The Nist Walkabout

Sunrise Surprise...

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 06:33:00 +0000

Jay and Karen left on Sunday after spending 3 weeks either visiting us or traveling the Southern Hemisphere. I've got a lot of photos (though Jay has more) and stories to tell, but I want to begin with their last day here cause it was AWESOME.

The entire time we have been here I had been planning on getting up to watch the sun rise over the ocean up at the Narrabeen Rock Pool and the headlands... but I am one who enjoys sleep so I hadn't done it. Well, Jay likes taking pictures more than me so I thought it would be a good idea for the four of use (always include the wives!) to get up and watch the sun come up. Well, sunrise was supposed to be at 6:10 so when the alarm went off at 5:40 AM, there was much weeping and gnashing of teeth. More than once I said, "If you don't want to go, we don't have to." Still, everyone got up, bundled up in sweatshirts and trundled down to the car to make it the 1.5 miles up to the rock pool in time for sunrise.

Is that gorgeous, or what?

Clarice took this awesome shot horizontally, but I cropped it into a vertical shot to accentuate the awesome sun glare on the still waters sitting on top the rocks

Get a load of the COLOR in the morning light!

And what a sunrise! I set up my tripod and fired away. Jay and Clarice took a bunch of shots as well. I was worried when there were no clouds in the sky except a long line along the eastern horizon. Clouds make the sunrise more interesting, but I didn't want to block it out altogether! Well, I needn't have worried, just been more patient. As the sun crept up past the cloud layer we were blessed with a beautiful morning!

We stayed and watched for over an hour. An older gentleman, we guessed last 60's, showed up and began swimming laps (yes, in a speedo) in the pool! It was around 55 degrees Fahrenheit! I asked, "Are you crazy?" to which he replied, "It's fine once you get in and get moving." I'm still betting he was missing a few marbles, but I can only hope to be healthy enough to go for a morning ocean swim in 55 degree weather when I am his age. Good on him, I say!

As we were getting ready to head home for showers, I noticed a kayaker making his way out around the headlands moving to our left, and I decided it would be a cool shot with him silhouetted against the sun's backdrop. I had just taken my shots and was turning to head back to the car when I noticed what I thought was a whale blow from right behind the kayak. Thinking I was just tired, I waited until I saw it again, then asked Clarice if she saw it, too. By now I was convinced and led the troop (at a brisk trot) up the 100 or so stairs to the top of the headlands. Out of breath at the top, I saw another gentleman looking out to sea with massive binoculars. Between breaths I gasped, "Is it still there," to which he replied, "Oh yes. All 4 of them." I'll tell you this, all 3 times I've spotted whales in the last couple of months it is only because I was looking at something else and noticed the blow nearby. But what a wonderful addition to our morning! The gentleman shared his binoculars and I whipped out my telephoto lens for some photos. they were moving so I couldn't use the tripod, and the sun was almost directly behind them so the shots we not great, but who cares?

The Kayaker I have to thank for helping me spot the whales. He had the best seat in the house!

The whales playing off the headlands

No way to confuse something that big with...

These cute and comparatively little guys!

We watched for a bit when we spotted a pod of dolphins swimming closer to shore! And another pod a little further out. We guessed 8-10 in each pod, we followed the dolphins back around the headland where they played and "surfed" down the waves next to a bunch of surfers before heading back out to sea. Best way to start the morning!

After showers, we took in breakfast at a nice little coffee place Clarice had been wanting to try for breakfast called the Narrow Bean. Get it? Narrabeen - Narrow Bean? Yeah, hilarious. The food was excellent and I'm told the coffee was as well.

We were meeting Paul and Amber in Manly for dinner, so we decided to head down a little early, walk along the beach and corso, and generally relax. First we stopped along the way and walked around Long Reef. It is another fabulous walk around the Long Reef Headlands winding around the golf course and offering spectacular views. We spotted what I thought was a peregrine falcon hovering in the breeze. It was wierd to see a bird stationary in the air as it let the wind hold it aloft. It landed and I got some good close-ups before it flew away... to defend it's nest from a big black crow! The dogfight lasted a good 10 minutes with the little bird clearly dominating the bigger crow until the crow finally gave up and flew off. As we followed the fight along the path, we came across a many with the biggest zoom lens I have even seen shooting the birds. I asked if it was a falcon and he told me, "No, its a kestrel". Huh. Have to Google that one. Turns out he was spot on! Wikipedia (a source I tell my students to never cite) says, "Kestrels are most easily distinguished by their typical hunting behaviour which is to hover at a height of around 10–20 metres (33–66 ft) over open country and swoop down on prey, usually small mammals, lizards or large insects." That's exactly what this bird was doing!

At first I was a little disappointed about the kite surfer and plane in the shot on the left, but now they are growing on me.

Left -Kestrel "hovering" in air. Right - He was moving pretty good in this one.

The "Dogfight"

Compare these close-ups of the bird we saw with these...

Left - Peregrine Falcon; Right - Kestrel
Fairly certain the man was right - we saw a kestral

Just a nice shot of the Morning Glories along the walk

Eventually we met up with Paul and Amber and continued the walk since we were early for our dinner booking. We did the short walk from Manly to Shelly Beach and hiked up the path to that headlands. Just a beautiful late afternoon enjoying the view from the lookouts. Clarice sys, "Look dolphins," and I almost doubted here because of our experience that morning. Nope, she was spot on! Another pod of dolphins (or maybe the same one, who knows...) made there way into the beach area, had a feed in the waters of the protected sea life area, then headed back out to sea. Another nice bit to watch and a great way to end the walks for the day.

Jay and Karen with what else... coffee!!

Dinner was at my favorite restaurant in Australia - Ribs and Rumps. The other Americans from Clarice's project went there almost every night when they were here for 2 weeks when we first arrived and I got to tag along one night. Clarice took me back for my birthday last year, and we've made it back another couple of times. The meat is terrific, but I have to say, the chicken is to-die-for! After dinner we said goodbye to Paul and Amber and headed home to bed. Long day, but totally one of my favorites of our time Down Under.

Tennis Anyone?

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 07:03:00 +0000

We would probably play more tennis here in Aus, but there are no free public courts. Everywhere you go you have to pay a fee to hire a court. Bummer. Still, its not too terribly expensive and we've played several times with the Brenners and Stuarts. Always a good way to get some exercise while still having fun.

Jon and Paul serving

Megan serving and Lach returning serve

No pics of Clarice (she was taking the pictures) and I think Amber was watching the Stuart kids during this game. Clarice and I keep getting our butts kicked (well mostly me...)

Adelaide and Kangaroo Island...

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 06:13:00 +0000

A couple of weeks after we got back from the Whitsundays, I had a long weekend planned so that Clarice could get away from work and relax a bit. I had wanted to go to Fiji or one of those islands, but it would take too long to fly there to warrant the expense, so instead we were headed to Kangaroo Island south of Adelaide in South Australia.

Friday evening we flew in to Adelaide, got our hire car and found our way to our hotel for the evening. Nothing fancy, just a place to sleep before our early wake up to make the 8:00 AM car ferry to Kangaroo Island. Neither of us slept especially well though due to the loud party people in the streets outside. The drive from Adelaide to the ferry was supposed to take 2 hours (we were told) but we made it in 1.5.

After loading the car, we enjoyed a nice 45 minute ferry ride over to Penneshaw. Since we only had a day, our plan was to get over to the west side right away (since the biggest national park - Flinders Chade NP - is over there) and take our time seeing the sights on the way back east to Kingscote.

While KI is not very large, it took another 1.5 hours to get over to Flinder's Chase National Park. We stopped in the Visitor's Centre, then drove the winding road out to Cape Du Couedic to see the lighthouse and the Admiral's Arch. (Note: Why is it when someone sees a rock arch along a shoreling they immediately name it "Admiral's Arch"? Who is this admiral everyone is sucking up to?)

Long and close ups of The Arch

Admiral's Arch, beside being an impressive rock formation, is also a protected breeding environment for New Zealand fur seals. They were everywhere and there were plenty of pups barking around - an unexpected bonus!

Next was something Clarice had heard about called "The Remarkable Rocks". They were, well, remarkable. We climbed all over them and took a ton of photos. Most had an orange lichen growing on them and that, combined with the blue ocean and green vegetation, made for some marvelous photos.

The next stop was the Koala Walk where we modified a game car game the Williams family plays called "spot-o" into a koala hunting game. The walk was a nice tree-lined affair, very similar to the stereotypical tree-lined drive at southern plantation houses in the deep south. The walk was self service, having only an "honor jar" to donate money for the protection of koalas. We had a very enjoyable half hour calling out, "spot-o!" every time we found one of them sleeping in the crook of a tree.

From there we went to the Seal Bay and took a guided tour along the beach, a protected area for Australian sea lions. Like the fur seals, there were plenty of pups who were curious enough to come right up to us, though we were careful to give them plenty of distance and not harass them at all. Let me tell you from firsthand experience - sea lion poop smells downright awful!

Last stop for the day, after checking in to our hotel and grabbing dinner at a local pizza place (natch) was to take a nature walk to see the Little (Fairy) Penguins. We were introduced to these little guys in Tasmania and could not pass up an opportunity to see them again. They are only about a foot tall (if that) and are so cute as they make their way up the beach and rocks to the chicks waiting in the nest calling out for mommy and daddy.

Clarice took this one JUST at the same time another lady did a naughty - used her flash! Shame!

Another early (7:30 AM) ferry ride had us driving back to Adelaide the next morning. We spent the day shopping, looking at architecture and stopping at William Ayers house. Ayers was an explorer, rancher and statesman who became very wealthy. His home sits in the middle of downtown Adelaide and is now open for tours where a variety of his (and other's) Victorian Era antiques are on display. It was pretty interesting learning a bit more Aussie history.

That evening we flew home to Sydney. Short "long weekend" but we saw more of Australia and really enjoyed all of the wildlife we got to see in its natural habitats.

Crusing the Whitsundays... Days 6, 7 & 8...

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 02:47:00 +0000

Day 6. We had seen all of the places we really wanted to get to, and I knew Clarice's whole point in this trip was to see Whitehaven so I convinced her that a return to Whitehaven was in order. We made our way through Hook Passage and out to Border Island where some of the best snorkeling was said to be found. NOT!! Well, not for us that day. With the winds still from the north, even their light gentle breezes stirred up enough sediment to ruin the snorkeling altogether. It was a bummer for both of us, but mostly for me since the stop had been my idea and our last chance to get in a good snorkel. ***sigh***

From there it was back over to Whitehaven for more fun in the sun! We anchored in the same spot we did on Day 2, up on the north end across from Betty's beach. It was mid-afternoon when we arrived and we needed to leave enough time to get back around the point to our planned anchorage in Tongue Bay, so we played on the beach, waded in the water, watched the numerous sting rays that gather in Hill Inlet (to feed on the small fish in the inlet) and generally relax. This was the first time we didn't feel any pressure to get to our next destination so the relaxation was complete. When we anchored in Tongue Bay, we did a little recon dinghy ride chasing turtle heads all over the bay, then we sat in the fly bridge until after sunset enjoying the weather and the little turtles having dinner.

