Australia Recap

A sad but bittersweet post, the Australia sector of this journey has come to an end.  4 months ago I was on a plane headed down under all by myself, no set travel plan, and nothing more than 4 nights booked in a hostel.  That plane trip from the states was very exciting yet scary at the same time.  Leaving all my family and friends behind and heading to a place that truly was foreign to me, all on my own.  Today I have four great months of memories and friendships that will last a lifetime. Crikey what a trip!  It isn't till I step back a bit and think about what I've accomplished till I really feel how awesome and unbelievable this trip was. Yes, I had a bit of aid in the groundwork with the trip as far as getting my visa and such, but it was me in the end that really made everything happen.  I secured my first job in another country, something not many Americans, especially my age, can say that they've done. I went solo, maybe the best call of this entire journey.  Yes, in some places having a friend from back home to share some great memories would have been cool, but honestly, travelling the world is all about meeting new people and learning about yourself.  Thanks to the heaps of international travelers and a very well laid out backpacking network in Australia, meeting new people was not difficult if you just made a simple effort.  Travelling solo forces you to be outgoing. This trip would not have been the same without the heaps of great people I've met along the way. Meeting new people and hearing their stories is just as mesmorizing as some of the most beautiful Australian destination. I have made contacts from all over the world and will eventually see them all again, whether showing them around the great state of California or in their respective countries. My friends from England, Sweden, Germany, Italy, and Holland have all invited me to their countries and offered accomodation.  I will undoubtedly take them up on their offers when I do eventually make it back over to Europe.

Maybe the best part of this trip is that I absolutely have no regrets.  I would not do anything different on the trip.  My time in Sydney, my travel itinerary, etc. For the time I had in Australia and the funds available, I did everything I wanted to do and that is the important part.

Working in Australia was quite the experience.  Although it was in the travel and transportation industry and (hopefully) quite the deviation from a future career path, my job at Gate Gourmet was a memorable one.  It really shows that I can excel at anything I put effort into.  Well even if I didn't "excel" like the fast moving Koreans, I still never got fired and I think thats a plus in anyones work career.  Learning the ins and out of airline catering was fascinating and is something I will always remember on any flight I board.  And yes, I will still eat the airline food, regardless of packing thousands of trays, tray after tray and seeing how it all comes together.

Things Learned

Well travelling around with international people you see and learn things about the world. I learned some aussie words, but definitely picked up on some common/slang German, Swedish and English(UK) words.

Also, and I got a feel for this in Europe almost 3 years ago, Americans don't have the greatest reputation among outsiders.  I think this may all be due to bad media and terrible stereotypes that sometimes can lead to be true. Europeans are fascinated about Obama, that had to be the most common question I recieved, "what do you think of Obama." Did get a bit annoyed after awhile with that question.  But yes, I think American movies, TV shows and just our modern culture can sometimes lead to false accusation of American lifestyle.  Another common topic was gangs. Whenever LA was brought up, the topics of gangs and Compton always came along. I always told people you can't talk anything if you have never actually visited a place.

