Tas-Mania

It always seems that every big adventure starts off with a colossal mishap. The morning I was set to embark on a week-long road trip around Tassie with three German girls (I'll get to that in a minute) was the first rainy day I'd had in a week on the island. The car we were supposed to hire came back in bad shape and there were no other automatics available so I wound up getting referred to another rental agency down the road. I picked up our dirt cheap car (only $33 a day, split four ways) and for the first time paid for insurance on a rental, thinking that bad things might happen over the course of a week of driving on the wrong side of the road around winding mountain highways and $2000 would be a lot to lose should something bad happen. When I was shown the '86 Toyota Corona that I would be driving around, I immediately regretted the decision. Let's put it this way, the car wouldn't be worth $2000 if there were forty $50 bills on the driver's seat. When I saw it, I asked if the car had power steering, to which the woman working there said, "You don't really notice a difference when you're on the road," to which I responded, "So you mean no?" And now, for those who have never driven a car without power steering, it's a better workout then a set of dumbbells. Parallel park an 86 Corona ten times a day and you can skip the gym. At first we couldn't get the trunk open, the clock wasn't digital (it was a clock face with minute and hour hands), and was all around a joy to drive

Now, as I log this little road trip, I'm going to create a couple separate entries so that you can see on the map the route I took. See all I do for you, faithful readers

First things first, a road trip with three girls is not nearly as glamorous as it sounds. Don't get me wrong, I loooove the ladies, I mean they rev my engines, but women do not belong on road trips. At least these ones anyway. The road trip was decidedly lacking in battle royales for shotgun, endless hours of discussions about sports and girls, heinous farting and all the other things that make road trips "road trips." We didn't even give the car a name (although I dubbed it Poncho. It needed a Mexican name, the only letters on the tags were CH and the car ran -- if you can call it's performance running -- like a Poncho). Bathroom breaks were pretty much hourly and would turn into half an hour ordeals. Mornings would consist of me getting ready and then waiting an hour. Plus the girls turned out to be unappreciative bitches. I could do nothing right and my driving was constantly called into question despite more than 1200 miles of incident-free driving in a week and every time the gas needle reached a quarter of a tank they started nagging me about when I was planning on stopping for petrol. If this is what married life is like (with just one girl, I'm not Mormon) then I might just have to stay single for a while longer. Next time I do a road trip with girls, I'm performing extensive background checks.

We started our week-long road trip through stunning nature the way every such trip does -- with a Cadbury chocolate factory tour. I'll give them this, Glenorchy's factory does it right. Two years ago I took a tour in Dunedin, New Zealand that was awful -- the samples were sparse and not good. This tour stuffs you so silly with chocolate that by the end you're not even disappointed they don't show you where they keep the oompa loompas. I just have a nagging feeling they give all the tour guides frontal lobotomies before they start working.

As we shot onto the open road after the tour the Corona started shimmying and shaking like an epileptic as I accelerated. It reminded me of my Canadian road trip with Josh two years back when we tried to crank Old Red -- his Toyota -- up to 100 but never made it when the car would violently spasm at about 90. The Corona also struggled to reach triple digits, but in this case I'm talking kilometers, not miles. We first drove east and then south to the Tasman Peninsula with a beautiful coastline and some cool rock formations on the cliffs that jut out to the ocean. While we were at the Remarkable Caves (which was just one cave, and not all that remarkable) we picked up a hitchhiker, Chris. He wasn't quite a hitchhiker since we all talked to him while he was hanging out enjoying the ocean scenery, but the guy was incredibly cool and I should've booted one of the Germans (their names are Nadine, Juliane and Judith if any of you care) in favor of him. Basically he's been wandering around Australia for a couple decades now and has had several newspaper articles written about him. On top of being a really friendly guy, the best part about him was he looked the role. His face was buried behind dark sunglasses and a bushy beard and his hands were as dirty and beat up as his bags.

From the Peninsula, we shot up the east coast on a beautiful drive along the water. The ocean is a perfect blue (think of Red's speech at the end of Shawshank, "I hope the Pacific is as blue as it is in my dreams") with dramatic cliffs and mountains as a backdrop. Although the sun set over the land, we were still treated to a spectacular sunset that splashed off the clouds and turned the sky a lovely mix of pink, purple and orange.

We stopped off in a really comfortable hostel in Bicheno, a town of 700 people, that was run by an awesome dread-locked bloke named Paul. Bicheno at night is actually very nice, a short walk to the beach allows you to get face to face with penguins coming back from the ocean and there's a blowhole that sprays water several meters high when the tide comes in.

The next morning we scooted down to the Freycinet Peninsula, home to Freycinet National Park. The park is famous for Wineglass Bay, a beautiful beach (and bay) with white sands, turquoise water and the bay forms a perfect crescent around it all. Sadly, you see so many pictures and postcards of the bay on pristine days that when you actually see it yourself, there's no way it can live up to the hype. On the walk from the lookout down to the bay we got our first glimpse of Australian wildlife as a wallaby hopped up next to us. As a crowd formed around it, an unbelievable conversation sprouted when someone saw something red dangling underneath the wallaby and everyone started commenting about how it was carrying a joey and that was the baby's tail. Ah, so sweet and innocent. Let's put it this way, that was a man baby, yeah. After chilling on the beach for a little we cut across to Hazards Beach, which for my money is just as nice as Wineglass Bay as far as beaches go, plus it's not nearly as touristy. All in all, we had a nice little five hour walk through the park.

We spent that night in St. Helen's, the nearest town to the Bay of Fires, which was named by one magazine as the second most beautiful beach in the world. Unfortunately we woke up to another rainy day and decided that if we were going to see the second most beautiful beach in the world, we'd do it properly and wait a day. We spent the day driving around the Blue Tier Reserve -- a nice rainforest with tall trees that looked very dramatic in the mist and rain and wallabies hopping along the road. We also checked out a few waterfalls that were nice, but nothing spectacular. On the plus side, I had to drive 12 kms of unpaved road (one way) to get to them. The next morning we were treated to a beautiful blue sky that made the Bay of Fires look fantastic, but I've got to wonder if there's only one beach better. What makes the beach so amazing though is the colors. The water is much like I described earlier, turquoise giving way to a rich blue. The sand is a perfect white and the rocks along the beach are covered in a speckling of red algae (or red something) that presumably gives the area its name. Overall, certainly worth the wait and forcing us (and by us I mean me) a manic drive across the state the next morning. And that's where this entry ends.

