We Go to a Land Down Under -- Fin

A little bit of this, a little bit of that

Friday, Oct. 14

The Twelve Apostles. All the photos in this post
are random -- not related to any of the text

The flight home

I won’t go into the trip home except to say that fewer people are heading to America than we came over with, so the flight attendants encourage the passengers to spread out. This time a young man is seated in our row, taking the window seat. The flight attendants tell us several times that we can feel free to spread out and take one of the empty seats. They start out addressing their comments directly to him and then mention that we can move if we want to. Obviously, they're trying to keep us together. But the young man shows no inclination to move.

Finally, Sharon decides to move to another seat so she'll have enough room to work on her quilt. She's in the middle seat, so I have to get up to let her out. By the time I'm ready to return to my seat, the kid has flipped up the arm next to him and stretched out across the middle seat, with his feet hanging down in front of my seat.

I don't stay long before another attendant tells me there's an empty row by the rear exit door of the plane. I decide to take her up on the offer. It's wonderful. I have all kinds of space, and I'm right next to the galley.

When it comes time to return to my assigned seat for landing, the kid has taken over the entire row and scattered belongings and trash throughout the area. He doesn't seem happy when I come back and make him move.

Kookaburra

The people

I’m impressed with the Aussies we run into. By and large they’re friendly and accommodating, and many of the ones we talk to seem genuinely concerned that we are having a good trip and enjoying their country. And the phrase “No worries, mate” doesn't seem to be just a saying; It’s an attitude.

You'll notice that I've posted no pictures of Aboriginal people. We were told they don't like having their photos taken -- as much to avoid just being curiosities for the tourists as anything else, I expect -- but would sometimes allow it if they were asked. I decided to respect their desire for privacy and didn't ask.

One of Aaron's pictures of Brandon feeding a wallaby.

The language

No real barriers to communication with people who share the same root language. You do hear all the expressions you've learned from the movies, with a couple of exceptions. During our time I never heard anyone utter the word “crikey.” Doesn't mean they don't say it, but we weren't in situations where it arose. Yes, "mate" is used extensively, and it turns out to be gender neutral.

Also, the only time I heard “sheila” was in a discussion one member of our group was having with Tony. I think we were in a roadhouse and the toilets, the most common word instead of our multitude of euphemisms, were labeled “blokes” and “sheilas.” Seemed kinda kitschy to me, like labeling restrooms in Mexican food place with “caballeros” and “damas,” or the seemingly infinite variety of labels you can encounter in barbecue joints.

One last foodie break

The Aussies have this concoction they developed called vegemite. The English have something similar called marmite, which Aussies used to eat before the big war. But the war disrupted shipments, so the Aussies came up with their own version.

Aussie humor

This has to be the nastiest concoction I believe I’ve ever tasted. It's made from leftover yeast extract used in brewing beer along with some spices, salt and other stuff. I gather the exact makeup is a secret, like Colonel Sanders’ spices or Dr Pepper’s flavors.

I was once asked how overly sugary stuff tastes to me since my sense of taste was altered but couldn’t explain because I had no frame of reference. If I were asked now, I’d refer to vegemite, though that might not translate to anyone who’s ever tasted vegemite because I don’t know what that tastes like to them.

According to Tony, vegemite is an acquired taste, as in growing up with the stuff being fed to you your entire childhood can cause you to acquire the taste. Of course I’d wager that almost everyone has some food they grew up with they won’t touch now. For me it's rutabagas. Didn’t like it then and still don’t. He also says the best way to eat it is to take a thick slice of bread, toast it, spread a generous amount of butter on it and then add a thin layer of vegemite on top of that. If you're curious, the boys tried it that way and still didn’t like it.

I think I mentioned that catsup is called “tomato sauce,” and you get take-away food, not to go. The one puzzler, if it hadn't been pointed out to us, would have been “capsicum,” what we would call bell pepper.

I once produced a parody of the Dos Equis' Most Interesting Man in the World in which I said, “I don't often drink beer, but when I do, I prefer whatever someone else is buying.” Several of our group meals have drinks included, and I take the opportunity to try the beers. I'm sure they were all major-brand, run of the mill beers, but I like all the ones I tried. Still, I'm no connoisseur. Tony doesn't seem to think much of them. The boys try out a brand that Tony likes and seem to agree it's better than the other brands we've sampled.

One of 72 fish sculptures created for the 2006 Commonwealth
Games. Each country was represented by a different species
of fish. They are scattered around Melbourne; this one is near
our hotel.

Architecture

The people who colonized Australia, convicts and officials sent with them to maintain control, were Brits. This explains why in a country so vast, with room to spread out, the older parts of cities are dominated by narrow roads and houses in the Victorian style, crammed together with postage stamp yards. I suspect this is less true in the newer suburbs, but like anywhere, the more property you want for your homestead, the more it’ll cost you.

But even taking into consideration the difference in the exchange rate, average home costs in the urban areas we visited seem to be higher than a comparable home would be in Dallas-Fort Worth. I could be mistaken about that given my limited perceptions, but I often wonder, after hearing Tony talk or seeing an item on the news, just how in the world people afford to live there. Maybe the average wages are better.

