm evening parties, beach swims, snorkelling, and weekend brunches. A similar story every year, so it’s easy for it all turn into a blur and forget the details. But it’s nice to now write, reflect and properly appreciate all the things that made this summer a great time.

Albany

One of the first trips after the family-packed Christmas and NY period. Jeremy bought a house in his favourite SWWA town - Albany. A couple of us helped load up the ute and trailer with a house-load of posessions, and even more of us went down to see his place just days after he had moved in. We camped by the beach for the first couple of nights, and stayed at Jeremy’s on the last night before coming back up. Aside from lazy afternoons spent admiring Jeremy’s beautiful new home and the unconventional DIY choices of the previous owners, it was a pretty typical trip south to Albany. Dips at beaches with squeaky white-sand, the iconic windmills boardwalk sunset hike, evening beers on camp chairs, silly car games to pass time on the road, and meat pies in Williams.

Jurien Bay

A nostalgic camping trip to Jurien Bay over the Easter weekend marked the end of the summer this year. To classify it as summer was a bit of a stretch given it was already April, but as Taf said in the car ride home it was “summer in spirit”. And it absolutely was. We started each day nice and slow, reading our books and enjoying our breakfast as we waited for a critical mass of friends to head over to the beach. Once we got there it was similarly chill. A swim out to the platform, jumping around being silly but not seals, and then drying off on the beach while reading our books. Then maybe another dip in the water, or a cafe for coffee, or the local market for some food. In the afternoons we’d mostly be back at camp, huddled under our gazebo to escape the strong breeze or playing some sort of sport on the oval. Drinks in the afternoon and some games in the evening before bed. A nice screen-free, carefree escape for the long weekend.

Everything in between

There was essentially something fun and exciting to look forward to every week. Here are some snaps the other moments scattered over the summer of 23/24 that made it such an incredible time.