Adelaide

I'm in Melbourne again now, but let me tell you about Adelaide...

As we stopped for lunch in the town of Frances just on the border of Victoria and South Australia, a man in a suit stopped to ask what we were doing lolling around on the grass outside a pub. After we explained and said we were traveling to Adelaide, he said "Ahh, Adelaide? That's where people go to die. Heh, I shouldn't say that; I'm from Adelaide". When speaking to Aussies about Adelaide in the past, the worst I've heard is that "Adelaide has the worst drinking water in the world; cargo ships refuse to fill their tanks there". As such, it seems that the locals think of Adelaide as a smaller version of Brisbane.

They may be right, but I liked Brisbane, and my time in Adelaide was fine, even though at the time, I was complaining of having nothing to do.

The YHA hostel was friendly and welcoming; with a pool table, lovely kitchen, a home-brew jukebox PC and a ping-pong table.

I went with a girl I'd met called Christina (who claims to have worked as an abseiling high-rise window-cleaner back in Sydney) to a "Reconciliation Faire". There were all manner of freebies,; radios, tennis balls, stickers, lanyards and even free hot-dogs. I had a chat with a man from a stall who turned out to be Aboriginal who was a lawyer specialising in Indigenous Relations and who traveled around the country (often camping under the stars) to meet the far-out tribes and groups, discussing their needs. He was called Fred.

After that, a few days passed. Coffee was drunk from the coffeehouse in the middle of Rundel St Mall, I read my book* and ping was ponged.

On the last night before I flew to Sydney, one of the guys came running into the common room exclaiming "There's a table football competition in the bar down the road! - No teams have entered yet and they need five teams to make the league. The winning team gets a $100 bar tab! We should go, then whoever wins can share out the beers!"

So we did. All eight of us. There turned out to be one other team made up of locals.

Huzzar, one of the YHA teams won (the team I was on "The Drop-Bears" came third), and so we drank late into the evening. The barman even ordered pizza for us! (It looked good, it smelt good too... ).

And so I left Adelaide, drunk on winning, and hung over from the resultant celebrations.


* I was despirate for a book to read; the only one I could find that wasn't a soppy romance book was a compilation of Jeremy Clarkson's column from the Sunday Times. Sorry :(

That which is nothing

We bought a fruit. It looked tasty and it was cheap from the Queen Victoria Market in Melbourne. The woman at the stall assured us that it was delicious, that you could eat both the fruit itself and the skin.

For the princely sum on AU$1, we took the persimmon back to the hostel, split it in four and started eating it.

Persimmons are the worst fruit in the world. Not because they taste bad. Because they are lazy. They have no flavour, they have no taste, their texture is that of indifference. Persimmons just don't try. At all. They taste and feel of nothing. They give you nothing in return for your AU$1, and you are left with a heart heavy with disappointment.

Groovy Grape from Melbourne to Adelaide

Whilst in Melbourne, at a loss as to what to do next, Laura and Kate suggested I travel along the Great Ocean Road to Adelaide with "Groovy Grape". I'd never heard of the company, but I trusted their recommendation and booked the trip.

There were seven of us (three Brits, two Canadians, one German girl and a Dutch girl), as well as Jen, our guide and driver from South Wales(!). Our three day drive from Melbourne to Adelaide was a blast; BBQs, fish and chips, the "Round The Twist" Lighthouse, the 12 Apostles (rocks in the sea - currently there are only 9 left standing), the Grampians (a mountain range) and a climb up Mount Hollow. One lunchtime, Jen asked if we'd like to play in the maze of the park we were eating lunch in. We agreed and then I saw a zipwire. Lunch was forgotten as we ran and zip'd back and forth along the wire. Brill!

This is just a quick summary of what happened; I'll update further when I have a bit more internettle time :)

So Long Sunshine, Hello Victoria

I arrived in Melbourne a few weeks ago... I'm not sure when to be precise, but a while back or thereabouts. I flew down on Virgin Blue and arrived at the YHA Melbourne Central hostel. The surly woman behind the counter seemed to disapprove of me, yet the hostel was friendly enough.

I befriended a group of cool Canadians and hung around with them for the two or three weeks I was in Melbourne. It mostly involved lazing around, walking through the city, mooching on the free Yarra Tram and Melbourne tourist shuttle, shopping in the Victoria Markets and drinking. Stacie had a birthday, so we went to Wagamamas*!!!