Slowing Down to Tassie Time

Clearly all I needed to do was moan and complain about the weather and someone would listen. As I walked out of the internet cafe I walked into sunshine -- not pure, not a cloud in the sky sunshine but it was sunshine nonetheless. The change in the weather allowed me to feel like less of a bum and explore the city a bit. Brisbane will never be on the same level as Sydney (not even close) but it is a nice little town. There's a nice pedestrian mall similar to Pitt St. in Sydney that contains mostly souvenir stores (not as good) but also is crammed in the middle with nice restaurants and pubs (a nice improvement on Sydney). If you cross through the pedestrian mall and over the bridge you get to a nice little section of town called South Bank. There's a nice walk that goes along the river and passes some restaurants and open park space. The highlight at the end of the walk is a manmade beach called the lagoon that gets absolutely jam-packed on the weekends. Brisbane also puts on a whole series of markets around the city during the weekends. I went to Eagle Markets with Sam (the English guy who I've been bumping into all along the East Coast) on Sunday -- the markets itself were nothing special, but it had a nice backdrop along the river.

That night I didn't bother venturing out of Birdee Num Num's (the hostel bar) to the main nightlife drag on Brunswick St because I learned my lesson from the night before and I had a good group of people to hang out with. Plus the hostel (which I dubbed the Captain Planet hostel because the floors were labeled Earth, Wind, Fire and Water and reception delivered the love -- their words. It makes perfect sense for Australia to love the show anyway because I've never seen a place -- North Carolina included -- so thoroughly embrace a good mullet) supplied me all the alcohol I could possibly want, simply for running a stack of their brochures to my hostel in Hobart. Free alcohol aside, it was a great night. I hung out with Sam and the whole group of seven or eight people we had built from roommates and other people as well as two Swedish girls, Bea and Adaleine, who were in my room in Byron. All the days and nights were more or less spent the same way in Brisbane. Walk around for a while in a different part of town during the day, get back for the pool competition at 3, play free pool for the rest of the day, eat dinner, debate when we should start drinking, start drinking. Although this sounds like nothing special, by the final day I didn't want to leave.

Alas, early Tuesday morning I left Brisbane and all the people I'd met along the East Coast for Hobart, Tasmania. Partly because it's Hobart, partly because my hostel is crap, things have slowed down considerably. Hobart itself is a really nice town. For one thing, it's not nearly as backpackery as the other places I've been in Australia, so it feels like the most authentically Australian town I've been in. The city is lined by a nice waterfront where most of the pubs and restaurants are located.

Central City Backpackers, though, has given me my hardest challenge for meeting people. The common area is large but arranged terribly for socializing -- there's a TV room, where everybody is too busy watching, and a bunch of couches where people sit around and read but not a single place to set up a card game or even just a circle to sit around and chat. It was a full day before I met anyone and those conversations were started around the "So have you not met anyone either" premise. And that brings me to another reason why I wouldn't recommend the place to anybody. Thursday was Australia Day, the nation's equivalent to Independence Day. Like in the US, Aussies use it as an excuse to not work and get pissed. Since backpackers like to throw themselves into the local culture, we were more than happy to not work and get pissed as well. The only thing was, nobody in the hostel knew what to do. When I asked at reception what I should do, the girls working at reception (the one highlight of the place -- all of them are exceptionally friendly) remarked that a lot of people had been asking the same thing. Since I mentioned that I had met nobody since I had been there, I told them they should organize some sort of pub crawl for everyone in the hostel to kill two birds with one stone.

Unbelievably the owner of the place put the keibosh on the idea shortly before we were set to leave because he didn't want his workers socializing with clients or some sort of bullshit like that, making Central City Backpackers the first hostel to neither promote nor facilitate the mass consumption of alcohol, and if anything do the opposite. We (two English girls Sarah and Laurelle, a Dutch girl Mendy and myself) instead wound up at another hostel, the Pickled Frog, which was putting on a barbecue and selling cheap drinks at its bar. They even went so far as to grill up sausages just for us and give us the discounted drinks. And that is why I have no problem giving them some free publicity on this spot. After leaving the Frog we went on a little pub crawl on the waterfront area called Salamanca until about 2 (or a full 12 hours after we started). Along the way I wound up meeting a girl who lives about 20 minutes away in New Jersey. You never know where you'll find them

Saturday morning I took a wander over to Salamanca Markets, the one thing Hobart is really renowned for. The best markets I'd been to in Australia had been in the Rocks, the historic district of Australia, and in terms of size and inability to walk at a pace faster than geriatric, Salamanca wins in a blowout. Like a standard market, they had stalls ranging from jewelry to books to clothing to food. And it was the food stalls where Salamanca came up woefully short. The whole idea behind these markets is that you can show up and not worry about lunch as you move from one free sample to another. Sadly, few of the stalls delivered. These people have to understand that just because I don't want to buy their food doesn't mean I don't want to eat it.

While the markets were a nice way to spend the morning, I was lost for ideas on how to spend the afternoon or evening. As I said, the hostel is very dull. At least tomorrow I embark on a week-long (or so) road trip around Tasmania, which if the postcards I've seen are any indication, should be amazing. Plus I'm sharing the car with three German girls, which shouldn't be all bad. Unless they decide they're bored of English.

Cheers

Who'll stop the rain

As I typed my previous entry I was watching overcast skies over Byron Bay hoping that the weather would eventually clear up so I could enjoy my final day there. With 20-20 hindsight, I should've been satisfied with overcast. A few hours after making that posting, the skies opened up and with the exception of a few hours here and there where it catches its breath it hasn't stopped raining since (four days and counting).

