Travelling Post 57 - The day I went to Seaside

The US West Coast is split between three states, with California being the most southerly, Oregon in the middle and Washington bordering Canada. After California I made the natural progression and headed to Oregon, specifically Portland.

Portland was a breath of fresh air, in comparison to California and I mean that quite literally. No where in California was ever really cold, but Portland... well by gosh I could see my breath, it was that cold. I haven't been in that cold for a long time. Mornings on Margaret River's vineyards was cold, and once or twice there was a morning frost on the vines but during the day if it weren't raining it was pretty warm. Portland never warmed up, and it was most refreshing. I'd never thought I'd miss the winter so much, but Portland was so refreshing, what was best it was a crisp cold, no wind and only the odd dash of rain. However having been in Seattle for the past couple of days, I've changed my mind, I want the sun back. Winter is nice for a couple of days but when it starts raining and the wind starts blowing I really don't like it.

Portland itself is a pretty great city, it is surrounded by great park lands and woods which I spent much of my time strolling around. I also did a bit of shopping in this sales-tax free state and spent a bit of time looking into the local history. I also liked it because I felt safe. In Californian cities I didn't feel all that safe walking around after the sun went down but Portland, despite having a 1million plus population felt like a large town not a city.

My whole West Coast experience has been city after city so I thought, for a bit of a change, I'd go to a small town by the sea and so off I went to Seaside. Sadly the weather was terrible all rain and wind and no sun. The town was nice enough and the Oregon coast was impressively rugged but the weather was just lame. I also visited their neighbouring town of Astoria, where parts of The Goonies was filmed. I tried to go for a walk in Astoria's woods but Oregon was recently the scene of a particularly bad storm and much flooding, the damage stopped me at every turn by fallen trees and broken pathways. After failed walks and bad weather, but a very relaxed couple of days I left Seaside for my next US destination - Seattle.

Travelling Post 56 - California in Pictures

Los Angeles

Fresh Prince of Bel Air House, outside Universal Studios, on the Walk of Fame

San Diego

Balboa Park and aboard the USS Midway.

San Francisco

On the way to Alcatraz, Alcatraz and the Golden Gate Bridge

Travelling Post 55 - California

From New Zealand I flew via Fiji to America's City of Angels, Los Angeles. Why it is named City of Angels I'll never know. The people are friendly enough, more friendly than you'd think from a city of it's size, however a lot of the city has surely been abandoned by Angels or any left aren't doing their work. Full of homeless from all over America come for the sun, the majority of LA is neither clean nor has a safe feel about it. I stayed in Santa Monica, one of the so called nicer areas of the city and on an early morning stroll along the sea front I saw near enough every bench taken over as a bed for the night. This was in direct contrast to the areas where the rich and the famous live, where they don't even have paths so no one can walk around invading their privacy They also had private security who drove around to keep out the paparazzi, which is fair enough but you can't help think they keep all the undesirables as well. That said this situation is world wide, in every city in the world their are rich areas and poor areas but never before have I noticed the difference so sharply.

I took a tour around Hollywood, saw all the rich people's houses and was suitably impressed. I'd wanted a tour that didn't go to the houses of the rich and famous, it is rather tacky isn't it?!? Despite my initial misgivings i was glad I went, I got to see the US class the divide, you know the one they pretend not to have, and these houses were very impressive. Hollywood itself was a bit dingy, full of buildings built in the 60s and 70s, but wandering along the walk of fame, spotting all the celebrity's stars I knew and wondering why there were so many I'd never heard of, was fun.

From LA I went South to San Diego and then North to San Francisco, and in California it seems Saints do better work than Angels.

Both cities were full of homeless but the streets were cleaner and the sites were nicer. Balboa Park in San Diego was particular highlight. Left over from the World's fair of nineteen 0 something, it is a beautiful city park in the city limits, full of wide spaces for sports and games, as well as gardens for ambling along and admiring. In contrast to the more famous Golden Gate Park in San Francisco, Balboa Park is far superior in every way.

