Sunday 23 July 2017

Bula Bula

Some last minute observations from our eight days in Fiji:

Tides and Happy Hour

When arriving at a resort you are provided with all sorts of information on how the resort operates and what is on offer over the coming week.  Some of this information is interesting but of little value and some is of great significance and must never be ignored.  Some examples

• Restaurant times are of minimal interest since the time allowed is quite generous.
• Pool hours are meaningless since they are opened pretty much all day.
• The timings for tours useless since we did not sign up for any local tours.
• Of greater interest is tide times so you know when you can snorkel to see the magnificent corals and all sorts of wonderful fish.
• Of critical value and not to be ignored is Happy Hour.  This is a quite constrained period and not to be missed when half price cocktails are on offer.  With much cheering and gusto the bar staff announce happy hour has started and so the waiting staff are run off their feet taking orders.  The value of the discount is soon negated by the number of cocktails you end up enjoying.

Drones

I was always intrigued by how people from remote tribes when first photographed would become anxious and angry in the belief that their soul was somehow diminished by the taking of a photograph.  I now understand how these people felt.

Early one morning we heard a high pitched whine which I assumed was from some piece of equipment being operated by the gardeners.  To my horror as I stepped out on our balcony I discovered a drone just few metres off our balcony with its lens facing directly at me.  I was appropriately dressed and not doing anything unsavoury however was not happy at the thought of suddenly being a social media sensation.  I think my soul was diminished in that moment.

My feelings about being filmed by a drone are unresolved.

Adult Pool

In my previous Fiji log I mentioned the serenity of the adult swimming pool.  This serenity was not always an enduring experience.  The definition of over 18 years as the defining limit for adulthood ensured there were days when bombing and leaping into the pool by excited and testosterone driven twenty-somethings was the order of the day.  Maybe the adult age limit could be redefined as over 35?  I know, I am becoming a grumpy old bugger.

The High Ground

Taking the moral high ground at a tropical resort is difficult but the process is something like this:

• Good breakfast with lots of tropical fruits.
• A session at the gym for the purpose of generating a sweat.
• A quick lap of the pool.
• All this accomplished in the late morning so you can allow the day to go down hill from about 12.00noon and finishing about 10.00pm.

This pattern has me considering an alcohol free month when we get home.

A New Skill Every day

They say you need to learn new skills to keep the brain active and to forestall ‘old timers’ disease.  It’s difficult to to do this at a resort but it was accomplished.

Our new skills are:

• Making cocktails using Fiji coconut vodka.
• Entertaining lots of kids in the pool hour after hour.
• Making sure granddaughters are appropriately covered up in the hot tropical sun.
• Ensuring you are at the right bar in time for happy hour.
• Not embarrassing yourself when encountering a sea snake.

Scary Encounters

I was returning from a forty minute snorkelling adventure and was getting close to the shoreline when I felt something brush across my shoulder.  It was a gentle touch; maybe a piece of floating seaweed had touch my shoulder.  I turned my head slightly to see a sea snake glide over my shoulder and down to the sandy bottom.  My heart raced, was it going to turn around and confront or attack me!  Maybe it was just an eel and not harmful.

The snake glided on and left me to deal with my inflated blood pressure.  I got out of the water and walked up to the dive attendant to describe my encounter.  Oh, that was a Banded Sea Snake he explained; they are very poisonous but attack only if provoked.  This is Fiji after all and everyone and everything is pretty relaxed – my words.

So it wasn’t some harmless creature of the reef but something that brought the threat of death.  Certainly made for a tale that will be told for many years to come.

The sea snake was about a half metre long and about 20mm in diameter with distinctive black and white stripes.

On reflection what I appreciated was the absence of signs all along the beach warning of sea snakes and scaring people from adventuring into the realm of a coral reef.  Sometimes we need fewer warnings and more opportunities to enjoy the risk.

That’s it for a few weeks.  We are now on the approach to Sydney and winter.

Vinaka

20 July 2017

Bula or welcome in Fijian.

Fiji, the perfect place to celebrate a significant birthday especially when you are escaping winter. Not my birthday, our daughter-in-law’s, and she had the forethought along with her sister to decide on an exotic location for their birthdays. So the choice was -5c mornings with frost or swimming, snorkelling and days of 30c in a tropical paradise. There was no choice.

Some observations.

• We don’t often fly on discount airlines and we have just discovered why. Our flight from Sydney was more like a day care centre with wings. I have never seen so many kids on a plane; from tiny babies through to excited teenagers. We were way down the back so it wasn’t too bad. We also had two granddaughters on board so who are we to complain.
• When you arrive in Nadi you have to change not your clocks but your attitude to Fiji time. Fiji time is worry free; it will happen just not in the timeframe you might expect. Just go with the flow, relax.
• In Fiji you greet everyone with Bula. Well around the resort you do. Don’t try it in the local towns, they are probably going to look at you funny. Bula means hello or welcome and you spend your day saying Bula to all resort staff. Funnily enough no one says it to fellow resort guests.
• Vernaka is thank you and is the other must use word. Bula and vernaka are pretty much to only two words you need. Everything else is in English and all the prices in Aussie dollars!
• When you arrive at the resort a rather tall and ripped Fijian calls out BULA several times with a deep baritone voice, greeting every new guest on their arrival. With his arms thrown high it’s an impressive greeting. You feel, yep now I’m on holidays.  We are not in Kansas anymore.
• There are two pools at the resort. One for families and kids, the other for adults. One is loud and full of activity with inflatable whales, balls and inflated rings. Lots of jumping, screaming and fun. The other is quiet, with few in the water. Many are sitting around the pool reading or just trying to break out of their winter paleness in just the few days they have in the tropical sun. You can guess which pool belongs to which group.
• The staff are all smiling and relaxed. They love the kids and seem to remember all their names and there are a lot of kids at this resort. The greeting of Bula is expressed with great passion by some and for some, maybe the gardeners it’s more of a chore but still uttered with a smile.
• The inflatable whales are pretty popular but it says a lot about our society when the warning advice on the whale covers almost one side of the toy. Maybe it should just say ‘this toy is not to be used as a toy’ or maybe ‘this toy will kill you’.
• We are on the coral coast so you just swim off the beach into coral reefs with fish and corals and all sorts of things to explore. The water is warm and there is plenty of room for all snorkellers.  There are also giant clams which are pretty spectacular.
• There are weddings happening here and lots of birthdays. The staff serenade people celebrating their birthdays with ‘Happy Birthday’ at breakfast and dinner. The staff have amazing voices. They also serenade people who are leaving to go home. This generally happens at breakfast. The words are all in Fijian but I think the translations is something like:
  • ‘So you are back to winter and you have to leave this tropical paradise,
    It sucks to be you…’    I’m pretty sure they are the words to their song.