Money

The smallest denomination bill the Aussie print is a fiver. They mint coins in 5 cent, 10 cent, 20 cent and 50 cent versions, each distinctly different from each other. And they mint $1 and $2 coins. The bills are different sizes, with the $5 being the smallest and the $50 the largest. I'm sure they have bigger denomination bills, but these were the ones we always worked with. The bills are made from plastic, I think, and some of them have clear sections. Aaron received a fiver that had large, clear sections in it and said he heard they don't work well in vending machines.

A ten-percent tax is built into the cost of everything you buy, and because they don't have pennies, any price that works out to less than a multiple of five is rounded. This happens frequently in the grocery stores, where produce is priced by the pound, and the sale price of our TimTams came out to A$1.83. On one of our shopping trips, I miscalculated the price, and rounding up put it a nickel past the amount of change in my pocket. While I was reaching for a fiver to substitute for all the coins, the checker dug in his pocket and supplied the nickel. What a nice guy.

The end

So, that was our trip, more or less. I'm sure I've left a multitude of items out. Now, looking back, it's almost a dream, one I would mind having again, but we have so much more to explore, so unless someone wants to start a Go Fund Me just to get me out of the country again, I expect we'll move on to other adventures.

Bondi Beach

We Go to a Land Down Under -- XII

A brief walkabout in Sydney

Thursday, Oct. 13

This will be our last full day in Australia. Like any good trip, I've loved every minute of the time we spent here, but I'm also ready to go home and resume my regular life. Sharon and I have not signed up for anything special, so we sleep in, take breakfast at our leisure – at last – and head out on our own to explore.

Click to enlarge and then notice the three groups of
people along the sides of the bridge.

The boys, on the other hand, have signed up for a once-in-a-lifetime experience, the Harbor Bridge climb. The Harbor Bridge is one of the largest single-arch bridges in the world, and a company conducts climbs to the top of the arch, pretty much every day of the week, no matter the weather. The day starts out a bit cool and windy, with a slight threat of rain, which is only mildly fulfilled later in the day.

Sharon and I don’t think we can handle the climb physically,-- you have to climb a ladder and although the steps on the bridge aren't supposed to be that taxing, the whole experience takes three hours.

Instead we plan to walk to the bridge and climb up in one of the pylons that’s been converted to a museum about the bridge. Four pylons flank the bridge, two on each side of the bay. They serve no structural purpose; they are “decoration,” which given their plainness doesn't really fit my idea of decoration.

After breakfast we break out the instructions Tony’s provided for getting to the bridge and strike out. We'll be traveling along a major street in the Central Business District that is being ripped up. Sydney once had a tramway like Melbourne's, but they did away with. Now the plan is to rebuild it. People throng the sidewalks.

The biggest downtown I ever worked in was in Abilene, and the only times you could talk about throngs in downtown were for art walks and the Christmas parade. Certain “throngs” was not a term to apply to normal business hours. This reminds me more of the foot traffic you see in New York as portrayed in the movies and TV.

Two of the bridge pylons. The one on the right houses
the museum, and the entrance is on the other side of that
right front leg. The walkway is on that next to top section,
about 80 feet above the roadway.

Along the way we drop in on a couple of shops, and I find the last of the travel pins I’ll buy on this trip. We miss a turn without knowing it and wind up near the entrance for the bridge climb, which we figure has to be near the pylon. Nope. We ask a nice woman at the counter, and she gives us instructions on reaching our destination. We have to backtrack a bit before finding the spot where we should have turned.

The entrance to the pylon climb could be easily missed – the sign for it is small and not in a prominent position. We climb some stairs to a landing where we buy our tickets. I notice that they have a senior rate and ask the woman how old you have to be to qualify. She looks a bit surprised and smiles sheepishly before saying, “I’m sorry, but it’s 60.” Now, she’s either very practiced at making old people think she believes they’re younger than 60, or she really believed I’m not 60 yet. I do hope it's the latter.

At any rate she seems relieved when I tell her my age and zips us through. The museum is divided into sections. Even though we've been warned we'll have to climb a couple of hundred steps,they are not very steep stairs. Three landings open into rooms with exhibits about the building of the bridge. On one landing they have a film, on another they discuss the politics behind building the bridge -- not everyone thought it was a good idea, and like most grand projects of this sort, snags caused delays that aroused new opposition -- and still another features the workers who pulled off the bridge’s construction. At the top of the stairs you can walk outside onto a walkway that goes around the pylon near the top.

Stained glass
window
commemorating those
who built the bridge

One of the cool facts we learned from the exhibits is that they built the  bridge from each shore side. To keep the two halves up in the air, they rigged massive cables from the top of each section back to shore and tightened cables as needed. When the two halve of the arch were completed, they slowly loosened the cables to allow the halves to be joined using a giant lynch pin. It took awhile and required multiple attempts, but not because the arch halves weren't in the right place. The halves were only a few millimeters off, well within tolerances to match them up.

From this vantage you can see groups of bridge climbers ascending one side, then descending on the other. We keep thinking one of the groups has to be the one the boys and other people from our group are in. I can zoom in on the descending groups well enough to make out faces. None of the faces belong to people we know. Oh, well.

We finally go back down and start walking back. Sharon wants to go back to the climb center to see if we can catch the boys, who’ll wind up coming in about 15 minutes or so after we arrive. They were impressed, to say the least. The climb's cost seems a bit high, but their reaction indicates it was worth every penny.