Day 7. Our last full day, we anchored in our new favorite spot off Whitehaven and Betty's Beaches and explored Hill Inlet in the dinghy. We timed the tides just right and were able to make our way deep into the inlet. We saw some outstanding bird life, some more fish and sting rays and wondered why a bigger sailboat had made their way up the inlet at high tide knowing they would be stuck until at least the next high tide. They had a lot of lines in the water so I guess the plan was a weekend of fishing in the inlet.

We spent 15 minutes watching this sand crab dig his burrow. Very interesting and fast little guy.

Saw this snail in a tide pool

When we got back to the beach we went for a last good stroll along the shore just relaxing and enjoying the weather which was perfect. When we got back to the dinghy, we noticed that another sailboat that had come around the tidal sandbar at high tide was now sitting high and dry on the sand! What did I tell you Day 1? Watch the tides!!! I had a good private giggle and took some photos via my telephoto lens so as not to embarrass the blokes in front of the pretty lady that was with them.

Beach sailboat (that they had rented) and our dinghy on the beach

Our home this trip and our planned home next time

A photographer taking a picture of me from a chopper while I take a picture of him from the beach. And another group who didn't watch the tides and got their dinghy stuck.

Sadly we had to leave Whitehaven and make our way back around Solway Passage to Turtle Bay to be in reasonable distance of the Hamilton Island Marina to drop of the boat the next day. We waited so long to leave we barely made it to Turtle Bay before sunset, but we were happily anchored and looking for turtles by the evening check-in. Turtle Bay, right? NO turtles. ***sigh***.

Day 8 consisted of us packing, cleaning and dropping off the boat at the marina in plenty of time to make our flight home to Sydney. We left our luggage with a resort concierge who was nice to watch them even though we were never guests of the resort and walked one last time through town stopping to have pizza at a cafe overlooking the harbour. As we ate, the parade of sailboats for the official start of Race Week made their way past in the passage between Hamilton and Dent Islands. From our vantage point in the cafe we could only see a never-ending line of sails slowly pass by. Quite a sight.

All in all a GREAT vacation that lived up to all expectations. Additionally, the experience "camping" on the boat reinforced for Clarice that we would have a great time hiring a campervan for our trip to New Zealand in December. So much so that we are now getting a campervan for both islands instead of finding hotels on the north island! Yay! If you EVER have a chance to visit the Whitsunday Islands - do it!

Cruising the Whitsundays... Days 4 & 5...

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 02:08:00 +0000

Day 4 started with us heading up to Blue Pearl Bay on the north coast of Hayman Island for more snorkeling. There was a group of people there when we arrived, but it was not too crowded to detract from the fun. Saw a stingray hiding under a rock along with lots of colorful fish and coral.

Our route of travel and Clarice all prepped for snorkeling

Denizens of the deep

After snorkeling for quite a while, we made our way to Hayman Island Resort to top off the fresh water tank on the boat and purchase a few goodies to eat. From there we decided to lunch on the small island of Black Island situated right in the middle of the ring of islands. We had a small beach to ourselves and enjoyed the sun and lunch. Jon went for a quick snorkel (saw another turtle!) before a nice man warned us the tide was dropping quickly and we needed to get off or be stuck there all afternoon. He was kewl and helped us navigate our dinghy around the coral outcrops to protect the reef.

Then we made the quick jaunt over to Langford where we were told the best snorkeling was to be found if we wanted to see turtles. Unfortunately the wind had shifted to come from the north, stirring up sediment and making visibility drop. Jon went for a quick swim while Clarice enjoyed the sun on the beach.

Lobster hiding and one of several giant sea slugs

Another sting ray caught while swimming and some of the plant life after the tide had left

Since the wind was coming from the north, we decided that night's anchorage should be Nara Inlet since it was protected from the winds. The ride south along Hook Island was the worst of the entire trip! The winds were at their worst causing huge waves that we had to fight just to make headway. It took a good 2 hours to get around to Nara Inlet, but not before everything in the front bedroom was soaked. We had forgotten the window hatch as open until a couple of big waves crashed over the bow. Oh well, things will dry. The evening was spent in tranquility in Refuge Bay in Nara Inlet, safely protected from the winds that, thankfully, dropped over night.

Day 5 - We started with a tour of the inlet in the dinghy and a brief hike to see some Aboriginal cave paintings. Sea turtles were everywhere and it was easy to spot their little heads popping up for a breath as they enjoyed their breakfast. We even had the opportunity to watch a couple of sea eagles fly overhead for a while before heading back to their nest. In the 70's and 80's boaters used to paint their boat names on the rock outcroppings of Nara Inlet, a practice that is outlawed today, but a lot of boat names remain.

Aboriginal Cave Paintings

Sea Eagle and morning at Refuge Bay

Boat names painted on the rock by visitors of old

Next we hopped over to Macona Inlet, but as we were making our way over there Jon spotted movement near a sailboat he had been watching. Convinced it was something, we turned and motored int hat direction for a little while (south towards Cid Harbour). We almost gave up and decided Jon was wrong when we spotted the whales! Two whales, a mommy and her very young calf (the calf was tiny compared to a full grown whale) were making their way south. We slowed, keeping a safe distance, and enjoyed watching them for quite a while when the baby breached!!! Something we have both always wanted to see, the little guy suddenly popped out of the water, rolled over and landed on its back with a huge splash. Thankfully Jon was watching through his telephoto lens and got a couple of shots - but the whale shot is a bit blurry due to the moving boat. Oh well, the splash is nice an crisp! Truely something neither of us will ever forget.

Mamma whale

Baby whale breaching!

We watched the whales for quite a while and then made our way over to Macona Inlet. It was a magnificent day and most everyone must have been on Whitehaven because we had the inlet almost to ourselves - much to our delight. We spent the afternoon sunning on a secluded beach and wading in the water where Jon came across about a dozen sea stars being rolled by the waves.

God's camouflage

That evening we planned on anchoring in Cid Harbour, so we left enough time to do another small hike from Sawmill Beach to Dugong Beach and back before getting back to the boat for dinner and a late episode of the original Battlestar Galactica before heading to bed. Great days!

Cruising the Whitsundays... Day 3...

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 04:26:00 +0000

For the sake of time, I'm going to eventually have to start combining days - much to my regret. We just did and saw so much it is hard to work it down to just a few snippets for you to enjoy. Oh well...

Travel day 3 - "Reddish-Brown"

We left Butterfly Bay early and backtracked just a bit to do some snorkeling along the top end of Hook Island. We were told these were the best spots and the lived up to the reputation! Our first stop was at Manta Ray Bay where we had the best snorkeling of the entire trip. Beautiful fish and coral, calm water, bright sunshine and not a single other human until we were ready to move on. Fantastic! I'm not going to inundate you with snorkeling photos (though I could) - I'm working on a snorkeling slideshow I'll add to the next post. But I have to include shots of us feeding the 3 large bat fish that swam up to our boat looking for a handout. We gave them each a couple of pieces of bread - they even ate some straight from Jon's hand!

Clarice took a video on her camera, but the camera is dying and videos won't play well.

Instead of moving the whole boat, we took the dinghy to the next bay over - Luncheon Bay - for a hike along its "beach" made entirely of broken bits of coral. Glad we brought the shoes as the book suggested. We're slowly moving along when Clarice says, "Look! Turtle!" Now after red pandas my favorite animals are sea turtles (of any variety) so I was a bit skeptical. I said, "Probably just a big fish..." and no sooner were the words out of my mouth than the turtle popped his little head out of the blue waters. But we didn't bring the camera! No matter, in a very "Steve Irwin" moment I had my mask on and was overboard almost before Clarice could say, "Do you want to get out?" This little guys was perfectly happy just lazily moving on his merry way, but I got 4-5 minutes to swim alongside him since I made sure to keep my arms tucked in and leave him a bit of space. Awesome!

Some fun trees. Check out the roots on the one on the right!

After we made it back to the boat we were pretty tired and decided to head around Hook Island and try to have a bit of a rest at low tide on Langford Island. Langford is a bit of rock with a long shallow sandy area the appears, as if by magic, at low tide. The Hayman Island Resort (across the water on Hayman Island - natch) ferries its highfalutin guests over there for a bit of sand and sun. Russ, our charter operator, told us that Langford was the best place to go if we wanted to see sea turtles, but we were tired of the swimming and just lounged around on the beach enjoying the peacefulness of the setting. As late afternoon approached, we ducked across the little bay over to Stonehaven Anchorage for the night. Excellent choice with one of the prettiest sunsets I've ever seen.

Approaching and sitting on Langford Island

Left - James Bond likes the Whitsundays! Right - a "See Lake City" moment

Don't you wish you were here?

Sunset at Stonehaven.

We were having a GREAT time... and then Wednesday the winds came...

Everything is ORANGE!! (And not just IN Orange...)

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 07:21:00 +0000

Ok, I'll have to speed up the updates or I'll be updating until next July even though we go back to the States in December.

But TODAY deserves a special post. EVERYTHING IS ORANGE!!! Well, it was this morning. There was a giant dust storm in the west that moved through Sydney in the early morning hours. I had to take Clarice to work and traffic was extra horrible since the storm forced ferries to stop running, planes from taking off, people from driving rapidly, people from walking to work...

I took a few shots of the Orange and then went back to sleep. Well I tried. The dust is STILL hanging in the air (it is now almost 5:30 pm) and it is very difficult to breathe - even indoors.

I want to emphasize, NONE OF THESE PHOTOS WERE ALTERED IN ANY WAY!!

Our street walking the block to the beach...

Little side circle...

Aren't Stop Signs supposed to be RED???

Walking down to the beach. The "white" is foaming waves.

Looking down along the beach

Needless to say it was a VERY strange morning. About 10:00 am a big wind system swept in making it even worse for a while before eventually blowing the storm out to sea. The wind has died down and everything is pretty much normal, but I still have crap stuck in my throat that no amount of pop/soda/Sprite can seem to remove!

Cruising the Whitsundays - Day 2...

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 06:47:00 +0000

Monday started out like every day of the trip - early. After our 7:45 radio check-in, we put on our hiking shoes and loaded the dingy for a trip over to a small hike. The hike led to the top of Hill Inlet lookout and gave us one of the most breath-taking views we have every seen. Pictures do nothing to demonstrate the beauty of the inlet.

Lovely shot of Jon driving the dingy...