I also met up with a British girl I met in Hervey Bay who was traveling south at the time and ended up in Melbourne. Her, her friend and I also mooched around and lived the dream; we even went to an AFL game at the MCG.

Laura, Kate, Dan and I were walking along the north bank of the Yarra when we fell upon a reel of fishing wire. Dan followed the wire into the water, started pulling and discovered an eel on the end of it! To cries of "Throw the damn thing back! Don't touch it", he tried to unhook it. The eel wasn't so helpful and covered his hands and coat in eel slime. Eww!

The people in my dorm were somewhat weird; a bloke from the WA mines (Rio-Tinto or BHP Biliton) and a bloke who was making podcasts of weird people; he showed me a picture of a girl who was having a "scar tattoo" - ouch! They were both Olympic-standard snorers :(

Melbourne definitely has a Cafe Culture. You can't walk down a street without navigating through bustling cafes bursting onto the pavement.

For my final day, we went to a coffee shop that was recommended to me by my ex project manager friend from Seven. It turned out to be a long way from the centre, but it was filled with caek and very good cwoffee, so we didn't mind that much! :D


*The staff at Wagamama QV Melbourne were useless; they didn't know about the 250Points = Free Wagamama T-Shirt, and the night manager had to be told by another member of staff that Sydney was in Australia! The food was good, so if you find yourself in Melbourne, check it out, but make sure you don't ask them any er tricky geographical questions :P

Road Trip from Cairns to Cape Tribulation

Back in Magnetic Island, I bumped into a girl called Tanja; it turned out we both wanted to travel up to the Daintree and Cape Tribulation. I left Magnetic Island shortly after, then she caught up with me in Cairns. We rented ourselves a Wicked Van.

We picked up our van from somewhere in North Cairns. We hadn't pre-booked one, but they found a van for us* and we drove happily (if tentatively) back into Cairns city centre to pick up our bags from the hostel. We stocked up the van with food and water from Bi-Lo, then drove off northwards. First stop, petrol. Could we find the petrol cap? Eventually. Once we had, could we find the release lever? We had to ask a couple in a HippyCamper(tm) van. :)

Once filled up, we drove north along the Cook Highway to Port Douglas, stopping half way at a lookout over the Pacific ocean. A guy was flying his R/C glider as a couple of other people watched the waves crash onto the shore.

Tanja drove from the lookout up to Port Douglas; She's a very good driver, but could well be more used to Autobahns than windy roads :D We arrived in Port Douglas at around 4pm, just as the Tourist Information bureau was shutting up shop. We were directed to "Dougies" Campsite and Hostel, which turned out to be a great place to stay. It even had a huge picture of a monkey sitting on a deckchair with a cocktail and a hat... Amazing!

It turned out that Tanja is a teacher of sports and technology (including cooking). I hadn't eaten so well from a hostel kitchen for a long time! Yum!

I was a bit apprehensive about the van; the floor was hard and the matrices were thin, but it turned out to be quite comfortable. Plus, with the window open, you could fall asleep to the sounds of the birds and animals outside.

From Dougies, we drove north again to Mosman Gorge (see photos). As we drove up there, we saw an aboriginal walking with no shoes along the lonely stretch of road we had been driving down for some time. We suspected he was paid to walk up and down it, to give a sense of authenticity to the tourists :P.

Mosman Gorge was a wonderful sight; a circular walk through the rainforest with swimming holes and a swing bridge. We took photos of each other sitting on rocks in a river; I found a good one to sit on, but couldn't get back - the rock was slippery and the water very fast flowing. After a good ten minutes of scrambling around from rock to rock, I eventually made it back to dry land and we walked back to the van for lunch. We sat on deckchairs behind our van eating sandwiches and watching the tourists drive past.

Continuing northwards, we drove along a dirt road to "Koalas" campsite, located by a river and on the sea. (Crocs?) We found a metal spike in the ground and wondered what it was for... it turns out it's used to open the coconuts that fall throughout the campsite. This was the first night we could see the stars as they were meant to be seen. Hundreds of thousands of them; the milky way; it was breathtaking. In addition to stars, we saw many cain toads too. No, we didn't play the national sport of Toad Hockey; we'll leave that to the locals.

There were some professional Aussie campers in Koalas. They had BBQs, Awnings, and seemed to be living in a hastily constructed Tentopolis! That night, I panicked as to whether we could drive the van so far north, but after checking the agreement it turned out to be fine.