I was all set to have a nice casual night out with a bunch of my roommates for my last hurrah in Byron. The plan was to go out with English Marie (we also had a French Marie) and two Swedish girls, Bea and Analie, around 10:30 and then eventually meet up with a bunch of other people I had met along the coast since Byron is where people start diverting their routes somewhat. Sadly, at about 10:15 we had a nice little monsoon that was still going strong the next morning. It was at least as strong as the storm I got in Newcastle, but there was nary a petrol station to wander over to. Instead we had to call it a night.

The next morning I headed up to Surfers Paradise, which really isn't all that popular with surfers (there are better beaches that are short bus rides away apparently) and is not paradise -- at least not anymore. They might've paved paradise to put up a parking lot though. And high rise buildings, including the highest residential building in the world -- with the exception of every one in Nimbin, of course. Surfers developed such a reputation as a hot spot and party central that soon the town had to start jacking up real estate prices and wound up building it into a high-rise tourist trap with streets lined by shopping malls and crappy souvenir stores where you can get your fill of stuffed kangaroos and raunchy t-shirts. Aside from it being gaudy and tacky, I won't be too harsh on Surfers since I only got to see and do so much with one rain-soaked day.

I will say this much though, the nightlife is kind of overrated. I went to the Rose and Crown or Crown and Rose, some combination of the three words with a big group from my hostel. The only reason for going was we had free drinks for an hour, which wasn't entirely the case since we were dropped off 10 minutes late and the bar stopped the special 10 minutes earlier. The special was all well and good, but the club was pretty crap once the drinks actually cost money. The music, in a word, sucked and the place was filled what the English delightfully call 'muppets.' (And since you're asking, 'Dan, what's a muppet?' It's not quite a mop, not quite a puppet, but mannnnn...so to answer your question I don't know... Actually, a muppet is what we call a tool. I just like muppet more). Anyway, the upshot was we left the place at midnight and I don't feel the least bit bad about such a pathetic showing

Yesterday I got into Brisbane, and you wouldn't believe it, but it's been raining here too. Thankfully, the hostel has its own bar where I eat for free because I'm here for four nights and a bar that not only gives away free drinks and gives anyone staying there cheaper rates, but it also attracts a mostly Australian crowd. At least that makes it easier to ignore the rain.

And since this has been a short, and admittedly pretty dull entry a little bonus for all those reading this who don't know me...Travelpod asks people writing a blog to actually put in recommendations and what not into our stories so that random travelers perusing the blog can get some advice (as opposed to me just saying I woke up and made toast, then I walked around, then I ate dinner and went to sleep). I'll do Travelpod one better and give a better-than-Lonely-Planet review of the hostels I've stayed at in Oz. Don't say I never did anything for you

In Sydney, I stayed in the Jolly Swagman. I wasn't overly pleased with the location, simply because I'm not a huge fan of Kings Cross -- something to do with overrated clubs and overzealous prostitutes chasing you down the street. Aside from that and the unairconditioned rooms, the place is excellent. It's the most communal hostel I've been in and to borrow a Lonely Planet phrase, the staff is friendly and helpful. Except, they really are. For example, my friend Tom booked an East Coast package -- through the hostel -- that included 11 nights accommodation. The hostel staff sat with him for over an hour as he mapped out the whole trip and booked a hostel for each one of those nights.

In Newcastle I stayed in the Newcastle Backpackers. First off, the whole town is skippable. Second off, the hostel is nothing special. It has a nice pool, and that's about it. The kitchen is tiny, the common room is unbearably hot and both shut at 11 so there's nothing to do if you don't want to go out. You're either in a cramped 14-share with no bathrooms en suite or a four-share (same price) with bathroom en-suite minus a toilet. The sink is literally large enough for two faucets and it was next to impossible to turn in the shower. The hostel also has an obnoxious $4 charge if you have to keep your bags there till late (which most people do since most of the buses out of town are at night). On top of it all, the storage room is closed for most of the day, so you're paying to not have access to your stuff.

In Port Macquarie I stayed in the Ozzie Pozzie. The rooms are nice, but again the common area shuts at 11 and the common room (there's a lot of benches outside) is like a sauna. The kitchen at least is nice and big. Port Macquarie is small enough that you can walk anywhere from the hostel, but also big enough that you're not thrilled with the location. They also charge $10 for keeping your bags through the day, which moves the border from obnoxious to obscene.

The Aussietel in Coffs Harbour, though, delivers most services that a hostel should (although a fan that actually moves around the room instead of pointing in one spot would be nice). It's small enough that you feel like you meet everybody there. The kitchen is large and wellstocked and the common areas are enormous and although you're asked to leave at 11, no one actually kicks you out. It has a nice big pool on top of it all, and as an added bonus they put on different activities each night. One night they had an excellent bbq, other nights they make drinks for everybody and then take you to the pub.

Main Beach Backpackers in Byron was nothing special. It had a pool and a nice common area going for it. The kitchen was decent but nothing was ever clean and the refrigerators didn't shut properly so all my stuff went bad. The rooms are either eight-share and unairconditioned or massive 16-share with air con. You actually have to go outside to get to the showers, which are separate from the toilets, and you don't realize how much of a pain in the ass that is until its pouring out. At the very least, its really close to the beach and rents out free boogie boards. There are probably better places to stay, overall.

And now, I'm in bunk Backpackers in Brisbane. I typically don't like large hostels because they're more impersonal and it's harder to meet people. bunk doesn't make it any easier by supplying a pathetic common area. The kitchen is in a separate building altogether, so that's a pain in the ass. On to the good stuff though. The bathrooms are en suite so you don't have to stagger down long hallways half naked and they have air con, the first time I've needed a proper duvet in over a month in Australia. As I alluded to earlier, the bar attached is excellent, with various activities early in the night and large parties later on. They give discounts to guests and unlike most backpacker bars it attracts a lot of locals. They also give you meal vouchers if you stay four nights and put on games that allows you to win your fill of free beer. It's also smack dab in the middle of the nightlife district and only 10 minutes from downtown. The hostel also has a pool, but its right next to the bar, so it's not conducive to "illegal" late-night swims like the other places. Hope this has been helpful.

