Singapore

Singapore was really short.  We were originally planning on staying for a couple days but the more we talked to people traveling the more we realized that we wanted to spend more time in other countries.

We arrived in Singapore at 11:30 pm due to a delay taking off because of fuel leaking from the engine.  The first thing to note is that it was hot and humid. Our "hostel" was actually part of the Costa Sands resort.  We got hand stamps when we left so we could re-enter without paying the fee.  We ended up having a room to ourselves, even though the website said they didn't have mixed gender dorms.

In the morning we used our breakfast voucher at McDonalds in the resort, where we received a coffee or tea and a sausage egg mcmuffin.  Bleh.  But better than fish head soup for breakfast I guess.  Then we headed downtown to get our bus tickets for Malaysia and check out the city.  We were sent to Lavender St. What we found were a couple of shacks in a parking lot, each shack being a different company which went to a different place in Malaysia.  So we bought our tickets to Kuala Lumpur for the following day then headed shopping.

Holy cow.  The shopping malls were several stories above ground and then another five stories below ground.  It was amazing.  And expensive.  Behind that white circle thing were Dolce and Gabana, Armani, Louis Vitton (which had a line outside to get in the store).  It was simply amazing.

We ate lunch at a little cafeteria.  I chose the 1 meat 1 vegetable and Andy had 1 meat 2 vegetable.  It cost $6 SGD for the both of us.

It was tasty.  Then headed back to the resort to hang out until dinner time.  We were pooped from all the walking and the heat.  For dinner we went to another little cafeteria outside the resort and had something similar to lunch.

In the morning we ate again at McDonalds with our voucher and then headed to the bus "station" to catch our bus to Malaysia.  There is a checkpoint to leave Singapore, then you head across a bridge and then enter Malaysia.  It was fun.

Summary of Australia

Australia was a different pace than New Zealand was.  Here, because the country is so large and distances so vast, we spent less time at each place and more time traveling.  We stuck mostly to the touristy things, which meant we spent a lot more money here than originally planned.

Average price of a bed at a hostel:  AUD $26

Price for a single scoop ice cream cone:  AUD $3.50

Average price of gas per liter: AUD $1.50

Katie's favorite experience: The Penguin Parade.  If ever you come to Australia, go see the Penguin parade on Philip island down by Melbourne.  Totally worth it.

Andy's favorite experience: Sailing the Whitsundays. If we had the time I would be really keen to do the Soloway Lass sailing trip, but it is three days and three nights.

Easiest dinner to make: Cooked rice or couscous added to pre-made soup.

Time shift:  10AM Sunday morning in Australia = 8PM Saturday night East Coast US

Exchange rate: AUD $1 = US $1.10

Predominant method of travel: Bus

Nationalities of people we met in Australia: Swedish, Canadian, German, Swiss, British, Irish, Italian, Kiwi (NZ), American.

In general we didn't meet as many people in Australia as we did in NZ.  Also Australia stole my hat and my sunglasses and tried to steal our camera but didn't succeed.

Byron Bay to Sydney

Brisbane is the last place in Australia where we took pictures.  We left early in the morning for a 4 hour bus ride to Byron Bay where we were just spending the day until heading to Sydney.  About halfway there we realized that we didn't have our camera.  Then spent another hour agonizing over where the hell did we leave our camera and how are we going to get it back.

At one of the bus stops we called the Brisbane hostel to let them know that we left our camera there and could they please please look for it.  We'll call back in another hour or so to see if you found it.  Then got back on the bus and headed to Byron Bay.

Random statue at one of the bus stops

We got to Byron bay at around 11am and immediately found payphones to call the Brisbane hostel again.  They found it!  Apparently we left it in the kitchen (or more likely the camera wanted to stay an extra day in Brisbane and catch an express flight to Sydney, so it snuck up to the kitchen during the night while we slept).  They took down our credit card information and would be overnighting it to the hostel in Sydney where we were going to stay.  Phew.

In Byron Bay we did the only real point of interest, the lighthouse walk.  It was drizzling a little bit but it was a pleasant walk with views of the ocean and a short fat lighthouse.  Luckily Andy brought his iphone so we have a couple pictures.  We decided to buy lunch and make dinner.  So lunch was from a local deli, Andy got a chicken salad baguette and I got the chicken curry.  For dinner we made pb&j, and bought some snacks at the grocery store; potato chips, crackers, red pepper cream cheese dip.  We got on the bus at 8PM and didn't arrive in Sydney until 9AM the next morning.