As far as things learned about myself, well heaps.  This has been a great individual experience.  I've never been one for horoscopes or star signs but it is right on.  I've seen on this trip, that my Aquarius personality is right on.  Aquarians are usually pretty independant and adventurous.  I wouldn't really have classified myself as adventurous before this trip, but now I would. Maybe it is due to the fact that this is the first time I truly have been on my own, and I think that is where my adventurous self comes out.  I constantly find myself always trying to explore new places and never wanting to miss out on an opportunity and will make the extra effort to make it happen.  This trip has improved my lifestyle.  I can't even remember the last time I slept past 10 oclock in the morning. (actually yes I can, when I was working). Let me rephrase that a bit. WHEN I AM TRAVELLING, I wake up early so I can make the most of my time, no matter how tired I am or how big of a night I had the night before.  I can't afford to piss days away when there is so much do to. I think travelling has made me healthier.  Let me first make clear that I am in no means in shape.  BUT, I would say I am far more active than usual while travelling. I have walked hundreds of miles of the past 4 months and I feel pretty good.  I am thankful that I never got sick at all during this part of the trip, especially in my one month travelling the coast and Melbourne. I think being sick while backpacking would be the worst possible thing that can happen.  So I must have treated my body pretty well never to feel under the weather, with the exception of a hangover here or there.  My eating habits over the past 4 months have been suprisingly pretty good. Thinking back on it, I probably ate better on this trip than I did any year in college (except for freshman year in the dorms).  I found myself eating almost 1-2 pieces of fruit everyday and eating breakfast, lunch, dinner almost every day of the weak. Yea, being on a pretty strict budget I couldn't afford 5 star meals every night with every ingredient possible, but I made the most of it. I also discovered I am taking less of the things I don't like out of my food and eating them.  Mostly vegetables.  Things I never used to eat I have started eating, and I dont really know why.  They include mushrooms, capsicums, cucumbers, and tomatoes.  Out of these 4, tomatoes have made way into my taste buds the most.  At times I still don't like eating them but sometimes they can be quite tasty and can really improve a certain meal, sandwhich, or salad.

Highlights of the trip

Here will be a quick rundown of some of my favorite things/nights/travel spots on the Trip

- Spending time relaxing at my favorite Sydney destinations, Manly Beach, Coogee Beach, Darling Harbour, Sydney Harbour, The Botanical Gardens

- Losing my debit card in the first weeks of being in Sydney and finding it without any harm done
- Newtown Festival the second week in Sydney
- Working at Gate Gourmet
- Pearl Jam and Ben Harper Concert at Sydney Football Stadium
- Living at Home Backpackers in Sydney and meeting new people outside on the deck every night, the best night was Wednesday, Free Wine and Cheese Night
- That 1 night I got kicked out of Scruffy Murphy's bar for my "swaying" dance moves
- Times out at the Sydney bars with my favorite friends
- New Years Eve overlooking Sydney's Harbour and a multimillion dollar firework show

- Taking the long Greyhound bus rides and listening to some epic playlists on my Ipod, favorites were The Grateful Dead, Bob Marley, and Creedence Clearwater Revival.
- Byron Bay
- Meeting up with my German girlfriends in Brisbane and cooking and eating that great dinner at the hostel
- Noosa National Park Bush Walk
- Day trip to Croc Hunter's Australia Zoo
- Fraser Island 4 wheel trip beach camping trip.

- When I urinated on a guys leg after he got stung by a blue bottle jellyfish
- Australian Day and partying and dancing in the rain on Magnetic Island
- The Magnetic Island bush walk in the pouring rain
- The Great Barrier Reef snorkel trip
- The hot wings and Blue Sky brewery in Cairns
- Kuranda adventure bushwalk and Barron Falls

- Great Ocean Road trip out of Melbourne
- Returning to Sydney, seeing all my friends for one last time

2 downsides of the trip

Well these are the two, and I think if these are the worst of it, it shows I didn't have to bad of a time.

-Night and morning in Surfers paradise after that one unknown strawberry shot before the pub crawl that put me down for the count and made my life and bus ride a living hell.

- This next one has been bottled up by me for the past 2 months.  I hate to think about it, but it happened.  I was involved in a large backpacker scam with 6 other of my roomates while I was staying at my apartment in Surry Hills, Sydney. None of us received our $300 dollar security bond back.  We all got played by our shady and shitty landlord.  This is something that I saw coming, I never signed a contract or anything. Like most of the time, I am partially to blame.  But anyhow what happened to me and my roomates is a very common thing in Sydney. These shady apartment renters taking advantage of backpackers.  I was given constant excuses that the owner was out of the country and couldn't get my money back till he came back.  My other roomates were told to give them their bank details and it would be transfered to them. Well those promises were never followed thru. We all got shafted.  Moving On, this was obviously right before I was taking off for my east coast trip, always having money on my mind.  $300 backpacking goes a long way but I did my best to not think about it.  I couldnt let something ruin my time.  Yes it sucks now, it sucked then, and it was worth about 1 and a half weeks accomodation, but I tell myself this.  Come a couple months I will hopefully have a job, that $300 dollars will be about 1 - 3 days work...no need to ruin a trip over 3 days work, just not worth it. Yes, extremely unfortunate it happened and yes I tried to put up a bit of a fight but got nowhere and eventually it wasn't worth my time, stress or effort.

