One more thing...

Well, I realize it’s been nearly two months since I updated, but I never did get around to my final thoughts about Australia, so I’ll start there. I’ll begin with my regular disclaimer that these are only my personal impressions of this country, and they should in no way sway your own opinions of it. I spent only a very short time there, and saw, geographically, very little of what is a very large country. I did enjoy my time there, and I do recommend it if you feel inclined to actually spend 14+ hours on a plane to get there. These are mostly the little tidbits that I’d been storing up over the trip and didn’t have time to elaborate on while I was actually over there. That or I didn’t feel like typing them all out on the tiny keyboard of my netbook.

Kangaroos. Oh yes, we saw them. Many of them. But mostly dead on the side of the highway between Cairns and Brisbane. I’m not kidding when I say there was a dead kangaroo every 100 metres or so for pretty much the entire stretch of the highway. Some of them were bloated, some of them looked pretty fresh. But there were so many of them you really got tired of seeing them. Fortunately for us, it was relatively cool while we were there (owing to it being winter and all). Apparently in the summer they stink something fierce. Pleasant thought, huh? They’re sortof like deer are in Canada. They like to jump across the highway at night. Or so we were told, since we-thankfully-didn’t see any, likely due to the fact that we didn’t really drive at night a whole lot. Well, the Aussies have come up with a solution: Kangaroo bumpers. That is, of course, only the name Glen and I have given them, because we never actually asked any natives what they were really called (or if that was actually the purpose of them). But nearest we can figure, that’s what they were for. It’s a metal bar across the grille of the car to prevent the kangaroos you hit from doing any damage to your vehicle. Basically, so you can just drive away and hose the blood off the hood later. At one point we heard a rumor that it’s a bit of a sport down there to see how many of the little buggers you can hit with your car. Right now all the bleeding hearts out there are abhorring my callousness, and can’t believe anyone would want to hurt such beautiful and cuddly animals. Okay, sure. But if you saw the sheer number of Kangaroo carcasses out on that highway that we saw, you’d know that kangaroos are not in short supply in Australia. In fact, they’re more of a menace than anything else. So really, it makes sense to have a kangaroo bumper. It saves you the cost or repeatedly repairing your headlights.

Food. Yes, we ate kangaroo meat. No, I did not like it. We had it as sausages one night, then Glen had it again in a meat pie. Both times it was ground, like hamburger, so that may have had some influence on whether or not I liked it. But I found it was a bit gamey, and there was a weird tang that I didn’t really like. Glen didn’t seem to mind it, but he’ll pretty much eat anything that has some type of animal in it. Because we were basically on our own as far as cooking went, we mostly just ate what we’d normally eat at home, so whatever was easiest. But we did try a little of the local foods, mostly in the form of candy and desserts. Lamingtons! I have discovered a love for Lamingtons. It’s basically just a hunk of cake dipped in chocolate, then rolled in coconut. Simple, but delicious. We also tried a whole host of chocolate bars that aren’t sold here in Canada. And I would just like to ask the Cadbury corporation why they don’t sell Cherry Ripe here in Canada? They’re delicious. I would buy them if they were sold here. We also discovered Starburst Snakes. They’re like gummy worms, but the flavors are way, way better. They taste like starburst candy, but in gummy worm form. I think between Glen, Slacker and myself we polished off 3 large bags in the course of a week. They should definitely sell those in Canada. And Smith’s Sweet Thai Chili potato chips. My God, were they good. Glen and I have searched the grocery stores here, but have yet to find anything remotely comparable. It’s probably a good thing those ones aren’t sold in Canada. Meat pies are very popular as a lunchtime meal in Australia. They love a good meat pie. We never did figure out why, but we did try quite a few, and they were pretty good. Kebabs! Oh my, the kebabs! But they’re not what you’d think. It’s really just a donair(or doner if you’re in Oz), that has some vegetables and sauces added, and is then grilled for a few minutes to heat it up. But they’re amazing. We discovered them in Cairns, and I think probably had at least 5 more after that. I justified this by forcing myself to believe they were healthier than they probably were. But they did have vegetables, so it wasn’t a total lie.

Tim Tams. I feel that by the sheer volume of Tim Tams that were consumed by me and Glen that these deserve their own category. They’re fantastic. And what’s strange is, if you look at the ingredients, what’s in them and how they’re put together, they don’t sound particularly appetizing. But for whatever reason, they’re awesome. So awesome, in fact, that there are many, many varieties of them. There’s original, double coat(twice the chocolately coating), Black Forest(filled with cherry and vanilla frosting), Dark(with a dark chocolate coating), Mint, Caramel and Crunch(a crunchy honeycomb is added to the cookie). My personal favorite was the crunch, though that was followed closely by the double coat. Mmmm…so good. The best part? You can get them here! I’ve found them at London Drugs and Save-on-Foods so far. I can’t even fathom a guess at how many packages of Tim Tams we actually ate in the month we were in Australia, but I do know it was a lot.

Cars. Like any country, the cars have different names. And different companies, though they’re the same companies, just with different names. But they also have cars there that aren’t sold here. Utes, for example. The closest thing we have to a ute here is the El Camino. And those didn’t sell particularly well, nor were they in production for very long. Well, there’s a lot of them in Australia. They’re really popular, though neither Glen nor I could figure out why. The other thing Glen noticed was that a lot of the trucks have snorkels. You see, when it rains in Australia, the water doesn’t really get absorbed into the soil. It just sortof runs off. So they get a lot of flooded roads down there. Quite often you’ll see a metre stick on the side of the road, with height marked on it. Why? So you know how deep the water is when the road floods. That way you know if you can drive through it or not. The snorkels on trucks move the air intake for the engine above the actual engine itself, so that you can drive through higher water and your engine won’t get flooded.