The Golden Gate Park was the only disappointment of San Francisco. The icons of the city, Alcatraz and the Golden Gate Bridge, on the other hand are suitably worthy of the mantle 'iconic.' Alcatraz was a really interesting place to visit, and rumour has it (though this wasn't on the tour), that the inmates were the only prisoners in the US to get warm showers so they couldn't get used to cold water and swim away to freedom. Life on that island must have been hard, particularly on New Years Eve when they could hear the city celebrating whilst they were stuck doing time on the rock. It certainly isn't a hotel I'd like to visit.

From California I headed on north to Portland.

Travelling Post 54 - The South Island in pictures, just the odd highlight

Travelling Post 53 - Around the North Island

I'm just going to briefly go over what I've done on the North Island since the Hot Water Pools.

From Hahei we headed to Raglan for the second night of the tour and then Maketu [spkn: Mak-e-tu] for the third. At Maketu we were treated to an excellent cultural evening. A local family performed some traditional dances for us and then taught the lads the Haka and girls the Poi.

The following night I hopped off the bus and spent the night in nearby Roturua. Roturua is situated on a a bed of geothermal activity and smells very badly of sulphur. Before getting back on the bus I walked around Wai-O-Tapu Thermal Wonderland where I saw Lady Knox Geyser erupting [pictured] and an array of heated water pools of varying colours and smells plus boiling mud pools. All very different to anything you'll find in Oz or back home.























After being driven to Taupo I spent the afternoon relaxing and the next day I completed a couple of easy, short walks around a Tongariro National Park.

From Tongariro National Park the bus headed to Wellington, the nation's capital and a much nicer city than Auckland. I had intended to spend part of my birthday doing a Lord of the Rings tour, but it wasn't running that day so I did that the day before. Satisfying my inner geek, the tour was interesting - for me anyhow - and from both the tour and my views of just the North Island's landscape it is easy to see why LOTR was filmed in NZ.

Next Stop: The South Island

Travelling Post 52 - On the road again.

After 3 nights and 2 days in Auckland I left the city behind for the rest of NZ. I'd booked myself on a Stray bus, which is a hop on hop off tour. The tours first destination was Hahei which we got to via a lucky tree and windy roads. We arrived in Hahei in the late afternoon and went on a coastal walk to Cathedral Cove, before having a BBQ dinner. Late evening we boarded the minibus for Hot Water Beach. This was pretty great, we dug holes in the sand and due to geothermal activity the water was hot, in some points to hot to touch. Certainly one of the more different evenings I've spent on my travels.

Above, digging the hole.

Below, Relaxing after the work was done, sadly the beer in the picture is not mine I forgot to bring some.

Travelling Post 51 - Auckland

I landed in Auckland sometime in the mid afternoon and eventually ended up at my accommodation a couple of hours later. My first nights stay was at the Nomads Fat Camel Hostel and, thankfully, I only booked one night. It took ages for me to get checked in as the staff were slow and they only had one machine to encode the key cards, then they sent me to a room where I had to ask fellow backpackers which bed was free and strip it myself. When i made my bed I discovered they hadn't even given me all the sheets I needed so had to go back to reception for more, and then the people in my room were amongst the biggest idiots I've had the experience of meeting on my trip so far. At 1.30 they came in drunk and loud, then left again, then came back and so on for the next hour before I gave up and went downstairs to read before they went to sleep. Safe to say I checked out there early the next morning and moved to Auckland City YHA, which was a vast improvement, but my first night in NZ didn't look like a good omen.

After not getting a good nights sleep I still couldn't waste the day so I wandered around town, looking in an Art Gallery (not my thing) then checked out the excellent Maritime Museum and the equally excellent Auckland Museum,

On my second day in Auckland I took a free Stray tour of the city where I learnt Auckland has the 4th biggest city sprawl in the world. Their comparatively small population of only 1.4million obviously has a policy of 'why build up when you can build up across' and why not I say, it makes for a good view. I got to see someone bungee jump from the Skytower, the highest building in the Southern hemisphere which was OK. The tour also drove us around the city, pointing out places to get a cheap or free haircut, and other such useful information as well as stopping off at Mt Eden for some great city views, a memorial for the first NZ Labor Prime Minister, and I got to walk along the Harbour Bridge to watch a free fall bungee jump. The tour was really interesting and great value, unlike some things I've paid for whilst away a didn't want to I wouldn't have minded having to pay for this.

