Tromping Around Townsville

Phewee, the last two days have been busy, busy, busy! Yesterday, Irene dropped me, Jen and Janet off downtown so we could check out the Museum of Tropical Queensland and get ourselves booked on a reef tour. It sure took some sleuthing to find where to book our spaces on the boat out to the reef - it was cleverly hidden in a mall several blocks from the information centre where we thought it was. The weather here is still extremly wet and rainy, with occasional thunderstorms. So although we signed ourselves up for a reef excurision for today, in the end it was cancelled because of high winds out at sea. We're on a waiting list to get on Saturday's cruise, but things don't look too good for getting to see the Great Barrier Reef this trip. Ah well... it's not like we can control the weather! I may have better luck when I head to Cairns with my parents in a couple of weeks.

After we'd figured out the whole reef tour booking thing, Jen, Janet and I headed back to the museum, where we spent the rest of the day. We were really impressed with size and scope of the museum, considering it's supported by a town of less than 200,000 people. I mean really - at home, cities the size of Kitchener, Mississauga or Kingston do not have museums like this one! When we walked in the entrtance we were greeted by a full sized cutaway model of the Pandora, the ship which was sent from England to round up the mutineers from the famous Bounty. Unfortunately the Pandora was wrecked off the Great Barrier Reef in northern Queensland on her way home to England. Several expeditions to the wreck have been carried out over the years, and the museum here in Townsville has a wonderful collection of artifacts from the site. And although the cutaway model was only for the first third or so of the ship, they had the outline of the rest of the ship marked out in the carpeting in the main foyer, so you could get a good idea of how big the original was. Pretty cool!

The museum also had an interesting series of galleries on Queensland's wildlife - both terrestrial and aquatic. One section was all about corals, and included a huge variety of coral skeletons that represent the different types found out on the Great Barrier Reef. I especially liked the HUGE model of a coral polyp that dominated the exhibit. Another section introdced us to common backyard wildlife by day and by night. In the night section, you could shine a flashlight beam on various spots on the display, and if you found an animal, it would make the appropriate noise! The final gallery we explored on this level was all about the rainfortest, which makes up a significant portion of norhtern Queensland. Australia's northern rainforests have World Heritage deisgnation because of their biodiversity, and it was good to learn a little more about them.

We had time to explore one more gallery before Irene came back to pick us up. Down on the main floor we found a small gallery called "Going Troppo"... apparently this term is used up here to describe how Queenslanders go a little crazy in the tropical heat! :-) There were these crazy giant scultputres representing various characters found in Queensland - the Aussie Bloke, the Marine Scientist, the Pioneer Woman, the Army Guy, and the Seaman. Around each sculpture were interactive displays you could play with to learn how each of these types of people have contributed to Queenslander culture. It was a little strange, but highly entertaining at the same time!

After a quick dinner and change, we all headed out to the Guide Hall for the evening's fun. Like we've done elsewhere on our journey, Jen and I (with a little help from Janet this time) ran a campfire for the local Guides... and Gumnuts, and Brownies, and Trefoil Guilders, and lots of leaders. The hall was packed! Because of the continuing rain, we had to hold the campfire indoors and it was really hot and muggy. We tried to do the indoor campfire trick with floating tea lights on the surface of a bowl of water, but it kept blowing out due to the currents generated by the ceiling fan! Ha ha! We conceeded defeat eventually and finished the campfire without the fire.

After the campfire, everyone joined in to share a big "supper" (note: the Canadian translation of the Aussie word "supper" is "snack"... although with all the goodies the girls brought, it really was a whole other meal). I had a chance to talk with many of the girls and leaders, and we handed out crests, and sang even more songs on request. It was great fun and we were all completely pooped when we finally got back to Irene's house. I didn't even have the energy to read a page from my book!

Today was equally jam-packed with fun. We all slept in a little bit, and then headed off to the Billabong Sanctuary on the edge of town. This is a privately owned, award winning eco-tourism park. They have a huge variety of Australian wildlife on display, including many kangaroos, geese, ducks and little wallabies who just wander around freely - and which you can pet and feed! We bought little bags of feed at the front desk and had a grand old time feeding all the different critters.

What was especially cool about this place is that the rangers did a series of talks throughout the day about the different animals they had in their care. The day was structured so that we could follow the rangers from place to place all around the park and see ALL of the talks. We also had numerous opportunities to pet and hold various aniumals. So I petted a koala and a wombat, held a shingleback and a blue tounged lizard, wrapped a carpet python around my neck, and generally had a grand old time. We raced turtles, fed a cassowary, and chased away the magpie-geese who were being a royal pain. (Some things really don't change - the world over, geese are pests wherever you go.) Jen finally got to hold a wombat and we got some really cute pics. We also enjoyed the crocodile show, where they fed the big crocs just like we used to see on The Crocodile Hunter. Let me tell you, I was *impressed* with how far out of the water that 5-m long croc could leap! We also liked how there was a second ranger in the croc enclosure with the guy who was doing the talk - armed with a big heavy metal pole, aptly named the "croc-bashing stick". This second ranger's job was to watch the back of the first ranger. If the croc actually did take a bite at the ranger, the second ranger was to bash it on the head with the pole. If that didn't work and the croc wouldn't let go, then the second ranger was to bash the first ranger (aka victim) on his head in order to (in their words) "stop the screaming". Ha ha... fortunately, these measures were not necessary. :-)

We returned home late in the afternoon for a drink and a bit of a rest, then Irene drove us out to the Guide Shop so we could take a look around. The shop was really cute and had some wonderful memorabilia up on the walls from past girls and Guiders. Then we all decided that we'd head down to The Strand, a promenade on Townsville's waterfront, to eat dinner and enjoy the rest of the evening. We wound up at a teeny little Thai restaurant for dinner and it was delicious.

The Strand is a place we're definitely going to have to go back and explore in the daylight. It's a 2-3km long stretch of waterfront which is all set up for family use. There were wonderful playgrounds for ALL ages of kids - from preschoolers all the way up to teenagers! Yep, we found a play structure that said "teenage use only" on it. What a great idea! Jen and I also loved the "Spder", a rope climbing structure right on the beach that we just had to try out. Thumper - you'll be impressed with how high off the ground I managed to get. We're still working on a way we could bring this home to Canada with us - it was just way too cool for words. There was also a free water park and several ocean swimming areas. It's not safe to just go out and swim in the ocean here - there are "singers" (jellyfish) in the water, some of which can kill. So like many northern beach towns, Townsville has screened in sections of the ocean which are stinger free and safe to swim in. What with the weather being so hot and all, going for a dip tomorrow sounds like a good idea to me!

Arrived in Townsville - and a Plague of Frogs

Jen, Janet and I touched down here in Townsville around 4:30 yesterday afternoon (that's 5:30pm Melbourne time; I'd forgotten that Queensland doesn't go on Daylight Savings Time) and we were met at the airport by Irene, our host/new friend here. Gotta love that Girl Guide trefoil! Irene wore a Guiding shirt to the airport and we had no problems spotting her at all! After collecting our luggage (which was a little bit soggy, thanks to the ongoing rain both in Brisbane, where we changed plans, and in Tonwsville), we headed back to her house.

Irene is a long-time Guider and it really shows in her house. I was browsing her bookshelves and she has the most wonderful collection of old Guiding and Scouting books, many written by Lord Baden-Powell himself. She also runs the local Guide store and has promised to take us there at some point this week. (Excellent.) She has an old corgie dog named Rowlie and a cockateil named George, and a HUGE Winne-The-Pooh stuffed bear that her daughter won in a contest! The Pooh bear comfortably sits in the largest chair in her living room.

I love Irene's back yard. She has a mango tree from which she collects the fruit every year and a lovely garden too. We went out after dark with a torch to look for cane toads... apparently they're usually everywhere here but not last night! We did, however, find many green tree frogs, which are larger than our grey tree frogs by quite a bit! They were easy to catch and were quite happy to sit on my arm or hand for a while, so we snapped some cute pictures. At one point, one of the frogs leapt off my shoulder - and straight into Jen's face! Give her marks, folks - there was no screeching or screaming, but she did have to gently peel the unexpected frog off her nose/cheek/eyeball while the rest of us doubled over laughing. The frog didn't seem to mind all the attention, and Jen dealt with the whole thing with good grace. Ha ha!

Today we're heading into town to find out about charters out to the Reef. The weather this week isn't supposed to be all that good, so keep your fingers crossed for us!

Back to the Great Ocean Road

So today was my last day in the Melbourne area for quite some time, and I celebrated it by driving Janet down the first third or so of the Great Ocean Road. The weather wasn't nearly as fine as it had been when Jen, Irene and I went, but it was still a nice day. The overcast dulled the colours of the waters and the greenery, though.

Our first stop was the golf course at Anglesea, where we had it on good authority that there was a mob of kangaroos that pretty much hang out there permanently. We found the roos, but they were way off on the far side of the course and so we couldn't take any pictures. There were signs posted at the entrance to the course that there was no entry to anyone for observing the kangaroos (apparently due to the risk of being attacked by a roo or being hit on the head by a golf ball). After writing that big rant yesterday about the stupid people on Phillip Island, I figured we'd better behave ourselves here, too. :-)

The coastal drive was just as spectacular as I remember it being from the first time I drove this route. Janet and I stopped for lunch in Lorne and I showed her the cute hostel we'd stayed in. We took a short hike in to Sheoak Falls, which was a beautiful waterfall, even if it was reduced to a trickle in this dry season. I chased little skinks which were sunning on the boardwalks to the waterfall, but didn't catch any. We pulled over at several good lookouts along the road to snap photos and admire the view. At Apollo Bay, we grabbed some ice cream and headed for the beach, where we watched some folks taking surfing lessons for a while.

We drove back to Melbourne via a twisty, windey road that took us through the heart of Otways National Park. It was absolutely beautiful! We passed through stands of fern trees and huge eucalypts, and at the tops of the hills were treated to stunning panoramic views of the Otways. Once back on the A1, we made great time back to Melbourne and actually beat Jen home from work!

