Pics

Here are a few pics of my trip that I didn't get a chance to post while on the road. I just skimmed through and picked a few, total pics for the entire trip = 1140.

Whitehaven Beach in the Whitsundays

Starfish near Cairns

Hiking through the Olga's
















An Aussie Meat Pie (the works) sorry I can't figure out how to rotate it on the blog




















Some of the 12 Apostles

Loch Ard Gorge along the Great Ocean Road

Koala next to the side of the Great Ocean Road

My first Footy Game

First Kangaroo encounter in Perth

Australia`s most famous Beach: Bondi

Sydney from the Harbour Bridge

Surfing

Home At Last!!!

I made it home today after a loooong day of sitting on planes. I caught the train to the Sydney airport and was not very optimistic I would get on but figured that I should really try. There were 9 other standby people waiting for their names to be called and 8 of them got seats about 45 mins before the flight and I had a feeling that was it and started to get ready to head back into town. The lady at the counter told me to wait around a few more minutes since there were 2 more passengers booked on the flight who hadn't checked in and if they didn't show up I would have a seat. With only 25 minutest left to the flights departure I was handed a seat in the very back of the plane and am still in awe that it all worked out. I made the typical mad dash to the gate and settled in to my seat for a 14 hour flight that was full of movies and an attempted sleep. I got in to Vancouver 3 hours before my flight left Sydney (see if you can figure that one out!!) only to find out they had lost one of my bags and had to go through the baggage help centre to track it down. When all the paperwork was done I made my way to the Toronto flight and got the 2nd last seat on the flight, it actually turned out to be a very successful flying day for me. Im now at home and am running on only about 3 hours sleep in the past 24 hours so I'm slowly fading. Thanks for following my blog for the past few weeks, I hope you had a taste of what I've been through and maybe are considering doing Australia yourself. I'll post a bunch of pics tomorrow now that I have the time and tools to do it properly, they say a picture's worth a 1000 words so you can see for yourself tomorrow.

Surfing

I have discovered my new favourite hobby-regardless of how often I'll get to it-surfing is absolutely awesome. I got up early and went to the pick-up point for the Surf's Up surf school and met Doug who was also waiting to be picked up and after a bit of a wait our instructor Dean pulled up in beat up Truck. Turns out the winter season is not a popular time for people learning to surf and it was just Doug and I giving it a go today. We drove to one beach and had to check the surf since every day is different based on the current, temp and winds it can bring in an array of surfing waves. The beach was a bit too sheltered for the wind today so we moved on to another one just up the road and it turned out to be perfect. The waves were about a metre high and were just right for us since neither of us had surfed beforehand and after a few minutes of dryland training we hit the water. I was surprised as on my 3rd go I got to a standing position on the board (only for a second or 2 mind you) and was instantly hooked. We spent a couple of hours in the morning getting as many waves as we could and then had a bbq on the beach only to get back out for another couple hours on the surf. There's something exhilarating about catching a good wave and getting up, a sense of accomplishment, like you've conquered something that the ocean's just thrown at you. I loved every minute of it but by the end of the day my legs were exhausted. The steadiness of controlling your board and standing up quickly was surprising hard and by the end of our 2nd session I was definitely ready to head back into town. I can't wait till the next time I'll get to go surfing, and don't know where it'll be but am already looking forward to it. For anyone who hasn't tried it, definitely do it if you have the chance but get lessons since I had no clue what to do and having an instructor nearby to give feedback makes a huuuuge difference.
Tonight I have the unfortunate task of packing up my things in hopes of getting back to Canada tomorrow. For anyone who doesn't understand how my Air Canada passes work, I fly standby so only get a seat if there's room available on the plane and am given a seat based on my seniority on the standby list-in tomorrow's case it's quite low. The numbers are not looking good so there's a chance I'll be back in Sydney for another night (or 2 or 3.....) but tomorrow I'm heading to the airport with an optimistic attitude. Please pray!!
I've had a blast here in Australia and am so glad I did the trip even though I was a little overwhelmed at the beginning. If I get the chance again in the future I'll definitely be back with a better perspective on what to do and what not to.

