Sandflies, Mountains, Rugby, and Sleeping Seals... A Few More NZ Adventures

[Oct 8-11, 2011]  Dunedin was a cute town to stay in, but we had a schedule to keep, so the next morning we continued on, but before we left town checked out Baldwin Street, the world's steepest street. It might be something of a quietly-kept secret, as none of us were previously aware that Dunedin was home to the world-record setting steep street, but it didn't disappoint. We parked at the very bottom of (the flattest part) and watched tiny, ant-like tourists climbing up what looked like one of those Hot Wheels ramps for toy cars from the '80s. We all happily admitted we were far too lazy to try walking it ourselves, but got a taste of what was probably the world's second-steepest street, later on in Queenstown (but more on that later).

Our original road trip plan had us tracing the southern coast all the way around to Te Anau, a bit inland, taking in the Catlins and Invercargill along the way. But as we'd just spent the last three days almost entirely in the car, we decided to cut quickly across the island to Te Anau and allow for an extra day to relax in Queenstown, where Stephane and Jenny visited not long before and found to be lovely. Note to anyone planning a driving exploration of New Zealand: it may look like short drives on a map, but it's best to take it slowly and allow yourself the time to enjoy the sights outside of the car! That said, the daylight hours are long, even in October, and you can easily drive well into the evening and think it's still 4pm... we still carry a bit of that Aussie night-driving fear from our many 'roo-dodging' experiences years back.

Allez Les Bleus!

An ecstatic win

Te Anau is a tiny but very touristy town in NZ's Fjordland region, built on the incredibly pretty (are we even surprised anymore?) Lake Te Anau. It's the main jumping-off spot for visiting Milford and Doubtful Sounds, two fjords many visitors explore by boat, but still a good 2.5 hour drive from Milford Sound-- an area of very remote and inaccessible wilderness. But before our trek out to the fjords, we spent the evening in The Moose, where in fact, where the entire town and all of its tourists had congregated inside to watch the Rugby World Cup quarter-finals. The game was especially important to our travelling party, as France was facing off against England in what was sure to be an exciting game. With the help of Jenny & Stephane's red, blue and white wigs and paraphernalia, we got in touch with our long-lost French roots and cheered on "Les Bleus", surprisingly, with quite an unproportionate number of passionate French supporters for the size of Te Anau. We subsequently learned the French national anthem and a few sports cheers, and when they beat England, the entire bar went crazy. It was so much fun to watch (and not really all that hard to understand) and it must have been around the time that we got really, really hooked on rugby...

But onto more adventures! That next morning we hopped in the car and set off on Milford Road, where we wound between mountains, for the first hour, higher and higher until we reached patches of snow (which we couldn't resist a frolic in), and entered into the Homer Tunnel-- a 1.2km tunnel that veers seemingly endlessly through a mountain, on a downward slope, which was a strange feeling. The tunnel is an incredible feat of engineering and construction, started as a job-creation scheme during the Great Depression, it took nearly 20 years to dig, and only recently was widened to accommodate two lanes of vehicles.

Mirror Lake

On the other side of the Homer Tunnel, the mountains appeared to go on forever to the still-hidden fjords. The highway continued to wind downwards, with plenty of great stops to check out, like Mirror Lake, until we reached Milford Sound. That's where we had our first encounter with the irritating New Zealand sandfly: here we were, innocently emerging from the car when suddenly we were ambushed! It appeared others were having the same problems, so we took a few hurried photos with the amazing (but hard to concretrate on) backdrop of Milford Sound, and dashed to the boats, where thankfully someone had thought to build a large structure made of glass, where we could enjoy the views without swatting. Luckily, thanks to the chilly temperatures we wore many layers of clothing, which the sandflies couldn't bite through, but Dayle still managed to find one persistently sucking blood out from between two of her fingers-- a bite which didn't disappear or cease itching for more than two weeks following the visit.

Glorious Milford Sound

But we suppose, if the sandfly terror was our admission fee to get down into the gorgeous natural scenery in Fjordland, well, it was worth it. We set off on our 2-hour boat cruise from the end of Milford Sound to the ocean (15 km), watching the weather change numerous times from sunny to cloudy to rainy to sunny. Seals swam alongside out boat as we shrieked with delight. The captain steered the boat underneath waterfalls plummetting down the cliffs on either side of the fjord and right up to impressive rock formations, and shared impressive facts about the area. Probably one of the highlights was Seal Rock, one of the only parts of the fjord (it was massive cliffs everywhere) accessible to seals climbing out of the water to rest, and we learned the incredible cuteness power of a mass of sleeping seals on a rock. It was a pretty great afternoon.

Waterfall fun

Following our sandfly dash back to the car (a pity we couldn't stroll more slowly through the lush fern-filled coastal rainforest), we made a dash back to Te Anau, and then onwards to Queenstown, to be done with the driving already. After a little bit of hunting, we found a sweet, sweet place to rest our feet for the next few days with fabulous views of Lake Wakatipu in the centre of town. We didn't think about the fact that the near-vertical walk down Turner Street to the heart of Queenstown also meant a horrific trudge up at the end of the night, but it was rugby time again (this time New Zealand vs. Argentina) and so finding a big screen was mandatory. It was another good game--and unexpectedly AMAZING food at the Ballarat Trading Company-- and we took it as a good omen for our trip to continue in the best of fates.

