South Island
So tons has happened since my last entry. Last time we chatted, I was aboard the ferry crossing from Wellington to PIcton (North Island to South Island) We arrived to the South Island crossing through some beautiful hills and Fjords on the way to the dock. After arriving to the tiny city of Picton, we started our long drive to our hostel, hoping to make it as close to our next day activity as possible. We arrived in Picton around 4:30pm, and were driving through some beautiful landscape until approximately 7:30pm. On the way there, we made a brief stop in the main city of Nelson for a quick stop to refill, and buy some groceries. Our hostel was in the small city of Motueka, and was a refurbished Bakery. When we were checking in, we were greeted with a nice older guy, his cat, and a basket full of freshly baked corn & chocolate chip muffins. We cooked our staple of pasta spirals and chicken, and shared stories with a young british couple who were sitting next to us. We were planning on going out to the one bar in town, but our exhaustion got the best of us, in addition to the 40 degree weather and rain, and we decided to turn in early for the night.The next morning, we had an early morning to catch our sea kayaking adventure in Abel Tasman National Park. We arrived to meet our bus in the next city over. It wasn’t the best of weather by any stretch, it was cold and raining, and we knew that soon ,we would be out floating in the ocean in the same. We suited up, and took a water taxi out to a small hut where we would be putting on wetsuits and gathering some of our other gear. The wetsuits were meager, but managed to keep us decently warm. Cat and I shared a kayak and we were joined by 3 other groups, mostly younger people. Unfortunately, we were only able to kayak for about 2 hours, and mostly in protected waters because of the strong winds and rain. The conditions out at sea would have probably thrown us straight into the water. So the idea to stay in the bay sounded pretty good to me. For lunch, we docked at a small spit which separated the bay to the ocean, by this time, the weather cleared up quite a bit and it turned out to be a pretty beautiful day! We had a lunch provided by the tour company, and narrated by our South African guide who has had the best accent on this trip so far. Lunch consisted of a massive sandwich, kiwi fruit, and boysenberry muffins. After lunch, we would be doing a 6km hike back to our pick-up site through the national park. It’s so weird to be hiking while its about 55 degrees out, but it visually appear that you are in a rainforest. The hike was really unique, I’ve never really hiked through a place that’s looked like that, and every now and again, you’d have glimpses of the ocean and some of the beaches. We arrived to our pick-up point exactly in time to see our sea taxi swing by and pick us up. The ride back to the start point was great, we were flying through the water, and by this time ,the weather was great. Also, I’ve never seen anyone put boats into the water like they do there, they drive the boat trailer out into the water with a farm tractor and launch and dock ships, with their passengers.Around 4pm that evening, we were on the go again. It was about 5pm, and we had a pretty long and tough drive ahead. Our next stop off point would be Franz Josef National Park. We would see how far we could make it, but it would be likely that we’d still have a fair bit of driving the next morning. The weather turned pretty sour and the rain didn’t really help with the narrow roads with hairpin turns. The driving alone would have been exhausting let alone the full day kayak we had the day before. But, we kept a pretty good pace. On the way there, we stopped in a small town along the way and found the one place still open. (note every town on the west coast was less than 4000 people, and there were only a handful). We were lucky to catch the one place open left in town and were able to get some takeaway food as a quick recharge. Cat got some fish and chips and I treated myself to pineapple burger. After another hour, we finally made it to Greymouth, the Mouth of the Grey River (clever eh?), we found an awesome little hostel called Neptunes which seemed like a great place if you were staying for a while. The funny thing was, since we asked for a double, their only double was actually a refurbished shipping container which was about 50 feet from the actually hostel (kitchen, bathrooms, etc…) However, we did have a TV with 3 channels!The next morning was an early one. We had to be up and moving by 6am, so we were up and shaking around 5:30. The weather that morning wasn’t promising, but we were optimistic it would get better As expected, we made it the Frans Josef village with time to spare around 8:40am. We stopped to get a quick gas and caffeine but then chcked in for our day-long hike on the Glacier.We bussed over to the river opening to where the glacier melt came down and began our hike. The weather had actually cleared up a bit since our morning. But they had outfitted us pretty well with waterproof jackets and pants. We hiked for about 20 minutes to the face of the glacier. It was massive! It’s so strange seeing it from a distance because it looks so different. It looks like a big mass of concrete until it gets closer to the top where it looks like blue icicles sticking up out of the ground. So the initial climb was technical, we were on safety ropes for much of the ascent. But once we topped out, it was fairly up and over climbing on the snow. Every now and again we would have to squeeze through a crevasse. These little parts of the hike were quite impressive since we saw into the clear ice from the side. Often it had shades of bright blue from the compression of the ice. After about 2 hours, we stopped for a quick lunch. One of our hiking mates managed to lose their juice box into a deep ice hole, never to be found again. Our guide, Ryan was really knowledgable and took us through some tough areas of climb. By 3pm, we were still climbing, but taking a closer look, we realized that we had not even traversed nearly 1/3 of the way up the 3000m glacier. At that point, we made a stop at our highest point of the day, and started heading back down. The way down was a bit quicker, but still pretty rough on the body. Not to mention every now and again you would step in a freezing cold puddle of ice water. My boots and crampons were fitted a bit small for me, so I was more than excited to be done with the walking, but the views were still unreal.After arriving back at the base, we turned in all of our gear, and headed to our accommodation which Cat booked ahead of time. If you’re ever at Frans Josef, we’d highly recommend the Rainforest tree Huts, it was about twice as expensive as a hostel double room, but we had a full kitchen, and the rooms seemed almost brand new. It was a great place to cook our dinner and relax after a day of hiking. We cooked up some beans chicken and rice, and also some kiwi fruit.The next day we were fairly slow getting moving, we slept in a bit trying to enjoying our nice place. We were back on the road around 11:30am for our trek down to the southern most point of our trip in Queenstown. We decided that we would probably take our time on the drive, and this decision was well worth it as the scenery was spectacular on the drive down to Queenstown. We passed only a few small towns, but we made it a point to stop at plenty of scenic destinations. If you’re cross referencing the blog with our photos, this is the day where we thought It would be a good idea to try to jump in as many as our photos as possible. So you’ll see a bunch of us jumping in front of the Fox Glacier, the Tasman Sea Coastline, and other random places such as the valleys on our way to Queenstown. On the way there, we stopped in a little country store which was playing “stand by your man” and the atmosphere was reminiscent of the country bar in the Blues Brothers. Just past the store, we found an empty plot of land which had a perfect view of the river valley. Cat and I stopped and took the moment to play some Frisbee in this pasture with a perfect view.It’s so hard to describe the views that we saw on our drive to Queenstown, but they definitely kept us interested during the drive. Our jaws would drop around every corner. We also stopped a number of times to take some short hikes to a variety of waterfalls We actually ran to some of them to shave a few minutes off so we would have a chance to see more. We arrived in Queenstown sometime after dinnertime. Our first mission upon arrival was to of course… book our bungee jump, a must-do in the Queenstown area. We booked both the Ledge Bungee (143 feet drop), and the Ledge Swing, which throws you out over the city and back. We had tried to book the big drop (Nevis), but it was booked out and we were leaving town before there was an opening…. We’re going to save it for next time… After our booking, we headed to our hostel and then to get some dinner. We had been recommended a place called Fergberger in Queenstown. Upon arrival, the place looked perfect, big burgers and country-renown fries. We found out that this local joint actually uses all local businesses as their suppliers, and the taste of the meal proved it. Cat and I agreed, it was probably the best meal of our trip.The night in Queenstown was the only location of our trip where we’d be spending two nights…. And what a nice thing that was. We were actually able to buy groceries for more than one day, and we didn’t have to worry about packing up and checking out immediately. On day 2 in Queenstown, we woke up a little late, but went on a little trek to scope out the city. We rented some mountain bikes and biked around the lake to a nearby city. The bike trip lasted about 2 hours with a short stop for lunch where we found a little dock on a far part of the lake to enjoy our packed pb and j. We spent a short bit of the afternoon doing some shopping for friends and family before we made our long-awaited trip up the Queenstown gondola where our body harness and bungee cord awaited.I think both of us knew that we wanted to do the jump before we arrived to Queenstown, but I think I may have been a fair bit more excited about the actual jump. Catherine was pretty nervous, but she was quite the trooper in convincing me to sign up for both the jump and the swing. Cat ended up going first, and on the swing since it was the less scary of the two. I videoed as she was lowered down into the starting blocks. She hastily smiled for the cameras before yanking the little red loop which sent her flying off into the distance with the picturesque views of the lake and the Remarkables in the background. Her scream didn’t sound planned at all, and was quite funny to watch if you ever have a chance! So I was next, and got myself in the same position. To be honest, I wasn’t really expecting the drop that came next. I am pretty sure I let out an non-manly scream when I went flying off, but the views were incredible, and after the split second of surprise, the drop is pretty fun too!So next was the bungee jump, if you watch cat’s videos, I apparently am sitting in the background, chilling on the couch while she is nervously getting attached to multiple cords, and asking if her limbs were going to be safe when she jumped. They really don’t give you much time to recover after your first jump…. But they counted. 5,4,3,2,1… in about the amount of time it takes you to read those numbers, and off she went. I remember screaming for her, just being excited for her. But she made it alive, with her limbs. I think she was pretty excited to be back on the platform though.Next it was my turn, I don’t think I was that nervous, but more excited about having the chance to run and jump off a platform into thin air. That doesn’t come very often. He mentioned doing a gainer, and I gave it some thought, but I thought it would be a shame if I screwed it up and ended up smashing my head again the platform… probably not the best way to spend $210. So I opted for the front flip, when my time came. I sprinted off the platform and gave my best front flip. I don’t really remember much of the actual jump, probably because it felt like doing a front flip off of a high dive, by the time I was out of my flip, I was flying down towards the Earth. The recoil on the cord throws you nearly back to the jump platform, that was pretty impressive.So after it all, it was an awesome experience and would definitely like to give it another go. The timing was perfect as it was nearly sunset and we got to watch the colors change on the surrounding mountains from the top of the Gondola.The rest of the evening was fairly easy and relaxed. We cooked our last dinner of the trip in the YHA kitchen, enjoyed the leftovers of our wine, and did some people watching of others and tried to figure out their backgrounds and intentions. Afterwards, we went in search of a good local and fun bar. This turned out to be a bit more of a challenge than one would think. But put into perspective, a town of 3500 on a Monday night, in a country with lots of sheep probably isn’t going to be the most happening place on Earth. Regardless, we ended up at Montys which was Monteiths Brewery’s restaurant and grabbed a drink with a warm fireplace to our backs and a little Aussie Footie on TV. I had a winter brew and Cat had a Pilsner.We had one last morning in Queenstown, and like much of the rest of the trip, it was well spent. We woke up a little earlier today and made breakfast and packed our things. Before our coffee/red bull runs, we over to the queenstown gardens and took advantage of their 18-hole Frisbee golf course. Our round took a little over an hour, but was a great and relaxing way to end our time in Queentown. After that, we made our way to the airport, parted with our friend and journey companion “Puggles” which allowed us to traverse the distance between Auckland and Queenstown, and checked into our flight.So ironically, I’m writing this entry about the South Island in the exact fashion as I wrote about North Island. Both times were written in crossing the passage between islands, only this time I write from the air. The last portion of our trip will consist of a short time staying in Auckland at a B&B, visiting a friend of mine from the IHouse, and making the 7000 mile journey back to the US.This entry is way too long, so I’ll continue with the trip wrap-up in a final entry.Paul
Friday, September 7, 2007
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
South Island of New Zealand (Picton, Nelson, Motueka, Franz Josef, Queenstown
The next morning, we had an early morning to catch our sea kayaking adventure in Abel Tasman National Park. We arrived to meet our bus in the next city over. It wasn’t the best of weather by any stretch, it was cold and raining, and we knew that soon ,we would be out floating in the ocean in the same. We suited up, and took a water taxi out to a small hut where we would be putting on wetsuits and gathering some of our other gear. The wetsuits were meager, but managed to keep us decently warm. Cat and I shared a kayak and we were joined by 3 other groups, mostly younger people. Unfortunately, we were only able to kayak for about 2 hours, and mostly in protected waters because of the strong winds and rain. The conditions out at sea would have probably thrown us straight into the water. So the idea to stay in the bay sounded pretty good to me. For lunch, we docked at a small spit which separated the bay to the ocean, by this time, the weather cleared up quite a bit and it turned out to be a pretty beautiful day! We had a lunch provided by the tour company, and narrated by our South African guide who has had the best accent on this trip so far. Lunch consisted of a massive sandwich, kiwi fruit, and boysenberry muffins. After lunch, we would be doing a 6km hike back to our pick-up site through the national park. It’s so weird to be hiking while its about 55 degrees out, but it visually appear that you are in a rainforest. The hike was really unique, I’ve never really hiked through a place that’s looked like that, and every now and again, you’d have glimpses of the ocean and some of the beaches. We arrived to our pick-up point exactly in time to see our sea taxi swing by and pick us up. The ride back to the start point was great, we were flying through the water, and by this time ,the weather was great. Also, I’ve never seen anyone put boats into the water like they do there, they drive the boat trailer out into the water with a farm tractor and launch and dock ships, with their passengers.
Around 4pm that evening, we were on the go again. It was about 5pm, and we had a pretty long and tough drive ahead. Our next stop off point would be Franz Josef National Park. We would see how far we could make it, but it would be likely that we’d still have a fair bit of driving the next morning. The weather turned pretty sour and the rain didn’t really help with the narrow roads with hairpin turns. The driving alone would have been exhausting let alone the full day kayak we had the day before. But, we kept a pretty good pace. On the way there, we stopped in a small town along the way and found the one place still open. (note every town on the west coast was less than 4000 people, and there were only a handful). We were lucky to catch the one place open left in town and were able to get some takeaway food as a quick recharge. Cat got some fish and chips and I treated myself to pineapple burger. After another hour, we finally made it to Greymouth, the Mouth of the Grey River (clever eh?), we found an awesome little hostel called Neptunes which seemed like a great place if you were staying for a while. The funny thing was, since we asked for a double, their only double was actually a refurbished shipping container which was about 50 feet from the actually hostel (kitchen, bathrooms, etc…) However, we did have a TV with 3 channels!
The next morning was an early one. We had to be up and moving by 6am, so we were up and shaking around 5:30. The weather that morning wasn’t promising, but we were optimistic it would get better As expected, we made it the Frans Josef village with time to spare around 8:40am. We stopped to get a quick gas and caffeine but then chcked in for our day-long hike on the Glacier.