So that’s about it for the moment. I have three big decision to make this afternoon: when to go snorkelling, what cocktail I will have tonight and which restaurant will we visit tonight.

Bula.

5 April 2016

The adventure is over and we are back home.  Its was quite a jolt to be in the chaos of Delhi traffic one minute and just a few hours later to be stepping out of Sydney airport into traffic that understands pedestrian crossings, stays within the white lines and there is not the constant tooting of horns.  The weather has gone from 41c (106f) to 20c (68f) and from very dry to the odd shower of rain.  Here everything is green, there are no villages and fields of wheat being manually harvested.  The differences between the two countries couldn’t be more extreme.

I thought I would finish the India reports with a series of awards for things that stood out over the 15 days of the tour.

Craziest Bike Ride

• Riding through the streets of old Udaipur during what was probably peak hour.  No rules, just keep moving with the traffic and when crossing a road show no fear.  Never wonder whether your travel insurance covers you for this little adventure, nor should you be wondering ‘what does the inside of an Indian hospital look like’.

Cutest Kid

• During a tour of a vegetable and fruit market we met a little boy with his dad.  The little boy didn’t speak too much but gave his dad the classic Indian head nod when dad asked a question.  The child was probably about 18 months old. We all had a little chuckle.

Scariest Moment

• On a night time jeep ride through some very remote villages on the pretext of seeing some wild life we were surrounded by a bunch of local lads on motor bikes.  The guide didn’t speak english so we had no real idea of what was being said or their intention.  We were glad when the cars started up and we drove away. We did see antelope, maybe a fox, maybe a hyena and other furry critters scurrying away into the night.  This was the total result of more than two hours on some very remote tracks in the open back of small 4WD vehicles in the dark.

Best Sunset

• Sunset at Sardargarh Fort on the top of a pavilion drinking local rum and orange juice.  The sunset was spectacular however after a couple of drinks we then had to negotiate some very steep stairs which were only slabs of rock protruding out of a wall.  No side rails.

Best Stone walls

• The stone walls of Rajasthan especially near marble mines.  The walls were straight and square and all made of white marble blocks.

Most Piercing Look.

• The stare given by locals when we visited a mosque in Delhi.  A bit unsettling.

Best Birthday party

• We gate crashed the birthday party for the 23rd prophet of the Jain religion at a major Jain temple.  The party goers were very happy to tell us about their celebrations.  Not sure how old the 23rd Prophet was but I am guessing the local shops would not have stocked sufficient birthday candles for his cake.

Most Gods in One Religion

• 33 million gods, semi gods and deities in Hinduism.  That’s got to be a record.

Least Number of Gods in a religion

• None in the Jain religion or Buddhism.

Most Indulgent Maharaja

• Probably Maharaja Madho Singh IIwho had two massive silver urns manufactured for his visit to London for Edward VII’s coronation.  The maharaja wanted to take Ganges water for his own consumption during the trip not trusting English water.  Each urn held 4,000 litres.  It’s a tough choice because all the maharajas were pretty good at surrounding themselves with lots of luxury.

Most Impressive Workforce Size

• India Railways employ 1.3 million people.  Can you imagine the weekly salary bill?  Everyone travels by train and it soooo cheap.

Most Impressive Fort

 

• This is tricky because we saw so many, some just ruins or museums and others active hotels.  My choice is Sardargarh Fort in Rajasthan.  This fort is being progressively restored by a husband and wife team who have made amazing progress over the past 10 years.  The fort is off the beaten track but well worth the visit.

Best Food

• Hard to pick but probably the food at the Sheraton Hotel in Jaipur.  The hamburger at Sydney airport on the night we returned was also pretty good.

Accidents

• Our guide for the bike ride through Udaipur was knocked down by a motor cycle.  After a few brief words, both got up continued on their way.  No road rage or exchanging of details for an insurance claim.
• One of our fellow travels was butted in the midriff by a cow who did not want to get out of his way.  No harm down and the cow maintained her position in the herd.
• Dehli Belly Score
• Probably only a couple of fellow travellers had a true case of Delhi belly, the rest of us had digestive systems that were challenged by the rich and spicy food.  Western toilets can be such a luxury in these moments of stress.

Best Road

• The freeway into Dehli.  The toll is so high the farm vehicles are discouraged along with every other dodgy vehicle, animal drawn cart and pedestrian.  The road was well maintained with virtually no trash on the side and the road surface in very good condition.