Thats it, and I always try to look at the bright side of life. Im alive, I am travelling the world, I am healthy and am right where I want to be.  Just another learning experience in my life and a warning to other backpackers, be aware.

Final Thoughts

Despite the above, everything on this trip was flawless.  Some of the most memorable 4 months of my life and proud of myself I made it happen. I always wondered what Australia would be like and it always interested me.  Well I conquered it, well not all of it, but a good chunk. Pretty big country.  I like the fact that I have travelled more around Australia than I have travelled the in the States.  The world is where its at, there is so much to see and learn from it. New cultures, new places, new food, who wouldn't want to experience it? I see this trip as a 5th year in college, because to be honest, I think you can learn just as much in the outside world than in a classroom or textbook, if not more.

It's been a great one Australia, hope to see you again someday mate.

Cairns Continued

Day 4 (Saturday)

Today I woke up to terrential downpours and true tropical storm weather. Cyclone Olga was making its way back to the mainland.  This was the day I was originally supposed to do my Great Barrier Reef Snorkel Trip.  I was smiling all day while walking thru the storm, knowing I made the best decision of my trip just a day earlier.  Anyhow, today was a day dedicated to just relaxing and touring central Cairns.  It rained almost all afternoon so it was a good time to plan more of my Zealand trip and prepare my back for my flight to Melbourne.

When the nighttime came around it was time to finally test out the great pumping nightlife in Cairns.  My dormmate Ray and I headed for Gilligans, the nearby backpackers resort and bar.  It was massive and was a good party for the entire night.  Heaps of backpackers and a jumping dance floor.

Cairns Lagoon at Night

Day 5 (Sunday)

Waking up from a previous pretty big night out, I woke up feeling pretty refreshed and energized.  Not having anything to do again today, I decided to head up to the nearby mountain town Kuranda.  Woo, what a day trip, this stop is a hidden gem off the beatin tourist track.  Instead of taking the expensive scenic railway or gondola up to the town, I opted for Johns Kuranda Bus trasport, only an 8 dollar return ticket, contrary to the 60 dollar train/gondola ticket.  The small shuttle bus left at 930am and took about 30 mins to make it up to Kuranda.

When I arrived in the lively and vibrant small town, I headed for the Barron River where there was some walking tracks.  The track that I started on was the starting point of the path that led to Barron Falls, my final hike destination.  Anyhow, the walk started off great until I encountered some major flooding of the river bank.  With the intense downpours the past few days this was no suprise but did not even think about it when I started the trip.  Not knowing another way to access the falls, I took off my shoes and braved thru the water.  Got up to knee deep at some points and to be honest I was a bit scared not knowing what was in the surrounding waters.  Having seen crocs in rivers just 3 days earlier, I was definitely tripping a bit walking for about 5 minutes thru this flooded river bank.  Anyhow I made it, was feelin quite the adventure man after explorin thru to higher ground.

Unknown Waters trekked

After this wet river walk, I entered into the jungle section of the trail.  The walking path took me thru the middle of a jungle, and about halfway thru experiences my second obstacle of the day, about 3 fallen trees.  Being in dense jungle areas, I really couldn't go around them so I had to go through it.  As soon as I started trying to crawl thru I got absolutely marred by the sharp blades of whatever specie of tree it was.  Passing thru was looking pretty grim.  It was then when my survival instincts came out, I quickly reached for my pocket knife and started cutting down these sharp vines, clearing way for myself.  I had successfully done it and was feeling great.