Sydney

It's been a few days since my last post, sorry for not keeping up. On Monday I spent my last morning in Perth before heading to the airport for my flight to Sydney. I used the public transportation and it took me quite a bit longer than I had planned and cut it real close to not making my scheduled flight time. Fortunately it was delayed a half hour so I was saved from having to solve a serious problem. I got into Sydney quite late, around 9:30 and took the train into the city where I found that the east coast is significantly more humid than the west coast. In Perth it was hot in the sun but as soon as you hit the shade you cooled right down whereas in Sydney if it was hot, it was hot, regardless of where you standing. Every time I go to get a clean shirt from my bag it feels damp from the humidity, but I can't complain since I'm loving it here.
Yesterday when I got up the forecast said it was going to be the warmest day of the week so I decided it was a great day to check out Sydney's most popular beach: Bondi. Took the train to the station closest to the beach and was told by a lady in a nearby hostel that the beach was just 20 mins up "that" road as she pointed up the neighbouring street. So I walked, and I walked, and I walked, and walked until 45 mins later I figured maybe a accidentally took a turn somewhere and stopped in at a convenience store for directions. It turns out the first lady I asked had sent me in the complet opposite direction..... I'm sure you can imagine how upset I was and ended up taking a bus since I was not in the most patient mood to now walk another hour or so to get to the ocean. When I finally did get to Bondi Beach (pronouned bon-die as I was frequently corrected) it was a bit smaller than I expected but one of the nicest beaches I've been to. It was pretty busy for their winter season and I found a spot to read for a couple hours and doze off thankfully with plenty of sunscreen on. I was able to catch another sunset but noticed that there was alot of smog or smoke nearby and it smelled a bit smokey, but didn't really think too much of it. Later back in my room when I was watching the news I found out it was in fact smoke from controlled burning of forests on the outskirts of the city which they do frequently here along with Perth. I had another Australian meat pie again last night but this time from Harrys Cafe de wheels, apparently a landmark in the city. It looks like a chip truck and they serve all sorts of meat pies and I got the tiger pie, which is not made of tiger like I'm sure your thinking but is a steak pie with mashed potatoes, peas and gravy slathered ontop. Soooooo good and as was checking out some old pictures on the side of the the truck I noticed that there were quite a few pictures of celebrities eating pies from Harry's. Most were older actors/actresses but I thought it was hilarious that there were about 3 or 4 pictures of Pamella Anderson eating a pie, an advertising scheme I guess???
Today I basically toured around the city and saw the infamous Sydney Opera House which really is so differenty from any other building I've seen. I walked over Sydney's Harbour Bridge only to find there really isn't much on the other side of the harbour other than houses and apartments. Next I checked out the Rocks which is the neighbourhood still standing from when the Europeans settled in Australia and is now a huge shopping district. I went into a souveneir store and was amazed at how pushy the store owner was, coming up to me every time I picked something up to show me what it was and how it worked (in the case of the boomerang I humoured him and listened to his description of throwing it and having it return). Making my way through downtown I made it to the Sydney Tower (basically their version of the CN Tower but not as tall) and got there just in time to catch a few minutes of sun and get a 360 view of the city at 250 metres up. When I got back to the bottom little did I realize that an OzTrek Movie showing was included in the price which turned out to be a cheesy movie about Sydney's history while sittin in moving seats-which I have to admit was kinda fun. I walked around the downtown core a bit more and saw what i could in dark of night before getting back to my hotel.
Tomorrow I'm getting picked up early and heading to a beach somewhere outside the city for a full day of surfing lessons. I'm super psyched and am hoping that 1 day is enough time for me to figure out how to get up properly.

Western Australia

This morning Janice and I headed down to Freemantle to spend the morning in the neighbouring city that is right on the ocean. It is very much a tourist town and is full of small cafe's, restaurants and we were lucky to be there on the weekend to hunt through the weekly market that has anything you could ever need. I continued my souveneir shopping and got a cool instrument that is local to the Aboriginals (can't give too much more info since someone is going to be recieving it soon).

Next we headed up the coast and stopped at a beach for lunch where it got quite windy and in turn lots of kitesurfers took to the ocean for a great show. We were watching a couple guys on the beach who were trying backflips, it was hilarious since a few times they landed facefirst and got a mouthful of sand. Not too sure why they chose to try flips on the beach where everyone could see them make fools of themselves?!?!?

From there we drove to AQWA (Aquarium of Western Australia) and got to see local marine life in a really cool environment. The highlight of the aquarium was a massive tank full of sharks, manta rays, sea turtles and other fish where a semi circular pane of glass looped in a circle and you literally walked underneath the water. Partway through, a group of people went scuba diving in the tank and were able to get close enough to pet the sharks, a mother's day treat that I'm sure not many mothers would look forward to.

After lunch we drove up to Yanchep National Park where we walked through a Koala enclosure to find most of them sleeping and one shy one hiding on the other side of a bush. From there we drove to a golf course in the park where I got to see Australia's claim to fame: Kangaroos. They really are a neat animal and we got within feet of them before they would bound off to find new grass to eat. Quite a few of them had babies in their pouches but it was too cold in the evening for them to pop their heads out. It was definitely a highlight of my trip so far and was amazed of how quick they were, easily able to outrun me.

Tonight we got some vintage fish n chips and the got an order of shark instead of the usual fish which was soooo good. I've had such a great stay with Janice and am sad to leave but will be returning to Sydney tomorrow for my last stint in Australia. I'm heading back home at the end of the week and will have a few days to tour around Australias most popular city and am hoping to get signed up for surfing lessons.