From there we’ll walk back to the hotel, stopping at a nondescript cafe for lunch. We are served by yet another young French woman, who does not come from Paris. I asked. Another of the waitresses appears to also be from France. I had promised our Parisian waitress in Cairns that I wouldn't trot out my high school French, but I did for these two, saying, “Merci. A bien tot.” They giggled and replied in French as well. I believe they said, "You're welcome. Goodbye."

Sharon and I want to stop off at a Woolies to pick up some fruit and TimTams, so the boys lead to one they knew about in the CBD and then split off to do their own thing until supper.

Replica of Captain Cook's ship. It still sails and is used as
a training vessel and for occasional excursions.

This Woolworth lies across the street from the town hall and occupies three stories of the building it’s in. It is the most like a Walmart of the ones we've been in, with groceries, electronics and other stuff. (Tony told us one day that the Aussies haven't warmed to the idea of allowing Walmart a toehold in their country.) We take our food back to the room and decide to visit the National Maritime Museum across from the hotel.

We're in luck, as admission is free today for everything but the special exhibits. Several ships are moored in the harbor next to the museum, including a replica of the Endeavour, Captain Cook’s ship. This ship and a submarine moored nearby are open to the public, but they count as special exhibits. We won't have that much time left to explore the museum so we skip going on board and taking pictures of the ships from dockside.

Among the other ships moored are a racing vessel, a boat used to find pearl oysters and a refugee ship. The refugee ship carried 37 Vietnamese fleeing their country in the '70s in a boat designed as a coastal fishing vessel. The name of the boat translates to "freedom."

Back inside we check out the exhibits, including one that’s dedicated to American and Australian naval interaction during World War II. One of the posters from that era shows and Australian Navy man and advises the Americans that he is not their enemy.

All too soon the staff announce that the museum is about to close so we go back across the pedestrian bridge to the hotel and hang out til dinner. We eat at a restaurant located on the harbor near the hotel. It's a farewell dinner, so toasts are made, Tony is given a card from the group, some birthdays are recognized and celebrated – all in all a convivial end to our great adventure to the land down under.

Sydney Opera House from the bridge pylon. Because you
can never have to many pictures of the opera house.

We Go to a Land Down Under -- XI

The icon you've all been waiting for

Wednesday, Oct. 12

Note: I am reliably informed by my family and by the time stamps on my photos, that I have some of the chronology wrong in this post. We visited Bondi Beach in the morning after our stopover at the Royal Botanical Gardens and took a driving tour of the city in the afternoon. My original version of this post also contained bad chronology, and I used our printed schedule to prepare what follows. Confused? Yeah, me too. But I opted for this note instead of amending the post.

Today will be a full day, devoted to seeing the sights of Sydney, including the two most iconic places in the city. You can probably guess what they are. If you can't, well you'll know soon. We drive past buildings that survive from the founding days of the convicts and head into the Royal Botanic Gardens. Like most of the gardens we've seen, they're huge and gorgeous, though our only stop is at an area where we can take pictures of the Sydney Opera House and the Harbour Bridge, which lie on the other side of the harbor. While we’re there, we’ll have a group picture made and see Mrs. Macquarie’s chair.

Sharon tries out Mrs. Macquarrie's chair.

Mrs. Macquarie was the wife of Governor Lachlan Macquarie (1810-1821). His wife liked to come to this particular point on the harbor and watch the ships, so Macquarie had the convicts carve a bench – really a ledge – from the limestone at the point for her to sit on. While telling us the story, Tony hops up on the bench and begins striking poses; the guys a total ham, I tell you. Most of the women have their pictures taken sitting on the ledge before we jump back on the bus.

From the bench we can see an island that was the site of Fort Denison, once a penal site and defensive fort that is now a historical site and ferry terminal. The island used to be was called Pinchgut Island because a prisoner sent there for punishment received only bread and water during his internment. The island was also the site of a gibbet, a place where a convict was hung and his body left hanging in public view as a deterrent to other would-be evildoers.

Back on the bus. I wish I could tell you what we saw and heard about, but I can’t. Didn’t listen that carefully and really couldn’t see much. But we wind to the Sydney Opera House, where we will take a guided tour. The story of the opera house’s construction is filled with political intrigue, engineering derring-do, great vision and sadness.

Two of the men most heavily involved, including the designer and architect, never saw the fruit of their labors, having become convenient scapegoats when things went wrong. The whole project was fraught with controversy, but now the building is what most people think of first when they think of Sydney. It's worth looking up the story.

The iconic shells that cover the opera house are not actually attached to it nor do they provide any ceiling structure to the building and are considered to be engineering marvels. The whole structure is designed to fit in with and reflect the harbor environment.

Part of the interior of the opera house

The interior is a study in lines, Sometimes beginning photographers will be given an assignment to take pictures reflecting various shapes to help develop their sense of composition. An assignment to do lines would be a cinch here. We aren't always allowed to take pictures inside, unless we are in public areas outside the theaters and concert hall. Our guide becomes very excited because the symphony orchestra is performing that night, and we will have a chance to hear a part of the rehearsal, which is being led by conductor Vladimir Ashkenazy,

I know next to nothing about who the guiding lights in symphony are, but our guide is almost ecstatic that Ashkenazy is the conductor. And like a true fan, she’s giddy that she gets to see the great man rehearsing the orchestra while wearing ordinary clothes instead of the tux he’d wear during a performance. Whatever floats your boat.

