You need real shoes. Like heels.

On my final day in Byron, Grant from Virginia pointed out, "I haven't eaten a meal indoors in 3 months. And I think I would hate it." I too had recently realized that I disliked the idea of returning to a city -- away from the bush turkeys and lizards, hammocks and tents, guitars and digeridoos -- back to the crowds, dwellings with walls and doors, and people who dressed in clothing without holes.

But the time had come to meet Rachel and so at 8:55pm on November 8th, in the midst of a torrential downpour, I boarded the Greyhound for the final leg of my east coast bus pass -- a 13 hour journey from Byron Bay to Sydney. I lucked out and was one of the few people who got 2 seats to myself. After some careful contortion a person my size can actually sleep comfortably on two seats. My head and torso are short enough to lie flat and my legs... well my legs just fend for themselves. But the point is that I can fall asleep and stay asleep for hours.


Of course it shouldn't surprise you that I am enfatuated with the efficiency the night bus provides. It saves not only on the cost of accommidation for the night but also on usuable daytime hours that would otherwise be spent sitting on a bus. And there is the added bonus of getting to check out the crazies who decide that 2:37 am is great time to board a Greyhound bus in places with names like Woolgoolga.

When the bus arrived at Sydney Central Station at 9:45 am, I scrambled to gather all my bags from the sidewalk and suit up into my official "on-the-move" arrangement of baggage. The hostel was only a block away and Rachel had already called to say she'd arrived so I excitedly hurried off... little realizing I'd left an item of some importance sitting on the sidewalk. Uh oh... suspense!

As I approached the YHA Sydney Central, I happened to look up and spot Rachel's back crossing the street at the next corner. Running to catch up with her was an impossibility considering the load I was carrying so I opted for plan B and yelled "RAACHELL!!! on the top of my lungs. Now picture this on a city street with me looking like a luggage cart with a head sticking out the top. Perhaps my social skills had deteriorated along with my hygene and desire to live indoors. A few attempts at this ferrel(*1) method of communication got the job done and she came back and hugged me and my baggage; even though she couldn't get her arms around us.

On the move

We got some breakfast and had a catchup and a wander through a bit of Sydney. It seemed as though no time had passed since I'd left home -- until the moment Rachel offered me a piece of gum. My wide-eyed excited response was "::gasp:: Gum?! I haven't had gum in so long!" As she handed me the piece she said, "I think it's time for you to come home. You are way too excited about this."



We spent the next 48 hours checking out Sydney -- the Opera House, the Sydeny Harbour Bridge, The Rocks, Circular Quay (pronounced "key"), the Australia Museum, a woman who fit herself into a 36" square box on the street, wine that was NOT goon(*2), $5 kangaroo roll(*3), hermit crab races(*4), etc.

Opera House

kangaroo roll

crab races


When we'd had enough of the city we headed to the Hunter Valley for a wine tour where I made the unfortunate mistake of being hungover BEFORE we started drinking at 11 am; but made it through all the tastings anyway, even the crazy chili shot.

It was around this time, about 3 days after arriving in Sydney that I realized that my hiking boots were missing. These were the boots that cost me a lot of money, were extremely rare in my size (only 2 pairs in the whole of the US) and required a bit of a wild goose chase before I managed to locate them at a store in California. Therefore as you can imagine, I really wanted them back. The only reasonable explanation for their disappearance was that I'd left them on the sidewalk when I got off the bus. My only hope for getting them back was that someone brought them into the Greyhound office that happened to be located near the store. When I enquired at the store, the man at the desk said, "I do have one pair of boots. They are very small." Jackpot.

We took the train out to Katoomba and the Blue Mountains to see the 3 Sisters and the Janolan Cave--where we had the priviledge of standing next what is believed to be the oldest known mud in the world--which in turn would make the caves the oldest known caves in the world. But don't hold me to it, that “fact” was imparted by our tour guide -- who just might have been the Australian double of Napoleon Dynamite.

Napoleon?

Janolan Caves

3 Sisters



We visited Bondi Beach for a day and spent 2 days in Manly Beach. Although these beaches are quite nice, the scenery does not even compare to the beaches of Queensland and northern New South Wales. I wished Rachel had more time and could have see these places that had floored me again and again. They were so abundant for such a length of time, that I think I began to take their scenery, atmosphere, and seclusion for granted. I was beginning to mourn those places and began to wonder, if I feel so overwhelmed and uninspired in a city the size of Sydney, will I ever feel ready to return to New York?

Reason why Australians have plastic Christmas trees.
Australian's get straight to the point.
Really straight to the point.

Dennis arrived in Sydney a week later and Rachel and I returned to the city center to meet him. We introduced him to kangaroo rolls and crab races before his jetlag got the best of him.


The following day was Rachel's last, and since we had not managed to locate a real, live, hopping, pocket-toutting, wild kangaroo, a trip to the zoo to see a real, live, pocket-touting, confined kangaroo was in order. Since Dennis also wanted to check "kangaroo" and other marsupials off his list and I'd already visited my share of Australian zoos, Dennis and Rachel made this trip on their own; leaving me to happily spend the morning reading in bed. As I'd explained to the two of them -- I am not on vacation, I am on an adventure. And the pace of an adventure is a bit slower than the pace of a vacation... kind of like a marathon vs a sprint.

After Rachel left us, I promptly got sick. Guess my immune system was just so sad to see her go.

I agreed to accompany Dennis out that night anyway and after some dinner and a few drinks we found a gay bar, as had been our intention for the night. But the bouncer took one look at me and determined he couldn't be letting a straight girl the likes of me into his establishment. Of course he claimed that my sandals (not even flip flops!) were the problem. "You need real shoes. Like heels," he said. Yeah sure. That sounds like sexuality profiling to me.

Dennis and I moved out to Bondi the next day where it rained and rained and rained and I slept and sniffled and slept some more. I think the highlight of our time in Bondi was meeting Jada from Canada and finding out that the name of her town in Saschachewan was Regina--pronouned Reh-j-eye-na. Yes she's heard all the jokes. But checking out hot Aussie waiters pulled a close second.

Chaos in Bondi





Is it a pool? Is it the sea? Is it a pool?