Around Perth

Today I was glad to be back in some warm weather, it seems like the south coast has much colder weather this time of year in comparison to the rest of the country. I was able to bust out the shorts and flip flops again which I wasn't able to do in Melbourne.

I started the day off by going for a run through King's Park which is the biggest one I've been to yet and it has a great view of the city with a path that runs along the edge of a steep slope. The skyline is amazing and is set next to Swan River which winds out to the ocean. After a quick breakfast Janice and I drove out to a couple of beaches in the area and went for a short walk. Cottesloe was the first one and apparently the most visited by people and at one end of the beach some people were giving surfing a try. It was interesting to see how sparse the beaches were with people since they are technically getting into their winter season and it's cold for the locals. From there we headed to the Subiaco Oval arena where the local West Coast Eagles played in an Aussie Football game against Hawthorne. It was such a different sport to watch especially with an oval shaped field and the number of players on the field. The Eagles ended up winning and it was definitely one of the favourite parts of my trip so far, a stadium full of 40 000 cheering fans is so fun to be a part of.

After the game we headed to King's Park where a couple of weddings were taking place and it really is the perfect setting. From there we toured through the local Perth University and are now back at Janice's place for dinner again. It is great getting toured around from someone living here since they know the ins and outs of what do/what not to do.

Tomorrow we're heading up the coast to some other beaches and apparently I'm going to be seeing some Kangaroos which I'm looking forward to. I figure I can't leave Australia without seeing some roo's.

Great Ocean Road

It has been a busy but amazing few days recently, I apologize for not posting in a while.

While in Melbourne at the hostel I met a few neat people, one of them being Brechd, a Belgium guy my age who was awaiting confirmation for his internship. I told him about me driving the Great Ocean Road later in the week and invited him along, and after a few emails and phone calls he said he could join. We took the shuttle bus out to the airport and I got the keys to my Hyundai Getz, a tiny car that had great mileage but no pickup when I put the pedal to the floor. We took off westward and after a few wrong turns made it onto the tourist route of the Great Ocean Road. It turned out to be great since it was quite a long drive to Port Campbell where we stayed Wednesday night. The drive was absolutely amazing on Wednesday as we were right along the edge of the coast and at times literally on the edge of a 100 foot drop to the ocean below. At one point there was a 20 minute stop where construction crews were working ahead and a worker came around to each car letting us know they were moving "rocks off the road that had fallen from the cliffs above"...... We drove by these rocks that to me looked more like boulders, some a few feet in diameter. We got to Port Campbell just as it was getting dark and walked around the town which turned out to be a few small motels, restaurants and gas station. Very much a tourist town.

Yesterday we drove to a site nearby; the Loch Ard Gorge, a small inlet where the ship Loch Ard crashed back in the late 1800's and only 2 people survived. I'm not quite sure why it was named what it was since a whole slew of other shipwrecks occured in the same region, but nonetheless it was a neat inlet that gave way to a great beach that was accessible from a set of stairs at the top of the steep cliff. A short hike in the area brought us to a blowhole that was created from the ocean eroding an underground tavern that led to a spot inland that caved in and was basically a plunging hole in the ground. A couple other beaches along the way were quite neat but definitely not swimmable based on the size of the waves and the rocky shore.

Our next stop was at the 12 apostles lookout, a point in the coast where you can see freestanding rock structures that have formed from the erosion of the sea waters. Some have toppled over from the ongoing wear and tear but a few are left standing and make for a picturesque scene with cliffs and and endless ocean in the background.

In the afternoon we drove to Cape Otway Park where the oldest lighthouse in Australia is located and toured around the area which included the telegraph station turned schoolhouse and WWII lookout bunker. The drive in to the Lighthouse was neat since we stopped to see what other cars at the side of the road were looking at and found Koala's nestled in the Eucalyptus tree's beside the road eating their leaves or just sleeping in the branches. They're such a funny animal because they have a soft, goofy look to them and were very photogenic when we all started snapping pictures. As we drove back to Port Campbell we raced against the clock and made it back just in time to see the sunset over horizon and another clear evening.

This morning we got on the road quite early to get the car back in time to the airport but the guy working at our hostel overestimated our travel time by about an hour so I had a long waiting time at the Melbourne airport before my flight to Perth. After a 4 hour flight I arrived in Perth and was welcomed by a friend of a friend, Janice who has been nothing short of an amazing host giving me an evening tour of the city and cooking me (something I have truly missed) a homecooked meal. She lives in the suburbs right next to Perth and are going to tour around the ciy and the coastal beaches for the next couple days and see the Aussie Football game I have long awaited tomorrow afternoon. It is great here in Perth since I am back in warm weather where Melbourne and the Great Ocean road was very cold both day and night.