We bussed over to the river opening to where the glacier melt came down and began our hike. The weather had actually cleared up a bit since our morning. But they had outfitted us pretty well with waterproof jackets and pants. We hiked for about 20 minutes to the face of the glacier. It was massive! It’s so strange seeing it from a distance because it looks so different. It looks like a big mass of concrete until it gets closer to the top where it looks like blue icicles sticking up out of the ground. So the initial climb was technical, we were on safety ropes for much of the ascent. But once we topped out, it was fairly up and over climbing on the snow. Every now and again we would have to squeeze through a crevasse. These little parts of the hike were quite impressive since we saw into the clear ice from the side. Often it had shades of bright blue from the compression of the ice. After about 2 hours, we stopped for a quick lunch. One of our hiking mates managed to lose their juice box into a deep ice hole, never to be found again. Our guide, Ryan was really knowledgable and took us through some tough areas of climb. By 3pm, we were still climbing, but taking a closer look, we realized that we had not even traversed nearly 1/3 of the way up the 3000m glacier. At that point, we made a stop at our highest point of the day, and started heading back down. The way down was a bit quicker, but still pretty rough on the body. Not to mention every now and again you would step in a freezing cold puddle of ice water. My boots and crampons were fitted a bit small for me, so I was more than excited to be done with the walking, but the views were still unreal.
After arriving back at the base, we turned in all of our gear, and headed to our accommodation which Cat booked ahead of time. If you’re ever at Frans Josef, we’d highly recommend the Rainforest tree Huts, it was about twice as expensive as a hostel double room, but we had a full kitchen, and the rooms seemed almost brand new. It was a great place to cook our dinner and relax after a day of hiking. We cooked up some beans chicken and rice, and also some kiwi fruit.
The next day we were fairly slow getting moving, we slept in a bit trying to enjoying our nice place. We were back on the road around 11:30am for our trek down to the southern most point of our trip in Queenstown. We decided that we would probably take our time on the drive, and this decision was well worth it as the scenery was spectacular on the drive down to Queenstown. We passed only a few small towns, but we made it a point to stop at plenty of scenic destinations. If you’re cross referencing the blog with our photos, this is the day where we thought It would be a good idea to try to jump in as many as our photos as possible. So you’ll see a bunch of us jumping in front of the Fox Glacier, the Tasman Sea Coastline, and other random places such as the valleys on our way to Queenstown. On the way there, we stopped in a little country store which was playing “stand by your man” and the atmosphere was reminiscent of the country bar in the Blues Brothers. Just past the store, we found an empty plot of land which had a perfect view of the river valley. Cat and I stopped and took the moment to play some Frisbee in this pasture with a perfect view.
It’s so hard to describe the views that we saw on our drive to Queenstown, but they definitely kept us interested during the drive. Our jaws would drop around every corner. We also stopped a number of times to take some short hikes to a variety of waterfalls We actually ran to some of them to shave a few minutes off so we would have a chance to see more. We arrived in Queenstown sometime after dinnertime. Our first mission upon arrival was to of course… book our bungee jump, a must-do in the Queenstown area. We booked both the Ledge Bungee (143 feet drop), and the Ledge Swing, which throws you out over the city and back. We had tried to book the big drop (Nevis), but it was booked out and we were leaving town before there was an opening…. We’re going to save it for next time… After our booking, we headed to our hostel and then to get some dinner. We had been recommended a place called Fergberger in Queenstown. Upon arrival, the place looked perfect, big burgers and country-renown fries. We found out that this local joint actually uses all local businesses as their suppliers, and the taste of the meal proved it. Cat and I agreed, it was probably the best meal of our trip.
The night in Queenstown was the only location of our trip where we’d be spending two nights…. And what a nice thing that was. We were actually able to buy groceries for more than one day, and we didn’t have to worry about packing up and checking out immediately. On day 2 in Queenstown, we woke up a little late, but went on a little trek to scope out the city. We rented some mountain bikes and biked around the lake to a nearby city. The bike trip lasted about 2 hours with a short stop for lunch where we found a little dock on a far part of the lake to enjoy our packed pb and j. We spent a short bit of the afternoon doing some shopping for friends and family before we made our long-awaited trip up the Queenstown gondola where our body harness and bungee cord awaited.
I think both of us knew that we wanted to do the jump before we arrived to Queenstown, but I think I may have been a fair bit more excited about the actual jump. Catherine was pretty nervous, but she was quite the trooper in convincing me to sign up for both the jump and the swing. Cat ended up going first, and on the swing since it was the less scary of the two. I videoed as she was lowered down into the starting blocks. She hastily smiled for the cameras before yanking the little red loop which sent her flying off into the distance with the picturesque views of the lake and the Remarkables in the background. Her scream didn’t sound planned at all, and was quite funny to watch if you ever have a chance! So I was next, and got myself in the same position. To be honest, I wasn’t really expecting the drop that came next. I am pretty sure I let out an non-manly scream when I went flying off, but the views were incredible, and after the split second of surprise, the drop is pretty fun too!
So next was the bungee jump, if you watch cat’s videos, I apparently am sitting in the background, chilling on the couch while she is nervously getting attached to multiple cords, and asking if her limbs were going to be safe when she jumped. They really don’t give you much time to recover after your first jump…. But they counted. 5,4,3,2,1… in about the amount of time it takes you to read those numbers, and off she went. I remember screaming for her, just being excited for her. But she made it alive, with her limbs. I think she was pretty excited to be back on the platform though.
Next it was my turn, I don’t think I was that nervous, but more excited about having the chance to run and jump off a platform into thin air. That doesn’t come very often. He mentioned doing a gainer, and I gave it some thought, but I thought it would be a shame if I screwed it up and ended up smashing my head again the platform… probably not the best way to spend $210. So I opted for the front flip, when my time came. I sprinted off the platform and gave my best front flip. I don’t really remember much of the actual jump, probably because it felt like doing a front flip off of a high dive, by the time I was out of my flip, I was flying down towards the Earth. The recoil on the cord throws you nearly back to the jump platform, that was pretty impressive.
So after it all, it was an awesome experience and would definitely like to give it another go. The timing was perfect as it was nearly sunset and we got to watch the colors change on the surrounding mountains from the top of the Gondola.
The rest of the evening was fairly easy and relaxed. We cooked our last dinner of the trip in the YHA kitchen, enjoyed the leftovers of our wine, and did some people watching of others and tried to figure out their backgrounds and intentions. Afterwards, we went in search of a good local and fun bar. This turned out to be a bit more of a challenge than one would think. But put into perspective, a town of 3500 on a Monday night, in a country with lots of sheep probably isn’t going to be the most happening place on Earth. Regardless, we ended up at Montys which was Monteiths Brewery’s restaurant and grabbed a drink with a warm fireplace to our backs and a little Aussie Footie on TV. I had a winter brew and Cat had a Pilsner.
We had one last morning in Queenstown, and like much of the rest of the trip, it was well spent. We woke up a little earlier today and made breakfast and packed our things. Before our coffee/red bull runs, we over to the queenstown gardens and took advantage of their 18-hole Frisbee golf course. Our round took a little over an hour, but was a great and relaxing way to end our time in Queentown. After that, we made our way to the airport, parted with our friend and journey companion “Puggles” which allowed us to traverse the distance between Auckland and Queenstown, and checked into our flight.
So ironically, I’m writing this entry about the South Island in the exact fashion as I wrote about North Island. Both times were written in crossing the passage between islands, only this time I write from the air. The last portion of our trip will consist of a short time staying in Auckland at a B&B, visiting a friend of mine from the IHouse, and making the 7000 mile journey back to the US.
This entry is way too long, so I’ll continue with the trip wrap-up in a final entry.
Paul
Around 4pm that evening, we were on the go again. It was about 5pm, and we had a pretty long and tough drive ahead. Our next stop off point would be Franz Josef National Park. We would see how far we could make it, but it would be likely that we’d still have a fair bit of driving the next morning. The weather turned pretty sour and the rain didn’t really help with the narrow roads with hairpin turns. The driving alone would have been exhausting let alone the full day kayak we had the day before. But, we kept a pretty good pace. On the way there, we stopped in a small town along the way and found the one place still open. (note every town on the west coast was less than 4000 people, and there were only a handful). We were lucky to catch the one place open left in town and were able to get some takeaway food as a quick recharge. Cat got some fish and chips and I treated myself to pineapple burger. After another hour, we finally made it to Greymouth, the Mouth of the Grey River (clever eh?), we found an awesome little hostel called Neptunes which seemed like a great place if you were staying for a while. The funny thing was, since we asked for a double, their only double was actually a refurbished shipping container which was about 50 feet from the actually hostel (kitchen, bathrooms, etc…) However, we did have a TV with 3 channels!
The next morning was an early one. We had to be up and moving by 6am, so we were up and shaking around 5:30. The weather that morning wasn’t promising, but we were optimistic it would get better As expected, we made it the Frans Josef village with time to spare around 8:40am. We stopped to get a quick gas and caffeine but then chcked in for our day-long hike on the Glacier.
We bussed over to the river opening to where the glacier melt came down and began our hike. The weather had actually cleared up a bit since our morning. But they had outfitted us pretty well with waterproof jackets and pants. We hiked for about 20 minutes to the face of the glacier. It was massive! It’s so strange seeing it from a distance because it looks so different. It looks like a big mass of concrete until it gets closer to the top where it looks like blue icicles sticking up out of the ground. So the initial climb was technical, we were on safety ropes for much of the ascent. But once we topped out, it was fairly up and over climbing on the snow. Every now and again we would have to squeeze through a crevasse. These little parts of the hike were quite impressive since we saw into the clear ice from the side. Often it had shades of bright blue from the compression of the ice. After about 2 hours, we stopped for a quick lunch. One of our hiking mates managed to lose their juice box into a deep ice hole, never to be found again. Our guide, Ryan was really knowledgable and took us through some tough areas of climb. By 3pm, we were still climbing, but taking a closer look, we realized that we had not even traversed nearly 1/3 of the way up the 3000m glacier. At that point, we made a stop at our highest point of the day, and started heading back down. The way down was a bit quicker, but still pretty rough on the body. Not to mention every now and again you would step in a freezing cold puddle of ice water. My boots and crampons were fitted a bit small for me, so I was more than excited to be done with the walking, but the views were still unreal.
After arriving back at the base, we turned in all of our gear, and headed to our accommodation which Cat booked ahead of time. If you’re ever at Frans Josef, we’d highly recommend the Rainforest tree Huts, it was about twice as expensive as a hostel double room, but we had a full kitchen, and the rooms seemed almost brand new. It was a great place to cook our dinner and relax after a day of hiking. We cooked up some beans chicken and rice, and also some kiwi fruit.
The next day we were fairly slow getting moving, we slept in a bit trying to enjoying our nice place. We were back on the road around 11:30am for our trek down to the southern most point of our trip in Queenstown. We decided that we would probably take our time on the drive, and this decision was well worth it as the scenery was spectacular on the drive down to Queenstown. We passed only a few small towns, but we made it a point to stop at plenty of scenic destinations. If you’re cross referencing the blog with our photos, this is the day where we thought It would be a good idea to try to jump in as many as our photos as possible. So you’ll see a bunch of us jumping in front of the Fox Glacier, the Tasman Sea Coastline, and other random places such as the valleys on our way to Queenstown. On the way there, we stopped in a little country store which was playing “stand by your man” and the atmosphere was reminiscent of the country bar in the Blues Brothers. Just past the store, we found an empty plot of land which had a perfect view of the river valley. Cat and I stopped and took the moment to play some Frisbee in this pasture with a perfect view.
It’s so hard to describe the views that we saw on our drive to Queenstown, but they definitely kept us interested during the drive. Our jaws would drop around every corner. We also stopped a number of times to take some short hikes to a variety of waterfalls We actually ran to some of them to shave a few minutes off so we would have a chance to see more. We arrived in Queenstown sometime after dinnertime. Our first mission upon arrival was to of course… book our bungee jump, a must-do in the Queenstown area. We booked both the Ledge Bungee (143 feet drop), and the Ledge Swing, which throws you out over the city and back. We had tried to book the big drop (Nevis), but it was booked out and we were leaving town before there was an opening…. We’re going to save it for next time… After our booking, we headed to our hostel and then to get some dinner. We had been recommended a place called Fergberger in Queenstown. Upon arrival, the place looked perfect, big burgers and country-renown fries. We found out that this local joint actually uses all local businesses as their suppliers, and the taste of the meal proved it. Cat and I agreed, it was probably the best meal of our trip.
The night in Queenstown was the only location of our trip where we’d be spending two nights…. And what a nice thing that was. We were actually able to buy groceries for more than one day, and we didn’t have to worry about packing up and checking out immediately. On day 2 in Queenstown, we woke up a little late, but went on a little trek to scope out the city. We rented some mountain bikes and biked around the lake to a nearby city. The bike trip lasted about 2 hours with a short stop for lunch where we found a little dock on a far part of the lake to enjoy our packed pb and j. We spent a short bit of the afternoon doing some shopping for friends and family before we made our long-awaited trip up the Queenstown gondola where our body harness and bungee cord awaited.
I think both of us knew that we wanted to do the jump before we arrived to Queenstown, but I think I may have been a fair bit more excited about the actual jump. Catherine was pretty nervous, but she was quite the trooper in convincing me to sign up for both the jump and the swing. Cat ended up going first, and on the swing since it was the less scary of the two. I videoed as she was lowered down into the starting blocks. She hastily smiled for the cameras before yanking the little red loop which sent her flying off into the distance with the picturesque views of the lake and the Remarkables in the background. Her scream didn’t sound planned at all, and was quite funny to watch if you ever have a chance! So I was next, and got myself in the same position. To be honest, I wasn’t really expecting the drop that came next. I am pretty sure I let out an non-manly scream when I went flying off, but the views were incredible, and after the split second of surprise, the drop is pretty fun too!
So next was the bungee jump, if you watch cat’s videos, I apparently am sitting in the background, chilling on the couch while she is nervously getting attached to multiple cords, and asking if her limbs were going to be safe when she jumped. They really don’t give you much time to recover after your first jump…. But they counted. 5,4,3,2,1… in about the amount of time it takes you to read those numbers, and off she went. I remember screaming for her, just being excited for her. But she made it alive, with her limbs. I think she was pretty excited to be back on the platform though.
Next it was my turn, I don’t think I was that nervous, but more excited about having the chance to run and jump off a platform into thin air. That doesn’t come very often. He mentioned doing a gainer, and I gave it some thought, but I thought it would be a shame if I screwed it up and ended up smashing my head again the platform… probably not the best way to spend $210. So I opted for the front flip, when my time came. I sprinted off the platform and gave my best front flip. I don’t really remember much of the actual jump, probably because it felt like doing a front flip off of a high dive, by the time I was out of my flip, I was flying down towards the Earth. The recoil on the cord throws you nearly back to the jump platform, that was pretty impressive.