We took the ferry to Manly Beach and hung out there for an hour or so.  The weather was cold and it was late in the day so it wasn't really a beach day.  But neat to see Sydney from the water.  And that rounds up our trip in Australia.

Andy's note: it's hard to express on this blog the amount of kindness we experienced from YHA staff during this whole camera losing debacle. Matilda in Brisbane was a great help and I believe personally overnight posted (mailed) the camera herself. The two guys at the front desk at Sydney Railway Square helped us get in touch with Matilda the following day to see if she successfully posted the camera and how much it cost. We even were assisted by the staff at a random truck stop somewhere between Brisbane and Byron Bay. The stop had no pay phone but they graciously allowed us to use their phone to ring the Brisbane YHA. People rock.

Brisbane dinner

While hiking the Routeburn Track in New Zealand we met a group of Australians that were hiking together as part of a high school parents outdoor program. One member of the group, Geoff, was kind enough to offer a lot of advice about Australia over the few days that we spent with them on the track.  He invited us over to dinner whenever we ended up in Brisbane.  We emailed with him a couple times to set up a good time for dinner, and met him at the train station around 5:30.

Geoff is a principal at a private school and his wife Jackie is a teacher at a public school, but to make extra money, they flip houses.  In Australia if you buy a house and live in it and then sell it for a profit, there are no taxes on the profit you make from the house.  They currently live in a large Queenslander house, which is similar to a colonial house, but no grand staircase in the front and the outdoor porch only covers two sides, not three. It was gorgeous!

We had brie and quince with olives and crackers for hors d'oeuvre with champagne (that's what they called it, who am I to argue) from South Australia. We talked about politics and the difference between Australia and America.  We talked about the differences in immigration and philanthropists and we discussed the immense amount of flooding Brisbane and Australia received earlier this year.  It was incredible to hear about how the flooding affected everyone around them (they luckily lived on high land so weren't as affected). We opened up a pinot gris from New Zealand once we finished the champagne.

For dinner had Australian barbecue - rump steak (the name of the cut from the cow) and chicken, eggplant and zucchini, and Jacky made smashed potatoes. When Andy asked Geoff what the difference between Australian and American barbecue was there seemed to be a general agreement of "not much". However, it does seem like butchers cut meat differently in Australia than they do in the U.S. The meat was then drizzled in a yummy mushroom gravy.  With dinner we opened a bottle of pinot noir from another area in Australia but I just don't remember where from.  The food was excellent as well as the company.  It was so nice to feel like we were more than just tourists in a country.

After dinner we had some tea and then dessert.  Jacky had made rum soaked plums topped with whipped cream she whipped after dinner and a sprinkle of cinnamon.  I asked if they actually skinned the plums themselves, but Jacky said they bought them in a can pre-peeled.

We hooked up our laptop to their tv and showed them our pictures from New Zealand and Australia.  Jacky didn't go on the hike with Geoff and the others but she met up with him afterwards and they traveled through NZ together.  It was a nice way of talking about each others trips and a pleasant way to end the night.

Geoff graciously gave us a ride back to the city (only about 15 minutes) so we didn't have to catch the train. Thank you Geoff and Jacky!

On to Brisbane

We caught a morning bus down to Brisbane which put us in the city around 2pm.  After checking into our hostel and situating the rest of our travel in Australia, we headed out to explore downtown a little bit.  It's a decent sized city, situated on a river and we spent a couple of hours just wandering through.  For dinner we bought soup from the grocery store and brought it back to our hostel, added the rest of the rice and some couscous and ate it with some rolls.

In the morning we made scrambled eggs with green pepper and onion, then took the bus to Mount Coot-tha. The bus drops off at either the summit or the botanic gardens/planetarium at the base.  We stopped off at the summit first which had sweeping views of Brisbane and the surrounding area.  There were signs to J.C. Slaughter falls, only 1.7 km, and we decided it would be a nice hike. The falls were laughably disappointing. There was hardly a dribble flowing over the rocks.  But there was a picnic area and we ate lunch there.  We hiked back up to catch the bus down to the base. There was a 1:30 show at the Planetarium called Black holes and we decided to watch it.  It was interesting, as I find most planetarium shows are, and was narrated by Geoffry Rush.

