On Thursday night I received a random call from Rachel, my older sister, asking if I wanted to join her and her friend Jesse, a friend of hers visiting from Melbourne, in doing the Tunnels Tour at Fremantle Prison. Now I had already heard positive feedback about the tour from people I know who had already done it, and after seeing the contestants of the Amazing Race go down there as part of the West Australian leg of the competition, I had since always wanted to do it. So naturally, I jumped at the chance and said yes to joining them. However, in the excitement of knowing I would be doing it the next morning, I got on the net and started googling to see what other people had thought of it, and to find out some of the things I would be looking forward to… stupid mistake. I will tell you why later … For those of you who don’t know much about the Tunnels Tour, below is the description given on the Fremantle Prison’s website…
Do you need a prison adventure?
Get into your hardhat, slip into your overalls, pull on your boots and charge your headlamps before locking into the ladder system and descending 20 metres into the depths below.
Trek through sections of the labyrinth of tunnels by foot, then board the replica convict punts to explore the submerged passageways accessible only by boat.
Discover original blast holes, bores, oil lamp recesses and artefacts from the days when working in the tunnels was hard labour for prisoners.
Dodge tree roots and find the plaque as you journey through this underground maze of tunnels on your extreme heritage adventure.
Believe me, they are serious about the overalls…coveralls to be more exact. Little did I know was that without even having started at UWA yet…I had already found my costume for this year’s PROSH event. (PROSH is basically where UWA students invade the City of Perth wearing weird costumes to sell a controversial magazine for charity (last year over $100,000 was raised)). The coveralls extended from head to toe, and because they only had the larger size left that day, we all ended up looking like some futuristic kind of gangsta with the baggy outfit to match. The part of the coveralls that cover your head is optional by the way, but me being the silly person I am…tried to keep it on as long as possible…before it became far too hot and I had to give in and take it off :(…and that was before we got down in the tunnel. With that being said, the entire coveralls appear to be optional for the staff that work there too… as they have no problem in going down the tunnels in only their shorts and t-shirt… which makes me wonder if the coveralls are worn for our own “protection”… or really just to brighten up the staff’s day when they see how ridiculous everyone looks in them. I lean more towards the latter, but either way putting on the coveralls does add to the fun of the whole thing…especially when you find out that you can take them home afterwards :O .
Before I speak more about this, I have to warn you that there are **SPOILERS AHEAD**. As in, you may find out things you would have liked to have been surprised about if/when you do the Tunnel Tour yourself. If you read on now, you cant say that I haven’t warned you… 
Our tour guide for the day was Amy, and it was only Jesse, Rachel and I that were booked in for that time of the day. Having done it now, I would have to say that doing the tour in a smaller group seems to be better, because I cant imagine having to manoeuvre my way around those tunnels alongside many more other people…and I guess if the “body heat rule” applies, then the more people that are down there…the hotter it would be. The reason why I say it would be harder to get around the tunnels with more people is because the tunnels which you walk around are not very tall at all; in fact most people, unless you aren’t very tall, 
would find themselves ducking down for the majority of the walking section. The image to the right might give you more of an idea about this. Before you head down into the tunnels, there is a small example tunnel that you can use to see what it will be like for you down there. And as you can see, I cant stand fully upright…and I don’t consider myself a very tall person either. But even with the continuous ducking I had to do down there, it didn’t become very bothersome at all, especially since you find yourself sitting down for parts of the tour anyway.
After we were all suited up, we watched a short movie about the history of the prison, the convicts/prisoners, and the problems that faced WA’s water system in the past. Interestingly enough, the tunnels themselves were seen as a solution to the growing water problem in Fremantle and beyond, as in the past they were used to store and collect water for the Prison and the townspeople and thus, allowing the area to prosper. What intrigued me, though, was the fact that the Prison and the townspeople shared the same water, and that it wasn’t filtered at all. So in my mind, after watching many episodes of Prison Break, that seems like it would have given the prisoners the perfect opportunity to seek revenge against the people who locked them up in the first place…but it wasn’t long before it struck me that if they were to say, poison the water down there, they would not only be killing the townspeople, but also themselves…Building the tunnels was solely the job of the prisoners, so I guess such plan would have been very possible. And hey, if they were stupid enough break the law and get locked up, they may have been stupid enough to poison the water too 
Or maybe my mind is just coming up with some big conspiracy theory now… lol. Anyway, building the tunnels was seen as the worst form of punishment for those locked up inside Fremantle Prison. The prisoners who were required to do it usually committed the worst crimes, and spent several hours almost every day of the week carving out the tunnels with primitive tools, sometimes even knee deep in water. Worse, after finishing their duties in the tunnel, the prisoners could have been sent straight back to their cells with no free time in the “yard”. :O
After watching the short movie, which actually won an award, we did a really short “quiz” about it, and then it was time to head down into the tunnels. First of all, we got shown how to use the harness system when going down the 20m ladder, and then we each put on our harness and hardhat which had a cool little headlamp attached which could be set to a “disco mode” if you pushed the button a number of times…:P Although, mine refused to go into such mode 
Amy, our tour guide, was the first to head down the ladder, who was then followed by Jesse. The ladder was double sided, so it was then Rachel and I who went down last. I don’t really know how to explain the harness system we were using, but it was simple to use for even the most inexperienced people. To get down to the tunnels the ladder is split into three “sections”, with a platform at the end of each ladder. It was this that caused the only “difficult” part of the entire harness system. In order to move on to another ladder, you had to also slide the piece of the harness attached to the other ladder along to the new ladder with you so you could keep going down. Now at first I thought I had the whole thing down pat and everything was going smoothly, until I got to such point of changing from the first ladder to the second ladder. I slid the piece of the harness about half way across to the new ladder until it stopped…so I tried to pull it again…it wouldn’t move…it had somehow “jammed” . Suddenly things weren’t going so smoothly anymore, and it is in times of panic such as this when you force yourself to take into account all the other factors surrounding you, such as how high you are from the ground So you could probably imagine me standing on the ladder panicking, pulling constantly on the harness trying to get it to move, whilst not only fearing being stuck on the ladder, but also somehow plummeting to the floor tunnel below :O… Thankfully the panic really only lasted about 15-20 seconds as after a few more pulls it finally gave way and I was then able to move on safely 
. Below are some images of the ladder system, which unfortunately was the last area where you were allowed to take pictures (Click images for a larger view).