So after it all, it was an awesome experience and would definitely like to give it another go. The timing was perfect as it was nearly sunset and we got to watch the colors change on the surrounding mountains from the top of the Gondola.
The rest of the evening was fairly easy and relaxed. We cooked our last dinner of the trip in the YHA kitchen, enjoyed the leftovers of our wine, and did some people watching of others and tried to figure out their backgrounds and intentions. Afterwards, we went in search of a good local and fun bar. This turned out to be a bit more of a challenge than one would think. But put into perspective, a town of 3500 on a Monday night, in a country with lots of sheep probably isn’t going to be the most happening place on Earth. Regardless, we ended up at Montys which was Monteiths Brewery’s restaurant and grabbed a drink with a warm fireplace to our backs and a little Aussie Footie on TV. I had a winter brew and Cat had a Pilsner.
We had one last morning in Queenstown, and like much of the rest of the trip, it was well spent. We woke up a little earlier today and made breakfast and packed our things. Before our coffee/red bull runs, we over to the queenstown gardens and took advantage of their 18-hole Frisbee golf course. Our round took a little over an hour, but was a great and relaxing way to end our time in Queentown. After that, we made our way to the airport, parted with our friend and journey companion “Puggles” which allowed us to traverse the distance between Auckland and Queenstown, and checked into our flight.
So ironically, I’m writing this entry about the South Island in the exact fashion as I wrote about North Island. Both times were written in crossing the passage between islands, only this time I write from the air. The last portion of our trip will consist of a short time staying in Auckland at a B&B, visiting a friend of mine from the IHouse, and making the 7000 mile journey back to the US.
This entry is way too long, so I’ll continue with the trip wrap-up in a final entry.
Paul
Monday, August 20, 2007
The North Island of New Zealand
So since my last journal entry, I have switched countries, currencies, and have added a travel partner. My last night in Sydney included spending some time with some fresh arrivals to Australia from Edmonton Alberta. Two gents and a gal, three friends from high school were on a 20-day trip to Australia. For one of the guys, this was his first trip outside of Alberta! So he had plenty of discoveries during the trip. Using different currency, using his passport, and seeing the ocean for the first time. But I caught these guys in the room later into the evening, so we pretty much hung out and had a few drinks and talked about what its like to be a Canadian. The guys got pretty involved with a political discussion while the girl didn’t’ seem to interested. It was one of the guy’s 21st birthday, so we were helping him along with plenty of drinks before they were going to go out on the town. I had already gotten myself ready for a night of rest, so I wouldn’t be joining them. However, I had plenty of things to be excited about since I’d be leaving Australia for New Zealand and joining Catherine after not seeing her for the last two months.
I woke up around 4:30am the next morning, probably around 15 minutes after the boys got back in from their late night… regardess, I tried to be up and out of the room as soon as possible to avoid disturbing their first half hour of sleep. I made my way out of the hostel, grabbed a bowl of cereal and made my way down to the railway station, which was 1 minute out the door. Surprisingly, there were quite a few people up and stirring at this point in the morning. Approximately, half of which were struggling to get home from the night before, and another half who were slamming their coffee in preperation for their day of work ahead.
Sydney’s Kingford Smith Airport is quite a sight, really well done and clean. And if you think planes are cool, you pretty much have your pick from a good handful of massive passenger aircraft from all over the world. I watched flights arrive from the US, Asia, and Europe. I had a relatively short flight from Sydney to Auckland next to a women who was on her 4th leg of 5 flights back from Ireland. Upon arrival to Auckland, things went fine, I had to have my soccer boots inspected since they had some dirt on them, which apparently is bad for customs, but on the up side, they cleaned my shoes for me, and returned them with a smile on their faces.
Catherine met me just on the other side of security and we fumbled around getting oriented and made our way out to our champaign (pink) colored rental car that slightly resembled an ugly egg. In terms of our needs and what we would be using the car for, it was a perfect fit. In terms of being socially acceptable and trendy, it was a total failure. It wasn’t exactly a perfect vehicle ether, the passenger side door lock was pushed into the body frame, all of the warning labels were written in Japanese (with no English translations), this is in addition to our less than perfect driving habits while on the left side of the road, but we made it ok.
We spent the first portion of the day touring around Auckland and some of the beach areas outside of the city, but since it is winter, our daylight hours were cut short. We had booked a bed and brekkie place right outside of the city so we wanted to make it there before it got too late. We arrived to our B&B which was called “Fringe of Heaven”, cheesy name right?, but the place is ridiculously nice. A Frank Lloyd Wright inspired home which sat on a tall hill with wide landscaping windows that look over into the bay. The home was almost entirely custom and had very nice touches in all places. Our hosts were a couple by the name of Bev and Julian, who were a very hospitiable couple. They offered us some wine and suggestions for places for dinner in the area.
The next day, we would start off with a full and massive breakfast consisting of bacon, eggs, hash browns, toast, cereal, fruit, and juice…. All with the expansive view of the bay in front of us. Unfortunately, our trip in heaven had to end and we made our way back to the road. Our first day would be some driving and a trip the Waitomo Caves for a “Black Abyss” tour… So to be honest, I didn’t really know what Cat had in store for me, I was merely a bystander in her planning of a hit-and-run New Zealand Trip in 10 days. But, I had good faith in her, as she is a very good planner. So when she had mentioned to me, that we would be going to see glow worms in underground caves, I imagined a nice cozy tour with hot chocolate and maybe a helment. I didn’t realize that I would be wearing a wetsuit, helmet, headlamp and climbing harness, all at the same time. To give a quick runthrough, we did in fact watch glowworms, but it was after we rappelled 60 feet down into a hole in the ground, jumped 15 feet into an underground river, floated around in that underground river (mind you the water was probably 55 degrees), climbed up over, around, and through multiple strong waterfalls, and then climbed out against the current. It was quite a surprise, but has probably been the most fun adventure so far on the trip! I’d really really recommend it to anyone heading down to that area because I had such a great time. That night, we trekked our way down to Rotarua, a provincial town that has quite a bit to offer.
When we arrived, it seemed a bit of an industrial and grungy place, with steam rising from all over. Little did I realize that this steam was rising from the many hot springs in the area. We spent the night in a small hostel called Funky Green Backpackers. The double room that we stayed actually was a separate unit from the main hostel, and was similar to a 3 bedroom apartment. We cooked a nice pasta dinner and prepared our belongings for the next few days.
The next day, we woke at a reasonable time and took a tour around Rotarua before continuning our journey south towards Wellington. We stopped in a place called the something-wonderland, which consisted of many hot springs and geyer type of formations. The formations were not the most impressive, but the colors of the waters we saw were quite amazing. We saw some bodies of water which were entirely neon green and bubling like they were from a witches cauldron. After that short trip, we went southward towards Taupo, a bustling backpacker town on the tip of Lake Taupo. We stayed at Tiki Backpackers, which was a tidy place with grand windows overlooking the lake and the snow-capped peaks beyond. As an aside, this time of year is an awesome time to see NZ because it’s so quiet, and places are not overcrowded. It’s a bit chilly, but not cold enough where you wouldn’t enjoy yourself.
We trekked around Taupo and did the usual essentials, groceries, internet, and a guilty pleasure trip to the local fast-food joint for some fries. We prided ourselves on cooking yet another good meal, which for us is quite the achievement. We woke up the next morning for a long trek southward to end up in Wellington.
Before making it to Wellington, we had plenty of scenery to greet us along the way. We stopped at a national park, which it’s name is eluding me at the moment, but it is where Mt. Doom was filmed for the Lord of the Rings movies. Which also means nothing to me since I don’t’ follow any of that. However, it was the most volcanic thing I’d ever seen in my life. Capped with snow, it was a gorgeous site. We stopped in the small basecamp for the three mountains in the area and took a short 2-hour hike to a small falls in the area. Had we stayed longer, I would have very much like to take a trip to the summit or hire a bike and do some mtn. biking in the area. However, that would have to wait for a later date. After our stop there, we drove south for another 5 hours or so passing some of my favorite landscape and thousands of sheep before making it to Wellington.
Wellington is quite a grungy city, having a feeling of Portland, OR but with a landscape of San Francisco bent in a circle. We didn’t get to see much of it last night, but we did manage to go out for a quite run of Thai food and a bar of ice cream. We went back to our hostel (Rosemere Backpackers), to plan for our next few days. This hostel was pretty unique and homly feeling, I’d definitely recommend it if you’re looking for a bit of a funky but friendly place.
Today, we woke up a bit earlier (like 20 minutes earlier) so we could get a quick glimpse of Wellington. Lucky for us, the sun was actually out, which is quite rare for this city. We drove up to the viewpoint near the top of the cable car and got some grand views of the city. Next, we had to catch the ferry over to the south island. But only after a short hike down the hill to locate the nearest Starbucks so catch some internet and for Cat to get a quick bit of coffee.
So now, 1700 words, and about 20 miles later, I’m on a ferry headed towards Picton on the south island of New Zealand, we have a little less than a week on our trip before life picks up again like a whirlwind back for me in Berkeley, and for Catherine in Atlanta. We have some pretty awesome trips planned still. Sea Kayaking in Abel Tasman National Park, Glacier Hiking at Franz Josef Glacier, some bungee jumping in Queenstown, and whatever else we find to fill the time between now and then. So I hope to have some pretty exciting things to report on in the next few days. But until then, I hope you all are doing well at home, and thanks for continuning to read these long and grammatically incorrect blogs!
Paul
I woke up around 4:30am the next morning, probably around 15 minutes after the boys got back in from their late night… regardess, I tried to be up and out of the room as soon as possible to avoid disturbing their first half hour of sleep. I made my way out of the hostel, grabbed a bowl of cereal and made my way down to the railway station, which was 1 minute out the door. Surprisingly, there were quite a few people up and stirring at this point in the morning. Approximately, half of which were struggling to get home from the night before, and another half who were slamming their coffee in preperation for their day of work ahead.
Sydney’s Kingford Smith Airport is quite a sight, really well done and clean. And if you think planes are cool, you pretty much have your pick from a good handful of massive passenger aircraft from all over the world. I watched flights arrive from the US, Asia, and Europe. I had a relatively short flight from Sydney to Auckland next to a women who was on her 4th leg of 5 flights back from Ireland. Upon arrival to Auckland, things went fine, I had to have my soccer boots inspected since they had some dirt on them, which apparently is bad for customs, but on the up side, they cleaned my shoes for me, and returned them with a smile on their faces.
Catherine met me just on the other side of security and we fumbled around getting oriented and made our way out to our champaign (pink) colored rental car that slightly resembled an ugly egg. In terms of our needs and what we would be using the car for, it was a perfect fit. In terms of being socially acceptable and trendy, it was a total failure. It wasn’t exactly a perfect vehicle ether, the passenger side door lock was pushed into the body frame, all of the warning labels were written in Japanese (with no English translations), this is in addition to our less than perfect driving habits while on the left side of the road, but we made it ok.
We spent the first portion of the day touring around Auckland and some of the beach areas outside of the city, but since it is winter, our daylight hours were cut short. We had booked a bed and brekkie place right outside of the city so we wanted to make it there before it got too late. We arrived to our B&B which was called “Fringe of Heaven”, cheesy name right?, but the place is ridiculously nice. A Frank Lloyd Wright inspired home which sat on a tall hill with wide landscaping windows that look over into the bay. The home was almost entirely custom and had very nice touches in all places. Our hosts were a couple by the name of Bev and Julian, who were a very hospitiable couple. They offered us some wine and suggestions for places for dinner in the area.
The next day, we would start off with a full and massive breakfast consisting of bacon, eggs, hash browns, toast, cereal, fruit, and juice…. All with the expansive view of the bay in front of us. Unfortunately, our trip in heaven had to end and we made our way back to the road. Our first day would be some driving and a trip the Waitomo Caves for a “Black Abyss” tour… So to be honest, I didn’t really know what Cat had in store for me, I was merely a bystander in her planning of a hit-and-run New Zealand Trip in 10 days. But, I had good faith in her, as she is a very good planner. So when she had mentioned to me, that we would be going to see glow worms in underground caves, I imagined a nice cozy tour with hot chocolate and maybe a helment. I didn’t realize that I would be wearing a wetsuit, helmet, headlamp and climbing harness, all at the same time. To give a quick runthrough, we did in fact watch glowworms, but it was after we rappelled 60 feet down into a hole in the ground, jumped 15 feet into an underground river, floated around in that underground river (mind you the water was probably 55 degrees), climbed up over, around, and through multiple strong waterfalls, and then climbed out against the current. It was quite a surprise, but has probably been the most fun adventure so far on the trip! I’d really really recommend it to anyone heading down to that area because I had such a great time. That night, we trekked our way down to Rotarua, a provincial town that has quite a bit to offer.
When we arrived, it seemed a bit of an industrial and grungy place, with steam rising from all over. Little did I realize that this steam was rising from the many hot springs in the area. We spent the night in a small hostel called Funky Green Backpackers. The double room that we stayed actually was a separate unit from the main hostel, and was similar to a 3 bedroom apartment. We cooked a nice pasta dinner and prepared our belongings for the next few days.
The next day, we woke at a reasonable time and took a tour around Rotarua before continuning our journey south towards Wellington. We stopped in a place called the something-wonderland, which consisted of many hot springs and geyer type of formations. The formations were not the most impressive, but the colors of the waters we saw were quite amazing. We saw some bodies of water which were entirely neon green and bubling like they were from a witches cauldron. After that short trip, we went southward towards Taupo, a bustling backpacker town on the tip of Lake Taupo. We stayed at Tiki Backpackers, which was a tidy place with grand windows overlooking the lake and the snow-capped peaks beyond. As an aside, this time of year is an awesome time to see NZ because it’s so quiet, and places are not overcrowded. It’s a bit chilly, but not cold enough where you wouldn’t enjoy yourself.
We trekked around Taupo and did the usual essentials, groceries, internet, and a guilty pleasure trip to the local fast-food joint for some fries. We prided ourselves on cooking yet another good meal, which for us is quite the achievement. We woke up the next morning for a long trek southward to end up in Wellington.
Before making it to Wellington, we had plenty of scenery to greet us along the way. We stopped at a national park, which it’s name is eluding me at the moment, but it is where Mt. Doom was filmed for the Lord of the Rings movies. Which also means nothing to me since I don’t’ follow any of that. However, it was the most volcanic thing I’d ever seen in my life. Capped with snow, it was a gorgeous site. We stopped in the small basecamp for the three mountains in the area and took a short 2-hour hike to a small falls in the area. Had we stayed longer, I would have very much like to take a trip to the summit or hire a bike and do some mtn. biking in the area. However, that would have to wait for a later date. After our stop there, we drove south for another 5 hours or so passing some of my favorite landscape and thousands of sheep before making it to Wellington.