On November 21st we left Sydney behind when we boarded a flight to the land where men are men and sheep are scared. Or so I'd heard.

Footnotes:
1. Ferrel is the Australian term for Redneck or people who are not domesticated; as in the opposite of a domestic cat is a ferrel cat.
2. Goon=Aboriginal word for pillow, pillow=what the bag that is inside of box wine is used for when the contents are finished
3. Kangroo roll=Kangaroo steak, shredded tasty cheese, grilled onions and barbecue sauce on a hoagie roll. Does not come with a plate but does come with a beer.
4. Patrons at Scubar have the opportunity to choose one of 16 hermit crabs to name and support before the 16 crabs are released at the center of a large round board. The first crab to find its way to the edge wins it's supporter a prize that varies in value from hundreds of dollars to crap.



A special thanks to Rachel and Dennis for taking much better photos than me on this leg of the trip. Photo credit goes to them.

Creepy mustache required

As I was packing up my stuff to leave Byron Bay on November 8, the most common response I received from those who learned about my looming departure was "why?"

The Arts Factory, a hostel and campground in Byron Bay was one of the most unique places I have called home in Australia. Although I was there for only 12 days, I spent most of my time with travelers who were putting down loose roots in Byron for a few months by living in tents on the campground and held jobs in town. It was nice to stay in one place for awhile and consistently have the same people around... even if it was for only just short of 2 weeks. Mimi, you got it just right in your facebook message when you said it appeared that I had found my way to a "hippie commune in the 60s". Except for the addition of computers, the internet, a reception desk and the election of Obama; I felt like this was exactly where I'd found myself. And I loved every second of it.

The Arts Factory may be most well known as the hostel where you can sleep in a teepee. In addition to the campground, and dorms there is a large teepee with 10 beds, a bus converted into rooms, cabins, and The Pentagon. I was a resident of The Pentagon, which was a 5 sided tent with wood floors, electricity, and 4 sets of bunk beds. But of course I couldn't help but smirk every time I was asked where I lived and had to respond, "The Pentagon."


Bus rooms


Teepee

If I had time to stay much longer in Byron I would have looked into getting a tent and staying on the campground. This campground is not the type with defined lots where everyone gets equal amounts of space and plenty of room between themselves and their neighbors. It is more like a squatter’s village or refugee camp. Tents are sometimes only a foot or so from one another. There are tarps strung from trees to shade the tents, clotheslines hung all over and bushturkeys running about stealing anything they can carry. Many people stay long enough that it is worthwhile for them to put furniture (mattresses, tables, bamboo rugs, milk crates to use as dressers, etc.) inside their tents. Most of these items are purchased or adopted from former campground residents. Let's just say I was a bit jealous that I didn't have enough time to try out this lifestyle for myself.


Campground


Cooking in the kitchen at the Arts Factory


I remetup (is that a word?) with Dan from NJ who I'd met a month earlier in 1770 and since he'd been at the arts factory for a few weeks already, he'd already gotten to know the other long termers on the campground and brought me along to bonfires on the beach and at the quarry, a Halloween party at an actual house (!), Sunday nights when the fat lady sings at the Beach Hotel, bacon cheese hamburger night with the boys, rainy afternoon movie time on the porch of Ben's tent, the 24 hour (meat) pie shop, the drum circle and whatever other craziness was going on.


Bonfire at the quarry

One afternoon I'd joined a group of people having a barbeque on a beach that required crossing from one beach to another by scrambling around the bottom of a rocky cliff over the rocks as the surf washed in and out on the low parts. We hung out there for a few afternoon hours and I FINALLY saw the ocean life that people were always pointing out but I could never spot. Three dolphins, about 50 meters from shore were swimming and jumping out of the waves. It should have been a postcard.

Byron is one of the best places in Australia to learn to surf. And so when I arrived in Byron it was time to put the money that Rachel, Greg, Linar and Mike gave me for my birthday towards surfing lessons. It was raining on the morning of the first day of the lessons but the waves were very calm -- so good for beginner surfers that our instructor said that if we couldn't stand up today we should just give up on ever being able to do it. I stood up for every wave except one. I could have used some extra instruction on how to dismount without making a fool of myself though. We were surfing quite close to shore and frequently I was still standing on the board as it road up into about 6 inches of water on the beach -- and I usually flopped off the board onto my hip or butt (or my face) like a dying fish. On the second day the weather was awesome and the waves were a bit bigger but now we were responsible for figuring out when to paddle and stand up on our own so it was a bit more difficult. I had the next day off which was really lucky because it ended up pouring all day. The following day, the weather was nice again but the rain from the day before was the result of a storm out on the pacific which meant the waves continued to be large from the storm and the tide quite strong with the water washing back to the ocean at about an 80 degree angle with the beach. The ocean battered me again and again both on my way in and on my way out. I did stand up a few times... but still couldn't figure out how to get off the board gracefully.

I was in Byron for Halloween. Apparently Canadians do Halloween like we do, but no one else does. Australians don't do decorations, pumpkins or trick r treating. It seems that their only recognition of Halloween is the occasional costume party. Which means that when about 30 of us (mostly American and Canadian) walked through town in costume on our way to a party we attracted enough attention to qualify us as a parade.

The end of Halloween was not the end of the excitement for the weekend. November 1st marked the 1st day of Movember, and there were many razor anxious guys around Byron ready to participate. Movember is an Australian and New Zealand fundraising event where guys sport ridiculous and usually creepy mustaches during the month of November. They ask their family and friends to sponsor their facial hair to raise money and awareness for prostate cancer and men's mental health. Since living in a tent with very little belongings often also means shaving is optional, there were probably more guys who removed facial hair to leave a mustache behind than those that had to start growing from scratch. There were way too many excited participants at the Arts Factory. So if my pictures appear to be full of creepy looking mustache clad characters, you now know why.

