Hi all -
I'm in New Zealand! And it's cold! Well, I'm comparing this to the Outback of Australia, so 15C (mid-50s) seems pretty frigid to me, especially since until today, I only had two long-sleeved shirts! :)
When we last left our story, I was in Noosa (north of Brisbane on the east coast of Australia), lying on the beach. That night, we had a quiet movie night at the hostel, which was a cool evening to relax. It was a lovely day, with a bit of a sad ending. Sometime during that afternoon/evening, my iPod either fell out of or was helped out of my beach bag. This, my friends, is truly tragic. And when I figured it out the next day, I'm not ashamed to say I had a good, hard cry about it. the thought of no music until January was too much to bear (as you'll read later, I've rectified this situation, so it's all okay).
The next day, Shel, Kirsty, and I (the girls I'd travelled with the last few weeks) went for a nice walk (which helped me work through the grief of my iPod) in the national park at Noosa Heads. It's about 5km around the shoreline, and nice and hilly. A good day for a walk. Followed by a good bit of girl-time (shopping). We were so happy to be in a town with more than one shop (the last one was Cairns), we went a bit crazy, and all bought dresses! We celebrated a bit that night with food and goon. Oh, you should know about goon. It's awful Australia cask wine (wine in a box) - you buy it either 2 or 4 litres at a time, and it only costs about $12-15. it's frightful stuff, but everybody drinks it. It helps if you add fruit juice to it. :)
The next day, we left Noosa for Brisbane, which was on ly a few hours by bus. Travel was uneventful until we got to the hostel, who had lost our reservation (this is the 3rd time this happened to us in a few weeks - SO annoying). It was sorted out, but annoying all the same. Anyway, then we split off. I met a cool guy called Jason in Sydney, who had made his way to Brisbane by then. He and I met up and had a walk around Brisbane (it doesn't take long - Brisbane is pretty small).
I had the brilliant idea to buy a new iPod (I'd planned to do this in the US anyway), and Jason offered me his music collection. I don't normally rip music from other people (copyright and songwriter's royalties and all that), but desperate times call for desperate measures. Sadly, I couldn't find an iPod - there's a shortage of them in Australia. After this, I went on a mission to buy an iPod (which I solved less than a week later). Shel, Kirsty, and I had some dinner, then got drinks in the hostel bar. Where we met Kyle, from Texas, who is active duty army on leave from Iraq. It was an interesting conversation - I respect his service to the USA, but we had some pretty major disagreements about policy and such, especially when he commented that he preferred when we were at war, because it was more fun for him. Shel and Kirsty were pretty shocked by it, to say the least. And, sadly, it doesn't do much for the opinion of Americans abroad.
The next morning, I hopped a flight to Alice Springs, in the Northern Territory. This is a kind of frontier town, and I really liked it. I was there for my Ayers Rock (Uluru) tour, and I had a nice wander around - lots of Aboriginal artwork (some of it I liked, some of it looks a bit like it was done by a 6-year old). That night I sat in the local saloon (complete with swinging doors) called Bojangle's. I chatted to the locals and had the Outback Grill - crocodile (okay, but nothing special), camel (yummy, but a bit tough), buffalo (also yummy, though I've tried it before), and kangaroo (this was fantastic). Had to be done.
The next day, I continued in my quest to find an iPod, to no avail, and sorted out some of my New Zealand details. Then I had a quiet night and cooked at the hostel, after a dip in the pool, a haircut, and a load of laundry (really stunning stuff, eh?). The next morning, I was picked up from the hostel at 6am (ugh) for The Rock Tour. There were 22 of us in a minibus, and it was a cool group. Our tour guide, Nathan, called himself "your basic Aussie yobbo", complete with a little beer gut and mullet. And man oh man, that guy can swear. He's fantastically colorful, and manages to be really offensive and call people names they should never be called in public and have people laugh about it. I loved it. :)
After some number of hours in the bus, we stopped at Kings Canyon for a 6km walk. It was beautiful, though you have to climb up onto the ridge to look down into the canyon, and the climb up was pretty sweaty. Luckily it was short, though it certainly brought the flies. Oh, Australian flies. They're something special. The same fly with land on your nose/eyelid/ear 5 times in a row after being swatted away. They say the Australian wave is actually a fly shoo-ing motion. Really, they're unbearable, and they aren't even taht bad this time of year ...
Anyway, we had a swim in the Garden of Eden in the canyon, then moved on to our campsite for the night - this was open-air camping in swags under the stars around a campfire. People, you HAVE to do this. Oh wow. I mean, yeah, it was cold, and there's sand and dirt everywhere, but it was just unreal, it was so good.
The next morning, we did the drive to Uluru National Park. Inside the park is Uluru (Ayers Rock) and Kata Tjuta (the Olgas). We did a 7.5km walk in the Olgas called the Valley of the Winds walk. I took tons of photos, but you just can't get a handle on it if you don't see it. And it's the most moved I've ever been by nature, I think. So beautiful I cried (good tears, not iPod tears). Please go someday. Then we went over to Uluru - the first glimpse really got us, even though we knew it was there somewhere. There was a bit of spontaneous applause, even. We did a short walk around a bit of the rock then - there are many creation stories around Kata Tjuta and Uluru for the Aboriginals (stories about certain cracks in the rock, for instance), and Nathan, our guide told us some of the stories (amid the swearing). It was a moving time to be so surrounded by the rich Aboriginal heritage; there are lots of problems with Aboriginal/western relations, but it was still special for me to have a cultural experience when I hadn't expected one in Australia.