The three of us are heading north tomorrow, far north, to Townsville in Queensland. We'll be there until Sunday, checking out the Great Barrier Reef and everything else that Townsville has to offer. Thanks very much to my new Guiding friend, Irene, who's generously putting us up during our stay there. After Townsville, I'm off on a whole slew of adventures all across the top of Queensland and the Northern Territory, and I'll finally be getting to visit Uluru too! So farewell for now - I don't know what sort of email access I will have while I'm gone. I will try to keep the blog updated as best I can. I return to Melbourne around the 5th of April. Cheerio!

Phillip Island

This weekend we finally made it to Phillip Island! This place has been on our "to do" list since before we left Canada - ever since Jen read an article in a travel magazine about the Little Penguins that live on the island, and how you can watch them come in each night from the ocean. So it was about time that we finally got to go and see them ourselves.

We rented a car for the weekend and when we went to pick it up, we were in for a pleasant surprise - we got a Toyota Prius hybrid. Very cool car. I like that it has an "on" button instead of a key. The "key" that we have for it is totally square and gets inserted into the dashboard before you can turn the car on, but there's no actual ignition like in a regular car. Jen and I took one look at our ride, turned to each other, and said (almost in unison) "Now that's a slick car!"... so that became the car's name - Slick. Once you've got it started, driving the Prius is pretty much like driving any regular automatic car - except that of course when the electric engine is being used, the car is very, very quiet. So it's equipped with a beeper for when it backs up - otherwise, you'd never hear it coming!

The drive out to Phillip Island wasn't all that remarkable, and in fact the first part of it was more than a little annoying, because there is no ring road around the eastern side of Melbourne. We had no choice but to cut right through the city for many kilometers before we could pick up the highway on the far side. (OK, let's be fair - this was also partly because Jen and I flat out refuse to pay for a toll road, which would have been another option.) The scenery on the way out wasn't all that exciting either, but that lack was more than made up for once we'd got to the island.

Phillip Island is one of two islands in Western Port Bay, which is one bay over from Port Phillip Bay, where Melbourne is. We drove over the short bridge at the one end of the island and there we were! We stopped in briefly at the visitors centre to purchase tickets to the "Penguin Parade" (more on that later). Janet purchased the cutest stuffed penguin ever! Jen and I kept shooting it envious glances, but decided to wait for now.

The next stop was the island's chocolate factory. Now, I must admit, when I first learned that there was a chocolate factory on the island, I was hoping that it would be something like the Hershey's factory back home, with the huge industrial chocolate production and the awesome store. Not so much here. This place was a small, family run business, and while you could look through a window and watch the chocolates being made, there was no tour or explanation or anything. The shop did have a wide variety of chocolate bars and other goodies though, and I picked up a few for my brother, who's been helpful beyond all measure these past few months with my websites and everything. So yes, Dave, the long-promised chocolate is in the mail - or it will be, tomorrow!

Afterwards, we drove to the tiny town of Cowes on the northern end of the island, where our hostel was. Let me tell you, I was NOT impressed with this hostel. The YHA was full so we ended up at the "other" place. Basically it was a renovated shed in the owner's backyard! Actually, when we pulled up to the front of the hostel, I thought that we had the wrong address - it looked like a fairly run-down house on an ordinary little side street. I wasn't much wrong. Basically, the owner had only recently begun to rent out rooms as a hostel, and he was in the middle of renovating his property at the same time. It was nuts. There was all this junk piled up on the front porch, two random dogs wandering around, and a large inflatable pool in the backyard. The "dorm" room that we'd reserved turned out to be a tiny room in the back of the renovated shed in the backyard. The common room, also in the shed, doubled as another bedroom - which meant that as we came and went from our room, we had to constantly tiptoe around other folks who were sleeping in the common room. There was also a large tent pitched in the backyard, apparently as another room for rent. Pretty crazy! But the owner, Paul, was a friendly, laid-back guy and he made us feel right at home. He lent us a couple of blankets to take with us for the penguin tour in the evening, which we were more than grateful for by the end! But with that said, this was not the sort of hostel where there was any point in spending time just sitting around and relaxing (there was no space!), so as soon as we'd dumped our stuff and eaten a quick lunch, we headed off to do some more exploring.

On our way to the hostel we'd passed the Koala Conservation Centre, and since Janet really wanted to see koalas, we headed back there. It was great! There were boardwalks set up in the gum trees at "koala level", so we didn't spend the entire tour craning our necks up to look in the canopy for koalas. There were lots of informative sign posts along the boardwalks, and they were all movable! Since the koalas do most of their moving around from tree-to-tree after dark, each morning the rangers could walk through the boardwalks, spot the individual koalas, and move the sign posts to the appropriate spots before the visitors arrived. This meant that as we explored, we learned about moms and babies, male dominance, old age, sleeping, etc. etc., all along the way. Also, there were rangers on duty all along the boardwalks, to keep people from harassing the koalas.

Actually, in many ways one of the "sub-themes" for this weekend was How Idiotic Can People Possibly Be, but again, more on that later.

One of the major highlights of the Koala Conservation Centre was when the lone male koala decided that he was going for a walk. We rounded a corner on the boardwalk to discover this huge koala quite calmly walking down the railing - escorted closely by a ranger to keep people a safe distance away! It was really cool. The ranger asked us all to step back to the far side of the boardwalk so the koala would feel safe, and explained that the koala was likely heading for a specific tree on the far side of the enclosure. The ranger cleared a path for the koala and off it went - at its own pace, thank you very much - even stopping to pose for pictures a few times along the way. When it passed me by I could have reached out and touched it, but of course I didn't. :-)

We headed back to Cowes to find a place to eat dinner, and accidentally discovered a cute little Night Market going on! As we explored the various stalls, the wind started to really pick up. In fact, the gusts grew so strong that the tent stalls were blowing away! I felt really bad for some of the vendors. Some of the food vendors just packed up and went home, as it was too dangerous for them to have open flame near such large amounts of flapping canvas and plastic. We decided to eat dinner somewhere indoors.

After dinner, it was finally time to head to the other end of the island to experience the Penguin Parade. What an aptly-named attraction! Phillip Island's penguin colony claims to be Australia's most famous natural attraction (funny, I would have thought that Uluru, or the Great Barrier Reef, would have already claimed that honour). Anyhow. There's a great visitors centre which explains the biology of the Little Penguin (also known as the Fairy Penguin), the world's smallest species of penguin and the only species found in Australia. The birds live in large colonies and they nest in the sand dunes, digging out burrows for themselves under the roots of the dune vegetation. Each morning the birds head out to sea to fish, and return each evening just after dusk. It was this "parade" in from the water that we had come to see.

A boardwalk led from the visitors centre out to the viewing platforms, and we marched out there along with a whole pile of other people to take our places on the beach and to wait for the birds to arrive. It was really, really cold and windy, and all three of us had on pretty much every item of clothing we'd brought on the trip with us! I was really glad for the wool blankets we'd borrowed from the hostel, too - we sat on one and covered our legs with the other. Huge stormy clouds kept rolling across the island, so we were intermittently pelted with sheets of rain and howling wind. On the plus side, as we were approaching the beach, the sun came out briefly and we were treated to the most spectacular, full-arched, double rainbow I have ever seen in my life. I could clearly see where both ends of the rainbow touched the earth (and water). How beautiful!

I have no pictures of this magical event, or anything else from the evening, because there was a strict no camera policy enforced by the park rangers. The penguins are very sensitive to bright lights, and the camera flashes would upset them greatly - even to the point of driving them back into the water or leading them to abandon the colony! And since it is utterly impossible to regulate the use of flash photography, the centre had gone one step further and just banned photography altogether. It's ok though, there were some excellent photos on sale in the gift shop, and I purchased a few afterwards.

This is where the Idiotic People Rant comes in. I was absolutely appalled at the behavior of the other people we were with. Right left and center, as soon as people were settled in the stands, the cameras came out and people started snapping photos. While this was mostly happening before the penguins arrived, every time a ranger saw someone with a camera out, they had to come over and tell them firmly to put it away again. How ANYONE missed the massive "no photography" signs, the announcements, and the "why no photos are allowed" talk by the rangers, is completely beyond me. I was particularly annoyed by the family behind us - I guess the mom pulled out her camera to take a picture and her kid said "Mom, I don't think we're allowed", and the mom's answer was "It doesn't matter. It's just one photo." ARGH! What sort of example does that set for your child? I mean, COME ON.

The only other thing the rangers asked us to do were to sit still and quietly. The "sitting still" thing also proved impossible for many people. No matter how many times this was enforced by the rangers, as the penguins appeared on the beach, groups of people would get up and rush over to one end of the stands or the other in order to get a closer look. This, of course, frightened the birds AND blocked the views of people who were already sitting there, including us. The "teacher" in Jen, Janet and I really reared its ugly head here. We started basically yelling at people to sit down as they tried to cut in front. I couldn't believe the glares we got back. Again - if my students had EVER behaved this badly, several things would have happened. (1) Cameras would have been taken away. (2) They would have been removed from the stands. It was so frustrating that all these ADULTS couldn't handle simple instructions that 5-year-olds could figure out - and that the park rangers, as hard as they tried, could do pretty much nothing about it. At least students can be disciplined!

If I was in charge of this facility, I would do several things. First, I would confiscate the offending cameras, and charge a $5 return fee to the stupid idiots who were snapping photos at the end of the evening. Next, I would not allow anyone to sit in the sand in front of the concrete stands. People in the stands pretty much stayed put once they'd claimed seats; it was all the folks sitting in front of us right on the sand who were causing the problems with standing up and running around. I would give such offenders ONE warning and then eject them from the viewing area. I mean, really - that's basically what we do in the classroom when a child's behaviour is bad. How sad that adults can't follow simple rules. There were clearly explained, legitimate reasons for why we needed to be still and not take pictures.

OK. Rant over. I promise. :-)

It was sad that all this stupid behaviour had to detract from such a magical evening, because it was magical. As night fell, the penguins appeared silently at the edge of the surf in small groups of 5-20 birds. Once they felt safe enough to leave the water, they would waddle their way up the shore and into the dunes. They were all around us! Some of the groups passed quite close by where we were sitting. Little Penguins are just that - little - only getting to be about 30cm tall. Once most of the birds had come ashore, the rangers told us that we should wander back along the boardwalks. Turns out that the holes we'd seen in the dunes on our way to the beach were penguin burrows! So all around us on the way back to the visitors centre, the dunes were now alive with penguins! Penguins greeting each other, feeding chicks, preening, walking around... it was totally awesome. We actually saw the birds much closer along the boardwalks than on the beach, so I was glad we got to spend some time there.