Jungle Walk

After the jungle territory, the next sector of the walk was the creek trail, which was closed but had no barricade blocking its access so I decided to go for it.  The path had some fallen trees that I easily trekked over and also had to cross the abnormally high creek and had to once again take off my shoes and make the pass thru the water.

I had then made it to my final path which led to Barron Falls.  This was the longest sector of my trip, about 3 kilometers one way.  I failed to mention that the weather on this day was clear, hot, muggy and humid.  Probably around 85-90 degrees.  After 3 hours of already walking, I was sweatin all over, and wearing already 2-3 day old clothes, it was safe to say I was emitting a pretty good amount of BO.

Anyhow I finally made it to Barron Falls, and what I saw was quite a suprise, I was not expecting falls of such great magnitude, it was a sight that was really quite special.  The largest falls I have witnessed in person and I was there at the perfect time of year, right when the falls are in their pure natural beauty after a tropical storm.

I took in the beautiful sight for quite awhile and enjoyed my delicious salami, lettuce and tomato sandwhich that I had prepared earlier in the morning.  From there, I went the extra mile or 2 on a road that lead to a lookout of Cairns.  Pretty good view.

After all that, I pretty much explored every sight and sound the surrounding national park had to offer and was feeling quite good about my recent achievements.  I'de say I walked a good 10-12 kilometers today, and with the hot humid weather I was absolutely knackered.  I headed back into the town and enjoyed a nice and well deserved iced coffee and ice cream bar. From there I explored the famous Kuranda Markets, these markets are the main reason Kuranda attracts tourists.

Croc Made of Tires

 There were some pretty good stalls and shops. My favorite being a photo gallery by Peter Jarver, a famous and well known Australian photographer. I really enjoyed his work.  Feel free to see some of his great work at http://www.peterjarver.com/

At 330 it was time to take the shuttle bus back into Cairns and it was good to finally relax after a hard days work.

Back at Cairns the weather was still sweltering, I quickly jumped in the pool back at the hostel.  At 5 the hostel put on a free bbq so I took advantage of that.

From there I headed to the Woolshed, a local pub/bar and watched the entire Australia Open Final.  Wasn't the greatest of matches but a great last 3rd set.  Federer is such a legend, so so good.

Off to Melbourne tomorrow, got an early flight in the morning. Cairns has been great...really enjoyed my stay here

Great Barrier Reef Trip

WOOOO, Sweet As.  Great day out on the reef!  Talk about a complete turn around from the Whitsunday day cruise.  Changing the date for my reef trip at the last second may have been the best call of the trip. The weather today was perfect, calm glassy waters, just a little rain, and best yet no wind. The sail out to the reef was flawless.  The tour company I did my trip with was called Ocean Free.  As we boarded the ship at around 730am, the crew was three mid 20s guys, very mellow yet they knew their stuff. Their names were Rob, Gordo and Matt. The sailing ship had only 14 tourists, which made the trip all the better.  Who wants to go to the reef with like 60 other people like many other tour companies do.  The crew said you probably picked the best ship in all reef tours, and after today, nothing led me to doubt that.

Since there was no wind, we could not really sail but we made it to our snorkel destination in about 2 hours, a place just offshore Green Island at Pinnacle Reef, just one of the many parts of the monstrosity that is The Great Barrier Reef.

Glassy Waters and Green Island

The 2 hour sail over to the island was paired with songs by Xavier Rudd and John Butler Trio which the crew had an entire playlists of, some of my favorite artists, set the tone for CRUISIN mode.  After we anchored at our destination, it was time to hit the waters and just before we jumped in the skipper spotted a reef shark just starboard, crikey. The shark continued onwards and we put on our gear (stinger suits, flippers, snorkel gear) and jumped in.