We spent the next few days doing silly tourist things in Queenstown: eating impossibly massive burgers at the legendary Fergburger, wandering around Lake Wakatipu, taking the Skyline gondola for views high above Queenstown (and having a blast riding the luge around the tracks on the peak), and playing a ridiculous but adorable mini-golf course made up of a miniature robotic town, sampling a good variety of local wines, and relaxing in our awesome two-storey townhouse (much nicer than any of the apartments any of us have lived in). It was good times for our last few days, before Stephane and Jenny left us to take in more live rugby on the North Island....

Mmmm, Fergburger for breakfast.

The Luge

Jenny putts for the win

Surfers Paradise Hit List #4: Our 2 Favourite Pastimes

From now on, if anyone ever asks us what our interests are, our answer is going to be "Surfing.... and brunch."

Surfing time

So on our last weekend in Surfers, like many weekends before, we did just that. Actually, we hadn't done much surfing in the past few months, thanks to winter rolling around and it getting a whole lot colder, and thanks to not owning surfboards or wetsuits. Luckily, we'd just learned of some cheap early-Saturday-morning surf lessons ($15!) for locals that were happening at the surf school just down the block from us.

We almost chickened out when we saw the weather forecast for the day -- 41 km/hour winds! Eek! -- and saw the giant waves crashing on the beach. But then again, what better time to learn? So we showed up at Cheyne Horan Surf School at 7:45am that Saturday morning and just tried our best not to look at the waves on the way there.

When we arrived, it appeared it would be just us and four giggly high school girls, who were all competing for the attention of Mark, our surf instructor. He seemed slightly relieved not to be alone with them, and gave us a few really good pointers once we got down to the beach. This time, we were practicing on spongey foam boards, so there was less of a chance of getting smashed up by our surfboards (yay!) despite the wind and the waves. And the big water was actually a good thing -- with more waves to catch, there wasn't much waiting, and plenty of room to practice. And though our lesson was only a little more than an hour long, we were totally exhausted by the end! And starving... surfing kinda works up an appetite.

Heaven.

So then it was onto the next order of business: having our very favourite breakfast in town once again -- the very awesome $10 all-you-can-eat feast at the Surfers Paradise RSL (the local veteran's club, which once inside looks less like a Canadian legion hall and more like a combination of casino, pub, and Holiday Inn restaurant, complete with patrons in Hawaiian shirts, informal dining and gaudy carpet). But ever since hearing about it, we've been hooked. And we're surprised the place isn't packed every day, because it's delicious! Your ten bucks gets you not only a cooked breakfast of eggs & meat, or various omelettes, or a beautiful French toast topped with sauteed mushrooms, herbs, and sundried tomatoes.... plus unlimited brewed coffee (Adrian's favourite), orange juice, croissants, pastries and fruit (and toast and cereal, if you're still hungry)

The only problem we can see is that it's all over by 10:30am... but we do usually manage to get a good half hour of eating in before it shuts down. It's got to be the best-kept secret in Surfers! We're thinking maybe they're keeping it hush-hush from all the students, or else there would be no room for the elderley folk and tradies (aka construction workers) who are always in there. But if you ever find yourself in Surfers, it's the best deal in town! Wow, we're getting super hungry just remembering our last meal there.

Weekend Exploring: Burleigh Heads

This past weekend we thought we'd do something a little different and check out a Gold Coast suburb we'd been hearing good things about: Burleigh Heads. We're actually still trying to figure out what the name "Gold Coast" encompasses — from what we gather, it's a 'city' made up of a whole bunch of suburbs sprawling along the Pacific coast, and also a whole bunch of inland suburbs, too. We're not totally sure how far north or south the Gold Coast stretches — perhaps to New South Wales on the south end, and nearly to Brisbane in the north? If anyone knows, please tell us! (Check out these maps here, or click on the map, right, to enlarge) But we do know that there's a lot more to Gold Coast than just Surfers Paradise, where we live. People around here tend to have many great things to say about Burleigh Heads (as opposed to lots of bad things about Surfers, but we'll get to that in another blog), so on Sunday, we hopped on a city bus and made the 30-minute trip south.

Burleigh is indeed a totally different world from Surfers. When the bus drops you off in the centre of town, instead of concrete skyscraper hotels, tall coniferous trees line the beach. There are a couple of streets full of laid-back cafes, takeaway restaurants (including an Indonesian one, which we're going to have to return to try!), and lots of little shops. We did a wander and counted maybe five butchers on as many streets. And hippies — plenty of hippie types roaming about. A few weeks ago, Dayle had asked a co-worker at her temp job where the best breakfast was to be found on the coast, and Danelle rhymed off a few spots, and they were all in Burleigh. So step one was to fill our bellies with delicious breakfast. We settled on the Pantry Cafe, the second place we checked out, finding a giant and inventive breakfast menu (Adrian had some sort of eggs and yummy spiced "mince" and Dayle had something like Eggs Florentine but with Turkish bread and asparagus rather than spinach- amazing!) And there's nothing like eating your breakfast outdoors under blue skies in perfect 25 degree weather! While people-watching, of course.

After our breakfast out, we wandered Burleigh's streets a bit — finding 3 or 4 more amazing-looking breakfast spots, cool independent clothing shops, vegetarian eateries, and a vintage theatre that had been converted into a tiny mall with restaurants and shops inside — and we continued our walk in search of Burleigh Heads' other great attraction: a seaside national park encompassing the headland right in the middle of town! It wasn't too hard to find, being the giant green hump by the ocean, and Burleigh Head National Park ended up being as lovely as we'd heard, too. Perhaps especially so, after being in the concrete jungle of Surfers for two months already. But either way, it sure is nice to hop on a trail and wander through the rainforest for an afternoon.