We tried to beat this group up, but got stuck behind them listening to their guide

Clarice does her "stand by the sign" thing

Hill Inlet - Whitehaven Beach is to the left

We went back and picked up the boat, then motored back around the point to park across from Betty's Beach, a shifting-sand area across the inlet from Whitehaven. Composed of the same fine, white sand, Betty's is another great place to enjoy the sun. There were a couple of day groups there, but the place is so big that you can find plenty of space to feel "alone in paradise".

Even with people, there's plenty of room!

Clarice on Betty's Beach (no idea who Betty was)

Cool sand patterns made by the wind and waves

Tracking the elusive "Seagull"

One of our favorite self-portraits

It was hard to leave, but we needed to make tracks if we wanted to get to that night's planned anchorage. We left Whitehaven and Betty's heading north planning on turning East around the top of Hook Island where the inlets were said to have some of the best snorkeling of the entire island chain.

Clarice driving the boat

After we rounded the point, light was slowly fading so we motored in the direction of Butterfly Bay, a nice safe anchorage from the forecast light S-SW winds. At first there were no moorings so we were trying to anchor just outside the marked protected reef area when I glimpsed movement out of the corner of my eye. Whales! Two whales, probably Southern Right Whales or Humpback Whales (the 2 most common in the region) were heading back the way we had just come. I popped on my telephoto lens and was able to get some pics. Not too bad considering the zoom, the rocking of the boat, the moving camera and the moving whales!

Thar' she (or he) blows!

They went right in front of this lucky boat. Law requires 300 meters separation, but if they come up to you all you can do is shut down the motor and wait until the go on their merry way. (500 meters if there is a calf present)

By the time the whales were out of sight, a boat had left one of the moorings in Butterfly Bay so we grabbed it quick. Much easier than anchoring! To protect the delicate reef systems, the Wildlife Service has placed permanent mooring bouys in several of the more popular places. Everywhere else you have to anchor outside a line of white bouys marking a "no parking" zone.

We did a quick snorkel in Butterfly Bay as the sun was setting. Not the best light, but there were some colorful fish. After a bit, Clarice got my attention and said, "I'm going back. I haven't seen one fish." I thought, "They're everywhere! How can you miss them?!?!" Turned out she go the bum mask and it was fogging really badly. We brought all 3 masks from then on so we never got stuck with the fogger.

Cruising the Whitsundays - Day 1...

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 06:15:00 +0000

Our "Big" vacation this year, one Clarice has been looking forward to since we arrived in Australia, was spending a week among the Whitsunday Islands and visiting Whitehaven Beach. We waited until August so that we could really enjoy the warm weather holiday during the Aussie winter.

I have no idea why Clarice insists on taking these "We're Off!" photos...

We left Sydney early on Saturday and flew to Hamilton Island - the main tourist island of the Whitsunday group. Almost all of the Whitsunday Islands have been made into nature preserves with people only really allowed on the beaches. There are a few places to tent camp on the islands, but you have to book ahead and schedule your visit. The waterways are also very much regulated to protect the ocean/reef environments. In 1978, a retired couple started charging people a nominal fee and giving tours of the islands on the boat. Now, 30 years later, bareboat chartering is big business along with the reef/island tours run by the resorts and private companies from the mainland. Add in the private boats and the place was not "crowded" per se, but there were always other boats nearby.

After arriving, Russ, the main person from whom we were renting out bareboat, picked us up from the airport and shuttled us out to the boat on the tender since the marina was full.

Our first view of our home for the next week!

After walking us through how to run and maintain the boat (he was pretty comfortable when we knew "port" and "starboard" and explained we were "boat people") he sat us down and walked us through 100 Magic Miles, a guidebook that talks all about the islands, the habitats, the anchorages and generally how to have a fun and safe time in the Whitsundays. Now in its 7th edition, this book is the "bible" of the area and we could not have had such a wonderful time without it. We had ordered our own copy, but it was not going to arrive before we left so we almost cancelled it. I decided it might be a nice souvenir, and now we're really glad we kept it!

We paid a small fee (less than a hotel room) for this one extra night on the boat, so once Russ was ready to leave, we took the tender back into the Hamilton Island Marina, dropped Russ off, and then hit some stores to gather provisions for the trip. Kind of dull, but I would later regret not buying more gummy bears...

Finally - Day 1! We both slept pretty well the first night even though the bed is small and the boat rocked in the light waves of the night. By 8:00 AM we were up and ready to go - not a normal time for me, but we were excited to get started. The first place we were going to stop was the purpose for the whole trip... Whitehaven Beach.

Our Path of Travel - Day 1

We untied from the mooring, started the motors and got underway. First lesson of traveling on the ocean - mind the tides! We knew this, and were readily prepared to take it into account when anchoring, but the tides are always moving and shifting, controlling how fast you can travel across the open water. Since our hired bareboat was governed at 10 knots, we were never going to set speed records so paying careful attention to the tides was something we were going to have to learn. Long story short, our first trip was ride into the path the tides. It worked out well though since we were in no hurry, had plenty of time to get comfortable on the boat and we got to watch the scenery, other boats and lookout for whales (none...).

Some of the resort homes on Hamilton Island

What kind of fish do you catch with a dinghy?

As we turned north and sailed through Solway Passage, we caught our first glimpses of Clarice's year-long infatuation...

Southern End of Whitehaven as we came through Solway Passage

The best spot to anchor is on the southern end of the 6 km long beach. We found a nice wide spot, dropped the anchor, packed up the tender and headed to the beach! Let me tell you, it is no wonder Whitehaven is ranked in the top 10 most beautiful beaches of the world! The beach is huge and the only way to get there is by boat so it is not crowded at all. Lot of room to swim, play, sunbathe, etc.

Clarice had it in her head that she wanted to walk the entire beach, so after a nice relaxing lunch and a dip we started walking. Barefoot. My delicate little feet would be mad at me for days. We knew it was 6 km, but it didn't look that far! We made it generally all the way stopping to take pictures along the way.

The beginning of the hike...

Did I say the only way to get to the beach was boat???

I may have forgotten a few other ways...

I TOLD YOU TO WATCH THE TIDES!

Sand worm - they like the fine, soft sand of Whitehaven

View back down the beach from the dunes at the Northern end. And we had to walk back...

I think Clarice was happy to be there...

Neither of us really wanted to leave, but after spending most of the day at Whitehaven, we had plans for a snorkel across the water at Chalkie's Beach before heading to our first anchorage. Chalkie's was only a short distance away, but it took delicate navigation to get close to the beach through a man-made break in the coral. Then we hopped into wetsuits and dove right in. While Clarice likes snorkeling, it is really more my thing. I bought a waterproof pouch for Clarice camera so I could take underwater photos and it worked great!

Wrasse (100 Magic Miles even has a fish ID section!)

A kind of Butterfly Fish

Bridled Parrotfish - photo does not come close to the colors when the sun is shining bright

Lots of little guys including a Yellow Tang on the left

Clarice snorkelling...

About 3:30 we needed to be heading to our first overnight anchorage. With the winds normally coming out of the S-SW (and that was the forecast) we headed just north of Whitehaven to Tongue Bay, from which we had already planned the next day's adventures!

Sailboats at sunset

Entering Tongue Bay - our first overnight anchorage

Keep a lookout for our continuing Whitsundays Adventures!

City 2 Surf... redux...

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 04:56:00 +0000

Last year, Clarice and some of our friends ran in the Sun-Herald "City 2 Surf" 14k run from Hyde Park in the heart of Sydney out to probably its most famous beach, Bondi. I, being completely fat and out of shape, volunteered to be the team's photographer. After spending that morning sweat-soaked from running all over the place (with a pack of camera gear) trying to get in front of them to take their pics, I joked that, "I should have just run the darn thing!" Oh how I regret those words...

This year, having lost 60 lbs and after a few months training at the gym, I was forced to "become an idiot"

2008 - I labeled this pic "The Three Idiots"

2009 - Who's the "idiot" now?!?

Clarice's time last year was a very respectable 1 hour 45 minutes so she set our goal this year at "under 100 minutes" or less than 1 hour 40 minutes. Fair enough for her, except she was holding ME to that goal as well! She's been married to me for HOW LONG??? (11 years - yes I know my anniversary).

We were joined again by our poor, beleaguered friends Paul and Amber who somehow always seem to get talked into undertaking these wild and crazy things. Amber had been sick all week, and Paul had been working a lot of hours and not had much time to train, so they decided to run/walk together as well, but had no intention of keeping up with the slave driver, err... Clarice.

Paul and Amber

Amber's "Wings" - apparently she drank her Red Bull!

75,000 runners milling about at the start - World Record Number of Participants for a foot race

Still milling - have I told you all how much I HATE crowds???

The traditional "Discarding of the Warm Clothes" - in the past runners would dress warmly (it is winter here) and then just chuck their clothes high into the trees. The race organizers have taken advantage of this tradition and now groups of girls collect all the clothes and they go to people in need.

Clothes cover the bus stop

And we're off! Finally...

It NEVER thins out. You spend more energy weaving in the crowd than running.

A last crown shot - for Todd (look front right). We were maybe 800 meters into the race when we approached the tunnel and we saw a gentleman getting CPR by the side of the road. I don't know what ever happened to that man, but the scene still haunts me. I said a quick prayer for him as I kept running. I am amazed how well run an event of this size is. Not even 1/14th of the way into the race and paramedics are already stationed in case of emergencies like this.

Jon's view for most of the race. Not complaining!

Right in the middle of the 14k course is "Heartbreak Hill" - about 2k of grueling up-hill running. All through training MY goal had been to be able to run the 6k to the bottom of the hill. CLARICE's version was "run to the hill, walk up, then run the remaining 6k". Neither of those actually occurred. As we reached the 6k mark and the bottom of the hill, Clarice looked at her GPS running watch and said, "Let's run the last 1.4 mile to get to 4 miles even." I nearly cried. The course if very hilly with lots of ups and downs, and my right hip was killing me. In training it started aching about the 5k mark and today was no different. Running up-hill only made it worse. I got to about .1 miles to get to her target then said, "I can't. I'll catch up." Mistake. Should have kept running because when she hit her goal and started walking, she had no intention of waiting for slow, old me! No way! I had to BRISKLY walk up-hill to catch her. It did give me a chance to get a drink, but did nothing to alleviate the pain in my hip, but I did catch up.

Clarice finally walking while I'm catching her up

Beautiful view of the Harbour Bridge and Opera House that I am amazed was not blurry since I took it on the run.