Wellington is quite a grungy city, having a feeling of Portland, OR but with a landscape of San Francisco bent in a circle. We didn’t get to see much of it last night, but we did manage to go out for a quite run of Thai food and a bar of ice cream. We went back to our hostel (Rosemere Backpackers), to plan for our next few days. This hostel was pretty unique and homly feeling, I’d definitely recommend it if you’re looking for a bit of a funky but friendly place.
Today, we woke up a bit earlier (like 20 minutes earlier) so we could get a quick glimpse of Wellington. Lucky for us, the sun was actually out, which is quite rare for this city. We drove up to the viewpoint near the top of the cable car and got some grand views of the city. Next, we had to catch the ferry over to the south island. But only after a short hike down the hill to locate the nearest Starbucks so catch some internet and for Cat to get a quick bit of coffee.
So now, 1700 words, and about 20 miles later, I’m on a ferry headed towards Picton on the south island of New Zealand, we have a little less than a week on our trip before life picks up again like a whirlwind back for me in Berkeley, and for Catherine in Atlanta. We have some pretty awesome trips planned still. Sea Kayaking in Abel Tasman National Park, Glacier Hiking at Franz Josef Glacier, some bungee jumping in Queenstown, and whatever else we find to fill the time between now and then. So I hope to have some pretty exciting things to report on in the next few days. But until then, I hope you all are doing well at home, and thanks for continuning to read these long and grammatically incorrect blogs!
Paul
Saturday, August 11, 2007
Last Day in Australia!
So once again, I’m a bit limited by the amount of time that I can be online, so no pictures at the moment on the blog, but they are posted onto my flickr site. So my time in the land down under has finally come to an end. 2 months and 2 days since my departure from Atlanta, GA I have covered about 9000 miles westward from my home, and tomorrow, I will begin the first 1000 or so back. Tomorrow is particularly interesting because I will be traveling to a new countrty as well as seeing Catherine for the first time since June 9th. By this time, she is somewhere over the Pacific, and will be arriving in Auckland in approximately 7 hours from now…. Unfortunately for her, I won’t be arriving in Auckland until about 12 hours from now…. But we’ve made arrangements to meet up in the land of Kiwis so hopefully everything will work out just fine.
So as for my last day in Australia, I tried to make the most of it. I was up at a hostel-early 7:45am and getting a proper breakfast downstairs. My breakfast was again my multiple pieces of toast, but only one bowl of cereal as my rations (and cash) are running low. I spent the first 4 hours of my day doing a combination of running/walking to various parts of the city. I started off at the Olympic Park area where the current AFL and rugby teams play, then easily jogged my way up to the Kings Cross (nightclub district) area, got myself a Red Bull, and continued on my journey. I ended up next by the Navy Yards, then stumbled across the entrance to the Sydney Botanical Gardens, which were absolutely awesome. I saw some of the best views of the city there, and the park in itself is pretty great. My next goal was to figure out how to get onto the Harbour Bridge. About 30 minutes later, I managed to find the approach and ran my way across the bridge and back. After all of this, I was pretty wore out. I only brought a little cash and my camera for this journey, and now that it was nearing noon, I was pretty famished. So I ran/walked my way back to the hostel, and made myself a bowl of soup and some other little things for lunch. By 1:30, I was back on a walk, a little more properly dressed this time. I headed over to the Paddington Market to buy some souvenirs to take back with me, and then over to the Powerhouse Museum (and old powerhouse, kinda like in Brisbane), to check out a major design exhibition going on. The museum was actually very impressive and modern. It was a bit of a combination of everything, including art/design, engineering and sciences. It was pretty cool, I guess I forgot to mention earlier how easily engineering and design go hand in hand here in Australia. Back at UQ, there actually was an architecture/civil engineering collaborative design studio….. I am still debating if such a thing could ever occur in the states.
So tonight was a pretty slow night, I was again starving by dinnertime, so I ate almost the rest of my rations here at the hostel, but still was having an urge for some good old fashioned aussie chips (fries), I went down to the local woolies and spent my last paper bill on some hot chips and some milk to finish off my box of cereal back at the hostel. So now, I am down to my last $2.10 of Australian money, hopefully I won’t need any money tomorrow, but I am keeping my fingers crossed (I already bought a train ticket).
But in looking back, this summer in Australia has been nothing short of awesome. A paid vacation, an academic collboration, an international adventure, it’s really been all of these things. But the trip isn’t over quite yet, so I have another 12 days or so to look forward to, and I hope to make the most of those still!
So as for my last day in Australia, I tried to make the most of it. I was up at a hostel-early 7:45am and getting a proper breakfast downstairs. My breakfast was again my multiple pieces of toast, but only one bowl of cereal as my rations (and cash) are running low. I spent the first 4 hours of my day doing a combination of running/walking to various parts of the city. I started off at the Olympic Park area where the current AFL and rugby teams play, then easily jogged my way up to the Kings Cross (nightclub district) area, got myself a Red Bull, and continued on my journey. I ended up next by the Navy Yards, then stumbled across the entrance to the Sydney Botanical Gardens, which were absolutely awesome. I saw some of the best views of the city there, and the park in itself is pretty great. My next goal was to figure out how to get onto the Harbour Bridge. About 30 minutes later, I managed to find the approach and ran my way across the bridge and back. After all of this, I was pretty wore out. I only brought a little cash and my camera for this journey, and now that it was nearing noon, I was pretty famished. So I ran/walked my way back to the hostel, and made myself a bowl of soup and some other little things for lunch. By 1:30, I was back on a walk, a little more properly dressed this time. I headed over to the Paddington Market to buy some souvenirs to take back with me, and then over to the Powerhouse Museum (and old powerhouse, kinda like in Brisbane), to check out a major design exhibition going on. The museum was actually very impressive and modern. It was a bit of a combination of everything, including art/design, engineering and sciences. It was pretty cool, I guess I forgot to mention earlier how easily engineering and design go hand in hand here in Australia. Back at UQ, there actually was an architecture/civil engineering collaborative design studio….. I am still debating if such a thing could ever occur in the states.
So tonight was a pretty slow night, I was again starving by dinnertime, so I ate almost the rest of my rations here at the hostel, but still was having an urge for some good old fashioned aussie chips (fries), I went down to the local woolies and spent my last paper bill on some hot chips and some milk to finish off my box of cereal back at the hostel. So now, I am down to my last $2.10 of Australian money, hopefully I won’t need any money tomorrow, but I am keeping my fingers crossed (I already bought a train ticket).
But in looking back, this summer in Australia has been nothing short of awesome. A paid vacation, an academic collboration, an international adventure, it’s really been all of these things. But the trip isn’t over quite yet, so I have another 12 days or so to look forward to, and I hope to make the most of those still!
Friday, August 10, 2007
Sydney Days 1-2
So I wish I could upload my pictures right now, but my card reader is packed in the depths of my luggage… so it will have to wait for a few more days. But for those just tuning in at home. I’m in Sydney now, and have will be here for one more full day tomorrow. I arrived yesterday, the 9th of August and the weather so far has been fantastic. I was a little bit scared when I left Brisbane that I would arrive in Sydney to a cold, rainy place… which it has apparently lived up to that expectation during the past two months. However, upon my arrival, it’s a completely different scene. First off, I had to say that just flying into the city was pretty awesome. The Airport here in Sydney is right along the ocean, so similar to SFO or OAK, you see the water right up until you land. Well as we were on approach, I saw two windsurfers cruising along next to the airplane (going a little bit slower of course), but they had to be less than 100 yards away… I thought to myself… wow, that is really awesome. I’m planning on someday being that windsurfing watching planes land from the comfort of my board.
But getting into Sydney was no worry, it’s definitely a bit pricier than Brisbane in some regards, but surprisingly cheaper in other areas…. Such as haircuts, clothing, and some foods… weird. But I checked into my hostel (YHA Sydney Railway Station)… and this place is by far, the nicest hostel I’ve ever stayed in. I think it was built about 3 years ago and is directly connected to the railway station. Some of the bedrooms are even in old rail cars, but it’s a really nice place with a big kitchen and plenty of nice comfy couches, one of which I’m sitting on right now. So once I dropped my bags off, it was off to start exploring the city. I began my journey by walking outside, and heading straight down George Street, the main drag into downtown, Sydney is definitely a busier place than Brisbane with its fast moving traffic, and people actually honking at eachother while driving. But still, a city is a city, one of my friends mentioned how it resembles a New York combined with Southern California… I could see it. So I’m walking down George Street and then pick up some groceries at the local woolies,.. food is unfortunately more expensive, but then I make my way down to the Harbour, and out of the corner of my eye, there it is, the Sydney Harbour Bridge… it’s one of those things that is just kind of awe-inspiring and something that I’d only seen on TV thus far in my life, so seeing it in real life was pretty amazing. In my past two days, I’ve probably taken about 40 pictures of it from different angles, but after my excitement from that was slowly wearing off, then out of the other corner of my eye comes the Sydney Opera House, It’s quite an impressive place as well. So I spent the next few hours walking between the two and just taking in the sights of Sydney Harbor. Sydney is an absolutely beautiful place, a bit busy, but has a lot of character in its relationship with the water, the ferries, and its architecture.
Later in the evening, I went out to a local pub with some friends from the program, and grabbed a drink. It was nice to hear the experiences of some others in the EAPSI program outside of Brisbane. But then, it was time to retire back at the YHA after a long day, my room was a 4-share, and wasn’t particularly hospitable, fairly quiet and tense looking guys, so I just minded my own business and went to bed.
The next morning, I had a slow start. I woke up around 8:45 and made myself down to brekky. For some reason, I’ve been eating a pretty good bit during the past two weeks. So this morning was no different with my two bowls of cereal, four pieces of toast and granola bar. But I knew I had a big day of walking ahead. I went ahead and bought a daily pass for the transit system. I first two a train then bus down to Bondi Beach on the south shore. I had heard that the walk from Bondi to Coogee along the coast was a must. And it when I got there, it was a great morning trek. I walked as I watched surfers and boogie boarders enjoying the surf at Bondi, it was surprisingly warm today with temps probably in the upper 70s. After about 2 hours of walking around the coast, I was getting ancey to make it back to the CBD, because I wanted to try to make it over to Manly Beach too. So luckily, the one bus I saw during this whole escapade was just around a corner. I knocked on the bus door because it was closed and asked how to get back to the CBD, and apparently this was the right place to be. The driver let me in and off we went.
I eventually made it back to Central Station, and then hopped back on the train to head to Circular Quay. Once there, I jumped on a ferry to Manly Beach. I sat next to a gent from Perth who was the head of the Pharmacy Board of Western Oz. Sounded like an important position, so I kept chatting. Really nice guy, gave me plenty of tips about Manly Beach and where to go, we also had a nice chat about American and Australian Politics. Apparently John Howard bailed out East Timor back in the day… who knew?
So once at Manly, I just kinda ambled around. I walked for about 2 hours there, around the beach over to North Point (I think that was the name), but did a little bit of hiking in the hills and cliffs around the beach, it was pretty rugged hiking considering how close to the city it was. But met a nice German/French couple along the way.
I headed back to the city around 415PM and caught the ferry. On the ferry ride, I got some great pictures of the city and the bridge. Once back, I was just plain ferry happy and decided to catch another one over to Darling Harbour, which goes under the Harbour Bridge…. Even better! So took that one, the ride lasted about 25 minutes or so. Once at Darling Harbour, I went walking for another 2 hours or so, seeing all of the touristy sights of Brisbane, but it is very impressive. Sydney definitely has lots to offer, and there were plenty of people out as well to make it interesting. I stumbed across a really awesome photo exhibit of photography from around the world. It had a sustainability/climate spin so each photo had little snippits of facts about the environment and such, it was really interesting. But after that, I was pretty famished, and it was nearing 7pm. So I came back to the hostel, and made myself some dinner, and now here I am. To be honest, I’m pretty exhausted right now, and may turn in within the next two hours.
But I’ll be off to NZ here in a few days, so I defiantly have that to look forward to. Cat and I are working out final minute details to meet up, but I imagine it’ll all work out.
Funny thing, I was just approached by a girl from Minnesota (more recently Chicago) who was trying to sell her airport train tickets because they were leaving early for the airport on a different day, and it turns out that she was sitting next to me on the Ferry today (I couldn’t’ remember) but she apparently noticed my Chacos, and also did again right now. Hah. Small world. Anyway, until tomorrow!
But getting into Sydney was no worry, it’s definitely a bit pricier than Brisbane in some regards, but surprisingly cheaper in other areas…. Such as haircuts, clothing, and some foods… weird. But I checked into my hostel (YHA Sydney Railway Station)… and this place is by far, the nicest hostel I’ve ever stayed in. I think it was built about 3 years ago and is directly connected to the railway station. Some of the bedrooms are even in old rail cars, but it’s a really nice place with a big kitchen and plenty of nice comfy couches, one of which I’m sitting on right now. So once I dropped my bags off, it was off to start exploring the city. I began my journey by walking outside, and heading straight down George Street, the main drag into downtown, Sydney is definitely a busier place than Brisbane with its fast moving traffic, and people actually honking at eachother while driving. But still, a city is a city, one of my friends mentioned how it resembles a New York combined with Southern California… I could see it. So I’m walking down George Street and then pick up some groceries at the local woolies,.. food is unfortunately more expensive, but then I make my way down to the Harbour, and out of the corner of my eye, there it is, the Sydney Harbour Bridge… it’s one of those things that is just kind of awe-inspiring and something that I’d only seen on TV thus far in my life, so seeing it in real life was pretty amazing. In my past two days, I’ve probably taken about 40 pictures of it from different angles, but after my excitement from that was slowly wearing off, then out of the other corner of my eye comes the Sydney Opera House, It’s quite an impressive place as well. So I spent the next few hours walking between the two and just taking in the sights of Sydney Harbor. Sydney is an absolutely beautiful place, a bit busy, but has a lot of character in its relationship with the water, the ferries, and its architecture.
Later in the evening, I went out to a local pub with some friends from the program, and grabbed a drink. It was nice to hear the experiences of some others in the EAPSI program outside of Brisbane. But then, it was time to retire back at the YHA after a long day, my room was a 4-share, and wasn’t particularly hospitable, fairly quiet and tense looking guys, so I just minded my own business and went to bed.