Campervans. Glen and I rented a 2-person campervan for our trip. We figured that way we killed 2 birds with one stone-we had wheels and a place to sleep. So rather than staying in hostels, we stayed in caravan parks. Well, in Australia the term “caravan park” means something entirely different. The caravan parks have barbeques that anyone can use-barbeques is code for a grill that’s gas powered, by the way. They have showers with unlimited hot water that, for the most part, you don’t have to pay for. They have a camp kitchen that’s basically just an outdoor kitchen without pots, pans or utensils(but they do have fridges, kettles, and microwaves). And they often have a pool. Yeah, life on the road was rough. Because of this fabulous infrastructure, apparently a new culture has emerged. The Caravan culture. We met a LOT of these people in the caravan parks. They’re usually seniors who are retired and actually have home elsewhere, but just go caravanning for a good chunk of the year. For the most part, they go north to Queensland where it’s warmer in the winter. Sorta like the snowbirds in Canada. They seem to stay at the same park every year, and some places even have a spot saved for them. They have neighbors that come back every year as well. So they all know each other. This subsequently leads to social activities being planned. Lawn bowling, in particular, seemed to be quite popular. It’s really quite fascinating, and in the month we were there we met tons of people just by being in the caravan parks. And they were generally always willing to chat your ear off if you had the time.

It’s a lot like home. Australia is a lot like Canada, with different flora and fauna. They measure everything in metric, they speak English, they use dollars and the queen is on their money as well. Their cities are quite far apart, and to get around and really see the country you need a car. It’s also a young country, relatively speaking, so much like Canada, they really don’t have a lot of old buildings with a lot of history. It’s all relatively new. They build their roads and sidewalks and overpasses the same. The food is pretty much the same. Honestly, if you took away the accent, and the change in trees and dropped the price of gas a few cents, a lot of Canadians probably wouldn’t know the difference.

Since it’s been a while, those are the little tidbits I can remember from our month-long excursion to Australia. Stay tuned, because I spent last week in San Francisco pedaling like a maniac. And I know you all want to hear about that.

Must...Get...Home...

There's more, you ask? But of course there's more! Who would I be if I simply left it at that last post and didn't add in a little more? I would be ordinary, something a categorically refuse to do. So here's more fun (or lack thereof) for you to enjoy.

Getting home was, shall we say, interesting. Normally, you have your flights booked, you get on them, and you get home. Sometimes with, sometimes without your luggage. But at least you physically get home. Well, we didn't. But let's start at the beginning so I don't confuse the living crap out of you.

We arrived at the Sydney airport via train bright and early, about 3 1/2 hours before our flight. Yes, I am one of those anal-retentive people who religiously shows up far too early for their flights. We made it through customs and security all right-for those that haven't been, in Australia you get to go through customs on the way out of the country as well. I'm not sure why this is, but I have 2 stamps in my passport to prove it. We found some decent breakfast and our gate and parked ourselves in some seats so we could await boarding for our flight. At some point in there, I decided to get up and ended up buying some booze at the duty-free to take back with us. This is when karma finally decided to barf all over us. The airport lost power. And I mean the entire airport. Including customs and security. So guess what? Half the people on our flight couldn't get through customs or security, which meant our flight wasn't going anywhere until the power came back on and they started processing people again. It took them an hour and a half to get the power back on, which meant our flight was delayed by 4 hours.

Given that we had basically already missed our connecting flight in Los Angeles (we'd be landing 2 hours after it had left), I went to the desk before we boarded to ask what we should do about getting a connecting flight. I was told that crews at LAX knew about what was happening, and that our flight, which was in fact booked with a partner airline, was being re-booked and we'd be fine once we reached Los Angeles. So we got on the plane and happily went along with what we were told.

It's a long flight, made even longer by the fact that we spent 4 extra hours in the Sydney airport. So by the time we reached LA we were exhausted and more than a little pungent, and we really, really wanted to get home. Just before we landed, we were informed by the captain that because of the power outage, a large number of the luggage people had checked hadn't made it on the aircraft. Why? Apparently because the power was off, the computers were down, and the luggage couldn't be processed in a timely fashion. According to the announcement, if the crew had waited even 10 more minutes on the ground, the flight crew would have been on duty too long, and that would have caused them to cancel the flight completely. Thus they decided to leave before all the luggage was on board. I completely understand this decision. As far as the airline was concerned, canceling the flight would've meant they'd have to re-book almost 400 people onto new flights. And given that it was summer, most flights were probably full, meaning that would've been a serious pain in the arse for them. As a passenger, I'd really rather have made it to my destination and not have my luggage, than be stuck were I was leaving from for what could've been a week or more, just because my luggage couldn't make it on the plane. Well, apparently when they said "some" luggage, what they really meant was "most". I think there was maybe 30 bags that came off that plane. But we figured that was fine, given that we'd be home in a few hours anyways, and we didn't really need our bags. We were told to file our missing luggage claim in Vancouver, as that was our final destination, and they had been tagged all the way there.

When we finally got off the plane we were again told by another V Australia employee that our flights had been re-booked, and that Alaska Airlines would have our new flight all ready to go, we just needed to get to their counter. So we went there, and they had no idea what we were talking about. We were told all the flights were full, and the best they could do was let us fly standby. So, thinking there was a good chance we could still get on a plane that day, we took the standby.

There were still 3 flights leaving LAX that day for Vancouver, we thought our chances were good. That is, until we sat through 2 flights and didn't get on either. When we asked at the desk, we were told that all the flights to Vancouver had been overbooked by 7-10 people, and there was little chance we'd actually get the remaining flight out. We asked when the next flight was that actually had available seats, and were told it was 9pm the next day. We took it, because it at least meant we were going to get home eventually.

I should mention that, in the meantime, we had actually had to check Glen's carryon backpack, because of the duty free liquor we had bought. We had no checked baggage to put it into, thus we had no choice but to check something in order to get it home. Well, evidently his backpack did make it on the first flight out, without us, because when we asked at the end of the night if we could get it back, they couldn't find it.

I should say that at this point, it was early in the evening and we had been awake for nearly 36 hours straight. So, now armed with our boarding passes for a flight the next evening, we went back to the V Australia desk to demand satisfaction. Or probably sympathy. That's more what we were going for. At any rate, Glen literally walked up to the counter and started the conversation like this:
V Australia agent: Hi. How can I help you?
Glen:We've got a problem. We've been up for almost 36 hours and we missed our connecting flight...
Well, however we explained it, it got us a hotel room for the night. A hotel room with a sweet, sweet shower and a soft comfy bed for the night. Sure, we had no bags or clean underwear, but when faced with potentially spending all night in the airport, we'll take what we can get. The hotel she did manage to find, however, was literally an hour cab ride from the airport. But hey, what else have we got to do? So she got us a taxi voucher and away we went. I should also mention that we were also allowed to charge $100 to the room for food at the hotel, which was nice, given that we had zero American dollars with us. She even managed to secure us a couple toothbrushes so we could brush our teeth, given that ours were, at best guess, still sitting on the tarmac in Australia. It was a Hilton hotel, and the bed was lovely. Almost as lovely as the shower.