Travelling Post 50- Almost Full circle with a Michael Palin wannabe sans camera crew.

I arrived back in Sydney on Friday 19th October after a 15hr greyhound bus journey from Surfers Paradise. Previously I had planned to go to Byron Bay but decided to bypass it in favour of Sydney. I also wanted to be back for a beer festival on the Saturday, which turned out to be a bit of a disappointment, the beer was too expensive for what you got. The Tandoori Chicken pizza i bought for tea was really nice though and the company was good. Other than that I spent my first Saturday back relaxing. That was my aim for the next 10 days, how I was so wide of my target.

I'd travelled the top half of the East Coast meeting up with a couple of other backpackers, Bethan and Briony, and after about a week or two apart I met up with them again in Sydney. After achieving my aim on Sunday, lazing around and watching TV with the girls, I went out on Monday evening for an easy night of social drinking and then came Tuesday night.

On Tuesday night we went out for a Chinese as it was my last night with the girls before I left OZ, as they were heading further South the following day. The meal was nice that is not the issue. Also at the meal were a few people I'd met briefly coming down the East Coast - Paul, Mette and Rachel - whom Bethan and Briony knew quite well from the Oz bus. Two of those people, Mette and Paul were friends travelling together and hadn't been to Sydney before. The following day I became their unofficial tour guide, and whilst loving the ability to show of my knowledge of Sydney it ended up being an expensive week of drinking, eating out and sight seeing. Such a hard life.

The following day I met up with Mette, Paul and Rachel and did a little sightseeing, bought some fish and then round to a different Paul's flat and had my most civilised meal since Easter Sunday.

On the Thursday, with me counting down the days the four of us then traipsed around Paddy's Market, Darling Harbour and then Paul and I visited the Maritime Museum. In the evening it was cinema time to watch the badder than bad Good Luck Chuck, I knew it would be pretty awful but I decided to go along with the crowd, never again.

On Friday, with 4 full days left in Oz I was eager not to waste my time so I went out drinking all day. A suitable, if expensive, use of my time whereby I most likely embarrassed myself but no one complained, they all thought I was funny. I just hope they were laughing with me not at me.

With three days left to go I took Paul and Mette around the Botanic Gardens and the excellent Rocks Market. In the afternoon I begged off staying out to long because I needed to return to my bed for a brief afternoon nap. I'd be forced to wake up at a ridiculously early 8.30am to play tour guide and my hangover hadn't gone by 3pm despite 2 litres+ of water a a couple of Panadol. In the evening I experienced my first, but most definitely not my last, taste of tapas. I am learning so much about new foods I've not tried before on my trip around Oz. [Please note that does not mean I will try old foods I know I don't like!]

On Sunday, 2 days before my Tuesday departure, I undertook the Sydney Harbour Bridge Climb. Originally I wanted to do this on my last day but sharing the experience with friends was much more preferable, especially as I have no photographs. If I needed my love of Sydney reigniting, which I didn't, the Bridge Climb would have done it, if I needed to be reminded of how expensive Sydney could be, the Bridge Climb would have done that to. The views from the top are simply spectacular, I challenge any city in the world to beat that view. I will also disagree with said city if they believe their daytime city view is better, simply because they would be wrong.

I had expected the Bridge Climb to be hard work but I was wrong. Tourists are put on the Bridge like a conveyor belt moving along every 10 minutes so there was a lot of stopping and starting as we waited for photographs to be taken ahead of us, and then we had to wait as we had to be stopped for our photograph. The biggest, nay the only real, criticism I have of the Bridge Climb is, rather predictably, the cost. It cost $200 to do the climb on a weekend (we waited a few days for good weather) and only 4 photos on one CD would have cost $50 and change. The photos were not good enough to even split the cost three ways with Paul and Mette, and I'll always have my memories so I didn't purchase them.