Cheers

The Nimbin Experience

You know that stupid cliche about the nights you'll never remember with the friends you'll never forget? Well, the place where you're least likely to remember your day is Nimbin. A couple hours from Byron Bay, Nimbin isn't as many people think the one place in Australia where marijuana has been decriminalized. It's just that people tend to look the other way there more than anywhere else. The whole town is literally one block long, yet you'll be offered weed more times on that one-block lap than you will if you walked anywhere else for 10 hours. For one thing, it has a one-to-one ratio of alcohol bars to hash bars. Even though I'm not excactly a pothead I heard it's a place that needs to be seen to be believed.

Since I went on a Sunday, the town was putting on its weekly markets. Basically the markets are a few stands of dread-locked people selling mainly hippie dresses and assorted jewelery and maybe a few book stands. I don't have to tell you what the general theme of the literature was. There were a few food stands as well, and put simply, Nimbin is a carnivore's hell.

The town also has a museum, which is probably the most unique one I'll ever encounter. By museum, I really mean a bunch of rooms with a lot of shit thrown together. There's no rhyme or reason to anything that's going on in the place. The walls are coated with newspaper clippings and lewd drawings that stoned-out hippies have made throughout the years. There's also a handful of old ladies walking around selling cookies and cakes. For those a little slow on the uptake, they're not trying to raise money for girl scouts. Since I knew it would be my only trip to Nimbin, I decided to take the plunge and get a cookie. And oh boy, let me tell you something about the rest of the day. ... I remember everything crystal clear. The cookie itself wasn't so bad (which might've been part of the problem) but for $5 I wanted a little more than a tasty treat.

The rest of the town consists of a series of shops, mostly selling stuff that has something to do with weed, Buddha and maybe Buddha smoking weed. Every storefront has a psychedelic painting over the entrance, even the on-the-level cafes and restaurants. The herbal shop is probably the most entertaining place to stop in, simply to read what various symptoms they treat and what sort of high they deliver. If you want to giggle like a schoolgirl there's a herb for you. If you want to sit around and say "Dooooooooode" for three hours there's a herb for you. If you want to feel like the whole room is closing in on you and you'll be in a state of neurotic paranoia for the rest of your life, well probably all the herbs are for you. They don't sell it that way though.

The tour I did included several other stops after Nimbin, and those places were maybe even better than the main attraction. The first stop was at Minion Falls, a secluded watering hole in between Nimbin and Byron. Not only is it a nice, serene spot with water at a perfect temperature, it also sports a waterfall that's about 20 feet high that you can jump off. It looked kinda sorta high from the water, but when I was actually up there and realized that to clear the rock ledge I had to run, step out and then jump, well it was looking about as high as my 43-meter bungy from a couple years back.

Afterward we had a barbecue at Rocky Creek Dam (the reason why I chose the tour over the more trippy Jim's Tours. There's nothing more attractive to a backpacker than the promise of free food). The Dam itself was a nice spot with great views of the winding river that it dams and includes a bushwalk through a rainforest.

As an added bonus to it all we got a free meal voucher to a night club in Byron called Cheeky Monkey's, a place where after 10, everybody gets really drunk and dances on the tables. Last night I learned that my magic number is 13 for how many drinks it takes to get me to do that as well. I'm discovering so much about myself on this trip.

Sadly, this is my last day in Byron and I now have less than a week on my East Coast swing before shooting down south to Tasmania. It appears that for now, my attempts at getting tanned will be in vain. All for now.

Cheers

Change of scenery redux

I've mentioned I don't know how many times in this spot that one of the best aspects of traveling is all the different, interesting people you meet. While I meant the great people I've spent whole days and nights talking (and drinking) with, I now realize the "different" part can go both ways. For example, I was walking through Port Macquarie at 1:30 in the morning with all my things fresh from a 3 and a half hour bus ride when I was approached by a guy who was friendly and all, but at the end of our conversation gave the most unusual request I've ever heard. If I ever encounter an indigenous woman (and I can only assume he meant US indigenous, not Aborigine) wearing native clothing, I'm supposed to give her a big ol' hug and say that it's from Matt McCurran from Port Macquarie, Australia.

Then there's the 42 year-old Dutch guy who I met the next night at the hostel. Unbeknownst to me, there's an international hostel bylaw that states every hostel must have a token psychotic old guy, and this one was the class of them all. For one thing, the guy keeps nine boxes of goon handy at all times. For all you non-math majors, that's 36 liters of wine. Should the apocalypse come, he'll be having the best party. Anyway, I met crazy Dutch guy (no one actually knows his name, the only time he said something coherent on the subject he said his name was Constant, as in "Constant Drunk") while having a quiet conversation with two Australian guys from Melbourne, Guy and Andrew, and two English girls, Sofie and Katie. Any hopes of quiet were dashed the second this guy sat down with us, well on his way through his first box of goon. At first it was hilarious -- everything he said was ridiculous and as he finished off every sentence, he'd trail off before wagging his tongue, making weird noises and then finishing it off with a loud cackle of a laugh that one can only possess if they are a few shrimps short of a barbie. The freakiest thing of all, when he laughs, he moves his head all over the place, yet keeps his eyes locked on yours. The first time he did it to me, Andrew leaned over and said "Terrified yet?" After a while, the whole thing got sort of old and we tried to retreat to my room to play cards. He spotted us and trailed us in, fresh box of goon in hand. As much of that wine wound up on the floor as it did in his mouth and we were unable to complete a single game because every time we started a new one he'd just pick up the cards and fail miserably at a card trick. One highlight though, when Andrew asked him his name, he said in a tone that suggested "C'mon guys, I've told you a million times," something that I believe closely resembles -- and my spelling of Dutch names can be a little off -- "Rujuuifdjnkajdkfdjshjdf von DHFASJFasdfjdkasfhjg asdfdk." As a fitting conclusion to the evening, we found him passed out sitting at one of the picnic benches, using the still full box of goon as his pillow. The joys of traveling.