After the show we had about an hour to kill so we lazed about in the grass outside the planetarium. We headed back into the city to catch a train to Indooroopilly (pronounced indro-pilly) where we were meeting people at 5:30 PM.  I am going to end this post here so I can talk in depth about the people we were meeting and dinner.

Fraser Island Day 2

After being awoken by the rain a few times throughout the night, the second day on Fraser Island started nice and early at 7:30AM. We once again ate at the resort and had an all-you-can-eat breakfast with fruit, cereals, eggs, hash browns and meats. At 8:30 we all hopped on the bus and headed up the east beach.

Our first stop was the shipwreck T.S. Maheno. The ship was originally built in New Zealand and used by their navy. In it's time it was a really fast steamer that eventually became a passenger ferry when it was outstripped in speed by more modern vessels. At the end of it's life in the 1930s the ship was sold to the Japanese for spare parts and metal. When the Japanese were towing it up the coast to Japan a storm hit and the Maheno got stuck on Fraser island. No one was hurt or injured during the wreck and they never managed to get the ship unstuck. Fortunately the shipwreck became a major tourist attraction on Fraser Island.

Continuing up the beach we came to The Pinnacles. This was simply a multi-colored sand formation that has spiritual significance for the Aborigines. Not much farther up the beach we stopped at Indian Head which are the only rocks on the island. Indian Head is also the second easternmost point in Australia.
Our last stop before lunch was the Champagne Pools which were a lot like the lava pools we saw in Hawaii. These are lava tubes close to the ocean that have been carved out by erosion and get filled with sea water. We then headed back down the beach and had lunch at the base of Indian Head (filled rolls and orange juice box).

After lunch we went to Eli Creek. This was an interesting place because it was a freshwater creek with sand at the bottom. There was a boardwalk that went along the creek and you could walk upstream a ways and then walk or float back down the creek out to the ocean. Once again it was cold, but Katie and I sucked it up and waded down the creek through the sand and back out toward the ocean.

Back on the bus, back to the ferry and off to Brisbane the next day.

Fraser Island Day 1

The bus picked us up from the hostel at 7:30 AM and dropped us off at the ferry.  After a half hour boat ride we arrived on Fraser (pronounced Fray-zer) Island around 9 AM.  Our bus was a monstrous 4WD vehicle that could seat something like 40 people, but today there were only 12.  Fraser Island is the world's largest sand island, meaning it is made completely from sand, no rocks or dirt.

Our first stop was Eurong resort to drop off some employees we picked up on the ferry, and pick up some guests who took the ferry from Rainbow Beach. We then drove 30 minutes to Lake Wabby.  This lake is a specific type of lake because of the way it was formed, but I don't remember what it was called (Laura, do you know?).  I think it used to be a smallish river from the rains and then sand blew over it and closed it in to form a lake.  There are catfish in the lake that used to swim out to sea when it was still a river.  It was a cool lake but a little cold and rainy for us.  It looks greenish because there is algae growing in it, in case you were wondering.

We headed back to Eurong resort for a buffet lunch where Andy and I gorged ourselves on food.  Next stop, Lake MacKenzie, which is a perched lake, it is only fed by rainwater and has no outlet.  It was the biggest perched lake on the island and a beautiful clear blue color.  We both sucked it up and jumped in the lake.  I mean, we had paid for this tour so we might as well take advantage of the lake.  The sand around the lake is 90% silica, which means it is great for exfoliating skin and shining jewelry.

Our last stop for the day was a rainforest walk which took about 40 minutes.  At the beginning of the hike the tour guide showed us a web of a funnel spider, one of Australia's deadliest spiders.  He pointed out a species of fern that only grows on Fraser island and has been around for 65 million years.  And lastly, the Satinay trees, which are enormous trees considering they grow out of sand.  The largest one we saw was three and a half meters in diameter, but the largest on the island is five meters in diameter.  It was really impressive to see.

At the end of the hike the tour guide showed us a web for a common trap door spider.  I asked the tour guide if the spiders look like the one slowly crawling towards his foot.  He jumped a foot and a half back before realizing the spider wasn't actually on him.  Common trap door spiders aren't deadly but can cause serious illness if bitten.

Dinner was back at Eurong resort and again a buffet of different foods.  We shared a room at the resort with a couple from Switzerland.  After dinner we hung out at the bar with two canadian girls, two swedish girls, the couple from Switzerland and a guy from Germany.  It rained on and off while we were at the bar and continuously throughout the night.