A few days after all the mustache excitement began was the day we'd ALL been waiting for... American election day. Since New South Wales is currently 16 hours ahead of EST, when the poles started to close at 7pm EST on the 4th, it was already 11am on the 5th in NSW. Sooo, election day monitoring for us happened on the 5th. This day happened to be quite rainy, which meant that rather than being on the beaches, or playing guitars on the campground or wandering about town, many people were seeking shelter on the kitchen balcony and covered area below the kitchen. Danny, from England, set up his laptop in this area and was consistently monitoring the BBC website. Grant, from Virginia, initiated the phrase, "Happy Obama Day", early that morning way before any polls had closed. Dan, from NJ, brought the celebratory beers. Claire from Canada, downloaded the acceptance speech from youtube on her laptop and a crowd of us "huddled around 'a radio' in a forgotten corner of the world" to watch. And unnamed people participated in another celebration titled "Bongs for Obama."

Throughout the remainder of the day we Americans received congratulations from Australians, English, Canadians, Israelis, Germans, and quite possibly much more. Liz from PA remarked that she was relieved because this meant that maybe she would be ok with going home again someday. Claire from Canada commented that this was a good day for Canada too because "the last 8 years for Canada has been like having a retarded siamese twin."

A few days before the election I was at a bar and an Australian woman must have heard Dan and I talking and came over and asked if we were American. She then followed this up with a phrase that was a first for my time in Australia. "I like Americans." I'm pretty sure we both looked at her with dropped jaws. Haha just kidding. I said, "Really? That's not something we hear often." She said something along the lines of, "Americans are loud. And they can be loud and annoying. Australians are loud and annoying too. But Americans have conviction. They get things done. So I like Americans." That reminded me of what the Italian girl Gulia said way back in Cairns when a bunch of us were discussing the meteorite that is predicted to come dangerously close to earth in something like 2020. She said, "I'm not worried about it. The Americans will do something." So maybe some of the world does believe there is a hope and a use for us yet. :)

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"So this is why they call it the bush" Continued

After returning to Brisbane from Cannondale I joined our team leader, Cameron at his friend Amanda's apartment for some beers. That's the second real living dwelling that I've been to in this country. We sat on her balcony (which they call a veranda) and she had a beautiful view of the city. Apparently both Cameron and Amanda normally don't care for Americans... ok I think they might have used the word "hate" but that's kinda harsh so I'm pretending they didn't say that.

But I passed the acceptable test and of course we had to discuss the reasons why this is the case. I think it all pretty much comes down to an ignorant self-centered cockiness that has been their past experience with Americans. Amanda was extremely well-educated about American politics. She said she thinks our candidate choices are really sucky and she doesn't think either one is a good pick. But I asked her if she could think of someone who would be a good option and she didn't have an answer for this. However, she did comment that my reason for voting for Obama is the best argument for either candidate that she has heard anywhere. (I think that was the moment I passed the American test.)

On Saturday morning I joined a tour group to go to Morton Island for 2 days and 1 night. Morton Island is another sand island, just not as large as Fraser Island. This adventure included snorkeling among ship wrecks, sand tobogganing in the desert, visiting a fresh water lake, a lighthouse and another beach with rips strong enough that it was not advisable to enter the water even just up to your knees. Unexpected adventures included: breaking down in the 4-wheel-drive truck on the inland sand track, witnessing a bird/duck creature pluck a fish out of the water that was twice the width of the bird’s neck and swallow it whole, rain, and my first Australian campfire.

Saturday night’s sunset from the western beach might have been the most beautiful sunset I have seen in this country yet... and I've seen a lot a sunsets.

On Sunday night we returned to Brisbane. Technically I was no longer supposed to be staying at the CVA house in Brisbane. But since I only took one small bag to Morton, I had to go back to the house to get the rest of my stuff. And the house sleeps 20 people and I knew there was only 1 person scheduled to be there on Sunday night. Annnd since I knew the door code, it seemed a waste to not just sleep there for one more night. So I went back to Albion and crept quietly around that creepy old house. Luckily the one other person staying there, who I hadn't met before, wasn't frightened by my presence and I got a free place to stay for the night. I packed up early on Monday and crept out without anyone from the office noticing.

I took an 8:15am train from the house to the main station in the city where to get the Greyhound bus to Byron Bay. The train was full of people going to work -- in offices! I had tuned that part of life out of my head for so long that I'd kinda forgotten that not all people in Australia are environmental team leaders or tour guides who don't wear shoes. But even so, sitting in a coffee shop in a train station in Brisbane and watching people go to work, I noticed that they looked so much more relaxed, so much less frantic, and so much less crowded than people in New York.

I spent 4 weekends in Brisbane and initially I wasn't so impressed. But by the end it had begun to grown on me. It reminds me of Denver…except with palm trees and purple trees and a beach not so far away and people who conclude every paragraph with "no worries".

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"So this is why they call it the bush."

Picking back up on my earlier comment that I spent 4 weekends in Brisbane, when I left Mooloolaba my destination was to return to Brisbane. I was scheduled to arrive at the Brisbane CVA office in South Bank around noon. I successfully navigated the bus to the train into the city but then ended up walking entirely around the outside of the train station (with all my stuff) looking for the bus to south bank before figuring out that I could have just stayed on the train one more stop to get to my destination. I purchased another train ticket, boarded the train, encountered an Australian guy who said, "You're crazy for trying to walk around this city with all that", exited the train, walked about 400 meters uphill in the wrong direction, turned around and reoriented myself and walked about 600 or 700 meters to the correct location of the office. Then I wanted a nap. But at least now I know that I can walk a kilometer with all my stuff.

Brisbane CVA differs from other CVAs in that they have a house just outside the city that can house 20 volunteers on the weekend but during the week they send all volunteers to assignments outside of Brisbane.

The CVA house in the city looked like the kind of place a horror movie could be filmed in. The architecture was old, the rooms were in a maze like pattern and the front door which had no porch light was mysteriously open all the time. Haha... no, that's just how people do it in Australia, doors spend most of their time open.


Sign in the bathroom. There was also a 4 minute sand timer hanging in the shower.