To get back to the airport we were to arrange our own transport, and then claim the amount from the airline afterwards, which seemed fine for us. We got a shuttle number from the hotel and booked our shuttle for the next day, quite early so we could check and see where our various bags had ended up and perhaps get our refund for the shuttle before the flight. We called in the morning to confirm the shuttle was coming, and all seemed well when they checked their bookings. Then came time to get back to the airport. We waited. And waited. 15 minutes after the shuttle should have been there, we called to check. Apparently they had made the booking for the next day and there was no one coming that day. Furious, Glen asked when we would be able to get a shuttle that day. The next time they could get one there was in another 45 minutes, which would mean we'd be cutting it pretty close. Unacceptable. So we canceled that shuttle and had the hotel call a cab. An hour and 10 minutes later we were finally at the airport, and feeling a little better because we knew we were finally going to get home.

Because we had a little time, we decided to check and see if they could find our bags. When they called the Vancouver airport, Glen's backpack had made it there (even though we hadn't flown yet), but our big bags were still MIA. The agent at the Alaska Airlines desk even called around at LAX and YVR (Vancouver) and no one seemed to know where they were. This, while a little perturbing, wasn't too worrying, given that were were going home, so even if they stayed lost for a few more days, we were going to be fine.

Finally we were on our flight home! At last, airborne for Vancouver! Shockingly, when we reached YVR, we found not only Glen's backpack, but our big bags waiting for us near the luggage carousel. It was a miracle! Our bags had made it home before we did! So we grabbed them and off we went. It was just after midnight at this point.

All was well again until we made it downtown, to waterfront station, only to discover that we had arrived so late the skytrain had stopped running out to our place. What to do? The nearest place we could catch a bus was a 20 minute walk. So we called a cab. We got home around 2 in the morning. Thankfully, I had called work from the hotel in California and managed to tell them I couldn't make it in for my Monday afternoon shift, which was a good thing given that we didn't get up until around 2 in the afternoon that day.

It took us a full day and a half longer than we anticipated, but we did finally make it home in one piece. I can't say it was the best experience I've ever had, and it's made me leery of every flying with Alaska Airlines again-seriously, you overbooked all your flights?!?-but it could have been much, much worse.

I still have a few little tidbits to add later, so keep your browser tuned to this URL. Hopefully it'll be up soon.

And they drove on...

My apologies for the lateness of this post. It's only now, over 2 weeks since we got back, that I've had time to actually sit down and finish it. And it's not even really done. There's still more! I know, you're at the edge of your seats! So here goes...

Now, let’s see…where did this intrepid traveler last leave you…Ahh, yes, Coolangatta. Well, it’s been an eventful couple of days, kids, so pull up a chair and a pack of your favorite Tim Tams-I’m currently munching on the Tim Tam Crush, which might just be my favorite so far.

From Coolangatta we mercifully left the main highway and headed inland to explore Springbrook National Park. For my Canadian friends, the national parks here aren’t like they are in Canada. They’re tiny and numerous. Very tiny. Like, you can drive from one end of Springbrook to the other in about 15 minutes, and that’s going between 40-50 km/h. We went because the Lonely Planet guidebook promised us waterfalls and pretty views. And we weren’t disappointed. In fact, it’s probably been one of the best detours so far. I was determined to do at least a little hiking, and no amount of complaining from Glen could change my mind. On the way to the trail we decided to hike, we saw some pretty amazing views from the lookouts-we were quite far inland, and from some you could see clear to the coast. Finally something to look at other than endless fields of sugar cane. The hike we picked was a mere 4 km, but ended up taking us about 2 ½ hours to do. Why? Well, we had to stop and take pictures of the pretty waterfalls. There were three of them, if I remember right, and 2 of them you got to walk behind, which was awesome. There were also several caves/crevasses/cracks in the rock that we got to walk through and fiddle around in. So naturally some fun was had puttering around in them, seeing how far we could wedge ourselves up the walls. The rest of the hike was through rainforest, which was cool and looks pretty much like you’d expect rainforest to be. At one point we stumbled across some green birds with bright-and I mean vibrantly bright-red bodies that were hanging out in a couple of trees eating the leaves. They were the kind of birds that you’d see selling for a couple hundred bucks in a pet store in Canada. Overall it was an excellent day, and a welcome deviation from the major highways.

We spent the night just south of the hippie/surfing Mecca of Byron Bay, on a beach called Broken Head. This morning we were picked up by Krazy Kat’s surfing and plunged into the Pacific for a lesson. And it was excellent. They showed us how to get up on the board in a way that’s much, much easier than the way I was taught in the last lesson I took-which was eons ago in Tofino. We puttered around in the water for probably 2 hours, and I actually managed to get standing-and I mean fully standing, feet on the board, actually riding the wave-several times. Oh, if only we had more time, and we could stick around for a few days… But the nomadic life is calling.

We spent the afternoon wandering the patchouli-smelling streets of Byron Bay, checking out various shops and munching on some delicious doner kebabs-they’re actually just donairs, I don’t know why they call them kebabs if they’re not on a stick. Doner kebabs, by they way, are my new favorite food. They’re delicious, and have just enough vegetables that I can delude myself into believing they’re healthy.

Tonight we make camp-or park the hippie campervan-in a fantabulous caravan park just north of Ballina. Seriously, it’s the nicest caravan park yet. The showers have shower curtains, and they’re spotless! Cue angelic cherubs here…

Anyways, I should probably get to sleep now, as I believe we have some craziness with macadamia nuts and perhaps cliff diving planned for tomorrow.