Being Mother's Day, a lot of families were out and about, so we probably didn't see as much wildlife as we could have on a weekday, but we came across some decent-sized spiders, a brush turkey kicking around in the dead leaves, plenty of butterflies, and a lot of interesting flowers. We were definitely happy to have Dayle's awesome camera back and ready for snapping (after a long hunt for a new battery charger). There are two trails in the park: an ocean rim track (1.2km one way) with great views all the way around the headland (where in winter and spring you can see humpback whales!) to the mouth of a river on the other side , and a rainforest loop (2.3km) that winds up and down through the awesome forest. We pretty much walked them all before heading down to a grassy north-facing hill overlooking the ocean and the town, where groups of people were sprawled out on the grass, soaking up the late-afternoon sun, watching the surfers below and drinking sparkling wine out of plastic flutes. It was a gorgeous scene. We had come prepared with some brie and a baguette, just in case we came across a good picnic spot, and I'm pretty sure we found one of the best picnic spots on earth! And to think that this was all waiting for us, a $3 bus ride (or $1.50 for students like Adrian), just five suburbs away. Needless to say, it was a little hard to leave, but we're sure we'll be heading back to Burleigh Heads again someday soon.

Culture Sponges

To kick off Adrian's mid-semester break, we figured it was about time to get a little culture. The Gold Coast is beautiful and all, but we're realizing more and more that we're truly city people. And although many people call the Gold Coast a "city", we'll argue that a place without museums, an art scene, live concerts, intriguing bars and cafes (in our opinion at least), a Chinatown, or any old buildings just isn't really a city. Lucky for us, Brisbane, Queensland's capital city, is only about an hour and a half away by train. So we hopped on the train early Easter Saturday, and made a beeline for Brissie's museums and skyscrapers.

Actually, Brisbane isn't entirely new to us — we visited Brisbane 3 or 4 times on our last Australia trip, but only to visit people, dash to the airport, or run exciting errands like filing tax returns. And just the week before Easter (this year), we actually ended up in Brissie by accident, when we took a wrong turn on the highway on the way to a farmers' market with our friend Tim, and ended up downtown. But this day was our first of our real exploring — grabbing a map and soaking it all up, just like sponges.

Brisbane's CBD was totally what we were craving: oooold ornate buildings (OK, not Europe-old, but Australia-old!), stately downtown shopping malls, stores selling cufflinks and high-end men's business clothes, pedestrian streets, and people everywhere! In a flash, we'd found a camera shop selling a Canon battery charger I was having one hell of a time sourcing in Oz, Starbucks frappuccinos, and signed a petition against animal testing. We soon reached the Brisbane River, a wide ribbon of water that loops through the city centre (and can be credited with some of the flood footage you would have seen back in January). Crossing over the bridge to Southbank, the views were pretty awesome, and we tried to imagine what it was like when the river was carrying boats and pontoons swiftly out to sea...

We'd heard great things about the "21st Century: Art in the First Decade" exhibition, which was about to close at the Gallery of Modern Art (aka the GoMA). It was a totally unique exhibit, and so cool to see some work by great present-day artists, as we're usually looking back at artists from previous decades and centuries, even. We only wished we had two days to spend wandering the exhibition, which was a collection of works by present-day artists from all around the world. Highlights included a massive 'cloud' of plastic shopping bags (Pascale Marthine Tayou, Cameroon), a cardboard-box installation, a piece by exiled Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, and a performance by an "iPhone Orchestra" (seriously!). A lot of it was really interactive, like a huge table of skyscrapers made of white Lego being constantly rebuilt into new forms; Rivane Neuenschwander’s (of Brazil) I wish your wish had visitors making wishes on paper and swapping their wish for someone else's wish, which was printed on ribbon and hung on a huge wall (somehow we both ended up choosing "I wish to travel through time and space"); a postcard sending project, and all kinds of other cool concepts and ideas. And it was all free! [Sadly, I don't think we would never find an exhibit this good — and free — at the AGO in Toronto!]

We still had a few big things on the to-do list, and kept wandering. Turns out Southbank is a pretty great place to hang out — there were tons of people out at the huge park along the river, which was almost finished from the post-floods fix-up. The Southbank Markets were really cool — full of way better arts/crafts/fashion than you'd see at the Surfers Paradise night markets each week, for sure. And there were so many great spots to stop and have a snack or a beer! We were introduced to Fat Yak ale and we're big fans since...

As it got dark, we found ourselves crossing the river again, this time ending up in the Botanical Gardens, where we met an interesting fellow that gave us a good rundown of what those flood days were like, pointing out scraps of plastic bags and debris still in trees. As we started to get really hungry for dinner, we found ourselves totally lost in a part of the map that looked fairly ordinary — reminding us of our least favourite part about Australian cities: street names often change by the block and there's absolutely no grid or logic to the majority of the urban planning. We ran into a Kiwi couple in the same boat as us, and somehow found our way to Fortitude Valley, where the plan was to have a nice-ish dinner (too hungry- went for Grill'd burgers!) and check out the nightlife (Adrian was promptly turned away from a bar because he was wearing shorts!). But anyway, it was a long and eventful day where we got a good taste of Brisvegas. And little did we know, we'd be back two days later to have some Anzac Day beers — with a lot of sailors! — under the massive Storey Bridge, at the Storey Bridge Hotel. It's certainly no New York, but it'll definitely do for an urban fix while we're living down in Gold Coast!

