Down Under Walkabout: April 2006

Arrived in Auckland

I made it to New Zealand despite a lot of questions at customs because I didn't have a copy of my return flight with me. As we were flying in, the landscape was really amazing. The mountains looked so green and lush. I can't wait to get out and see the country-side. Auckland seems nice, though I've only seen it at night.

On the trip through the Grampians, we ran into an obstacle. A tree was blocking the road and there was no alternate route. Well there was one, but it would have added an hour and a half to our day preventing us from climbing the mountain we were headed to. So can you believe that this group of people actually moved this tree that was still connected to it's trunk in the ground? It took a lot of effort, but we were able to get it out of the way just enough to drive through.

ANZAC day and Aussie Slang

Yesterday was ANZAC Day (Australian & New Zealand Army Corps). ANZAC was the name given to the soliders of World War I. Since the war, the two countries have denoted one day to the memory and gratitude for all soldiers as well as national pride, much like Memorial Day back home. I went to the ANZAC march (parade) for a while. It was full of bagpipes, marching bands, and veterans. It was really long and somewhat somber, so I didn't stay the whole time.

On a different note, there is a lot of slang down under that I thought might be interesting for everyone back home. This is a list that only has a few of the words I have had to incorporate into my vocabulary.

Oz-Australia
Aussie-Australian
Yanks- all Americans, even those in the South
Kiwi- New Zealanders
mobile (pronuced mo-byle)- cell phone
queue- line
breakie- breakfast
mum- mom
mate- friend, also used to address strangers
g'day- typical greeting, good day
how you going?- how's it going?
you alright?- can i help you?
good on ya- good job
chips- fries
crisps- chips
footy- Australian Rules Football
thongs- flip flops
reli- relative
youse- y'all
no worries- it's ok, no problem , you're welcome (i think it is the motto of oz)
she'll be right- it's ok
arvo- afternoon
entre- appetizer
main- entre
tea- evening meal (they also have morning and afternoon tea which includes tea and biscuits)
biscuits- cookies
bloake- man, dude
barbie- barbeque, or anything on the grill
bushwalking- hiking
heaps- lots
picie- picture
Hungry Jacks- Burger King

There are tons more, but I can't remember them all right now.

Grampians to Adelaide

After the Great Ocean Road, we entered the Grampians National Park. Much of the forests in this park were burned (almost half) in the bush fires of January. Most of the trees seem to be recovering though they're trunks are black. Our first stop was a hike down to McKenzie Falls which was a really nice waterfall. The next day including a hike up Mount Hollow which provided some really nice views. It was 190 meters to the top and there were tons of rocky walls to climb and caves to explore. We cooked on the barbie for lunch and played a little footy (Australian Rules Football). It was good fun though I jammed my finger. I arrived in Adelaide that evening and am here now. I took a tour around the Barossa Valley which is full of grape vineyards. And I ate kangaroo!

Great Ocean Road

I have just finished travelling from Melbourne to Adelaide (see map). Part of the journey included travelling along the Great Ocean Road. This road was built as a memorial to the Victorians (those from the state of Victoria) who died in WWI. They completed the road in 1919 and it is full of breath-taking views along the coast. Some of the road is extremely windy and steep which is why Mercedes Benz chooses to film some commercials there. Along the road, we stopped at Torque which is home to Ripcurl (these guys invented wet-suits) and Quicksilver (they invented board shorts aka boardies). Just out of Torque we saw several koala bears along the road. We were able to stop and get some cool pictures. Did you know those animals sleep about 19 hours/day?? The best part of the road is the 12 Apostles (see pic). These "apostles" used to be part of the actual land, but as the water pushed itself along the land, the land began to erode away leaving columns of land in the middle of the water. This process is still happening. Near the apostles is London Bridge, which is a smilar land formation but is more like a bridge than an apostle connecting the mainland with another piece of land. In 1990 the bridge of land actually collapesed into the ocean leaving a couple stranded on the new island of land. About 4 hours later a helicopter came to rescue them, but not before the media came out and put together the romantic story of the couple stuck on the island. Unfortunately, after the romantic story came out, it was discovered that the man had a wife back in Sydney...