After the climb we headed to Coogee where I had a brief look around to see what had changed and what hadn't before taking my sightseers on the Coogee-Bondi walk. I think it was as I walked down Coogee Bay Road, looking at what used to be my old work place, now transformed into a coffee bar not evening resembling the previous establishment that I knew how much I'd miss Oz. Although that was a fleeting feeling that got suppressed in the usual mix of emotion and the excitement of heading to NZ.

In the evening after a Lasagna for dinner the three of us headed to the tallest building in Sydney, the Skytower rounding of the busy day of sightseeing with some night time views of the city and a high altitude drink of course. Then it was off for more drinks, before a 2am bed time.

I arose early on my last full day in Sydney to go for pancakes. We were supposed to be meeting for breakfast but by the time we were sorted, by 'we' I mean Paul and Mette not I, it was more like brunch. After brunch we headed to the Pylon lookout, the original Harbour Bridge climb (up some stairs) which was included in the Bridge Climb price. The views from the Pylon were impressive but not quite so much as further up on the top of the bridge, but at least I got to take my own photos and had some taken of me [see below]. In the early afternoon I left Paul and Mette boarding their taxi saying good bye to them and also to Rachel, my Friday drinking partner, who was joining them in their journey South, then I headed to IEP where I used their free Internet for one last time and said goodbye to the staff. My last night in OZ ended up being one of my cheapest. I ate spaghetti on toast for dinner and watched TV all evening, it was a bit of a come down from the past week but I needed a break so didn't mind too much































On Tuesday 30th October 2007 just after 11am I left Australia on Air New Zealand flight 704 for Auckland, leaving behind the sixth largest country in the world and all its deadly creatures. Some things have been excellent, otherwise good, some things so so and yet others (mostly the work) a little bit crappy. If I had the chance to go back in time I wouldn't do much different, otherwise I wouldn't have met the people I met and had the experiences I've had, but if I was repeating my year in the future there is certainly things I would never do again such as work on a vineyard and perhaps I wouldn't staple my thumb again. Perhaps.

Travelling Post 49 - Brissy and Surfers Paradise...

Cunningly shortened to Brissy, Brisbane is Queensland's capital and its largest city and was my penultimate stop before Sydney. As Oz cities go, its nothing special, both Melbourne and Sydney have more attractions and Perth is a little prettier. The banks of the river are beautifully designed with relaxing walkways, but I felt all this, like much of the city was not decked out for the tourists but its inhabitants. Brisbane is a not really set up for the casual backpacking tourist but to live in I reckon it would be a bonza place.

After Brisbane I headed back for one night and day in Surfers Paradise. I was there the day before the Indie 300, so the coastal town was quite busy and the promotion made the town a little more appealing on the eye, even if there was nothing else particularly special about it.

Travelling Post 48 - Crickey it's a Croc

From Fraser Island I continued my journey southward to Noosa Heads. Noosa is a small town, which looks, and is expensive. The reason for heading there was to visit Australia Zoo, that institution formally owned by the late great Steve Irwin, for as a backpacker many other reasons to visit Noosa Heads are too costly.

As zoos go, Australia Zoo isn't huge, the number of animals caged there are fewer than cheaper but larger zoos such as Toronga in Sydney. The comparably few animals isn't a criticism, the animals here are among the most well kept I have ever seen with the animal accommodation more spacious than pretty much any I've ever seen before. What is a criticism is the price, it certainly hurt the wallet.

I visited the zoo with a few friends I'd met on the Fraser Island trip and upon entering the zoo our first sight was a talk on Galapagos Tortoises, they were huge. It struck me immediately how much the zoo keepers cared for the animals. Our next stop was the elephant feeding, where members of the public, including myself, queued up and offered to get our hands all slimy. We saw elephants later on as well, this time they were playing ball with the zoo keepers - the life of an incarcerated animal seems easy.

The main attraction of the Zoo is the Crocoseum, a 5,000 capacity arena where the zoo keepers bring in animals for all to view and learn about. The show was a bit of an anti climax, whilst still entertaining it was very Americanised with overly enthusiastic presenters and poor, poor jokes. The highlight of the show is the crocodile feeding, but having seen this in the wild all that was in it for me was learning a bit more about these ferocious killing machine.

