Oy, Oy, Oy

Aussie, aussie, aussie, or is that out of order? We recently returned from our exploits in the neighboring country which owns our continent's name. I headed over to Brisbane for the Australian Sports Medicine conference Tuesday after work. Luckily, Dunedin has direct flights to Brisi which made it quick and easy. The sunny 80 plus degree temps were a welcome treat for my vitamin D deficient body. The conference was pretty informative and much more social than conferences in the States. For example, every day we were fed lunch and had morning and afternoon tea breaks with fruit and cake or cookies. So it was nice to chat with lots of different people. I didn't do too much touring but did wander downtown and to the South Bank where the conference was. It was a nice city centre and I was able to walk everywhere I wanted to go. In Queensland they don't observe daylight savings and the sun rose about 5am, which meant the birds outside my hotel awoke before 5, which made it harder to get over the 3 hour time difference.

On Thursday Katie took off after work and headed to Sydney to meet the in-laws-to-be who also happened to be touring there at the same time. I will let her fill in the details:
As Craig said, I left Thursday for Sydney. With the exception of getting rear-ended on my way to the airport, everything went smoothly and I was reunited with the Wassingers in Sydney at about 11pm. We stayed up for awhile catching up with a glass of wine before crashing. Friday morning, we set out in the nice Aussie sunshine to check out the city. We decided to walk which I though was a great idea and I think Barb and Gary did too until it ended up being 13 hours of walking. I thought it was fun, they thought the bus would have been a nice option. We did see a ton though, including the observation deck of the Sydney Sky Tower, a tour of the famous Opera House, the Botannical Gardens, Darling Harbour, and multiple other parks and pretty architecture. Gary and I had booked the Sydney Harbour Bridge Climb for that evening so we decided to relax with a beer before heading over. Unfortunately, 3/4 of the way through my James Squire Ale, I remembered that you have to have a breathalyzer before you're allowed to climb. Uh Oh! I sadly left my beer on the table and headed to the bridge. The whole operation is impressively organized. We checked in, passed our breath test (phew!), got geared up in jumpsuits, radios, warm clothes, and special carabiner/steel cable/keep you on the bridge at all costs equipment. Then we had a safety briefing, including a practice climb up and down some ladders. This whole process took about 45 minutes and then we were herded outside to the bridge! Now, being afraid of heights, I was very nervous. But, I have to say, it wasn't too bad. The first section of the bridge consists of sections of narrow plank catwalks over the road (scary because you can see through the cracks to the traffic below). The next part was the worst for me: 4 levels of ladders up to the steel archways of bridge. Frightening! Once on top though, you are on these huge, wide, steel beams that you would really have to try to fall off of. And you can't see through them which makes it less scary. We spent sunset at the very top of the bridge which was cold and windy but gorgeous, with great panoramic views of the city, including Darling Harbour and the Opera House. While we were climbing, Barb wandered over to a noodle festival in the park for some tasty treats. By the time Gary and I got back down from the bridge, we were famished so we too headed over to the hundreds of noodle tents for some dinner.
Next morning, we hopped on a tour to the Blue Mountains to see the famed Three Sisters. It was a pretty day, lots of mountains, waterfalls, and nice views. We did a few hikes, learned about the area, drove through Olympic Park, and hopped on a ferry across the harbour, back to the city. That sums up my time in Sydney as the next morning I hopped on a plane to Cairns to meet Craig.


Fountain from the Sydney Sky Tower

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Opera House


Trio in Front of Sydney Bridge

After our different travels we met in Cairns, the gateway to the Great Barrier Reef, on Sunday morning. Cairns is tropical and hot most of the year and midspring brought nice weather but strong winds. Sunday we wandered around the town which is mostly souvenir shops, tour booking agencies, and restaurants. Tired from the early flights, we took an afternoon siesta and went out for dinner. I had some barramundi, a locally famous fish, and Katie enjoyed a chicken salad. I wasn't too impressed with the fillet but did enjoy the Movenpick ice cream after.


Look, Shorts and a T-shirt

Monday was our day trip to the Barrier Reef and we were treated to high seas and winds (20-30 knots). After several warnings, we both ate some motion sickness tablets and didn't have any issues even though it was pretty rough. We decided to snorkel as opposed to intro scuba dive. We docked at an anchored pontoon and suited up. The reef was just off the platform and we spent most of the morning and afternoon with our eyes on brightly colored fish, coral, and any other creature who passed by. We didn't see any rarities like sharks or turtles but were thrilled none the less. There were a couple of Napoleon Maori Wrasse fish (realy big and colorful). The sun was warm and the waves were high. The waves were rolling through and it seemed like we would rise and drop 5-6 feet with each one. This was somewhat disorienting which was compounded by the lack of peripheral vision from the mask. The reef was awesome and it's no wonder this is one of the natural wonders of the world. We also took a ride in a semisubmersible boat and got some info from the marine biologist on board. The 90 minute ride back to Cairns was rough and a bit rainy. We got off the boat sad to end the day's exploits but glad for the memories. That night we were looking for a cheap and easy dinner. Pizza and a kebab were the ticket.


Scenes from the Cairns Esplanade


The Pix don't Show how Colorful they Really Are


Katie Approves

The next day we had booked a rainforest and surrounds tour. We booked a 4 wheel drive tour which was supposed to be different than most of the other tours. We got a backdoor tour of the rainforest which was not as spectacular as we had hoped. The tour did go into the rainforest through some unpaved roads. We have become used to the temperate rain forest of NZ so the tropical rainforest of Aussie wasn't much different, just warmer. We did get to learn some about the trees, fruit, and birds from our knowledgeable, albeit bland, guide. The coolest part of the tour was seeing the strangler fig trees which grow on top of and then take over existing trees. Their roots start up on the canopy and drop all the way to the ground. Impressive. We also came across a mountain bike race which was utilizing the same roads we were touring. So we spent an hour or so scouting for and avoiding mountain bikers flying past downhill or struggling up it.


Us in Front of the Strangler Fig Roots

The tour also took us into "the bush" which is the most common landscape in Australia and encompasses most places not on the coast. This is an arid dusty environment sparse in trees and little grass. We drove through looking for kangaroos and wallabies and saw only huge termite nests. These bugs dig out an underground cave system and move the remains on top of the ground to get it out of their way. They varied in size and looked like big boulders. After the somewhat disappointing tour we went out for some italian food and souveniring. Then wandered along the coast on the boardwalk until bed.


Safari Gembar

The evenings in Cairns bring the birds and bats out to play and make lots of noise. Our hotel room was palm tree level and the birds were so loud we had to keep the doors closed to maintain sanity. The fruit bats, or flying fox, also come out at dusk. These big mothers fly around and are generally scary to look at. If you don't like bats, Cairns is the not place for you. I would guess the wingspan to be 30-36 inches. I was just glad they didn't poop on me, since they don't eat meat.


Flying Fox (we didn't take this picture)

Our last day was spent enjoying the sun and heat. We wandered down to the public pool and relaxed in the sun for a while and took a couple dips in before flying to Brisbane on our way home. We spend our last Aussie night in Brisbane with a quick meal in the city centre. I then took Katie on a tiki tour of the business district and South Bank. We grabbed a beer and wandered home for our AM flight back to Dunedin.


Brisbane Old Parliament Building

Dunedin was as we remember, cool but sunny. Now my parents are in town for a visit.

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