Emptiest Road

• We travelled along a section of newly built divided highway that had almost no traffic.  We drove several miles in the luxury of no traffic only to discover this new road wasn’t connected to anything; the road wasn’t complete.  At the end of the sealed road was a dirt track that connected us with another highway and surprisingly lots of traffic; we were back on a real road.

Best Deal We Didn’t take

• Hand knotted carpets at $40 a sq metre for merino wool, $43 for camel hair and $130 for silk.  Next time must have measurements and a room in mind for such a carpet.

Most Odorous Market

• The Delhi spice market had us all gagging for breath.  We rejected an offer to walk deeper into the spice market as none of us brought oxygen equipment with us!  Even the locals wore face masks.  There was so much spice there was a consistent fog of spice.

That’s it until the next adventure.  We have two more planned for the rest of the year so you never know when I will be adding to this blog site.

 

 

5 April 2016

Our travels in India are coming to an end and the closer we get to coming home the hotter it gets.   Yesterday it was 41c. and it looks like it will continue to be hot until our departure.

This sounds rather clichéd however it must be said; the contrasts in this country are confronting.  This is a country with nuclear power and nuclear weapons and yet wheat is harvested by hand.  India has a space program which it is difficult to reconcile when you see the poverty in the rural villages.  There are massive mogul palaces that were once decorated in gold and the Taj Mahal a wonder in marble.  No photograph depicts the Taj in its true glory.  However, when you step out of the green spaces of the gardens surrounding the Taj Mahal you are again confronted by the noise, the smells, congestion and grime of the city of Agra.

Recent Observations

Road workers

Women working on the roads wearing saris with hi-vis vests over their saris – something you wouldn’t see in Australia.

Government Signs

If your household is below the poverty line the government will provide subsidised rations to ensure people don’t starve.  A sign will be painted on the front of your house declaring you are receiving these benefits.  Imagine a sign on the front of your house for all to see declaring the people inside receive the old age pension or maybe are on unemployment benefits., it would never happen

If you are on a government sponsored employment program your name will be listed on a sign in a prominent part of the village telling all you are employed on that program.

These are seen to be a quite reasonable practice in India, something which we would find to be a complete breach of our privacy.

The Evil Eye

Most trucks and car are decorated with tassels under the vehicle and sometimes around the Windows.  The tassels are for decoration but more importantly to keep the evil eye away.  Bald tyres and overloaded trucks are quite acceptable so clearly the evil eye is far more potent than unroadworthy vehicles.

The roles of men and women

All hotel staff that are visible have been men. They collect the baggage, wait on tables, clean the rooms and generally manage the place.  There is occasionally a young woman on reception and often omen in the gardens.

All the historic photos in the old heritage hotels are of the conquests of men.  Polo, tiger hunting, and the photos of the ruling maharaja, all men.

Everything looks old

 

Regardless how new things might be, buildings, roads, trains, cars and trucks, everything looks old before its time.  Shiny new trucks or cars are never seen.  Maybe because everything is so dry and dusty and now is the end of the dry season. Maybe everything in India has a hard life.

Religion

There are 33 million gods in Hinduism.  That’s more than a God for every man, woman and child in Australia.

So here’s a thought.  Everyone in Australia could adopt their own Hindu god, have their own religion and then declare tax free status. There are plenty of gods to go around.

Probably in response to Hinduism, the Buddhist and Jain faiths have no gods.  This is India; one extreme to the other.

Window Shopping

I thought the roads in Scotland and England can be narrow.  India leaves them for dead.  Our bus took on some narrow village tracks that allowed us to window shop from the comfort of the coach.  With all the people, cows, motor bikes and merchandise he was still able to negotiate roads one car wide with buildings right to the edge of the gutter. 

The Role of the British – I’m going out on a limb here but…..

One thing you must give it to the British, they united this place.  They probably became the common enemy back in 1947 which ensured India could develop a sense of nationhood and to become united to be rid of the British.

You must wonder however if the British had not unified India where would it be today?  Maybe a sub-continent of many small counties none of which were economically sustainable.  Before the British India was made up of so many princely states all of which were busy building bigger and bigger palaces and going to war with each other.

It was the British investment in the archeology of India that ensures we get to enjoy the Taji Mahal and so many other wonders.

History

It’s fascinating that the history of India includes links to Genghis Khan. The palaces and forts are decorated with precious gems from Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran and Iraq.  The mirror works comes from Aleppo in Syria and so it goes on.

Sadly, we in the west generally only know of these countries through reports of war, destruction and displaced refugees.

Driving in India

Road rules – based on Darwinism and survival of the fittest

White lines – for aesthetics only

Indicators – superfluous; never used

Rear vision mirrors – what?

Cows on freeways – of course, why not

This piece was tapped out on a coach ride between Agra and New Delhi

 

28 March 2017

Our travels through Rajasthan continue.

The Patina of India

Some might call it grime rather than patina but India does have a look and Dorothy we are not in Kansas anymore.  This is a very dry region but you can’t help but feel you could do so much with a high pressure steam cleaner.

The countryside has a dry bleached look which I am sure changes in the wet season when the monsoon arrives.  However, in this haze of dust there are flashes of brilliant colour.  Reds, blues, yellow, gold and silver. These are the saris worn by the women walking through the villages, in the fields and along the roads.  A complete contrast to the general background; coloured gems in a swathe of gravel.

Rubbish

It’s everywhere and it’s probably one of the things that is the most confronting. It’s in the villages, on the roadside, hanging from trees, in dry river beds, in the fields, everywhere.

Everything has a use.  Even off cuts and waste from the marble processing works are recycled as dry stone walls.  In the marble mining areas, you find miles and miles of pure white dry stone walls that are perfectly straight and square.