Once we got down there, we sat down inside of the entrance to the tunnel and got told about some of its history, how it was built, and its history as a method of escape for the prisoners. Unfortunately, it was never used as a way of escaping from the Prison, as the prisoners were always under the watch of guards as they built and carved it out of the limestone. It apparently took the prisoners months to carve out small sections of the tunnel, and hence would have been extremely obvious if they weren’t following the pre-designed plans of the tunnel. Amy told us about people who had told her of a story about a prisoner coming out of a hole (a well, maybe?) in someone’s backyard in Fremantle one day, telling the members of the family that he had escaped from Fremantle Prison and then running away. And apparently, a women turned up to the tunnel tour one day who claims she was related to the person who witnessed the prisoner climbing out of a hole in their backyard…and still left the tour thinking that even after the staff tried to explain how impossible it was :S . But to me, there is one significant flaw to that story anyway…if you had just escaped from a Prison, why in the world would you tell the FIRST PEOPLE YOU SEE about what you had just done??? Sure, there could be bragging rights about your achievement far later on in your life, but not as soon as you have just escaped – when, if Prison Break is anything to follow, you are supposed to make yourself seem as much like a normal citizen as possible.
After a while we got back up on our feet and explored some more of the walking section of the tunnels, where some interesting features were pointed out and we learnt some more facts. Some of the interesting things included learning about where you currently were in the area (the tunnels extend outside of the Fremantle Prison grounds) and looking up through a hole in the roof that extended all the way up to a roadside above where you could see daylight, although the daylight doesn’t actually extend itself into the tunnel because it is so far up. Another interesting thing pointed out to us was the recent “discovery” (well, at least by our tour guide) of spiders living throughout the tunnels. Although there wasn’t very many in the tunnel, it definitely looked as if they were spreading. Interestingly enough, the webs of the spiders living in the tunnels seemed quite different to the ones we see living above ground. Instead of threads of web that are usually hard to notice (well, hard enough to notice for me to have walked through countless amounts of spider webs in my life :|), in the tunnels it appears as if the threads of web are much thicker, to the extent you cant not see them with the naked eye. In fact, some of the webs actually looked like the spiders had had a tough time making them. Or maybe the spiders just don’t care how their webs look inside of a tunnel, because no one is really supposed to be able to see them anyway lol. Believe it or not, this was only one of two creatures found living in the tunnels :O
After walking further around the tunnels, we came to a point where there was a pile of limestone rocks blocking what seemed like an extension of the tunnel. This point of the tunnel had apparently been apart of many prisoner escape conspiracies as well, however we were told that these kinds of escape stories are impossible as well, and rather than an elaborate escape tunnel being built at this section, the most likely apparent scenario is that the prisoners accidentally dug the wrong way, and were forced to fill it back in with limestone and then continue digging in the opposite direction. Kind of boring, but better than an explanation where a guy climbs out of a hole in someone’s backyard and exclaims “I JUST ESCAPED FROM FREMANTLE PRISON :>” .