THEN Clarice did the unthinkable - she started running again before we got to the top of the hill!!! Instead of getting 2k to walk and recuperate, we walked less than 1!! The next stretch was blessedly down-hill so I could take longer strides and that helped my hip a little. About the 9k mark I was whining. 10k I was down-right complaining. 11k I felt like I was going to die. 12k crests the last big up-hill and you can see the finish line, but you still have 2k to go including running PAST the finish line only to circle back. Auuugghh. The ONLY thing that kept me running was the thought that Clarice had her heart set on us crossing the finish line together and getting our picture taken. Without that, I would have stopped and walked. In the end, she dragged my sorry butt across the line in 93 minutes, way under our goal. I told her, "we could have walked the hill and still made it!"

Wait for me, we're almost there!

North Bondi Surf Life Savers carried this coil of rescue line the entire way trading places among the 5 of them. Show offs. I'm sure they raised money for their worthy cause.

The Aftermath...

Paul and Amber finished a bit behind us, as planned, and we trekked back into the city. A really memorable event, but one I doubt I will ever do again (since we won't be here next year...).

Crikey!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 06:59:00 +0000

I know.

Last weekend we took a day trip to Australia Zoo - home of Steve Irwin the Crocodile Hunter! Now, a day trip from Sydney involved a flight to Brisbane and back, so the trip was not for the faint of heart, but neither of us could stomache the idea of a niece or nephew asking us when we got home, "Do you go see The Croc Huntere's zoo?" and having to say, "We didn't have time."

Together with a furry friend

We stayed in a hotel down by the airport proving I value sleep over security. Actually it was fine until we had to get up for our 6:00 AM flights. Flight was uneventful and we arrived at Austrlia Zoo just as the gates were opening...

First stop - whatever was right in front of us! Lots of everything you would expect to find at Austrlia Zoo if you've ever seen Croc Files or The Crocodile Hunter TV shows - komodo dragons, lizards galore, koalas, kangaroos, kookaburas, etc. If it lives in Australia, it is at Australia Zoo. The snake house was very elaborate and well done, but we didn't spend much time there.

"Freshies"

Acco - star of Croc Files and The Crocodile Hunter

Who doesn't love a koala sleeping in a tree?

Fat Wombat

Echidna (NOT a porcupine!)

There were a lot of moms with joeys in their pouches

Couple of strange ducks for Jay

The really different part of Australia Zoo than any other aoo I have ever been to (including San Diego Zoo) is the educational/conservation aspect. Lots of zoos have signs talking about the animals, lots of zoos even have little shows explaining things about them as well. Australia Zoo has things called "Wildlife Adventures" where you can get hands on with the animals and talk one-on-one or in a verey small group with the keepers. These are really limited to not stress the animals out, but we were very lucky to get to meet one of my very favorite animals of all time - the red pandas! I first saw red pandas at Columbus Zoo when we went with my brother and his family. They look like little red raccoons and they are SO CUTE! This adventure was limited to 4 people and lasted only for 15-20 minutes as you got to hand feed the little guys their main meal of the day consisting mostly of fruit and veg. I'll never forget Pasang and Yoddah. I wanted to take them home with me.

Pasang - one of our new buddies

Clarice and Pasang - means "Born on a Friday"

Jon with Yoddah - means "Enlightened One"

Yes, we also saw the croc show at the 5000 seat "Croceseum". Even though it is winter, the temp was in the low 70's all day and the shade in the park made it very comfortable. Apparently though, the crocs really prefer it to be summer and a lot hotter. No matter, "Norman" performed admirably and the show was very educational.

The show opened with some of the reptile keepers bringing out a few of their friends. They talked about each animal and the things that endanger them in the wild. Then the aviary group brought out a bunch of native Aussie birds that swooped overhead and landed on the railings amonst the spectators. Very cool. Last was the big croc, Norman, coming out for a feed. Even though the weather is cooler than they prefer, Norman still got most of his body out when the did the "tail walking" trick where the croc jumps out of the water to grab a piece of meet from the keeper. The purpose of the trick is to show how crocs can take birds and other animals right off tree limbs in the wild.

Wanna wade with a python?

Norman - doing his thing

Later we visited the elephants learning that elephants have only 4 teeth (not including their tusks) and that those teeth are HUGE! We watch the tigers play in their enclosure with the keepers only a few feet away. When the tigers were born, their keeps spent 24 hours a day with them to make them used to their presence. Even though they are great friends and play together, I wouldn't want to be a tiger keeper. Who wants a friend who might eat you any second?!?! I'll stick to red pandas, thank you.

Keeper with elephant's tooth

Before we left for the airport we hit the gift shop pretty hard (duh!). I truely think my family was the inspiration for the saying, "Been there. Done that. Got the t-shirt." All of the proceeds go either back into the zoo, over to the zoo's animal hospital, or into wildlife conservation. The Irwins are currently having a bit of a dispute about some conservation land they have in Queensland that is apparently in the way of "progress". Good on them for saving wilderness!

It was a VERY long day, and not the cheapest day trip around, but it was definately a once-in-a-lifetime adventure.

Playing "Catch Up"...

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 07:04:00 +0000

Its not fair to try and compile April and May into one post, but with our trip home, work projects, Spring semester ending and summer beginning, and all of our various activities, I have just not had a chance to post! I know! I should be taken out back and shot! Anyway, here is a "running dairy" of April and May:

Clarice's triathlon: The Sunday before we were to leave on our visit back to the States, Clarice ran in a corporate triathlon with a team from her work. They had a 400m swim in Sydney Harbour in the shadow of the Opera House, a 8k bike ride and then a 4k run. B-e-a-u-t-i-f-u-l day for the event.

Funny story. Well, funny now. We stayed the night before in a hotel downtown because we had to have Clarice's bike checked in to the event by 6:30 AM. WE had a plesant Saturday evening in the city, work up ready to go, but in the shower I had the thought, "I wonder if we can get the bike out of the car from the underground parking garage?!?!" Nope. Garage was all locked up. We had to call the "emergency" number and pay $100 for someone to let us in to get the bike out. Thankfully we had woken up early so we still made it in time for Clarice to start with no problems. Just another example of Jon being an idiot.

Kind of a nice location, huh?

The Zimmer Team!

Can you find Clarice at the start of the swim?

1/2 way home!

The Big Finish!!!

Then we spent 2 weeks at home. Well, a couple of days were in Columbus visiting with my brother's family and my mom, but the rest was in Warsaw. Sorry if we did not get to see you while we were home! Those 2 weeks were crazy busy and neither of us got much sleep going to bed very late and getting up early to be in to work by 7:30AM most days.

The last weekend in April we went to Oceanworld in Manly. It is an historic site that has been an aquarium (and more) for almost 100 years. They have an excellent tunnel where you walk in a big circle with sharks, fish, rays and turtles swimming above you. Very much like the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago, but a bit smaller. We had a By One Get One coupon so it was a cheap date, too!

Jon and a blurry turtle

Clarice getting eaten!

They had a large area full of lizards, snakes and turtles as well

May was finals for my classes and Clarice was really busy with work so we did not do anything too exciting most weekends. We spent a nice day stolling the rocks on Avalon Beach and lunching on Palm Beach. May did bring us exciting news of the arrival of Ashley Landrum (the third baby born to former College Class students - that I am aware of), as well as the much anticipated arrival of another nephew - Ian Patrick Nist! Such a bummer that we were here in Aus and have not gotten a chance to meet the kiddies yet, but we will!

Last weekend was out 11th wedding anniversary. We were kindly given a voucher for discount rates at a resort north of here on Salamandar Bay - but they had to be used by the end of May. No problem, that's our anniversary! It rained in the evenings, but we were blessed with really good weather for exploring Saturday and Sunday.

Saturday we got up early and drove to various places to go hiking to lookouts over the bay. Very pretty! We had a cuppa (hot chocolate for us non-coffee people) at the Coast Guard Station on Nelson Bay, hiked to see WWII gun emplacements, watched fishermen cleaning their fish, and then played 9 holes of golf at Nelson Bay Golf Club. Well, we only got in 7.5 holes due to darkness (at 5:00!!!) but we were not playing as fast as we normally do. We played the first and were walking to the second tee when I said to Clarice, "Look! Deer! (pause) Wait, they don't have deer here... those are kangaroos!!!" Standing near the tee and up on another tee box were 6-7 red kangaroos. Some big older blokes, a few I took to be mommas, and a couple of younger joeys - one of which was still nursing from momma. Too bad we did not have the camera! After we played the second and were coming back on the third there were more! About 25-30 in all! Every time we hit a ball anywhere near them we were cautious to go and play it so as not to worry the bigger males. They pretty much ignored us, but the pleasure of watching the kangaroos made us take our time playing resulting in not having enough light to finish. And we were both playing pretty well, too!

The Port Stephens Headlands

Nelsons Bay

At Boulder Bay

The Pelicans waiting for their share of the catch

Sunday had us up early for a 4-Wheeler Sand Dune Adventure along Stockton Bight - one of the longest dunes (36k) and the fastest moving sand dune system in the world. Movies are often filmed out there to mimic a desert including Mad Max and some of the Star Wars movies! Being the off season (its winter here now) there was only one other couple with us, so the four of us got to do a lot of extra stuff and had personal attention from our two guides. They drove us 20k down the beach, set up an area for us to practice riding the 4-wheelers (little 90's so nothing that we couldn't handle easily anyway) and then took us on an expedition down to the wreck of a ship that has been stuck on the beach for 30 years. We had a great time and would totally do it again - hopefully with bigger bikes!!

I suppose we could have done this...

...or this...

...but we did this! What is taking so long?!?!

Much better!

I cannot understand why the sand turned pink when I cropped this...

Nothing but dirt for MILES! (well, 36k - you can convert)

NOT us... but a lot of fun to watch!

Clarice tearing it up!

At the shipwreck

I love the composition of this shot Clarice took

Tin City - filmed parts of Mad Max here

Alright, that gets us pretty much caught up. We have lots of exciting adventures planned and I promise to do better on posting regularly!!

The Rest of Melbourne...

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 03:24:00 +0000

After spending all day Saturday at the tennis, we considered going back Sunday for more, but thought we should go with the original plan -> go walking and see all of downtown Melbourne.

We got started early and probably walked 10 miles. Melbourne is very "European" and could be transplanted to the Continent and no one would notice. The best part was Federation Square which is composed of many new "modern" buildings surrounding an open-air square. One of the buildings has a giant television screen built into the side and all afternoon/evening people gathered to dine al fresco and watch the tennis. We sat there Sunday evening to watch Aussie Jelena Jokic (yes, she is an Aussie with that name) play some of the best tennis of her life.

Most of downtown Melbourne crosses the Yarra river just before the river reaches Bass Straight and the ocean.

On the left is the main train station in Melbourne (sorry no trains, Ethan). On the right is one of the funky buildings of Federation Square.

More of the funky buildings in Federation Square

The "slots" on the building on the left are scrolling message boards at night!