The Other Reason

Wow, more than a month has passed now since we made our big move to the Gold Coast, and it is still pretty great. We've probably droned on about the beach enough to make you all roll your eyes and make pukey faces, and whenever people ask us the reason we made the move, we'd still probably answer, "the beach," or perhaps "the warm climate". But, in case any of you are on the fence right now, thinking hard about relocating somewhere warm, we've got another, very awesome reason for you. The fruit!

Yes, over the past few weeks we've been enjoying the most delicious, perfect avocados we've ever seen. And these are apparently the "battered" ones, the cyclone survivors. Sadly, Australia lost a massive amount of produce during all the weather disasters during the past few months. It's probably an awful time to be a farmer here — but then again, is there ever a good time to be a commercial farmer in this crazy country?

We're not sure how much an avocado used to cost in the grocery stores here — it's between $1.50 and $1.78 an avocado at the moment — but it's worth it for our new favourite breakfast — avocado and tomato, with cheese melted over top on an English muffin. Yum! And we've been spending a lot of time drooling over recipes on this website.

Bananas are another story. Delicious as they are, it's pretty hard to pay $12.98 a kilogram for bananas when we remember them being more like 49 cents a pound back in Canada (just over $1/kg). There's a touching little notice posted next to the outrageous banana price signs at both of our local supermarkets, explaining how most of the country's banana crop was wiped out from Cyclone Yasi, but we should keep buying what's left and do our part to help Aussie farmers. And of course, these bananas can't compare to the bargain ones shipped across the entire continent of North America while still green, and sprayed with gases to ripen at just the right time on the truck. But still...

So when we found cute little lady finger bananas for sale at a stall at the local Carrara Markets this past weekend for $6 a kilo, we were stoked! They looked a little beat up so we didn't buy very many — even though the lady at the booth assured us we shouldn't worry about the deep black scrapes in the peel, which were "left by the flying foxes" (or bats, to our Canadian readers). But now we're wishing we bought enough to fill a backpack! These lady finger bananas are tasty little things... and the lady at the market was right — the marks were purely surface blemishes. And the other amazing thing about these bananas is that they were grown in Tweed Valley, only 50 km south of where we live. Forget eating apples all winter because it's all we've got while the fields and the trees are buried under the snow. If there was ever a good time and place to try out the 100-Mile Diet, subtropical Queensland would be it! If you're looking for us this weekend, we'll probably be at a farmer's market somewhere. Or maybe imagining up new avocado recipes.

Merry Christmas!

There's something about the routine of family holidays that make us feel like we weren't off on the other side of the world for two Christmases. Big dinners, plenty of drinks, chitchat with family members, lots of cookies... somehow Xmas this year was the same as always.

Breaking with routine wasn't terrible: celebrating Xmas while hiding from the Australian heat in an air-conditioned cabin-style hotel room (and in the pool) last year was quite the experience. Sharing big dinners with an international crowd (while avoiding the heat again in the a/c) in Melbourne the year before that was another memorable way to spend the holiday. It's was always a bit weird to spend Christmas in summertime, but it was nice to not have to wear sweaters and slippers! It was fun to call home on Christmas while on the road... but now the funerary jokes about us "being in a better place" and "it's too bad they can't be with us this Christmas" will have to stop. :)

There were some new additions to our families since we left-- a few tiny nieces (Adrian's family), a wiener dog 'nephew' (who dressed up festively as a reindeer for Dayle's family) who made things a little more interesting. The snow has mostly kept away (great, in our opinions!). Sadly, Dayle's favourite holiday ice cream-- PC Candy Cane Fudge Crackle, yum!-- seems to be missing from all of the Zehrs & No Frills stores she's been hunting for it at. Yarrr! And after years of daydreaming about it too...

Hope everyone had a merry Christmas... it was great catching up with everyone, and thanks for all the great loot! All the best to you guys in the new year. xoxo, d&a

Getting Imperial in Hue

For the last few days we've been enjoying the old imperial capital of Hue. It was noticeably cooler-- rainy too-- when we stepped off the train from Danang (a beautiful three-hour train ride along the coast, high up on the sides of mountains) and we could definitely feel that we were out of the tropics and into the north.
Hue is built along the wide Perfume River, which we would cross every day by foot to get to the old walled Citadel (and the locals would look at us like we were crazy, as no one walks in Vietnam!). The Imperial Citadel is a UNESCO World Heritage site, and though bombed a bit in the American War, is constantly being restored, and wandering around within the high walls is a fantastic way to spend a day (even a rainy one!). The Imperial City housed the long-running Nguyen dynasty, who reigned in the 1800's and early 1900's. It's a real fairy-tale kind of place, with calm green moats and ornate palaces and pagodas within.
We also hopped on bicycles one day and headed outside the city limits to visit emperor Tu Duc's tomb-- more like an giant elaborate park than a tomb! It seems the life of an emperor isn't a bad one at all. (Though the life of a servant isn't so good... apparently all 200 of the servants who buried Tu Duc were beheaded, as to keep the secret of where he was buried from potential grave robbers.)
Among other things, the Nguyen emperors were known for being fussy eaters, so we splurged a little to sample some Hue-style cuisine at the often-recommended Y Thao Garden restaurant. We pretty much had to roll out of the restaurant after eating our 8-course meal served most artistically, with bean cakes shaped like roses and spring rolls served from a glowing jack-o-lantern peacock carved from a pineapple and carrot feathers. Too awesome.

