For the second leg of the race, you'll be heading to Queensland...

Our second stop of the trip was the one I was most excited for: Far North Queensland. It's a beautiful spot that holds many great memories and adventures, having living in Port Douglas for more than four months back in 2007. I've been anxious to revisit our former home to see how fast things might have changed. We also had a trip booked to snorkel the Great Barrier Reef (a must-do!) and rented a car so we could drive into the leafy wilderness of Daintree National Park. It promised to be a great couple of days.

We were also hoping to find a little more sunshine and heat up in the north, after our previous day in the cold and wet Blue Mountains. Well, we got our wish. As soon we stepped off the plane, a steaming wall of humidity hit us. We stepped out onto the tarmac in Cairns, surrounded by sugarcane fields and lush green hills under dark blue rainclouds. Somehow the colours are all a little deeper in the tropics -- maybe it's the sunlight? Right away I felt like I'd returned home.

We made a brief stop through Cairns, zooming past the big Captain Cook doing his Hitler-esque salute in our rental car, and like that, we were in the centre of town (smaller than I remembered!). We took a stroll down the boardwalk along the seashore, and I remembered why I steered us away from getting a hotel in Cairns - the massive unsightly tidal mudflats, that sleepy yet mildly rough vibe, and souvenir junk shops at every turn. (Probably with some interesting history though: after our first trip to Australia, my great uncle Alan told me some great tales about his backpacking experiences in Cairns back in the 1960s, when Cairns was just a tiny mining and fishing outpost at the end of the railway line. There were so few places to sleep that he had to take turns sharing a bunk with the miners, who worked all night and slept by day!)

What Cairns did have was plenty of al fresco restaurants serving beer and thin-crust pizza -- perfect on a hot day. With full bellies we set off on the winding oceanside road north to Port Douglas, stopping nearly every five minutes for another look at the insanely gorgeous views of the Coral Sea from beaches and cliffs.We finally reached the turn-off to Port Douglas, familiar territory with its jungly main road and blue-footed scrubfowl pecking about under the roadside palms. We arrived at the Sheraton, an stunning tropical paradise of a hotel (albeit with interior decorating that's a wee bit '80s), with a swimming pool that flowed under footbridges, around palm trees, and stretched around about 6 different hotel buildings! We settled in, checked out the hotel grounds a bit (we got lost there more than a few times!). Later we ended up on Port Douglas's main street, which was pretty much as it was when we left in 2007, with many of the same restaurants and bars still around, and a few new additions.

The next day was our reef trip, which we booked with Port Douglas's reef trip juggernaut, Quicksilver, for the main reason that they have a massive multi-storey platform built out on the reef, so my mom could check out the reef from outside the water, and my dad and I could snorkel it up. When we arrived at the platform, they recommended at this time of year we wear lycra "stinger suits" for snorkelling, to avoid deadly jellyfish stings (and a few had been spotted here and there), so we paid the $5 while my mom laughed at us in our head-to-toe black spandex suits that even had hoods and mittens. My mom went off into one of the 'semi-submersible submarines' (like a skinny glass-bottomed boat that sits low in the water) and we hopped into the water... it was beautiful. We weren't sure if the coral would be really damaged thanks to daily snorkel trips, but there was so much life - coral and fish - and colours everywhere. One guy saw a shark, but unfortunately (?) we missed it. We saw a couple of turtles from the sub, and a big cuttlefish, which was cool. My highlight was a bunch of clownfish and their babies, hiding in a sea anemone. I was the last one out of the water in the afternoon when the ship honked its horn for everyone to come in.... it was so great to explore the Reef again!