After spending most of the morning walking around, doing some shopping and getting a bite to eat, we decided to see if there were tickets available to that afternoon's performance of Wicked the musical. Everyone who has ever seen it raves about how wonderful it is and to see Oz in Aus was kind of a unique idea. We actually got very good seats even though we were in the balcony, and the show was every bit as good as every claims.

After the show we walked around some more and it felt like the guys from Top Gear were in town as we seemed to pass a lot of very expensive and exotic cars.

Audi R8 and a nice Ferrari

My personal fav - Lamborghini Murcielago

Lastly we grabbed a quick bite to eat and watched tennis at Federation Square until the wee hours of the morning. Lots of fun! I'd go back to Melbourne, especially for sporting events. They have lots of nice hotels, great shopping, awesome modern stadiums and arenas... but I don't think we will have time. Stink!

Melbourne and the Australian Open (Tennis)...

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 05:22:00 +0000

Well, first the tennis. I hope to get a plethora ("Would you say I have a 'plethora' of presents?") of posts up in the next week before we head home for a "break" and come back to Aus for the rest of 2009.

The 3rd week of January saw us finally hitting Melbourne for an event that Clarice had marked out since they day we agreed to come to Australia -> the Australian Tennis Open. We made a long weekend of it, planning on spending all day Saturday at the tennis, Sunday and Monday morning exploring Melbourne before we went back to Sydney. Looking back, we could have happily spent more time at the tennis. Not that Melbourne was bad, the tennis was just that good of an experience.

Neither of us had ever been to a professional tennis event, so we thought we would take it easy in the morning with ground passes that let you into every court but the 2 main ones, and then got night passes to the big stage - Rod Laver Arena. Still, because it was 1/2 way through the tournament, we had no idea who we would be seeing until the day before. When we got to the grounds, saw that James Blake was playing in HiSense (the #2 court) in the morning, we decided to upgrade our ground passes to HiSense and cheer for an AMERICAN!

Blake was the 3rd match on HiSense so we decided to catch some doubles first (after hitting the souvenir stands, natch). We got good seats (at the smaller courts there are no "bad" seats) to see 2 Aussies, Paul Hanley and Jason Kerr, take on a seeded team. Not having watched much doubles on TV, I kept forgetting that the alleys were "good", but the action is so much faster paced than singles. I'd definitely hit more doubles next time. The other great part of the match was this group of teenagers calling themselves "The Bogan Army". At first I was afraid they would be rowdy and eventually be asked to leave, but I was VERY impressed. They knew when to cheer and when not to cheer, were loud and together, brought cheer/song sheets so everyone knew the words, NEVER repeated a cheer in the 90 minutes the match lasted, got other parts of the crowd into the cheering, and generally made the entire experience more memorable. Good on ya' Bogan Army!

Hanley/Kerr easily beat the seeded pair with the outstanding support of "The Bogan Army"

"The Bogan Army"

Clarice after getting Hanley and Kerr to sign her program

After Hanley and Kerr won easily, we worked our way over to HiSense not wanting to miss Blake, but knowing he hadn't started yet. We saw the scoreboard for Lisa Fernandez's women's doubles match and stopped by to cheer on another AMERICAN before getting into HiSense.

Being the #2 court, and having a retractable roof, HiSense is a multi-purpose facility that also hosts concerts as well as sports outside of tennis. Lot of seats with almost everyone in the shade, HiSense is a nice, modern arena. We got inside just as the first set of women's singles between Svetlana Kuznetsova and Alona Bondarenko (a Russian and a Ukrainian, respectively). Both were seeded and I knew about Kuznetsova since she was a top ten player at one point (currently #8). Let me say this about the ladies: A couple of BRATS! Especially Bondarenko. They complained the entire match, used up all of their challenges, took forever to serve, played crappy tennis... and then Bondarenko lost the third set tie-break by double faulting and then storming off the court in a huff. Prima Donnas. Nice to look at, but HIGH MAINTENANCE.

I was more impressed by my telephoto lens than I was by the quality of play...

Then it was time for the boys to take over. James Blake v. Igor Andreev (insert "yes, master!" joke here). Both guys played well, but James was definitely on his game and won in straight sets. Clarice managed to worm her way through what seemed like hundreds of people to get an autograph. Blake stayed and signed for quite a long time - good on him for that!

I got a kick out of watching the ball persons (gotta be PC) line up and walk on and off the court when they changed. Just made me laugh for some reason - probably the hats.

We found some dinner in the hour between the morning and evening sessions, and with Clarice this can sometimes be an adventure. Unlike the majority of sporting events I've been to (and I've been to quite a few) there was not food stands everywhere you turned. They were all centered around the main square (which was really a circle), so we ended up walking around for 20 minutes just finding food. Ah well, what else do you want to do in the heat and sun?

Rod Laver Arena, the main court, obviously has the biggest names and is always sold out. We got our tickets months in advance not knowing who we would be watching. Turns out we were in luck - #1 in the world, Rafael Nadal. First we had to get through a women's singles match that pitted #4 in the world Elena Dementieva against Aussie Girl of the moment Samantha Stoser. There was a trio of women next to us who lived and died with every point, even making noises of angst if Stoser faulted on her first serve. Though she really played well, and looks to have a bright future, Dementieva played out of here mind and was just too experienced. Straight Sets.

Until Dementieva took off her white jacket to reveal an orange dress, I was worried I was only going to be able to tell them apart by their visors.

And can someone tell them it is night? What's with the visors? The lights were all from the sides so don't blame them!

Obligatory shot of the lovely couple. I only had my Socceroos jersey, but I wanted to show I was supporting Sam. I wore my USA jersey during Blake's match!

Last was Rafael Nadal v Tommy Haas. Haas is old and washed up, Nadal is in his prime and #1 in the world. STILL, the German fellow behind us, well into his cups, was convinced that "Tommy can do it!" Err... not so much. Every point we heard, "You can do it, Tommy!" When someone cheered Rafa, he would reply, "Tommy!" It was actually kind of funny. Nadal is a horse (look at him!) and won easily in straight sets.

We had a great time and would be going back if we were here next January. We've decided that we must get to Wimbledon, Flushing Meadows and Paris for the other majors. We don't really follow tennis, but the majors (and good players) make it a lot of fun to watch in person.

Parkes, Australia. Elvis and The Dish...

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 05:51:00 +0000

Alright, I'm back to trying to catch up again. This trip was taken in January and it is March. So I'm a little behind...

Paul and Amber invited us to join them on a trip to visit Paul's Uncle Warren in Parkes. It was the first weekend of the new year and Parkes is "famous" for its Elvis Festival. We had been meaning to head out that way to see "The Dish", and free lodging is always welcome -> so we joined them. (Just kidding, guys!! We LOVE hanging with the Brenners!)

I drove the first half, getting us out of Sydney proper. Then, since he knew where he was going and I didn't, Paul took over. Thankfully, being another employee of the company, he is insured on our car as well. He trekked us all over the planet, making a quick stop in Bathurst, home of the Bathurst 1000 auto race. It is the most famous auto race in Australia, like a mini-Indy 500, only obviously much longer and using "stock" cars. What I didn't know, until we pulled onto the track (you read that right) is that a good portion of the track is used as normal roads the other 364 days of the year. People's driveways come out onto the track! We did a lap (stupid speed limits) and the kept on treckkin'.

We then stopped in Forbes, the other large-ish town in that part of New South Wales. It has a couple of really cool looking older churches and some interesting "old-timey" architecture. Actually, it resembled any small town in the Midwest (being built around the same time).

From there, we finally made it to Parkes. If we had gone straight, the drive would have been around 4.5 hours, but it took us most of the day with the side trips. Still, we made it right on time to welcome in the "Elvis Train". Every year the festival has a special train that comes out from Sydney (with regular passengers as well) loaded with people coming out for the festival... and lots of people dressed like the king and Priscilla. What a strange sight! 1000s of miles from Graceland, in another country altogether, and off the train walk a bunch of people straight out of Memphis during the heyday of Elvis! Little did I know. Wait until tomorrow, Jon!

Warren and his wife have a beautiful house at the top of the hill overlooking Parkes. They were very gracious hosts and told us a lot about the history of the area. Paul took us by some of his old family homes that they lived in before moving to Sydney.

Saturday morning we headed out early to get a good spot for the parade. Warren comes through again! They are part owners of the building that Warren's auto parts store is located in, and the building has a second floor balcony overlooking the main street for the parade. If I had been forced down on the street with the masses I might have gone insane. Instead we had a bird's eye view for the fun.

After the parade Paul, Amber and the two of us got back in the car and drove 30 minutes out to The Dish - a radio telescope that searches the heavens for unusual activity. It has been in use for over 50 years and is so sought after by scientists studying the cosmos a special commission has to delegate time and tell others they will have to wait. The Dish was also used to receive transmissions back from the Apollo moon missions and relay those transmissions back to mission control in Houston. When the moon was on the other side of the Earth, Houston could not receive transmissions because the Earth was in the way! We saw a couple of movies about The Dish, astronomy and a cool 3-D "mars mission". We had lunch in their little cafeteria (good food) all the while watching the dish rotate and move towards whatever celestial object they were supposed to be observing.

Next Paul, Clarice and I joined Warren for 9 holes of golf. Clarice and I had not played in about 10 months and boy did it show! For every good shot we hit a dozen junky ones. Warren, however, was lights out playing what he told us was his best 9 ever. Yeah, right! Ringer!!!

After dinner, Paul, Amber, Clarice and I decided to head back into town and see what Elvis was up to that night. A lot. Every pup we walked into (or even just outside of) was blasting Elvis with people packed in like sardines. At one place they had karaoke and Amber and Clarice just HAD to sing. They picked Sweet Home Alabama even though they only really knew the chorus. Still, people sang along and no one booed. They did pretty good!

Sunday we got up early again (so much for resting on vacations...) and attended the Elvis Gospel Celebration for Sunday morning church. It was hilarious while at the same time quite an interesting was to worship God. Elvis recorded a lot of gospel music - I never knew how much. A professional Elvis impersonator performed, a local preacher spoke, local groups sang other Elvis tracks, and over 2000 people packed the undercover Big W (like Wal-Mart) parking lot. Scratch "Giant Elvis Church Service" off my list of things to do before I die!

The drive home was long, but we took a scenic route through the Blue Mountains and got to see some beautiful views. We may never make it back to Parkes, but if we were only going to go once, we picked the perfect weekend!

Why do the call it "Cricket"???

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 06:35:00 +0000

One of my many memories of our trip to London and Scotland in 2006 was sitting in the hotel in Glasgow with very tired feet waiting for the Champions League Final between Arsenal and Barcelona to start. (That's soccer, or football, people!) Clarice and I were both exhausted, it was the last night in Scotland and we just wanted to rest so we decided to watch the game in our room. We had an hour before the match started and the only thing I could find on their 5 stations that was even mildly interesting was cricket.