The other spooky thing about the Brisbane house was that it had 3 other Americans in it! There were only a total of 7 of us staying at the house that first weekend I arrived. Corey, 22 and from PA; Pat, 18 and from Buffalo; Will, 20 and from NJ; Maxine, 21 and from England (I volunteered for one week with her in Cairns as well); Anita, 19 and from Germany; Stefan, 19 and from Germany; John, 23 and from Korea. Everyone was there on their own. Corey had just graduated from Pratt and was spending 2 months in Australia before getting a job; Pat had just graduated high school in June and although he was super smart he didn't get into any schools that he really wanted to go to and so decided to take a year off to volunteer and travel as well as fill out applications to reapply to college; Will was attending Lehigh but would have been required to declare a major this semester and since he was unsure between engineering and something that would lead to law school, he was taking a semester off to figure it out; Anita and Stefan had both just finished high school in Germany where it is normal to go to high school until 19 if you are tracking yourself for Uni as well as common to take a year or 2 off to work or travel before actually going to Uni). Anita wants to go to Uni for marine biology but would prefer not to go to a German Uni since they have no ocean or "sea" as she says. She's in Australia for a year or two trying to figure out if it will be financially possible for her to go to Uni here. Stefan is completing 13 weeks of volunteer work with CVA in various places all over Australia before he will go back to Germany to fill his public service requirements. In Germany there is a lottery that everyone gets put into for public service at age 19 or 20 and if your name gets called you are required to spend a year in the army or as a firefighter or paramedic. Stefan is doing his voluntarily because he will get free training as a firefighter and paramedic and if he likes it enough, then after a year he can start getting paid to continue doing that work. John is in Australia working and traveling before going back to Korea to finish his degree in tourism, at which point his family would look down on a decision to travel because he would be expected to put his degree to work. Maxine, who I first met in Cairns in early September, will be completing 12 weeks with CVA over 4.5 months. She just finished a degree in dance and creative writing and is in Australia to travel before she has to look for a job at home.

Maxine and I went out that first Friday night and met up with 5 Irish girls I'd met on the Whitsundays and 3 Irish girls she'd met on the Whitsundays. The first bar we went to was filled with Australians who'd come straight from work all dressed in their work clothes. It was strange but they seemed so foreign to me that it was almost like I forgot that I'd ever actually been part of that professional working world. It was a bit weird and awkward as so we eventually peaced out for the comforts of... what else but an Irish pub.

And it was here that I met Canadian Chris who surfs in Canada. I didn't know that was physically possible. But apparently with a good wet suit and a whole lot of conviction, one can surf in Vancouver. He's out in Australia for a year enjoying the warm water. He'd just spent a number of months traveling from Cairns to Brisbane and living in his van. He was in Brisbane for about 2 weeks hanging out with people he'd met along the way through couchsurfers.com. (I’m not going to explain it. If you are curious check it out.) He’d also come to Brisbane to sell his van before flying down to Melbourne to spend another 3 months surfing there before the end of his visa would send him home. Over the course of our conversation he revealed that he did not usually like Americans but that he did pay more attention to our politics than to Canada's. When at the end of the night we exchanged Australian phone numbers he commented that he could not believe he wanted the phone number of an American. I guess now I know what it is like to be the stereotyped minority. Except unlike minorities whose culture is evident on their faces, no one knows my identity until I open my mouth and share it.

So back to that CVA business. On Monday my team consisted of myself, Maxine, Will, Pat and another Korean guy named Kim who joined us that morning. Our teamleader was Fab. And our assignment for the week was Happy Valley on Fraser Island! The trip would take us 4 hours back up the highway along the coast and 2 hours on the beach "highway" on the island. We were making this trip in a 4wd "troopie" as this group called it -- which meant sideways bench seats and occasionally flying off the seat resulting in the addition of a few new bruises to the collection on my legs as well as a bump on the head.



Our accommodation on the island was another one of these Australian structures that is caught somewhere in between of being inside and outside. The bedrooms had 4 walls but like any campground type structure were inhabited by spiders in every crevice. The kitchen and bathroom could be described the same way but the common area had 2 walls that were really just screens overlayed with a metal grate. This kept most bugs out but not wind, rain or temperature. The floor was like a wooden deck raised a few feet above the ground. There was about a half inch between each board and so when we swept you never needed a dust pan because you just swept all the crumbs, dirt and sand into the cracks and down onto the ground. There was real furniture (ie not outdoor or waterproof furniture) in the common area and a tv with dvd player so it was a bit disorienting as to whether you should think of yourself as indoors or outdoors. This was highlighted on Wednesday night when we experience a torential downpour while we watched a dvd in the dark. We had to turn the volume up because the rain was so loud -- and because there was no wall between us and it. (For those who were wondering, the movie was either Predator, Alien, Alien vs. Predator, Wagons East, Blood Diamonds, or a Kiwi film called Eagle vs Shark. We watched them all that week. Oh yeah and Kiwi means a person or thing from New Zealand.)


Dingo






Our work on Fraser was just weeding. We sat on the ground and pulled out crows foot on the campground in the mornings when the tide was too high for us to drive from our accommidation in Dundaburra to Happy Valley. And in the afternoons we went to Happy Valley and pushed through the bush looking for Easter Cassia, which we pulled out of the ground and hung upside down from the trees so that it didn't reroot itself. Easter cassia is fairly easy to pull out but finding it, which meant plowing through branches and brush and vines and the insects that inhabit them was not my favorite. But we did occasionally push through to the top of some hill and could see out to the ocean that was perpetually in earshot and the sight was another one to make you stop in your tracks -- well either that or a sharp wait-awhile vine that snagged you around the shin.


Anita, me and Stephen

On Friday we headed back to Brisbane and went out for a few drinks at a very typical backpacker bar called Down Under. And on Saturday Maxine, Anita, Will, Stefan and I took a two hour train and bus ride to Surfers Paradise to spend the day. Contrary to the name, Surfers is not really the most ideal place to find good surfing waves. It is however, a great place for nightlife. Unlike all other Australian beaches I have seen, the beaches in Surfers are lined with tall buildings and feels kind of like what I'd imagine Miami would be like. Maxine commented this beach reminded her of European beaches.

My favorite part of Surfers was the talking bathrooms. Just off the beach was a series of individual toilet units that on the outside were reminiscent of a porta potty. But once you got inside, this was no temporary nasty toilet. When you closed the door, the bathroom spoke to you to inform you that you had 10 minutes to use the toilet and that you should lock the door. Then "All You Need is Love" began to play. There was no button to flush the toilet but the toilet would flush automatically when you turned on the water to wash your hands (I was also in another one where the door unlocked when you washed your hands). It was like using the bathroom on Star Ship 9.