Well, clearly this never got posted whilst we were in Ballina. If I remember right, it’s because blogger was giving me some issues and I didn’t feel like wrestling with the wifi connection any longer. So I’ll do my best to bring you up to speed on what’s gone on since then. From Ballina we again headed south, our first stop being the Macadamia Castle nearby. It’s set on a macadamia plantation and we weren’t sure exactly what it was, but we did know we both like eating macadamia nuts, so we figured we’d give it a go. We ended up going no further than the gift shop, because it was really just an amusement park for the kiddies, with mini golf, a petting zoo and a couple other things we weren’t really interested in doing. So instead we bought some nuts and hit the road again, headed for a tiny town called Angourie, where there was supposed to be a pool we could swim in, with cliffs we could jump off of. Well, we got there, and found the pool, but the water was a little sketchy and had a fair amount of scum in it. And we didn’t really feel like jumping into water from cliffs when we couldn’t tell how deep it was. The cliffs, by the way, were fairly little, and rather uninspiring-so not worth the hype the guidebook afforded them. But we did get some nice views of the ocean from there, so it wasn’t a total loss.

From the scungy pool we headed a ways up the road known as the “Waterfall Way”, and you can probably guess why it’s called that. We ended up spending the night at a “rustic” caravan park in Dorrigo, which is a town so small I literally ran all the way around it in half an hour. In the morning we headed out for a view of Dangar Falls, which are quite impressive, then went down to the rainforest center in Dorrigo National Park and walked out on the skywalk, which hovers above the rainforest with a good view of the valley. We also did a little walk through the rainforest nearby and saw a couple pretty waterfalls and some birds. After that we headed back to the highway and went south, where we ended up driving straight into the pouring rain and freezing cold. We spent the night near Halliday’s Point, and ended up cooking dinner under and awning near the BBQ area, with our fingers wrapped around warm mugs of hot chocolate to keep them from freezing. That night we slept with the accompaniment of torrential downpour on the roof of the Hippie Camper off and on all night.

In the morning we headed south again and made a stop in Newcastle at Nobby’s Point, which is a spit that comes off the mainland fairly far. Because the wind was still screaming and it was still raining on and off, the surf was huge and completely whitewashed, and at points farther out on the spit it was actually coming up and over the walkway. Along one side of the spit the waves were breaking in perfect curls, so there were probably a dozen guys out there with fins and boogie boards actually catching the waves. I reckon they had to be a few bricks short of a load to even attempt that, because at that point on the spit it had changed from sand to large, pointy boulders that could probably have turned them into hamburger if they didn’t kick hard enough to get away from them. I admit I’m a little nuts sometimes, but I’m pretty sure it’s not something I would have tried. As we were standing there, watching the waves crash up over the spit farther down, Glen turned to me and said, “You know what? I’ve got dry clothes in the van.” At which point he grabbed the waterproof camera from me and proceeded to walk down the spit directly into where the waves were coming up. He came back looking like a drowned rat, but a drowned rat with a big silly grin on his face. The one thing he did forget, though, was that even though he had dry clothes in the van, he didn’t have dry shoes in the van. And thus the socks and sandals combination was born yet again.

Next on our itinerary was Sydney, and the hostel we had booked. Just as we were checking in, our friend Charlene-Slacker-happened to show up in the lobby, so after we dropped off our stuff and finally figured out where to park our van-with zero help from the hostel staff-we ended up next door at the Winking Lizard for a few beers and dinner. The next day was the International Tree Climbing Competition out in Paramatta. For those who haven’t seen a real arborist work, it’s pretty impressive. It’s almost like Cirque de Soleil, except with ropes and climbing equipment. There are several different categories that climbers compete in, and they’re awarded points based on time, speed, and technique. If you’d like to know more I’d suggest checking out the International Society of Arborists website, mostly because I don’t really understand everything completely. We went because Slacker is an arborist, and she competes in the competitions. She literally missed competing in Australia by one spot and a bit of bad luck, but she wanted to come and see the event anyways, so we decided to go with her. It was a chilly day, but we still had a fair amount of fun watching.

That night we got back to the hostel early enough to head downtown to Circular Quay and see the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House, the two big landmarks in Sydney. And yes, they are that impressive in person. The Harbor Bridge is, quite simply, a massive steel structure that, by looking at it, you swear looks far too heavy to be suspended above anything. But there it is, in all it’s glory. And the Sydneysiders-the residents of Sydney-are definitely proud of it. The Opera House is also an impressive building. It’s quite beautiful, especially right around sunset when the orange hits it. It’s not a white as in the pictures when you see it up close, though. It’s more of a beige color, and actually, I think rather than paint, the outside is actually tiled. At least it looks like it when you get up closer.

The next day was reserved completely for touristing. First we wandered out to Paddy’s Markets downtown, which feels a lot like Chinatown in any city, crowded and packed with too much stuff to even contemplate looking at all of it. It’s packed with everything from NBA jerseys to UGGs to supercheap souvenirs, all shoved into stalls inside a warehouse. I went to Oz fully expecting to come home with a cheap pair of UGGs, simply because that’s what you buy when you go there. Well, trying to find a pair that actually comes in my size was next to impossible. They did have a pair in my size, but they were the original plain ones, and they made my feet look huge. Normally I’m not very vain, but in this case, I didn’t feel like spending $100 on boots I can’t wear outside in the winter and I don’t really like that much. So I didn’t get any. But at least I know now that I don’t want them anymore. I did buy a couple things, and Slacker got a couple things as well. From the market we ended up at the Maritime Museum, which was wonderfully free to get into. Then we walked across the harbor and went into wildlife world, where Slacker got her first glimpse of Australian wildlife. Glen and I even got to see a few animals we hadn’t seen at the other zoos yet. It was a pretty good day, overall, though when we got back to the hostel we were exhausted and our feet were sore from walking all day. But a good kind f sore.

Monday morning Glen and I signed up for the Bridgeclimb, which was a very expensive way of getting up and actually onto the Sydney Harbor Bridge. They take you up the top arch of the bridge to the peak, so you get an excellent view of the city from there, and it’s not nearly as scary or exhilarating as it sounds. The exciting part is actually walking out to get to the arch, where you get to walk down a very narrow, rickety wooden walkway with nothing underneath it but space and water or ground-you are harnessed in, though, just in case. The top of the arch itself, though, is wide enough to drive a car over, solid steel, and you walk down the center of it with railing on either side, so it’s not nearly as extreme as it sounds. Good view though. It’s a pretty big buildup, because you literally spend an hour getting geared up, putting on a jumpsuit, getting pouches with a rain jacket and fleece jacket attached to your harness, and making sure there’s nothing loose dangling that could fall onto the bridge deck. Seriously, everything’s attached. If you wear glasses, you get a lanyard to attach to them, which is then clipped onto your jumpsuit. You get a handkerchief with an elastic that attaches to your wrist so you can’t drop it-no Kleenex allowed up there. And you get a radio so you can hear your guide as you’re going up. It was quite the experience. Though we did pay for it-just over $200 for a climb. Each. But we figured, when are we gonna be in Australia next? So we went for it.