Catching up—10 days in Hoi An

It’s well established on the Vietnam tourist trail, so we weren’t sure how we’d like it after spending a few days as the only tourists (and thus quasi-celebrities) in Quy Nhon. It’s unlike any other spot we’ve been to—on one hand, a somewhat quiet & conservative town that goes to bed around 9 pm, but it’s also a mad mix of history, shopping, and quaint charm. By our third full day of exploring the easily walkable and incredibly picturesque town, we were far from that feeling of “we’ve seen it all”.
Hoi An has been a trading port since the 17th century located on the Thu Bon River, just a little inland from the South China Sea. A stroll through the narrow streets past the old, comfortably decrepit buildings one can feel very much like you’ve stepped into another time. Various influences—French, Chinese, Japanese—blend together in the architecture, making “Ancient Town” a charming collection of buildings with faded yellow plaster walls, mossy roofs, dark wood shutters, and bougainvillea… many of the houses have been passed down within families for hundreds of years; there’s many ornate temples and congregational halls to explore, and then there’s the old tea warehouses, which convert beautifully into restaurants and shops! It’s all set along a (slightly stinky) river and with a strict ban on cars (only “primitive vehicles and walkers” allowed, according to signs), it’s a little reminiscent of one of the islands of Venice.

And then there’s the shopping…

Besides being a magical and historical place, Hoi An is tailor central. Thanks to the availability of gorgeous silk of every colour and texture, about a zillion tailor shops offer to make shopping-hungry tourists custom-made clothing unbelievably quickly and for supercheap. At first, these shops are a bit overwhelming—there are so many of them, for one thing! And then there’s the sales tactics—pressure, more pressure, lots of false flattery, calling out to you to come into the shop as you walk by… just walking down the street can be a bit harrowing, so we avoided them as much as we could for the first few days.
Inevitably, we all get a little braver and enters their first shop. At first we tried to enter and leave as quickly as possible—get the basic info (prices, how long everything takes to make, and take a peek at fabrics and clothing samples) and a business card and get out while you can. We browsed many good and bad reviews of various tailors online before coming, and perhaps were a bit warier than some after reading quite a few horror stories. While Dayle was thinking more about a few dresses (something that can’t be messed up too badly), Adrian was hoping for a nice suit. We visited about 12 shops or so—from tiny and dusty, to high-end ones with elaborate fishponds and lounge areas within the shop—and finally settled on Mr. Xe, a guy who’d gotten great reviews online for his tailoring. At $85 USD for a tailored wool suit, he was somewhere in the middle (we found $60 to $120 was about the average price) and very firm on needing a few days to sew everything well and fit it properly—while some prided themselves on speed, we had a good feeling about the very flamboyant Mr. Xe (if not mixed feelings about the very friendly and extremely “encouraging” salesgirls). And our instincts turned out to be right—Adrian’s suit (and his dress shirts, and pants) turned out great! On the other hand, the dress Dayle asked for to be copied out of a magazine (in a way, to see how well they’d do) turned out to be a little more Amish than Lily Allen. Which brings us to our first lesson of Hoi An tailors: they all have their fortes, so work with them, not against them! Later we found another shop, Blue Rose, with a couple of very trendy shopgirls and clothing samples and great fabrics. The garments we got made—a mix of dresses, casual shirts, and a sporty jacket—look fantastic on, but the sewing and construction is pretty much nowhere close to Mr. Xe’s in quality. We even went to a third shop, which we found to make gorgeous silk dresses and really cool winter coats, but the tailored items were definitely not up to the fit standard we now had to compare to. But we still came out with a lot of cool, really original and well-fitting clothes made for a fraction of the cost you’d find them for in a store back in Canada or Australia (and sometimes for less than what we’d pay just for the fabric). And we had a great time doing it! So Lesson #2: if you go in to have some fun, and don’t expect haute couture for $25 a dress, you’ll leave with a great experience and a wicked new wardrobe.Another thing to think about if you’re going to Hoi An and planning for some tailoring, give it time! Not that we spent 10 days in fittings, but nearly every day there were a few adjustments (and often new orders to make). One of the most frustrating experiences was when Dayle had a pair of shoes made (honestly, she would have been happy just to shop around til one store had the right size). Somehow the cobbler must have cut the shoe too small to begin with, and though each fitting found them a little bigger, there was still that toes-jammed-against-the-front feeling (Ouch!) until they finally agreed to redo it completely. And you feel a bit bad making people adjust things so many times, but you wouldn’t purposely buy shoes a size too small normally, would you? So Lesson #3: Allow time to get things fitting properly, and don't be afraid to be picky! All we lost was time, and we managed to discover many great restaurants and street scenes in the many walks back and forth between tailors and the shoe shop.

And we must mention the restaurants! Hoi An has a few culinary specialties of its own—ie. the noodle dish Cao Lau, made authentically only with the water from the ancient Ba Le well, located in a tiny laneway in a residential area of town. We were never up early enough, but apparently there’s a daily pilgrimage of little old ladies to the well. And Cao Lau (which also comes in a splendid vegetarian version) and Adrian’s favourite, fish grilled in a banana leaf, are the perfect foods to eat at a riverside restaurant, under glowing silk lanterns and washed down by 4000 dong (that’s about 40 cents) glasses of bia tuoi (draught beer).