Suffice it to say that by the time we finally crawled back to the hostel, it was very late, we were very tired, and so glad we'd come! Even with all the stupid people.

This morning we said our goodbyes at the hostel and headed out to do some more exploring of the island before heading back to Melbourne. We went back down to past where the Penguin Parade is, all the way to the western-most tip of the island, to a pair of rocks called The Nobbies. The Nobbies themselves are important seabird nesting grounds, and off-limits to people. That didn't stop three stupid idiots who were down on the rocks, playing in the surf. Morons. Not only is the beach off-limits (as in, the only access point, a stairway, was blocked off with a big DO NOT ENTER sign, that they must have hopped over to get down there), the waves coming in off the ocean were huge and the three guys were in danger of being swept away. We reported them to the park rangers. We had the satisfaction, at the end of the morning, of seeing them being questioned by police. Apparently one of the blokes actually fell into the ocean, and was lucky to get out again alive. This stretch of beach has killed people before.

The cliffs and dunes around The Nobbies were spectacular. The wind was fierce and whipping up the ocean like nobody's business, and I got some pretty good shots of ocean surf crashing against the rocks. We even spied a lone penguin lounging at the entrance to its burrow. So cute! There were lots of silver gulls nesting in the dunes as well, and so for the first time in my life I saw seagull chicks. Jen and I were joking that the poor seagulls get a "bad rap"... here all these zillions of tourists flock to the island to check out the penguins, because they are "cute". But what about the gulls? They play an important role in the local ecology as well, but because they are a "common" bird, they are often ignored. I, for one, enjoyed the opportunity to get close to a gull chick - they were beautifully camouflaged and once they had hidden themselves in the grasses, were almost impossible to spot.

Seal Rock, which is further out in the ocean past The Nobbies, is home to a large seal colony. The island is too far from land to be able to see the seals from shore, and unfortunately due to the stormy conditions the boat cruises had been canceled, so we had to content ourselves with learning more about the seals at the interpretative centre instead. Ah well, can't win them all!

Once we'd finished with The Nobbies, we had just enough time left to zip around the island and visit a couple of other short nature trails before we had to head home. At Pyramid Rock, Janet snapped a photo of me and Jen that nicely shows how insanely windy it was. At Conservation Hill, we explored a boardwalk that took us through a mangrove swamp filled with millions of tiny crabs. And at Cape Wollemai we marveled at the awesome waves coming in to shore, but didn't have enough time to hike the trails out to the point. Wollemai Beach is a world famous surf beach, but there were no surfers today - the waves were just too huge and the wind too cold!

So after all this, we finally headed back home to Melbourne, where our housemate Renzo had promised to prepare us dinner. And what a dinner! I swear there was enough food to feed a small army, let alone the 14 or so of us who shared in the meal. Have I said recently how much I love my house? It feels so strange... in two days I'll leave here and not return for six whole weeks, as I head off to explore Queensland and the Northern Territory. I'm going to miss everyone!

Thinking Day

I'm a little bit behind in my blogging, so I'm going to try my hardest to catch up again tonight. First things first - let's talk about last Friday, which, being February 22nd, was Thinking Day. For my non-Guiding friends who are reading this, Thinking Day celebrates the birthdays of the founder of Guiding and Scouting, Lord Baden-Powell, and his wife, Olave Baden-Powell. This year also marked the 100th anniversary of Scouting, so all around the world it was a pretty important day for the Scouting and Guiding communities.

I spent much of the day on Friday at the hospital with my housemate, and doing a bit of general running around as I get ready for my next big trip. (By the way, my housemate was discharged from the hospital late on Friday night, and we're all happy about that!) Jen, of course, was at school. Janet was on her own for the day, and she spent it in true Guiding fashion - at the local Guide Shop! Perfect timing, too - when she arrived there, she was dismayed to find that the shop was closed. Turns out this was because the Trefoil Guild was in the middle of having a lovely luncheon, and they invited her to join them! So she spent several happy hours chatting with the ladies from the Trefoil Guild, including Wendy Baden-Powell, the grand-daughter of Lord and Lady BP! How cool is that?

Janet did eventually meet me downtown at the end of the afternoon, and we set off together for the suburb of Vermont, where the three of us (Jen too) had been invited once again to come and play with Nina Cole's Vermont Guides. Turns out the whole District was joining us, so we had girls as young as six and as old as sixteen, and all their families, too! The evening started off with a "sausage sizzle", then everyone was broken into four groups and the oldest girls led their groups around a round-robin of activities. Jen, Janet and I were in charge of Yells. So we taught a yell from the 1900's that Lord BP would have learned in Africa, and then we taught a couple of modern summer camp style yells too. It was great fun! Afterwards, everyone gathered back inside the hall for a short skit, and a Promise Ceremony (enrolment) for one girl.

It was great. How wonderful to be able to spend Thinking Day with Guides from another country. That's really what this organization is all about - growing friendships and building communities. As a complete sidebar, it was also rather novel to be able to enjoy Thinking Day in sandals, even though it was a wee bit on the nippy side (summer is over here now and we're well on our way into autumn. I'm in denial.) Jen and I will be camping with Nina's Guides in April and we're looking forward to that too.

A Quick Update

Thank you to everyone who was praying for/rooting for/thinking about my house mate. They have been discharged from the hospital (two days earlier than we were expecting!), and is now back here with us. I was educated at the hospital about how to administer an emergency drug should we find our housemate unconscious from too little insulin. So for now, all seems well, and my housemate is working on adapting to their new routine. Thank you, everyone, for keeping them in your prayers.

We got two new housemates yesterday - Karen from Newfoundland, and a guy I haven't met yet (and won't today - we're leaving shortly!). So our house is full again for the first time since November!

Today Jen, Janet and I are taking off for Phillip Island, which is home to a very famous fairy penguin colony. We'll be gone overnight and back late tomorrow. Cheerio!

An "aha" Moment

So you'd figure that with today being Thinking Day and all, I'd be spending this blog entry talking about that. But I'm not. It's past midnight and I'm rather tired and will be off to bed shortly. But I came to a realization today that I think is important to share.

One of the things I've really struggled with this year, what with taking time off work and traveling and with all the questions surrounding my summer job, is who I really am. I mean, what makes me, me? I've been having a really difficult time separating *WHO* I am from *WHAT* I am. Am I still "me" if I'm not a teacher? If I'm not a camp director? If I'm not a Girl Guide? Does what I do dictate who I am?

Well, thanks to a number of events that have happened this week, not all of which are recorded in this blog, I think I've finally come to a bit of an understanding about these big questions.

Turns out that Thumper was right all along. (Curse her. She's always right! Sometimes I swear I've just gotta pay more attention.) I can still be "me" even if I'm not doing the things I usually do. My "me-ness" (if that makes any sense at all) is still there. Like I said, events from this week have finally helped me to see that. This has brought me a sense of inner peace that I didn't realize I was lacking until I had that all-important "aha moment" earlier today.

So thanks Thumper. I owe you one. Thanks for knowing me better than I know myself.

Happy Thinking Day to all my Guiding sisters around the world. I promise I will write later about today's adventures.

Keep In Your Prayers...

So, quite high on the list of things I wouldn't want to have happen to me while traveling in a foreign country... I got a phone call about 9pm last night from one of my house mates, who was in the hospital. They had been sitting in emergency since 3pm. They had just been diagnosed with type I diabetes! So they're going to be in the hospital for at least the next three days as the doctors get blood sugar under control, and so my house mate can learn how to self-administer insulin, since they'll have to do that for the rest of their life.

YIKES.

So please keep my anonymous house mate in your prayers - they're going to need it!

My plans for the day have changed somewhat, as I will be at the hospital for a good chunk of time.

Immigration Museum, Koorie Cultural Centre, ACMI, and the Night Market

Phew -it's been a busy couple of days! Janet is off to visit Jen's school today, so I'm at home with a day to catch up on blogging, finish booking stuff for the next big trip, and to deal with the rest of the running around. Sometimes, I feel like a bit of a housewife, but that's ok. :-)

On Tuesday, Janet and I spent the morning dealing with household stuff like laundry and grocery shopping. Then after a quick lunch we headed downtown to check out the Immigration Museum, which I've been meaning to visit for a while. The museum is housed (appropriately!) in the old Customs House, which would have processed immigrants to Melbourne in the old days when most new people arrived by sea. It was a really interesting little museum. There were lots of displays containing the stories and artifacts of people who immigrated to the Melbourne area, from the 1850's all the way to present day. Some of the stories were sad, some were funny, and some were really touching.

What we found really interesting was learning about how Australia's immigration policies have changed over the years. For example, for many years, British people were preferred over all other immigrants. This was then broadened to people of European descent, as part of the "White Australia Policy". This policy was only repealed in 1975! I found this fascinating, because certainly in the big cities, Australia is just as cosmopolitan and multicultural as Canada. But it's been quite the long journey for the country to be able to embrace multiculturalism.

The other dispaly which we quite enjoyed was a room set up like an immigration interview room. We would sit at a desk and play the role of an immigration officer, trying to decide whether or not to let someone into the country. Opposite the desk was a TV monitor and it would play the interview with an applicant. So you would sit there and listen to "your" conversation (piped in from speakers right beside you), and the applicant's responses (as shown on the TV screen). Once the questions were over, you had to make a decision whether or not to let the person in. once you'd made your selection, the rest of the interview would play and you would discover whether or not you'd made the "appropriate" decision. So yes, a very thought-provoking museum!

Yesterday dawned grey and rainy, and so Janet and I were forced once again to find an inside venue to explore. Janet seemed to find this quite funny - for the first two days of her tour, we looked for indoor spaces to escape the heat, and now we were escaping the rain! Anyway. First we ended up at the Koorie Cultural Centre, another place I've been meaning to visit. Unlike the Aboriginal cultural centre Jen and I visited in Adelaide, this place focused much more on the history of the Korrie peoples and the struggles they've faced since European invasion. The centre in Adelaide taught about Aboriginal traditions and had an excellent art gallery, but nothing on current issues. All in all I liked the Koorie centre here in Melbourne better. I spent entirely too much money in the gift store - I found my Dad his (rather late) Christmas present, and also a beautiful book for me.

