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Tales from Down Under In early '99, I took a two week solo trip to Australia. Most of the time when I travel, I dread returning home; you'll see it manifested in my slow trudge up the jetway on my return flight. When it was time to leave Australia, they had to deport me, drag me handcuffed, screaming, clawing at the trodden red carpet of the Qantas terminal, strap me in my seat, stuff a VB into my then uncuffed hand, and order me to stay there under penalty of a swift punt from the Kicking Boot. OK, not really, but you get the idea: I think I found my ideal country. And here are a couple e-mails I sent home to tell a few friends about it. The first message, from Sydney, NSW... G'day Mates- Some tales from down under, where I've been enjoying myself for the past few days (and right now waiting for the weather to clear up)... Yeah, it's a long-ass flight here, made even longer. I arrived
here after about 16 hours in the plane; my original journey was supplemented
by a few hours because of an unexpected stopover. After just getting
to sleep for a couple hours, I was awakened by our friendly Qantas pilot
asking if there was a doctor on the plane. A woman apparently was
having some sort of problem with her pacemaker. The pilot then dumped the
plane's fuel and we landed in Honolulu, where the unlucky lady was wheeled
off the plane. After about an hour on the ground, we were off again.
Upon belated arrival in Sydney, the
So now I can say I've been to Hawaii, too. I'm staying in Bondi Beach, a community kind of like Redondo or a cleaned-up version of Venice Beach. The travel agent set me up at a Best Western... or at least an Aussie version of one. Not the cleanest or newest place (I'd probably categorize it as low-end Motel 6, if Motel 6 featured shredded comforters, burns on the carpet and mildew farms) but functional and close to the beach, bus lines, and most importantly, good pubs. Interestingly enough, in Oz, a hotel usually is a bar, and sometimes has guest rooms. A pub is a pub, but also occasionally has guest rooms. Either place, VB and XXXX (a lager, not a deluxe porn flick) aplenty. The evening of my arrival, I went to meet up with the Sydney Thirsty Thursday HHH in a community called Mosman. A combination of buses and ferries got me to the start with about 2 minutes to spare -- without the help of the improvised directional committee on the ferry, who were able to get me to one block from the start, I might have ended up, well, elsewhere. The run was good and scenic, through a Corona Del Mar-type community, across beaches and behind the wealthy folks homes. The HHH is really friendly to visitors & virgin runners, and paired up us new guys with seasoned "buddies", hashers of the opposite sex who were loosely responsible for our well-being. At the on-in, my buddy and I were expected to have dug up enough scandalous dirt on each other to present to the group. I think we both failed in that regard, so fabrication had to suffice. The on-on-on was at the Buena Vista hotel (yep, not a place with rooms). I met a guy named Ian "Hillclimber" (or something to that effect) who knew Cochise and Willy from Saigon. Yesterday I took a trek through Sydney, kind of loosely based on a walking tour recommended in the Lonely Planet book, but with much improvisation to make up for thirstiness, etc. Sydney is incredibly clean for such a large city (even the buses and the two-story subway cars). I heard the Opera House described as looking like "several turtles engaging in acts of sexual congress." Quite fitting. Then, so as to avoid the standard tourist trap harbor cruises (where I might be stuck on board for up to 2 hours and might actually learn something), I took the slow ferry over to Manly, across the mouth of the bay to the ocean. Quite a scenic ride. Sydney's like a warmer version of San Francisco, scenery-wise. Gambling, in the form of video poker machines, is widespread and legit in the "hotels." In a most non-Vegas-like manner, AU$1 (about US$0.60) gets you 100 credits, which you can penny-ante up one at a time, or in increments up to a ghastly AU$5. So while playing around in the less-than-a-cent region, I hit a royal flush, which earned me a grand total of... AU$5. I'm waiting for the weather to clear up and I'm going to spend some time in the water this afternoon. This evening I'm meeting up with some of the guys from the HHH and tomorrow, off to Cairns for scuba on the Great Barrier Reef. More tales to come (if