The next morning, I had a slow start. I woke up around 8:45 and made myself down to brekky. For some reason, I’ve been eating a pretty good bit during the past two weeks. So this morning was no different with my two bowls of cereal, four pieces of toast and granola bar. But I knew I had a big day of walking ahead. I went ahead and bought a daily pass for the transit system. I first two a train then bus down to Bondi Beach on the south shore. I had heard that the walk from Bondi to Coogee along the coast was a must. And it when I got there, it was a great morning trek. I walked as I watched surfers and boogie boarders enjoying the surf at Bondi, it was surprisingly warm today with temps probably in the upper 70s. After about 2 hours of walking around the coast, I was getting ancey to make it back to the CBD, because I wanted to try to make it over to Manly Beach too. So luckily, the one bus I saw during this whole escapade was just around a corner. I knocked on the bus door because it was closed and asked how to get back to the CBD, and apparently this was the right place to be. The driver let me in and off we went.
I eventually made it back to Central Station, and then hopped back on the train to head to Circular Quay. Once there, I jumped on a ferry to Manly Beach. I sat next to a gent from Perth who was the head of the Pharmacy Board of Western Oz. Sounded like an important position, so I kept chatting. Really nice guy, gave me plenty of tips about Manly Beach and where to go, we also had a nice chat about American and Australian Politics. Apparently John Howard bailed out East Timor back in the day… who knew?
So once at Manly, I just kinda ambled around. I walked for about 2 hours there, around the beach over to North Point (I think that was the name), but did a little bit of hiking in the hills and cliffs around the beach, it was pretty rugged hiking considering how close to the city it was. But met a nice German/French couple along the way.
I headed back to the city around 415PM and caught the ferry. On the ferry ride, I got some great pictures of the city and the bridge. Once back, I was just plain ferry happy and decided to catch another one over to Darling Harbour, which goes under the Harbour Bridge…. Even better! So took that one, the ride lasted about 25 minutes or so. Once at Darling Harbour, I went walking for another 2 hours or so, seeing all of the touristy sights of Brisbane, but it is very impressive. Sydney definitely has lots to offer, and there were plenty of people out as well to make it interesting. I stumbed across a really awesome photo exhibit of photography from around the world. It had a sustainability/climate spin so each photo had little snippits of facts about the environment and such, it was really interesting. But after that, I was pretty famished, and it was nearing 7pm. So I came back to the hostel, and made myself some dinner, and now here I am. To be honest, I’m pretty exhausted right now, and may turn in within the next two hours.
But I’ll be off to NZ here in a few days, so I defiantly have that to look forward to. Cat and I are working out final minute details to meet up, but I imagine it’ll all work out.
Funny thing, I was just approached by a girl from Minnesota (more recently Chicago) who was trying to sell her airport train tickets because they were leaving early for the airport on a different day, and it turns out that she was sitting next to me on the Ferry today (I couldn’t’ remember) but she apparently noticed my Chacos, and also did again right now. Hah. Small world. Anyway, until tomorrow!
Wednesday, August 8, 2007
Leaving Queensland...
So it's the last post from my desk here at the Indooroopilly Lodge... I'm sad to go, but I've spent the last 2 hours doing my homework on Sydney, and I'm sure I'll really enjoy it down there. So out with the old and in with the new, time to end one adventure and start a new one!
Cheers from Brisbane, and we'll see you again on the other side in New South Wales.
Cheers from Brisbane, and we'll see you again on the other side in New South Wales.
Tuesday, August 7, 2007
Last Day On Campus
So yesterday was rather amusing, since I finally got access to the data which I could have literally spent two months sorting through in order to find a good solution to my problem. So obviously, today I had my work cut out for me. I won't bore you with too many details other than that I spent a good chunk of the day at the Arch/Music Library hacking out house sales information about greater Brisbane. But during lunchtime, I did manage to get out and get a few photos of the UQ Campus here at St. Lucia. And of course, just like every other Queensland winter day, the weather was absolutely perfect.
So this is the great court... looks nice doesn't it? I guess this center part is the equivalent of the quad... even though for some reason, it lacks a quaddy feel. As a side note, I think I'm also picking up this aussie trend of addying -y to everything, because that's what they do.. they have footie(Aussie rules football), brekkie (breakfast), noonie (afternoon).... it's rather hilarious actually. Ok so back to the story, the great court is where you can find students tabeling and doing undergraddy type of stuff.
This next photos is the UQ Union, or the food court and things like that, it definately has this 70s era feel to it, but it's nice because its largely outside and there are quite a few things to choose from. However, not very many chains as we'd see on our campuses. I'm guessing that most of these places are run by campus.
I can't say that I've eaten here too much though, I usually try to save my money but going to the grocery store and spending $1.99 on some cambells soup (I've tried every kind at this point), but it's such a good deal, and much healthier than doing ramen, while only spending about a buck more... But luckily, tomorrow I'm going downtown to have a proper lunch, I think I'll be joining my friend Oli and we're going to hit up one of the English Pubs on the queens street mall, it's ridicilious how much I'm looking forward to it, I guess it reflects the quality of my lunches for the past two months.
So this next shot is just looking back from the UQ Union into the opening where the Great Court is located. Since the semester has started, I've really enjoyed being on campus, I don't know if I like it just because it's UQ or if I just miss being on a college campus and being an undergrad again. Regardless, I love hearing all of the accents. They have alot of BBQ fundraisers where they grill sausages on campus, but for whatever reason, they don't do hot dog buns here, so I've been having quite a few sauasages where you put it on a diagonal on a regular piece of sandwich bread....
This shot is overlooking the area of campus that rolls slowly down into the UQ Lakes, I've played frisbee down here a few times, but it's definately a nice place to relax and do a bit of people watching.
This last shot is just a bit further on down the road, but you can see the Lakes pretty clearly and those four big sticks over the horizon is the Eleanor Schonell Green Bridge, which was built only to be used by buses and bike/ped.... what a great idea huh? But that's pretty much it. I'll be spending my last few hours on campus tomorrow afternoon, and I will definitely miss it. It was nice being a visitor observing campus life as an outsider.
So this is the great court... looks nice doesn't it? I guess this center part is the equivalent of the quad... even though for some reason, it lacks a quaddy feel. As a side note, I think I'm also picking up this aussie trend of addying -y to everything, because that's what they do.. they have footie(Aussie rules football), brekkie (breakfast), noonie (afternoon).... it's rather hilarious actually. Ok so back to the story, the great court is where you can find students tabeling and doing undergraddy type of stuff.This next photos is the UQ Union, or the food court and things like that, it definately has this 70s era feel to it, but it's nice because its largely outside and there are quite a few things to choose from. However, not very many chains as we'd see on our campuses. I'm guessing that most of these places are run by campus.
I can't say that I've eaten here too much though, I usually try to save my money but going to the grocery store and spending $1.99 on some cambells soup (I've tried every kind at this point), but it's such a good deal, and much healthier than doing ramen, while only spending about a buck more... But luckily, tomorrow I'm going downtown to have a proper lunch, I think I'll be joining my friend Oli and we're going to hit up one of the English Pubs on the queens street mall, it's ridicilious how much I'm looking forward to it, I guess it reflects the quality of my lunches for the past two months.
So this next shot is just looking back from the UQ Union into the opening where the Great Court is located. Since the semester has started, I've really enjoyed being on campus, I don't know if I like it just because it's UQ or if I just miss being on a college campus and being an undergrad again. Regardless, I love hearing all of the accents. They have alot of BBQ fundraisers where they grill sausages on campus, but for whatever reason, they don't do hot dog buns here, so I've been having quite a few sauasages where you put it on a diagonal on a regular piece of sandwich bread....
This shot is overlooking the area of campus that rolls slowly down into the UQ Lakes, I've played frisbee down here a few times, but it's definately a nice place to relax and do a bit of people watching.This last shot is just a bit further on down the road, but you can see the Lakes pretty clearly and those four big sticks over the horizon is the Eleanor Schonell Green Bridge, which was built only to be used by buses and bike/ped.... what a great idea huh? But that's pretty much it. I'll be spending my last few hours on campus tomorrow afternoon, and I will definitely miss it. It was nice being a visitor observing campus life as an outsider.
Monday, August 6, 2007
End of Monday Night Ultimate
So one of the highlights of my week for the past month has been gearing up on Monday nights to play Ultimate over in Yeronga with my team the Chimichungas , we've done pretty well in the past month, we're currently 2nd in the overall rankings , which isn't soo shabby. This all started on the first night of course when I told the story of getting lost, in the dark, and wandering all over southwest Brisbane by Bike... and eventually finding the field about 45 minutes later. However, things have smoothed out since then, I'm still riding my bike to the fields, but the commute has seemingly become much shorter and enjoyable. Mainly because UQ is back in session, and I actually see people on my ride to and from the field now.
But tonight was my final game with the team, who I've really gotten to know and who have become a sort of a second family here in Brisbane. It's funny how frisbee people are very nice. I think it's because they have a "nobody knows our sport, so we have to stick together" mentality. But they're really a fantastic bunch of people. Not even my team, but just everyone I've met so far in the league as well. But tonight we played a hard fought match between the UQ team, we were down about 6-0 in the beginning. I suspect just because of their youth and speed, they got to us early. Unfortunately, we ended up losing the game, but only by one point, which we were very close to evening the score.
I of course had to take a picture of the team before my departure!
After the game, the team went out to West End for a quick dinner, and just to socialize in general. I had a great time as their humor is quite good. Aussies are a funny bunch of people.
But oh yeah, I'm also doing reseach here in Queensland if you didn't know already, and I literally found the holy grail of research materials today from a tip from a professor in urban planning. I'm not going to go into too much detail, but it basically would have done me a whole lot of good if I would have gotten access to this stuff about 3 weeks ago... oh well, that's the way it works I suppose. Tomorrow I'm going to go back to campus and hack it out for a good portion of the day, tomorrow evening will be pretty uneventful besides the typical trip to the gym, and getting my last dinner at the Indooroopilly Lodge (I'll be playing frisbee on wed night as well).
It's kinda passing by quickly, but I suppose it's time to get moving on with life.
But tonight was my final game with the team, who I've really gotten to know and who have become a sort of a second family here in Brisbane. It's funny how frisbee people are very nice. I think it's because they have a "nobody knows our sport, so we have to stick together" mentality. But they're really a fantastic bunch of people. Not even my team, but just everyone I've met so far in the league as well. But tonight we played a hard fought match between the UQ team, we were down about 6-0 in the beginning. I suspect just because of their youth and speed, they got to us early. Unfortunately, we ended up losing the game, but only by one point, which we were very close to evening the score.
I of course had to take a picture of the team before my departure!After the game, the team went out to West End for a quick dinner, and just to socialize in general. I had a great time as their humor is quite good. Aussies are a funny bunch of people.
But oh yeah, I'm also doing reseach here in Queensland if you didn't know already, and I literally found the holy grail of research materials today from a tip from a professor in urban planning. I'm not going to go into too much detail, but it basically would have done me a whole lot of good if I would have gotten access to this stuff about 3 weeks ago... oh well, that's the way it works I suppose. Tomorrow I'm going to go back to campus and hack it out for a good portion of the day, tomorrow evening will be pretty uneventful besides the typical trip to the gym, and getting my last dinner at the Indooroopilly Lodge (I'll be playing frisbee on wed night as well).
It's kinda passing by quickly, but I suppose it's time to get moving on with life.
Sunday, August 5, 2007
Bridge to Brisbane 12km
Today started at a rather early time, the earliest that I've been up ever in the history of my time in Australia... a whopping 4:30AM to be picked up by my friend Al at 4:45AM. We had to pick up another friend who was running over in West End and make it to the race start by 5:30AM (apparently the organizers wanted to be absolutely sure no one would be late). So getting out of the car near the race start at 5AM was pretty much right up there with how cold I was when I was sick with a fever laying in my sleeping bag at Noosa. It was freaking freezing. The sun had yet to come out and warm the winter brisbane sky. But luckily, since I was among hardcore frisbee players, we broke out the frisbee in the staging area and that really helped us warm up. Once race time came close to 6:50AM, the sun had come up, and wow did that make a difference. It was probably the most beautiful morning that I'd experienced in a while, watching the sunrise come up over the Brisbane Harbor, staying among 33,000 other people viewing the same thing. Around 7AM, the race began, with the all too familar, run 30m, then get slowed to a walk because of the congestion, this wasn't helped at all since we were going up an incline. But while on the bridge, I was treated with a unique sight which most people aren't able to see, a birds-eye view of the Brisbane Harbor, Brisbane Airport to the east and north, and an awesome view of downtown Brisbane City to the west. It was hard to enjoy the view, while maintaining pace, and avoiding falling on top of someone else in the highly-congested pack.
Here's a picture of the bridge... The run after the bridge was pretty scenic, going along the Brisbane River in many parts. The time went by surprisingly quickly, as I was jamming out to my typical workout music. My mile splits were probably around 8min/mile, not too shabby in my book considering this is the first time I'd run outside for training since June 14th. (I'd been playing ultimate frisbee, but that is quite a different type of training) The finish was near the Brisbane Powerhouse in New Farm. After the race, I was pretty knackered out, but doing ok. Much better than I was doing after the SF Half Marathon in Feb at least (I could barely walk then).
We took the bus back to our car, and meanwhile, my bladder was going crazy.. I probably had to go to the bathroom 6 times between 6am and 9am. (I held it for the race)... But afterwards, we treated ourself to a massive breakfast, I bought my first omlet of the summer which could not have been better. However, it was in the shape of a quiche ...and about the size of an individual pizza. I'd never seen something like it, but it was quite good nonetheless.
The rest of the day has been pretty uneventful aside from a long sit by the river near the lodge, a long chat with Catherine, and washing clothes. To be honest, it was a perfect Sunday. Right now it's only 8:30, but I'm ready to pass out over this day. But I'm going to try to stay up for a bit longer and plan out the rest of the week, which consists of 3 more days here in Brisbane before my journey continues on to Sydney.
Here's a picture of the bridge... The run after the bridge was pretty scenic, going along the Brisbane River in many parts. The time went by surprisingly quickly, as I was jamming out to my typical workout music. My mile splits were probably around 8min/mile, not too shabby in my book considering this is the first time I'd run outside for training since June 14th. (I'd been playing ultimate frisbee, but that is quite a different type of training) The finish was near the Brisbane Powerhouse in New Farm. After the race, I was pretty knackered out, but doing ok. Much better than I was doing after the SF Half Marathon in Feb at least (I could barely walk then).
We took the bus back to our car, and meanwhile, my bladder was going crazy.. I probably had to go to the bathroom 6 times between 6am and 9am. (I held it for the race)... But afterwards, we treated ourself to a massive breakfast, I bought my first omlet of the summer which could not have been better. However, it was in the shape of a quiche ...and about the size of an individual pizza. I'd never seen something like it, but it was quite good nonetheless.