We walked further down the tunnel from that point where we ended up on a kind of metal grating/platform that extends into a tunnel that contains water (so we were above the water at this point). Amy tells us that it is easy for people to not even see the water when all they are using is a torch to guide their way (such as the headlamp on our helmets), and that when the Amazing Race contestants were running around in the tunnels, a women ran straight off the metal grating/platform into the next tunnel and landed straight into the water :O Come to think of it, I actually think I remember seeing that part on TV. But when Amy showed us the “illusion” with her torch, you can see that it was quite an easy mistake to make…just one that you hope someone else makes before you We all sat down on the platform/metal grating, and Amy spoke to us more about the tunnels and some funny experiences from previous tour groups. After that she asked us all to turn our headlamps off, and then radioed the staff up above and asked them to turn the tunnel lights off :O . If you remember, at the start of this entry I said that googling about the Tunnel Tours was a stupid mistake, and it was finding out this point of the tour that was why. Now I’m not scared of the dark, its just that something didn’t sit well with me about being in complete darkness, with no source of light, 20 metres below the surface, in a tunnel made by prisoners many many years ago. So, after reading about that point of the tour, I was worried about it for the rest of the night But in reality, the experience was not scary at all…in fact, it was quite surreal and unforgettable…in a good way When the lights fade out in the tunnel, your eyes have absolutely no source of light to try to adjust to…so all you are able to see…or not see :S… is black. I couldn’t help but think at the time was that maybe this experience is what a blind person has to experience their entire life. You couldn’t even see your hand in front of your face…no matter how close you put it. It was as if you had completely lost your sense of sight… and where I for once fully realised how lost I would be without it. And when a silence falls upon the group for a few moments, you know they are thinking the same thing. We actually sat there for about 5 minutes chatting before the lights were turned back on, which was a point where your eyes almost thank you for some sort of light again, and I guess also some sort of vision.
After this we got back up and made our way through the tunnels to the “dock” where we would get into boats to explore the “flooded” parts of the tunnel system. It was two people to a boat, where the front people would paddle. Amy, as the tour leader, had to go in a boat by herself, and it ended up being Rachel and me in a boat, followed by Jesse by himself. The people at the front of each boat got the job of using the oars to row, and as I was sitting at the front that job was laid upon me. Now I cant even remember the last time I had to row a boat, if ever, so my rowing skills were definitely going to be a bit rusty. But I thought that what I had seen in movies and TV shows would be enough to get me by and it would be fine…it wasn’t. Almost straight after I had began to row, our boat crashed into the side of the tunnel wall. I would row the other way to get away from the wall, and then I would crash into the other side of the tunnel. It didn’t really click into my mind until a few moments later that crashing into walls 20 metres below ground that had been there for so long could never be a good thing…but nonetheless I continued to go from wall to wall for a while until I somewhat got the hang of it and managed to stay kind of in the middle of the tunnel. Whilst we paddled through the tunnels, Amy stopped at a few points to explain things, such as a plaque placed on the wall of the tunnel to commemorate the finished project, and to acknowledge the work of the prisoners who did it. The theory goes that it would have been too embarrassing for the Prison and the Prison Officials to publically honour the efforts of the prisoners, but still wanting to, they placed the plaque somewhere where only the prisoners would have known about it and seen it; somewhere where they thought the public would never go (well they were wrong, weren’t they ). But even if they didn’t publicly honour the prisoners, the existence of the plaque shows that while the prisoners could have committed the worst crimes imaginable, they were still respected for the work that they did. And the fact that the tunnels are still standing to this day, shows that the prisoners must have had some care for the work that they did whilst in prison, too.
Whilst I was hard at work rowing the boat throughout the tunnels, little did I know that when we had stopped at a point so Amy could speak to us, Jesse sneakily attached his boat to mine and Rachel’s… which meant that for the majority of the boat part of the tour, I was not only paddling for one boat…but two :O…So whilst I’m struggling just to keep the boat in the centre of the tunnel…I’m needlessly carrying this extra weight behind me…and I didn’t even realise until towards the end when Rachel and Jesse couldn’t help but laugh at the fact I didn’t know. Sorry guys, I guess it was wrong of me to be more focussed on not bashing into the tunnel walls so the place doesn’t topple down on top of us lol… Oh, and it was towards the end of the tour that we saw the second creature living in the tunnels :O Up on one of the rafters near the roof… was…a large… cockroach! :O Apparently the cockroach had a name too, but unfortunately I have forgotten it now According to Amy, it is always the same cockroach, and before our tour she had thought it was dead and had made the previous tour have a minutes silence on the cockroach’s behalf. It seems that cockroaches can not only survive nuclear bombs, but can survive in the Fremantle Prison Tunnels too After watching the cockroach in awe for a few moments, we paddled down the tunnel and then back to the “dock”…and yes I bashed into the walls a few more times too …and made sure Jesse wasn’t attached to my boat too *evils*. After that, the tour was pretty much over. We climbed back up the ladder, thankfully with no troubles this time, got un-harnessed, took our coveralls and boots off then headed outside where we then received our Tunnels Tour “successful completion certificate” :> . Overall, the Tunnels Tour was really good; in fact, I think it exceeded my expectations. The tour guide, Amy, was really laidback and fun, and for a bunch of water tunnels, they certainly do have a lot of interesting history behind them that you probably wouldn’t have even thought of before doing the tour. In conclusion, I highly recommend the tour to everyone, and if you know me, invite me to go with you and I will gladly go do the tour again
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. Now, if it was a one off thing I wouldn’t have been so annoyed, but only the day before he had left me standing at the station for at least 45 minutes by myself not knowing when or if he was going to be turning up…because he was asleep in bed and forgot to set his alarm (in the end I had to leave without him 