Slabs of sandstone that might have become paving are recycled as fences around fields.  Waste from the granite and sand stone mines also becomes dry stone walls.

Maharajas and Maharanee

It seems the ruling class was occupied by four main activities they were:

Shooting tigers – there are pictures everywhere in the hotels of safaris and hunting parties with dead tigers and panthers.

Fighting your neighbouring Maharaja – seems conquering more land from your neighbour was the prime business of the day.

Looking after your many wives and 100s of concubines – fortunately owning a massive fort ensured you had plenty of rooms to keep the various parties well separated and each in their own luxurious setting.

Building massive forts or palaces – the forts are stunning.  They are huge and have been occupied for hundreds of years.  Many are now hotels.

The owner of one particularly magnificent fort had the architect buried alive in the foundations so no one could discover the secrets of the fort.   Probably seemed reasonable at the time.  We would have put the floor plans in a vault.

Men and women

Women are in the fields cutting wheat by hand and doing manual labour, even loading sand trucks using baskets.  Jobs like waiting tables for tourists or managing the reception desk at the hotel are all done by men.

Women do the gardening at the hotel and often cover their face when we pass.  The fear is someone in their village will gossip about them being uncovered in front of westerners.

Toilets and Bathrooms

It’s Asia I’ll say no more.

Cows

They seem to wander aimlessly without anyone caring for them, yet they are owned by individuals.  Each morning they will leave their owner’s house and wander the neighbourhood getting a small amount of feed at each house they visit.  Being sacred those that feed the cows receive a blessing.  At the end of the day the cow finds its way back to its owner’s house.

It’s the job of the untouchables to remove any carcasses, and to remove the hide before burying the cow.

 Newspaper Journalism

The writing style is in a unique conversational style of English.  The police are always the ‘cops’.  Politicians are reported as VVIP which I assume means very very important people.

An Udaipur newspaper reported the death of an individual and how their organs had been donated for transplant.  The report then went on to list the names of the patients and what organs they received.  Along with their name, their age and their city were included in the report.  Never would happen in Australia.

That’s it for now.  More reports to come as we visit Jaipur, Agra and New Delhi.

26 March 2017

Welcome to Log 24 and to a couple of new addressees who have stubbled on to my mailing list.  You may not have asked to be included in this restricted stream of consciousness and you will come off the list with an email request for same. This is number 21 in the series and the first from India and specifically Rajasthan.

My last log was written at the end of our 3 months on the road around outback Australia.  This log is coming from a different kind of outback. From wide open spaces in Australia with no one around to cities of 23 million in India. We have country in Australia just like Rajasthan, it’s just that no one lives there.  Here there are villages everywhere even though the country is dry, rocky and desert like.

India overwhelms the senses and there is so much to share so I will break these emails into two or three for the time we have left in India.

History of 3500 years.

Thirteen years of high school gave me a good understanding of the history of Australia, Britain, a bit of Asia, and maybe Europe and USA.  Nothing covered the 3,500 years of Indian history. Our tour guide is determined to fix this gap in our education in just 2 weeks.  So far I am aware Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva are the big three of thousands of Hindu gods.  We have seen many forts, or castles in the European context and now have a bit of an understanding of all the invasions the Indian continent has gone through these past 2,000 years, the final one being by the British.

Bike Riding

Insanity helps if you want to ride the streets of old Udaipur. The roads are about the width of one car which is not helpful when two cars meet.  There are no footpaths and there is a deep gutter of each side of the road, flowing with a septic mix of who knows what.  You are on a bike and there are people, kids, tuk tuks, cars, and the odd cow which will have an attitude.  It’s mayhem, there are no rules except everyone accepts the situation is chaotic.  The locals smile at you and the kids call out.  Heading in one direction is fine until you have to turn across the traffic at an intersection. It then gets even more overwhelming.  You are trying to work out the rules (there are none) or maybe a pattern to the traffic (there isn’t one).  You think there will be a gap (there won’t be one) or maybe someone will stop for you (they won’t).  You then realise you are on your own, surrounded by thousands.  You have no choice but to get on your bike and ride across the flow of traffic. Just go!  You reach the other side and realise you have probably just achieved new level of enlightenment and so you feel the need to say Om several times.

I forgot to mention the tooting of horns and cacophony that means conversation with your fellow riders is out of the question.

We survived and will tell our grandchildren about the time we rode bikes in India.

Road Works

Amazing, it happens in the traffic.  There are no diversions, no traffic cones, no signs warning you that there are road works ahead.  There are no flashing lights or people with stop/ go signs.   The traffic just flows around the machine laying the bitumen and the rollers compressing the new roadway.  And no one is flustered or upset, it just works.

Cement

Indians love cement.  I have never seen so many signs advertising different brands of cement.  There is: Wonder Cement, Ultra Cement,  Shree Cement, Ultra Tech Cement – The Engineers Choice, Abuja Cement and of course Pro Cement.

Cement is used for pathways, roads, houses, fence posts, power poles, rendering and many more uses.  Sure, sounds like what we use cement for, but in India there are many stores in every village selling cement.

There are however no cement trucks.  It’s all mixed on site by hand, even multi story buildings.

Class System

It is very deeply part of Indian social structures.  The newspapers reported a politician would not get off a plane for 30 minutes after it had landed because he had to fly business class.  He then slapped a member of the cabin crew with a slipper 25 times.  No, not 24 or 26 times, the paper reported 25 times.