After the bridge climb, we headed for the Blue Mountains, which are a very popular place to camp and hike in Oz. I’d guess it’s probably because of their proximity to Sydney. You can drive there in less than an hour from downtown. They’re beautiful, but in a way completely different from the mountains in Canada, especially the Rockies. I guess they get called mountains, but they’re really a series of plateaus and valleys, with the plateaus being separated from the valleys by large, almost completely vertical cliffs. Why are they called the Blue Mountains, you ask? Because of the Eucalyptus trees that grow there. The trees release a certain amount of oil into the atmosphere, and because of the density of the trees, and the amount of oil they release, the air in the valleys-at least on a clear day, we discovered-has a blue haze. Hence, Blue Mountains. The area is really fascinating, and we read all the signs we could but never did discover exactly what caused the seemingly uniform cliffs that occur everywhere in that one area. What we do know is that it was really, really fun to explore and hike there.

We spent three nights in the Blue Mountains. The first night was at a caravan park, with us in the van and Slacker in her next right next to the van. Well, kids, it’s winter in Oz. And even in Australia it still gets cold. Especially if you’re at a higher elevation. It froze that night. Being good Canadians, we all had toques (or beanies if you’re an Aussie), but Glen and I lacked mittens. We bought some at the first place we came to. The next two nights we ended up at a different caravan park, but this time in a little cabin we rented. Turned out the cabin was a mere $20/night more than simply parking our van and trying to sleep and cook in below zero temperatures, so for comfort’s sake-mostly my own-we got the cabin. And it had heaters in it, so it was-please excuse the expression-the cat’s ass.

Glen still somehow had a bum knee from the half marathon at the beginning of the month, so for the most part he either sat in the van and read his book, or wandered around whilst Slacker and I hiked. The first day we were there we hiked out to the Three Sisters, which is a rock formation in Katoomba. From there we descended the Great Staircase, which had something like 900 very steep steps, so we were glad we decided to go down instead of up. Then we hiked along the cliff base to the boardwalks at Scenic World. Roughly translated, Scenic World translates as “Japanese tourist trap”, and it has something like a mile of boardwalks through the rainforest that, despite our best efforts, Slacker and I couldn’t figure out the reason for building. But getting up from the cliff base at scenic world was fun. They have the steepest railway in the world there. It literally goes straight down the cliff. We rode it up, because the one-way ride was way cheaper than the two way ride, and it allowed us to hike down but not have to go back up. It’s a pretty weird experience, going straight up a cliff with no safety belt on. Glen met us at the bottom and said the rail is only set at 52 degrees, but when you’re riding it feels damn near a 90 degree vertical.

Slacker and I also hiked down to Victoria Falls, which was a lot farther off the beaten path than the previous day’s hike. It started like any other hike in the Blue Mountains, by going straight down into the valley. Down in a big way. Only this one we knew we’d have to come back up. At the bottom we found the cascades, which at first we thought were the actual falls. But after checking them out, we decided to keep going a bit farther and found the actual falls themselves. The Australians really know how to build a waterfall, I’ll admit. Most of them come off cliff overhangs, so it’s free-falling and a lot prettier than if it flows down a slightly sloping cliff. But I suppose it’s easier to get a cliff overhang if you’ve got a cliff to start with, and they’ve got those in abundance. The nice thing about Victoria Falls was the complete lack of other tourists. We were the only ones there, so we got that wonderful feeling of isolation and discovery you get when you hike into remoter areas. From there we visited the info center and Govett’s Leap, which has another amazing and this time incredibly tall waterfall.

Our last hike was the day we left, and this one Glen actually came along for. We hiked over Wentworth Falls and down some steps that had been carved into the cliff opposite over 100 years ago. Yes, they were steep. Very steep. And given that they were cut into a cliff gave you that feeling of being right out on the edge. Well, because you were right out on the edge. The edge of the cliff. It was hard to get a really good view of the falls from anywhere, but the little glimpses we got of it were pretty much good enough. On the way back to the van we hiked along the undercliff trail, which is basically just what it’s called, a trail under the cliff. It followed along underneath a lot of rock overhangs and near the bottom of the sheer cliff of the valley, then back up and into the parking lot. It was a fairly quick and easy hike but worth it, I think.

From there we weren’t really sure where we wanted to go. Slacker, however, was very insistent that she needed to see the ocean, so we decided to head for the sea. We pretty much decided where to go once we were actually in the van, and heading east towards the coast again. We wanted something right on the beach if we could get it, and it ended up being a caravan park in a city called The Entrance (honestly, I’m not making this stuff up), just north of Sydney. It really was right on the beach. Sortof. It was right on the edge of a lake that was literally attached to the ocean. So technically it was a beach, just not an ocean beach. But the ocean was within walking distance. So we all went over there, and in regular Sara style, the shoes came off as quickly as possible. The water was surprisingly warm given how far south we were, actually. Slacker and I also managed to get the bottoms of our pants wet, ‘cause the waves came in a little more powerfully than expected every now and again.

That night Glen and Slacker set about to polish off as much of our food as they could, because this was to be the last night in our beloved Hippie Camper. ‘Twas a sad night, indeed. They did a pretty good job of it, too. There was still some stuff left, but we took that into the hostel and left it on the free food shelf. The next day we dropped all our stuff off at the hostel and managed to get the campervan back on time. You’ll all be pleased to note that we miraculously managed to not accrue any additional charges, despite picking up a few new widow chips along our one month journey. It was hard to leave our lovely van in that sad, empty lot, but all good things must come to an end, I believe.

Back at the hostel, Slacker did her best to find us a seafood restaurant to eat at, but when we went looking for it we couldn’t find it. So instead we ended up with pizza and kebabs. Ahh, one last kebab. I shall likely spend the rest of my days searching for a kebab place in Vancouver with a taste comparable.