Our third day up in FNQ was a road trip day, and we took the car north all the way to Cape Tribulation, to the end of the road for cars, at least (it's where the 4WD track starts up Cape York). We checked outthe ancient Daintree Rainforest, taking a crocodile-spotting cruise on the murky Daintree River -- unfortunately not seeing any crocs, as we learned they're harder to spot at high tide (strike one) and don't sun themselves on the riverbanks so much in the summer (strike two), but we did see some cool birds and plants, and learned all about the mangroves. We also stopped at incredible Cape Trib beach (sadly my parents aren't as big beach bums as I am... I could've stayed there all day!), ate strange fruit ice cream at the Daintree Ice Cream Company, and wandered through the jungle boardwalks in search of wildlife. My dad provided the mosquito bait as he ran ahead through the boardwalks, while my mom and I hung back and inspected odd-looking spiders and noises in the bushes. It turns out, she is a bit of a lizard whisperer, and lured out all kinds of crazy reptiles along the trails on our trip. No cassowaries this time (maybe I got everyone's hopes up too much after my previous encounter?) but well, there are only about 1200-1500 left in the wild in Australia. And you really have to take things at a more leisurely pace to see these creatures....

 

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

We're Baaaack

We're back in sweltering Brisbane after a delightful week and a bit in New Zealand. For one thing, it sure is strange to holiday in a cold country only to come back to a hot place... the complete opposite of what we'd usually do! But though the South Island was a little chilly, it was kind of nice to put on some layers, don toques and gloves, and - dare I say it?- stomp around in the snow! Well, the snow thrill wore off in about 20 seconds or so, but it sure did make for lovely photos.

Anyway! We had a fantastic time -- NZ far surpassed our expectations for being a great place to travel. We lucked out with pretty amazing weather (lots of sunshine and blue skies), had great travel companions, and a strong Aussie dollar on our side. The Kiwis we met were really nice, endearingly rugby-mad, but sadly few and far between. The South Island felt more than anything... kind of empty. On almost any road in the parts we travelled to, you could count the cars you passed on your fingers, and when we did meet people running hostels or shops or tour companies, more than half the time they were from another country. It was a little weird... it seems that most New Zealanders must either live on the North Island, or in Australia. Where we went, it also even felt devoid of wildlife, which could have been due to climate, time of day, introduced species wiping out the native fauna, or maybe something else (we kept seeing signs about poison being used in national parks to wipe out various pest species...).

So it was just us and the sheep for most of the trip. We drove our Toyota Camry up and down mountains, hiked a few great trails around Mount Cook, Lake Tasman, Mt Aspiring National Park, and up Franz Josef Glacier - an unbelievable day for more than a few reasons! We got into a few adventures, trying our luck at paragliding in Queenstown, and scoring a free helicopter ride off the glacier when the mountain next to us started collapsing into the valley below. We had some great local food - cheeses, wine, lamb, and ketchup out of a can (for dipping grilled cheese sandwiches, silly!). We got caught up in the Rugby World Cup frenzy, we saw some rare penguins, and took a boat cruise through the fjords of Milford Sound, our boat chaperoned by adorable seals who swam alongside us. And besides all of that, it was so nice to get out into the fresh air and reunite with old friends. We're definitely already dreaming of a return someday to check out the North Island, and perhaps to embark on one of NZ's many Great Walks, where we can get gloriously lost in a national park for a few days at a time!

But that's our trip in a nutshell.... more detail to come! And if you've got the urge to look at a million or so mountain photos, don't forget to check our Flickr page. xx A&D

On A Penguin and Mountain High

Hello from gorgeous and cold New Zealand! It's been a crazy couple of days already, but since we scored some free wifi, we thought we'd take advantage and write a little update. 

We arrived in Christchurch to freezing cold weather and just an hour after an aftershock (damn!) on the 4th. Met up with our friends Stephane and Jenny and we're picking up where we left off in 2008 when we parted ways in Melbourne- they're perfect travel companions. Got our car and cruised around Christchurch as Disaster Papparazzi (hey, I call it photojournalism!) -- seeing all sorts of cracked, condemned, and empty houses, shops, and streets. The city centre is fenced off, crumbled, and deserted, and there are workmen about but that's all -- Adrian said it well when he remarked it felt like something out of a zombie movie!