After our tour we gather outside to walk to a wharf where we’ll board a boat for lunch and a tour of Sydney Harbor. Someone notices a plane skywriting a proposal, so we all dutifully begin taking pictures, but we have to leave before we find out the name of the person being asked. Not that we’d have known who it was. I never did look to see if it made the news.

The Harbor Bridge

The company conducting our tour of the harbor is named for Captain Cook, and we are greeted by a man wearing a period British naval outfit as we board the boat. We grab seats on the dining deck, put in drink orders and hit the buffet. Afterward we head out onto to the upper decks to take pictures. The view is stunning -- a bright sunny day with lots of boats, commercial and private, plying the waters. At one point we sail briefly into a section where you don’t see the opera house and the Harbor Bridge, but mostly they are the objects that dominate the view, and we will see them from all sides before we dock.

Again, though a running commentary is piped over the PA, I don’t remember most of what was said, though I know parts of the information repeat history we’ve already heard, or in the case of the bridge, will hear the next day.

Bondi Beach lifeguards. The swimming area is marked by
these red and yellow flags. You can't swim outside the flags.

At the end of the harbor tour, we’re back on the bus with an ultimate destination of Bondi Beach, perhaps the most famous beach in Australia. We hear more of the history of the city and travel through some of the tonier sections of town. Among the things we learn is that Speedo started in Australia -- thanks, mates -- and that the beach life-saving patrols that were immortalized in “Baywatch” were developed in Australia, right there on Bondi Beach.

You already know about Uggs, and stores that carry that brand of love-‘em-or-hate-‘em shoes are everywhere. I did not, however see the Uggs style that’s a cross between a traditional Uggs and a sandal.

I’m sure I’m leaving out some other iconic brand for us that began in Australia, but I can’t for the life of me remember it. Even with help from the Internet.

The winds are blowing when we arrive at the beach, but not near as strongly as they were on our trip to the Twelve Apostles. It's a bit cool out, and the waves are rolling in at frequent intervals. Surfers and body boarders try to catch the waves, but I didn't see anyone manage a ride that lasted more than a few seconds.

We’ve been given enough time to walk out to the water and have a wade if we want. The boys doff their footwear and head for the water. I trail behind just to take pictures. Tony has warned our group not to turn their backs on the water because people have been surprised by waves that were larger and came up farther on the beach than expected, knocking the unsuspecting tourists down and pretty much ruining their day.

The sand on the beach is beige, deep and quite fine grained. How fine a grain? My feet sink in a bit while walking, but I never noticed that any sand had entered my shoes. But back at the hotel, I take off my shoes, and sand spills out onto the duvet on my bed. I brush that off and then notice that more takes its place because the soles of my socks are covered as well, as I should have expected. Easy solution; take my socks off. But the sand has penetrated my socks and also covers my feet.

The guys take a selfie after a quick wade.

Bondi is the last stop on our city tour, and from there we wind our way back through the narrow, hilly streets til we return to the hotel. We again leave the boys to their own devices and head back over the pedestrian bridge to the shopping mall to check out the souvenir shops there and to grab some nighttime shots of the convention center and Darling Harbor at night.

We wander about in the mall but don’t find anything we can’t live without. So we walk back across the bridge, take a couple of other pics, and head back to the room.

TV guide: The same networks seem to be on pretty much everywhere we go, much like the standard hotel lineups you run into, except you don't see listings for local channels. Local news inserts take place between shows, though. One channel is devoted to old British shows. Yet another seems to be devoted to the coverage of cricket. I never watch much of it because cricket makes no sense to me.

One thing about watching the news programming is that it all seems quite familiar. Same kinds of discussions we have back here, same kinds of political rhetoric, just with an Aussie accent.

The Monday after our arrival is dominated by discussions of the Australian Rule Football championship -- the equivalent of our Super Bowl -- which were held in Melbourne Saturday, and the national rugby championship held in Sydney on Sunday. Aussies are just as sports absorbed and fanatical as Americans.

Another item that dominates the news is the Tostee murder trial. This Tostee fella met some young woman through Tinder and started a relationship. Something went bad, and she wound up falling to her death from his 25th story apartment balcony. Someone actually got a picture of her legs dangling outside their apartment.

The prosecution said Tostee threw her off the balcony during a fight between the two. He said she jumped. He also said horrible things to her during the argument, which the prosecution had a recording of, though I didn't catch why they had that.

I did look the story up when we returned, just to find out what the verdict was. Not guilty. Reminded me of one of my journalism professor's talks on covering trials. People are found not guilty of a particular charge, he said, but that doesn't mean they are innocent. Probably true here.

We Go to a Land Down Under -- X

What a croc

Tuesday, Oct. 11

This guy is 13.5 feet long and weighs a bit over ,1,100 pounds.

This will be a travel day, but before we leave we’ll have just enough time to walk across the street to the casino. But we’re not there to gamble. At the top of the building is the Wildlife Dome, another wildlife attraction and one of the few that's allowed to let patrons have their picture taken while holding a koala. They have lots of birds and some reptiles, including a gigantic saltwater croc. This guy could easily take down a small boat.