Now, I'm a fan of almost any sport as long as I can understand the rules, and I generally pick things up pretty quickly. Cricket, however, stumped me. We watched for an hour and neither of us understood one thing that happened. The most we got was, "I think they are trying to know down the sticks with the ball." How profound.

When Paul and Amber came to the States for a year we became good friends through Clarice's work with Paul on their project. Paul played cricket all his life, only stopping to make the trip to the States. He played serious cricket for his local club and, I believe, still holds some records there. While they were in the States they introduced us to the surrealy sport of Rugby League and we drug them off to Purdue to see college football (among all the other things they did). In an year I never had a chance (or a reason) to ask him to explain cricket to me.

When we decided to undertake this adventure in Australia, Paul was determined to take us to a cricket match. The cricket season doesn't really start until December, being a summer sport, and on the first weekend of the year Paul and Amber took us to see the first day of the 5-day test match between #1 in the world Australia and #2 South Africa. (That's right, then entire contest would take 5 days)

Now, like I said, I'm up for almost anything once. My in-laws got me into ice fishing for crying out loud, but when Paul said, "Bring a book" and he was serious... I was aprehensive. The day went from 10:00 until 6:00 and when it was over Australia, even though they batted first, were still batting. BUT, I did learn the rules and even some of the strategies behind the game. What I didn't learn, no matter how many people I asked, why is it called cricket?

We had a good time, mostly watched the game (I didn't get much book reading done), enjoyed some great weather and had a good time with friends. Later in the week, after the 5-day Test, the same to sides played a few 20/20 matches where each side only gets 20 "overs". It is a version that is designed to be played in a couple of hours and generally resembles a "home run derby" in that, because it is so much shorter batters have to take more risks and swing for the fences (though there are no fences).

There is also a THIRD type of cricket called "One Day Cricket" where each side gets 50 "overs" to score as many runs as possible. Crazy. I'll never figure out how to follow cricket, but I have a fairly decent understanding now of how to watch cricket. I'd gladly go again, but I doubt any of you Americans would want to go with me. And we think baseball is slow! :-)

New Year's Eve 2009

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 06:08:00 +0000

Hey, it's only February 4th (Clarice's birthday by the way) and I'm just now getting to New Year's in Sydney. Suck it up, cupcake!

New Year's Eve (NYE) for us started very early. We had a 6:00AM flight out of Hobart and had to drop off the rental car first. While security in Australian airports is not quite as strict as in the States (it is getting there) we still needed to be at the airport about an hour before the flight, so we left the hotel at 4:30AM. If you know me at all, you know I cannot function without a shower, so that meant not a lot of sleep for me! ***sigh***

We made it back to Sydney, got the car out of airport hock and made it home with it still pretty early in the morning. Straight to bed... well Clarice unpacked first (this is her normal function, she could not sleep with dirty laundry in a suitcase and not in the hampers).

We were invited to spend NYE with Paul and Amber, our good friends who live in North Sydney. It is only a few blocks from their place to a nice spot along the harbour where we could watch the fireworks off the Sydney Harbour Bridge and elsewhere in the harbour. Since Sydney is a little bit bigger than Warsaw, we figured we were in for a treat.

One of the nice things Sydney does on NYE is "Family Fireworks". Somebody smart (probably a mother) said, "Hey my kids are awful NewYear's Day because they stay up all night just to see the fireworks. Maybe if we had an earlier fireworks we could put them to bed and save a lot of parents a ton of grief. Kind of like a late Christmas present." (I don't know if those were his/her exact words - I'm paraphrasing... well making it up, but you get the idea). Anyway, to appease all the little ones Sydney launches fireworks at 9:00PM as well! What a great idea, especially considering that it is summer here and people want to be outside and see fireworks. The entire early fireworks, though not off the bridge, was a very "4th of July" atmosphere with people playing loud music, munching grilled meats and generally having a good time. After walking down to the 9:00 fireworks, we trudged back up the hill to Paul and Amber's for some more refreshment before making the exact same walk back down just before midnight.

Another interesting thing about Sydney's NYE celebration is that they have a theme every year complete with a glowing symbol of that theme on the center of the bridge. This year's theme was "Creation" and the symbol was predominantly the Sun, but it changed shapes often during the fireworks before settling back into Sun form when they concluded.

The entire event was spectacular and easily the biggest fireworks display I have every seen live. The shot things off not only the harbour bridge, but all up and down the harbour mouth. The crummy video below, captured with Clarice's camera, so not even begin to do it justice.

This video is much better. I'm "borrowing" it from YouTube. It does get kind of loud.

We had a great time, and a special thanks to Paul and Amber for having us out! Definitely a NYE to remember! Hopefully 2009 goes that well all year long. So far... so good!

Tasmania Day 5

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 07:34:00 +0000

Our last day started just like the others - up bright an early. All we really had to do today was get to our hotel in Hobart, but we had plenty of little hikes to do throughout the day and one major stop at Lake St Clair.

The rain the day before had caused all of the creeks, streams, rivers, what-have-you to rise and waterfalls were stronger than normal. We hiked to several and got wet at all of them from the large sprays of water!

One quick hike we did completely spur of the moment (I saw a road sign) was a hike to the top of some dunes that had views of the Great Southern Ocean. It was similar, if a little smaller, than Warren Dunes in Northern Indiana, and incredibly windy.

About midday we made it to Lake St Clair. The Visitor's Center there is the bottom endpoint of the Overland Track - the 4-5 day hiking track that obscenely insane people book months in advance to attempt. We saw many hikers who had made the trek in the rain the last couple of days and we finishing up. They would drop their ragged packs, wipe their rain-wet hair out of their faces, pull off their hoods... and proceed to regale anyone who would listen about how wonderful their trek was and what an awesome experience they just had. Made me want to try it - but not in the rain. We did a couple of tracks in the park including one that led to a spot that supposedly had platypus most evenings. We saw nothing - it was a little after lunch - but had a good time none the less.

Clarice set the goal of being in Hobart by 6:00 so we could walk around the wharf again and go out to dinner. We arrived at the hotel at 5:58. Just admit it... I'm good! We dumped the stuff and headed back out almost immediately (potty stops don't count). What I had not realized when I was booking the hotels was the first week in January is Hobart's "Taste of Hobart Festival" and the conclusion of the 3 major sailboat races - the Sydney to Hobart, the Melbourne to Hobart, and for the less adventurous the Launceston to Hobart. All 3 start on Boxing Day (they day after Christmas for you Americans) and by the time we arrived on Dec. 30 everyone had arrived. We saw lots of sailboats ranging from things that looked like they needed a complete overhaul to the multi-million dollar Wild Oats and Scandia. The Sydney to Hobart is the biggest of the 3 and always sees the most entries. They have "Line Honors" for whichever boat makes it the fastest and "Overall Honors" for the fastest including handicap. Wild Oats won Line Honors for a record 4th consecutive year.

We went for pizza (and you're surprised why?) and wandered around the docks looking at all the boats, comparing which ones we would buy if we had unlimited funds and laughing at all of the drunk sailors - and there were a lot.

Nice vibrant rainbow.

Line Honors Winner - Wild Oats

All in all we loved Tasmania - though if we had to do it again we would pick a side and do it more indepth. We just didn't have enough time to do everything we really wanted to do and do it well. Maybe we'll go back!

Tasmania Day 4

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 07:14:00 +0000

Day 4 saw us leave Burnie very early in the morning because we had to get to Strahan for our pre-booked cruise around Port Macquarie and up the Gordon River. It drizzled throughout the day, but whenever we needed to get out of the car, or out on the boat's viewing platforms, God blessed us by having the rain stop. It was kind of eerie, but much appreciated!

Port Macquarie is the 2nd largest port in the southern hemisphere behind only Port Philip (Melbourne). Sydney Harbour could easily fit inside Port Macquarie. So why is it a realitively little used port? Why does the vast majority of shipping traffic head to Devonport instead? Well, the problem, you see, is The Heads.

When we got on the Lady Jane Franklin II, The Heads was our first stop. The Heads, the oceanic entrance to Port Macquarie, is actually quite wide. The problem is it's depth. On the wide side it only gets to aboue 5 feet deep. Yep, I could stand out in it with my head about water. The part reaches out from the northern headland to a small island. Between the island and the southern head the entrance is quite deep... but the width of the channel is about 60 feet - barely large enough for ships in the 1800s and nowhere near wide enough (or deep enough) for modern commercial shipping vessals. Add to that the Great Southern Ocean relentlessly pounding the shoreline with waves that have travelled from South Amercia (the widest oceanic distance between continents in the world) and navigation in and around The Heads is very difficult and treacherous. Four-wheeling, however, is quite popular as we saw several 4x4 SUVs driven down along the beach on the shallow side. People were fishing and evidently camping out there!

The Heads. See that tiny bit on the left between the island and shore? THAT is the only place boats have enough depth to pass through. That wide opening on the right - way too shallow.

Another view (heading back into the harbour) of the opening and a shot of the lighthouse on the island.

From The Heads we needed to travel the length of the harbour to get to the Gordon River, but we had a stop to make along the way. Because of the nice mix of salt water from the ocean and freshwater from the Gordon River, the harbour is an ideal spot for fisheries. We stopped for a few minutes and watched them feed the fish in their holding pens - by shooting a giant fire hose with the fish food in the water!

After that quick stop, we headed the rest of the way across the harbour (this boat is very fast) and headed up the Gordon River. The rainforest runs right up to the river and there are many different varieties of trees. The most precious is the Huon Pine. It takes 1000 years to grow to its massive height and was very much prized in the era of wooden ships because an oil it contains prevents wood-boring insects from eating it away - thereby making ships last a lot longer between refits. It is a very light wood and you can definitely smell the oils - even in products that have been made and sealed. The Lady Franklin has an 8 year old Huon Pine growing in a pot inside its main room. Eight years old and maybe a foot tall!

We stopped a way up the river and were able to debark and take a walk through the rainforest. Every rainforst is different, and this one was very, very dense.

After we got back on the boat and were back in the harbour, we made one more stop - at Sarah Island. Like Port Arthur, Sarah Island was a settlement for convicts. Unlike Port Arthur, the living conditions were not quite as bad once a shipbuilder was asked to teach the men to build ships. The shipbuilder convinced the warden that healthy, well fed convicts would be happier and work harder. Surprise, surprise, he was right. They turned out over 100 ships and boats in just over a decade before the island was closed by the government and consolidated with Port Arthur to save money.

When we got back to Strahan, Clarice and I went back into a wood-working mill and picked up some unworked blocks of different exotic woods the grow in the area, including a block of Huon Pine. Clarice ran over to the post, just before it closed, and mailed them to her dad for his birthday. Apparently, when he got the package with four blocks of wood, he was very confused, but much more excited once Clarice told them where they came from and about the woods.