The second I was in the water I already was surrounded my heaps of fish.  I kept my eye out for that shark but never found it. Was hoping I would tho in all honesty.  It was time to explore with some serious snorkeling.  I spotted a giant jellyfish about 10 meters out, it was HUGE. Knowing I had a stinger suit on for a reason, I decided to keep my distance as some can be deadly.  Anyhow, I continued my swim over the reef and was loving it. Hiring that underwater digital camera was well worth the 45 dollars.  I was having a blast with it and now won't only have mental images of this great day. The photos turned out pretty good and also recorded some good videos.  Enjoy. As always click pictures to enlarge

The coral reef was colorful and vibrant as I expected and was very entertained on the amount of fish swimming near it and around me.  Visibility was not too ideal as it was still high tide but still doable.

Almost swam into this little guy

As I was making my way back to the boat, there were some giant fish around the boat since the crew had beed throwing out some fish food. One of the fish was the giant Darth Vader fish, this thing was like half my size. It is something I have always seen in acquarium fish tanks, but being out ride next to it in the same tank was pretty unreal.

(Bigger in real life than in picture)

Darth Vader

Anyhow, I jumped back on board and started feeling a bit sick.  We were then served our lunch which included Chicken legs, sandwhich meats, potato and macaroni salad and a vegetable salad. I ate most of it but still was not feeling to great.

From there we jumped in the small boat and headed to Green Island, where we had time to explore. There is a 5 star resort there and some restaruants. I decided to use my time on the island to walk around it. It was really nice.  Not a sound in the air except wildlife and the ocean, it was pure bliss. I think this was also the first island I have ever circumnavigated on foot. Another milestone in my life.

Green Island

After walking around the island, I made my way inland to get a feel for the resort and restaurants. It was then where I decided they misnamed green island. It should have been named Asian Island.  Heaps and heaps of asians everywhere, in the pool, walking, snorkelling. For some reason, Green Island attracts them, this was not just a 1 day tour that brought a lot of them, it is reoccuring. After about 10 minutes I had to get out of there and headed back out to the beach were I ended up walking around half the island again, away from the tourists and with nature.  Green Island also housed the largest saltwater crocodile in captivity, and maybe the largest in the world.  The crocs name was Cassius and was around 18 feet long and weighed over 1.3 tons. I did not see him in person as I did not want to fork over money to see him, but saw some pictures, thing really was monstrous.

Anyhow, I was feeling back to normal again by the time I got back to the ship. From there it was snorkelling part 2.  I strapped up in my stinger suit and snorkel gear, turned on my underwater camera and I was good to go. This time around, the conditions had improved. I was closer to the reef and explored new areas.

Still no sharks but stumpled across some mysterious object deep in the coral, may had been an octopus. I backed away pretty quickly.  I wasn't about the threaten his territory. I then saw some extremely colorful fish and found some Giant Clams.  The shells on these things were huge.

It was a great session and was eager for more but sooner or later I had to head back to the boat for the sail home. Before we took off, the crew had put some food that was leftover from lunch in the water.  Only took about 5 minutes till some sharks appeared at the surface, sickner. The big fish, including Darth Vader was also there gettin the food scraps. Entertaining.

Anyhow, I was stoked on the recent snorkel sesh, was feeling great.  Not a hint of sea sickness on the sail back and was the end to a great and beautiful day on the reef.  Couldn't have asked for better weather during this time of year. Even the crew was suprised how calm the waters were. Yea it rained a bit but no big deal.  Tomorrow wind is supposed to be 25-30 knots, more than double of what we had today, cheers to me for being on top of the weather forecast and changing the trip day.

Great day on the reef, Ill put up this picture even tho I look super haggard, still think its a pretty classic photo tho, plus a great background of the boat.

Cairns

Day 1

I left Magnetic Island early in the am to catch the ferry back to the mainland. The ferry ride was nice and calm this time, making it for a much more pleasant morning, especially following a long and non sober yet epic Australia Day(night) party. My backpack was filled with drenched clothes from the previous days bushwalk in the rain and dance party, smelled pretty bad.

Anyhow I then boarded my final greyhound bus that took me 6 hours north to Cairns, the so called adventure capital of Australia. Cairns marks the end of my east coast trip.  It has truly been a great one and all has gone very smoothly.  Greyhound was a great means of transport, mostly always on time and suprisingly comfortable, including both my 12 and 15 hour rides.

