Swan River cruise, city to sea.

Our Swan River cruise is an out-and-back sailing between the city and the port, 2.5 hours from casting off to tying up, and it can begin at the Perth end or the Fremantle end. Over the microphone, the captain names what slides past: Bell Tower · Swan Brewery · Kings Park · Royal Perth Yacht Club · the big riverside homes · Fremantle's inner harbour. It starts from $42, with 553 reviews averaging 4.4.

Treat it as sightseeing, not a meal. Nothing to eat is bundled in, anyone drinking alcohol aboard must be 18 or older, and the operator keeps the right to swap the boat or alter the course. Think of it as the river's greatest hits in one easy sitting: the skyline shrinking astern, the wide reaches of the middle river, then the cranes and ships of the port before the turn for home.

Plans can stay loose: hold a seat, settle the bill later, and get the whole fare back by cancelling at least 24 hours before departure. Separate guides on this site deal with the other ways onto the river: one way to Fremantle, lunch and dinner cruises, the wine day upriver, private charters and the Transperth ferry. Each one says plainly what it costs and who it suits.

No Australian capital gets more sun than Perth, by Tourism Western Australia's account, and its figures put summer highs around 29°C, with February usually the hottest, and winter at about 12°C. The nearest station, Perth Metro, logs a mean January high of 31.2 °C with just 19 mm of rain all month. Summer is the classic cruise season: bright light on the water, long evenings and very little chance of a wet deck.

Winter brings the rain. July averages 142 mm at the station, with a daily low of 7.9 °C, so a midwinter cruise is a window-seat affair with a jacket for the deck. Even then, clear days between the fronts can be crisp and beautiful on the water. The shoulder months are gentle: April averages a high of 25.9 °C and October 23.5 °C.

The Noongar calendar divides the year into seasons that follow the land rather than fixed dates. Of those seasons, Birak covers December and January as the rains fade, Makuru brings June and July's cold and wet, and Kambarang paints October and November in colour. The climate chart on this page shows every month.

Not everyone wants to come straight back. A single-direction ticket costs from $32; the quickest sailing is 75 minutes, it goes either upstream or down, and the captain still narrates. It leaves you free in port for as long as you like. That makes it the better choice when Fremantle is the destination and the river is simply the most scenic road to get there.

The train is the easy way home. Rail links the port and the city centre in 25 minutes, Tourism Western Australia says, so a late lunch in port still gets you back to your hotel by mid-afternoon. Pay AUD 3.50 in cash for a Go Anywhere ticket and the next three hours of Transperth travel are covered. On a Sunday, paying by SmartRider or contactless card, the ride is free.

Fremantle is worth the hours. Stalls have filled the market halls since 1897, convict hands raised the prison walls in the 1850s, and the boat harbour still fries fish and chips beside the trawlers. The Perth to Fremantle guide on this site plans the day, from which direction to sail to how long to stay in port before the train.