Photos……finally

South Melbourne

Today was a touristy city day as I basically covered the southern half of Melbourne as best I could in the beautiful weather. The wayMelbourne works is that the main downtown core is located just north of Yarra River and so I crossed over to the other side of the river today and saw all the major sights. The main thing I saw was the Olympic village from the 1956 games. They've definitely redone most of the buildings but it still very much has the sports feel to it and it's interesting beacuse they've added a couple more massive sporting venues next door so there basically is a huges sports area of the city where the Olympic village was. About 4 main arenas are next to each other and the Australian Open is played in one of them when it is in full swing.

I was also able to go through the Royal Botanical Gardens which had some interesting parts to it and was a mix of plants from all around the world. They had a few neat ponds and I got to visit another "Long Island" which was situated in the biggest pond in the park.

The rest of the day was just wandering around and at the end of the day I got to catch some live Jazz since the annual Jazz festival is in town this week and they have performances each night in the main Federation square. The square is set up brilliantly with a slight incline and they set a stage up at the bottom so whenever large events are in town people just have a seat in the square and it's converted into a mini ampitheatre.... sort of. I then finally got around to trying the Australian specialty of meat pies tonight. I wasn't quite sure what was "Australian" food until recently when I kept seeing meat pies sold everywhere, they're basically a flaky crust with steak filling and I got the works ontop of it which was a lump of mashed potatoes and mashed peas with gravy poured overtop. Absolutely amazing!!!! Another food I've gotten a little too attatched to down here are Tim Tam's which are little chocoalate wafers with icing in the middle and then coated with milk chocolate. In Airlie Beach especially everyone was eating them and I got a pack yesterday and made the mistake of finishing a whole pack by the evening in which case I wasn't feeling too special this morning.

Tomorrow I'm hitting up the Northern part of Melbourne and then Wednesday I get my car to do the Great Ocean Drive, getting super excited for that!

Saint Kildas

This morning I got up early and went for a run along the river here in Melbourne and found out very quickly that rowing is a big sport here. I must have passed 60 or so rowing skulls with anywhere from 1 to 8 people in them, most of them cruising along casually but a few obviously training for some sort of competition. There is a boat club 2 blocks from the hostel I'm staying in and they were constantly loading or unloading boats onto the racks when I passed both times. The sun slowly came up and it looked like it was going to be a gorgeous day but within the hour it clouded over and has stayed like that all day.

I took the tram (their word for streetcar) to St. Kilda's, a small beach hotspot about 30 mins away and spent the majority of the day there. It worked out perfectly because on Sundays they have their weekly market booths set up along the main drag so I got to see some neat local artifacts and carvings. I was amazed at some of the things people can make with their own two hands, but unfortunately most of them were much to large to take along with me. I then headed to their botanical gardens which turned out to be nothing special and moved on to the beach which was absurdly cold with the clouds and heavy winds. I decided to go with flipflops and shorts today and regretted it pretty quickly when I got off the tram. Reading up about St. Kilda's before going I had heard they were famous for their cake shops and realize why. A string of about 8 or 9 bakeries lined the Promenade beach street and had cakes that would entice anyone around, I settled on 2 different ones but could have easily kept going....

I am back at the hostel now and am going to cook up dinner and head out to the main square (can't remember its name) where I went last night before heading to bed. They have a massive jumbotron set up on one of the sides of the buildings where they had an Australian Football League game playing. It was awesome, a huge crowd turned up and it got very vocal to the point of a near-fight. Definitely going to check it out again, I'm slowly learning the rules of the game and am supposed to see a game live in Perth when I head there this weekend.

The next 2 days I'll just be touring around the downtown core and hope to see as much as possible.