The following Monday, Will, Pat, Corey and Stefan had all left for their next destinations and my new team consisted of myself, Maxine, John and another Korean guy named Martin. Our teamleader was Cameron and our location was Kennelworth in the Cannondale Mountains about 2 hours outside of Brisbane. Our task was more weeding -- but this time the foreign plant of choice was Lantana.

Each day began with a 3 km hike out into the woods -- but this time with the luxury of a trail -- to meet one of the (power) rangers. Lantana is a plant that was brought here from Europe by the english to create hedges. It grows all twisted and entwined in itself and generally grows about 6 or 7 feet tall, although if it latches onto a tree it may creep even taller. The roots come out of th ground fairly easily but getting yourself in close enough to them to get a good grasp is a bit tricky. Also it's branches are stiff like sticks, not flexible like a flower stem, and so when they do come out they are pointing 7 feet in every direction and sometimes a power ranger might pull one out and stab an innocent American girl in the eye. But no worries, my contact saved the day -- even though it subsequently fell out into the dirt. But I'm like a master bushwalker and managed to find a way to clean it and pop that sucker back in.

Of all the places I had been so far the Cannondale Mountains poised to biggest threat in terms of deadly Australian nature. Several species of poisonous snakes were known to live in those woods; including the brown snake. A trapdoor spider joined us for smoko one day, but the funnelwebs stayed away. There are leeches, jumping ants, plenty of breeds of ticks and stinging trees inhabiting these woods too. I'd always thought that you only find leeches in the water but I was wrong, they live on ground too. Our teamleader, Cameron, had 3 leeches on him in one day. Jumping ants literally jump to about knee (or in my case, hip) height and they bite. Based on the Martin's expression after falling victim to a jumping ant, I deduce that it is as painful as the Australian’s claim. But this pain subsides -- kind of like a bee sting. The stinging tree on the other hand keeps you in pain for weeks/months. These woods were home to GIANT stinging trees, which means that they are about as tall as a 6-8 story building and they have leaves about the size of your hand (not my hand -- your hand) that are covered in silia containing a poison. The silia just need to brush your skin to become embedded and when this happens they will continue to sting until they come out. And it usually takes a long time for them to get out. They are too tiny to pull out with tweezers, although sometimes a bit of tape will do the trick. Temperature changes aggravate the exposed area even more, so showers -- both hot and cold -- are extremely uncomfortable. But you must be thinking, “ if the leaves of a giant stinging are located 6 stories up into the air they can't be much danger to people, right?” No, no, you silly American; these leaves fall to the ground and their silia continue to be capable of stinging you for 100 years after they fall. That's right, dead leaves that want to hurt you are hanging out all over the ground, crumbling up and disgusing themselves as innocent rubbish. What kind of place is this where even the leaves are out to get you?

Then there is the ominous bush turkey; who won't bite but will steal your lunch. I may have mentioned bush turkeys before. They are black, about two feet long, have a red face and a yellow hangy neck. They creep around looking for things to steal and bring them back to the mound that they build out of leaves and sticks and flipflops (or thongs or pluggers or whatever you'd like to call them). They make a noise that sounds like "HHMMMMMM". They can't really fly but they do jump and manage to get up into trees, especially ones that have plastic bags containing ham sandwiches tied to them, but their balance isn't so hot so occasionally they fall out of the trees. Their thievery doesn't end with food products as we discovered when Martin informed Cameron "Turkey steal you cigarette." And sure enough, a bush turkey had run off with the whole box.


Bush turkey


Refilling my waterbottle in a creek. Tasted and looked like perfect bottled water.

Pulling out lantana is not so much fun so we managed to entertain ourselves with a hike up a dry creek bed one day, a hike along the edge of a wet creek another day, and a hike to a waterhole with a waterfall to go for a swim on a third day. Only Cameron, Maxine and I went out to the waterhole, and we arrived to find that we had it completely to ourselves, which Maxine commented would be impossible to find in England.

When we wrapped up in Kennelworth, on Friday, we headed back into Brisbane. After checking on facebook and my Morton Island plans for the weekend I joined Cameron and his friend Amanda at Amanda's apartment in Fortitude Valley. It was great to chat with a few Australians on a level that wasn't restricted by their tourguide or teamleader status…

OK I am tired and so this post will have to be continued at a later date.

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Do you have the kitchen sink in there?

There is a sign along the side of the highway as you enter Brisbane (pronounced briz bin) that says "Brisbane - Australia's most livable city." Who was in charge of writing taglines that day? Debbie Downer?

For the last 4 weekends I have arrived in Brisbane on Friday or Saturday and left on Monday. Brisbane is the largest city outside of Melbourne that I have been to in Australia so far. Cairns was a "city" but the downtown (or CBD as they call it) is small and exists pretty much only for tourists. And everything outside of Cairns CBD is really just a large suburb. So arriving in Brisbane for the first time on Saturday October 4, I was greeted with familiar city sounds and sites for the first time in over 2 months. Brisbane is still pretty small as cities go but it has experienced a great deal of growth over the last 10-15 years.

When I arrived in Brisbane on the 4th I was traveling with Jess and Alex, the 22 year old English girls that I originally met in 1770 and had traveled to Fraser Island with. After parting ways with the rest of our Fraser Island group, Jess, Alex and I went to Noosa for one night and then continued on to the Australia Zoo near Gimpy (yes, there is a town called Gimpy). We brought all our luggage with us to the zoo and locked it up in lockers for the day.

Australia Zoo, is the "Home of Steve Irwin, Crocodile Hunter." This is where many of Irwin's crocs live as well as plenty of animals with pockets and spikes, and venom, and crazy wacko names. There were of course plenty of kangaroos, wallabies, koalas and lizards. There were cassowaries and dingoes, emus and wombats, tasmanian devils and every one of the 10 most poisonous snakes. There were non native species like camels, otters, elephants and american alligators (probably just for the sake of comparison to the ginormous salties). We went to see the croc show at the Crocoseum where in addition to hand feeding the crocodiles chunks of meet, they also released all kinds of colorful and huge tropical Australian birds. There is no roof on the Crocoseum so the birds really could have just flown away. But they circled in and out and around and all came back to their trainers. I used the $41 from the 50/50 the New York Caresers held on behalf of my trip went to pay for my ticket to visit the home of these crazy marsupials. Thanks guys! I heart animals with pockets!




