After I found out that there were actually seven Peter Pan statues worldwide -- even after I visited the original in London -- it never occurred to me that I might someday visit all of them, because I knew one was in Perth, Australia, on the exact opposite side of the world from my home in Newfoundland. However, in 2008 I had the opportunity of a lifetime to travel to Australia to teach a series of writing workshops -- one of which was near Perth!
 

When my host, author Nathan Brown, offered to take me to do a little sightseeing around Perth, I had one request. He did take me to the beach where I got my feet wet in the Indian Ocean, and that was amazing -- but Nathan was a little bemused that what I wanted most was to visit a tiny park in Perth called Queens Gardens. It took a bit of searching, but we found it, and I got my picture taken with the third of the Peter Pan statues I'd had the chance to visit.

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While visiting the statue, I was amazed to see that, just like our statue in Bowring Park at home, this one stands near a pond with swans in it -- but the swans in Perth are black. When I expressed amazement, Nathan said, "That's ... the colour swans are," and I realized things really are different in Australia.

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I found a few conflicting accounts of where this statue fits in the Peter Pan timeline. Most websites I've seen say it was made in 1927 and was the fifth of the statues cast from Frampton's original mold, but the Australian sources I've read say that it was erected in 1929, dedicated to the children of Western Australia on the occasion of the state's centenary. You can read about it here and also here (the second link includes an excerpt from a 1929 newspaper, which makes the date seem fairly accurate. Might it have been made and sent to Australia in 1927 and not erected in Perth till 1929? I would like to know more).

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When I posted my Facebook picture of myself with this statue, a friend pointed out that the base looked less full of creatures than that of the other statues. However, as they are supposed to have all been cast from the same original mold, they should be identical, and in the Wikipedia photo of the Perth statue it does look identical to the others, so the slightly different appearance of this one may just be the angle at which I was standing when the photo was taken. 

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One difference is that some of the Peter Pans have lost their flutes over time, and this seems to be the case with Perth Peter Pan.