Janet and I had a few hours to kill before heading out to the 'burbs for trampolining, so we got back on the City Circle tram and rode it pretty much the whole way 'round, listening to the recorded commentary as we went. We got off at Federation Square and checked out the Australian Centre for the Moving Image. They were unfortunately between major displays (a cool exhibit on the history of video games is opening in March!), but we had some fun in the "Imagination Space", where we sat and watched random videos made by ordinary people from all over Victoria, documenting their everyday lives. Some of them were really good, and some of them were, well, strange. But it sure felt good to sit down and (let's be honest) close our eyes for a little bit, and if we absorbed some culture along the way, well, so be it!

Janet and I caught the bus out to trampolining, where we met up with Jen. Now that Jen's teaching full-time, it makes more sense for her to go straight to trampolining from her school rather than come all the way back into the city to meet me. I was glad to have Janet as company... that's a looooong bus ride to do on my own! Our class was shorter last night than usual - Mark (our coach) had agreed to take us to the Night Market afterwards, and in order to get there we needed to leave early. The trade-off for this was that he worked us extra hard the whole night! It was worth it though. Janet even got up on the trampoline for a bit!

We escaped the trampoline torture around 8:30 and headed back downtown to the Night Market. It was just as fun as the last time we'd gone, just before Christmas, although there were definitely fewer people there. Janet, Mark and I enjoyed roo burgers, Jen had a panzerotti. We all wandered around and enjoyed the sights, smells, and music. Then Mark was kind enough to drive us home - which was great, 'cause we were all pretty tired at that point!

Jen's First Aid Training Rant

So... while Janet and I were playing at the Melbourne Museum and then with the Guides (see my last post), Jen of course was at school. And after school today she had to take the second part of a first aid recert. She had a bit of an interesting time. But let me let her tell the rest of the story... over to you, Jen...


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Well, Becky has asked me to write about the day that I had learning about Australian First Aid. The first part of the First Aid course was pretty much the same as a Canadian one, look for danger, assess consciousness and the ABCs. We got into the scary part on how to deal with the snake bites and spider bites that can kill you in Australia. How to bandage a wound until you can get the anti venom kit into you.

The mind blowing parts are the differences between the Australian and Canadian standards for First aid.

Number 1- when someone is conscious but fully blocked in choking, you are suppose to lie them on their side and deliver 5 sharp blows to their back to get the blockage out. The Heimleck maneuver is not used because you could force up bile from the stomach. You are not suppose to hit someone on the back! That is a given!

Number 2- If you have administered an epi pen to a child, and they have not reacted to it (to solve the breathing problem) or the ambulance hasn’t shown up, you are not allowed to give them another epi pen even if they have another one. You have to have permission from the ambulance attendant. I’m sorry, I am not going to let a kid die because I have to wait for permission.

Number 3-It is illegal to make schools “nut free” because it is against the discriminatory laws in Victoria. It is discriminatory against a child that wants to eat a peanut butter sandwich in class. So you can’t have “nut free” or “scent free” schools. When I mentioned that we did all that we could do to make it possible, I was given a look like I was crazy.

Number 4-You can’t get Twinex in Australia, that epi pen that has a double dose on it so that if a child doesn’t react to the first dose, you can give them the second dose.

So that is my rant about the differences between Canadian and Australian First Aid. I still can’t believe that it is considered to be discriminatory when it is someone’s health that is at risk. That someone’s food preference is put above a child’s health, that’s nutts.

Melbourne Museum, and more Guides

Today, Janet and I went to the Melbourne Museum. Seems that Janet suffers from the same museum issue as both me and Jen - we ran out of time and didn't see the whole place! But wow, what we did see was GREAT.

Like the national museum in Canberra, the Melbourne Museum is housed in a brand-new, thoroughly modern building. We spent a good chunk of the morning in the Koorie cultural gallery, learning about the local Aboriginal culture. Unfortunately you're not allowed to take photography in any of the Aboriginal galleries in any museums anywhere in the country, so although the exhibit was wonderful, I can't share it with you pictorally. I am on the hunt for some quality Aboriginal artwork to bring home instead. They had a good display on the relationship between the early European naturalists and the local Aborigines, and how their collaboration led to a wealth of scientific discovery.

This museum has a number of displays which took me completely by surprise. For one, they've got a whole FOREST - a living one - for you to explore and discover! The enclosure is accessable from inside the museum building, but is screened and in and open to the air on two sides as well. In the enclosure there were all sorts of little birds and lizards running around freely. You could walk along a balcony at canopy level. You could follow another trail to get a close-up view of the stream and what lies beneath it. In another section they had trunks of ash trees which had been charred by fire, side-by-side with plots of seedlings which had started to grow after the ground had been scorched by flames. These seedlings would eventually be planted by schoolchildren. How cool is that?

Unsurprisingly, I *LOVED* the life galleries. There was a room called the Virtual Room, where you put on 3D glasses and watched movies play about all sorts of aspects of the living world. The biodiversity gallery was excellent, with mounted specimens of a huge variety of Australian plants and animals. I'm talking hundreds and hundreds of mounted snakes, lizards, birds, mammals, inverts - you name it, it was there. If I'd stood to take pictures of everything I wanted to, I would have been there for a week! They also had a GREAT bug gallery, which unfortunately we had to zip through because we were running out of time.

The Evolution gallery was a little disappointing. One thing I'm finding is in short supply here are good dinosaur fossils. In almost every museum I've been in, the dinosaur skeletons I've seen have been casts. I don't know enough about how fossils are formed... perhaps conditions just weren't right in Australia to get good fossils. Interestingly, many of the 'real' fossils I've seen on display, both here and elsehwere in OZ, are from Canada! At any rate, they did have one skeleton I've been wanting to see for a long time - an Apatasaurus (Brontosaurus). It was a cast, but it was still cool. The neck of the animal was posed in a manner that scientists now feel is likely inaccurate, but really, there wouldn't have been space in that gallery to stretch the neck out the way we currently think it must have sat.

And the surprises just kept coming! I originally hadn't been too interested in checking out the Human Body gallery, since the one at the Ontario Science Centre is pretty good. But at one point as we were walking from one gallery to another, I caught sight of the line of naked human sculptures that marked the entrance to the display, and that got my attention pretty quick! For obvious reasons, no photography was allowed in the Human Body display, but you'll have to take my word for it, they did a good job. Turns out that the sculptures we'd glimpsed from afar had been made to represent the span of the human lifetime - so there was a 2-month-old baby, a 3-year old, a 7-year old, a teenager, a young adult, a pregnant mother, and an elderly couple, to name a few. All naked. Left nothing to the imagination, let me tell you! But they were tasteful and thought-provoking. The rest of the exhibit was just as good... there were displays on the history of anatomical discovery, various real organs and organ systems, and an explanation of the Visible Human Project.

And that was where we ran out of time. We didn't get to see the marine sciences gallery, or the one about the human brain, or spend nearly enough time in the Virtual Room. I've already decided that if I have any time at all, I'm going back to the museum in April before I leave.

Janet and I ran out of time because I'd also arranged for us to go and visit a Guide unit and do some campfire songs with them, but this unit meets early (like 4:30!) and was a fair distance away from the museum. So we suddenly realized around 3pm that we needed to get our butts moving. After a mad dash home, a quick change into uniform, and another dash across town on the bus, we arrived just in time. We spent the next couple of hours with the 1st Aberfeldie Brownie Guides in Essendon. They were wonderful! We had a real campfire, including s'mores, and shared songs and games. The girls taught us a fun game called "Cup Up" which will be added to my website as soon as I find time to breathe. Trust me, this was a great game to play on a blazing hot day!

At the end of the meeting the girls thanked us and we exchanged gifts - they gave me some patches and a Guides Australia tea towel, and I handed out patches of my own and Girl Guide pencils. By the time Janet and I got back to the house, we were both definitely pooped. And it's supposed to be even hotter tomorrow than it was today! Gotta find another indoor venue to visit, that's for sure...

Another Hot Day

So as I was getting dressed this morning, I noticed that my belly button hurt. What the...? Looking at myself in the mirror, I was more than a little surprised to discover that I have quite the lovely bruise/rash right in my navel! I'm pretty sure this is a result of yesterday's body boarding, but I really don't know exactly how I managed to do that. I mean really - what sort of person goes around bruising their belly button?

Many of you who read my blog regularly will not appreciate me harping on the fact that it was hot today. Too bad! This is, after all, MY blog. :-) So yes. It was definitelty hot. I believe the mercury peaked this afternoon at 34C around 3pm, right about the time that we were all down at the beach at St. Kilda.

Today was Jen's mom (Janet)'s first full day with us in Melbourne. Jen, Janet and I enjoyed a leisurely breakfast this morning and then collected Jen C. and Oksana (aka the entire Canadian contingent from our house) and caught the tram out to St. Kilda. We had three objectives. First - eat gourmet burgers at this great little restaurant Jen and I found earlier this year. Second - go for a swim. And third - do some shopping at the St. Kilda craft market, which is only open on Sundays.

It took us longer than expected to make it out to St. Kilda... once again, Metlink conspired against us. Apparently they're doing major track work along the St. Kilda waterfront, so the tram stopped at the very edge of the neighbourhood and we had to walk the rest of the way. This was about a 2-3km hike, but it's not like we had any choice. We wandered out to the end of the St. Kilda pier, where I'd earlier discovered that there is a fairy penguin colony. No penguin sightings today (they're only really active at dawn and dusk) but there were tons and tons of big jellyfish in the water, so that kept me amused for a good while! One of our local grocery store chains, Coles, was handing out free cans of chilled lemonade, so we all enjoyed a nice refreshing drink as we strolled along the pier.

The hamburger joint (Grill'd) was, of course, WAAAAY on the far side of St. Kilda from where the tram let us off, which meant we had to walk past all the market stalls on the way there. Try as we might, we weren't quite able to walk all the way down the line without stopping to do some browsing. (We had promised ourselves that we would do our shopping at the end of the afternoon.) It was really, really hot at this point, and I think all of us were glad to finally make it to the restaurant.