Ayers Rock

The last couple days have been absolutely amazing and VERY hot!!! I flew in to Ayers Rock on Thursday Morning, dropped my bags in storage at the hostel and headed to the landmark Uluru (or Ayers Rock for the non-aborigines). Basically it is a massive rock, 9.4 km in circumference and 348 m high (taller than the Eiffel tower I learnd), and as the earths plates were settling way back the whole rock rotated 90 degrees so you can see the earths layers vertically all across it. The rock has both a base walk, around 10 km that tourists can do and there is also the "climb" which is a steep hike up the side of the rock to the highest point on it. There are signs everywhere telling people "Do not climb Uluru as it is a sacred ritual for the local Aboriginal men." Talking to our driver on the way in, he said alot of people, including himself but it is a very physically demanding hike so it is only really open to a select population of people. As we arrived at the base camp I was very unhappy to find the rock climb closed because of high winds but my driver said sometimes they re-open it later in the day if the wind's died down. I started off doing the base walk and quickly found out how brutal the flies can be in the Outback. They were everywhere and basically swarmed people that arrived, going for their face and ears. As bad as they were, I was determined to enjoy the walk and certainly did as the walk was full of stopping points with legends of how different features of the rock came to be. The entire walk took me about 2.5 hours and as I made my way back to the start I was thrilled to see that the climbing hike was re-opened. Let me tell you that this may have been the steepest hike I have ever done, and the first 1/3 of it had a chain handrail and some points had to have been very very close to an 80 degree incline!! After I reached the end of the chain handrail section I was clueless to the continuation of the trail and starting snapping pictures in celebration. The flies were equally bad at the top than they were at the bottom so I was ready to begin the trek down when I happened to notice some paint markings off to the side which showed me there was another long section of the trail that took you further up. Boy I woulda felt like a complete dummy not seeing that..... Anyways, the rest of the climb was an up and down climb but nowhere near the steepness of the first part and I was absolutely amazed at the view when I finally got to the top. This may be one of the most breathtaking things I have every seen in my life, the endless red sand, sparse vegetation and distant hills put every other care in life out the way for those few moments I was up there. To anyone who ever travels to Australia, you absolutely have to climb Ayers Rock if the opportunity arises.
I climbed back down the rock, and am still (2 days later) feeling it in my calves. At the bottom I had just enough time to head over to the Visitor's centre where I got the downlow of the whole story behind Uluru's mysterious legend and picked up a few locally made souveneirs. Then when I thought the day just couldn't get any better, our driver took us to a lookout for the infamous Uluru sunset where we experienced the sun setting behind us, casting eery shadows and putting on a crazy colour show of the entire Ayers Rock. During the day the rock is almost a yellow/orangy colour but as the sun set it turned to a deep orange, then dark red and finally a rusty brown, all within the timespan of about 15 minutes. We got taken back to Ayers Rock Resort which is a resort owned by one company and has 5 different hotels/campgrounds/hostels and is about 20 minutes from the Ayers Rock Resort. The hostel had about 30 beds but only 3 were filled during my stay and they had the best facilities of any places I've been to yet.

The next morning I was up at 5:30 and another shuttle picked me and 4 other people up to see the Golga's sunrise. The Golga's are the second part of the Uluru park which is comprised of about 60-70 big rocks (as tall as Uluru) and are about 45 minutes from the Ayers Rock resort. We got to the sunrise lookout and watched as the sun rose just next to Uluru and brought the Golga's to life with another neat array of colours. I apparently got trigger happy with my camera and took about 50 pictures from the lookout, but it was just so picturesque. Next we were taken to a hiking route in the Golga's and did the route in about 3 hours stopping a couple of times to see the landscape and scout out any Kangaroos. Apparently if you're there early in the morning (which we were) there is a very good chance fo seeing them but we had no luck that morning. The hike was almost equally as neat as Uluru but we had a strict departure time to work with so our time there was very limited.

Back at the resort I had the afternoon to catch up on some sleep and check out the local resort visitors centre with history on its construction and future designs. Whoever runs the place is a genius because they have the only rights in the area to build hotels so people have no choice but to stay at the Ayers Rock Resort, brilliant design scheme. On the flipside since only 1 person owns the place everything is overpriced and I didn't go on the internet there due to the $1/6 min rate which I thought was absurd. I met this guy who checked into the hostel earlier in the day and he told me all about his 18 month world trip which made my 3.5 week stay look so miniscul. One day I hope to do a longer trip like that, sounds like some crazy fun.

This morning I was on a 10:15 flight out of Ayers Rock and stopped over in the neighbouring city Alice Springs before getting to Melbourne around 3 pm. I checked into the Greenhouse Backpackers, a perfectly located place in the heart of Melbourne and headed over to the IceArena for a hockey game played by the local Melbourne Ice. Keith Seckington a friend, plays for their team and I was planning on catching their home opener tonight but as I got to the gates, they told me the game was sold out. You can't even imagine how bummed I was about it, I ended up walking just under an hour to get to the arena and then get locked out..... Not to be completely let down, I decided to tour around the dockside area nearby and was surprised to pass a Costco which I thought only existed in North America.

Tomorrow I head to St. Kilda, a small town to check out their beach and hunt through their weekly market for any neat souveneirs. The forecast calls for rain tomorrow but my fingers are crossed it will hold off until the evening. The internet is free here at the Greenhouse so I'll definitley be checking in regularly. All for now,

Cairns

I just got back from my day boat trip out to the Great Barrier Reef in Cairns and it was AMAZING!!!! Before I go on about that though, I'll backtrack to yesterday's interesting travels aboard the Tilt Train.