The next morning it was on the train and off to the airport for the flight home. And there’s a saga that goes with that, but I’ll save that little morsel for now, since I’m guessing your eyes are getting tired of reading by now.

I hope you don't mind sand in everything...

Now, let’s see…where did this intrepis traveler last leave you…Ahh, yes, Coolangatta. Well, it’s been an eventful couple of days, kids, so pull up a chair and a pack of your favorite Tim Tams-I’m currently munching on the Tim Tam Crush, which might just be my favorite so far.
From Coolangatta we mercifully left the main highway and headed inland to explore Springbrook National Park. For my Canadian friends, the national parks here aren’t like they are in Canada. They’re tiny and numerous. Very tiny. Like, you can drive from one end of Springbrook to the other in about 15 minutes, and that’s going between 40-50 km/h. We went because the Lonely Planet guidebook promised us waterfalls and pretty views. And we weren’t disappointed. In fact, it’s probably been one of the best detours so far. I was determined to do at least a little hiking, and no amount of complaining from Glen could change my mind. On the way to the trail we decided to hike, we saw some pretty amazing views from the lookouts-we were quite far inland, and from some you could see clear to the coast. Finally something to look at other than endless fields of sugar cane. The hike we picked was a mere 4 km, but ended up taking us about 2 ½ hours to do. Why? Well, we had to stop and take pictures of the pretty waterfalls. There were three of them, if I remember right, and 2 of them you got to walk behind, which was awesome. There were also several caves/crevasses/cracks in the rock that we got to walk through and fiddle around in. So naturally some fun was had puttering around in them, seeing how far we could wedge ourselves up the walls. The rest of the hike was through rainforest, which was cool and looks pretty much like you’d expect rainforest to be. At one point we stumbled across some green birds with bright-and I mean vibrantly bright-red bodies that were hanging out in a couple of trees eating the leaves. They were the kind of birds that you’d see selling for a couple hundred bucks in a pet store in Canada. Overall it was an excellent day, and a welcome deviation from the major highways.
We spent the night just south of the hippie/surfing Mecca of Byron Bay, on a beach called Broken Head. This morning we were picked up by Krazy Kat’s surfing and plunged into the Pacific for a lesson. And it was excellent. They showed us how to get up on the board in a way that’s much, much easier than the way I was taught in the last lesson I took-which was eons ago in Tofino. We puttered around in the water for probably 2 hours, and I actually managed to get standing-and I mean fully standing, feet on the board, actually riding the wave-several times. Oh, if only we had more time, and we could stick around for a few days… But the nomadic life is calling.
We spent the afternoon wandering the patchouli-smelling streets of Byron Bay, checking out various shops and munching on some delicious doner kebabs-they’re actually just donairs, I don’t know why they call them kebabs if they’re not on a stick. Doner kebabs, by they way, are my new favorite food. They’re delicious, and have just enough vegetables that I can delude myself into believing they’re healthy.
Tonight we make camp-or park the hippie campervan-in a fantabulous caravan park just north of Ballina. Seriously, it’s the nicest caravan park yet. The showers have shower curtains, and they’re spotless! Cue angelic cherubs here…
Anyways, I should probably get to sleep now, as I believe we have some craziness with macadamia nuts and perhaps cliff diving planned for tomorrow.
Please forgive any weird formatting that might occur on this trip. For some reason Blogger doesn't seem to like Oz too much.

Crikey!

Well, we’re on our own now, driving down the east coast of Oz, hanging out in Caravan parks and pretty much just takin’ it easy. I last left you all while I was in Cairns, I believe, just after having acquired my “sea legs”. Well, it’s now been 4 days and if I close my eyes and stand still, sometimes it still feels like we’re still on the boat. Ahh, equilibrium.

Anyways, from Cairns we motored south, and our first stop happened to be at Murdering Point Winery. No, that’s the actual name, I’m not making that up. They make “exotic fruit” wines, like mango and lychee-the lychee one is actually pretty good, and that’s coming from someone who doesn’t generally like wine. So we bought a few bottles. Combine that with the rum we got in Bundaberg and I’m pretty sure we’re already over our duty-free liquor limit for bringing back to Canada. Oh, well. It’ll be worth it if we have to pay a little extra. Then we kept going down that road and stopped at a lovely little beach for lunch. We called it a night fairly early in Townsville, so we could actually cook dinner without having to use a flashlight-or a torch, as the locals call them.

The next morning we hiked up Castle Hill, which seemed a little like the Grouse Grind of Townsville. It was about 1 km up uphill with stairs built into the hill, and yes, there were people headed up and down in their workout clothes. At the top there’s a pretty good view 360 degree view of Townsville and the surrounding area. You can actually drive to the top of it, but we decided (well actually, Glen decided) that hiking up it would be better. Especially since we just spent the better part of a week sitting around. It was kinda nice to get out of the van and get some exercise. After that we stopped just south of Townsville at the Billabong Wildlife Sanctuary. I have no idea if they’re affiliated with the clothing company or not. They have all manner of Aussie wildlife there, including reptiles, koalas, and Cassowarys. But they pretty much started as a place to bring wayward crocodiles. And they have a lot of them, both salt and freshwater. We sat in on a couple of the talks, and especially like the one about the wombats and koalas. Have you ever heard that koalas are endangered? Yes? Well it’s a lie. There’s tons of them in Oz, and they have no known natural predators, save for cars and trucks. Wombats, on the other hand, are disappearing like crazy. There’s one species here that has only 128 actual animals left. That means that if I ever decided to have kids, and they wanted to take a trip like this, there’s a good chance there wouldn’t be any of that particular species of wombat left. That, my friends, is really sad. While we opted not to actually cuddle a koala, since we’d already done that in Kuranda, we got to pet one instead. They have one big, old dude named Ray Charles that you can pet and have your picture taken with, you just can’t pick him up. He’s got a pretty sad story, actually. He was found as a baby when his mother was hit by a car, then released back into the wild. Then he was attacked by a dog and blinded, so now he can’t be released back into the wild, which is why he’s at the sanctuary. Oh, one other interesting tidbit we learned. Every wildlife place pretty much has koalas you can cuddle, but apparently the government regulates how much cuddling the little guys can do. They’re literally only allowed to “work” for 20 minutes a day, 3 days a week. That’s a work week I could get behind. It has a lot to do with their diet, which consists solely of eucalyptus leaves, which have virtually no nutritional value. So they spend most of their days sleeping or eating. We also got a good look at some crocodiles, and I got a good snicker out of watching Glen as we listened to the reptile talk. Apparently they have something like 22 of the top 24 most venomous snakes in the world in Australia. Sure makes you want to head out for a bushwalk, doesn’t it?