The restaurant was very crowded and also hot (many of the little cafes here are not air conditioned), and we ended up stuffed into the very back of the shop. Suffice it to say that by the time our food arrived, some of our group weren't feeling all that well any more. So we ate and got out of there as quickly as we could. It was a bit of a shame, really... in other circumstances I would have liked to linger; their fries are excellent and I ended up having to pack mine home and eat them cold.

Next stop was the beach, where all of us basically dropped our stuff on the sand and waded straight out into the water. The water in Port Phillip Bay is significantly warmer than the ocean down at Torquay, plus of course there's no surf, so getting into the water wasn't nearly as painful as it was yesterday. However each time I visit the beach at St. Kilda I find myself liking it less and less. It was extremely busy and full of people; there were all sorts of unpleasant sharp objects in the sand (including quite a lot of glass, you should have seen the handfuls Jen took off to the garbage can!), and the water was full of slimy algae. I think I've been spoiled by the pristine beaches I've been able to swim at this last little while. I don't know that I'll choose to swim at St. Kilda again.

Once we'd all decided we'd had enough of the water, we faced a bit of a challenge - getting changed out of our bathing suits before going shopping! Jen and I didn't want to keep our board shorts on (we've discovered they're not all that comfy to wear wet on land). Since as far as we knew there was no changing station down at our end of the beach, we ended up using our towels to shield each other as we quickly stripped and changed on the beach! Yikes! I'm pretty sure I didn't moon anyone, but if I did, my friends were too polite to say. And then of course as we left the beach, we walked right past a changing station. GAH!

The shopping was, of course, divine, and I know that everyone found at least a little something to buy for family and friends back home. I found a PERFECT gift for my mom, but she's gonna have to wait until she arrives here in OZ to find out what it is. Hee hee hee!

By this time the heat was really taking its toll. I'm pretty sure that our newest house mates, Jen C. and Oksana, were feeling the heat more than Jen and myself. After all, we've been in the country for a good long time now and have had time to adjust to the climate here - even though that adjustment was a painful process. I am now really glad that I arrived here in OZ's spring... it meant that the temperatures I left behind in Canada were pretty similar to those I first experienced here. But Jen C. and Oksana have both only arrived here in the past few weeks, so they went from Canadian winter (and what a miserable winter it's been!) to Australian summer - and I know they're having a harder time adjusting. Suffice it to say that there were many showers and much napping once we finally made it back to the house!

Back to Torquay

So today Jen, Jen and I (no, that's not a typo, we now have two Jens living in the house) went back to Torquay to play in the surf. We had absolutely perfect weather - not too hot, but hot enough to make sure we didn't freeze when we were in the water. Brilliant blue sunshine, a gentle breeze, and awesome surf. The waves were HUGE - much bigger than they were two weeks ago. Jen and I are getting better at body surfing every time we go out. We definitely caught more waves today than ever before. I got tumbled and rolled by a few waves, too - thus discovering what happens if you're not quite on top of your surfboard when a big wave hits you. Ha ha! My knees are gonna be red for a little while, but no serious harm done.

I even managed to beach my board a few times! This happens when you catch a good big wave and its energy carries you all the way into shore. The only thing that stopped my board from moving forward on these huge swells was when my board finally came in contact with the sand. It was great. Once again I managed to get sand pretty much everywhere. We ate ice cream on our way back towards the bus stop in order to get the taste of the ocean out of our mouths. (I'm not kidding! I practically swallowed the last wave we rode in, and believe me, it did not taste good at all!)

We had a few complications getting home. Jen's mom was scheduled to arrive at the Melbourne airport at 8:45 this evening. If all had gone according to plan we would have had time to make it back to the house and shower (and maybe even eat something) before going out to the airport to collect her. Not so much. First the bus was late. Then there was a ton of folks getting on the bus with us and they didn't all have tickets, so the driver had to make change for them all - SLOWLY. As a result, we missed our connecting train in Geelong. Then when we finally caught the next train, there was a big bunch of guys in our carriage who were drinking (and already quite happily drunk) - and they had to be evicted by the train staff before we could proceed. The guys weren't interested in getting off the train so this took quite some time.

So in the end we got back into Southern Cross station with exactly enough time to grab the bus to the airport to meet Jen's mom. At least that part went off without a hitch, and she's now been toured around the house, fed a late dinner, and has headed off to bed. Tomorrow's going to be another full day as we head to St. Kilda markets and more beach time. Gotta take advantage of the warm summer weather here in Melbourne, as it won't last much longer!

The Drop Bear Myth - Busted!

Someone has FINALLY called me on the drop bear attack I wrote about a couple of weeks ago.

You know, this took a LOT longer than I expected. I was almost positive I'd get an inquiring email from one of my Aussie readers within the first 24 hours of that posting! (You know, something along the lines of: "Um... Becky... you DO know that drop bears don't actually exist, right?") In the end, though, it was my parents, and their friends Lucas and Anita Hellemans, who blew the whistle. They were shrewd enough to do a bit of research online and discover that drop bears are COMPLETELY MYTHICAL.

The short version of the explanation: considering how truly dangerous the Australian bush country is, it's amazing how many outsiders don't take the risks seriously and get themselves killed by doing stupid things like driving into the outback without adequate water and fuel. (Don't laugh, this actually happens pretty much every year.) Some say that the legend of the drop bear was created by Aussies as a method of exaggerating to outsiders of the dangers of the bush - "Don't go out there after dark, the drop bears will get you." Although I've not experienced this myself, I've been told that some Aussies will deliver drop bear warnings to tourists in a completely deadpan, believable way. I learned about them first through a book called "The Last Continent" by Terry Pratchett. If you're into Discworld, you'll understand. If not, well, you'll have to pick up the book and read it to get the reference.

For more information on the whole drop bear thing, check out what Wikipedia has to say, and also the Dropbear Conspiracy Page.

HONESTLY, you should all know better than to believe absolutely everything you read on the internet! Seriously now, can you really imagine me and Jen getting attacked by something like that and NOT instantly text-ing everyone we know on our cell phones? (OK, I know we had no reception for a good part of our WA trip, but still. You get my point.)

I just hope I did the Aussies proud. I tried my best to write about our fictional assault in the most factual, deadpan manner I could. :-)

Having said that, I would like to point out that everything else I've shared in this blog is absolutely, totally, 100% true. Including our adventures meeting royalty, falling in a pink lake, surfing Wave Rock, and the nature of the Aussie blow fly. Honest. And if you don't believe me... well... get yerself on a plane and come on over to check this place out for yourself!

Last Day of Peace and Quiet

So the last few weeks, life really has been moving at a slower pace. I've been reading, surfing the web, planning trip stuff, chatting with friends, and just basically bumming around. Today is my last day of such bliss for a long time. Tomorrow Jen and I (and hopefully some of our house mates, if we can convince them) are going back to Torquay for another day of body surfing. And then tomorrow night, Jen's mom arrives, and life will turn into a bit of a whirlwind as we tour, travel, snorkel, hike, and all that sort of crazy stuff. So I'm going to enjoy this last bit of relative peace and quiet.

I've been plotting out the rest of my travels here in OZ, and it struck me how soon I will be leaving this country. Where has the time gone? I know I've been busy, but there have also been weeks where I've done hardly anything at all. After all this time, I find myself feeling a little torn. I'm looking forward to going home, to getting a new apartment, buying my next car, starting my next job, and all that. But I'm not looking forward to leaving here. There's still so much to explore - not to mention having to leave all my new Aussie friends behind! I'm itching to get back to work, but I am also really enjoying having all this time off. And yes, I know exactly how much of a luxury this year off has been. I am grateful for every moment.

Teacher Strike and Other Stuff

So... today Jen's on strike!

She almost had heart palpitations when she was told last week that there would be a strike today. I mean really... she's only been teaching for a little over a week! But we were thinking of teacher strikes in terms of what's happened in Ontario the last few times, with entire school boards being shut down and lots and lots of hard feelings. No no! That's not what's going on. This is a one-day work action, and not all teachers are involved. Apparently it's not mandatory to be part of the teacher union here, which Jen and I find really strange.

So yeah, she's downtown somewhere, joining the protest. If you're interested in learning more about the issues, check out this article from today's Herald Sun.

Mark worked Jen and I rather hard at trampolining last night. I did 100 back drops in a row without dying. Jen successfully did some sort of flip whose name I can't currently remember, but she's been working on them for a long time. I strained a muscle in my arm that kept me from doing anything even remotely resembling a front drop for the rest of the night (and boy am I glad I'm not having to write on a blackboard today). Jen landed on her head at one point and kinda went 'crunch', but appears to be OK today. We're both going for massages once she's finished striking, in celebration of her first paycheck as a contracted teacher.

When I went down for breakfast this morning, I discovered we've acquired yet another new house mate. Her name is Oxana, she's from Windsor, Ontario, and yes, she's also a teacher! I think it's funny that there are more teachers in this house than any other profession.

Jen's mom should have landed in Sydney by now - she'll be touring Australia with us for the next three weeks or so. She'll be in Sydney until Saturday and then she'll fly down to join us here in Melbourne. This means that Jen and I will be spending the next two days cleaning and tidying in order to have a "mom-approved" house. :-)

My parents will be arriving in Sydney in early March, and I'll be there to meet them. For a while I wasn't sure if they would be coming at all! Dad had problems getting a visa, and then my Mom fell and broke her arm in a bad spot. But they've both been cleared and will be on their way shortly. It's been a dream of my Mom's to come to Australia for as long as I can remember, so I'm really excited!

Point Nepean National Park

Yesterday, I went on an adventure.

I've spent a ridiculous amount of time indoors these past couple of weeks and it was time for a change. So I got up when Jen got up to go to work, and rode the tram downtown with her, and headed off on my own from there. My goal for the day was to check out Point Nepean National Park, which, it turns out, is a long, long, LONG way from home. Once I'd seen Jen off on her tram towards the school, I jumped on the Frankston train and rode it all the way to its end. And from there I got on the bus to Portsea, which took me all the way to the entrance to the park. Total travel time from our house? 3 1/2 hours - one way! Good thing I took a book along with me! The route to the park took me all down the side of Port Phillip Bay, the huge bay that Melbourne is on, and the ride was actually quite pretty.