All in all it was a good day, but Australia Zoo is still just a zoo and having seen a fair few in Oz already and seeing many animals in the wild it wasn't worth the entry fee.

Travelling Post 47 - The largest sand island in the world.

Heading South from Agnes Water, as I closed in on my end destination, I stopped off at Rainbow Beach for a self guided tour of Fraser Island; the blog title indicates why it is a place of significance. These self guided trips are an oddity on the backpacker trail, the company I used arranges the 4*4, food and camping equipment then stuck me with a bunch of strangers to journey up and down the island. They gave us a menu and a possible itinerary for out journey and off we went, driving ourselves to and around the island.

The island scenery is not as impressive as you'd hope from a World Heritage listed area, we travelled all the way to the top of the island at Indian Head and whilst the views were good I've seen better in the Lake District. What is impressive are the lakes much more impressive than those in the Lake District. We visited two of the Lakes on the island, Lake McKenzie and Lake Wabby, both spectacularly colourful. The edges of Lake McKenzie are this wonderfully clear-blue colour which gradually changes to a wonderful Turquoise before suddenly dropping off into a deep ocean coloured blue about ten metres from the shore. I saw Lake McKenzie on a cloudy day and the colour was still brilliant, I'd love to return when the sun could show me all its colour in full glory. Lake Wabby, whilst smaller, was also brilliantly coloured but not blue like its neighbour but superbly green. It is a shame I forgot to take my camera to Lake Wabby, you'll have to settle with photos from Lake McKenzie.

Travelling Post 46 - Lady Musgrove Island

Travelling Post 45 - Sailing the Whitsundays

Travelling Post 44 - Townsville

Townsville is a city very much like Bangor, just bigger. The centre is situated in a valley but it has outer valley areas and is a University town, OK so that's about where the similarities end but it is also where I met up with a friend from the newly named Bangor University. He showed me the er.. highlights of Townsville, which are as limited as Bangor and then we went swimming in an open air swimming pool in the next town along.

The pool was decently sized and brought up the question why we don't have these free facilities back home? Yes the weather is often too bad for swimming pools but what about sports facilities as well as the often poorly kept parks we do hav? On that pondering note this post ends.

Next Stop: Airlie Beach and the Whitsundays

Travelling Post 43 - Magnetic Island

Was ok, nice beach anyway.

Next Stop: Townsville.

Travelling Post 42 - Rafting that white water

Its been 8 or so years since I last went rafting, and that was in Austria. On Thursday of last week I rectified this time gap and went rafting on the Tully River in Northern Queensland. Reputed to be the best spot in Australia for rafting, it was a must do activity on my East Coast tour. My memory of rafting 8 years ago is obviously a little hazy but I don't remember it being that much fun, I also remember it being much harder. There was some stopping and starting in the morning but post lunch we really got going, the main problem of the day was the sheer busyness of the river. The company I was with had around 9 boats on the river so it was a bit cluttered, aside from that it was a great day.

The day started off with a bit of a worry, with me slightly concerned the 7 crew members of the boat would accidentally cause each other severe head injuries and concussion throughout the day. On our first rapid a former US Navy officer lurched forward as a young English girl fell backwards and their heads collided. More accurately the Navy officers cheek collided with the girls helmet and left a nice 'u' shaped gash on his face and a blood soaked life jacket. Oh the perils of rafting, but fear not worried readers I was left unharmed throughout the day, much to the chagrin of our guide who constantly tried to tip us all into the water but failed miserably.

The most amusing part of the day was the names of the rapids, but as my parents are reading this I shan't go into that, lets just say you can tell it is a male dominated sport.

Of the week I'd been on the East Coast by that point it was the best day so far and all I can say is bring on more rafting when I get to New Zealand (and Wales when I return home.)

Next Stop: Magnetic Island (which I've already done I just have to post about.)

Travelling Post 41 - Back on the East Coast

After over 7 months of being away, I arrived back on the East Coast last week, however this time I stayed in Cairns, way up in the Tropical North.