From there we headed south-stopping at a couple fruit stands, of course-and ended up in Arlie Beach. Yesterday morning we rented some camping gear and hopped a boat out to South Molle Island in the Whitsunday group of islands, to hike the island and camp for a night on an almost private beach. The hiking was pretty tame-it was basically just a path mown through the grass at a very gradual incline up a hill-but we managed to get in about 14km of actual hiking. We pretty much covered the entire area of the island itself, and even checked out the resort on the other side. At one point, Glen asked what these weird trees were, ‘cause they looked like a tree trunk with grass growing out the top. The next info sign we saw said they were called grasstrees, so he guessed pretty close. The beach we were staying on wasn’t particularly sandy, because it was made up mostly of broken little pieces of coral that had washed up on shore. I think the Whitsundays pretty much mark the southern tip of the Great Barrier Reef, so that makes sense. We had a pretty good sleep that night, with the exception of listening to the wild cockatoos screeching and squawking overhead as they chased each other around. Noisy little buggers they are. Coincidentally, they island would be a wicked good place to birdwatch if you brought your binoculars, ‘cause we saw tons of different types of birds-most that we couldn’t identify.

This morning the boat picked us up and we came back to the mainland, and pretty much just wandered around Arlie Beach for the rest of the day. Actually, we did fit some laundry and grocery shopping in there (one simply cannot run out of Tim Tams, after all).

Well, I’ve no idea when this is going to get posted, so in all likelihood another chunk of writing will end up being attached to this one before I manage to get it online.

Well, shockingly, we didn’t get to an internet connection before this is going to get posted, so there’s more to add. From Arlie Beach we ended up in Yeppoon for the night, which was literally right on the beach. A really wide beach. Glen and I actually got the running shoes out and went for a little jog when we got there, because it was fairly early still, and we managed to jog back to the caravan park along the beach. It was pretty cool, I’ve gotta say.

The next morning we motored into nearby Rockhampton to check out the Dreamtime Heritage Center, which is sortof the aboriginal museum in the area. They have some excellent displays, and the tour was quite good, if a little spotty and short on actual information. You kinda got the sense that the “tour guides” were really grad students who were forced to volunteer there as part of their grad work, so they seemed a little disorganized at times. The facility itself, however, is fantastic, and the tour is not boring in any way. Near the end one of the guides played the digeridoo for us, which is a talent I will never acquire. My sister can play a little, but this guy definitely put her to shame. Sorry, Jana, but when you can do a Kookaburra call, then I’ll be impressed. Then came the highlight of the day, they showed us how to throw a boomerang, and then let us try. Glen and I actually did rather well, as compared to everyone else in our group. It’s a bit of wrist action, and you have to basically hold the boomerang vertical, which is completely counterintuitive. But it worked pretty well. Interesting fact, the returning boomerang actually has no practical significance. There’s no purpose for it, other that just as something to play with. There are countless types of boomerangs, for hunting and various other things, but the returning boomerang really doesn’t do anything other than come back if you throw it right. Now I’m starting to think all the things I thought about Australia were wrong…

From there we ended up in Agnes Water for the night, but we got there too late to try surfing-they’re pretty much the most northerly beach for surfing on the east coast. For some reason, all the caravan parks in the area were full, so we ended up at a backpacker’s hostel called “Cool Bananas”. That’s right, Slacker and Jana, it’s real. Cool Bananas is a real place! It’s a pretty nice hostel, but it ended up being a bit crowded because all the other campervanners who couldn’t find a site spent the night there as well. There’s something to be said for not having to wait an hour to cook dinner because there’s no burners left in the kitchen for you to do your cooking on. We ended up getting up fairly early and heading south anyways.

Our final destination was Brisbane, but we stopped in Maryborough for a bit on the way. Originally we were just going for the Bond Store, which was some history about sugar cane (more ranting about the sugar cane when I get a proper-sized keyboard) and the liquor industry. But then I was thumbing through Liz the GPS unit-she’s got a British accent so we named her after the Queen-and discovered that there’s a statue of Mary Poppins there! Apparently the guy that created her came from Maryborough. So naturally we had to find the statue. From Maryborough we headed to the Australia Zoo, home of the late Steve Irwin and family. It’s actually an amazing zoo for someone who doesn’t live in Oz, because it has all the native animals in it, and you can interact with a lot of them-you can pet koalas, feed kangaroos, hold snakes, and lots more. They had some animals we hadn’t seen yet, like some little hedgehog dudes and Tasmanian devils. Yes! Tasmanian devils! Which are actually quite small. Think slightly larger than a Chihuahua. They ain’t real big. But you wouldn’t want to mess with them if you saw their teeth…

In a nutshell, the zoo was awesome. And the merchandizing was pretty amazing, too. You could get Steve Irwin wrestling a crocodile keychains. Seriously, they were huge. Though something a lot of North Americans probably don’t know is that the guy was a very active conservationist, and he did a lot of amazing things in that area. Which makes a lot more sense that they basically named a zoo after him. It’s sorta nice to know that he wasn’t just the guy that wrestled crocodiles and said “crikey” a lot.

From the zoo we took a circuitous route to Bonnie and Sabz place-Liz didn’t know about the new bridge in Brisbane, so we got lost for a bit. But we did eventually find our way, and got to consume one too many beer sitting on their verandah, with our beer nestled in some lovely beer cozies they provided. This morning we took the train into the downtown area of Brisbane and wandered around on foot for a couple hours, checking out the parks and a little market we stumbled on. The ladies weren’t home when we got back so we left them a note and headed south again, and were nearly an hour away before we realized we had absconded with their tourbooks. Hopefully they’ll be okay without them until we get a chance to post them back. We didn’t make it too far-just to Coolangatta, and we don’t have many plans for the next couple days, though Glen’s currently combing through the Lonely Planet guidebook looking for surfing beaches, so you can guess what that means.