I can find another reason to go inside!) The place I'm staying in Cairns is called "Tuna Towers" ... there's got to be story there. -Erik the Bushie ... and its sordid conclusion from Cairns, QLD... G'day again mates- With a diminishing hangover, I'm presently enjoying Cairns, in the tropical north of Queensland. I'm now an official, PADI Gold Certified Open Water Scuba diver (or "bubblehead," as our course instructors prefer). No more sneaking around Cozumel in search of shady dive operators; I now have the official credentials to go down with the fishies. And thanks to nights like the last, I no longer need a weight belt either -- the sheer mass of my liver alone easily pulls me to the bottom. The past week has gone past in a saltwater and VB-soaked frenzy. This started with an evening out with members of the Sydney HHH and their mates, not a lilly-livered bunch for sure. After a picnic under the foot of the Sydney bridge, we headed to a pub there in Milson's point... then to a place called Blueberries in North Sydney... and so on. The effects of liver distention were just starting to materialize. On Sunday I picked a later flight to Cairns. That 9am one just didn't fit well into my schedule after my 5am return to Bondi. None of the change fee BS you get in the US when you want to change flights: the request was met with a cheerful "No worries, mate." Cairns is a town nestled between tropical hillsides and a bay. If you saw "The Thin Red Line," first, you have my sympathies. Second, they filmed much of it just north of Cairns. The place I'm staying (on both sides of my scuba trip) is clean
(save the occasional cuca) and nice, especially for a
In Queensland they have a really strong accent, almost like that "Freshen ya drink gov'nah" woman on The Mr. Burns' Casino episode of the Simpsons. After a late night with some nice folks from Denmark, Scotland, and other points beyond, groovin' to Chef's Salty Balls at a place called the Woolshed, I struggled off for diving school. This was on Superbowl Monday, as it works out to be in Australia. Our instructor Murray is a really funny guy, but was also thorough and professional, so in the end, nobody perished. The dive class went beyond the 2-hour resort course exercises, but was also interspersed with videos, equipment sales pitches, and other chances for naps. Wednesday really early we boarded a ship that was a little small for our 25-person contingent and headed out to the Great Barrier Reef. I'd gladly pitch the merits of Dramamine II Non Drowsy Formula, as many of my bubblehead mates found themselves barking at the seals until we reached the protected and fairly flat waters of the reef. We spent 3 days aboard the creaking MS Kalinda. The ocean is warmer than 80F and chock full of sea life. I swam next to big sea turtles, and saw rays, eels and sharks. We saw the toothy guys on our night dive, which wasn't half as freaky as I thought it would be. Murray told us that sharks are attracted by the light sources and get kind of a deer-caught-in-the-headlights stare until they finally thump into the light source. It was kind of funny to watch people gingerly shine their lights on the two 1.5m reef sharks, and then shine the light elsewhere, usually on their diving buddy. Upon our return to terra firma, Pro Dive put together a graduation
party for us at one of the finer local watering holes. Actually,
it was more like a Get-The-Yank-Drunk celebration. My "second prize"
for the photo contest involved a drink called a Flaming Lamborghini.
More precisely, it was a *series* of drinks with that name, consisting
of a glass of flaming rum (sucked through a straw), followed by a shot
of curacao, followed by an absolutely horrifying combination of tequila,
Another late night of revelry at the Woolshed ("where the men are men and the sheep are nervous") and now here I sit at an internet counter with one hand on the mouse and the other on my head. In my final few days here, I have a trip planned to the rainforest. Other than that, I think I'll be drinking lots of water. -E There was a lot
more to that whole adventure that I described here. There's a stack
of photos to match (wanna see what a Flaming Lamborghini really looks like?
wanna see what Erik looks like immediately after sucking one down?).
Plus answers to life's pressing questions, (like how do they prefer their
jugs in Queensland?), how an unlucky kangaroo makes for a lucky man, as
well as dijeridoos and dijeridon'ts.
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