Showin' off his red feathers.

Aaron and Brandon spend some time in the small-bird section and wind up being roosts for some of the colorful denizens. One of them has a nip at Brandon’s ear while it’s at it. Meanwhile I find a couple of cockatoos by the exit door, one of which has some brilliant red feathers. As I take pictures, the one with red feathers starts walking across a limb, and I can’t get a good shot of the feathers. For no particular reason I say, out loud, “Aw, c’mon. I can’t see your red feathers” The bird stops and starts walking back the other way. This prompts me to say, again out loud, “C’mon. Fluff up so I can see the pretty feathers,” at which point it turns its back to me and does precisely what I asked. Pretty smart bird, I’d say.

By mid-morning we are back at the hotel to meet our bus to the airport, where we’ll jet off to Sydney for the final part of our journey.

Foodie break: We eat a lot on the planes. Not just snacks, meals. Everyone of our in-country flights services a meal, a couple of breakfasts and a couple of lunches. And we eat them, even though we’ve already had breakfast at the hotel or lunch somewhere. Why not?

On the domestic flights all our meals come in a box, something Tony makes a joke about at one point of the tour. I know you’re not supposed to be able to taste as well on an airplane, but pretty much everything we’re served seems pretty tasty to me. The lone exception was something called a tomato cheese toastie they served us on the flight over from Dallas. Basically it’s a toasted cheese sandwich with tomato inside. It wasn’t bad, but it also wasn’t something I’d want seconds on, and in fact I turn another one down later in the flight.

On the international flights the attendants hand out a menu early in the flight that describes the choices that will be available for meals and the various snacks that will be served. (Had I any sense, I'd have saved them.) In addition, I discover on the flightback that they have other snacks not listed on the sheet back by the galley and you are welcome to help yourself. I’m pretty sure this accounts for the five pounds I gained on the trip and not the massive breakfasts I helped myself to at the hotel buffets. I mean, I had to have walked all that off.

Our hotel in Sydney features the least impressive rooms we’ve had – smaller than the others and with twin beds. No, not two queen-sized beds, twin beds like you slept in as a child. They have two rooms set aside for the O’Connor party, but the one assigned to the boys is set up for us, with the twin beds having been pushed together and made up as one bed. They have that fixed, but we leave ours the way it is. Feels like being in a ‘50s sitcom.

Darling Harbor

Another odd thing is that we can only log on to the Internet using the credentials for the boys’ room. No big deal, but it took a few minutes to figure it out. Also, to conserve energy, you have to put your room key in a slot by the door before you can turn the lights on. I drop my card in there but can’t get the lights to come on. I ask the guys if they’ve figured it out, and they come show me how to do it. I just wasn't pushing the card down far enough. One of the upside of having genius, tech-savvy children.

The positive to our room is that it overlooks Darling Harbor, named for Ralph Darling, one of the guiding lights of early Australia. Across the harbor lies the Australian National Maritime Museum and a shopping mall, among other things. I mention those two specifically because we spend time in both.

We head over to the mall because Tony said it has lots of place to eat at. You cross the harbor by way of a wide pedestrian bridge decorated with banners and quaint street lights. The mall houses some restaurants, including a Mexican food place we came close to checking out, just to see what the Aussies idea of Mexican food was. It's sign did indicate that it was California-style Mexican food, but still, it would have been interesting.

In the end we wound up in the food court, where the guys decided on sushi, and we checked out a Turkish food place. Sharon had a chicken salad, and I had a gozleme -- roughly pronounced goss-lee-ma -- pretty much like a quesadilla.

ICC Sydney -- the convention and exhibition center
that opens December 2016

Afterward we split up. The boys are off to shop; Sharon and I will stroll around the harbor. We see the convention center, the bottom of whose roof has multicolored lights that flash on and off on this night. The next night the lights shine steadily but the colors morph. On our last night there, the lights aren’t on at all. Not sure if there’s a reason for that, but when I look up the center online, I find that it’s not scheduled to open until December, so maybe they were just testing the lights.

A street performer is set up in front of the center, and he juggles flaming batons while balancing on a keg. Some of the folks from our group are watching, and one of them, who suffers from an excess of personality, is trying to amp up the crowd, at one point being so loud about it that the performer is momentarily distracted and almost loses his balance. (Video at https://youtu.be/XvH0z7e2I2M) At the end of his act, he makes a low-key appeal for money, but the woman runs up, takes his hat away from him and starts working the crowd for donations.

We stroll until we come to the wharf, now an entertainment district with shopping and restaurants, built on the location where the first settlers built a brick manufacturing concern. The wharf's location is very near the wharf that was the primary point of entry for seafaring passengers coming to the country. We cross back over the harbor and continue to amble along until we reach what seems like the end of developed section at King Street, which leads back into the central business district.

This is a popular area. We see groups and couples doing pretty much what we’re doing, enjoying an evening stroll along the bayside on a beautiful evening. It is, however, a bit cool out, so we turn back and head for the hotel.

We Go to a Land Down Under -- IX

The village in the forest

Monday, Oct. 10

The realization begins to set in that the end of our trip is in sight. Because of the side tours we signed up for, our days often seemed really long, but the trip as a whole is passing far too quickly.