At 7:10 yesterday morning a shuttle bus picked me up in Airlie beach just down the road from the hostel I was staying at and took me out to the Proserpine train station for my trip up to Cairns. The day before I was scrambling to figure out a way to Proserpine since it's a 30 min drive from Airlie and ended up submitting a request for a shuttle with the details of my train departure the following day at 8:30. They replied back confirming my bus and telling me a pickup time of 7:10 which made me wonder how many stops we were doing on the way since that's kind of early for an 8:30 train. So how many stops did we make you ask..... Zero!!! My driver seemed to be on a mission as he sped the whole way and got me to the station at around 7:35. I wasn't exactly pleased when I found out that the Proserpine terminal is simply a small office with a concrete platform and small overhanging roof. Anyways, I waited, and waited, and waited and was wondering if the train was even going to show, until it showed up at 10:00 with a simple apology for "delays on the tracks". Well it turns out that delays are common on our route as we stopped 3 more times in random locations for about 30 minutes at a time and in turn didn't get to Cairns until very late last night. The scenery was neat at times but for the most part we just passed through farming fields or forests.

This morning was another early one as I had to be on our boat for 7:30 and had booked my hostel online not realizing its a good 20 minute walk from the harbour here in town. Our boat, the "Ocean Free," was a 3 level motor boat that took us straight out into the ocean and got us to our first snorkeling point in a random mooring site. The coral was unbelievable and the fish much bigger than those in the Whitsundays which made this trip a more visual pleasing underwater experience. We next hopped onto a neighbouring boat moored in the middle of nowhere which I found kind of funny, and went on a short ride in what turned out to be a glass-bottom boat. It was very similar to scuba diving, only we saw a lot more things in a shorter amount of time. My favourite on the boat tour was this massive clam that had to have been at least 3 feet wide, it almost looked fake when we first went overtop of it.

Next we hopped back onto the Ocean Free and went out to a caye, once again in the middle of nowhere and lounged around/snorkeled for another couple hours. The caye was really neat, basically a 50 ft x 50 ft white sand beach about 20 km away from shore which only appears when the tide is low in the afternoon. I got some cool pics but will have to find a computer where I can upload them, I have trouble finding computers that read memory cards here. I did my final snorkel of my trip and ended up finding a sea turtle sitting in a bed of coral, which it turns out noone else was able to find. The turtle was pretty deep and dove a few times to get pictures but the combo of strong current and deep, darker water made it hard to get good ones. After jumping back on the boat we went straight back to the harbour and reached the docks around 4:30. This gave me enough time to walk around Cairns, which is not as big a town as I thought it was but is picturesquely placed between a set of huge mountains and borders a river that runs inland. When I first realized that I had only planned a single full day here I was a little disappointed but now realize it worked out well since I've seen everything I wanted to and am ready to move on to other sights.

Tomorrow morning I have a very early flight to Ayers Rock and need to catch a 4:50 shuttle to the airport. This will be my 3rd early morning and I'm slowly starting to see my body catching up to the lack of sleep since it's hard to get yourself to bed early when you're in a country with so many things to see. Either way I'm excited for the next 2 days at Ayers rock since all the tour books I read made the point of claiming it to be a must-see on the list of places to visit in Australia. After my 2 days at the rock I head down to Melbourne for my longest stay in a single city and then I rent a car to drive the Great Ocean Road (the thing I've most been looking forward too). I've been keeping tabs on driving here since I'm going to be behind a wheel in a week and will need to adjust to the fact that they drive on the left side of the road. Should be interesting!!!!

No Pictures.....

I've had 2 computers crash on me in the last 15 minutes and this 3rd one keeps locking up whenever I put in my memory cards. Sorry, no pics today, I'll try again maybe when I get to Cairns tomorrow.

Whitsundays

Funny moment of the day: I just walked into this internet cafe right now and asked the lady working here where the closest washroom is, all I got was a confused look and "a what????" I apparently still have to figure out some lingo down here, they call it the "toilet" which I guess is the proper term....

The past two days have been amazing so say the least. On Saturday I woke up very upset because it was pouring out and I was supposed to be boarding our boat in the afternoon for the next 3 days. Apparently the weather out here mimicks that of Halifax in that it changes quicker than you can keep up with. By the time I had finished showering from my run, the sky was completely cleared and I'm sure the temp had reached 30.

I checked out of my hostel for the night and put my large backpack into storage since you're only allowed a small bag on the boat and wandered over to the neighbouring harbour where we were set to leave at 12:30. Since the time I arrived at Airlie Beach on Friday and the day we left on Saturday another 10 people signed up, bringing our total number to 25 people. A total of 4 crew were onboard with us and we set sail in a boat that I'm still trying to figure out what to call. It was a cross between a huge catamaran and a powerboat but most of the people referred to it as a sailboat.

Our first stop was near one of the Whitsunday Island lagoons where I had my first go at Scuba Diving!! They broke us up into groups and of course I was the only one in my group who had never dived before and every practice procedure we did in waist-deep water took me twice as long as everyone else. Once we finally got into deep water it really was an amazing experience, the combination of being completely weightless and surrounded by coral and fish was like nothing I've ever done. Dad had loaned me his new underwater camera (thanks dad!!) but I was reluctant to take it along since we went down to about 12 metres and it was only certified safe to 10 metres. Kind of a bummer, I was hoping to get some cool pics of the deep ocean.