To be honest, I wasn't at all sure what to expect when I got there, but I was pleasantly surprised. I knew that the park sat at one of the headlands to Port Phillip Bay. I knew there was an old fort at the very tip. But that was about it. Apparently Point Nepean has only been open to the public since 1988. Due to its strategic location, it had previously been used as a military fortification since the 1850's or so, right up until the end of WWII. This means, among other things, that there are a lot of unexploded bombs and other ammunition laying around - so about 2/3rds of the parkland is still not accessible, for safety reasons. Even in the areas where I could explore, there were signs everywhere to tell me to stay on the path, don't go down to the beaches, etc. etc., because of the danger of unexploded bombs. Good grief!

Because of its isolation, Point Nepean shelters a number of plants and animals that are now rare elsehwere in coastal Victoria. I saw gannets, terns, dolphins, a cool lizard, and tons and tons of butterflies. It was interesting to see how the land changed as I walked towards the tip of the peninsula. On the Pacific side were sheer cliffs and pounding surf. On the Port Phillip Bay side the waters were calm, shallow, and sure looked awfully inviting to swim in. As I neared the tip of the peninsula, the trees became smaller and smaller and then were replaced entirely by scrub. All along the peninsula were a number of old military installations, now slowly crumbling away. Along with forts at Queenscliff (the other headland to the Bay), Point Nepean played an extremely important role in defending Melbourne's harbour during the gold rush years. The fortifications were manned until the end of WWII. I found the gun placements where Australia's first shots of both world wars were fired from. What was really cool was that most of the fortifications were built right into the hillsides - so there were all these tunnels to explore, and you never quite knew where you were going to end up.

The other reason I'd come here was to see The Rip, the entrance to Port Phillip Bay. It is apparently one of the most dangerous navigable stretches of water anywhere in the world. But ships who want to make port in Geelong or Melbourne have to pass through here. Only one narrow channel in the middle of the already-narrow Rip is passable for big ships, and my understanding is it's quite the operation to get through the passage. There were sure lots of satellite towers and lighthouses all along my route! I didn't get to see any big ships pass through, but even so I could still appreciate how narrow an opening The Rip is, considering the hugeness of Port Phillip Bay!

I'd walked from the visitor centre all the way out to the tip of the peninsula, about 7kms or so, and boy was I tired. I had stupidly left my knee braces AND my hiking shoes at home, so I did the whole trek in my sandals. So I wussed out and took the transporter back to the park entrance, where I bought myself an ice cream and waited for the bus to take me home, and enjoyed being off my feet. Somehow that 3 1/2 hour ride home was MUCH longer than the 3 1/2 hours out! Probably because I was getting awfully hungry.

As we pulled into Frankston, where I would swap my bus for a train, we passed by the waterfront - and there was a sand sculpture contest going on! So I hopped off the bus to go and take a closer look. Unfortunately the exhibit was closed... and it would've cost $10 to get in anyway (good grief!), so no go. Someone had inconsiderately raised a huge fence all around the sculptures so from the outside you could only see their very tops. (Hence how they could get away with charging $10 to see piles of sand. Craziness.) But there was a car park next door to where the sand sculputres were, and it had a second level, so up I climbed and managed to snap a couple of shots of the castles.

And that was basically my day! Even though it took me such a long time to get home, I still beat Jen - she'd forgotten that she had a first aid course to do for school last night. When I got home I discovered we'd acquired yet another new house mate, Rob, who's a Melbournian just returned from overseas. What with one thing and another, and a couple of good shows on TV last night, it was almost 11pm before I crawled upstairs (cursing my sore feet all the way) and into bed!

Oh - and I've added more pics on facebook from this adventure. They straddle two albums (curse Facebook's rule of only having 60 photos in an album... as if that were enough...):

Melbourne - Part Three

Melbourne - Part Four

The Docklands

Jen had a fair amount of school work to do today, plus we really needed to hit the grocery store, so we didn't wander too far afield. We did, however, take a couple of hours this afternoon to explore the Docklands, on the east side of downtown Melbourne. This is a section of the city that I just hadn't quite gotten to yet - it's a little off the beaten path from my usual haunts.

Of course, first we had to get there. And once again Metlink conspired against us. I needed to purchase a Sunday Saver card (it's cheaper to ride the system on Sunday than any other day of the week), but all of the shops we usually purchase Metcards from were either sold out or not open. So we took a bit of a scenic route to find a corner store that WAS open AND selling Metcards! Then when we'd finally made it downtown, the tram we needed to catch was (a) late, (b) stupidly full of people, and (c) stopped three blocks before our stop, at which point the driver informed us that the tram would be turning at the next corner and wouldn't be going to the Docklands today. We ended up walking the last bit out of sheer frustration. Sigh.

As you can see, there were certainly some interesting things to see in the Docklands. Like Toronto, Melbourne is trying to revitalize its waterfront (and boy, does Melbourne have a lot of waterfront!). This section used to be full of warehouses etc., but the main shipping port has moved away from the city centre, leaving a space ripe for - of course - condos and big expensive yachts. Oh, and street art. The piece shown here is called - wait for it - "Cow Up A Tree". Ha ha! I love it. And there was a very helpful plaque at the base of the sculpture, explaining its history. Apparently the inspiration for this sculpture comes from real life. When it rains here in OZ, it can POUR, and that means flash floods. It is not uncommon for cattle to find themselves stranded in the tops of trees when the floodwaters recede again! There were other sculptures as well... we were puzzled by the series of white forms titled "Silence", and even after reading the accompanying poem, have no idea what the point of the piece is.

It's Chinese New Year (kung hei fat choi!), and there were dragonboat races going on at the Docklands as part of the celebrations. I think we must've shown up near the end - there weren't all that many folks watching or racing, but it was still neat. I was kinda lusting after the shirts of one of the teams... bright, blood-red, with an awesome Chinese dragon silhouetted in black on the front. AND made of quick-dry material. Mmmm! So cool.

The random nature of the things we've come across in our wanderings continues to amaze me. Topping the "random" list today - we found a skating rink! At one end of the Docklands was a structure that looked somehting like a modern version of a circus tent. As we approached, we could hear disco music pouring out of it. And when we got right up close, we realized it was a skating rink! Not just a skating rink, really - a DISCO skating rink. Inside we found rows of lawn chairs for spectators to watch, and a small (ok, make that weenie) ice surface, about the size of the stage at my school. The interior was dark and there were dance lights set up all around the room. It was crazy! You could rent skates and go play for about $10/half hour. Ha ha! I'll wait 'till I get back home, thank you very much. But living in Ottawa does that to you - once you've skated on the canal, there's no going back!

State Training Event

So today, Jen and I attended part of a State-level training for Guider Trainers here in Victoria, as special guests! We'd met Lynne Emblin, the State's Training Advisor, when we were up at the camp in Chiltern in the spring. She invited us to come along to today's training and give a talk about Guiding in Canada. So we did!

I am embarrassed to say that I actually had to do some RESEARCH into Canadian Guiding in order to feel confident at the training. I've been a Guider "in the trenches", as it were, for a long time, but for one reason or another, my grasp on Guiding history has been fuzzier than I would like. Add to that all the programming changes that have happened in the past few years, and the restructuring of our administration in Ontario this past year, and it was quite a challenge for me to ensure we were giving accurate information.

It was a blast, though. I put together a powerpoint presentation about the different branches of Guiding. I borrowed (acquired? stole?) a whole lot of images off the National website - the online store was a treasure trove for graphics of badges and pins and uniforms! Jen and I came up with a song, game or activity typical to each level of Guiding, so as we went through the presentation, we broke up all the talk with fun stuff. And at the end we taught some Canadian songs and games, and it was great.

As a thank you, we received our very own, certified, limited-edition "Tori" bears, the official mascot of Guiding here in Victoria. They're so cute! I like that they're wearing the Australian Guide uniform - what a great thing for us to be able to share with our own units when we return to Canada. And did I mention that they're cute??

The other great thing is that we made contacts with a number of leaders who would like us to come and play with their units. We're thrilled. Since we've been in summer holidays for the last two months or so, the number of Guiding activities has been limited. Looks like things are about to pick up!

PS - once again, Metlink was conspiring against us. We got to the train platform this morning to discover that, once again, our train wasn't going to be running. Gah. And then at another point on our journey when we had to switch trains at an unfamiliar station, we almost missed our outgoing train because we couldn't figure out how to get to that side of the platform! Thank goodness that Kathy, one of the Guiders at the training, was kind enough to drive us home. The trip out to get to the training was stressful enough.

Comings and Goings

I actually meant to write this last night but I got sucked into a good movie on the big TV downstairs, and before I knew it, it was bed time! (Gads I sound old when I say stuff like that.)

This has been a busy week of comings and goings at our house here. Julianna, our British doctor, headed home to England last weekend. Also on the weekend, we added another Canadian teacher named Jen to our crew - she's originally from Peterborough but has moved her home base to Calgary, and is now doing relief teaching like *my* Jen was last term. Then Olivier, our French computer guy, was unable to find work here in Melbourne so he took off for Singapore on Wednesday. And yesterday I got home to discover that a couple had moved in to one of the other double rooms. Daniel's from South Carolina and his girlfriend Lucy is from right here in Melbourne.

And we still have empty rooms! Our landlord really jacked up the rents for new folks coming in, so it's not surprising me that he's having a hard time filling the place. But there's a huge housing shortage in Melbourne right now, so I'm pretty sure it's only a matter of time. Our landlord has been in every day this week, showing the place off to potential renters.

The weather's been grey and cool and wet all week, and while I know that's not nearly as crummy as what most of my friends have been dealing with in Canada, it's been a bit of a bummer. There looks to be some hope of sunshine today, which is good, as Jen and I are about to head off to help run a training for local Guiders. Toodle-oo!

Quarantine

OK, so it's taken almost 6 months, but we finally managed to get something quarantined by Australia Post!