The next day, we drove do the Daintree River ferry. Before crossing, we bought tickets to a Daintree river cruise and the Daintree Discovery Centre (a skywalk & tower tour). Crossing the river, we saw "Danger Crocodiles" signs (as we were to see for almost every river we crossed on our way up).

We stopped at the Daintree Discovery Centre and spent the rest of the morning exploring the different levels of the forest. We had hoped to see a cassowary, but they must have been hiding that day! The "Interactive Interpretive Exhibition" consisted of some forest fruit, a plastic cassowary and some hilariously bad 1980s stop-motion animated videos of the evolution of Australian wildlife. After a coffee in the cafe, we drove a short way to the Janga(?) boardwalk to have a picnic.

After lunch, we drove further northwards and stopped at the Daintree Ice Cream Company, nestled in an orchard containing all the fruits they use for their ice creams. I had a frozen mango juice and Tanja had the ice cream, which she confirmed was good.

Continuing our journey, we arrived in Cape Tribulation. Being a bit nervous of driving on dirt roads (by this point, we had seen that our rental agreement prohibited driving on unsealed roads), we tried a campsite on the sealed road into Cape Tribulation. This turned out to be deserted, so we took our chances and drove down the dirt road (er, I mean "long driveway") to "Cape Tribulation Campsite", which also a couple of metres from the beach. The guy at reception said that his campsite had the best rainwater in Australia; the prevailing wind blew from the ocean and the nearest landmass was South America. This was handy, as the rainwater from the roof of the kitchen was also the drinking water (goodness knows where the water from the non-drinking water taps came from!).

We spent two nights in Cape Tribulation, mostly lazing around and enjoying the fresh air, beach, boardwalks and bottleshop. :D We walked around a large circular boardwalk and also tried to walk along a forest path. Alas it was rather othergrown; to the point that we walked past the entrance twice. The first time we walked up the road to find it, it felt as if we'd walked half way to Cooktown!

After our two nights, we drove back down, crossed the Daintree River on the cable ferry and took the river cruse from Daintree Village. We could barely understand the chap giving the tour, but he had eagle-like eyes for spotting crocodiles and tree snakes.

We then drove back down to Dougies, spending the night relaxing and drinking; We had a bit of drink to finish off, as we had hoped to take part in the free sailing at the Port Douglas Yacht Club, but arrived too late and were too far down the list. We didn't mind, as it was a good place to sit and watch the sunset. As way of thank you to the yachtsman, we had bought beer, which we had to take back to the campsite and drink ourselves... what a shame! :D :D :D

The next day, we drove back to Cairns, said goodbye to our van and returned to the YHA Hostel, our adventure at an end.

This has definitely been the best five days of my trip so far. Wonderful stuff!



* The Beetles, see photos in the usual place.

Cairns

I've arrived at the top of the Dog track! Cairns is a welcome change from the smaller towns (read villages/hamlets) that I've stayed in since leaving Brisy. They even have a small Myer - the Australian equivalent to John Lewis :D

The Dog was on time and schedule, unlike at Airlie beach, where we had to wait 4.5hrs... in the unrelenting heat of that afternoon we really got to know that bus shelter; and each other!

Whilst at Magnetic Island, I was befriended by another stray dog (why do the come to me? :/). I called the number on its collar; the chap at the other end of the line said he was stuck on the mainland and didn't know who else could look for it. Thankfully, a bloke turned up in a ute, asked if I was ok and said he'd take the dog to the local plant nursery (?!). Given that I couldn't do much with said dog, I agreed and called the owner back to inform him. The bloke picked up the beast, hoss'd him onto the flat bed of his ute and drove off; the dog just stood on the back, staring at the world as it went past in a way that only a dog could - CraZy!

The hostel in Cairns (another YHA) is friendly and clean. Alas the reception staff are somewhat ineffectual. I've played pool (and won on a technicality - my opponent potted the black. I myself potted the chalk, which was rather embarrassing). I even got to play with the new Canon 450D digital SLR... mmmm shiny... mmmm quick!

Tomorrow I go on an "Outer Reef Cruise", where we can snorkel and hopefully continue to loaf! (a 6:45am start will preclude this at first).


A Quick Book Review

Flat Earth News (Nick Davies) - Very good: give it a read!
Contest (Matthew Reilly) - Rubbish: don't!

Onwards and Upwards

Today I take the Dog to Cairns. Will report further on this northward progression once I arrive :)