July 30, 2002
01:52 AM dublin time
hurray, we're in melbourne!
we've actually been here nearly five days now - we must be enjoying ourselves if it took me this long to post something when the house we're staying in has internet and i don't even have to haul myself out to a cafe.
it's strange to be sleeping in a house rather than a van again. strange but good. and definitely warmer.
now we must off to print up some "van for sale" notices. anyone want to buy the bestest cutest reliablest little van in the world?
[link]July 25, 2002
06:01 AM dublin time
the highlight of our stay in perth, for both of us, was the 'cheap-as' two dollar hari krishna take away dinners. what a bargain; salad, curry, rice and dessert all crammed into a take-away carton. other than that, perth was like any other city really with not much to offer us poor sods, though the neighbouring town of freemantle had the highest concentration of indian/asian clothes and jewelry shops i've seen outside of the koh san road in bangkok.
we left perth, back on the bryson track, heading south to the tall trees and the valley of the giants. this is an area of enormous trees, some so tall and commanding such panoramic views of the area that they were used as bush fire lookouts. three of these lookouts are now open to members of the public brave enough to climb the 50, 60, 70 metres to the top on a series of sturdy metal peg steps flimsily caged in with chicken-wire. i got about five steps [four metres] up on the first tree. aonghus climbed all three to the top. and seemed to enjoy it too.
from there it was a swift trek across the nullarbor to adelaide, where we are now. that's just 730km or one long day's drive on to melbourne and we're giddy as puppies at the thought of getting back. even the prospect of miserable melbourne winter weather can't dampen our spirits.
[link]July 16, 2002
08:09 AM dublin time
of course we braved the increasingly untropically inclement weather for some west coast snorkling at ningaloo and were very glad we did. the water of torquise bay was just warm enough for a couple of short dips which was fine as a current flows across the aquamarine-blue bay lending itself to minimal swimming and a relaxing snorkle drift. having not made it out to the great barrier reef on the east coast, i can't really compare, but i was delighted by the variety and brilliance of the fish i saw - with stripes and spots of all colours, mobs of little electric blue ones, pipe shaped fish, puffed up fish, flatly gliding sting rays, rainbow coloured parrot fish champing noisily on the coral.
we left the parrot fish to their coral and headed south to monkey mia and its famous dolphins. bear in mind that i can't get too worked up over dolphins when i say they were just a little boring. they came in to the shore and swam up and down a bit and got fed some fish. it was all very pleasant to watch them eat, but nothing to get too worked up over. hurray dolphins, yeah, whatever. though the fact that the weather was getting steadily worse the further south we went might have had something to do with my apathy.
leaving monkey mia before i died of over-enthusiasm, we arrived in kalbarri in a shower of drizzle - our first rain in about two months. this didn't do much to rouse my excitement, but we managed to drag ourselves out to see one of the gorges of kalbarri national park. though my initial feelings were aptly voiced by a fellow sightseer "...nothing is as impressive compared to karajini", the clouds had by then cleared and we decided to do the [thoroughly enjoyable] three hour loop walk through one of the gorges. i swear i never thought i'd like the outdoors this much, though happily the rain kicked in again before i got too fond of it.
heading southward once again, we detoured off the road to perth to visit the pinnacles - a forrest of naturally eroded limestone pillars, standing surreally in a desert of yellow sand. just another of australia's bizarre geographical features...
and so arrived this morning in perth. australia's third[?] city. i'm sure it would be wonderful if it wasn't so blummin' chilly. i am not looking forward to the weather in melbourne. somebody please plug in an electric blanket for me.
[link]July 09, 2002
03:21 AM dublin time
we left broome after a relaxing four days - the longest we've spent anywhere since recuperation in byron bay! we were heading south and inland in search of the gorges of the karijini national park and a supposedly 'challenging' route through them called the miracle mile, stopping off en route for some early morning shell collecting on eighty mile beach [which stretches along the western coast for a lengthy 128km].
we reached karijini late and settled ourselves into a camp for the night after an unsuccessfully brief spot of shooting-star searching from which we were driven in[van]doors by the freezing temperatures. this is still the tropics goddammit, but away from the sea the nighttimes drop to near freezing.
we were delighted by the investigation of our first gorge the following morning - this area is somewhat remote and less touristed giving an untouched feel to the park. the trails through the gorges are marked with red dots and can involve stepping stones across the gorge-bed stream, clambering up the natural stone steps on the sides and leaping from level rock to level rock on the scree strewn gorge floor. and that's the easy ones.
we had heard that the miracle mile we were in search of, invloved walking up one of the gorges, around and sometimes through cold pools of water, scrambling down short falls and up another gorge with similar features. and the tough bit: scaling a 25m high waterfall face that blocked the route between the two gorges. i wasn't sure if i would manage it, but we thought we'd give it a go. unfortunately, we never made it that far... before we even got to the waterfall face our decision was made for us - we reached a natural rock slide into a deep pool. if we'd gone on into the pool we wouldn't have been able to return again and without seeing the 25m climb i was not willing to risk going past a 'point of no return'.
so we went round the other way. and this was the really fun bit. you had to let yourself down into one part of the gorge on a knotted rope, skirt the edge of a large pool, swim and wade through the next part [through the pretty chilly water], a bit more scaling, a bit more scrambling and we came to our 25m falls. they didn't look totally impassable, but i was glad i'd decided against it.
all in all a gorge-tastic couple of days and probably the highlight of our trip so far.
at the moment we're in exmouth and thinking about doing some snorkling on the ningaloo reef, but this tropical weather is letting us down again, and i'm not sure how warm the water is. we might take a quick dip, but i'm not promising anything. oh for the heat of the malaysian sea at the perhentian islands where we did our first snorkling.
[link]July 02, 2002
10:41 AM dublin time
so now we're in broome, which if you look on a map you will discover to be in western australia specifically on the sea. i guess that means we're doing the west coast.
however i last left you in darwin where things were feeling more and more south-east-asian what with some of the hottest weather we've experienced since being in australia, evening markets selling thai food, sarongs and fisherman's pants and a dip in the timor sea. we decided to leave darwin before our longings to return to asia and it's comparative cheapness caused us to sell the van and hop on the nearest bangkok-ward flight. so we headed south once more in the direction of kakadu national park - australia's largest [and most mentioned] national park and alongside uluru [ayer's rock] it's most visited natural site. so there. it came to worldwide attention when the film crocodile dundee was filmed there. think mangrove lined wetlands, murky croc infested creeks, eucalypt scrub lands and lots and lots of mosquitos.
i'm not sure if at this stage we're all national parked out, but for me, kakadu felt like too much hard work. it didn't help that about half of the sites of interest and all of the croc-free swimming locations were accessible by four wheel drive vehicles only. and because it's so spread out we ended up spending long stretches in a roasting van with cd getting cranky and dying for a swim. but we did get to see some interesting aboiginal rock art and stumbled on a fascinating 'meet the ranger' session on the bewildering subject of aboriginal kin relationships, so it wasn't all bad, and certainly not worthy of the local expression "kaka-don't, litchfield-do" - the two parks are too different for such a glib surmise.
heading further south we arrived at katherine gorge in time for an arm achingly fun day of canoing through the gorge on the katherine river. i can't believe we haven't done more canoing on this trip - we may have to rectify this, though next time on a slightly faster river. the fast bits are the fun bits.
we've been in broome now for two nights and are enjoying staying still for a bit. we're also aware that we're going to be heading south towards chilly melbourne all too soon and are getting in a last bit of sun lazing and swimming.
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