The rest of the day has been pretty uneventful aside from a long sit by the river near the lodge, a long chat with Catherine, and washing clothes. To be honest, it was a perfect Sunday. Right now it's only 8:30, but I'm ready to pass out over this day. But I'm going to try to stay up for a bit longer and plan out the rest of the week, which consists of 3 more days here in Brisbane before my journey continues on to Sydney.
Friday, August 3, 2007
Last Friday in Brisbane
So... the reality of the end of summer 2007 is nearing... Today was my last Friday night in Brisbane, a city that has slowly become my home for the past two months. As much as I'm looking forward to moving on to Sydney, New Zealand, and eventually back to Berkeley, I am going to really miss this place. It may not be a Melbourne or a Sydney, which are considered the international gateways of Australia, but I think that characteristic itself makes it unique. I spent five years of my life in Atlanta, GA, and even though Atlanta is no New York or San Francisco... it has a way of really growing on you. I feel that Brisbane and Atlanta have alot in common, they may not be the greatest of tourist cities, but they have that small town feel and have a big sense of community. In both places, if you know the right neighborhoods, the town has plenty to offer, and well, things are a good bit cheaper. Brisbane has been good to me, the weather has been in the upper 60s to lower 70s all winter, and it's rained only 3 days. Every other day has been pure sunshine and to me... that makes a huge difference.
So despite what people say about the Brizzy or Brisvegas, I think this is a fantastic place to be, and it has been an awesome place to spend a short time of my life. The bike rides along the river to the university, the river ferries that pass by the downtown, Queen Street Mall with its street performers and slight feel of a big city, and the small pockets of nightlife in West End and Brunswick Street. I'm really thankful for being here in the sun, warmth, and among the friendly people of Queensland.
Tomorrow, I'll be spending my last saturday hopefully at the beach down at the gold coast... going for one last surf. Then Sunday, I'll be joining in on the Bridge to Brisbane 12K run... I haven't really ran all summer, but oh well, sometimes you just gotta go for it. I figure the worst that can happen is that I'll have to walk... or pass out and fall into the river, but let's hope the former is the worst.
Anyway, I'm getting tired, so its time for bed. Will write back with more info tomorrow.
So despite what people say about the Brizzy or Brisvegas, I think this is a fantastic place to be, and it has been an awesome place to spend a short time of my life. The bike rides along the river to the university, the river ferries that pass by the downtown, Queen Street Mall with its street performers and slight feel of a big city, and the small pockets of nightlife in West End and Brunswick Street. I'm really thankful for being here in the sun, warmth, and among the friendly people of Queensland.
Tomorrow, I'll be spending my last saturday hopefully at the beach down at the gold coast... going for one last surf. Then Sunday, I'll be joining in on the Bridge to Brisbane 12K run... I haven't really ran all summer, but oh well, sometimes you just gotta go for it. I figure the worst that can happen is that I'll have to walk... or pass out and fall into the river, but let's hope the former is the worst.
Anyway, I'm getting tired, so its time for bed. Will write back with more info tomorrow.
Wednesday, August 1, 2007
Winding to an End...
The summer months have gone by so fast! It has been I believe seven weeks since I moved into the Indooroopilly Lodge, and at least two months since I have been in this crazy place called Australia. I can say the time has really flown by. It's been such a great summer, 1) because it's been exciting to explore a new and foreign place (without the stress of feeling vulnerable, and they speak english!), and 2) I'm being paid to research things that interest me, at my own pace. In hindsight, this program was quite a find, and I'm really glad that I was able to have it a part of my academic and life experience.
It's been a bit challenging trying to live two lives, 1) the life of a backpacker/traveler by weekend and be surrounded by people constantly on the move, and people who have been on the road for months if not years, then to come back to the steady-pace lifestyle of working in Brisbane by the week. But the multiple lives do keep things interesting and makes for the weeks to go by rather quickly. The month of July truly went by in a whirlwind. The combination of starting to play frisbee on a regular schedule, in addition to the travels to Fraser Island, Noosa, and Airlie Beach made the work weeks rather short.
But it was in July where I really hit a nice stride of meeting new people, and finding a good lifestyle while being here in Brisbane. Don't get me wrong, it's an amazing opportunity to be able to live in another country. But when you're working in another country, coming home, eating dinner, the routine is no different than being at home in the US. That's why having some of the evening activities made such a big difference, it was like finding a community to be a member of, here in Brisbane.
Looking back at June, I think I spent most of the evenings trying to find things to do, and I guess in the long run, it paid off. It's funny to think back about the day that I arrived in Brisbane and took out that funny plastic money from the ATM. But now, it's August, and in twenty-some odds days, I'll be back at the grind in Berkeley, which actually sounds a little exciting in its own right. I'm looking forward to some good Thai food, going windsurfing, and hopefully giving kite surfing a go. But I'll definitely miss the easy-going lifestyle of Brisbane, the clean and safe streets, and probably most of all, just the feeling of being the foreigner on the block.
So to give a short update on this week, I've hit the ground running in terms of writing my report. I've come to realize, that I probably don't even need much of a report, but I would like to have something substantial for my own good. Thus far, I've cranked out about 15 pages worth of substance, but I definitely have a good ways to go. Since I've gotten back from Airlie, I've had two nights of ultimate frisbee and some good days of work at the office at UQ as well as spending some time at the State Library of Queensland downtown. Frisbee tonight was good fun, it was a warm-up night for the UQ undergrads, but I've found that most of the people I met tonight, were Americans studying abroad... strange huh. But it was still a good time overall, it's always nice to meet people in the athletic setting. I also went to the gym a bit earlier today, and even though it's a bit of a more challenging place to meet people, I think I've become quite a regular, and I know most of the trainers there who have broken the ice with me because I apparently do some pretty strange workouts.... who knew?
But I'll be here in Brisbane only for a week longer. In that time, I plan to fit in three kite surfing lessons, a 12 km run, two frisbee games, one real estate meeting, a software workshop, and other odds and ends which are needed before one leaves a city for good. So, in essence, I have my work cut out for me during the next few days. But, I'm looking forward to it! The highs this week will be in the mid-70s and sunny every day. Did I mention that it's rained three days out of the time I've been here, and one of those was when I was deathly ill last week... not too shabby.
Well I'll quit rambling for now, but I just wanted to say thank you for anyone who has kept up with the blog until now... I know I endlessly ramble and have terrible grammar and punctuation. Oh, I also got a compliment on my "cool" american accent today... how fun!
Take care everyone, I hope things are going well back in the states. I have spent some of my downtime here to follow politics, and I think I've narrowed down my favorite presidential candidate, any guesses?
It's been a bit challenging trying to live two lives, 1) the life of a backpacker/traveler by weekend and be surrounded by people constantly on the move, and people who have been on the road for months if not years, then to come back to the steady-pace lifestyle of working in Brisbane by the week. But the multiple lives do keep things interesting and makes for the weeks to go by rather quickly. The month of July truly went by in a whirlwind. The combination of starting to play frisbee on a regular schedule, in addition to the travels to Fraser Island, Noosa, and Airlie Beach made the work weeks rather short.
But it was in July where I really hit a nice stride of meeting new people, and finding a good lifestyle while being here in Brisbane. Don't get me wrong, it's an amazing opportunity to be able to live in another country. But when you're working in another country, coming home, eating dinner, the routine is no different than being at home in the US. That's why having some of the evening activities made such a big difference, it was like finding a community to be a member of, here in Brisbane.
Looking back at June, I think I spent most of the evenings trying to find things to do, and I guess in the long run, it paid off. It's funny to think back about the day that I arrived in Brisbane and took out that funny plastic money from the ATM. But now, it's August, and in twenty-some odds days, I'll be back at the grind in Berkeley, which actually sounds a little exciting in its own right. I'm looking forward to some good Thai food, going windsurfing, and hopefully giving kite surfing a go. But I'll definitely miss the easy-going lifestyle of Brisbane, the clean and safe streets, and probably most of all, just the feeling of being the foreigner on the block.
So to give a short update on this week, I've hit the ground running in terms of writing my report. I've come to realize, that I probably don't even need much of a report, but I would like to have something substantial for my own good. Thus far, I've cranked out about 15 pages worth of substance, but I definitely have a good ways to go. Since I've gotten back from Airlie, I've had two nights of ultimate frisbee and some good days of work at the office at UQ as well as spending some time at the State Library of Queensland downtown. Frisbee tonight was good fun, it was a warm-up night for the UQ undergrads, but I've found that most of the people I met tonight, were Americans studying abroad... strange huh. But it was still a good time overall, it's always nice to meet people in the athletic setting. I also went to the gym a bit earlier today, and even though it's a bit of a more challenging place to meet people, I think I've become quite a regular, and I know most of the trainers there who have broken the ice with me because I apparently do some pretty strange workouts.... who knew?
But I'll be here in Brisbane only for a week longer. In that time, I plan to fit in three kite surfing lessons, a 12 km run, two frisbee games, one real estate meeting, a software workshop, and other odds and ends which are needed before one leaves a city for good. So, in essence, I have my work cut out for me during the next few days. But, I'm looking forward to it! The highs this week will be in the mid-70s and sunny every day. Did I mention that it's rained three days out of the time I've been here, and one of those was when I was deathly ill last week... not too shabby.
Well I'll quit rambling for now, but I just wanted to say thank you for anyone who has kept up with the blog until now... I know I endlessly ramble and have terrible grammar and punctuation. Oh, I also got a compliment on my "cool" american accent today... how fun!
Take care everyone, I hope things are going well back in the states. I have spent some of my downtime here to follow politics, and I think I've narrowed down my favorite presidential candidate, any guesses?
Monday, July 30, 2007
Whitsundays Islands!
So after yet another short work week, (this one is an all-time record of one-day.. Thursday). However, to my credit, I was on my deathbed Monday and Tuesday, and well Wednesday, I got a little over anxious with my health and tried to get up and going, only to find out that after breakfast, I was ready to pass out for another 6 hours. So since my last marathon post, I've been feeling better, still a little cough here or there, but definitely a major improvement. Per the reccomendation of my girlfriend and parents, I did go to the doctor to find out that I had a Upper Respiratory Tract Infection, which I think is a fancy word for moderate cold. Regardless, I was put on some medication for a while, but I am like new now.
So Thursday I had a very productive day in the office, which I should have considering it was my only 7 hours of work of last week. But it didn't last long since we left on Friday for Proserpine, Qld, which is where the Whitsundays Coast Airport is located. This past weekend trip was trip 3 of 3 for our small group package. The other trips included Fraser Island and Noosa River Everglades. But this trip was by far the grand prize of them all, a 2 day 2 night sailing trip to the Whitsundays Islands and the inner Great Barrier Reef. So we arrived on Thursday afternoon without much incident, and checked into our hostel.
We met up with a friend of ours from the program named Jason who was stationed up in Townsville for the summer. So the group grew to 4. Grabbed a drink in Airlie Beach, which is nortiously backpacker-ly, and apparently backpackers are supposed to like wet-t-shirt contests, because we were asked to go to at least 4, luckily, it isn't really the type of thing that we were into, so we opted to go to the local bar, grab a drink, and just relax without the added entertainment.
The next morning, we had time to get a proper breakfast (opposed to the last two weekends where our tour left around 7am or something earlier), so we took advantage of this , and I found some french toast and bacon which was absolutely spectacular. This is the first hot breakfast I'd had since I left the US as far as I remember. Wow, it was amazing.
After the breakfast, we checked in and commenced our boating trip.
So here you can see our ship, a 19-m "pocket maxi" boat which apparently had won quite a few races. It was a nice-yet-modest vessel. No such thing as private cabins on this thing, we all had beds that lined the lower deck, mine was about 1.5 feet wide by 7 feet long, and was an arm's length from the food-service bar and about two leg's length from the bathroom door. not exactly spacious, especially for the 22 people that would be on board.
But the four of us made the best of it! As you can see, we are drinking our classy boxed wine. To our credit, it was a Shiraz, which is a specialty of Australia! So back to more about the boat, there were only two main areas, the top deck, as seen below, which served as our living room during most of the day and into the evening. And the lower deck, where we slept, used the bathrooms, and got our food. I should also note that there was a shower, but none of us used it for the duration of the trip. I just got my first shower in the past 4 days about 40 minutes ago. It felt fabulous.
So its' quite amazing how fast time goes by when you're on a ship and not moving very fast (there wasn't much wind), but over the course of the 2 days 2 nights, we can sum up the trip in that we laidout on the deck and caught some sun, went to Whithaven beach, and went snorkeling to see some of the reef, but that's about it. Yet, those activities were all amazing in their own right, but I guess I am just trying to say the time went by soooo fast. The water and the wildlife were really awesome though, I think we were quite lucky. Even without the snorkeling, we were able to see dolphins, humpback whales, huge jellyfish, sea turtles, schools of tuna, and other fish in the water. While snorkeling, we saw all kinds of exotic fish and even hung out with a turtle for a little while.
The others on the boat were all of a good bunch, the usual suspects however. A majority of peoeple from the UK, a pair of Canadian couples (who played frisbee), a spainard, and a handful of german guys. We all got along just fine though.
Here's a shot from the beach where we set anchor on the 2nd night, we were able to see a very nice sunset over the waters.
I had to put up this shot just for kicks. Our flight today was 2 hours late getting into Proserpine, which was really annoying since I was supposed to have a frisbee game at 8:15pm (that's a little difficult when your plane gets to the gate in Brisbane at 6:45pm).... but regardless, this photo is a picture of the "waiting room" at Proserpine Airport, now I'm used to a small-town airport operation, but their "baggage claim" was a carport where they drive the lugage carts through, like a drive-in, and then you just pick your bag straight off the luggage cart. The waiting room is just as it looks, an outdoor courtyard with your typical airport seating. Hilarious.
So Thursday I had a very productive day in the office, which I should have considering it was my only 7 hours of work of last week. But it didn't last long since we left on Friday for Proserpine, Qld, which is where the Whitsundays Coast Airport is located. This past weekend trip was trip 3 of 3 for our small group package. The other trips included Fraser Island and Noosa River Everglades. But this trip was by far the grand prize of them all, a 2 day 2 night sailing trip to the Whitsundays Islands and the inner Great Barrier Reef. So we arrived on Thursday afternoon without much incident, and checked into our hostel.
We met up with a friend of ours from the program named Jason who was stationed up in Townsville for the summer. So the group grew to 4. Grabbed a drink in Airlie Beach, which is nortiously backpacker-ly, and apparently backpackers are supposed to like wet-t-shirt contests, because we were asked to go to at least 4, luckily, it isn't really the type of thing that we were into, so we opted to go to the local bar, grab a drink, and just relax without the added entertainment.