On the complete other end of the scale, there are the posher eateries, like Tam Tam Café, set in an old tea warehouse with a menu of fantastic salads and French-style sandwiches (hard to find in Vietnam!). And across the street there’s Cargo Club, part white-tablecloth restaurant and part patisserie, which we’re positive makes the best chocolate mousse on the planet!

And if it is possible to get bored/sick of Hoi An, there’s always the peaceful 4km bicycle ride to beautiful China Beach, where American GIs used to head for some relax time during the American/Vietnam War. And there are the ancient Cham ruins of My Son, a sort of mini Angkor Wat set in a steamy butterly-filled jungle (and also decorated with bomb craters from the war), a very fun motorbike ride away from town through the rice paddies.

We must have visited at the most exciting of times too—while we were (sort of) sticking around for Earth Hour, where the town would shut off the lights with many other world cities, there was also a major build-up to March 28 which we were puzzled about. Banners around town mentioned the 28^th with a slogan in Vietnamese punctuated by an exclamation mark. Every evening there seemed to be another lit-up, music-blaring boat dressed up in brightly-coloured fabric, flags, and images/statue busts of Uncle Ho. There were musical performances in public areas and finally, a parade of blindingly bright floats covered in Ho Chi Minh, sparkles, and peace doves (complemented by a sky covered in lightning streaks and thunder!) As we noticed more and more Vietnam flags decorating the shops, we also learned in a loose translation, that March 28 is Hoi An’s (and nearby Danang’s) Liberation Day, when the Americans finally left (in defeat?) the area. So while we were getting excited to see the lights go off and candles float down the river, the townspeople were getting excited for a much more patriotic kind of occasion. It was quite the buzz… though not that Hoi An isn’t every day!

Nha Trang in a Nutshell

It's crazy how easy it was to spend an entire week in the beachside city of Nha Trang (and how happy we continue to be that our visa extensions allow for this kind of travel). When we left this past Tuesday, we had finally felt we'd seen and experienced enough of the city to feel OK with leaving-- but it wouldn't have been that hard to lose a month there.

Beach culture in Vietnam is altogether different than in Australia (well, duh!). In fact, many of the locals don't come to the beach for a swim until about 5 pm-- we're pretty sure this has to do with staying pale and avoiding a tan. The beaches are generally crowded with people, hawkers, and often trash. Peace and quiet can be hard to come by when you're getting bugged to buy snacks, drinks, and paintings (yes, really) every two minutes. We watched one English guy react very badly to this... but no matter how annoying the sales pitches can be, you've got to keep your cool-- yelling at a little old lady won't accomplish anything aside from giving the rest of us tourists a bad image...

And maybe it's for this reason there are so many people saying how much they dislike Nha Trang on travel forums online-- sure, it's very touristy, some things are a bit overpriced, and the beach isn't pristine-- but in our opinion it was a nice, scenic place to relax for a while! We actually haven't gone sunbathing in ages-- the scorching Aussie sun made it a very dangerous and painful endeavour. So we delighted in being able to throw down a sarong in the sun and just be lazy. And we did splurge a little one day and rented lounge chairs & got served drinks all day at the private beach of a great local brewery/restaurant, the Louisiane Brewhouse.

But besides the wide, long beach (OK, the sand wasn't close to as soft as some beaches we've been to) surrounded by mountains and carefully manicured boulevards, there's more to Nha Trang than just the scenery. There's a certain vibe to the place-- an easygoing attitude that allows one to wear beachy clothes around town without getting stared at (normally everyone's quite covered up in Vietnam!). There's also a wealth of nice hotels at very competitive prices-- our room in the Nha Quyen was huge and well-located, with a balcony and a/c for $12USD-- and about a zillion restaurants to choose from in the tourist area. For those in need of culture, there are the ancient Po Nagar temples built by the Cham civilization around the 7th to 12th centuries (we're not experts on this, but we gather they were a Hindu kingdom which occupied the area around that era), and countless Buddhist sights to take in. There are many snorkelling, diving, and island boat tours-- which we opted against, as we've heard whisperings of "dynamite fishing" being done not so long ago in the area, and now many of the reefs are a bit lunar-looking and devoid of sea life. The number of dried seahorses for sale at the local market made us a bit suspicious of the underwater scenery too.

We also made some really great local friends in Nha Trang-- while indulging in some excellent Italian food at a little restaurant called Olivia one evening, we ended up chatting for hours with our very bubbly waitress (who we later learned was the owner). We exchanged some English for some Vietnamese, shared some laughs, and suddenly Kim Anh had elected herself our personal tour guide, taking us to the local vegetarian restaurant with her cousin (we'd arrived in the midst of a monthly? Buddhist rite when everyone eats veggie for three days around the full moon), another day around all the important Buddhist temples in the city--even for a feast with a bunch of young monks!-- and later on to her family's house for the meatfest that ends the vegetarian days (eek! says Dayle), where we drank beers with the uncles and her grandfather and learned a bit more about everyday life in Vietnam. We feebly tried to repay the kindness with an introduction to the almighty fajita at a place called El Coyote...