I don’t know when I’ll be posting next, but I know you’ll all be at the edge of your seats, dying of anticipation.

Now, about those "sea legs"...

Well, it’s definitely time for an update, I think. I last left you in Bargara, a lovely little seaside town near Bundaberg. Well, we chose that location because of the rum distillery. That’s right, we got to tour the Bundaberg Rum Distillery. And it was awesome. And yes, they do give you samples at the end of the tour. Apparently, many moons ago, there was a huge excess of molasses due to the processing of all the sugarcane they grow and refine in the area. What did they decide to do with this excess molasses? Well, make rum, of course! And all it takes, other than molasses, is yeast (Sacchromyces cervisiae, to be exact), water, and time. One part of the tour was the aging vats, where the rum sits and ages for at least 2 years. We weren’t allowed cameras on the tour because they could potentially cause a spark, and the alcohol content of the air in that building could cause a massive explosion. And, quite frankly, that would be a huge waste of rum. And, ooh, did that room smell delicious. We were allowed to sample almost all the products they make there at the end of the tour (including the rum liquer they make where they mix rum, chocolate and coffee-oh, yes, we bought a bottle of that), and we did. Though Glen did most of the drinking and I restricted myself to sips so one of us could drive. Possibly the best tour ever.

After that we made a quick stop at the “mystery craters”, which are craters made from rock that no one has any idea as to how they formed. Glen and I agreed they’re probably volcanic, given what they looked like. Then we basically just drove the rest of that day and the entire next day to get to Cairns. Yesterday we drove up through the rainforest to the “mountain” town of Kuranda. It’s a little Banff/Jasper-esque town with plenty of souvenier shops and a couple attractions. Like the Koala ???, where I did, in fact, get to hold a koala. Princess-the one I got to hold-was pretty sleepy at the time, but she didn’t try to rip my eyes out, so that was pretty cool. And yes, they are even cuter in person. Then we got to feed some kangaroos and wallabies-which are like miniature kangaroos. You’d be surprised how soft kangaroo fur is.

Then we stopped at the bird sanctuary, where the residents are far too friendly in some cases. One particular parrot tried very hard to steal Glen’s glasses, so much so that he actually had to almost fight the bird to get them back. There was another one that wouldn’t get off my shoulder, and yet another that tried to take a chunk out of my finger. Little buggers. We also stopped by the butterfly house, which had butterflies. For lunch we found a place selling authentic Aussie meat pies, so Glen got a Kangaroo one. So yes, we have now tried kangaroo. It’s a bit chewy and gamey, and I can’t say I really like the taste of it too much. But when in Rome, one must at least try the kangaroo meat.

This particular post is being typed while on a boat hovering over the Great Barrier Reef, somewhere east of Cairns. It wasn’t particularly fun getting here, because despite a copious dose of gravol and wristbands and all manner of staring at the horizon, I couldn’t keep my breakfast down. Seasickness rears it’s ugly head. It takes 2 hours of rolling waves to get to the reef, so you can imagine there’s plenty of opportunity in there for things to go horribly wrong. Sadly, I think I may have been the only one who actually ralphed. Well, that shall be my claim to fame, then. I’m the girl that barfed.

Well, it’s now been 3 days since I started this post, because my loving husband forgot to bring the plug converter along on the boat, so I was running on battery, which was low to start with. Now I’m not sure when this’ll get posted, but I’m hoping for soon. The dive trip went well. We survived, which is something considering it consisted of 11 dives (4 the first and second days, and three on the third). Neither of us got the bends, and after about half a day my stomach finally calmed down enough that I felt like eating. Which was good considering the sheer amount of food that was available. You actually burn a ton of calories while SCUBA diving, due to the fact that you’re in the water fighting current and swimming around, but it also takes quite a bit of extra energy to breathe bottled air at depth. So we’d dive, then eat, then dive, then eat, and so on. And we never had to cook or do dishes at all. It was awesome. Well, until we had to dive again, and then there was the whole trying-to-put-on-a-freezing-cold-wetsuit thing. Miserable, that was. But once you got the thing on it wasn’t so bad. The water was around 23 degrees Celsius, which apparently is really cold for the Great Barrier Reef, but awesome if you’re from Canada and the water temp of your last dive was 9 degrees. My wetsuit didn’t fit at all. Again. I’ve accepted now that I’ll never find a standard wetsuit that will fit me, but this one was particularly bad. First, they tried to give me one that was about 3 sizes too small. Then one that I couldn’t get my thighs into. Finally I got one that I could get up my legs, but when I put the top on there was a good 2 inches of loose material around my arms. Super. Thankfully I brought a rashie that I wore under it to keep me at least a little bit warmer. Oh, and the material on the outside of the suits was so abrasive that I ripped open the knuckles on 3 fingers trying to get into one on the first day. Then I had to dive for 3 days with seriously abraded knuckles. This is in addition to my aviary attacked finger. I feel really bad for my hands right now.

We did see tons of fish, big and small, and even more different kinds of coral and anemones. It really is a very diverse reef. We did 2 night dives and managed to see a few sharks, which we were told many times were harmless-and really, they were fairly small, so I think we could’ve taken them if we’d really needed to. On the way out we saw a pod of dolphins, and on the way back we stopped for a good 10 minutes for a bunch of whales-I think they were Minke whales, but don’t quote me on that. The diving itself was excellent, once you managed to get your gear on and actually get in the water.

Living on a boat was a whole new thing, though. It pitches and rolls literally all the time-and we were out on what the crew said was relatively calm seas. We’re talking, like, a good 4-6 feet of up and down all the time. Ugh, I’m getting ill just thinking about it. It made sleeping pretty interesting. And going to the bathroom. And showering. Yes, they had showers on the boat, with a seemingly endless supply of hot water-I still can’t figure out how they stored that much fresh water on the boat. But showering when the floor keeps rising and dropping the entire time is pretty weird. Somehow we managed, and acquired what one of the crew called our “sea legs”. Which explains why, now that we’re on dry land, the ground still feels like it’s moving. I wonder how long that’s going to last…

Now I think it’s time to leave you, as we should be getting on the road and heading south for more adventure.