From there, we drove inland on a dreary and cold afternoon after a big breakfast at Denny's (yes, the American chain!!) towards Mount Cook, watching the mountains in front of us get taller and taller, and oohing and aahing and stopping the car every time we saw a snow-capped peak peeking out from the clouds. And nearly every landscape belonged to us-- there's a certain feeling around the South Island that I've experienced only in the Aussie Outback: a huge sky, a massive landscape, and a peaceful and profound emptiness-- solitude, I guess. Very hard to describe! (Has anyone else felt this sort of thing? Help!)

It cleared up just as we hit Lake Tekapo, a beautiful blue glacial lake. We kept on until we hit Mount Cook Village in the evening, a contrived little ski chalet-feeling settlement  built in a flat valley beneath towering mountains with a posh hotel, 2 hostels, and a couple of houses for the Department of Conservation - Mt Cook is NZ's highest mountain at 3700m or so, though not that tall by Canadian or European standards- but still pretty amazing. We stayed and ate in this lovely "Backpacker Lodge" with a pub decorated with deer head hunting trophies and great beer called Tui on tap -- unfortunately the "grocery stores" were basically a few items of junk food and instant noodles behind the hostel reception desk. Ugh. So much for saving money by cooking! Every room had a view of the mountains that was almost too perfect-- it felt constantly like we were looking at a painting, not a real scene!

This morning we set off for a hike to Mt Cook lookout, a really cool trail running along the valley floor through grass and lots of spiky plants. We got close to the mountains and another turquoise lake at the lookout and heard a BOOM and a rumbling sounding something like a big truck going over a bridge on a highway... this happened a few more times, minutes apart, before we saw what it was: avalanches high up in the snowy mountains! Just crazy. We hiked another trail later on to Tasman Lake, in the same area, and this time found a huge blue lake with giant ice chunks floating in it-- that didn't look that big until we saw a teeny little yellow tour boat cruising between the icebergs.... and we realized how warped our sense of perspective is.

After our mountain hikes we headed back to the coast in our car, passing rolling hills, perfectly still lakes, and many, many sheep (with which we play our very favourite country-driving game... honking at sheep and making them hop and run this way ad that.... a forgotten pleasure from our drives around Tasmania, but somehow a game Stephane and Jenny also know! Maybe it's universal?) We made it to the coastal town of Oamaru about two hours before dusk, and checked out the Blue Penguin Centre to find out about seeing the little blue penguins the town, and this part of the coast, is known for. Turns out they've turned the place into sort of a Phillip Island (Australia) style circus-- $25 to sit in the grandstand and watch the penguins swim into shore from the ocean. 147 penguins counted last night, they kept telling us! We sort of wondered if we could just spot some on our own, and then one of the ladies at the centre let it slip in hushed tones that: "If you drive to this spot on the map right now, it'll take you only about 5 minutes to get there, and if you look hard and peer into the bushes alongside this beach, you might see a yellow-eyed penguin, as they come in from the ocean around this time to their nests in the bushes, where they live and hide along this inlet". Why not? We thought.... we could always come back to the penguin circus later.

We get to the viewing area and it seemed the word was out -- there were 5 or so other cars parked there, and it actually wasn't long at all before we saw funny little shapes in the bushes on the steep incline from the beach. Penguins! More emerged from the grasses and we were totally photo happy... and even video happy, as we watched them build nests, shake their cute flipper arms, and make the weirdest bird noises ever (we'll edit the clips together and post them on the blog in the future). It was insane! They totally stole the spotlight from the adorable little seal flopping around on the beach far below, but ah well, these were really cute penguins! 

Finally the sun set and we were so full of penguin-spotting joy that we just headed to a hostel and a grocery store.... and then what do we learn from the lovely hostel manager? Well, if we just walk to the town pier, there should be plenty of the little blue penguins nesting along the rocks at night. Sure enough.... well, none of us have ever seen so many penguins in one day, but there is something about spotting rare (?) wildlife in their natural habitats that just gives you this amazing feeling of satisfaction. Euphoria, really! And so far New Zealand has been a continuous shot of pure euphoria. We can't wait to find out what comes next!