Way back in October, Jen's grandma mailed her a parcel (by sea) which was supposed to reach us in time for Christmas. Well, it never arrived. We'd kinda given up hope of ever seeing it when it still hadn't shown up by the time we got back from WA, especially since the parcel from my parents, which had also been shipped by sea and several weeks later than Jen's grandma's parcel, did arrive. So yesterday when I poked my head outside in the rain to check the mail, I was pleasantly surprised to find the parcel sitting on our doorstep.

Like every other parcel we've received, it had been opened by Quarantine. This no longer surprises us. In fact, it's become kind of a game to find out whether or not our mail has "passed inspection". I mean, really - either our address raises red flags in the Quarantine office, or it is just routine to for them to open every single parcel that crosses the border. We have accumulated quite the collection of "What Can't be Mailed to Australia" pamphlets.

Well, this time, they actually kept something! Most of the parcel passed inspection, but apparently Jen's grandma had included a small Christmas tree or decoration of some kind that had a wooden base, and that's a big no-no. So in the parcel Jen had a nice long letter from the Quarantine folks, telling her that if she wanted the ornament, she would have to pay to have it irradiated, and it would cost $45! Oh, and it would take another 6-8 weeks to get to us.

Good grief!

So, no Christmas ornament for us. It's well past the season now anyways. :-)

Jen was so happy to get her parcel at last - even if she didn't really get to have all of it! Now I'm just waiting for the one I know my grandma mailed, and then we will finally have acquired all of our Christmas parcels from home!

Our WA Trip - Part Ten - Back in Adelaide

When we were actually IN Adelaide at the end of January I wrote a bit in the blog about our adventures. I mean really, it was more of a rant than anything. But I've finally reached the point in recounting our WA adventures where we've made it back to Adelaide, and I can wrap up the story. And about time, too! I'm getting a wee bit sick of sitting at the computer.

So... I'd last left off with Jen and I going to sleep on the train on the Monday night, secure in the knowledge that we'd be arriving in Adelaide early Tuesday morning. Well, Tuesday sure started bright and early - 6am in fact - with the train staff switching on the lights in the carriages and playing this really annoying, overly cheerful music. Yuck. So we grumpily got up, packed all our stuff, ate our breakfast (including the rest of our fruit, since we couldn't take it cross the border, i.e., off the train), and settled in to watch the last of the scenery flow by. This train ride really was much easier and somehow smoother than our outbound trip, but we were still looking forward to getting off.

Unfortunately, as we were passing through the outskirts of Adelaide, our train struck and killed someone who was crossing the tracks illegally. We didn't feel anything - the train just came to a rather abrupt halt on the tracks, blocking a road (which I thought was strange). Then when the announcement came over the PA that there had been an "unfortunate incident" and that the train had to hold where it was until the "police and ambulance arrived", Jen turned to me and said "They shouldn't lie. They're not waiting for an ambulance, they're waiting for the coroner." Jen worked the VIA trains for a year before going to teachers' college, so she had a pretty good idea what was likely happening. In the end the train was delayed for two hours and we didn't pull into the station until almost 10am. Which wasn't so bad for us, since we were getting off, but all the folks who were going through to Sydney lost their ability to tour Adelaide, as the train was now well behind schedule. Yikes.

And after all that, when we finally made it to the hostel, it was still a little too early for us to be able to check in and put our gear in our room. So we left it in the lobby like we did last time and headed off to the central markets to check them out. (We have a bit of a thing for markets.) The markets in Adelaide are small compared to some of the others we've visited, but they kept us entertained for a couple of hours. The markets back on to Adelaide's Chinatown, and we ended up in a teeny little hole-in-the wall Chinese restaurant for lunch. So like Toronto! It was great. Then it was back to the hostel with a load of groceries.

The train trip had tired us out (again), so we took turns napping and taking showers, and headed out to do some more exploring in the late afternoon. We wandered back to the downtown to visit the Art Gallery of South Australia, yet another excellent - and free - institution. We loved this gallery! Many of the paintings had informative blurbs beside them to explain something about the artist's past, or why the painting was historically significant. The security guard at the gallery was really funny (well, either that or really bored)... he kept coming up to us and telling us that he'd painted the piece we were currently looking at. Or he'd offer his opinion on the art, which wasn't all that flattering. We laughed at his description of some of the post-modern stuff, you know, the kind of art that Jen and I both "don't get"... well, the security guy shared our opinion too - and loudly!

The art gallery closed at 5 and we ran out of time to see it all - again. But we didn't want to head back to the hostel quite yet so we decided to try and follow the walking tour of downtown Adelaide as described in Lonely Planet. Well, we got a little bit lost. (I'd blame jet lag from our traveling but I don't think it works that way when you're on a train.) Anyhow, we ended up wandering through the downtown core, along the river, and through a portion of the Botanical Gardens before we got so turned around we decided to strike out for a main road and find our way back to the hostel. As we wandered down Rundle Street, we noticed a few oddities. First off, there was all this money embedded in the sidewalk, all down the street. Strange. And then we passed the Scout Shop. I saw the sign first, and figured it'd be like our Scout and Guide shops at home, where they sell uniforms, some basic camping gear, etc. NOT SO MUCH! This Scout Shop would've given MEC a run for its money - and all the proceeds from the store go to support Scouting in South Australia. What a fabulous idea! Why aren't we doing this in Canada??

The rest of the evening was spent at the hostel. Since we'd eaten out for lunch, we cooked our dinner at the hostel and ate in the common room. A whole bunch of folks were watching a fairly violent movie on the TV, in which there was a lot of swearing and blood and everyone died. Fun. And then we basically crawled off to bed!

The next morning, we'd promised ourselves we were going to spend the morning at Glenelg, where the beach is. And that was the Day Of No Waves. But I've already ranted about that whole experience earlier in the blog, so I'm not going to repeat it here. We basically spent the entire day in Glenelg, although we did head back to the hostel for lunch and a shower so we wouldn't be all crusty after our swim in the un-wavy water.

The afternoon's activities were pretty cool. We visited the Rodney Fox Shark Experience and learned more about shark attacks in Australia than I think was strictly necessary. Rodney Fox got into the Australian history books after surviving a great white attack back in the 1970's. The photos of his injuries are pretty horrific. After he'd recovered, Rodney became fascinated by sharks and spent the rest of his life researching them and advocating for them. I didn't learn much new information, but the exhibits were great.

We also visited the Bay Discovery Centre, which has displays all about the local history. We were there right before closing so we didn't get to go through it all. However the tour guide/host really stole all our attention... he was creepy! He seemed friendly enough at first, but then quickly went off into this big long rant about how important it was to know our history, and what the significance of Confederation was, and on and on and on. When he discovered that we were Canadian, his remark was "Oh. I had some of your type in here earlier. They couldn't speak English either." Now he might have been just trying to "take the piss out of us" (as the local saying goes), but still. I thought he was quite rude. Jen's also convinced he was trying to make advances on me, although I was completely oblivious to this at the time. (And I'm glad - the man was well into his 70's! EEEEW!)

Jen and I were supposed to meet a local Guider and some of her girls that evening, but unfortunately she had to cancel at the last moment due to a family emergency. So instead we enjoyed a leisurely dinner at a gourmet burger bar, where we ate far too much. We took the tram back into the city and got off several stops further than was strictly necessary, so we could walk off some of our dinner before heading back to the hostel. And that was our second day in Adelaide!

Thursday the 24th was the last full 'touring' day of our trip. We started it off in grand style by sleeping in, until all the other girls sharing our dorm room had headed out for the day. Jen and I both still had some souvenir shopping we wanted to get done, so we headed back downtown to finish that off before heading to the local Aboriginal Cultural Centre around 11:30. What a wonderful place. We watched a 45-minute film on the 5 seasons that the Aborigines of North Queensland recognize, and enjoyed a digeridoo performance as well. The artist who played the digeridoo for us was great. He used the instrument to make the sounds of a variety of animals, like kangaroos and dingoes. But he also made up a song about hitch-hiking and did a great impersonation of an Indy 500 car racing down the track! Ha ha! And yes, I finally broke down and bought a horribly stereotypical Aussie souvenir - a boomerang! But it's a real returning boomerang. AND it's left-handed! How could I resist?

The rest of the day really was pretty lazy. Neither Jen nor I wanted to spend more money, or go back to the beach (it wasn't quite warm enough), so we ended up wandering back through the Botanical Gardens, across the river to North Adelaide, past the cricket grounds (the big test match between India and Australia was going on, so the cricket grounds were PACKED), and back through the far side of downtown. We enjoyed a delicious dinner at a teeny little sushi restaurant. We found yet another internet cafe and spent some time catching up with the world, and then it was time to head back to the hostel.

The funniest part of the day was when we got back to our room! One of our other room-mates was already there, reading a book on her bed. We chatted with her for a while and discovered that she was from Sydney and traveling around the country. Jen and I still had cricket on the brain, since we'd passed the cricket oval, so we asked Sally (our room-mate) to explain cricket for us. It's such a complicated game! At first, I don't think she thought we were serious. But as it became more and more apparent how little we understood of the game, she rose to the challenge. Turns out that she too is a teacher, and it showed - she ended up drawing a diagram on the floor of our room, using a pillow for the mound and two thongs (flip flops, not underwear) to represent the batters. It was great! And Jen and I came away understanding at least SOME things about this mysterious game! We're going to have to kidnap one of our Aussie friends and drag them off to a game and get them to explain what's going on blow-by-blow, I think.

And that brings us to the end of our WA adventures! We caught the train back to Melbourne early the next morning. The Overland was a pleasure to ride after all the days on the Indian Pacific, and somehow the 10-hour ride passed quickly. It felt SO GOOD to be home - to know the transit system, to know where the good pizza was, and above all, to sleep in our own beds!

Ever since we returned, I've been basically chained to my computer, typing up these ridiculously long blogs, catching up on a ton of email and reading, and trying to figure out what the heck I'm gonna do this summer. It'll be nice to take a break from all that tomorrow and go out and get some fresh air!

Our WA Trip - Part Nine - Rottnest Island and Back Across the GAFA

Time for another WA Adventure installment!