The next morning, we had time to get a proper breakfast (opposed to the last two weekends where our tour left around 7am or something earlier), so we took advantage of this , and I found some french toast and bacon which was absolutely spectacular. This is the first hot breakfast I'd had since I left the US as far as I remember. Wow, it was amazing.
After the breakfast, we checked in and commenced our boating trip.
So here you can see our ship, a 19-m "pocket maxi" boat which apparently had won quite a few races. It was a nice-yet-modest vessel. No such thing as private cabins on this thing, we all had beds that lined the lower deck, mine was about 1.5 feet wide by 7 feet long, and was an arm's length from the food-service bar and about two leg's length from the bathroom door. not exactly spacious, especially for the 22 people that would be on board.
But the four of us made the best of it! As you can see, we are drinking our classy boxed wine. To our credit, it was a Shiraz, which is a specialty of Australia! So back to more about the boat, there were only two main areas, the top deck, as seen below, which served as our living room during most of the day and into the evening. And the lower deck, where we slept, used the bathrooms, and got our food. I should also note that there was a shower, but none of us used it for the duration of the trip. I just got my first shower in the past 4 days about 40 minutes ago. It felt fabulous.
So its' quite amazing how fast time goes by when you're on a ship and not moving very fast (there wasn't much wind), but over the course of the 2 days 2 nights, we can sum up the trip in that we laidout on the deck and caught some sun, went to Whithaven beach, and went snorkeling to see some of the reef, but that's about it. Yet, those activities were all amazing in their own right, but I guess I am just trying to say the time went by soooo fast. The water and the wildlife were really awesome though, I think we were quite lucky. Even without the snorkeling, we were able to see dolphins, humpback whales, huge jellyfish, sea turtles, schools of tuna, and other fish in the water. While snorkeling, we saw all kinds of exotic fish and even hung out with a turtle for a little while.
The others on the boat were all of a good bunch, the usual suspects however. A majority of peoeple from the UK, a pair of Canadian couples (who played frisbee), a spainard, and a handful of german guys. We all got along just fine though.
Here's a shot from the beach where we set anchor on the 2nd night, we were able to see a very nice sunset over the waters.
I had to put up this shot just for kicks. Our flight today was 2 hours late getting into Proserpine, which was really annoying since I was supposed to have a frisbee game at 8:15pm (that's a little difficult when your plane gets to the gate in Brisbane at 6:45pm).... but regardless, this photo is a picture of the "waiting room" at Proserpine Airport, now I'm used to a small-town airport operation, but their "baggage claim" was a carport where they drive the lugage carts through, like a drive-in, and then you just pick your bag straight off the luggage cart. The waiting room is just as it looks, an outdoor courtyard with your typical airport seating. Hilarious.
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
And we're back! Noosa, Sickness, and things that comlplicate sickness
So after a few days down for the count, I am about 85% back on the money, but that is well enough to at least update the ole blog for the week. This writing will pretty much be the peak of my intellectual energy since last Thursday. Just as an aside, it's pretty amazing how much you can learn when you have free time on your hands, like all day, for two straight days.
So going back to the story, our past weekend was spent at the Noosa Everglades
which is about a 2.5 hour train ride north of Brisbane. Before hopping on the train, I had a fairly relaxed day. Went to the office in the morning, came back did our grocery shopping, and then we were off to the train station. After hopping on our 3:50pm train, I felt a bit tired, but no worries, I napped a bit on the train ride up, and we made it to Noosa (after an hour delay in some random town) around 8:00pm. Our hostel was at a YHA right next to the bus stop (we had to take the bus from the train station, that took about an hour), but since it was dark, and it was Australia and nothing is ever open, it took us to actually locate it's whereabouts. After that, it was then around 8:30pm. Trying to find a meal after 8:30pm in Australia is about as easy as trying to find a person bank teller that is open until midnight. It doesn't happen here. Unless you're a super-expensive-trendy-resort town restaurant. Such like the one we ended up going to and paying quite a bit for an undercooked pizza. But it was a filling meal. No complaints, Australia has been good to me so far, so I should help propel their dominate tourism economy a little bit.
After dinner, we decided to call it an early night, and turn in around 11pm. The rooms we were staying in were true "queenslanders", if I haven't explained this idea to you yet, just imagine sleeping in a screened in porch with no wind. Well when the temperatures drop to 40 at night, it's not the warmest of places, but luckily I had my sleeping bag, so as long as I didnt' have to stand outside, i'd be alright. Well at 4:50am or so, my chance to go stand outside came when the fire alarm went off.
When I was living at Woodruff Dorm when I was at at Georgia Tech, I actually used to like fire alarms, because it was the only chance to see my other dorm mates, I hardly got to see them otherwise... funny
About an hour and a half later, we started getting up so we could be downstairs and ready to go by 7:45am. We were picked up by a nice fella, probably in his early 40s driving a little mini-bus type of thing with a trailer, we threw our stuff in and met the other 9 people who would be at our trip. We stopped at a second hostel and met them all there. Quite a varied group, 2 girls from Ireland, a guy from Scotland, guy and gal from Germany, two from France, and a couple from Canada. All really nice and it made for a good group to travel.
For the trip itself, I'm going to shorten the story into a experience part and sickness part, because the longer I write definitely doesn't make the quality any better.
So from day one, we set off across a large lake, which the name escapes me. But the waters are crystal clear and very still, which makes it mirror almost everything around it. We took a ferry over this body of water to a floating station where we would mount up and load our canoes. From here, we would set off on our approximately 36km over 3 days canoe trip. The canoes were standard, reminding of my midwestern canoe days, but the scenery was pretty remarkable. The Noosa everglades are supposed to be similar to the Australian rainforest, the plant like definately resembles that, we saw some pretty wild looking plants. In terms of animals, I can't say that I saw that many, but I did see a few pelicans, which were enormous. When I say these things are enormous, I mean when I saw a few of them on land, I mistaken them for people. We made camp our first night and then made rest for our second portion of our journey the next day.
Day two pretty much encompassed another 13 km roundtrip, but with a 15km-round trip hike in the middle uphill to the "sand patch" which is a huge sand patch, probably the size of 20 football fields on top of this forested hill in the rainforest. We got up there for some spectacular views of the Noosa valley on one side, and the Pacific Ocean on the other.
I should make note that during all of our canoe time, the views on the river are pretty magnificant, the water is really still, so it is almost eerie passing over it on a canoe, because you can't tell it's distance because it's mirroring so much. I'm not sure if that makes sense. It basically looked like other canoes were floating because the water was so still.
Day three was our trip back. we had to leave the campsite rather early because we needed to make it back to the station by 10am. During our 1.5 hr canoe trip back, it started raining a bit, and continued for about 30 minutes, luckily not a downpour though. At the ranger station, we dried off our stuff, and hopped back in the Ferry where our van and a hot box of chips (fries) awaited us.
So from the sickness point of view. Before I tell this side, I just want to preface, I understand there are plenty of things worse that could have happened, and I should already be thankful of my health, but I thought this would still be an amusing thing to write. On Friday morning, I was feeling a bit rough almost like on the verge of some kind of illness. So, the 4am fire drill and standing outside wasn't the best of help. Then on the way to the floating station, we needed to wade through the lake to reach our ferry boat, and also bring all of the supplies from land to the boat. This was all happening with the notion in my head, if i'm getting sick, this is probably not the best option of ways to spend my weekend. wading in rivers, canoeing, and camping. So day one, I made it ok, after the first 2.5 hours of canoeing, we stopped for lunch and I had a quick pass-out nap (not power nap, because I literally passed out), then we canoed for another hour up to our campsite, where I also turned in for an early night. Day two, I felt a little bit worse, but not deathly, but I was convinced, "I am already up here, might as well make the most of it", plus, there honestly isn't that much to do at a campsite for 12 hours. So I decided against sleeping in the tent all day, and instead making the 12km canoe trip and 12 km hike to the sand patch, where again, I had a pass-out nap on the sand dunes.
So that night, I had every piece of clothing I owned on my body, and was getting up every hour to cough unmentionables. But, during that portion of the night, most of the stress that had come over me, was just that I'd have to wake up the next morning, canoe some more, and then spend another 6 hours in transit before making it to bed.
Well the next morning came, and I wasn't woken by sunlight, but instead my raindrops hitting the tent. Fantastic. By this point, I had acquired the suck it up attitude, which of course while camping is already after the "no bathing", "sand is on everything", and "you smell horrible" attitudes are already in effect.
But we broke camp, and steadily made it into the canoe. At this point, my illness (which I believed to be strep throat) had probably reached near its peak. So I was thinking to myself, what the hell am i doing with this sickness, canoeing on a river, in wet clothes, in the rain. But in due time, I knew I would at least be in the safety and warmth of a warm bus or train to take me to a bed to rest it off.
Well we eventually made it back to Noosa, grabbed a quick lunch and boarded the bus. The ride went pretty smoothly, and then getting on the train went smoothly as well. At this point in the day, my throat was giving me all kinds of problems, so I was trying not to talk too much, which on public transportation is typically pretty easy right?? Well, of course the one person that would like to sit down by me was a well-intoxicated Kiwi. (to her credit, she was very nice), but she didn't comprehend the words "sick", "ill", or "not feeling well" no matter what order I put them in. She continued to ask me questions, sometimes repeating questions if there were any silent moments where I was trying to regain my energy from the previous question. I just thought, the irony of it all. Luckily, that only lasted about 25 minutes, but probably the most draining portion of the travel home.
Finally made it back to Indooroopilly around 6pm on Sunday night and then slept for approximately the next 24 hours. Today, I ventured to the grocery store and am a bit more on my feet, but still not 100%. Hopefully by the end of the week things will be back to normal. But I am much better so thanks for those who had asked about me!, I spoke with my parents and girlfriend back at home and they gave me encouraging words, and Cat even sent me some get well flowers today, so that was fantastic, nothing like people who care about ya to make you feel better.
By the way, if you're ever traveling abroad, you should get an HostellingInternational card, their medical insurance people are awesome!
So going back to the story, our past weekend was spent at the Noosa Everglades
which is about a 2.5 hour train ride north of Brisbane. Before hopping on the train, I had a fairly relaxed day. Went to the office in the morning, came back did our grocery shopping, and then we were off to the train station. After hopping on our 3:50pm train, I felt a bit tired, but no worries, I napped a bit on the train ride up, and we made it to Noosa (after an hour delay in some random town) around 8:00pm. Our hostel was at a YHA right next to the bus stop (we had to take the bus from the train station, that took about an hour), but since it was dark, and it was Australia and nothing is ever open, it took us to actually locate it's whereabouts. After that, it was then around 8:30pm. Trying to find a meal after 8:30pm in Australia is about as easy as trying to find a person bank teller that is open until midnight. It doesn't happen here. Unless you're a super-expensive-trendy-resort town restaurant. Such like the one we ended up going to and paying quite a bit for an undercooked pizza. But it was a filling meal. No complaints, Australia has been good to me so far, so I should help propel their dominate tourism economy a little bit.
After dinner, we decided to call it an early night, and turn in around 11pm. The rooms we were staying in were true "queenslanders", if I haven't explained this idea to you yet, just imagine sleeping in a screened in porch with no wind. Well when the temperatures drop to 40 at night, it's not the warmest of places, but luckily I had my sleeping bag, so as long as I didnt' have to stand outside, i'd be alright. Well at 4:50am or so, my chance to go stand outside came when the fire alarm went off.
When I was living at Woodruff Dorm when I was at at Georgia Tech, I actually used to like fire alarms, because it was the only chance to see my other dorm mates, I hardly got to see them otherwise... funny
About an hour and a half later, we started getting up so we could be downstairs and ready to go by 7:45am. We were picked up by a nice fella, probably in his early 40s driving a little mini-bus type of thing with a trailer, we threw our stuff in and met the other 9 people who would be at our trip. We stopped at a second hostel and met them all there. Quite a varied group, 2 girls from Ireland, a guy from Scotland, guy and gal from Germany, two from France, and a couple from Canada. All really nice and it made for a good group to travel.
For the trip itself, I'm going to shorten the story into a experience part and sickness part, because the longer I write definitely doesn't make the quality any better.
So from day one, we set off across a large lake, which the name escapes me. But the waters are crystal clear and very still, which makes it mirror almost everything around it. We took a ferry over this body of water to a floating station where we would mount up and load our canoes. From here, we would set off on our approximately 36km over 3 days canoe trip. The canoes were standard, reminding of my midwestern canoe days, but the scenery was pretty remarkable. The Noosa everglades are supposed to be similar to the Australian rainforest, the plant like definately resembles that, we saw some pretty wild looking plants. In terms of animals, I can't say that I saw that many, but I did see a few pelicans, which were enormous. When I say these things are enormous, I mean when I saw a few of them on land, I mistaken them for people. We made camp our first night and then made rest for our second portion of our journey the next day.
Day two pretty much encompassed another 13 km roundtrip, but with a 15km-round trip hike in the middle uphill to the "sand patch" which is a huge sand patch, probably the size of 20 football fields on top of this forested hill in the rainforest. We got up there for some spectacular views of the Noosa valley on one side, and the Pacific Ocean on the other.
I should make note that during all of our canoe time, the views on the river are pretty magnificant, the water is really still, so it is almost eerie passing over it on a canoe, because you can't tell it's distance because it's mirroring so much. I'm not sure if that makes sense. It basically looked like other canoes were floating because the water was so still.
Day three was our trip back. we had to leave the campsite rather early because we needed to make it back to the station by 10am. During our 1.5 hr canoe trip back, it started raining a bit, and continued for about 30 minutes, luckily not a downpour though. At the ranger station, we dried off our stuff, and hopped back in the Ferry where our van and a hot box of chips (fries) awaited us.
So from the sickness point of view. Before I tell this side, I just want to preface, I understand there are plenty of things worse that could have happened, and I should already be thankful of my health, but I thought this would still be an amusing thing to write. On Friday morning, I was feeling a bit rough almost like on the verge of some kind of illness. So, the 4am fire drill and standing outside wasn't the best of help. Then on the way to the floating station, we needed to wade through the lake to reach our ferry boat, and also bring all of the supplies from land to the boat. This was all happening with the notion in my head, if i'm getting sick, this is probably not the best option of ways to spend my weekend. wading in rivers, canoeing, and camping. So day one, I made it ok, after the first 2.5 hours of canoeing, we stopped for lunch and I had a quick pass-out nap (not power nap, because I literally passed out), then we canoed for another hour up to our campsite, where I also turned in for an early night. Day two, I felt a little bit worse, but not deathly, but I was convinced, "I am already up here, might as well make the most of it", plus, there honestly isn't that much to do at a campsite for 12 hours. So I decided against sleeping in the tent all day, and instead making the 12km canoe trip and 12 km hike to the sand patch, where again, I had a pass-out nap on the sand dunes.
