Friday 29th Feb 2008

• Cape Leeuwin – two oceans meet
• Bicentenial tree
  • I swear to God one of us was about to slip and fall to their death at any moment, but the 7 year old Chinese girl and her fearless ascent to the halfway point makes me pull myself together

  

• Quick stop at Northcliffe for pie. A town set up by a bunch of hippies. You can feel the love.
• Treetop walkway & Valley of the Giants.



• Williams Bay for lunch. The most photographed beach in WA. So I don’t really bother.



• The Gap & Natural Bridge. This was once connected to Antarctica.



• Albany

See more spiders along the way

Thursday 28th Feb 2008

The day starts off with a tone I don’t wish to keep. A snapping…breaking tone. The crisp kind of tone you get from crouching down with a toothbrush in your pocket.

Perth – 39 degrees! Glad I’m leaving.
(Any cooler down south?)

The journey starts. I reckon I should be a Sudoku guru by the end of this.

1 x Israeli [Kobi]
1x German
1x Taiwanese ['Christie' – Chang Cha wa]
2 x Dutch [Mike, Marijke]
3 x Chinese
1 x Japanese [Tomo]
1 x English (me)

Today’s itinerary:
- Dolphin Discovery (research centre – Bunbury) – no dolphins today
- Bushshack Brewery – Small brewery in the middle of nowhere.
- Busselton Jetty – Its just a jetty. We stay for lunch (the first of MANY salad and salami sandwiches) and then move on.

- Ngilgi Cave (Yallingup)

- Wine tasting (Margaret River region)
- Chocolate Factory
- Margaret River town – brief bottle shop stop. There’s a beach and some shops. We don’t see the beach.
- Prevali beach (“Surfers Point”)

- Augusta

We have our own little chalet complex where I have my first Aussie barbie followed by a bit of “Box Munching”. I bow out gracefully at the semi finals where the box has been reduced to a flat sheet of card on the floor.
Pick it up using only your mouth!

Wednesday 27th Feb 2008

Back on foot. Life slows down without wheels. The world rotates past more calmly.

Cottesloe beach for a bit of a swim and a run and a frolic in the sun.

An abbo a the station gets me thinking:
In ‘our’ society we associate certain behaviours with drunks, crazies and drunken crazies.
The way we look at abbos allows us to easily drop them into one of these slots, but they can’t all be drunk?
It’s too easy to make assumptions, but maybe they are simply different. Is it so difficult to accpet the thought of a civilisation that functions differently to our own and still consider it civilised?

Tuesday 26th Feb 2008

Kings Park again, this time with the bike; got to see a few more bits.

The biggest ant in the word tries to eat my pen!

Nice vantage point on the top of “DNA Tower”.

Bit late getting back to meet Shanon. We are supposed to be going to the cinema.
Has she gone already? I cycle to the bus station, but without knowing where I’m supposed to be going I probably didn’t have much chance finding the correct route number.
Back to the hostel; there she is.
New plan. New cinema. New film (“The Bucket List” – watch it) .
Shane, “Horse” (…I didn’t like to ask!), and ‘mumbles’ (worse than me) join the group.

I’m feeling the heat of that spotlight on my head again.
It’ll be gone on Thursday.

[Looks like Carlos gets his girl. Why does this bother me?]

Monday 25th Feb 2008

I struggle to get up after a late Interneting session last night. The party lifestyle!!!

Today becomes another ‘non-day’. (Too hot outside anyway…or some other excuse…)
Sorting out photos.

Keeping a daily log can really put a spotlight on the mundanity of your life!
So I spend $1800 to sit on a bus for 15 days to escape it.
Two trips: 5 days south, 10 days north.

I give up the computer desk, to allow another laptop geek to play games, and I go late night Interneting again. The party goes on!

Sunday 24th Feb 2008

Day trip to Rottnest Island. 07:30 start.

The queue at the ticket office simmers into a chaotic storm of carnal desperation as those with pre-paid bookings and those without scramble for their place on the last lifeboat on a sinking ship Certain doom awaits those left behind. No wait, it’s only a ferry to the island.
A volatile mixture stirred up by somebody’s genius decision not to open the pre-paid ticket booth.

The half-hearted life jacket demonstration by the spotty teenager pales in comparison to the regimented porcelain dolls of Singapore. Welcome to Oz mate!

9km long and 1km wide. This should be a breeze!
But the wind and hills say no.