Leaping Lizards!

Something happened last week in Brisbane where the temperatures suddenly shot way up from the usual 22-degree days to around 28C to 30C. Suddenly we're walking on the shadowy side of the street and everyone's in sundresses again. It's still supposed to be spring for another few months, and there are lots of flowers blooming in true spring spirit. But the best part about this early summertime is it's brought out the lizard population in the city!

Not far from our apartment is the South Bank Parklands, a great strip of grass, trees, walkways, and cafes (and the artificial beach) running alongside the river for many city blocks. Griffith University stands at one end of the parkland and just beyond the campus is a delightful little patch of jungly duckpond, where birds cruise around and kids play in the playground (and teenagers make out). We're well used to all of that scenery, so imagine our surprise when one day, we saw a big fat iguana-like lizard perched on a rock at the edge of the duckpond. And then a bit of movement catches your eye on another rock, and there's a smaller lizard, running on its hind legs in a near-standing position, just like a tiny velociraptor!

It's a lizard-vs-duck world out there.

The paths throughout the parklands are always packed with joggers and cyclists, and now add to that fearless lizards dashing across the pathways, just to make things a little more interesting. They don't appear very afraid of people, and they certainly aren't afraid of birds that are way bigger than them -- I witnessed a magpie vs. lizard standoff one day and the large and nasty magpie (the ones we're afraid of) was the first one to flee.

An unlikely jogging hazard

"Yeah.... what?!"

The former Gondwanaland park

We're not sure if the lizards were just hibernating during the last few months, or if they were holidaying in the Outback or something. But apparently the jungly duckpond area of the parklands was formerly something like a living educational theme park about Gondwanaland, the big prehistoric land mass that all the continents broke off from many eons ago. After the theme park was shut down, the "dinosaurs" of the miniature Gondwanaland (aka. Gondwana Rainforest Sanctuary) were either set free of perhaps escaped -- at least, that's one theory on why there are so many reptiles hanging around the river. But we also saw quite a few lizards sunning themselves on the rocks next to the cliffs of Kangaroo Point (a suburb near South Bank that rises high above the city atop some gorgeous riverside cliffs). It's lizard heaven here in Brisbane: rocks, sunshine, plenty of bugs...what else could a lizard want?

Lizard near the Kangaroo Point cliffs

We even have a resident lizard who's made his home on our own back patio -- a little skittish skink that lives in the raised root of our palm tree, and comes out for sunshine briefly until he's spotted by curious breakfasters peeping into his home. We named him Louie... and promise to snap a photo of him if we're ever quick enough one day.

Garden skink - a spitting image of our backyard pal Louie!
 (image by ozwildlife)

Surfers Paradise Hit List #2: Our Favourite Form of Exercise

It's hard to call a 45-minute walk on one of the most gorgeous beaches ever exercise, but doesn't that just make it even more rewarding?

Giant jellyfish!

From the day we first set foot in Surfers, we've been trying to make sure we never take the beach for granted. At any time of day, there's many more people like us doing the exact same thing; in fact, one of the local papers even publishes the exact best times to walk on the beach (according to when the tides expose that lovely flat, packed, walkable sand) with the daily weather report. So one of the things we have been doing the most since deciding to move to Brisbane is taking long strolls along the beach.

Living by the beach and seeing it every day, you realize how the landscape is constantly changing: after a windy couple of days, the dunes are bigger, smaller, or even in other places. After a bout of big waves, sometimes the sand has been carved into small cliffs, even along the water. And the sandbars in the water build themselves up, flatten themselves down, and move along as well. It's always cool to see what the waves have washed up, too: some days it's seashells, some days purplish jellyfish, and one day we came across a jellyfish the size of a truck tire. It was pretty crazy.