So that night, I had every piece of clothing I owned on my body, and was getting up every hour to cough unmentionables. But, during that portion of the night, most of the stress that had come over me, was just that I'd have to wake up the next morning, canoe some more, and then spend another 6 hours in transit before making it to bed.
Well the next morning came, and I wasn't woken by sunlight, but instead my raindrops hitting the tent. Fantastic. By this point, I had acquired the suck it up attitude, which of course while camping is already after the "no bathing", "sand is on everything", and "you smell horrible" attitudes are already in effect.
But we broke camp, and steadily made it into the canoe. At this point, my illness (which I believed to be strep throat) had probably reached near its peak. So I was thinking to myself, what the hell am i doing with this sickness, canoeing on a river, in wet clothes, in the rain. But in due time, I knew I would at least be in the safety and warmth of a warm bus or train to take me to a bed to rest it off.
Well we eventually made it back to Noosa, grabbed a quick lunch and boarded the bus. The ride went pretty smoothly, and then getting on the train went smoothly as well. At this point in the day, my throat was giving me all kinds of problems, so I was trying not to talk too much, which on public transportation is typically pretty easy right?? Well, of course the one person that would like to sit down by me was a well-intoxicated Kiwi. (to her credit, she was very nice), but she didn't comprehend the words "sick", "ill", or "not feeling well" no matter what order I put them in. She continued to ask me questions, sometimes repeating questions if there were any silent moments where I was trying to regain my energy from the previous question. I just thought, the irony of it all. Luckily, that only lasted about 25 minutes, but probably the most draining portion of the travel home.
Finally made it back to Indooroopilly around 6pm on Sunday night and then slept for approximately the next 24 hours. Today, I ventured to the grocery store and am a bit more on my feet, but still not 100%. Hopefully by the end of the week things will be back to normal. But I am much better so thanks for those who had asked about me!, I spoke with my parents and girlfriend back at home and they gave me encouraging words, and Cat even sent me some get well flowers today, so that was fantastic, nothing like people who care about ya to make you feel better.
By the way, if you're ever traveling abroad, you should get an HostellingInternational card, their medical insurance people are awesome!
Monday, July 23, 2007
sick....
I am sick and have been sleeping for the last 24 hours. Once I'm better, I'm fairly sure I can make an entertaining post out of this one.
Feel free to send care packages :-)
Best wishes,
Paul
Feel free to send care packages :-)
Best wishes,
Paul
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Pre-Weekend Post
Well it's only Wednesday night, but we'll be on the road yet again tomorrow. This weekend, we'll be doing a 3 day 2 night canoe trip of the Noosa Everglades. I'm really excited about it, with the slight exception that I have no idea how the two aspects of floating around on water, and sub-freezing temperatures will mix. Hopefully, they will not mix very much, but one still wonders. Since my last post, things have been fairly slow here in Brisbane. I arrived back early monday morning from the overnight bus from Hervey Bay. I spent half the morning in bed, and rolled into the office around 1pm. That night, I played my weekly frisbee game for the Chimmichungas (spelling?) over in Yeronga. It's about a 25 minute bike ride from here, but since the quality of my bicycle is hovering near zero, it felt like it was nearly twice that. But the ride is fairly scenic, taking me through St. Lucia, through campus and over a nice cable-stayed bridge
The other side of the river is a little less scenic, which takes me past a fairly creepy-by-night cemetery then an approximately another 2 miles until the Yeronga Football Club where we play ultimate. The game started around 8:15pm, and we played for about an hour and some. Our team was pretty dominate, and we won by at least 10. The games are great fun and everyone on the team is really friendly. I'll have some pictures for next time.
So on the way back, my bike got a flat tire, and it happened about 3 miles from Indooroopilly... great, so since I have so much money wrapped up in the investment, I thought it would be ok to ride the flat tire all the way back over the hills and through the woods back to the lodge. Obviously, if you know about flat tires, and trying to ride/drive on them,... it basically is the worst thing ever. But at the time, I was willing to make the sacrifice. So yesterday, I went to the local K-Mart (they do much better here than in the states) and picked up a new tube, and instead of heading to campus, I decided to do most of my work over at the State Library of Queensland on the river, fabulous place, really great facility, if you're ever in Brizzy, you should check it out. Then I took a quick lunch break and then finished up over at the Brisbane City Council Library before heading home.
Today was spent most in the office, and I won't pain you with the details of sitting and reading documents about brisbane transportation aside. However, I did mange to pull up a 1965 Wilbur Smith document that specifically recommends to the city of Brisbane to rid itself of all trams and trolleys in favor of Diesel buses and to commence building multi-level highways alongside the river front....lovely. Well Brisbane at least knew better for half of that plan.
Tomorrow, we'll be on our way to Noosa and leaving around 4:30pm. So I may not have a chance to write until Monday. So until then, hope you all have a great weekend!
The other side of the river is a little less scenic, which takes me past a fairly creepy-by-night cemetery then an approximately another 2 miles until the Yeronga Football Club where we play ultimate. The game started around 8:15pm, and we played for about an hour and some. Our team was pretty dominate, and we won by at least 10. The games are great fun and everyone on the team is really friendly. I'll have some pictures for next time.
So on the way back, my bike got a flat tire, and it happened about 3 miles from Indooroopilly... great, so since I have so much money wrapped up in the investment, I thought it would be ok to ride the flat tire all the way back over the hills and through the woods back to the lodge. Obviously, if you know about flat tires, and trying to ride/drive on them,... it basically is the worst thing ever. But at the time, I was willing to make the sacrifice. So yesterday, I went to the local K-Mart (they do much better here than in the states) and picked up a new tube, and instead of heading to campus, I decided to do most of my work over at the State Library of Queensland on the river, fabulous place, really great facility, if you're ever in Brizzy, you should check it out. Then I took a quick lunch break and then finished up over at the Brisbane City Council Library before heading home.
Today was spent most in the office, and I won't pain you with the details of sitting and reading documents about brisbane transportation aside. However, I did mange to pull up a 1965 Wilbur Smith document that specifically recommends to the city of Brisbane to rid itself of all trams and trolleys in favor of Diesel buses and to commence building multi-level highways alongside the river front....lovely. Well Brisbane at least knew better for half of that plan.
Tomorrow, we'll be on our way to Noosa and leaving around 4:30pm. So I may not have a chance to write until Monday. So until then, hope you all have a great weekend!
Monday, July 16, 2007
The Weekend & Fraser Island
So for those playing along at home, I haven't even gotten a chance to show you my room yet! Well actually, since I've been in Brisbane (Brisneyland, Brisvegas), I have actually had three rooms, my first in the City Backpackers Hostel downtown, and then two rooms here in the Indooroopilly Lodge. I had a nice place upstairs, but for some reason, they decided to move me downstairs (which is a worse room basically), claiming that someone needed my room upstairs, but strangely enough, I have yet to see anyone move in up there. hmmm.. At any rate, here is my place. As you can see, I've filled it up pretty nicely. I am typing this very blog sitting in a 70s -era lawn chair that I scavaged from outside my room. It's not the best of quality of accomodation, but it works. 
So let's go ahead and move on and talk about the weekend! So much has happened and I've seen so much in the past couple of days , but I'll try to sum it up as quickly as possible, for your benefit, and because I am getting really tired.
Well we left Brisbane on Thursday on a 2pm bus headed north to Hervey Bay. The bus was like any other you could imagine., similar to a greyhound experience in the US. We made plenty of stops on the way up, and the entire bus trip took approximately 6 hours. Of course they played a few movies on the way up to Hervey Bay, but naturally, they are about the most non-offensive yet, IQ dropping movies that are out there. (daddy day care and legally blonde 2). Actually they threw in Cheaper by the Dozen, and I actually appeal to that one because of my midwestern roots :-).
So we arrived in Hervey Bay in darkness around 9pm. Check into our hostel, and since it's still relatively early, we (My friend Oli and Rob) decide to go explore the town. As many of you know Australia as a country, tends to replicate the business hours of my hometown of Gibson City, nearly everything is closed by 6pm, and if you're lucky, you'll find a grocery store that stays open until 11pm. So we had a rather exciting trip in search of the town's only event going on , the local grocery store. After that, we tried to get a drink, but were turned away from the first bar since they close d at 10pm... luckily, we were able to convince a local hostel that we were guests, and they served us at their on-site bar. But it was an early night, we needed to be up by 6am the next morning for our pre-departure briefing.
So Friday morning, 6:50AM, this raspy -voiced Aussies walks in , and looks like he's done this about 100 times too many, starts speaking to us. "Hey guys, I'm gonna put in this DVD, it's got two parts, so when the first part finishes, go ahead and someone get up and start the second part", then he walks off. ... hmmm, good start. Well the DVD is quite informative about how to drive in sand and not kill yourself and your group, the second part was all about how not to anger a dingo (which we never saw btw), and camping tips. After this meager breifing, we got assigned to a group for our Land Cruiser (which we fit 11 people into, as opposed to the original 9 which we were told), but we had a fantastic group including myself, and four other guy friends, 2 scottish girls, 2 british girls, and an older couple from barcelona.
Just a brief on what Fraser Island is, it's the largest sand island in the world. We had booked a 3 day - 2 night camping trip which included a 4x4 rental, and a bunch of camping stuff.
These first two pictures are actually on the 3rd day on the island when I woke up to see the sunrise (6:40am), It's pretty cold during the night and into the morning, hence the gloves and woollie hat. But by 10am, it warms up to about 70 degrees.
Here's a photo of Lake Wabbie, this place was RIDICILIOUS!, I've never seen anything like it in my entire life. To the left, you see all of that sand, it was a complete desert., then on the lower right, you can see the small lake, which has of course the clearest water you could ever imagine. This is one of the two lakes which we visited on the island (Lake Mackenzie and Lake Wabby), both were absolutely pristine and had fantastic beaches.
Here's us on the vehicle ferry heading over to Fraser Island
Just to give you an idea of what the driving was like, mostly single-track and on the island, the fastest we would usually get going was 20 km/hr (slow)...., driving on the beach you can do up to 80km/hr, but it's WILD driving on a beach, I just went to a place in the states where you can do it (Oceano Vehicular Rec Area, - Pismo Beach, CA), but I've never seen this anywhere else.
This shot is through the wreck of the Maheno which is on the eastern coast of the beach.
Here's a nice shot of my feet hanging over the ledge. It's probably a good 70 feet down to the bottom. Strange though, this was probably one of the only cliffs I saw on the island.
So all in all, the trip was awesome, you should check out the photos , maybe they will help paint a better picture. We took the nice bus from Hervey Bay so we got back to Brisbane around 6am this morning. it's been a rough and groggy day. I just got back from our Ultimate Frisbee league tonight and now I'm destroyed... I got a flat tire on the way back as well, so tomorrow will be a fun day putting the bike back together, as well as mending my foot wounds from ultimate... hmmm, good night!
So let's go ahead and move on and talk about the weekend! So much has happened and I've seen so much in the past couple of days , but I'll try to sum it up as quickly as possible, for your benefit, and because I am getting really tired.
Well we left Brisbane on Thursday on a 2pm bus headed north to Hervey Bay. The bus was like any other you could imagine., similar to a greyhound experience in the US. We made plenty of stops on the way up, and the entire bus trip took approximately 6 hours. Of course they played a few movies on the way up to Hervey Bay, but naturally, they are about the most non-offensive yet, IQ dropping movies that are out there. (daddy day care and legally blonde 2). Actually they threw in Cheaper by the Dozen, and I actually appeal to that one because of my midwestern roots :-).
So we arrived in Hervey Bay in darkness around 9pm. Check into our hostel, and since it's still relatively early, we (My friend Oli and Rob) decide to go explore the town. As many of you know Australia as a country, tends to replicate the business hours of my hometown of Gibson City, nearly everything is closed by 6pm, and if you're lucky, you'll find a grocery store that stays open until 11pm. So we had a rather exciting trip in search of the town's only event going on , the local grocery store. After that, we tried to get a drink, but were turned away from the first bar since they close d at 10pm... luckily, we were able to convince a local hostel that we were guests, and they served us at their on-site bar. But it was an early night, we needed to be up by 6am the next morning for our pre-departure briefing.
So Friday morning, 6:50AM, this raspy -voiced Aussies walks in , and looks like he's done this about 100 times too many, starts speaking to us. "Hey guys, I'm gonna put in this DVD, it's got two parts, so when the first part finishes, go ahead and someone get up and start the second part", then he walks off. ... hmmm, good start. Well the DVD is quite informative about how to drive in sand and not kill yourself and your group, the second part was all about how not to anger a dingo (which we never saw btw), and camping tips. After this meager breifing, we got assigned to a group for our Land Cruiser (which we fit 11 people into, as opposed to the original 9 which we were told), but we had a fantastic group including myself, and four other guy friends, 2 scottish girls, 2 british girls, and an older couple from barcelona.
Just a brief on what Fraser Island is, it's the largest sand island in the world. We had booked a 3 day - 2 night camping trip which included a 4x4 rental, and a bunch of camping stuff.
These first two pictures are actually on the 3rd day on the island when I woke up to see the sunrise (6:40am), It's pretty cold during the night and into the morning, hence the gloves and woollie hat. But by 10am, it warms up to about 70 degrees.
Here's a photo of Lake Wabbie, this place was RIDICILIOUS!, I've never seen anything like it in my entire life. To the left, you see all of that sand, it was a complete desert., then on the lower right, you can see the small lake, which has of course the clearest water you could ever imagine. This is one of the two lakes which we visited on the island (Lake Mackenzie and Lake Wabby), both were absolutely pristine and had fantastic beaches.
Here's us on the vehicle ferry heading over to Fraser Island
Just to give you an idea of what the driving was like, mostly single-track and on the island, the fastest we would usually get going was 20 km/hr (slow)...., driving on the beach you can do up to 80km/hr, but it's WILD driving on a beach, I just went to a place in the states where you can do it (Oceano Vehicular Rec Area, - Pismo Beach, CA), but I've never seen this anywhere else.
This shot is through the wreck of the Maheno which is on the eastern coast of the beach.
Here's a nice shot of my feet hanging over the ledge. It's probably a good 70 feet down to the bottom. Strange though, this was probably one of the only cliffs I saw on the island.So all in all, the trip was awesome, you should check out the photos , maybe they will help paint a better picture. We took the nice bus from Hervey Bay so we got back to Brisbane around 6am this morning. it's been a rough and groggy day. I just got back from our Ultimate Frisbee league tonight and now I'm destroyed... I got a flat tire on the way back as well, so tomorrow will be a fun day putting the bike back together, as well as mending my foot wounds from ultimate... hmmm, good night!
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