The moral of our story is that we're realizing more and more how important it is not to have expectations about a place before going there, and to stop feeling the need to see every sight/going to all the tourist traps to get the real vibe of a place. Sometimes not being a total tourist can work in your favour-- if we hadn't slowed down and had some beers on our balcony instead of hitting the bars, we wouldn't have noticed the goings-on of the local brothel across the road (in daytime it appears very much like a nail salon!). If we'd run screaming at the first sight of a cockroach in the bathtub, we wouldn't have had six very bug-free nights-- and lovely days on the beach!-- after that.

Weasel Coffee

Around the world cultures indulge in their fine cuisine: the French eat horses, the Inuit have their whale blubber, and Vietnamese have their weasel coffee.

So when in Rome, right?

The scene was a small restaurant just off the main strip called Pho Cali – in Nha Trang. Nothing major, pretty simple actually, the place was decked out with a few nice stool seats and had a menu of some cheap eats. We were very stoked because we had been able to order everything in Vietnamese and could understand their responses. It was probably this confidence that had Adrian muster the guts to ask for ‘café chon’ – weasel coffee.

The order garnered a lot of attention from all the staff in the restaurant, mostly giggles. Our waitress did a sort of double take and repeated what Adrian had ordered; just to be sure. The most amusing part for us was when our waitress made absolutely sure of our order by imitating a weasel itself. Suddenly managers where sticking their heads out of office doors and some school children were watching us intently while the staff rushed around preparing our drinks.

One of the horrible stereotypes about South East Asia is that they’ll eat anything. And mostly it’s true, but one of the most bizarre of world cuisines is here in Vietnam and took it as our duty to sample some.

In the central highlands there are huge coffee plantations, mostly set up by the French. Then someone had the idea to feed these coffee beans to our furry friend, the weasel - who then poops them out. It’s up to some poor fellow to sift through all that poop and harvest the digested beans one by one; and the pay is pretty crap (had to pun, sorry). The process either removes caffeine badness or adds flavour, but in the end it’s the most expensive java here, ringing up at 20,000 Dong a cup. Take that StarBucks!

We took ours with milk, naturally, and then down the hatch it went with a quite hush from the restaurant staff, grinning the whole time.

The coffee itself was pretty tart, and strong – with a flavourful bouquet finish. Fruity, one could say. All in all it was like any other coffee, and strangely enough we debated whether or not you’d classify it as vegetarian. It was a great way to get some ‘props’ from the locals, who were delighted at our bravery, but for us it was another adventure to cross off our lists.

Proudly finishing our last drops both of us did notice that we had a pretty thick layer of ‘the pasties’ on our tongues afterward.

Spending Like Millionaires.... of Dong

We've just woken up to our second morning in Vietnam a little fuzzy-- maybe from the 4 hour time difference from Melbourne, maybe from the million or so dong we spent on a big day of eating and drinking. EEK! OK, so a million dong (that's the Vietnamese currency) works out to be about $90AUD, and less than that in Canadian, but we've now learned it's still definitely possible to spend lots of money, even in a place with prices as cheap as Vietnam. So today we'll live frugally! Except for our "extravagant" hotel room, that is-- with TV, free internet, A/c, balcony, ornate sculptured ceilings, private bathroom, fridge, and enough room to fit two dressers and a desk-- for $15 USD. Sweet!

We arrived in Ho Chi Minh City at about 8pm on Feb 20, and were immediately awestruck by all of the people and the lights-- the neon light signs were visible even from the plane! After spending so much time in the vast empty parts of Oz, riding streets alongside hundreds of buzzing motorbikes was a trip! We checked into out guesthouse and hit the town with our friend Warren, who is teaching English here (Adrian used to work with him at ANZ bank). Good times on the tourist strip-- eating great noodles from a street vendor on child-size tables and plastic stools!-- for less than a $1 USD pp., drinking Tiger beers for next to nothing too, and people-watching... welcome to Asia! Warren's been enjoying the HCMC life for about 8 months now, and isn't at all ready to say goodbye to the city-- something we're starting to understand as we get into its energy, which is sort of laid-back but a little nuts at the same time. Got scared half to death by a giant rat scurrying through our laneway on the way back to our hotel (seriously bigger than the stray kittens hanging out on the street) and we were thankful to be staying on the 4th storey of our building.

Yesterday we woke up with that "Oh my god, where are we?" feeling that happens on the first morning of any trip and ventured out in the humid sunshine (29 degrees). I grabbed a Western breakfast and Adrian went straight for the pho (Vietnamese noodle soup) and we took a walking tour of part of the city, marvelling at the scenery and practicing our street-crossings. First lesson: There are crosswalks painted on the roads, but it doesn't seem to make much of a difference where you cross. Lesson 2: Find a tiny gap in the constant barrage of cars, buses, and motorbikes, and start walking across very slowly... something that goes against all instinct when a speeding bike's coming at you, but if they'll steer around you with ease if they can tell where you're heading and how fast. Cars are another story-- GET OUT OF THE WAY! is about the best advice to follow.

We wandered through some street markets (vendors very grabby in parts) and managed to find the necessities-- a SIM card for our phone ($6 AUD!), a plug converter, and a bath pouffe-- which all took a bit of Charades and Pictionary, as we're finding Vietnamese is a very hard language to pick up quickly! But we've learned a few basics already and we're working on mastering the conversion math [11,000 Vietnamese dong equals $1 Aussie dollar; $1 USD equals 16,000 dong. We'd like to eliminate one currency, but our savings are in AUD and some of the prices here are in USD and some in VND.... and then there's all the bloody zeroes to deal with..... yarrrrrrrr!].