I didn't technically need to be in Brisbane for another week but I decided that it would be more fun to go to the zoo with Jess and Alex and spend the weekend with them in the city than to venture on my own again. Plus, the Canadian and English guys from our Fraser Island trip were living in Brisbane for another 2 weeks and we'd made plans to go out with them on Sunday. Turns out we were super tired by the time we arrived on Saturday and just spent the evening uploading pictures and checking email. The boys had been at a music festival for the day and when they called around 10 to see if we would want to come out, we sillily passed on the offer to save our energy for the following day. What we should have foreseen was that the boys would been in worse shape on Sunday and would therefore back out on those plans. Boys! But the 3 of us made it out to the Normanby Hotel (an old hotel turned into a bar) anyway and had a good time.

I parted ways with Jess and Alex on Monday morning. They were continuing further south and I headed back north a bit to a town called Mooloolaba (pronounced MOO lu la ba). Since I was backtracking I couldn't use my Cairns to Sydney Greyhound pass or I would run out of kilometers about 100k short of Sydney and they'd have to chuck me off the bus into the bush.

So instead I took regular Brisbane area public transportation. This involved taking the train to a bus. Brisbane's transportation system is pretty good. And it's very new, easy to use, clean and not crowded. As I boarded the bus to the hostel with all my gear, a woman who I believe was in her late 70s asked me, "do you have the kitchen sink in there?" I chatted with this woman for the bus ride and it turned out that she was born in England but had been living in Oz since she was about 10. She has some grandchildren who are now back living in England (Who knows why!) To keep in touch with them she has a small device about the size of my fold up keyboard when it is open (like 10 inches by 4 inches) and she can type out emails and send them via cell service... just like me. I showed her my phone and keyboard. Funny that the only person I've encountered in my travels who is able to send emails remotely like myself is a woman in her 70s. Love it.

Mooloolaba is a bit off the normal backpacker track. There is only one hostel and many of the people there were in town to find work as strawberry pickers. They get picked up at like 6:30 am and pick until about noon, but after that it is too hot so they send everyone home. They get paid by the amount that they pick and average is about $50 in a 5 hour day. For those who are thinking that this is strange that travelers are working as strawberry pickers, here is the deal. Australia does not directly border any country... especially any developing country with people who are willing to do manual labor for very little pay. Therefore, there is a constant shortage of people to work in agriculture jobs. The solution is that jobs that in America would frequently be filled by Mexicans and Central Americans, in Australia are filled by European, Asian and American travelers in their 20s. These people are often college educated and come from middle class backgrounds but are desperate for some quick cash without commitment in order to fund their journeys. You must have a working holiday visa in order to do this work (that is the visa I have) but other than that you can usually show up in Mooloolaba, or Bundaberg or Bowen or any of the many other base locations for agri work and make arrangements to start picking capsicums, or mangos, or pineapples, within a day or so and quit whenever the trauma of the heat, the thorns and the repetition conquers your psyche. As an added incentive, any traveler who does 3 months of agricultural work can get an extension on their visa to stay for a 2nd year.

I stayed in Mooloolaba from Monday through Thursday nights. It was a pretty quiet week. I didn't make much of an effort to make friends because I was really hoping for some time to myself to read on the beach and wander around and keep things inexpensive. However I did have one adventure that week -- in the mall. On Thursday it was cloudy and cool so I decided to go to the mall so that I could see a movie, buy a new shirt or two (clothes get worn out quickly when you wear the same things several times a week), and find a new book to read.

Well it turns out that in Australia I look like a criminal. I was taking my sweet time in a H&M type store called Supre. I was debating a lot because when you have to carry everything you own on your back, and you aren't earning any money, you don't want to make any rash purchasing decisions. Anyway, the store employees didn't seem to think that my slow method of shopping was as innocent as I did, and they suspected me of shopping lifting. They told mall security that they thought I might have put clothes on under my clothes in the dressing room. Fair enough, considering my speed and the number of times I went in there... but if they had used their brains it would have only taken one glance at me to realize the absurdity of this since I was wearing a WHITE TANK TOP... the kind where the only thing I could hide behind it would be a neutral colored bra. Or maybe a pair of stockings. And since this store didn't carry either of those items, there wasn't anything I could have gotten in there that wouldn't be just as obvious as writing thief on my face. But even so, the mall security guy took me to his little booth and made me empty out my bags. Amongst my wallet and cell phone and sunglasses was my white sweatshirt, which thankfully has permanent dirt stains on the sleeves, my plastic box with my sandwich for lunch and my water bottle. Maybe these items weren't helping my case since they made it look like I was a bum in need of a day of shoplifting. But after pointing out the white-tank-top aspect of the ridiculousness of this scenario to Mr. Mall Security Guard, he agreed that I was just a traveler with whole lot of time on my hands and sent me on my way strip-search free.

And that was the end of my time in Mooloolaba.

Leaving Australia zoo.


Can someone tell me what this sign means?

Everybody eats.

I just ate a cup of fruit pulp. Sounds pretty gross but it is really just frozen pieces of fruit put into this machine that churns it up real fast and pumps it out looking like icecream. It was quite good but some hot fudge, or even Nutella would have made it better.

I bet you don't even know what Nutella is. It is a brand name for hazelnut spread...like peanut butter but made from hazelnuts instead of peanuts. It is dark brown and so it looks like chocolate and also manages to taste like chocolate. It is as common around here as a topping for toast as butter. Another common toast topper is vegemite. Don't know about that one either? In england it is known as marmite. Oh wait, you wouldn't know it by that name either. Vegemite is a vegetable extract turned into a paste. It looks the same as hazelnut spread but tastes VERY different. I have not actually tried vegemite out here since I had a lovely introduction to it during the New York Cares Staff Day blind fold taste test in July 2007 which was rigged to favor the english staff members (How can you guess a food you've never tasted or even heard of, escpecially while gagging? Haha, just kidding, Mel!)