My first day in Cairns was spent spending money, a whole lotta money, but as the blogs that will be coming your way over the next few weeks will show, it'll be worth it. My second day was spent on Palm Cove beach, relaxing, reading, getting a tan. After the busyness of the past few weeks and the even more busy next three weeks I needed a day to relax, so I did.

On my third day in Cairns I took a day trip to Cape Tribulation, where the Daintree Rainforest meets the beach. Cape Trib is a spectacularly beautiful place but, being 3hours away from Cairns, a little far to go on a day trip. We only got a 30 minute board walk through one part opf the Rainforest when we should have had more, that said I did enjoy the tour. The tour started with a nature cruise on the Daintree River before heading for the aforementioned walk and then lunch. After lunch it was beach time, but no swimming, couldn't be bothered with the whole drying myself afterwards, then the only other notable stop I remember was the ice cream place. Daintree Ice-cream is made on site, from locally produced fruit and only sold in that place in the whole world, well the sell worked on me, and I bought some - it was delicious.






















Above, the road through the Daintree Rainforest
Below, where the rainforest meets the beach



















My fourth day was spent on the Great Barrier Reef, and I have to say I was disappointed. Yes the Coral was amazing, the fish were multi coloured, and the ocean was amazingly clear, but at Ningaloo, on the other side of the continent, it was all that and more. Ningaloo just had something extra, it had a good tour. I paid $100 for my GBR tour and $130 for my Manta Ray and Ningaloo tour, and a got a whole lot more for $30 extra. At Ningaloo I got 3 guided snorkels, lots of information about the reef and it's inhabitants with around 11/2 hours in the water, at GBR I got 2 unguided snorkels and very little information (when I tried asking about turtles the guy I asked barely spoke English and didn't know much.) I was able to spend more time in the water at around 2 hours of swim time, this was split with an hour in each spot which was about half an hour too long. I was pretty disappointed, but I did manage to spot a turtle (with no help from the crew) and swam alongside it for 10 minutes - that made up for the poor tour.

My fifth and final in day around Cairns was spent in the touristy village of Kuranda getting back to nature with a visit to the Australian Venom Zoo - full with an array of scary, venomous or poisonous creatures that can kill you or your pet in 15 minutes. I also visited a Koala Zoo, where I fed Kangaroos again and after that walked for far too long to Barron Falls. A pretty good day, if too much walking.

Next stop: South to Mission Beach and white water rafting

Travelling Post 40 - One big, great, rusty, rock

On Friday I left Alice Springs for an amazing 3 day, 2 night trip to Uluru and back with The Rock Tour. In terms of tours it was my best yet and sat in front of Uluru, eating dinner as the sun sat behind me is, most definitely a highlight of the trip. But I'm jumping ahead of myself.

On our first day I arose at a ridiculously early 5.20am to get ready and picked up for 6.15am. Once on the bus it was sleep time before a 3 hour walk around Kings Canyon, which was a good hard walk to get us all worn out before heading to our nights camping. The advantage of this walk, unlike the others undertaken on the trip was The Garden of Eden, a billabong half way into the walk filled with freezing cold water to cool us down in the 30+ degree heat. As advised by Nick the tour guide, I went in fully clothed.

Kings Canyon

Our first, and second, nights camping was in a swag bag, under the stars. The best way to describe a swag bag is a canvas sleeping bag with a mattress in it, but a sleeping bag goes inside the swag bag. It was an interesting experience, but a surprisingly comfortable one to. On the second night we had to place our shoes off the ground so as to stop dingoes taking them, that worried me slightly, what if they found no shoes and decided to take me in their stead!

Our second day began at an even more ridiculously early 5am and it was off for another 3hour walk, this time to The Olgas, or to give them their Aboriginal name Kata Tjuta. The Aboriginal story behind these amazing rock formations is related to Uluru. Uluru was built by two boys who started off building a mud pile, when they had finished they slid down Uluru and threw away the stones that were in their way, which ended up in a big pile; Kata Tjuta. There is obviously a scientific story behind their creation but i cannot remember it, and will not be half as interesting as the Aboriginal tale.