Melbourne

Melbourne is a pretty cool city that seems to be quite competitive with Sydney. There are lots of little alley-ways full of cafe's and shops where you least expect it. I was able to go visit the site of the Australian Open, but not for long before it started pouring down rain on me out of nowhere. Next door is the MCG and other stadiums that were used for the Commonwealth Games that just finished up. (Those are the games that all the nations who are part of the British Commonwealth participate in, similar to the olympics).
I was able to go to an Australian Rules Football game, aka footy game. It is similar to rugby. It was pretty entertaining and exciting. After a few minutes, it was pretty easy to catch on to the rules.
The Comedy Festival is going on for the next few weeks. I have gone to three shows. They were entertaining, but nothing spectacular. They all had a lot of Australian humor which I either didn't pick up on or didn't find funny. It's still cool to see.

Few more pictures

Fraser Island

Click to enlarge pictures.. Fraser Island group

Ah, the grehound. My main mode of transportation along the east coast including a few over-nighters.

Magnetic Island

Carlo Sandblow at Rainbow Beach

New Pictures: Coffs Harbour & Byron

Awesome sunrise at Byron Bay from Australia's most eastern point. ( You can click on any photo on this site to make it larger)

Ben and I had to stop from our bike ride to take a picture of this awesome sunset at Coff's Harbour

The marina at Coff's Harbour. I think I heard the OC music playing...

Down to Melbourne

I flew from Cairns to Melbourne yesterday. It is about a 3.5 hour flight. It was really cool as we took of from Cairns. As soon as we made it through the clouds you could look down and see the ocean dotted with islands everywhere, all of which were covered in green and surrounded by sandy beaches. After a bit of flying, everything below was red or brown and extremely flat. The landscape was like this for most of the way as we flew over the outback. Just as we began to get close to Melbourne, things started to turn green again. Melbourne is on the southern coast of the continent. When I got off the plane and walked through the airport, I noticed everyone was wearing coats, so when I walked outside I wasn't surpised to feel the cool weather. With the wind, it is pretty cold. This weather is a huge change from what I have been used to the last several months. I actually have to wear shoes instead of flip flops. Melbourne is really into footy (Australian Rules Football). It is kind of like rugby. I'm hoping to go see a game while I'm here.

Cairns

Well I have made it to Cairns. This was the last stop on my bus route as I have been travelling up the east coast from Sydney. It's pretty hot and humid here. I am going to Melbourne from here. The internet is about to shut off, so I can't write anymore..

Sailing the Whitsunday Islands and Great Barrier Reef

Sailing the Whitsunday Islands was pretty darn cool. The boat I was on was called the Boomerang; it's an 83 foot maxi ocean racing yacht. It has raced around the world and won first place in the world maxi series race. Aside from being 83' long, it is 20' wide with a mast xtending 100' fet above deck. It houses 26 guests and 4 crew, but that's pretty crowded.

We set sail from Airlie Beach (see the map). Our first stop was Macona Inlet which is on Hook Island. We anchored and slept there. The next day we sailed to Tongue Bay where we hiked to a lookout to view Whitehaven Beach (some travel shows call this the world's most beautiful beach). Then we hiked down for a swim, but not without our stinger suits to protect us from the box-jelly fish. These little creatures will cause an adult to stop breathing in hardly any time. If bitten, you must be immediately airflifted to a hospital and pray. After our swim, we sailed to Cateran Bay Border Island(not shown on map) for a snorkel along the Great Barrier Reef. The snorkel was amazing! I saw so many different fish (see list below) and lots of coral. It was as if you were living in another world for a little while. The amount of colors I saw on the fish and coral was more than I expected and really higlighted by the sun shining through the water. After th snorkl we sailed to Refuge Core Nara Inlet to sleep,but not without some rain on the way. No worries mates, the rain doesn't hurt. Our final stop was Raven's Core for another great snorkel and then back to Airlie Beach.

The crew let us partipate some while sailing. I was able to help pull the ropes as well as turn the grinders while raising the sails.

The fish I saw include stipred coral fish, fox faced raabit fish, red emperor, drummer, moorish idol, and tusk fish. I saw more but I wasn't able to find them all on the chart I found. The fish would swim right infront of you as if you weren't even there. You could hear them eating the coral when you got nearby.

One night after dinner on the boat, we were all on deck looking at the stars and out of nowhere came pieces of a meteor! I didn't know what it was at first; it looked like fireworks. Following it were many shooting stars. And when you looked in the water, you could see what looked like lighting bugs on top of the water. Apparently it was some type of ameboa that would light up as a defensive mechanism. If you threw some water down on them, they would light up even more.