Anyway, it seems people either hate or love vegemite. But enough people despise it that the crew of Spank Me used it as a punishment for breaking the rules of the boat. Any plastic bags, papers, beer cans, cigarettes, clothing, etc blows or slides overboard, becoming a death trap for turtles and dolphins and you receive a vegemite fine -- a spoonful of vegemite to be eaten by itself. Stand on the stairs and block traffic -- vegemite fine. Put on Jack Johnson or U2-- vegemite fine. Knock over the skipper's coffee -- vegemite fine. Wave to your friends while snorkeling using the universal distress signal -- vegemite fine and a very angry wet crew. Anyway, those few that do enjoy the vegemite claim it is best on toast with butter. I've also seen it with eaten with butter AND melted cheese.

Speaking of butter or margarine, it has recently come to my attention that the whole world puts margarine on their sandwiches except for maybe me. Am I crazy? No one in NJ does this, right? NY? The whole east coast? Have I forgotten? The aussies do it, the europeans (all kinds) do it, even the canadians do it. If you purchase a sandwich it will have butter. I don't get it. Aren't there enough other flavors on your sandwich that you don't need butter too? On the last day of our fraser island trip we had no more margarine left. I said, "No more butter, now you all have to eat your sandwiches like americans!"

The grocery stores here are like scaled down versions of our. Makes you realize really how much excess we have. In Australia you can find anything you might want. You just might not find it in every single store, or in 17 different varieties. Unless we are talking about kitkats... they have tons of different kinds of kitkats. There is a cookies and cream kitkat that is amazing. Cookies are called biscuits, unless they are chocolate chip, in which case they are cookies. There is a "biscuit" here called a Tim Tam. It is sort of a square chocolate covered waffer with an oreo like cream on the inside. Other than Tim Tams I have been too impressed with the cookie selection. There are a lot of plain type cookies that are type people like to dip in tea. They do "tea" here, like england.

I still can't believe how many people have watched me make a sandwich and put jelly on top of my peanutbutter and say, "Peanut butter AND jam!? That's weird." I had no idea PBJ was really so american. I mean I knew it was a quintessental American food but I would have thought the idea would be so simple that it would easily spread. It's even more of a shocker to see how many people think that the combination is gross. I mean I'm sure they have sung about "peanutbutter jelly time"...

The fries here are called chips and the chips are called crisps, unless the fries are the big fat kind, then they are called wedges or if they come from McDonalds then they are called fries. There is a sandwich at McDonalds right now that comes with avocado. I got a breakfast wrap with avocado. Are they adding avocado at home too or is this just because the avocados here are abundant and perfect? There is also a limited edition sandwich called the McAustralia. In case you can't make it out in the picture, the description says, "Traditional damper bun, 100% Aussie beef, premium bacon, juicy pineapple, and bbq sauce."

Oh but back to those chips fries crisps. They have meat flavored potato chips. I mean bbq flavored is one thing. But there are chicken crisps, and roast beef crisps and steak crisps. Apparently these are also common in Europe. Do we have this and I just not noticed? I was quite amused to discover this snack.


There is one ingenious item that has been a regular in my diet. They make small single serving cans of tuna in a flavored sauce. These are awesome for a traveler because it means you can make a sandwich out of just the loaf of bread and the can of tuna (both of which travel and store well) without needing an mayonnaise or anything else to flavor the sandwich. You can also make a salad and add a can of tomato basil tuna and you won't need to buy any salad dressing because the sauce with the tuna is enough for the whole salad. This is also crucial since you can buy a single serviing of salad dressing and since the remaining bottle would have to be refrigerated, which is not an option on long bus rides and days when your bag is locked up in a locker at the zoo.



-Bell peppers are called capsicums.
-Bagels are almost non existant.
-The closest thing to a tostito is a plain dorito.
-Pizzas only come in small sizes, ie personal pizzas or dominos type pizzas. I have yet to see a large slice of pizza.
-Peanut butter is not as good.
-Granola bars suck.
-Organic is hard to find. (I miss kashi)
-All the produce is perfect and delicious (maybe this is just compared to JC).
-Ground beef is called mince.
-Dishes referred to as curry are quite common and are not what I would think of as curry expect that they are spicy.
-The bloomin onion was invented by Outback and exists only at Outback.
-Ketchup is often called sauce.
-Salad dressing is often called sauce.
-Cheddar cheese is sometimes called tasty cheese and sometimes called cheddar cheese and i've yet to figure out the difference.
-People will put cheddar cheese on their spaghetti dishes.
-There is no "american" cheese.
-The english love their beans on toast and spaghetti on toast, and although that idea is quite foreign in the US, you can find it on menus in Australia... along with plenty of fish and chips.
-I haven't yet been able to find any black beans... just baked beans, red kidney beans, and chickpeas.
-Raisins are called sultanas.
-I think coronas taste different, but there is no reason why, since they are all bottled in Mexico.
-There is no hershey chocolate. But there are many varieties of Cadbury and kitkats, and anything made by mars.


- Burger King is Hungry Jacks.
- Pretzels are not easy to find.

I've given up taking the nutritional value of foods into account when making my purchases. I consider the price, I consider the protein to carbohydrate ratio in my meal, I consider the potential leftovers and if I can hold on to them until my next meal; but if I turn the package over, the nutritional information means nothing. This is because most items don't list calories, they list energy using kilajewels (kj) I believe. I have no scale on which to judge this measurement. And everything seems to have more fat than I am used to seeing on the package. At first I thought the unit was different for this as well but then I remember we also measure our fat and protein in grams. It probably always seems higher because there are not so many low fat and lite varieties for food here.

I have heard that Australia recently passed the US for the fattest nation. And yet people keep asking me"is everyone in America fat?" Dude, are you looking at me? If EVERYONE was fat, and I walked around looking like this, don't you think I'd be reduced to a pancake by now? And so I carefully explain that Australia actually now has a higher percentage and so if they walk around on the street in Australia they can assume to see a similar sort of ratio of fat to thin in America.

