myrainasia

To be honest, I missed the first half of the game (Adelaide is 13.5 (yes you read that correctly) hours ahead of NY) and did not feel like racing out at 9 am in the morning to sit in a bar. I arrived at the end of half time (10:30 ish?) and discovered I hadn’t missed much. Third quarter was a snooze, but final Q was great! So I guess most of my friends and family did not get to sleep until quite late. The guy sitting next to me was from Boston- he just barely managed to avoid sobbing out loud at the end.

Really missed my annual Super Bowl party- Johnny, Frank, Bob- if any of you are reading this, I’ll see you next year. No New Yorkers in the bar but there was a batch of people rooting for the Giants- actually they were rooting against the Patriots, so I wasn’t the only one cheering when the Giants won.

So I imagine some of you are reading this to hear about Australia. Don’t want to disappoint a large (but extremely silent and unresponsive) group of followers.

I finished Tasmania with a trip to Mt. Wellington (their highest mountain), a visit to the Salamanca market, and an Australian BBQ for Australia Day. The views from Mt. Wellinton were stupendous and the best part is that you can get on a bus and it goes directly to the top- no hiking involved. The worst part of the trip was that it took me a long time to gingerly edge my way out onto the lookout platforms and we only had 30 minutes at the top, so I missed a few spots. (For those of you bothering to view my photos, that’s probably not a great loss.) The Salamanca market is a don’t miss in Hobart. Salamanca is a restored area by the waterfront that’s now full of restaurants and chichi shops, and the market is a large food/crafts/Tasmanian goods street fair held every Saturday. It seemed at the start to be a pretty cool kind of street fair; about halfway through it seemed like a street fair. The BBQ was with friends of Vicki and Richard and was laid back and very pleasant- and no shrimps were thrown on the barbie.

The next day I made it back to Melbourne and this time managed to settle in peaceably, so Melbourne and I are now equal. Melbourne is a gorgeous city and I did my usual trot all around- an activity which most other tourists don’t seem to understand at all. I try and explain that I just like walking around cities, but this usually meets with blank stares.

Then I had what is becoming my usual personal crisis about how to get to my next stop. Australia is way bigger than it looks on the Mercator (I think that’s the word ) map of the world that all of us grew up on. I believe it’s larger than the US (42 hours from north to south and I have no idea what the east to west distance is). So traveling by bus (like I did in Europe and South America) is not really feasible. (Well, it’s feasible, but I ain’t doing it.) Traveling by train is equally time consuming and not particularly cheap. Many tourists take the train as a tourist activity. Considering that there is apparently not much to see for looong stretches of time, I just couldn’t see it. That leaves traveling by plane- many cheap flights to be had, but still it adds up, or taking a multi-day tour to do the sightseeing along the way.

Let us pause for a moment here to discuss the multi-day tours. Most of them are aimed at backpackers, and the ones that are not are out of my financial range. That leaves the backpacker tours. Ahem. The great joys include sleeping in the great outdoors or in hostels, getting up at 6 am every day, and hiking for 6 to 8 km (4-6 miles?) daily. (Did anyone reading this think Myra for any of the activities in that sentence?)

So, one of the don’t miss sightseeing trips out of Melbourne is a tour of the Great Ocean Road. The GOR runs southwest out of Melbourne and there are a number of tours that run the GOR over 3 or 4 days, ending in Adelaide (which is where I wanted to go next). But then I found a $42 fare on Tiger Airways and wimped out with a 1 day tour and that was just perfect. The GOR is as beautiful as they say, although I do believe that much of the scenery was similar to that in NZ. We saw koalas in the wild, which was kind of cool. One of the rock formations you can see in Australia-3 is called The Twelve Apostles. You will know it when you see it, but don’t try to count to 12, many have washed away.

Not done yet with the touring story… Adelaide is a pretty little town, although I don’t think I would call it a don’t miss type of place. From Adelaide I want to go north to Ayers Rock (Uluru) and onto Alice Springs- pretty much the only things to see/do in central Australia. Qantas has a monopoly on those 2 locations and all of the sleeping options in Ayers Rock are run by 1 company on behalf of the Aborginal owners, so the prices are kind of outrageous. This left- yes, you guessed it!- a backpackers’ tour.