Bird lesson in Kurrawa Park

One sunny morning, we thought we'd walk down to Broadbeach, the next suburb south, and grab a coffee for the walk back. It's about a 45-minute stroll and was lovely. On our way into the cafe strip, I was taking photos of some of the flowers around the seaside park in Broadbeach when we met Brian, a retired guy with a soft spot for birds. He was an interesting fellow, and on his daily walk to the library, he always carries a bag of mince (ground meat) in his pocket -- and his friends the Butcherbirds know it. We learned a lot about the Butcherbird from Brian as they landed on his shoulders and arms, and swooped in as soon as they spotted a little meat in his fingers. Adrian even fed a few of them too. They're pretty cute but great hunters-- in fact, they eat insects, lizards, and even other birds. He also told us about all the other species of birds --and snakes! -- that live along the coastline, even amongst the urban sprawl.  It was a bit of a lesson in appreciating the smaller, simpler things in our environment, and it's good to know there are people out there that don't let all the amazing things in our neighbourhoods go unnoticed.

Brian tells us all about the amazingly intelligent Butcherbirds

Inquisitive little devil!

Our New Flatmate

We haven't told you too much about our new home yet. It was actually only the second place Adrian checked out on his first apartment-hunting day, but as soon as he saw it, he knew it was the one. And as soon as he emailed me the photos (as I was still in Canada at the time), I shrieked with excitement. It's a huge, furnished two-bedroom with tons of light, a wraparound balcony with a panorama showing the mountains on the west side, and ocean on the east, and lots of other high-rises all around us. We've got luxuries we've never had before, like a washing machine and a dishwasher, and three (yes, three!) swimming pools, two tennis courts, and a whole bunch of BBQs. And did we mention it's just across the road from the beach? OK, OK, we'll stop mentioning that already. :)

We're sharing the place until the end of July with Julie & Liv, from Denmark & Norway- they're also Griifth U students, like Adrian, and are fantastic. It's a bit of change, going from having your own apartment to sharing one with flatmates, but somehow, happily, this transition has been a surprisingly easy one. But then, yesterday we got news of a third, slightly more uninvited flatmate who's lately been making himself at home in our new apartment...
---

"Oh yeah, and look out for a bird flying into the apartment," Julie said as she and Liv were heading off for school. "A WHAT??" I replied.

Apparently this black-and-white bird - a magpie-lark, to be exact - scared Julie half to death the day before when she returned home to find it flapping around our living room. Since we generally leave our balcony doors open to let in the sea breeze (as there are no screen doors) and we're about level with some of the trees on the fifth floor, I guess our place is also fair game for the birds. And here I was marvelling at the fact that we never encounter any bugs!

I was sure the apartment bird had to have been a one-time event. So yesterday I open the door after my morning walk on the beach, and am relieved to not witness any flapping, or chirping, for that matter. I'm just sitting down on the couch with a glass of water when I see it - bird crap on the top of one of our faux-leather armchairs. Aha! Well, maybe it was from the day before...

So later on, I'm catching up on some emails in the living room and have all but forgotten about the bird. But I glance up from the computer screen and something catches my eye to the right of me - and I see that just behind the couch, a little black-and-white bird is strutting calmly around the carpet.

It took a surprising amount of yelling, clapping, and shooing (with a mop, even!), but I finally got the thing out of our apartment. The neighbours must have been wondering what all the fuss was about. But I must have scared it, as it didn't come back for the rest of the day. But then today, sometime during the five minutes between the time Adrian and I made our coffees and left the kitchen, and Julie & Liv returned from their morning run, we heard yelling in the living room: our sassy little houseguest had returned... and not for the last time.

So I guess no apartment is absolutely perfect. Some of them come with mice, some with cockroaches, and then there was that pesky flies-in-the-drains problem at our last place in Toronto. And how about our cabin in the woods with all the Huntsman spiders and moths? But a bird in the apartment is a totally new issue. Perhaps we'll have to make ourselves a scarecrow for this one.