Our ride to Kuranda

Today we’ve signed up for an excursion to a place called Kuranda, a town that dates back to the late 1800s whose orginal draw was gold, then timber, and for a short time, coffee. The railroad we'll travel on was built to ferry workers and settlers to the community.

We’ll take a train with old-time passenger cars up into the mountains through a rainforest. The tracks cross numerous bridges and go through 15 tunnels. Aaron's been keeping track of them and can give the number of each tunnel for a while, but then turns up one short. Guess he missed one. But it's OK because they're numbered and the numbers appear on the wall at the entrance to each tunnel. We are often inches away from the forest, and if we were inclined to ignore the rules, we could reach out of the open windows of the car and touch them. Every once in awhile the trees part, and we glimpse wondrous vistas.

Barron Falls

The train stops once on our trip at an overlook where we get off the train to view Barron Falls, which we are told can be quite impressive after heavy rains.

The PA announcer on the train encourages passengers to check out a shop at the train station in Kuranda that specializes in tea and scones, so Sharon and I do. The tea is nothing special, just a tea bag with hot water served in a Starbucks style cup, but the scones – oh, my. The woman who takes our order tells us they have a fresh batch and brings us a couple of large scones with “creme,” a whipped cream that really doesn't have much taste to me, and strawberry jam.

The valley from the train

I like scones, but the ones I can find back home really aren't much, especially when compared with the ones we had in Ireland. These scones were light and fluffy, almost cake-like, causing a near rapturous state in my mouth. I'm not usually a fan of strawberry jam, but I have had some I liked, such as the homemade jam served with our popovers at Acadia National Park in Maine, and the jam in Kuranda easily matched what we had in Maine. Not a bad start to our time in Kuranda.

Did I say that Cairns was a tourist town? Kuranda, though much smaller, could be the picture by the definition of tourist town in a dictionary. In the middle of the 1900s, tourism had begun to take over the primary purpose for the railroad and the town. In the 1960s, the town became a bit of a hippie haven. Now, at one end of the town lies the train station and a skyrail station. At the other are a variety of attractions. In between is a scenic walk along the main street of town, which is lined with shop after shop -- many featuring local arts and crafts -- interrupted only by restaurants.

Our eventual destination is the Koala Gardens, one of three wildlife attractions that lie next to each other. Their credit card machine is down, and I don’t have enough cash on me. The guys do and go ahead while I prepare to run back to an ATM I’d seen back down the road. The cashier hears me and tells me about a machine that lies around the corner.

When we return a couple about our age is standing at the register having a discussion about who really wanted to see the attraction. The husband tells the wife he doesn't want to go, but she can. She replies that she thought he wanted to see it. This goes on a bit longer, and they decide that neither wants to see it that badly so they leave.

These are the critters Brandon fed. I don't have a good shot
of them eating from his hand.

The gardens are basically a small zoo, filled with a variety of native Australian animals. One of the cool features is a section where the animals, mostly wallabies and other smaller marsupials, roam free, and visitors are welcome to feed them. Aaron gets some nice pictures of Brandon feeding one of the animals, which gently takes the food straight from his open hand.

I see one of the critters -- a wallaby, I think -- bound across the compound, and it’s an amazing sight. Effortless hops propel the animal at least the length of its body, and it only takes a half dozen hops or so for it to cover the width of the area. A fenced-off area lies adjacent to this section to which the animals are rotated so they can de-stress from hanging out with the humans.

Of course we see koalas, along with a number of other exotic animals, including other marsupials and freshwater crocodiles. These latter look a lot like caimans, which I think are the same thing. I look it up later and find out the two are closely related but not the same species.

We wander through the exhibits until time comes to be heading back. We have a specific departure time on our tickets for the skyrail ride back to the outskirts of Cairns to catch our bus back to the hotel. Tony has made it sound as though we’ll miss the bus if we fail to jump on the skyrail at the right time, which makes me nervous. We stop at one of the restaurants to grab a bite to eat, and I’m afraid I annoyed everyone fretting that we wouldn't receive our food on time to eat and make it to the skyrail.

Fortunately the food comes, and we have enough time to eat without having to wolf our food down. Turns out there’s some leeway built in to allow passengers to visit a couple of lookouts on the way down, and when we arrive at the bottom of the skyrail we have to wait a bit before the bus shows up. I should have been more relaxed; I hate being a pain to those around me, but apparently I have a natural talent for it..

The skyrail

The ride is spectacular. You glide above the rainforest on the way to the bottom. At points the tram car slows to a barely perceptible crawl, so slow you wonder if you’re about to be stuck a couple of hundred feet above the ground and become the subject of one of those rescue stories you see on TV. But then the car slowly picks up steam, and the journey continues.

We make two stops on the way down. One of the stops provides a view of Barron Falls from the other side – you can see the train and its lookout from there, and the other takes you down a path where you can view native flora, The path ends at a lookout that shows an open view of the valley and surrounding mountains. Pick any superlative to describe the scene; it’ll fit nicely.

The water skiing place

Near the end of the skyrail journey, the forest opens up, revealing a plain below. We see a small body of water to our left that looks sort of like a track. We’re trying to figure out what it is -- something to do with water treatment, perhaps? -- when we see movement on the water. A water skier is being pulled around the water. Don't know if it’s just a ride or a way to learn water skiing, but it's a novel concept.