Anyway, onto what I've been up to since I last posted (which I acknowledge was quite a while ago). As my final activity in Sydney, I watched the National Championship game with Craig from Canada and Marco from France. Craig and I used the game to try to teach Marco the sport. Because the game was so good, Marco wound up getting into it as much as all the other Americans and Canadians who were at the bar and understood (more or less) exactly what was going on. Just goes to show, all those European punks who say it's an idiotic sport just don't know what they're talking about. Anyone who thinks cricket is a class sport clearly has no credibility on the subject.

After the game I parted ways with the Jolly Swagman crowd that I had spent the last three weeks with to work my way up the coast toward Brisbane. My first stop was Newcastle, a college town three hours north of Sydney, and frankly I was disappointed. The town wasn't all that exciting and the beach was closed due to rough tide (which I suppose isn't the towns fault). Worry not though, I still managed to pick up a doozy of a sunburn on my shoulders, and as you might imagine, backpacking with roasted shoulders isn't the most pleasant experience. My one night in Newcastle started off with a few rousing games of kings with Canadian girls Heidi and Talia and two English guys, Kevin and Sam. We were all keen to go out on the town but a class five typhoon hit the town to put the keibosh on that idea. Unfortunately, we didn't want to just call it a night at 11 when the common room shut and apparently our only option was to take the party to the local Mobil station. Getting drunk at a gas station -- just like the sketchy teenage years I never had.

While I was in Newcastle I also had the opportunity to play cricket with a bunch of other backpackers. I had more fun than I expected, but it did nothing to disprove the fact that it's a stupid sport. For one thing, you can hit the ball backwards, and that's considered a good play. Also, if you have a shit hit, you can simply say "I care not for that" and choose not to run. Imagine if they had that rule in baseball, A-Rod might even be a .200 hitter in October.

After Newcastle I moved onto Port Macquarie, an underrated town that many people choose to skip. Unfortunately, I couldn't enjoy Macquarie's selection of pristine beaches because I was too sunburnt to even consider taking off my shirt. Instead I spent the day walking around in the unforgiving heat. Port Macquarie has a beautiful beach side walkway where pelicans are flying all over the place, and if you're lucky, you can spot dolphins in the sea. The walkway is lined with large rocks that everybody paints with their own messages and designs, a real unique aspect of the beach front. Port Macquarie also has a koala hospital that offers informative tours about koalas and the numerous and diverse ways that they can get themselves in trouble. It was an interesting tour, but wouldn't be suggested if all you want to do is walk up to a yard and say, "Awww, what a cute koala."

After just one full day in Macquarie, I moved onto Coffs Harbour, a much more popular backpacker destination, although I thought the beaches were much nicer in Port Macquarie and the Coffs town wasn't nearly as accessible. This is not to say that Coffs wasn't nice, I just didn't buy into all the hype. My days at Coffs consisted of bumming around the beach and/or the pool (it's really the only point of going up the East Coast). The nights weren't all that special except for the final one. It was intended to be a quiet night (the worst ones always are) in which I sat around till about 11 playing shithead -- the backpacker card game of choice -- with a few English girls I had been running into throughout my East Coast swing. But when they called it a night, my roommate Paul, who was a great guy but without a doubt the world's WORST snorer (imagine a chainsaw getting revved up -- at one point after waking me up my groggy impression was that he was intentionally being as loud as possible, like it was a contest) invited me to play a drinking game with dice called Three man. Three man is an absolutely lethal game when you're three man, which I was since I was the new player to the game. Sparing the details of why I had to drink, I wound up powering through seven mugs of goon in the first five minutes of action. By about 2 everyone had the brilliant idea that the next logical step was to all jump in the pool (the first of two such nights I've now had in the last week). We held the world's worst game of volleyball until the police showed up to put an end to our romp because we were being too loud (which we must've been if they could hear us from the street).

With my final day in Coffs before heading up to Byron Bay, I walked with Katie and Sofie and a couple of the girls from the previous nights round of shithead to what Coffs is famous for -- a big banana. On the way up to Byron we also passed the big prawn, or what I like to call the big oxymoron. Quick aside -- Australia has big "stuff" scattered throughout the country. Why, I don't know, but what I've learned after six months in this country is not to ask questions, just smile and nod. Anyway, I was expecting to clear a turn in the road to see this huge banana sticking into the sky, making the Washington Monument look like a millimeter tweeter. Needless to say, I was pretty disappointed. The thing was, at best, 20 feet long and laid on its side in the middle of a tourist trap center. If it weren't free I would've demanded my money back.

After that crushing moment, it was on to Byron, the main reason I went on my East Coast swing as opposed to just turning south from Sydney to go to Tasmania. I can say this much, half a day into my stay I had already decided that it is well worthwhile. Byron is backpacker heaven, with restaurants and nightlife everywhere. The great thing about it as well is it's where everybody heading up the coast slows down for five or six days, so everybody I've been meeting along the coast is all here (I'd been bumping into the same people before Byron, but not at this rate). I went out my first night in Byron, and it was the first time since I was in Chapel Hill that I went out and expected to run into people at the bar. Maybe more important than the nightlife, the beaches at Byron are spectacular. The sand is smooth and clean, the ocean has great but not overpowering waves and the water is crystal clear. Byron also sports a lighthouse walk where you can go to the most eastern spot in all of Australia and excellent lookouts from the lighthouse. I walked up the other day with my English roommate Marie and spent about 20 minutes watching a large pod of dolphins playing below us. I'm going to have a tough time tearing myself from the place, especially since it's gone the longest way toward getting me tanned since I was about 12. It's always hard to say goodbye.

Ringing in the New Year

The one thing I never really got from all my previous travels and that I was looking forward to on this trip was the chance to stop and catch my breath in one place for a week or so at a time. Sure, things can get a little boring at times now that I've been in Sydney for two weeks and knew the place before I even got here. But on the other hand I've had the opportunity to really get to know the people who I'm staying with at my hostel. It's fun and all to bounce around and be in a new place every day, but it's also much more meaningful to be around the same group for two weeks or so where conversations and relationships move on from the standard, "Where are you from, where've you been, how long have you been here and how much longer do you have." And that's my philosophy schtick for the day.