The Strahan Post - one of the oldest buildings on the west coast of Tasmania

Well, that was day 4. We spent the night in the little town of Queenstown just north of Strahan and on the main road back to Hobart. We had all of Day 5 to get back to Hobart and find our last hotel for the trip.

Tasmania Day 3

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 06:22:00 +0000

Wow, I'm behind. In order to get even "kind of" caught up I'm going to have to make these posts short and sweet.

Day 3 started with us leaving Launceston and heading in the direction of Cradle Mountain. Our first stop, however, was a set of caves known not only for interesting stalagtite/stalagmite formations - but for "glow worms". The caves were not as nice as the ones we went to in the Bule Mountains (Jenolan Caves), but when they shut all the lights off and the little glowing spots appeared all over the ceiling... that was pretty cool! They are not really "worms", but the little bugs glow to attract food (prey) to get stuck in the web. No photos of the worms since we were not allowed to take any.

Then we went to Cradle Mountain National Park. Every time we told people we were going to Tasmania the person would ask, "Are you going to Cradle Mountian?" One of hte best known places in Tasmania, I would compare Cradle Mountain - Lake St Clair National Parks (they are attached and form one giant area) to Yosemite National Park in the States. Huge area with lots of differing terrains, landscapes, vegitation and interesting places. Day 5 we would hit the Lake St Clair part on our way back to Hobart, but today was a day Clarice was really looking forward to. Every picture she had seen of Cradle Mountain in our guidebooks was wonderful and she wanted to see it for herself. Well... she did. At times. When the low clouds parted. Oh, and when the rain stopped. Not the weather we would have liked, but the day turned out to be a success. We sat in the transit station eating lunch watching the rain pour and both were thinking, "If he/she suggests leaving we're out of here." Instead, because she wanted to see Cradle Mountain so badly, Clarice said, "Let's take the bus up to the start of the trail and see if the rain slows a bit." It was more of a drizzle when we got off the bus so we said, "We'll go this far (looking at the map) and if it doesn't let up we'll head back. The rain eventually let up and we made it all the way around the 6 km track that circles Dove Lake at the base of Cradle Mountain.

Cradle Mountain from on the trail (left) and at the trailhead (right)

The 2 of us at the start of the hike - loving the weather and the low clouds!

When we got back to the car and were putting the bags in the back I saw this little guy! A Wombat out in search of a snack!

After we left Cradle Mountain... the sun came out. Doesn't that figure. We needed to get to Burnie on the northern coast by tonight, but first we planned on one more stop in a little out of the way hamlet called Sheffield. Friends who had been there told us that, to attract tourists and to keep the town alive, in the 1980s the town commissioned huge murals to be painted on the sides of the town buildings depicting life in Tasmania. They were a hit, attracting people travelling to Cradle Mountain and have turned into a yearly "Mural Festival" and contest with new murals painted in a special town square set apart just for murals.

The last shot is Clarice pointing to the signature of the artist. It reads "Purdue 2000"! The artist's name is Cheyenne PURDUE!

After Sheffield we headed to Burnie and our hotel/place to sleep for the evening. As we approached, Clarice remembered that this area of Tasmania is known to have penguins nesting all along the northern coast. We decided to check-in to the hotel and then try and find someplace to go on a "penguin watch". In our hotel room was the customary "things to do" book and Clarice found an article that said, "To see penguins, call Keith" and gave a number. No name of the business, no address, not even a last name. Just "Keith". I was skeptical to say the least, afraid of being mugged and killed to say the worst. Clarice called anyway.

Keith turned out to be a wonderful bloke who works for the Parks and Wildlife Department. He has spent his life studying penguins and participate in several rescue efforts after oil spills all over the world. He was hilarious. Of Asian descent, I expected an accent... but not a thick Aussie broag! He said that instead of the 30-50 person "tours" that were actually pretty hard on the penguins, he led small 12 person max groups that he could better control. And it was FREE! He only asked a donation if you felt "the experience was worth it". I had no cash other then a $50 and I felt guilty not giving him anything, but after 10 minutes I leaned over to Clarice and said, "I'm giving him the $50." Totally worth it. The tours cost at least $35 a person and we had a group of 8 for a 2.5 hour show!

He led us down to a little beach where he had set up two levels of bleachers. We all sat down and he told us exactlyhow things were going to work. He explained that we were going to see Little Penguins (their species name) and they are the smallest full-grown penguins in the world. There will be between 40-50 and they will come up in groups in 2 places - buy the rocks to our left and the rock cliff to our right... Very good information and all spot on perfect. It was so funny to see him point a red-light flashlight down one corner of the beach and here him say things like, "If group 3 has started over here..." then move the flashlight... "Group 3 will be starting over here"... and their they were! We even had to sit completely still and quiet while 10 penguins walked 2 feet away from us up to their nest right behind us!

After all the penguins had made it safely to their nests (we waited a bit to make sure no others were coming) he took us on a beach walk and visited several nests where parents (penguins mate for life) were raising their little chicks. We even saw mom and dad feedling little ones! Needless to say, this was one of the highlights of our trip and something I will never forget. The penguins themselves were awesome, but it was Keith's information, hilarity and just general love for the little birds that made the experience. And to think I was worried we were going to be mugged and killed! :-) My only regret is that we could not take pictures, but I picked up a postcard with some of the little buggers making their way up a beach.

Anyway, that was Day 3. Stay tuned for more!

Tasmania Day 2

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 05:30:00 +0000

I wrote the next bit that day in Tasmania. I'll tell you when it switches back to now (as I post this).

A lot of driving was expected today as we planned to make our way up the east coast stopping first at a town called Richmond. Richmond was known for the oldest stone bridge in Australia built, of course, by convicts in 1853. It is wide enough for a normal 2-lane road.

We were blessed with bright sun for most of our photos, then we wandered over to an old church to find a pleasant surprise. The church, St Luke’s” is the oldest Catholic Church in Australia and is still in use. Framed in their small foyer is a letter from Pope John Paul II in 1986 congratulating them on 150 years of worship in that church. The years have been kind to the walls and roof, but the steeple has been replaced twice. We walked behind the church to the cemetery and looked as some of the old gravestones. It is always interesting to see what was written, how old the person was when they died, and any ornamentation on their headstone. Headstones have always been a great source for the historic record and the ones in Richmond were no different.

From Richmond we got back on the Tasman Highway and started making our way north up the east coast to the Freycinet Peninsula. We were making good time until we got stopped behind a serious accident along the only road heading north. Here I sit waiting for the accident to be cleared for us to start our trip again. We’ve lost 1.5 hours already and we’ve been told it will be “a while”. After scouring our maps looking for an alternate route only to find there just isn’t one, I decided to get out the laptop and site here looking over the cliff at the ocean and the beautiful blue water. It is a wonderful view and would be quite tranquil… if I did not know that every minute spent waiting here was endangering my chances of making it up to the Bay of Fires later today. I’m trying to remind myself that someone just up the road is probably fighting for their life right this second and my inconvenience just does not matter. At least we had some grub in the car and got to eat a picnic lunch here on the cliff side. That will save us some time later. The medical helicopter arrived about 20 minutes ago and since I can no longer hear the rotors I assume they found a place to land. An ambulance arrived on the road shortly thereafter. I doubt I’ll ever learn what happened, and I’m almost certain that I will never know the victims name(s), but I still say a prayer for them and the emergency personnel. Most everyone has been quite accepting of the road delay and patient, doing the same things we are: sitting and eating. We can see Freycinet Peninsula from here, so I know we will get there.

Funny update. As I was typing that last sentence a woman came up and asked if she could charge her Iphone off my computer as her battery just died. How funny is that?!?! Her kids are very grumpy, but she seemed very nice and of course I am charging her phone. When I finish this up I’m going to turn the computer off, but I have my radio transmitter/charger in the car so I’ll charge it over there. She is just two cars in front of us. Hopefully it will not be too much longer.

It wasn't. Obviously this is the part where I am back at now now, everything I'm typing now, I'm typing NOW. (Then, however, will never be now. For that I am, indeed, sorry. Sorrier still that only Clarice and my bro will get that reference.)

We had planned on hiking up to the Freycinet Lookout (1 hour) and then on down to the beach (another 30 minutes) before hiking back out. Well, because of the accident, if we were going to make it to the Bay of Fires we only had time to get to the lookout. Freycinet National Park, like all of the parks in Tassie, is huge and we barely scratched the surface - as with every place we stopped. Oh well, now we know what we want to focus on if we ever get back!

Freycinet Lighthouse

Us at the lookout over Wineglass Bay

Clarice on the hike up to the lookout

We did do a couple of hours hiking at Freycinet, but not nearly as much as we would have liked. It is definitely a picturesque place but so was our next stop - The Bay of Fires. Even before we started planning our Tassie trip I saw on MSNBC an article in the travel section about the Top 10 undiscovered beaches of the world. #1 was The Bay of Fires in Tasmania. When we went over to our friend's place for dinner they showed us some photos they took at the bay and I was sold. Because of the long drive, and the fact we were still 2 hours over exceptionally twisty roads from our sleeping place, we were only granted about 90 minutes and we only got to one small section of the beaches. It was fabulous! There were places to camp just over the sand dune from the beach, not very many people (in fact, at some points there was no one at all), and just some of the most beautiful water you will ever see. I took lots of photos and would have loved to spend an entire weekend just crawling all over the dunes, pools, rocks, beaches, inlets, etc. and taking pictures.

This is "The one I got soaked for" - I think it turned out pretty good!

We needed to get moving before the sun set and we would have to drive in the dark. As it was we still ended up with 30 minutes or so of nighttime driving - not something I would recommend in Tassie. Partly because of the treacherous roads and partly because a lot of animals are noctournal. I just missed an echinda on day 1 and barely missed a wallaby on day 2. Darn thing hopped out right in front of me. I've been lucky enough to have to hit a deer back home, imagine if I came all this way just to wipe out a wallaby or something!

Long post, but I hope you are enjoying our Tassie trip. Three more days to go!

Tasmania Day 1.2

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 06:43:00 +0000

From the Tasmanian Devil Wildlife Park (see previous post) we headed to Port Arthur. The site itself covers many acres and has over 30 historic buildings in various states of repair/ruin. Some are just the outlines of where the buildings once stood, some have been restored or kept standing, others have faded into history all together.

Nice panoramic of Port Arthur from the water

I was infatuated with the colors and swirls of the bricks

The Chapel

After the 45 minute walking tour we took the harbor cruise that was included with our admission fee. The boat circles the Isle of the Dead and pulls alongside of Point Puer where a boys penal station was built and run for about 15 years. The idea was to keep the young offenders from becoming old offenders by restricting their contact with the men at Port Arthur. Good idea, bad location since there was no fresh water and the land was terrible for raising even subsistence crops. Water had to be rowed over every day by convicts from the mainland.