Jen and I spent our last day in Western Australia at Rottnest Island, which is about a half hour's boat ride off the coast of Perth in the Indian Ocean. The island was named "Rottnest" by the English colonists, who mistakenly thought that the marsupials on the island were large rats. In fact, the critters are quokkas, and they're related to kangaroos. And they're so cute! More on them later. Rottnest Island was originally used as a prison site for Aboriginals who had been convicted of committing crimes, and sadly many inmates died of despair on the island, bereft of their traditional homelands and social structures. These days, however, the island is a resort/retreat, playing much the same role that the Toronto Islands do in the GTA. Jen and I caught an early ferry out so we could spend the entire day on the island.

We were a little worried about the weather as we were departing the ferry dock in Fremantle... it was cloudy and cool and not at all looking like it'd be a good day to spend on the water! Fortunately the ferry itself was totally enclosed, so we didn't completely freeze on the way over. The ferry was actually pretty cool. It was like a cross between a catamaran (it was double-hulled) and a speedboat. And speed it did! The waves on the open ocean were pretty big and the boat bounced and sloshed its way across to Rottnest. Watching the spray dribbling down the outsides of the windows, I was glad that we were inside the boat for the ride!

We disembarked at the jetty at Thompson Beach and headed straight for the information centre to figure out where to go next. Rottnest is pretty big... about 12kms from end to end, so we knew there was no way we'd make it around the island by walking alone. There was a shuttle bus that did regular routes around the island, so we bought day trip tickets. The next stop was the surf shop so I could rent a mask and snorkel (although I got a set myself for Christmas, I stupidly didn't bring them with me on the WA trip. At least I had my new flippers!). Jen and I had hauled our boogie boards with us too, in the hopes that we'd find a surf beach. The only little glitch at the start of the day was when we realized that there would be nowhere on the island's many beaches to safely leave things like our passports and wallets, while we went snorkeling. Fortunately there were lockers at the ferry landing, so we locked all our valuables away. So sadly, I have no photos of Rottnest, 'cause the camera was locked away too. Ah well! That's what postcards are for.

So with no further ado we hopped on the bus and headed for our first destination, Little Salmon Bay. We'd learned that there was a - get this - underwater nature trail here, for snorkelers! How cool is that? So we strapped on our gear and waded into the water (screeching for the first bit 'cause it doesn't seem to mater where we go, the ocean is blasted cold!). By this time the sun had come out and the day was slowly warming up. We quickly found the first marker, which was a bronze plaque set into a concrete on the ocean floor. There were handles bolted to the sides of the plaque so you could dive down and hold on while you read it. So that's what we did! We followed the trail of plaques all around the bay, reading about the various underwater habitats represented, and seeing lots of different fish. It was great. I could happily snorkel all day, every day, if the opportunity presented itself!

As much fun as the snorkeling was, we had to be careful we didn't swim out too far away from the shore, in case we got too tired to be able to swim back again. It's deceptive how far you can swim with flippers on! And of course we tried our best to stick together, but that proved to be a bit of a challenge because all the clothes I wear when I swim (including my flippers) are black! Jen kept complaining that I was hard to spot in the water if I was any distance away. Jen, fortunately, was easy to spot, because her swimming flippers are bright orange. Anyway, we eventually got cold enough that we got out of the water, dried off, ate lunch, and spent some time catching some rays on the beach in an effort to warm up.

Now, I'd been wondering about the snakes here in Australia. The way some of my books read, you'd think there was a snake under every rock and in every lawn. But up until our visit to Rottnest, we hadn't seen one. As we were sitting on the beach enjoying the sunshine, I caught movement out of the corner of my eye. When I turned, I discovered that it was a snake - and it was heading straight for where Jen was snoozing! So I very calmly told her "Jen, you need to roll to your right, there's a snake coming your way." And she did! Calmly! I have no idea what sort of snake it was - it was about 2 feet long, slender, and dark brown or black. I didn't see its underbelly. But in a land where so many critters are venomous, why take chances? We both calmly got up and gave the snake a wide berth. By this time, other folks around us were aware that something was going on, and getting up, too. The snake seemed inclined to slither its way right across the beach, through a sizable crowd of people, and that was just asking for trouble. So we waved our towels and shoes (not with feet in them!) in front of the snake's nose (but not too close!) and got it to change direction and head back into the dunes. Phew!

We headed back into the water shortly thereafter to explore a part of the bay that we hadn't in the morning. This turned out to be even better snorkeling! The water was deeper (probably about 20 feet) and there was all this kelp. We saw some huge fish (3ft long or more) here which I later ID'd as bream. Again, it was totally great. But we'd promised ourselves that we would also try to do some boogie boarding, since this would be our last opportunity in WA and we hadn't yet used our boards on this coast. So all too soon we were back out of the water and on the bus, looking for a surf beach.

I guess that good surfing days don't happen at the same time as good snorkeling days. Although there were several surf beaches marked on our map of the island, there were no waves at any of them. So reluctantly we stayed on the bus and kept hoping to find something better. No luck. We eventually got off the bus at The Basin, the closest snorkeling beach to the main ferry jetty, where we snorkeled for another hour or so. Here the fish and environment were totally different again. There were these great underwater rock stacks, arches, and caverns where the fish could hide. I didn't want to get out of the water.

In fact, we almost missed our ferry back to the mainland! We had to walk from The Basin back to the ferry, and it was further than it looked. Then, along our way, we finally saw one of the island's famous quokkas, so we went over to get a closer look. The quokkas are really tame, and this one hopped right up to my outstretched hand and sniffed me! Apparently I wasn't all that interesting (read: I had no food) so it quickly hopped away again, but still. So cute! We also stopped to grab some french fries before heading out to the ferry... which I was sure was leaving at 4:45... only to find out that it was leaving at 4:30 and we were the last passengers on board! Yikes!

When we got back to Pat and Rob's, we did one last load of laundry, and then presented our Perth hosts with their thank-you presents - some goodies we'd brought from Canada and a new box of laundry soap!

We caught the Indian Pacific back to Adelaide on January 20th. Pat and Rob were kind enough to drive us back to the train station and see us safely on our way. I must admit, both Jen and I weren't really looking forward to the ride back, considering how miserable and uncomfortable the ride out was. But it appeared that our luck was changing at last. This train was only about half the length of the one we'd come out on, and there was only one car of day-nighter seats, instead of two. This meant that there would be half as many of us vying for space in the lounge car. Also, the seats in this train were a little bit wider and a LOT more comfortable, and had a lot more leg room. Hooray!

The train stopped in Kalgoorlie again on its way to the Nullarbor, even later at night than it did when we were coming west. This time 'round, we took the whistle stop coach tour. It was COLD. Remembering that the last time we passed through Kalgoorlie, it had been somewhere around 38C at 10pm, this time it was only 25C, with a sharp cold wind. That's the coldest temperature we'd experienced in three weeks, and we felt it (all the while thinking how ridiculous it was that we needed our fleeces at 25C)! The tour was certainly very informative - as we trundled through the sleeping town, the coach driver educated us on various aspects of the town's history and architecture. However he had a very creepy, uber-stereotypical tour operator voice which kept distracting us from his actual words.

The highlight of the tour was stopping at the Super Pit, which is the largest open-pit gold mine in the world. Currently the pit is about 3km long, 1km wide, and over 400m deep. The picture I've linked to here is terrible, but remember I was shooting it at almost midnight! It was pretty incredible looking down into it, and knowing that the teeny little trucks I was seeing were in reality huge mining trucks as large as a house. Kinda put things in perspective, I guess you could say!

The... ah... lowlight (?) of the tour was near the end, when the bus drove down Hay Street. This section of Kalgoorlie is famous for its brothels. And apparently was only half a block away from where Jen and I had gone exploring on our outbound trip! Ha ha! The tour guide went into quite a lot of detail on the history of the brothels in Kalgoorlie, and pointed out that one of the establishments actually does brothel tours every afternoon, where you can go in and learn... um... first-hand... what goes on in there. Apparently the brothels are legal, but prostitution is not. So as long as the... um... business is conducted inside the buildings, everything is fine. Oh, and each establishment must also run a legit business of some sort, so they're all bars as well (and popular ones, too!).

Once we were back on the train, we settled down to sleep. The chairs were comfy enough that we were both able to sleep sitting up, instead of contorted into all sorts of strange positions like we'd tried on the way out. Thank goodness!!

The 21st passed pretty uneventfully, as we spent the entire day on the train. Our "battle plan", as it were, was to spend as much time as we physically could in the lounge car instead of in our seats. At least in the lounge there were tables, and places to prop our feet up, and better windows to see out of, and more comfy chairs. So that's where we stayed. For pretty much the entire day. We stretched our legs at Cook when the train stopped to refuel, and realized that there were no flies! How strange... why are there no flies in Cook when they appear to be absolutely everywhere else in this land?

Jen had discovered the day before that she'd burned the back sides of her calf muscles quite nicely when we went snorkeling. Yes, she did put on sunscreen. She had to spend a good portion of the train ride to Adelaide applying copious amounts of aloe vera gel to her legs. This meant that, by the end of our second day on the train, her legs had taken on a distinctively green (and mouldy) appearance. Once again - poor Jen!

The train ride back had its moments, too. There were a number of other 'regulars' who camped out in the lounge car with us for most of the trip. One lady, I swear, didn't stop talking AT ALL. On the other hand, eavesdropping on her conversations was interesting. I'm pretty sure she rode the train across the country on a regular basis. At one point while we were in the Nullarbor she was remarking to her friends that when she'd passed through in December, it was bucketing down rain and the enitre plain was flooded - they couldn't even gte off the train at Cook - and that this was the greenest she'd ever seen the Nullarbor! You've seen my pictures - does this look green to you? Looking out over that bleak landscape, I was having a hard time reconciling the idea that I was seeing a LUSH and GREEN Nullarbor. What in heavens name did the place look like when it was truly dry? The train also stopped at one point in the middle of absolutely nowhere on the Nullarbor to drop somebody off. As in, we watched the guy step off the train, get into a waiting ute with a friend, and drive off across the plain - not that there was a road or landmarks or anything. I assume they were off to work at a sheep station or something.

And so we passed our last night on the train, secure in the knowledge that we'd be pulling into Adelaide around 7:30 the next morning, and we'd have the whole day to explore the town and maybe even get back to the beach...