One quick story that I forgot to mention in the last entry before I get to the play-by-play for the week. Those who have been reading along will remember my coincidental reunion in a Kings Cross club with Sharon, the Irish girl I met in New Zealand. Well, Friday morning, I'm sitting in the hostel's TV room when I see a guy checking in who looks really, really familiar. By the time that I came up with my theory on where I knew him, he had walked away. About a half an hour later I saw him and his girlfriend in the kitchen. I sized him up really quickly before moving in and asked, "Do I know you..." I could tell he was thinking the same thing, and at the same time we said "Whitsundays!" I was on the same sailing trip with him and the girl he was with (who looked familiar after closer look as well) in Australia. Two years ago. Not only that, him and the girl MET on that trip and have been together ever since. I know it's a cliche, but it's a small world.

Anyway...On Thursday I made my triumphant return to Coogee to meet my friend Anthony and his American girlfriend Courtenay (Anthony studied at UNC a semester before I went to Australia -- Courtenay lived on the same floor as me freshman year). Before meeting up with them I made a quick stop at the Coogee Residence to make sure it was still standing. After that, I went to the beach with Anthony and Courtenay and we bumped into a couple of his mates, including Dave, who I met when he studied in Chapel Hill with Anthony two years ago. I then walked up and down Coogee Bay Rd, and I'll repeat the sentiment from my first Sydney posting -- nothing, and I mean NOTHING has changed. With maybe two or three exceptions, everything is just as I remembered it two years ago. Even many of the bouncers at the Coogee Bay Hotel are still the same. Since we were in the middle of a record heat wave, we stopped at the Palace Hotel for a few cold ones. Thankfully, the Palace has changed. The Palace was one of those places that went out of its way to embrace all the Americans who flock to Coogee and Uni New South Wales every year, giving everybody a VIP card and holding "America Night" every Wednesday. Needless to say, it got very corny after a while and I didn't enjoy it much, aside from the free hour of drinking you got when you played Rock Paper Scissors for your drinks. But now the Palace has been completely overhauled to the point that those of you who know it wouldn't recognize it any more, but it looks really nice. When you add everything together: we had cold beers on a hot day, we hadn't seen each other in about a year and we were overlooking the beach, and life was pretty sweet overall.

Two days later, it was New Years and it was a sweltering 44 degrees. You don't need to convert that, just know that by noon I had already taken two showers. After raving about the weather for Christmas, this was taking it to a bit of an extreme, but I suppose I really shouldn't complain. We spent the first few hours of the day not deciding how we were going to ensure this would be the greatest New Years ever, before finally reaching the conclusion around 2 that we should at least be having the meaningless conversations with beers in our hands. Around 7, after splitting a slab of beer with my Canadian friend Craig, we embarked on a mini pub crawl through Kings Cross as we slowly worked our way toward the Harbour. We arrived at Circular Quay (the Harbour side) around 11, and as you might imagine, it was absolutely packed with people. We couldn't really get a proper view of the water so we headed back up through the Botanic Gardens to get to higher ground. The view we had didn't enable us to see the fireworks with the Opera House as a backdrop, but the display was still spectacular. Maybe because they'd been built up so much we were a little disappointed (the show went on for about half the time we expected), but it was still the best I've ever seen

As it turned out, it probably wasn't the worst thing we weren't in the Quay. Apparently it was even more packed right by the water and fights were breaking out everywhere -- so much for the year of love Sydney was trying to promote (they lit up three giant hearts on the Harbour Bridge to really hammer it home). The one thing that struck me as we walked with an unimaginable mass of people toward the city center was how little people were getting into the New Years spirit. In New York, anybody you walk by gives you a cheery "Happy New Years" and is more than happy to try to make a new temporary friend. It wasn't that way in Sydney at all. Thanks in part to alcohol, I was running around wishing everyone a Happy New Year, but got as many grumbles and weird looks in return as I did people willing to wish me the same thing.

After a half an hour of stumbling along, me, Tom, Sion and some girl we had just met, Meg, found our way to Scruffy Murphy's for a night cap. (Everybody else who I watched the fireworks with just went back to the Cross and went to the same bar they go to every night -- so boring). We got there around 2:30 to find out that Big Nyte Out (the band that plays there every Tuesday) would be performing a set at 3. It turned out to be a perfect way to open the New Year. My holiday spirit got a little out of control as I ran around buying rounds for perfect strangers, but hey, it's New Years, and they only come around so often. Especially in Sydney. By the time the band was done and Tom and I were ready to finally call it a day, the sun was out. Not rising. Out.

I didn't show signs of life again until about 2 in the afternoon where I scrambled to shower and get out to watch the end of the Giants game at the sports bar around the corner. Fortunately I found a table with three other Americans who were watching the game and had drinks out, so I didn't have to feel obliged to get something (I'm pretty sure my body would've hated me even more had I gotten anything that wasn't H2O). It was the first American sports game of any variety I've watched since watching the Carolina basketball game in LAX in late November. Good to see the Giants become the 2005 NFC East Champion Giants. Better luck next year, Al.

I leave Sydney Friday to work my way up the New South Wales coast before getting into Brisbane. Once that starts, I might have some more interesting things to say than, "Today, I got up, walked around, and then drank." There is always the chance, though, that it could just be the same thing but with "went to the beach" instead of walked around.

Cheers

It's not hard to be a J-O-O on Christmas

As I signed off from my last post, I was a little worried that the pace I had set for myself in Sydney would not ease off. And as the last week has progressed, my fears have been realized. In fact, it was only minutes after signing off that I was "coerced" back into action. The problem (if you want to call it a problem) is that my hostel is very communal and around 3 in the afternoon, there's always about a dozen people outside sitting in the sun and enjoying a few bottles of Toohey's. After some hours of that, everybody gets motivated for a night on the town. People sleep, bum around in the morning and then it starts again. Lather, rinse, repeat.