After Kata Tjuta it was off to the cultural centre before sunset at Uluru. I was expecting to see the sun setting behind Uluru, but instead the sun set behind us as we watched Uluru changed colour, or rather we saw it change shades of the same colour. The sunset was watched by many people who all had arrived at a viewing area, luckily we were there quite early so I sat down near the front with some friends I'd made. Some people there had paid hundreds more dollars than I to be there and be waiter served with glasses of champagne, but if you ask me the best way is the way we did it. Sat in the dirt, chatting, having a laugh and trying to take a picture every 5 minutes to get the changes. Then, just after sunset, but when it was still light, our tour guide had finished making dinner so we got up, grabbed our dinner and sat back down where we were and ate it there, no table needed. It was a really nice evening, and I took lots and lots of photos, all of the same thing.

















Sunset

The final day was. yet again, a really ridiculously early 5am start so as to get to Uluru for sunrise. Again the sun was behind us as we watched Uluru come out of darkness. It wasn't as impressive as sun set, I think it was because the viewing area was smaller, and it had lost the novelty value.
















Sunrise


After sunset we walked the majority of the reddish monolith, so coloured because of the oxidisation of the surface iron content, then it was off home via a quick 5 minute camel ride.

When I made the decision to come to Australia, I made the decision to visit Uluru at the same time, its synonymous with the country and not only a great natural site but also one of huge cultural significance to the indigenous population. As you walk around Uluru, there are sections that you are forbidden to take pictures because they are sacred places, being respectful no one of me or my friends took pictures. The original inhabitants of the area, known as Anangu, request that no one climbs the rock but because it is leased out to the Australian Government it isn't forbidden. At the cultural centre it explains why this is so, yet there were still people on the tour who wanted to climb it which was disappointing. What wasn't was when we arrived the climb was closed due to strong winds, so they didn't get their wish. Ha.

I didn't know whether to expect a spiritual experience or whether it would be just a big rock. Well I never got a spiritual experience, anyone who knows me could have told me that I'm not that sort of person, but neither was it just a big rock. I think I recognised it for what it is, both an impressive feat of nature which is historically and culturally significant and neither facade of the rock should not to be dismissed as trivial.

Travelling Post 39 - Jump little croc, jump

From Perth I headed to Darwin via 4 days of trains just to see two things:-

• The city itself (nice enough)
• Litchfield National Park (worth the trip)

I'd never heard of Litchfield before I arrived in Australia but, like everyone else who has watched Crocodile Dundee I have seen its larger neighbour Kakadu. Litchfield is a smaller version of Kakadu with more sights closer together, and whilst Kakadu is not suitable for a day trip Litchfield is. It is a national park with many billabongs, crocs, termites and other Australian nature but our tour was centered around the watering holes.

To start the day the tour headed to Adelaide River, not actually in Litchfield, for a half hour-or-so tour up the river to see saltwater crocodiles jump out of the river. The crocs were mostly around 3-4 metres long and would happily eat you if it was you hanging on the end of the rod. They eat anything with a heartbeat, as the skipper explained, or in other cases anything that recently had a heartbeat.

There was this one croc, nicknamed 'Grandpa' or 'Hannibal,' who ruled the river, the simple reason being he was massive at 6-7 metres. Whilst the crew members managed to coax Grandpa to the boat for a feed he didn't jump out of the water, if he had that would have been amazing. On the other hand just being so close to such a powerful creature in its natural habitat was exhilarating in itself. Not sure how I would have felt if the boat was not in between him and me, exhilarating probably wouldn't cover in that circumstance, dead might though.

After the tour it was into Litchfield where we visited 2 small waterfalls and swam in their pools, viewed a larger waterfall and then jumped into Buley Holes, a series of small pools. At the end we viewed some massive termite mounds and then headed home. It was a really enjoyable and relaxing tour, but not what I was expecting, there was no real walking, only a few hundred metres to billabongs and back, but the freshwater swimming was refreshing, I'd had enough of saltwater these past 10 months.