Tomorrow morning at 6:15 am (something else that fails to scream out my name) I leave with Adventure Tours for a 6 day, 5 night trip through the outback to Alice Springs via Ayers Rock. I did opt for the single room ensuite (budget accomodations) upgrade, but that’s for the first 3 nights. The last 2 nights will find me sharing a tent- I plan to skip the sleeping in a swag (as I understand it this is a little single tent like thing), especially after the girl who signed me up told me the part she didn’t like so much was when the dingos come right up to you. She assured me they weren’t dangerous. I also hear the first night dinner is kangaroo- I’m advised it’s very good. I know this is not a joke because kangaroo, along with crocodile and emu, can be found on menus here.

Stay tuned for an interesting update from Alice Springs!

Just in case people are worried that I’ll lose my spoiled pampered NYer edge, I am contemplating spending a few nights in Club Med Lindemann Island. That’s in the Whitsunday Islands, midway down the northern part of the east coast between Cairns (in the north) and Brisbane (pretty much dead center of the east coast). I will be flying to Cairns from the Alice (that’s what the Ozzies call it) and was planning to stop in the Whitsundays after (many recommendations for the Whitsundays).

Since I’m already into this line of thought I may as well finish up. The route from Club Med will be Brisbane, Byron Bay (supposed to be very pretty and full of ex-hippie types) and then I will spend the last week in Sydney before flying out on March 1.

Phew- that was a long entry. I’m so exhausted I will have to head off to the beach now. Yesterday it was 32 (somewhere in the low 90s I believe) and today promises to be beautiful as well.

Love to all and tune in next week.

Having spent the past week in Tasmania I am happy to report that I am feeling much better now. Most of the credit goes to Vicki and Richard (and Elizabeth, Olivia and Charlotte) who welcomed me to Hobart, picked me up at the airport, fed me homecooked meals, drove me around to all of the big tourist sites, the list goes on, and gave me some needed TLC after my Melbourne debacle. Immense thanks!!!! (For those who are wondering, we met Vicki and Richard on our cruise in Russia)

After the irritation of Jetstar and the misery of Melbourne, Tasmania has been a delight. Much more laid back, no Australian Open in town, really lovely downtown, excellent weather (except for a crummy first day), and my funky little hotel which has a lot of character.

I have seen the big tourist sights, most important of which was Port Arthur, the second strike prison which was in operation from the 1830s to 1870s (I think I got that right) and has been (and continues to be) lovingly restored. Aside from leaving your loved ones and everything you knew, I’m not convinced that deportation to Australia was the worst punishment in the world for a prisoner in the 19th century. I don’t think prisons in the 19th century were great for anyone, and many people can trace their ancestors through significantly worse forms of immigration. But that’s enough controversy for this blog.

Vicki and I huffed and puffed our way (well, at least I did) to the lookout point over Wineglass Bay at Freycinet National Park (it was about 45 minutes up the mountain and I don’t care how many little kids ran right by us) but it was worth the view, as were the other views in Freycinet that were accessed by a 5 minute flat hike on a wooden path. You can actually see these photos pretty quickly if you go into Flickr. I am caught up with my downloading of photos so everything I talk about today is already viewable. Is everybody impressed?

On my first full day here, after going for a stroll in historic Richmond, I happened to mention that I did not realize Tasmanian Devils were real animals. Next thing I knew I was whisked off to a zoo/petting zoo/animal shelter where I saw real Tasmanian Devils (they’re dog-sized and very cute but I’m told they’re really nasty evil brutes when they fight), along with kangaroos, wallabys, emus, wombats (my favorites- really adorable), koalas, etc. etc. I got to feed the wallabys which I thoroughly enjoyed. (See pictures.)

Now you have gotten some of the high points of Tasmania. I leave on Sunday for Melbourne. The Open ends on Saturday and I already have my hotel booked, so keep your fingers crossed that this will be a happier experience. I have also read enough of Lonely Planet to realize that I will probably land in Sydney smack in time for Gay Mardi Gras. I think I will book my hotel in advance this time in order to avoid having to blog another “I hate” entry.

Final question- I can see that lots of people are looking at this blog. Don’t you people have any comments???

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