The 2018 Melbourne Cup is on its way to WA but won’t be shown in Perth.
Camera IconThe 2018 Melbourne Cup is on its way to WA but won’t be shown in Perth. Credit: Supplied/Supplied

Why Perth will miss out on the Melbourne Cup this year

Matt ZisEastern Reporter

THE Melbourne Cup’s jet-setting world tour descends on WA this week but the people of Perth won’t get much of a chance to glimpse Australian horse racing’s most famous prize.

That’s despite the Cup and its handlers arriving in Perth on Thursday and also taking a break in the city on Saturday night.

The Cup’s only date with the public while in WA is on Friday in the small country town of Boyup Brook, about 270km away.

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Organisers in the town most famous for an annual country music festival have gone all out in preparation, with the cup to take part in a special street parade with a horse-drawn carriage and vintage cars.

“We have a number of community activities organised including a street parade, a special Flemington High Tea and a Flemington Fling Gala Evening,” Upper Blackwood Agricultural Society secretary Sue Titchmarsh said.

People at Boyup Brook Soldiers Memorial Hospital and Boyup Brook Citizens Lodge will also have a chance to get up close to and be photographed with the 18-carat gold trophy.

The Cup will return to Perth on Saturday before heading east on Sunday morning’s Indian Pacific train bound for Sydney.

The world tour is becoming tradition for the $200,000 trophy that the Victorian Racing Club describes as “the People’s Cup”.

This year’s journey started in the United Kingdom and Ireland in July and will take in 37 locations, before the cup returns to Flemington in time for the race that stops the nation on Tuesday, November 6.