So anyway, when I signed off from the last entry, it was about 1 in the afternoon. I was hanging out outside talking to some Germans who were in my room the night before when this English guy, drunker already than I've probably ever been, stumbles over to introduce himself. All the Germans had unusual, very German names that he couldn't even come close to pronounce, so (and this is my theory anyway) when he got to me and my nice easy name, he proclaimed that we had made a special bond, were best friends, and after 30 seconds it had felt like we had been friends for a million years. Needless to say, I got roped into going to the pub with him and a bunch of other not as drunk but still tipsy people to play free pool. That night I got talked into going out with the Norwegian girls, Heidi and Kristin, I had met earlier in the week. Peer pressure is a bitch.

Friday was a casual day because I had already walked everywhere I wanted to see for daytime activities and I had to wake up at 5:45 the following morning to work, and even I'm not stupid enough to go out with that facing me.

Normally, I wouldn't mention a day of doing manual labor for cash-in-hand, but this turned out to be an exceptionally infuriating day. I had to be at the site (a house) at 7 am until 3:30. The guy whose house we were working on was a total French prick, but I was willing to overlook it if he stayed out of my way, and I didn't mind the backbreaking work since I saw it as a way to make some money and get some exercise and sun.

The work was brutal and non-stop and around 2 or 2:30 my arm started cramping up really badly. I had been pushing a wheel barrow when my arms just locked up on me and when I let go, my middle fingers bent in and I couldn't move them at all as if they had been broken. Most human beings with an ounce of decency, you would expect, would understand that cramps are injuries of exhaustion and not make a big deal when someone with a cramp takes some time to drink water and stretch it out and also realize that they might pop up every so often. Alex, the French prick, told me I should just go home, but I was afraid he would use that as an excuse to not pay me, so I told him I could keep going, and actually managed to do some pretty strenuous jobs in between cramps. It wasn't till 3:30 though, that things got really ugly. We had been warned by one of the regular construction workers not to work past 3:30 because we wouldn't get paid overtime for it, and other people had learned that lesson the hard way. But Alex insisted that we clean up the bricks and cement and soot from the walls we had been knocking out because the walkway needed to be used by other people. The five of us who had been working all day weren't exactly thrilled with the idea, but we figured if we all just sucked it up for another 20 minutes we could get the job done and never have to deal with the asshole again.

Meanwhile, though, the professional workers continued to knock out walls. A few people complained that there was no point in cleaning if more mess was just going to be created (aside from the fact there was no way in hell we were going to be there with bricks and other debris flying at us). Also, it was Christmas Eve, and we wanted to be back having dinner, not donating our time and effort to a thankless prick. After Alex came out several times to ask why we weren't working, I finally stood up to him, asking us how he expected us to do the work with the walls still being knocked out, as well as the point that we were supposed to be done half an hour ago and several other points that would have appealed to anyone with an ounce of logic. Finally he told me he was sick of me and never wanted to see me again and told me to go home. Once I made sure I would be paid in full, I told him I'd be just as happy to never see him again and got exactly what I wanted -- which was to go home. Unfortunately, I have no idea when all the other guys I was working with were able to escape.

If anyone had earned the right to go out that night, it was me. I went downtown to Cheers and Three Wise Monkeys (which only means anything to those who have been to Sydney). I'm always used to Christmas Eve being a quiet, slow night, but the downtown was as busy as I'd ever seen. Three Wise Monkeys is a four-story bar and the only place where you could move with any space was the stairwell.

The next day, I had what I can say, without any question, the best Christmas I've ever had. The Chinese out here is delicious and the movie theater was very comfortable.... Just kidding. I woke up around 10 and people were already downstairs drinking. After several bottles of water, and a few beers to follow, I went with about 10 people from the hostel to Bronte Beach. We had absolutely perfect weather (not to make you guys jealous, but the degrees Celsius out here was probably higher the degrees Fahrenheit in New York) and the ocean was supplying great waves. We hung out on the beach for about five hours, each of us saying, "This is the life" at least once every half an hour and then went to the park behind the beach for a nice Australian barbecue. As you might expect, we weren't the only ones with the idea and the park was filled with people running around playing soccer, frisbee, volleyball, all sorts of things. All in all, I couldn't have drawn up a better Christmas. That night, a bunch of us found the only bar open in Kings Cross to put a cap on the day. We only stayed out for a drink or two, but it was great having another one of those UN nights (I was with Marco from France, two Dutch girls Yolinka and Rika, Bob from England, Tom -- the lunatic from the top of this post -- from England as well and his Swiss girlfriend Sevi, who might be even crazier than him).

I hope all of you had great Christmaseseses as well, and for all the fellow Jews out there, have eight crazy nights.

Cheers

Take me to the place I love

Along with New York and Chapel Hill, Sydney is the other place where I absolutely feel at home. It's hard to explain what this place meant to me when I lived here for five months two years ago, but it's just a special place that, unfortunately, only the people who I lived with in Coogee understand what I'm talking about. The city is clean and diverse (although that's a problem for some people at the moment) and there's plenty to do. Sort of like Manhattan, the Central Business District is compact enough that if you're feeling ambitious you can walk to all the major hot spots in one day. The weather is almost always agreeable (I was there in the middle of winter two years ago and never needed anything more than a light jacket) and the people are friendly (especially if you're white).

As many of you noticed, I often keep emotions to myself, but from the moment I landed in the airport Monday evening, I've found that I've had a big smile across my face for no particular reason other than I'm back. That first night, I had no Aussie currency so I just hung out in my hostel in Kings Cross (a backpacker haven that also doubles as Sydney's red light district) and got friendly with two Norwegian girls who were staying in my room. One reason why I love traveling... And here's another. My other roommate is this behemoth German guy named Burt, who has a long pony tail and a long goatee (looks like my freshman year roommate, squared). Belieing his size, he's a really quiet guy, who's nice enough, but just kinda hangs in the background. That night I was lying in bed reading when he popped out and started a conversation by asking me to remind me of his name. The way he asked though, he was after something else other than than mindless small talk. He was holding the song lyric jacket from his CD and after a few other questions, asked, "I can't find it anywhere in my dictionary, what does 'ho' mean?