Our coach has a crew of three.  The driver, the guide and a person referred to as the helper.  After 5 days of travelling together we asked the guide what was the helper’s name?  A reasonable question since we saw this guy every time we got on and off the bus.  The guide had to ask his name even though they had been sitting together the whole time of the trip.  He was after all just the helper.

Load limits

There are none.  We saw a dump truck with well over 50 tonnes of marble in the back probably close to 75 tonnes.

Safety Rules

There are none.  Building roads, working on power poles, running machinery, climbing scaffolding there are no rules.  This is Asia.

That’s it for the moment.  As always if you don’t want this stuff please say so and you will see no more.  Any other feedback would be appreciated.

25 September 2016

So this is it, the last log for this adventure.  We have returned home after 96 days and 13,860 kms (8612 miles) on the road. The last couple of days were wet with lots of rain and cooler temperatures.  It was supposed to be Spring weather when we returned.    To bring this series of logs to a conclusion I thought I would summarise the last 3 months with a series of awards for some of the more memorable observations or events.   They are in no order.

Worst Road for Corrugations

• Bungle Bungles road or maybe Gunlom Falls road but we turned around on the Gunlom Falls road because it was so bad; maybe it got better.

Best Campground Manager

• Mission Beach.  She was so engaging with everyone, even offering kids a ride in her buggy when she was driving around the park. She could teach many out there on how to run a business.

Most Random Event

• Lone yachtsman in Port Douglas – see Log 23

Amazing Scenery

• Everywhere especially the Bungle Bungles

Emptiest Road

• Tanami Road with only a couple of road trains and few cars over 1,000 kms (620 miles).

Most Expensive Fuel

• Billiluna, $2.62 per litre  ($10.48 a gallon) but who was going to complain when in one direction the nearest competitor was 500kms away and the other 200kms distant.

Best Steaks

• Darwin and generally anywhere up north.

Amazing Forest

• Bunya National Park, Queensland

Worst Midgees (sandflies)

• Between Townsville and Mackay. We went inland after Mackay to avoid the blitters.

Best Barman

• An Irish backpacker at the Kulgera roadhouse,

Biggest Corrugations

• Tanami Road from Alice Springs to Halls Creek, especially on the WA end of the road.

Worse Coffee

• A coffee shop in Ingham Queensland

Best Pies

• Pinnacle, Queensland; outstanding homemade pies.  They make 300 a day, by hand.

Hairiest Trip

• Skytrain gondola ride over rainforest out of Cairns

Favourite Towns

• Dry tropics – Kununurra
• Wet tropics – Cairns

Oldest Rock Art

• Kakadu – 20,000 year old art work alongside art that is only 100s of years old.

Most Ubiquitous Fauna

• Termites; we were travelling before the bush flies were around.

Campground Fees

• From zero to $55 a night

Best Fish and Chips

• Hiway Inn, Daly Waters NT.

Scariest Sound

• Stone Curlews at night.  (Check out Stone Curlew call on YouTube.)

Most Amazing Stars

• The view of the Milky Way on the Tanami Road.

Best Meal

• Roast dinner cooked by Barb with an excellent red wine in the Tanami Desert.

Bags of Snakes Consumed on Trip

• Too many to count

Most Frustrating Observation

• Travel destinations owned by foreign companies that pay no Australian taxes.

Arriving home observations:

Upside to getting home:

• You suddenly have a wardrobe of clothes to choose from.
• A WiFi network with almost unlimited downloads.
• Granddaughters

Downside of getting home:

• Three months of mail to deal with.
• Unpacking and cleaning van and car.

One Thing I Will Do Next Time:

• Slow down and spend more time in special places.

That’s it for now.  We are thinking about when the next trip will happen and where we might head.  In the meantime I have some red dust to clean out of the car and van.

 

14 September 2016

It’s been over three weeks since I last imposed on you my steams of consciousness so I thought it must be a time for a new log.  We are now well into a southerly transit meaning arriving home is now an inevitability.  Before we get too far south however I thought I would provide a catch up on our travels from Cairns heading south.

 

Turning South

• It was a salutary moment in the trip when at a campground in Cairns we were asked which way we were headed.  With a slight hesitation and a quavering in the voice I had to admit we were headed south or in the direction of home.  Now home might be three thousand kilometres away but it seems the trip had reached a definite milestone.  We were now heading towards home rather than away from home and the I don’t want to go home syndrome is firmly in control.

Five Star Campgrounds

• Five star camping doesn’t seem right and yet there exists such facilities.  So for all of my friends that claim they will only camp under 5 stars I have found your campground.
• What defines a 5 star campground I hear you ask.  Before we checked in we were taken on a ride in a golf cart to have a look at the site they were proposing to see if it was ok by us.  I have never before had such an offer.  The camp had three pools and one spa that was for adults only.  The sites were huge, the whole camp was like a lush garden and all roadways were paved.  There was also a café and pizza shop and even flowers in the bathrooms! More importantly it wasn’t the most expensive camp we have stayed at on this trip.

Fishing Tournament

• Country radio can be very entertaining out here in the boonies.  The radio report of a local fishing competition went like this: Windscreen Wal  won the fishing competition.  He had a fair lump of a boat that handled the lumpy weather pretty well and was able to get out when others couldn’t manage.
• I think what we had here was a chap who in the past fitted or currently fits windscreens and his name is Wal.  Now Wal has a large boat that is able to handle stormy seas and therefore was able to be at sea when others couldn’t and therefore was able to catch the winning fish, thereby winning the local fishing trophy.
• I wondered if Windscreen Wal was a fair lump, I have my suspicions.