The rest of the evening is ours. Sharon and I leave the guys to their own devices and make plans to do some souvenir shopping. We walk into town, having identified a quartet of likely shops to visit. I’m looking for something called a travel pin, a pin that shows some tourist attraction that I can attach to my bush hat. Sharon’s trying to find some inexpensive items for people from her workplace who’ve asked her to bring them something.

We find what we’re looking for, and while walking back to the hotel, we’re treated to a sight Tony had told us to watch for. As dusk sets in, large bats, so big that Sharon initially thinks they are birds, stream across the sky. These are a particular kind of fruit bat found in Australia they call flying foxes, This particular bat, the spectacled flying fox, only resides in Queensland, the state Cairns is located in, and their nightly flights have a tourist draw equivalent to the bat flights at Carlsbad Caverns or Congress Avenue in Austin. Wonderful way to end our last night in Cairns.

We Go to a Land Down Under -- VIII

Reef-er madness

Sunday, Oct. 9

This is it. We’re going to the Great Barrier Reef! We are going to snorkel for the first time. At the Great Barrier Reef!

I wouldn't have minded being up early today, but we don't leave 'til mid-morning. We've all our stuff ready to go – including a towel pinched from the pool area. Tony told us yesterday that

Our chariot to the reef

he was obliged to tell us we could rent towels from the concierge, which would have been A$4 or so, but the hotel kept towels at the pool area. Then he gave us directions for finding the pool. Sure enough, when we reached the hotel he gave us a whole spiel in the lobby, loud enough for hotel personnel to hear, about renting towels and then told us that if we were interested in a swim in the pool, we would need to go to the third floor and then walk down the spiral staircase, omitting any reference to towels at that location.

As you can imagine, most everyone in the group wound up taking a towel to the reef with them.

After breakfast we meet with Tony in the lobby to go over some details and then take a short walk to the pier where the boat that takes us to the reef is moored. Several companies make runs to various parts of the reef. Ours will take us to a section known as the Norman Reef, about 35-40 miles away as the crow flies, or two hours on the boat.

We’re on a catamaran, which is fairly stable, but we will hit a couple of patches that make for a bumpy ride. A woman on the port side of the deck we’re on tosses her cookies not long after we leave. The crew treat her very kindly and rapidly take care of the mess. If I hadn’t happened to glance over there at the right time, I’d never have known anything about it.

Green Island

We make a stop at Green Island, an island that part of the larger reef area on which they've built a resort, and some of the passengers debark to partake of the resort's entertainment while we continue to the reef. A barge -- they call it a pontoon, but it's huge, unlike the pontoons I'm used to at the lake -- lies at anchor with a heliport anchored nearby. Almost everything we’ll need for the next few hours is on that barge.

We go to collect our snorkeling equipment, and the guy who helps Sharon and me asks if we are taking any medications. We tell him that we take cholesterol meds, and he says we have to sign a release. The release lists a bunch of conditions and medications, none of which have anything to do with cholesterol control. We point that out, but it doesn’t matter. After signing, he gives us a different mask and tube that apparently mark us out for the lifeguards so they can keep an eye on us.

Tony has volunteered to help the newbies, and after we are kitted out, we go find him. He’s helping one of our group who doesn’t even swim. He’s going to need to take some time with her, and we had seen a video on the ship that gave basic instructions on what to do, so we decide we’ll just jump in and give it a go.

An area is roped off around the barge representing the limits of where we’re allowed to go. It seems pretty large until you’re in the water with a couple of hundred other people. The side where we entered the water is to windward, so the waves and wind tend to push up against the rope. Also, the coral in this part is deeper, so we can’t see much detail. Wearing a mask in the water helps some with our myopia, but not that far away.

We push out toward the center and encounter Tony, now finished with the non-swimmer. He asks if we have any questions or problems and suggests we swim over to the other side of the boundary.

This is a good suggestion. We come much closer to the coral on that side and spot fish swimming by. But it’s still crowded, and another swimmer smacks into me, causing me to lose my mouthpiece and swallow a mouthful of water, which being saltwater is not a pleasant experience. I've been bumped entirely too many times and feel like I'm being pushed around by the waves, I need a break.

Shot this fish with the cheap underwater camera set
up I use when sailing. The wires anchor on of the rings
in the snorkeling area where swimmers can take a
break. That's not the barracuda, by the way.

They have some rings anchored around the area where swimmers can hang on for just such a break, and we head for it. As we near the ring, we spot a large, long fish floating not far away and start swimming toward it. Just about the time I think I could reach out and touch it, it swims off to a spot on the other side of the ring. Which is OK because we're not supposed to touch the animals or the coral. (And yes, I know living coral is an animal. You know what I meant.)

Another couple is hanging on the ring when we arrive, and I ask them if they saw the big fish. The woman says they did and says she thinks it’s a barracuda. Later we’ll be in an observation deck part of the barge, with pictures of the kinds of fish likely to be spotted. Sure enough, we recognize the photo of the barracuda. Sighting confirmed.

Best shot I got of the reef with my waterproof rig

I’m still feeling pushed around and not quite so excited about being there, so I get Sharon and we snorkel our way to a platform on the other side of the barge. I’m done for the day but tell Sharon I’ll see if I can find the boys so she can snorkel with them. Turns out lunch is being served, so I go back and get her to go to lunch, where we meet up with the guys.