The next day, I woke up to 80 degree weather and a cloudless sky so I wandered back to the city center. I started off at Hyde Park, a great three-block park right in the heart of the city (at this point, all you who have been here before can skip ahead if you'd like). At one end of the park is a magnificent fountain with numerous sculptures of characters from Greek mythology in the water. As an added bonus, there are plenty of lunatic Asian tourists running amok to keep yourself entertained. You then walk through a path that is perfectly shaded by these tall, grand trees that bend over the walkway to create a nice canopy to walk under. That leads to a large contemplation pool that is at the foot of an ANZAC Memorial (ANZAC= Australia and New Zealand Army Corps). Aussies are very proud of their service in foreign wars and most of this memorial is devoted to the fallen of WWI, a war that Australia has plenty of reason to be somber for. Back then the British crown had even more control and recruited large forces for the war effort. Because Australians were still the peons of the empire, they were normally ordered to the front lines of the suicide missions while the Britons hung back (Mel Gibson launched his career making movies about this). Australia, in fact, suffered the most casualties relative to overall population of any nation

After the park, I walked up and down George St, the Broadway of Sydney where most of the nightlife is found. From there I sliced through Chinatown onto Darling Harbor, a beautiful spot that often gets lost in the hype of the main harbor (where the Opera House and Harbour Bridge are -- but more on that later). Those rezzies out there will be relieved to learn that, amazingly, in two years very little has changed in the city. Darling Harbor has changed around many of its shops and some spots have gotten a little too modern, but otherwise, just about everything else is precisely as I remember, and it was shocking how quickly I regained my bearings.

That night I renewed an old tradition and headed to Scruffy Murphy's. Again, the rezzies will be glad to hear that Scruffy's is the place to be on a Tuesday night. Not only that, they still charge just $7 for a jug and, best of all, Big Nyte Out still rocks the place. Not only is Big Nyte Out still on every Tuesday, their set list is almost unchanged in the last two years.

Since I wound up being on my own, I started talking to this English guy, Mike, at the pub. As it turned out, he's trying to start a Web site that will be the equivalent of thefacebook for travelers (and since he kept me in free beer all night, I'll give his site some free publicity, it's travelfaces.com). He was friendly but had a personality that I can only describe as bizarre because without a degree in psychology I'm not entirely sure I can fully put it in words. Toward the end of the night, we started talking to two English girls. After a few minutes, we worked to the part of the conversation of where we were from. When I said the US, the girl I had been talking to said, "Oh, I've met a few Americans, they were all wankers. I don't like Americans," and walked off. Good to see that people can meet three people and apply their reputation to 250 million of us. It's that sort of general attitude that most people assign to Americans. I guess that just makes her a massive hypocrite. And a bitch.

After way too little sleep (I got back at roughly 5:30) I walked into town with my Norwegian friends and then left them to go job hunting while I wandered up to the harbor. You've seen the Opera House. Even if you've never been to Sydney, you've seen it, on television, in pictures, you know it before you even get there. Most landmarks that are that way never live up to the hype. You see them and think, "Yeah, looks familiar." The Opera House is not like that. I've seen it up close and personal countless times and it is still stunning. Even with the grand Harbour Bridge across the harbor, the beauty of the harbor itself and the skyline in the background, the Opera House still commands all your attention. After just relaxing in the scenery for a while, I wandered over to a street performer who juggles knives, and as a finale, juggles flaming sticks while lying on a bed of nails. If this sounds familiar to some of you, that's because he's been doing it in the same spot under the rail tracks for years. As I said, nothing has changed here. I even helped in his show once two years back. (That reminds me, Sydney has some of the most bizarre street performers you'll see. When I was walking through a pedestrian mall Tuesday I saw a guy playing a guitar and kazoo while balancing another guitar vertically on his head. This, of course, is still a distant second to the guy who played the guitar, djiridoo and foot tambourine all at the same time. With a cockatoo on his head.)

Exhausted again, I decided to spend the rest of the day hanging out outside my hostel, where, around 5 or 6, people just start bringing out six-packs of Toohey's and chill for the night. The plan was working out beautifully until around 9:30 when the hostel receptionist announced that there was $100 bar tab at the nearby Empire Hotel (two notes -- for you non-Aussies, hotel=bar and for you Aussies, the Empire, in case you forgot, is the sister club to the Coogee Palace). Since only six of us were keen on going out, it was setting up to be a good night. The plan was to drain the tab and go home. That didn't really work. I wound up pounding jugs with two girls, Lena and Monica, who recently graduated from Texas, an English girl Claire, an English guy Nick and a German girl, Judy, who had a handshake like the jaws of death.

One of the goofy, endearing things about Australia is the culture lapse between here and the States. In general, they're still living out the 80s, but popular music has a three-month lapse. So right now, Gold Digger is all the rage. Unfortunately, so is that idiotic Lump song by the Black Eyed Peas (you know, "My lump, my lump, my lovely lump" -- there, now all you have the song stuck in your head too. Welcome to my hell). Honestly, going through that craze once was more than enough. A good chunk of the hip-hop they played, aside from the Black Eyed Peas, was stuff I hadn't heard for a solid 10 years. And for many of the songs, there was a damn good reason for tha

Just before the end of the night, I also had one of the most random reunions ever. When I was in Paihia, I wound up making friends with an Irish girl, Sharon, on my dolphin swimming trip. I gave her my email address because I had a few pictures she wanted and we were set to get into Sydney within one day of each other. As I only now know, a few days after I met her, her campervan was broken in to in New Zealand and all her stuff was stolen. Basically, that was supposed to be the end of our friendship since my contact info was in her bag and I had no way of getting in touch with her. Until I bumped into her playing pool at a club in an area of the city nowhere near where she is staying.

And to put this in perspective, some quick background on Sydney. As you all know, Aussies like a good drink here and there, and they've established a few places where they can acquire one. You could go bar-hopping like a maniac every night and probably go nearly a year before hitting every pub in the greater Sydney area. If you could've placed a bet on us winding up at the same pub at the same time, you'd be very rich right now.

Anyway, you're probably bored by now, and since I didn't make it back until 3:30 (while managing to avoid getting propositioned by any hookers) I'm starting to feel a little drowsy. I have a feeling this pattern will continue itself straight through the New Year. If I'm still alive.

Cheers