We paid a little extra for a 45 minute tour around the Isle of the Dead, so named since it was the cemetery of Port Arthur. Convicts were buried on ½ of the island in unmarked graves while free people (guards, military people and their families) were buried on the other half of the island with stone carved markers. Because the markers were places facing north/south, weather has caused a lot of breakdown in the stones but thankfully a photographic record was made in the 1930’s so the text on most, if not all, is known. The guide did an excellent job of telling the stories of a dozen or so people who were buried there. In fact, Clarice and I thought she was very creepy – the perfect guide for a cemetery!

We spent the next couple of hours wandering the grounds and taking in the many buildings and features of the prison. One aspect that was especially interesting was the Separate Prison – the prison they built for solitary and silent confinement. Each cell had meter thick stone walls and no one was allowed to make a sound, even the guards! They sat in these cells without talking for 23 hours a day. For one hour each day they were “allowed” exercise. I put that in quotes because it was more of a forced exercise. Each convict was hooded (so they could not even see anyone) then taken to a series of larger rooms where they entered, the door was closed, then they removed the hood/cap and were made to walk briskly around the room until the bell rang signaling stop. Then they were taken back to their cells. Even church was solitary! Each prisoner was led under hood/cap to a specially built chapel in the building. They would enter and walk down an assigned isle to their place where they stood for the service. Once in their place, they closed a small door behind them. That way, each “cell” was smaller than an old telephone booth and the only person they could see was the preacher. From there, they were allowed to sing the hymns, often the first time in a week they had heard their own voice. Stories were told of prisoners trying to communicate by singing incorrect words, but if caught was a very serious offence. No wonder the prison saw a dramatic rises in asylum cases!

The "Solitary Chapel" - each convict stood and could only see the preacher!

The Insane Asylum - where the convicts often went after too much time in the Separate Prison

A couple of "convicts"

We spent about 6 hours all told at Port Arthur and then took the extra daylight we had (being summer and so far south) to drive around the rest of the Tasman Peninsula. We did a small hike to an old mine that used convict labor and had several ruins of buildings. Pretty interesting.

By that point we were pretty tired and the day was fast fading so we headed back to Hobart. We stopped in one town to get some food and supplies, ordered pizza delivery from the car, and we delighted to find the pizza dude arriving at our hotel door just ahead of us. What great timing! I moved all our photos to the laptop, we cleaned up and scarfed down the pizza, then we went to bed knowing tomorrow was going to be a LONG day.

Tasmania Day 1.1

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 07:34:00 +0000

Christmas Day, at 6:00, we flew down to Hobart, Tasmania to spend the time between then and New Year's Eve exploring. Friends of ours had just returned home after spending 8 weeks motoring about the SE corner of Australia and their 3 weeks in Tassie helped us narrow down the essential things we had to tackle while we were there. Let me tell you straight off, Tasmania is a wonderful place if you like nature and the outdoors (we love both) and 5 days is nowhere near enough time to see everything. That would take months.

December 26th - We left the Old Woolstore Hotel (loved it) in Hobart with the intention of spending the day on the Tasman Penninsula. Now, I need a map as the vast majority of you could not find AUSTRALIA on a map much less Tasmania. One moment while I hit Google. Amuse yourselves...

Alright, there we are. Hobart, for the map illiterate, is the "star" at the bottom and the Tasman Peninsula is clearly marked for you. The plan for Day 1 was to drive down and explore this penninsula focusing on Port Arthur, a location that served as a convict prison for many years in the middle 1800s and is a major tourist attraction today (much to the chagrin of the now dead convicts I would imagine).

On the Tasman Penninsula

The entire drive down to Port Arthur would only take 1.5 hours so we planned to make a stop along the way at the Tasmanian Devil Zoo. We know our luck with wildlife in the wild and we are not leaving Tasmania without seeing Devils. They are too cute! Cuddly looking, but they will bite your fingers off if you get too close. We got to watch the keepers feed a male and two females who were penned together and loved watching them “grrrr” and fight over the pieces of rabbit. They ate the bones and all! Apparently, the Tassie Devil has the strongest bite pressure of any mammal on earth. I’d believe it as we could hear bones crunching with every bite.

Another to add to the "Fun Animal Road Sign" Collection

Adorable... from a safe distance

Keeper teasing the hungry devils. Good way to lose an arm!

What you can't see are the 3 other pieces lying a short distance away

Which is more cute and cuddly?

We also visited the other animals in the small zoo, wallabies, kangaroos and birds of all kinds. Our favorite was the Tawny Frogmouth, an owl-looking bird that we both thought looked exactly like a “Furby” – the toy from a few years ago that you could “teach” to talk. Basically balls of fluffy feathers about the size of a 16” softball.

Tell me those aren't just Furbies in a cage!

'Roo with Joey in her pouch

How cool am I?!?!

After leaving the park, we took one more quick detour before getting to Port Arthur. We had seen photos from our friends of Tasman Arch, a natural rock formation just a quick jaunt toward the coast. Pretty cool indeed. There once was another arch in Victoria that led out to a stone pillar in the ocean, but it collaped in the early 1990s stranding a couple of Canadians out on the new pillar! They had to be rescued by a helicopter. No wonder why people are not allowed out on the Tasman Arch.

Alright, that's plenty for today. Tomorrow I'll rock up with the photos of Port Arthur and finish off Day 1 of our Tassie Adventure!

Jon

Christmas Down Under!

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 07:30:00 +0000

Christmas is always a busy event often overshadowing the reason for the holiday - Jesus' birth. Being in Australia, we did not know if it would be lonely, stressful, busy, slow, enjoyable, hectic... Turns out it was pretty darn cool.

Sunday, December 21st - The evening service at church turned into "Carols by Glowstick" and was a lot of fun. it is already warm (it being summer here) and the fire marshals don't like that many lit candles in one place anyway, so glowsticks it was! Clarice invited Amber and Paul who came mostly to see Clarice play the piano, but enjoyed it none the less. Afterward a bunch of us walked over to the Berry Reserve alongside the Narrabeen Lagoon (just across the street from our apartment). Another church was putting on a carol sing followed by fireworks! We gathered on a couple of blankets, played with the kids and really enjoyed the fireworks - though it felt more like the 4th of July on Tippe Lake.

Tuesday, December 23rd - The men's and women's studies that we go to on Tuesday nights gathered at the Thompson's for one big dinner. Lots of people, talking, gag gifts, good food and an enjoyable evening. Even the expected rain stayed away until most everyone had left.

Christmas Eve - Clarice had to work until 2:00, but after that we were invited over to the Pittwater to watch the annual Dog Races. Not what you are thinking! I thought, like you did, that this would be dogs racing around a track. Not so fast my friends! The dogs (and owners) are taken across the channel between the mainland and Scotland Island, and the dogs swim back. First dog back gets a pile of dog food (enough to last a while, anyway) and the winning owner gets a nice cold beer. Rumor has it the event started when two guys, probably intoxicated, bet who's dog could swim the distance faster. It has now grown, over 30 years) into a pretty big Christmas Eve event/tradition. We went with some of the families from church and parked at their place just up the road. Definitely a first for us - but another something "distinctively Aussie"!

Santa Dog

Jon and Summer Simmons (ain't she a doll!!!)

Threw in a pretty Lorikeet shot for ya'

After the Dog Race, we hightailed it over to the McLoughlin's for a wonderful dinner out on their patio. This is the same family who hosted our small group dinner when Jay and Karen visited. They had a few other couples over including two Americans who were visiting their friends who go to NBC. They were from Chicago (small world) and get this - Natalie even went to summer basketball camp at GRACE COLLEGE!!! How strange is that?!?! Great dinner cooked by Neil and then home to bed because...

Christmas Day - ...Clarice has to open her Christmas presents in the dark. Since it is summer here (I love reminding you) sunrise is very early in the morning. We got up at 6:00 and left all the blinds closed. She even made me turn the lights back off so it stayed dark. Forty-five minutes later we had everything opened and got ready to go.

We had lunch at the Thompson's with two of their daughters and one of their sons. The rest live elsewhere (mostly in England). It was a very nice lunch and a good time to share with friends. Steve's younger brother, Stuart, was even able to join us. We taught them how to play double-deck bid Euchre, but only got to play a couple of games. We plan on getting back over there some evening to play some more. Then it was off to the airport, but first we had another quick stop to make...

... at Paul's parent's house. The live very close and were on the way so we stopped by to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and to meet Paul's aunt and uncle who we will be visiting in January. We only had about thirty minutes, but it was nice to stop and visit.

Then we finally got to the airport where we caught our 6:00 flight to Hobart, Tasmania!! More on that in coming posts.

We had a great Christmas Down Under, but both got a touch homesick at times. We hope everyone had a great holiday and make sure you set a place for us next Christmas!!!

Jon

Concert Week #2...

noreply@blogger.com (Jon & Clarice) — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 06:57:00 +0000

I know! I've been really busy trying to get my Financial Accounting problems done for my final exam, so cut me some slack! :-)

Concert #2 was the one I was looking forward to for months - Billy Joel! LIVE! At Acer Arena! We had "OK" seats in that we were pretty square (face on) to the stage, but we couldn't have been farther back. The seats we had were $130 each and I guess I'm a cheap-o but I couldn't justify paying $200 or more to sit on the floor. Maybe it's just me.

The show was a Tuesday night and traffic getting across Sydney in work rush hour is abysmal, so Clarice got off work at 4:00 and we drove over early. The show started at 8:00, but we arrived in Sydney Olympic Park (where the arena is located) about 5:45. That may seem a bit early, but we both agree if we had left at 5:00 we would not have gotten to the arena until almost show time and had to park who knows where!

We walked around the park for a little bit, I grabbed a hot dog at a little stand, we people-watched, then went in. First stop... Parents any guesses??? The T-Shirt stand, of course! Picked up a "T" to go with the "Only the Good Die Young" shirt I still have from high school. Clarice passed, and I can't blame her. There was only really 1 version I liked. Another was OK, but who wants a grey concert shirt? Anyway...

Billy played a lot of his hits and a few "album tracks" like Zanzibar, but with over 30 years of songs he was never going to play everything. Missed out on Pressure, but I think he hit all the ones I really really wanted to here. The show lasted 2.5 hours with no opening act and the only "intermission" was when one of the "guitar roadies" named "Chainsaw" came out and did Highway to Hell with the band. Billy played guitar. Chainsaw was actually pretty good, but he never stood still - just stomped from one end of the stage to the other.

We had a great time, got home late and only Clarice had to get up to go to work the next day! My kind of evening!

Jon