Anyhow I got into Cairns aroudn 6pm and experienced the humidity of north tropical queensland the second I got off the coach.  2 cyclones had just hit Cairns a few days earlier, the rain was off and on but one this for sure..it was very warm and humid.  Anyhow I checked in my hostel, The Northern Greenhouse. The hostel has been the cleanest hostel I have ever stayed in, and they offer free brekky and internet...highly recommended by me.

I then took a trip to the local supermarket, woolworths to stock up for the week.  I headed back to my hostel and prepared my meal.  Turns out movie night was going on, the featured film, BLOW.  I don't usually like the feeling of staying in and watching a movie while travelling, but since I had to get up early the next day for a tour I let it slide. The movie ended up being great.  I have heard about it before and have several mates recommend it to me. Johnny Depp is in it, worth a rental for sure.

Anyway, I was knackered from the day of traveling so headed to bed quite early around 11.

Day 2

Today I did a day tour to Cape Tribulation and the Daintree Rainforest, about 2 hours north of Cairns. I did the trip thru a tour company and had a great time.  Was in a small shuttle bus with about 20 other people, old and young and had an extremely informative tour guide, Debbie.  The benefits of these tours is you learn more about the culture/history. Anyhow we headed up along the coast till we hit the Daintree River where we went on a Crocodile Cruise on the river.  It is not too common to see crocs on the river at this time of the year but we spotted 2, 1 baby on the shore, and 1 swimming alongside the boat, around 2 meters long.  Pretty great seeing some wild saltwater crocs.

Croc, middle left of picture

After the Croc cruise we headed into the Daintree Rainforest where we went on a walk thru it.  It was very tropical, and having it rain during the walk really gave you a better feeling of a true "rain"forest.  The Daintree is the oldest rainforest in the world. It is hundreds of millions years old.

After our walk thru the forest we got back in the van and headed towards Cape Tribulation where we raomed the beach for a bit and then had a nice sit down lunch at PK's, a restaurant in town.  I had the fish n chips, not too shabby.  I had made good friends with an Australian couple from Melbourne, Troy and Catherine, they were in their late 20s and we exchanged cultural differences. They were shocked about how cheap beer is in the US, it truly is shocking compared to what you pay here.

Cape Tribulation was as far north as the trip went.  On our return we stopped at a lookout point, which included a overlook of bat reef, the area where Steve Irwin was stung and killed by a sting ray.

We also stopped at the Daintree Ice Cream Company. I tried the 5 dollar sampler cup.  The flavors were Rasperry, Mango, Coconut and Wattleseed, whatever the hell that is, but it was great.

We then continued onto Mossman Gorge for a quick bushwalk and a trip out to the gushing river

The final spot on the trip was Port Douglas, the wealthiest city per capita in Australia.  Not really my sort of town but was worth the 20 minute quick stop just to give it a gander.

The bus dropped me off back at my hostel in Cairns around 6.  After doing a quick weather search, I decided to move my Great Barrier Reef trip up 1 day to hopefully avoid some increasing off shore winds.  I headed out to go hire an underwater digital camera.  A pricey 45 dollar rental I think it will be worth it as this is one of the most beautiful natural wonders of the world.

For dinner I took advantage of a backpacker deal I had, Free wings at the local Blue Sky Brewery with a purchase of a drink. The coupon said only 5 wings, well it was my lucky day. After sippin on my great blue sky locally brewed beer, I was brought out my dish of wings, and I got 10!  These wings were super tasty, I got the hot ones.  The ten were so much better than the 5. They rivalled Hooters wings, I was lovin them.  It was a great meal, all for the price of a beer.

- Reef tour tomorrow, looking forward to it, hoping for the best conditions and minimal motion sickness

- Anxiously awaiting to try out the Cairns nightlife, supposedly may be the best party stop on the entire east coast.

- Routing for Federer to win Aussie Open

- Less than 2 weeks in Oz