That evening we sailed to another Island (I can't keep track of all their names) and anchored for the night after cooking up a huge BBQ dinner onboard which I never thought was possible with being limited to a boat. The food during the entire trip was amazing and they had a full kitchen where 1 of the crew spent the whole time cooking for us. After dinner they played a slideshow of all the day's pictures on a projector and afterwards showed us the movie Sharkwater to "calm us down" in case we encountered a shark in the upcoming days. It ended up being a completely clear evening and we got a neat view of the moon and stars, which were completely different to those we see in the Northern hemisphere.

The next day we sailed to Whitehaven Beach which has the finest sand in the world, 97% silica, and feels so different from any other beaches I've been to. The crew told us that due its pure properties, NASA would take the sand to help build its spacecrafts but after much debate the beach became a protected park preventing them from using the sand for any more projects. We arrived in the morning which is high tide and therefore most of the sand was submerged, but when we left 2 hours later, a section of the beach was above water for a good 500 metres. The coolest part was when we walked into the waters of the beach manta rays would swim around and didn't seem to mind us there.

In the afternoon we went to another lagoon for more diving and snorkeling and ended up seeing a turtle hanging out in the shallow waters. We could swim right up to it and come within inches but were obviously told not to touch it. I got a few neat pictures with my camera but realize now I'm on a computer that doesn't read memory cards, I'll upload some pics later today if I get a chance on another computer. The evening we spent watching another slideshow of the days pictures and everyone passed out pretty quickly from the heat and all the stuff we did that day.

Today we got up before the sun came up (which you can imagine not alot of people were happy about) and had our last snorkel which wasn't great because the water was really silty. After a quick breakfast, we set sail for the harbour and had complete sunshine the entire way back which was amazing as we all sprawled out on the main deck. I just checked into a different hostel for the night and am meeting up with everyone after since there is a traditional boating afterparty here in town.

I expected the majority of the boats passengers to be American but was amazed to find myslef the only North American!! One other guy claimed to Canadian but he has lived in South Africa his entire life and just recently moved to Vancouver in the past year. Everyone else were European and a few local Australians tagged along. Before boarding the boat on Saturday I felt a little out of place going on a 2 night cruise on my own but discovered that pretty much half the people were in the same boat (ha, get it!!) and were travelling around on their own too so I learned a few tips on where to go in Melbourne and Sydney.

I found it interesting on the boat that morning and afternoon tea were a regular meals and I was the only one that wasn't a regular tea drinker. I was also introduced to Vegimite, a spread you put on toast that's made from yeast. I was expecting something sweet but found it to be VERY salty and don't have clue why anyone would want to eat it.

Tomorrow I catch a bus early to the local train station and take a full day ride up to Cairns where I'll do a day trip to the outer reef for more snorkelling. I'm really hoping the weather holds up, but am not going to expect it too since it apparently has been raining non-stop there for the past 2 weeks......

I'll try to get on a different computer later on but if not then I'll upload some pics tomorrow.
All for now, Cheers (a new expression I've picked up that means everything from "hello" to "thanks" to "goodbye")

Airlie Beach

This morning I caught the shuttle bus again back to the airport for my flight to Hamilton Island, one of the 70ish islands that make up the Whitsunday Islands. Almost all of the islands used to be volcanoes at some point and have now grown into lush tropical islands that were amazing from the air and equally as impressive when we finally landed.

Getting off the plane (the only pic that turned out this morning...)

The Hamilton Island airport was extremely small and only services a handful of flights each day, and when looking for accomodations right on the island I was shocked at how expensive each place was. Large hotel companies have bought up shares of land and built either grand hotels or very ritzy cabins which I found started around 350 per night. On to plan B..... A ferry operates from the airport terminal and took us into a town called Airlie beach that has become very commercialized due to its proximity to the islands. The town is pretty much a main street with shops offering boat tours to the reef and islands, along with some surfwear stores with ridiculously priced clothing.

I checked into a place called Magnums backpackers and is pretty neat being situated a short walk away from the busy road in a rainforest style setting. The rest of the afternoon I spent on the small beach in town trying to get back into reading mode since its been a few years since I conquered a novel. The temperature was perfect-around 26-but the overcast skies didn't exactly make it beach weather which meant I was one of the few actually at the beach. I grabbed a dinner at a local bakery and am going to call it quits now at 7:00 pm (technically 5 am hometime). I thought I'd be able to make to at least 10 tonight but have no real desire to stay up since the town is sparse when it comes to sightseeing.