Hot Date and the Random Visitor

• We were enjoying a picnic lunch at Port Douglas when a random chap wandered up to us from the harbour and asked if he could sit down with us.  Did he want to share our picnic or did he want money we wondered?  What was going on?  He joined us and told us he was a yachtsman and had been sailing around the world for the last eight years.  His yacht was moored in the harbour.  Fascinating we thought.  He went on to tell us that soon he would be heading for Indonesia before the wet season storms hit the Australian coast.  He had arrived in Port Douglas just 8 days ago.
• It seems our weathered and well tanned sailor had worked on oil rigs making enough to buy a yacht and sail the world.  We continued our lunch as he regaled us with his life story. This was all in a few minutes as we enjoyed our picnic.
• Abruptly he announced he had a hot date and had to go.  He explained it was ok to keep the date waiting a little but not too long.  And off he went.  I think we were a convenient stalling strategy.
• We stared at each other wondering what had just happened as the lone yachtsman headed off to meet his hot date. We felt we had just lost our new best friend.  It was about 2.00pm.
• We went off on our walk down the main street of Port Douglas and down to the beach.  On the way back to our car, about 3.00pm, there he was in a pub with the hot date!  There was a moment of intimacy with a brief kiss as  they left the pub together just in front of us.  We heard her call her friend to say she would be making her own way home.  Curious we thought, quietly chuckling to ourselves.
• The relaxed couple wandered off toward the harbour where the yacht was moored. But alas this story doesn’t have a happy ending; the hot date was about to implode.
• The yacht was not moored to the local jetty or dock but was in the middle of the harbour and a ride in a zodiac tender was required if this date was to continue on what seemed to be its logical conclusion.  From a respectful distance we could see she baulked at the continuation of the date.  While we were some 200 meters away we could observe a brief and animated discussion between the two after which she headed back in our direction and back to town.  He was left on his own on the jetty, staring at the water looking very rejected. A very learned friend suggested the idea of getting into a small craft to head across the harbour and be isolated in a boat would have been a deal breaker.
• We drove away with fond memories of Port Douglas and our random friend, the lone yachtsman and wondered what might have been.  This was probably the most random event of our trip.

Country Pubs

• In country Australia there are several common names for country hotels.  There is usually a Commercial, a Railway, a Grand and maybe a Cricketers Arms.  The Commercial was for commercial salesmen, the Railway was usually close to the railway station and the Grand isn’t anymore.  The Cricketers Arms probably once sponsored local sporting clubs but now just displays sporting trophies from the 1940s.
• To add to this nomenclature there can be a top pub. Now the top pub is usually located at some high point and is geographically above all other pubs.  A top pub is one that serves good food, has great staff and cold beer.  To add to the confusion The top pub can also be A top pub.
• I was in the town of Monto and asked the local butcher where I could buy a bottle of wine.  I mean who else would you ask? She thought for a moment and then said the top pub would probably be the best place.  She didn’t say the Grand or the Commercial the two pubs in town and yet I knew exactly which pub she meant.  This is one of those things that all Australians inherently understand.

Aircraft Disaster

• There was a copy of an old newspaper in the shop window, something of a local museum.  The newspaper article, dated 1948 was about an aircraft crash that occurred in 1943.  It was five years before the crash site was found.  A crew of eight Australians were killed along with a similar number of US Air Force members.
• The newspaper article described in some detail who found the aircraft after all those years and who was with him when the wreckage was found.  The article went on to describe the relationship between the two who had found the plane, their professions and what they were doing at the time.  So we learned the chap who found the plane was with his father-in-law who was also a local farmer who at the time was rounding up sheep.  Several lines were dedicated to this information that had absolutely no bearing on the fate of the aircraft.  1940s journalism combined gossip pages with disaster reporting; entertaining and informative. In the days before TV or the internet, newspapers were the social media of the day.

Ruined Resorts

• We have visited the ruins of  what were tropical island resorts back in the 1920s and 1930s.  Now a trip through the Whitsunday Islands includes a commentary of the resorts that were all the rage in the 1970s that are now deserted and abandoned.  Recent cyclones haven’t helped the tourism industry and our preference for Bali as a holiday destination has surely impacted these islands.  Oh, and  foreign interests have just bought Daydream and South Molle islands.  Maybe they know something we don’t.

Country Towns

• This part of the country has some amazing small towns that must have been thriving economies in the past.  The days of manual labour would have filled these towns with sizeable populations.  You can tell they were once a big deal because you can still find a store with the sign that announces it was once an Emporium.  These were the department stores of their day.  The timber floors, timber walls and timber ceilings, and the smell of these stores evoke a time long gone.  Down the main street there are still bakeries with wonderful smells of freshly baked pies and now of course the coffee shops which I am sure never existed back in the 1950s.
• One of our objectives on this trip has been to spend some money in these little towns to help them stay alive.

 

This is probably the penultimate log for this trip. We are now on the outskirts of Brisbane (this log has taken a while through poor discipline on my behalf) and will be heading into NSW early next week.  I hope to get one more log out before we get home with some reflections on the 13,000 kms we will have covered.

Yours in perpetual cartographic wonderment.

21 August 2016

It seems like it been forever since I last downloaded.  My last email was written in Mataranka NT where we had a day off from driving.  Mataranka’s claim to fame is thermal streams that you can float down in 28c water.  Very relaxing.  After Mataranka we continued on to Daly Waters and back on to the Savannah Way.  This section of the trip involved many days on dirt roads with several creek or river crossings.  Very remote country.

We have now crossed the Gulf Country ie the bottom of the Gulf of Carpentaria and are now on sealed roads.  Yay!  The weather continues to be hot but less humid in the gulf country.  We have arrived in Cairns having reached the end of the Savannah Way and suddenly are surrounded by green grass, people, traffic and lots of towns.  After two months on the road the car has been washed and vacuumed.  We feel like we have rejoined civilisation at least for the moment; we still have four weeks of travel ahead of us.