Fotodump Friday

Andy's pictures:
This was on a bridge in Melbourne. I liked the "more bars in more places" look of the tress lined up with the ferris wheel.

This isn't a great picture, I just like the story behind it. When Katie started feeding the birds this one refused to get off once the birdseed was all gone. The bird started trying to grab on to Katie's shirt sleeve with it's beak to climb up. Luckily he wasn't successful and flew off.

Somewhere on the Great Ocean Road.

On the way out of Green Island on our Great Barrier Reef trip.

For all the geology nerds that read this blog - why is this rock orange? (Esk Island, Whitsundays)

Bad iPhone picture, but I was excited our 737 from Auckland to Sydney was parked next to an A380.

Katie's pictures:
The albino kangaroo outside of Melbourne during our Penguin Parade tour.  It seemed a lot older than the other kangaroos, but that could just be because it's albino.  There was also one albino roo hopping around too.

The fruit looked bright and colorful stacked together at Victoria Market in Melbourne.

The Loch Ard gorge was really cool to walk around in.  I just wanted to revisit it.

This sign was at the Whitehaven lookout.

A comment was left asking if I was wearing a wetsuit.  This is a lycra stinger suit.  It is a full body suit (hand gloves, stirrups for the feet, hood).  It provides some protection if you run into either of Australia's deadliest jellyfish, the Box jellyfish and Irukandji.  They are super sexy.

Our group that went sailing on the Waltzing Matilda in the Whitsundays.  All of them were really wonderful to sail with.

Lockey

After we returned from the Whitsundays our skipper Lockey informed us that the fun wasn't over yet. The company that books trips on Waltzing Matilda invites everyone on the trip to a local bar called Beaches the night they return for a round of drinks and socializing. We had originally intended to catch a bus at 7:40PM to head down to Hervey Bay but managed to change our ticket to the 11:40PM bus so we could join in the festivities.

We didn't spend much time on character development in the previous posts about the Whitsundays, and really there were too many great people on the trip to describe, but I wanted to spend a little bit of time talking about Lockey.

Lockey is just about everything you would expect in the skipper of a small sailboat. Average height, thin, tattooed, a nice mop of curly unkept hair, extremely tan and simply put, a character. Many of his mannerisms honestly reminded me of Jack Sparrow. I asked Lockey how long he had been sailing and he simply held his hand a couple feet off the ground and said "since I was about yay big." Even his name sounds like he could be a character from Pirates of the Caribbean.

We met up with some of the other folks from the trip at beaches around 7:30PM. Most of them were from the U.K. - a handful of brits, an irish couple and one german. 8:30 rolled around and we were wondering if Lockey was going to show up. Fashionably late, he meandered into the bar and up to our table around 9, greeted by cheers from the group. In classic pirate... I mean sailor fashion he ordered a jug of rum and coke. After a few rounds of drinks at Beaches Lockey decided it was time to move on and brought us to a bar up the road (right next to the YHA) called Phoenix. We only spent an hour or so at this bar before it was time for us to say goodbye and catch our overnight bus to Hervey Bay. What a great couple of days.

Bluff enroute to Glenorchy

I don't know the exact location of this bluff, but the bus driver that brought us from Queenstown to the start of the Routeburn Track stopped here for a few minutes so we could have a look and take some pictures.

The lake is Lake Wakatipu that stretches from Queenstown down to Glenorchy. The road from Queenstown to Glenorchy wasn't built until the 60s so you used to have to take a ferry down the lake to get to Glenorchy. The road that we continued down after this stop is just barely visible on the far right of the photo.

Sailing the Whitsundays (part 2)

On the second day everyone woke up between 6 and 7 and breakfast was served (mainly bread with a selection of toppings, cereal and milk, and a fruit salad). We once again had beautiful clear weather (although it could have been a bit warmer) and started making our way to Esk Island. Apparently not many people go ashore at Esk Island because it's also known as Snake Island and is said to have the largest number of deadly snakes per square meter in Australia. That said, Lockey assured us that he had never seen any snakes over the last few years of going there, but on the flip side he also hadn't seen any birds. At around 8 or 9 we made our way to the beach. Rather than sand the beach was made up of pieces of dead coral. Not far up from the beach there were some rocks formations that showed where the water level had been years and years ago. We climbed up the rocks a ways to get some pictures but didn't venture too far into the bush. Most of us just sat around and chatted while one or two people snorkeled.