That night, we camped inside the national park, and made a mess of ourselves - remember the goon from above? It reared its ugly head again. As you'll see from the photos (see links below - finally!), we got pretty silly. And I seem to really love taking photos of myself with other peole. :)
The next day was a rough start. Aside from being a largely hungover group (some of us were probably still drunk), we got up to see the sunrise at Uluru. As hard as it was, it was worth it. So beautiful. Then we set off on a walk around the base of Uluru, some 9km or so (we all walked about 23km - 15 miles or so - during the tour, which was great). I didn't expect to be so moved by it, but it's a truly special place. There are people who climb the Rock, but the Aboriginal people ask you not to, because it's a sacred place for them. I had contemplated it, but I realized as soon as I got there that I didn't want to go up - it would be too disrespectful. And the base walk was fantastic, with a watering hole and wall art. So great.
After that, we all piled back into the bus and I was dropped at the Ayers Rock airport, along with two other girls, and the bus headed back to Alice Springs (6 hours or so, I think). It was convenient to get dropped at the airport, but i was really sad to miss the ride back to Alice Springs and the dinner that happened that night. We'd gelled into a really great group, and this was one of the best tours I've ever done. The UK chunk of us (10 or so) are already talking reunion in the new year!
My flight to Sydney was nice because I had a row to myself and got to sleep (after so much drink and so little sleep, the day caught up with me). I stayed with Peter and Sue Simons, friends of my aunt and uncle, for the next few days in Sydney. There was a bit of a snafu at the airport, because hotmail has been losing my emails lately. If you think I should have responded to you and I haven't, drop me another email, because this happened several times.
Anyway, it was great to see Peter again (I'd had a tour of Sydney at the beginning of my OZ trip with him) and meet Sue. They treated me so well - a roast dinner that night (it was Sunday), and I had a shower in my ensuite bathroom and slept in a California King sized bed. It would have been just as lovely to see Peter and Sue in other circumstances, but you have to understand that I've been sleeping in a single bed with 4-8 other people for the past 3 months. So this was so very luxurious. I slept better than I have since July. Ahh.
The next day was a lazy morning for me, though I was able to sort out my transport/route for New Zealand. There's a hop-on/hop-off backpacker bus company called Stray. I'll be in NZ for 5 weeks, and will tour both the south and north islands. If you'd like to see my route, check out this link (http://www.straytravel.com/bret.php).
Basically, I can stop at any of the open circles (overnight stops) as long as I want, then just get on the next bus. There are tons of activities - lots and lots of treks and walks, as well as activities like zorbing (wiki it), hot air ballooning, skydiving (I'll do this in Taupo), bungy (no way), whitewater rafting (yeah!), whale watching (yay!), you name it. SO COOL!
Anyway, then Sue and I went for lunch and in search of an iPod, which I found! I have a new 80G iPod classic (the pretty silver one). A nice drive around the neighborhood (they live in one of the northern beach communities north of Sydney), then a relaxing dinner and evening in front of the telly while I started putting some of Peter and Sue's music on my iPod. While I don't have MY music, I have music again, and I'll be throwing myself on the mercy of hostels and other travellers who have their music collections on them. I'll use this as an opportunity to broaden my musical horizens. For example, I got some Regina Spektor from the hostel in Sydney, and I'm LOVING her.
The next day (yesterday - yes, I'm finally almost done), we drove up to the Blue Mountains for the day. It's really beautiful, and we went through a few of the towns. I'd really love to go back there and hike and camp (with my newfound love of camping) there for a few days. It's stunning scenery, and the towns have a nice feel to them.
Then Peter and Sue dropped me in Sydney (back in the redlight district), where I spent my last night in Sydney. I had a relaxing night in at the hostel, chatting to a few people. I got some good tips on New Zealand, gave a few tips on OZ, and did a bit of journal writing. Then this morning, I caught a flight to Christchurch, which is 3 hours ahead of Sydney (12 hours ahead of the UK, 17 to the East Coast, 20 to the West Coast - wow), quite a bit further south (longer days - hurray), and a lot colder (boo). After I got to the hostel, I went in search of clothes. I need some good walking stuff, which I got some of. All I need now is a rain coat, which I haven't needed yet.
I'll do that tomorrow, then get on the Stray bus Friday morning. The first stop is Kaikoura, where the humpback whales are in the middle of migrating through. My timing is PERFECT for this, so I'm pretty excited about that. After that, I don't know how long I'll stay there - that's the beauty of the thing. They say you need at least 19 days to get around, including the mandatory stops. I hvae 33, so I'll be fine. If i get to Auckland fast enough, I'll either go on up to the Bay of Islands (far north of the north island), or hop an earlier flight to Fiji (I can feel my tan draining from me already, though I expect no sympathy from you).
You might wonder why I'm so long-winded in these emails. First, I want you all to know how much I'm enjoying this. Also, it's another way to document my trip, along with my journal (which is 3 weeks out of date - yikes) and photos (which you can now look at some of, at least).
Okay, I'll stop now (my bum hurts from sitting down so long). You'll find links below to photos of my Rock Tour trip. Lemme know if the links don't work. I'll send out more links to other sets of photos soon (I'm working on India now, then just have Greece to do).
I hope you're all well!
Love,
Dina xx
Australia - The Rock Tour 1: Kings Canyon
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=25637&l=3edc7&id=620235943
Australia - The Rock Tour 2 - The Olgas
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=25676&l=c0fc8&id=620235943
Australia - The Rock Tour 3 - Ulura and evening antics
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=25677&l=ae809&id=620235943
Australia - The Rock Tour Final - Uluru base walk
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=25680&l=ab4df&id=620235943
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