Observations filling my head:

Remoteness

• We haven’t been in or anywhere near a town big enough for a supermarket in nearly three weeks.  This develops a strong need to replenish our stock of food and to remember ‘what was it I said I needed to buy when I am next in a town’.   Of course that conversation in your head was weeks ago and in a very different setting.  Now you just have to try to remember and visiting camping stores is always a good way to prompt your thinking, alcohol outlets also help.

 

US Taxpayers and the GPS

• I would like to recognise and thank the US taxpayer and their investment in GPS satellites.  This is the first time we have used the SATNAV system so much and what a value it has been. Without guess work the navigation system tells me how far I have to go to my destination and the software in the car tells me the range I have left in my fuel tank, especially useful when driving in 4WD.  Across the vast distances on dirt roads when refuelling points are separated by 100s of kilometres these two numbers, distance and range are my guiding stars.  So thanks again US taxpayers, keep it up.

 

Strange aircraft

• On the side of the road at Daly Waters is this broken shell of an aircraft.  According to the plaque in the pub the plane was operated by Australian spies during WW2 and was present when the first A  bomb was dropped on Hiroshima.  It was there to take pictures.  And yet it’s not in a museum it’s just left on the side of the Stuart Highway to deteriorate and how many people drive past this relic without ever wondering about its past.

 

A Tale of Woe

The Premonition

• On the first night of our travels I unwrapped a mattress overlay for Barb.  We had not installed it prior to departure and so I had the large plastic bag it came in to discard.  Now, I thought this is an excellent piece of plastic sheeting.  I don’t know what it is good for but it seemed too good to just throw away.  At this stage the minimalists amongst you are shouting throw it away!  (You know who you are.)  I compromised and cut a section of plastic bag and folded it up for storage.  I had a solution to an as yet undefined problem. It was light and compact and therefore needed to be kept.  This happened on 18 June.

The Event

• On 7 August as we drove into Doomadgee, an aboriginal community, on a wonderful piece of sealed road a passing car threw up a rock which destroyed the passenger window right behind the driver’s seat.  The window went off with an incredible bang.  In all my years of driving I have never seen a passenger window broken by a passing rock.  To make matters worse this happened on a sealed road after all the kilometres we had driven on corrugated, dirt roads!

The Repair

• The plastic sheet suddenly was the solution to the problem of a missing window.  With lavish use of duct tape and with the plastic sheet trimmed to size I had a workable window that would last until it could be repaired in Cairns.   Well almost last, it required regular maintenance of additional tape as the hot days soften the adhesive but it is so much better than no window with clouds of dust entering the car.
• This to me is a salutary story and valuable rationalisation for why some stuff is useful and should be kept.  Why some stuff needs to be kept may not be immediately obvious but in time all shall be revealed and you will celebrate the day you kept that piece of something that seemed to be a solution to an undefined need.

The Tragedy

• A small piece of glass fell down into a case of beer and between two cans.  With the bouncing on corrugated roads the tiny chip wore a hole in one of the cans of beer, released the pressure in the can and allowed beer to slowly spill on the floor of the car; that was a tragedy.

Campsites

• It amuses me that once you pay for a campsite and set up your camp that the piece of land you are established on suddenly becomes yours and anyone walking across it is suddenly a trespasser.  Nothing is ever said you are just thinking, this is my site what do you think you are doing walking there!  Of course as soon as you drive away your site simply reverts to the surrounding bush.

Employment in the Outback

• It seems everywhere we go someone is looking for people to employ.  There have been ads for camp cooks during mustering on cattle stations, there are vacancies at campgrounds and even some that have closed because the cattle station is mustering and they can’t find the staff to keep the campground open.  At Hells Gate Roadhouse we found an Italian family operating the roadhouse and campground. Hells Gate has only recently reopened after being shut down for illegal alcohol sales.  What is incredible is finding this family who were all well dressed and well groomed in the middle of nowhere.  A little piece of Europe in the Gulf country.  They are making a huge effort and the Hells Gate campground will be a place to stop in coming years.

The Circle of Life

• Latvian and Polish youth work in UK restaurants, hotels and bars.  The British and Germans work in Australian and New Zealand restaurants, hotels, campgrounds and bars.  And the Australian youth work in US coffee shops and bars.  All the older people ask ‘why aren’t our young people working in these jobs?’.  They are, just in another country!

Burke and Wills camp

• It’s pretty sobering to visit Camp 119 of the Burke and Will expedition.  You can still see a few of the remaining trees that they blazed back in 1861.  The trees are not big now and yet they were big enough to mark over a hundred years ago.  It would suggest these are very old trees that grow slowly.  Very poignant place to visit when you think this was the last campsite for this expedition before their dash to the coast.

 

 

That’s it for a while.  We are now faced with the dilemma of ‘where to from here’.  I think the fear is that once we turn south we are effectively heading for home rather than away from home as we have been doing for 2 months.

3 August 2016

Since the last Log we have travelled up to Darwin and spent time in Kakadu a national park bigger than Wales or New Jersey.  The weather has ben hot and humid and the country sparsely populated by people but full of crocodiles and things that would like to eat or at least kill you.