After about an hour on Esk Island we got back on the boat and headed for the Coral Gardens. I don't know if that's the official name of this area or just a name given by the crew of our boat but it was by far the best coral we saw on the trip. There didn't seem to be as many fish as there were at Dunbell Island but there was tons of bright coral to look at. Katie and I snorkeled for 20 or 30 minutes and then signaled for a pick up (fist in the air). Once back on the boat we dried off and soaked up the sun before lunch. All the meals on the boat were great and lunch on the second day consisted of a really nice pasta bake (no meat), sliced deli meats, bread and salad.

After lunch we started back to Airlie Beach and did a little unpowered sailing along the way (pretty much all of the trip we had been sailing with only the motor or both the motor and the sails).

It was both Katie and my's first time spending the night on a sailboat and it was a blast. The trip was made better by great company and a great crew.

Sailing the Whitsundays (part 1)

I had never heard of the Whitsunday Islands until we started traveling and discussing Australia with other travelers.  All the discussions about Australia we have had have included a must see trip to the Whitsundays.

Off the coast of Airlie Beach is a group of 74 islands varying in size and popularity called the Whitsunday Islands.  They are part of a mountain range that connects with the mainland, but after the ice age the water level rose and covered the land connections.  The largest island is Whitsunday which is home to Whitehaven beach, some claim the most beautiful beach in Australia.

Our sailing trip was on the Waltzing Matilda, a 60 foot sailing ship with Lockey, the skipper, Nat and Charlotte as deckhands, and 12 other guests.  We set sail at 8:30 am Thursday morning after having been relieved of our sandals, flip-flops and shoes - no footwear allowed on the boat but we could put them on when we stopped at beaches and the like. We had blue skies and were told that it was some of the best weather they had seen in months.  By 11:30 we were at our first destination, Dunbell island.  Lunch was served first, a selection of quiches with bread and salad.  Once finished we jumped into the water to snorkel around the island.  The water was a lot murkier than the outer Great Barrier Reef, but there was still a significant number of fish and coral to see.

After snorkeling for an hour we hopped back in the boat and headed to Whitehaven beach on Whitsunday Island. We anchored in Tongue Bay and then made our way ashore via the tender boat. From Tongue Bay we did a little nature walk to a lookout and then made our way to the beach. The sand on Whitehaven beach is 98% silica which makes the beach look bright white and clean (it also makes the sand squeak when walked upon). We had the whole beach to ourselves. There was a lot of bonding amongst the group which made the trip much more enjoyable overall.

After sunset we went back to the boat for a dinner of steak, fish (for me), potato salad, vegetables, salad and bread.  It was quite yummy.  Lockey started in on pirate jokes and we all sat around swapping jokes of our own.  Nat told us a game of Uno is traditional aboard Waltzing Matilda so one huge game broke out and then everyone went to bed fairly early.

Airlie Beach

We spent the last day in Cairns at the hostel or the free community swimming pool (lagoon)
We caught the midnight bus to Airlie Beach.  It left at 12:30AM and arrived in Airley at 11:30AM with multiple stops during the night picking people up and dropping others off.  It really wasn't too bad since we had ear plugs (thank you Jay!) and neck pillows.  The bus was only half full so we also each had 2 seats to ourselves.

Once in Airlie Beach we checked into our hostel and started planning our sailing trip to the Whitsunday Islands. We settled on a 2 day 1 night trip that leaves tomorrow morning.  This also presented us with a logistical problem with the number of days we are in Australia and how much stuff we still wanted to do.  So we called Qantas and had them push our flight to Singapore back two days.  It's a relief, now we can also do a two day trip to Fraser Island (which we will do on Sunday).

Headed to the grocery store to get food for lunch, dinner and motion sickness pills.  The prospect of being on a small sailing boat for two days is a bit daunting for my stomach.  After lunch we headed off to the lagoon (the salt water community swimming pool).  The lagoon here is lovely!  It's not like the cement swimming holes at home.  For both the Airlie Beach and Cairns lagoon, there was a shallow end which you could walk from dry land to the middle of the pool without needing steps.  There are also several fountains in the pool, not to mention the trees surrounding the pool to provide shade.  And last but not least, there is a sandy part to the lagoon.