Tomorrow I'm booked on a 2 night island tour which begins in the afternoon and takes us to Whithaven beach on Whitsunday Island. When I was booking the tour, the lady at the desk told me that National Geographic ranked Whithaven as the best beack in the world so I'm expecting great things. The weather sounds like it might be cloudy again tomorrow so it kind of takes away from the beach effect but nonetheless there's snorkelling and island walks happening the following day. The two nights are spend on a boat that sleeps 25 and has everything from showers to a full kitchen, sounds interesting but I've heard some of the boats are far from clean, as long as the beds are ok, I'm fine.

After getting back from the tour on Monday, I get ready to catch an early morning train to Cairns on Tuesday and have only 1 day in the city before heading to the outback for 2 days at Ayers Rock. When I was booking the boat tour the same lady also told me the train I'm on doesn't run on the coast like I thought it did so I should be prepared for a long day of trees, trees and more trees. I wanted to at some point take a train through part of Australia and this seemed like the shortest and most reasonable option but hopefully I won't be regretting it.

My first post I was at a computer that didn't read memory cards so I couldn't upload any pics. I tried to upload multiple ones but it's taking too long so here's my cheesy pic of the day: me covering up half the Opera House with my head (didn't realize this until now).

Flights Flights And More Flights!!!!

So it's official I have now been to a completely different continent and love it. I landed this morning at 8:15 in Sydney and have had a few hours to tour around and see the basics of the city. It may sound all fine and dandy, but getting here was quite the process and it started 2 days ago.

I began my travels on Tuesday afternoon where I spent the morning at home doing last minute bookings and making sure I had everything I'd need for the 3.5 weeks ahead of me. I got on a flight to Ottawa originally and had to take this route to Vancouver because of people rerouting their flights in an attempt to avoid the volcanic ash situation in Iceland. I made it to Ottawa and had some doubts about the 2nd flight to Vancouver since there was an increasing standby list with myself on it and limited open seats. Turns out I got the 2nd last seat on the plane and was sure that from there on in, things were a go!!

Arriving in Vancouver I had 4 hours to kill and didn't exactly want to spend it sitting in a terminal since I had sat for the last 5 hours I hopped on the skytrain and went to downtown Van. It actually hadn't really hit me until I was sitting on the train that the Olympics had just finished 2 months prior so it turned out to be the perfect opportunity to see any changes to the city since visiting last summer. I made my way to the Olympic Cauldron and was shocked to find noone in sight, a very eerie feeling. Two months ago, the city had to put up security fences to keep the mobs of people from getting too close and now not a soul was around to enjoy its amazing craftsmanship. I snapped a few photo's of the Cauldron and walked around a bit more ending up at an amazing crepe place which would give the Halifax market a run for its money. I returned to the airport a little while later and got ready for the last leg of my travels.

The Vancouver airport after about 11:00 turns into a ghosttown since no domestic flights are able to take off or land after that time. Walking through a poorly lit terminal (saving on their electricity bill I suppose) and not seeing a single person until you get to your gate is a very strange feeling. I felt like I was doing something wrong or in a forbidden place but of course it was just due to the lack of flight traffic at that late an hour. I boarded the plane and was able to get myself the centre 3 seats on the plane all to myself (an indescribably blessing!!!) The flight was weird because we took off on the evening of the 20th and flew the whole time in complete darkness only to arrive as the sun was coming up on the 22nd. I lay down the best I could over the 3 seats and surprisingly got almost a full nights sleep waking up only a few times to a limb that had gone numb from the awkward position or the positioning of the spare seatbelts. Both dinner and breakfast were served, and Dad I now understand why you bring your own meals to work now. Blechh!!! It's been awhile since I was on an international flight that served meals and they were nothing to boast about.

After landing and getting the plane fumigated for any foreign diseases (with the passengers onboard nonetheless....) we went through a very relaxed security checkpoint with more dogs on site I think than people. They had dogs climbing all over the carousels sniffing bags and walking amongst the crowds of people and I could tell a few passengers were a little uneasy. The best way to get downtown I found is taking a shuttle bus which is surprisingly cheaper than the public train and quicker too. I checked into my small hotel which is probably the plainest room I've ever been in and have spent the past couple hours walking around the city. My plans are to stay in hostels the majority of the time here but knowing that my internal clock would be quirky the first day here I found a very cheap hotel which now allows me to go back for a nap with no disturbance.

Tomorrow I fly out to an island airport by the Barrier Reef and am spending 3 days doing some snorkeling tours and island excursions. I've read that it's best to book both last minute as the prices drop and am hoping this is true and not that I end up missing all the booked boat tours. Not too sure if there is going to be internet where I'm staying as it is very much a beach town with a couple hostels and a grocery tour. If I don't have access there, then definitely in Cairns where I'm taking a train on the 27th that will take the entire day but is apparently quite an amazing ride.

Anyways, time for bed this jetlag is just killing me!!!