Speaking of pancakes... Australians love their pancakes. I even saw a pancakes stand in the food court at the mall in Maroochydor. But they seem to like them with things like lemon and peanut butter and jam on top. Not with syrup. Or maybe syrup is just to expensive to be included in a free backpacker pancake breakfast.

I probably average about $13 a day on food. Many hostels have free breakfast -- which is really just toast. But when it is available I always eat it. Some hostels also have a $5 meal each evening (one option only) available for about 1 hour. Common $5 meals would be barbeque (sausages, onions and potatos), pasta, pizza, chicken snitzel, or burritos. I have one square plastic box that I frequently carry around with a sandwich in it for lunch -- that is whenever I have access to ingredients for making a sandwich. However, my major weakness to keeping the food budget in check is icecream. Gelato, frozen yogurt, sundaes and even fruit pulp that looks like icecream is everywhere, and I just can't resist.

Sand in places you didn't know existed

Today is the 8 week anniversary of my arrival in Australia. It will be another 9 weeks until I arrive in Melbourne to settle for a bit.

In the last week I have been involved in several conversations about how all of us travelers are perhaps the luckiest people on earth. And how we don't understand why more people, specifically Americans, don't take advantage of life, youth, freedom and their two legs and get the hell out to here or there or anywhere.

The night I was leaving 1770, I was sitting outside, writing the previous post, at the best hostel I have been to yet (Cool Bananas) and I met Dan and Tim, from New Jersey! Eight hours, a few beers, and a dinner of bangers and mash later we were still sitting at the same table discussing our journey's -- where we'd been, why we decided to come to Australia, and how it all compares to our home state. We discovered that we have a mutual friend -- a guy I knew in college and they knew from their hometown. It was such a relief to speak to people who knew, amongst other things, what I meant when I used the acronym TCNJ. But they were getting on a 2am bus to Noosa at the end of those 8 hours and so it was time for another round of goodbyes.

I moved on to Rainbow Beach the next day with Jess and Alex (both from England), and Andrea (from Switzerland) who I'd met at Cool Bananas. We were all going to Rainbow Beach to travel out to Fraser Island, the largest sand island in the world. Fraser Island also has a very unique eco system in that it is virtually the only place that rainforest grows in sand. Minus a few paved parking areas inside fancy resorts, there are no paved roads on the island. The island is only accessible via ferry -- the kind that carries vehicles. Your vehicle must also be 4WD since you will travel the length of the island by driving on the beach. For a package price, a hostel called Dingos in Rainbow Beach arranges for rentals of 4x4s, sets you up in groups of about 10-11, provides tents and other camping equipment, purchases food for 3 days and 2 nights, and gives you a map and some tips. The tips include: how to drive on sand, how to avoid being one of the 300 vehicles that get swept away into the sea each year, how to finding places to camp, and how to avoiding getting eaten by dingos.

Jess, Alex, Andrea and I decided to stay together as a group and quick grabbed a group of 4 guys -- Tim and Josh from England, and Ford and Skylar from Canada -- to join us. We were later assigned 3 more girls; Yolanda from Holland, Anne from Denmark and Barbara from Switzerland. Amongst our group we had 2 nurses, a paramedic/firefighter, a mechanic, and even two lawyers. In the case of any emergency, we'd be covered.



4 trucks left from Dingos Tuesday morning with 10-11 people in each. I think my favorite part of the trip was just driving around in the truck on the sand "highway". Since it was high tide we had to take an inland path on the southern part of the island the first day. This was also made of sand but went through the jungle rather than along the beach.


The first afternoon we stopped at Lake Mackenzie -- a freshwater lake with water clear enough to see through to the bottom in many places. By 2:30 we headed out to drive an hour up the island to a shipwreck in the area where we'd been advised to look for camping. All 4 trucks met -- although our team -- the A team -- arrived first and choose the spot... all others followed. This was to be a theme for the trip. The A-team was pretty much always first, fastest, and most efficient.



Before the sun had set, 16 tents had been set up, trucks and tarps were in place to block the wind off the ocean, steaks and potato salad had been cooked and eaten, the beer and goon had been opened and our 43 person beach party had begun.

On day two, we took our time packing up camp because the tides would not allow us to drive until late morning. We boiled some eggs and introduced a few europeans to peanut butter and jelly sandwiches while we waited. Next stop was Eli Creek, where you can hop in the shallow and again insanely clear water and float along with the current (perhaps practicing a crocodile immitation) out to the beach.

After Eli, we headed up to Indian Point, where we climbed a few rocks up to a place where you can see the ocean on two sides and can frequently spot sealife. I was able to see a sting ray, 2 dolphins and an eagle's nest. This spot was another one of the many places that I keep thinking, "this is so beautiful, nothing could top this." And then inevitably, a day or two later something does.





We traveled back south along the island to find a camping spot for the 2nd night and again it was the A team that did the scoping out and the choosing of the location. Before we settled on a spot we had to dig the truck out of a few sand drifts but we beat out the other teams anyway. One truck never found us that night and had to camp on their own. Too bad for them because the site, the food and the party was even more memorable... or I should say NOT so memorable... for some.




By day 3, our hygiene had deteriorated pretty badly. But since the tides again did not allow us to drive in the morning we walked our stinky behinds 2 km up the beach and 2 km inland to Lake Wongai. The shore of one side of the lake is a huge and very steep hill of sand -- which of course taunts anyone with testosterone to run down and dive into the water.

After our hour long walk back from the lake we sat down for a lunch of eat-any-random-leftover-you-can-find with a side of sand. Then we headed back for the ferry to Rainbow Beach.

It was another awesome time. I have been really lucky so far with my random groups on trips like this. The people can make or break the experience. Our group was so much fun that I have decided to continue to travel with Jess and Alex for a few more days. And we will meet up with the 4 boys in Brisbane on Sunday as well. They've all been in Australia for almost a year and so their visas are coming to an end. Skylar and Josh will be heading home, at least for a little while, and Ford and Tim will go to Southeast Asia for the next 4 months or so.

Its addicting this traveling thing. Especially when you can travel and then work just enough to fund more travel and then travel a bit more. I might be hooked.

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