We met up with Warren in the late afternoon at Fanny, a great ice cream shop with delicious flavours and very artistic sundaes (I had a Canard, ice cream in a duck-shaped basket with wafer wings!) and the evening went on from there-- to gorgeously decorated, swanky coffee shops, a Pho restaurant, and a bar or two. But most memorable of the night was when I got entirely lost in the city on the back of a motorbike taxi-- it's scary enough being right in the thick of the traffic, but then my motorbike taxi driver lost Warren and Adrian, who were on Warren's bike and said "Follow us!" and zoomed off to disappear into the crowd. Everything looks mildly familiar in HCMC, but the street names are long and difficult to remember, and I have a terrible sense of direction without a map or the sun to guide me. So I spent about 45 minutes on the back of this old man's (who didn't speak a word of English) motorbike, reading street names aloud and hopelessly trying to communicate with him. Of course, Adrian had our phone, the hotel key, the backpack.... I was lucky we split up our money in the morning and had 500,000 dong in my pocket, as I'd left my wallet in the backpack on Adrian's back too! I also had our new phone number in my pocket but didn't know how to use a payphone, let alone speak the word "telephone" to the driver. Eventually he pulled over and had me speak with some other motorbike drivers, and I managed to write down our hotel's address, as I guess I'm hopeless at pronouncing it properly.... and then my driver couldn't find the street.... it went on and on.... finally in some miracle we came across it, and I had to run around trying to change this big VND bill to pay my 50,000 ($5) fare. Somehow Warren had a feeling to check our hotel, and I was just about to call the guys when he appeared on his bike to save me! We zoomed back to where he left Adrian, and who was Adrian hanging out with but the old motorbike taxi driver who didn't know his way around town! We decided to go to a bar close by, this time split up the mobile phones, and when Warren and I got to the bar, this time it was Adrian who had disappeared.... well, I guess we shouldn't have used that driver's services again, cuz he dropped Adrian right off at our hotel, despite the driver and Warren's agreements to meet on a certain street. At least Adrian's ride was a bit cheaper than mine.... needless to say a lot of beer was necessary after that.... and that's about all I can say about our second day in Vietnam!

PS. If you can figure out how to call/text Vietnam, we'll be reachable for the next month or two at +84 (that's the country code) 1265772662. Good luck & miss you all! xoxoxo Dayle & Adrian

Playtime in Melbourne

It's been a busy few weeks, but though we've been working a whole lot lately, we're trying our best to make sure there's still time for fun. Although it's gotten chilly and the streets are no longer filled with summertime tourists, and the festival-a-week season is long over, there are still plenty of fun things to do in the city. Here are a few of our recent highlights:

- The Game On exhibition at the ACMI (Australian Centre for the Moving Image): an art show all about video games. How cool is that? We went a few weeks ago and found it to be all about nostalgia, and surprisingly not full of gaming nerds as we had suspected. There were multiple interactive exhibits (sooooo many games to play!) which highlighted just how much video games are part of our generation's (and so many others) growing up. There were write-ups on game genres, historical timelines, international games, music, pivotal characters, and more. And we especially had a good laugh when we noticed how many arcade games had a dad at the controls while their little kid waited anxiously to get a turn! It was kind of a all-you-can-play buffet of games-- definitely worth the $15 admission. Some of our favourites at the exhibition included Street Fighter, Lemmings, Chicken (a much-pixellated game where a chicken/yellow blob has to cross a busy highway and not get run over by trucks/speeding square blobs), Galaga, Wii table tennis, Way of the Exploding Fist, and a Japanese game which simulated driving a slow-moving train.
- Dining out: We are big fans of the Italian eateries on Lygon Street (near our house), as well as the $9 Indian dinners at Funky Curry on Bourke Street (CBD), and most recently ate delicious Chinese cuisine under giant Chairman Mao posters at Post-Mao Cafe in Chinatown (apparently the chef used to cook for old Mao). We've found excellent Japanese fast food in the food court at Crown Casino and some really interesting Japanese treats at Kazen in Fitzroy. Oh... and then there's Chocolateria San Churro (a strange and interesting chocoholic paradise which specializes in, yes, everything chocolate, in drink and in solid form in a cafe setting; although the white hot chocolate is great at first but soon feels like you're drinking a cup of butter). And then there was that lovely multi-course pancake dinner at the very charming and old-school Pancake Parlour... Melbourne has not been disappointing our appetites!
- Drinks at cool spots like the Croft Institute, a science-lab/school-themed bar hidden deep in the alleyways of downtown, past smelly wheelie bins and lots of graffiti; the overpriced but heaps-of-fun Mai Tai, a kitsch Polynesian-themed bar which serves its most popular cocktails by the giant bowl; and at Spleen, a shabby-chic and laid-back sort of place in the CBD which we end up at a lot.
- Possum-feeding in Carlton Gardens: For some reason this activity never gets old. Especially after a few overfilled glasses of wine at the Post-Mao Cafe.

Still to come:
There's still so much to do here (it's starting to look as though we may stay in Melbourne til November or December!)... including checking out the rooftops from the Rialto Tower, the Melbourne Aquarium, dining at a Greek restaurant (the city has something like the second-largest Greek population after Greece itself), and perhaps doing a little shopping for artsy trinkets at the weekly St Kilda Esplanade Market. Not to mention a trip out to Phillip Island (an hour or so away) to see the teeny fairy penguins march in the Penguin Parade!