Wild at heart

Just a short ferry ride from Perth, Rottnest Island – or Rotto, as the locals call it – is the perfect playground, with its 63 beaches, its car-free roads and, of course, those cute-as quokkas. You can explore the island under your own steam or let a local show you around. Cyclists can head over with one of Paul’s Eco E-bike Tours, or you can join one of the scuba and snorkeling tours that visit the island. The crystal-clear waters are surprisingly warm; follow the Rottnest Shipwreck Trail, marked by information plaques on the ocean bed and marvel at the tropical fish, soft corals and underwater caverns.

The lush Swan Valley is a favourite weekend getaway for Perthites, thanks to its rolling hills, heritage townships, farms and wineries. The Dinner in the Paddock tour offered by Lumineer Adventure Tours lets you sample the area’s highlights. As well as a gin-tasting at a distillery, you will get to visit a camel dairy, try out their skincare products and say hello to the camels themselves (check out those eyelashes!). The tour finishes with a barbecue dinner in the paddock as the sun sets and the stars twinkle into being overhead.

Few sights bring a smile to our face as quickly as a pod of dolphins porpoising through the water. At Rockingham, just south of Perth, you can do more than just watch them: you can join a Rockingham Wild Encounters tour to swim with the approximately 200 wild bottlenose dolphins that live here. You don’t have to be an endurance swimmer – a belt around your waist connects you to your tour leader, so you won’t drift off. These are wild dolphins, so there is no guarantee what your encounter will be like but if you are in luck, you’ll even get to hear them vocalising through whistles, clicks, squeaks and barks.

We do love a stargazing tour, and the dark night skies of Mandurah, just south of Perth, offer the perfect conditions for discovering the wonders of the universe. Using two telescopes, this Salt and Bush Eco Tour offers close-up views of stars, planets and galaxies, as well as sharing sky stories from Indigenous cultures. Apart from boning up on your astronomical knowledge, our favourite thing about this tour is that it reminds us that there is much more to our world than just the sights and sounds we encounter every day.

The slowly winding Swan River (Derbarl Yerrigan) has many moods as it flows through the city, but some of its loveliest stretches are found in the Swan Valley. The Point Walter Cliffs and Caves Tour from GoGo Active Tours lets you breathe in its beauty through two very different activities. Gaze down from above as you hike the 8m-high cliffs along Blackwall Reach, soaking in the stellar views. Then flip your perspective by getting down on the water and gently paddling a kayak down to Bicton Baths, letting the current carry you along.