This should be called “Fly nest” Island. The entire day I am marauded by flies almost constantly. They fly as fast as I pedal. As soon as one group gives up the chase, I find I’m in the middle of another gang’s ‘hood.

Surprising, considering the size of the spiders here. They must eat a kilo of flies a day!
This beast would fill my palm, no kidding!
Easily the biggest insect I have ever seen in the wild. Can’t wait to get into the outback.

Sox insists on hunting out the locals and soon finds the ‘rats’ of “rat nest” Island.

He invites them over for a quick chat.

Turns out they’re not rats at all. Rather, gentle little marsupials called Quokkas. A kind of dwarfish ‘roo. Friendly fellas, they agree to pose for a photo.

This region of Oz is the only place in the world where they can be found in the wild.

Lots more cycling. Lots more flies.
Another Red Rooster, this time without the fried fruit.

Make it back to the ferry with minutes to spare.

Saturday 23rd Feb 2008

Matt’s face this morning tells me just how much ‘fun’ I missed out on last night. He has less fun today.

Yesterday got away, but I keep a close eye on today. What to do?…um…
Jump on a train to the end of the line and cycle back? Again?
Sounds productive enough for me.

Armadale. 50km South East.
Navigating the first 10-20km through residential areas slows me down, but the rest is a simple ride along the riverside all the way to Perth.

I make it home minutes before sunset.
Six hours, with breaks and ‘navigational complications’.

I join Marijka and gang to watch a DVD. Everyone being a different flavour of foreign, they usually find it useful to have English subtitles turned on. Usually…
“F*** him” => “Out of luck he is”
It’s like they were written by Yoda with a Thesaurus.

Friday 22nd Feb 2008

Turns out Shane is a bit of a Judo champion; won a number of national tournaments. A ‘protein-shaker’, he’s a bulky, sporty kind of guy who seems to be good at everything.

The day skips straight onto night.
In search of someone to go out with, I find room mate Matt and two of his cockney-banker mates from home (now living in Oz) teamed up with a Scottish woman, a Northern lass, and an Essex girl, all fired up and ready to go hunting Jagerbombs (Jagermeister & Redbull).

They find their first in the Brass Monkey. My ‘Honey Wheat Beer’ fails to deliver on all accounts. No honey. No wheat. Mmm, just like [insert generic larger here].
I ditch the ‘woy-oy’ boys with false promises of catching them up later as the hunt moves onwards. I stay to savour my nectar.
I manage to persevere through about $4 of my $8 beer before going back to the hostel.

Marijka and a German bunch are in the lounge.
We try “Night Out 2”.
We each take it in turn to become the reason for being refused entry: No Passport (for a bar!!!), no shoes, no shirt.
So much for the backpacker scene.

Thursday 21st Feb 2008

Back in the saddle today. This is turning into a cycling holiday.

Train north to Joondalup and then cycle down the coastline until I give up.
The coast must be only about kilometre west from Joondalup train station but it takes me the best part of 2 hours to find my way out of this town (including lunch).

But still, I get to see some sights and even stumble into a police academy parade. Not sure if I should be there so I shoot and run.

Eventually find the water!

I follow it down on a leisurely ride for the next 4 hours or so.

(The famous drive-through ‘bottle shops’)

Cottesloe again! An hour and half until sun down. Third time lucky maybe?…
Sox’s patience pays off and he finally get’s to enjoy an ocean sunset.

Every evening the trees next to Cottesloe beach host some kind of nightclub for birds. Beautiful rainbow-coloured birds flock here in enormous numbers. They seem to pair up (after a drink at the bar to loosen up, of course) and sit together in the trees singing as loud as they can for the whole evening. Doors open pretty much the minute the Sun turns its back, and they are up partying until long after I have gone home to bed!
It’s an exclusive club though with a strict dress code: green suit, purple shirt, red/yellow tie.

Being so dark, the camera fails to capture the spectacle.

Wednesday 20th Feb 2008

Several devious plans later, it’s the good old fashioned hacksaw that saves the day.
Clearly not the first person to do this, the hostel hacksaw only has an inch of blade with any teeth left.
I’m so glad I opted for the cheapest padlock money can buy rather than the steel monster alternative.
Note to self: keep spare key OUTSIDE the locker.

Marijka (Ma-Rye-Kah) – A medicalsh internsh from Hollandsh. We become friendsh over dinner and she teaches me some Dutch.