The Weather and Seasons

• The western idea of four seasons namely winter, spring, summer and autumn has no relevance in Kakadu. The modern Australians up here, the non-indigenous ones, think of two seasons, wet and dry.  It rains in the wet and it doesn’t rain in the dry; pretty simple.  To the people who have lived here for maybe 50,000 years there are six seasons and they don’t breakdown into a simple 2 months for each season and their names are difficult to pronounce without practice.  They are:

Gudjewg                                   December to March                                              The wet

Banggerreng                           April                                                                               Transition from monsoon

Yegge                                          May to June                                                               Cool weather, good time to                                         burn

Wurrgeng                                June to August                                                         The cool dry season

Gurrung                                    August to October                                                 The hot dry season

Gunumeleng                          October to December                                          Pre monsoon, we call it the build up.

 

• I think we could learn something from the Kakadu people and I think it’s time to let go of the association with the weather and agriculture to define the seasons. A more modern definition of seasons might be the following breakdown:

Travellin	June to September	Go somewhere to escape the cold
Doin	September to October	Get overdue stuff done from Travellin season
Gardenin	October to December	Get veggie garden ready and plant tomatoes etc
Chillin	January to March	Barbeques, relaxation and watch for bushfires
Fixin	April to May	A good time for maintenance and prep for Travellin

These seasons define our current modus operandi however they might be just a little too parochial for general acceptance.  Regardless, I think it’s time for the conversation.

We Are Strange Beings

• The vast majority of Australians live along the coast or are in relatively close proximity to the ocean. And yet so many head out into the outback and remote places on this continent, for what purpose you ask? They go there so they can seek out isolated water holes, waterfalls or maybe billabongs with crocodiles.  Some of these features only last part of the year.  So we drive enormous distances to see Emma Gorge, or Kings Canyon, the Pentecost River maybe Edith Falls or Twin Falls and Jim Jim Falls.  We walk Kings Canyon and maybe camp at Wangi    Its seems we are in a constant need to find  landscapes that include water even though most live right by the ocean.  Is it that we evolved from the oceans and we are pinning for the good old days?

The Savannah

• The forest and tree cover is so different to the southern states. There are no big trees or trees of great age and no fallen trees on the ground.  There is no tangle of old fallen trees or old tree stumps.  The savannah looks like all the trees are maybe 40 years old.  Why is this?  We are told that traditional burning by indigenous people have shaped the landscape.  I would like to differ; its bloody termites that shape this country.  Once they attack a tree its doomed to be completely eaten out, it then falls and it finally finished off by the termites and fire.  Of course the little blitters give us probably Australia’s only unique musical instrument the didgeridoo.  The didgeridoo is made from tree trunks hollowed out  by termites and I while am guessing there is no Stradivarius of termite species  maybe different timbers give different tones.
• In our neighbourhood if there was a bushfire it would be attended by many fire trucks who would stay with it until the fire was extinguished and then for days after to ensure there was no reignition. Not so up here.  Fires are lit and left to burn wherever they might go.  It not unusual in the burning season (now) to drive by a fire with substantial flames just by the road and not a soul in sight.

Travellers and Road Intelligence

• When meeting people up here the two questions you ask at all introductions are ie. where are you from and where are you headed. The answers to these questions then allow you to decide whether these people have information you need, like what’s the road between Borroloola and Hells Gate like? Even then their information needs a date stamp.  They might say ‘Oh its fine’ you then inquire ‘when did you drive that stretch?’  ‘Oh about six weeks ago ‘.  This is  practically useless information.  Road conditions change so fast.  These questions are however accepted social etiquette in all campgrounds.
• There are websites that you can access for road conditions. Typically they only report Open or Closed.  Maybe Road Works between X and Y.  And that’s it.  This information is neither timely nor is it useful.  I asked a ranger ‘What’s the road to Jim Jim Falls like?’  His reply ‘Fine, if don’t mind destroying your car’.  This is the information you need.  It turned out he was on the money.  The literature said ‘Deep water crossing’.  Deep can be very subjective, what’s deep for me might be a doddle for others.  It turned out deep was 0.8 metre which would mean the water would come in through the doors of the car and I would have needed a blind on the grill. We took a 4WD tour to Jim Jim falls.
• I called a police station at Borroloola for a road report and his answer ‘people are getting through’. Does this mean they got through with the assistance of a tow truck, or they got through with their marriage intact or they got through alive.  I love it, not sure what to make of this information but his statement is somehow compelling.  The only solution, regardless of the information you collect; you have to drive the road yourself.

Time Frames

• They keep telling us this is an ancient landscape and it all becomes too easy to dismiss until you start to think – yes I know not a good idea.
• The sandstone around here is about 1.2 billion years old and embedded in the sandstone are eroded quartz river pebbles that are another 1 billion years old making them over 2 billion years old. These rocks were around well before any life evolved so there are no fossils and yet they are only half the age of earth.  Well it amazes me.
• In terms of human habitation we were looking at art that has been found to be 20,000 years old.  The gallery with the 20k year old art also had art painted throughout the past 20k years, right up to the early 1960s.  This art records changing weather patterns, sea levels and local animals.  One site records a Diprotodon and they haven’t been around for a very, very long time.  Yep, two verys and that is a long time ago.

Swimming Pool Etiquette

• The swimming pool at the campground provided noodles. I just wanted one.  Two little kids each had four noodles and there were none spare.  They knew they had corned the noodle supply and they knew I wanted one.  They also knew they would never give up one of their noddles.  I waited.  The kids tired of the pool and got out to find their mum and dad.  The noddles were abandoned.  I made my move; two noddles, one for Barb and one for me.  Others grabbed a noodle and the abandoned noodle pile diminished.  The two kids returned to find fewer noodles, they cast a glance across the pool and saw me with a noodle and glared as only little kids can.  I knew I had done wrong but I had a noodle!

That’s it, we are now headed for the next stage of the trip, the Savannah Way and Queensland.