{"product_id":"blue-manna-mandurah","title":"Blue Manna: Local Secrets, Honest Stories \u0026 the Real Mandurah","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eNobody here says blue swimmer unless they're selling you something.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe estuary at the end of our street is about the size of the whole of Gateshead. It has its own crabs, its own name for them, its own season, and its own opinion about people who wade in with a scoop net in October. I found out every one of those the hard way, in front of a retired Alcoa man called Gaz who has lived two doors down since the first estuary bridge opened in 1986 and who has never once called me anything but Pom.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWe came in November 2023, me, my wife and two kids, from Low Fell, on her nursing visa and the usual Pom promise of sunnier and cheaper. Sunnier is true. Cheaper is not, and I'm not going to pretend it is to sell you a book. Three years of being corrected over a fence turns into a fairly good guide to a place, so I wrote it down. It's not the tourist board. It's the estuary as Gaz sees it, with my mistakes left in so you don't have to make them.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align:center;margin:26px 0;\"\u003e\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0942\/8218\/7134\/files\/blue-manna-mandurah-spread.jpg\" alt=\"Chapter Three: Season's Shut, Pom, a real spread from Blue Manna\" style=\"max-width:100%;height:auto;border-radius:6px;\"\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch3\u003eWhat's in it\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eBlue manna, and the rules.\u003c\/strong\u003e Why the season shuts on the first of September and opens on the first of December, the size gauge, the bag and boat limits, why most of the early December crabs are undersize and when they come good, drop nets versus scoop nets, where Gaz sets his, and what happens if Fisheries turn up.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFour bridges, two called the old bridge.\u003c\/strong\u003e The Pinjarra Road bridge and the wooden one before it, the 1986 estuary bridge and its twin that opened in February, the new fishing platform on the eastern side, and how to tell which bridge a local means before you drive the wrong way.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eWhich side are you.\u003c\/strong\u003e Halls Head, Falcon, Wannanup and Dawesville against the town side, Coodanup and the canals, Lakelands and Meadow Springs up the top, and what each one says about the other. Including the bit where the Halls Head side is technically an island since the Cut.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eBeaches by wind, not by name.\u003c\/strong\u003e Blue Bay, Falcon Bay, Pyramids, Town Beach, Avalon, Seascapes with the dog, the estuary at Village Beach, and Gaz's rule for reading the sea breeze so you're not the family packing up at half one.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe train, the Forum and getting about.\u003c\/strong\u003e Fifty four minutes to Perth Underground, the flat fare, the 591, 592 and 594 from the station, where to park at Lakelands, which shops are on which side of which bridge, and the Sunday you will regret driving into Perth.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eWhat it actually costs.\u003c\/strong\u003e Rents and house prices on the beach side, what a lease renewal feels like, eggs, petrol, a pint, and the honest sums a family from the North East does before they come and after they land. No cheerleading.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe year, the way Gaz keeps it.\u003c\/strong\u003e Crab Fest in March, the boat show in October, the Arts Festival and Music Under the Bridge, Peel Thunder at Rushton Park, the Christmas lights on the canals by boat, the July cold inside a tiled house, and the first of December when every tinnie in Halls Head goes on the water at once.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eBeing a Pom here.\u003c\/strong\u003e One in ten people in this city was born in England. What that means in the pub and at the school gate, what locals are sick of us saying, and how to be the incomer people don't roll their eyes at.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch3\u003eHow it works\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003eAn ebook of about sixty pages, download link straight after you pay, opens on your phone at the jetty. Crab rules, train fares and bridge names all change, and Gaz will tell me the day they do, so the book gets rewritten and every past buyer gets the new copy for nothing. One payment, updates for life.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align:center;margin:28px 0 18px;\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/rootsand-routes.com\/cart\/58091674370430:1\" style=\"display:inline-block;background:#2c5f8c;color:#fff9ec;padding:16px 34px;border-radius:6px;font-size:18px;font-weight:700;text-decoration:none;letter-spacing:0.3px;\"\u003eGet Blue Manna now\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align:center;margin:26px 0;\"\u003e\u003cimg src=\"https:\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0942\/8218\/7134\/files\/blue-manna-mandurah-updates.jpg\" alt=\"Buy it once, keep it forever, free updates for life\" style=\"max-width:100%;height:auto;border-radius:6px;\"\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ch3\u003eWho this is for\u003c\/h3\u003e\u003cp\u003eFamilies in the UK doing the sums on Western Australia and wanting the sums done by someone who has actually paid Halls Head rent. Poms already here who still say swimmer. People in Perth who come down for a weekend and only ever see the foreshore. And anyone who grew up on this estuary, left, and wants to argue with a Geordie about which bridge is the old one.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eGaz says the crabs don't care what month it is in England. He's right about that as well.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align:center;margin:28px 0 8px;\"\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/rootsand-routes.com\/cart\/58091674370430:1\" style=\"display:inline-block;background:#4b6b4a;color:#fff9ec;padding:16px 34px;border-radius:6px;font-size:18px;font-weight:700;text-decoration:none;letter-spacing:0.3px;\"\u003eDownload it now, free updates for life\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp style=\"text-align:center;font-size:14px;color:#555;\"\u003eInstant download. Any device. Written under the pen name Jason Boardman.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Roots \u0026 Routes","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":58091674370430,"sku":"MAN-BM-01","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0942\/8218\/7134\/files\/blue-manna-mandurah-cover.jpg?v=1790287560","url":"https:\/\/rootsand-routes.com\/products\/blue-manna-mandurah","provider":"Roots \u0026 Routes","version":"1.0","type":"link"}