By the time we’ve eaten, we discover that not much time remains until another attraction we’d thought about taking advantage of, a semisubmersible submarine, will be making its last run soon. We spend a bit of time on the observation deck watching fish go by. Some guy in scuba gear floats by, and one of the other folks on the deck says he’s the official photographer -- the one who takes pics of the guests in their various activities. She says he told her he has a couple of fish who follow him around, he’s become so familiar to them.

We catch that last sub ride and enjoy the short trip viewing the reef and associated fish. Then it’s back on the boat and back to shore. I know it sounds as though I didn’t enjoy the snorkeling, but I did. Given the chance, I’d do it again in a heartbeat, especially in calmer waters with fewer people bumping into me. Ultimately I would call it the high point of the trip.

The semi-submersible in the background. A rope and float
set up like the one the yellow boat is moored to marked
the boundary of the snorkeling area.

You may wonder, as I did, about all this tourism going on at the reef so short a time after news outlets had reported on a study that said the reef is somewhere between 80 percent and 95 percent bleached. All I can say is that the government is supposed to strictly regulate reef tourism with an eye to its impact on the reef. I can hear the “hmmphs” being said while you read this. And honestly, I wouldn't have missed it for the world.

Back in Cairns we meet for a group dinner at a place called Dundee’s. I honestly don’t remember what I had, but I do remember it was delicious. Drinks we supposed to be included, but a couple of folks don't seem to understand that the selection is limited to a choice of beer, wine or a soda, and those of the restaurant's choosing. We've been sitting at the table Tony joins, listening to him entertain us with hilarious stories about eating food in America when a waitress approaches him to discuss how he wants to handle dealing with the mixed drinks that a couple of someones in our party ordered. Sadly story time is over.

We’ll have another group dinner in Sydney before we leave, and this one I remember because it’s a seafood linguine.

Foodie break: Someone asked me when we got back if we’d tried any exotic foods while there. Pfft. Of course we did, Aaron had an emu burger one day -- I tried a small bit of the meat and found it tasty. We tried kangaroo, also pretty good, and crocodile, a white meat that looks like chicken but that, to me, has less flavor and a softer texture. I can live without it. Our seafood linguine on the last night has baby octopus in it. Tastes OK, but you have to get over seeing an entire small octopus show up in your food.

Sharon and I often felt like we weren’t getting enough veggies in our meals and definitely not enough fruit, so we would often leave the guys to go explore the various available cuisines and go find a Woolworth’s to buy some fruit, which will be our supper.

Woolworth’s? Yep. In Australia it’s a grocery chain, though the larger stores are almost like a Walmart, carrying a variety of products in addition to the groceries. (The other big chain store is IGA.) While we’re in country we’re delighted to discover that TimTams are on sale at Woolie’s, as it's called locally, so whenever our stock ran low or out, we’d buy a package to go with our fruit. We also discover that cheddar cheese tends to be marked as tasty and extra tasty, which we take to be equivalent to medium and sharp here at home, though we didn't buy any cheese to find out. Don't remember what they called the cheese we decided had to be mild. Probably mild. Oh, and the cheddar is white.  

We Go to a Land Down Under -- VII

Not quite on the dot-dot

Saturday, Oct. 8

Our hotel provides free use of laundry facilities and free laundry soap. Now, the laundry facilities comprise two washers and two dryers. With 48 tourists in just our group, you know the demand was high. But this morning the guys let us know that they’ve been using the machines and that they’ll be free soon.

Dot-dot paintings by our tour group.

We already have a load fixed up and jump on the opportunity because we figure we’ll have just enough time before we leave for Cairns later in the day. We do, but I had a moment of panic because we get confused about the time thanks to the weirdness of the time zone shifts we're experiencing and to the clock in our room that’s not correct by any time zone. We’ve been unable to figure out how to reset the darn thing. I know my phone will have the right time, but I had glanced at the TV, tuned to a morning news show, and then the room clock.

This will be a travel day, but we don’t leave until after lunch, so we have an activity scheduled for mid-morning. We walk to the town center, which only takes a few minutes, to meet with a group that conducts sessions on Anangu lore and something called “dot-dot” paintings.

Two young women – sisters -- along with an Aboriginal woman discuss how stories were communicated through drawing in the sand. Obviously this kind of art doesn’t survive, so eventually the “dot-dot” painting was developed. The name describes the style. Using brushes and pointed sticks, the artist draws on a canvas by creating various sized dots -- but not like pointillism, where the resulting picture can show great detail.

Large sections will be covered with large dots. A certain amount of detail will be added with smaller dots. Certain symbolic elements are drawn on in another layer, and these symbols give the basics of the story being communicated in the painting. Because of the sacred nature of some of the stories, another layer can be added to obscure the story to the uninitiated. Tony has told us several times that these paintings can only be properly interpreted by their creators.

"Hey, mate. Whacha doin'"
"Just hanging around. You?"
"Getting a new perspective on life."

After the presentation, we’re led to tables with supplies so we can make our own dot paintings. Now, I probably wasn’t paying attention well enough, so I don’t realize that except for the symbols, mostly dots are used. I brush paint over a large section of my canvas and then add symbols for the story I’m trying to represent. One of the sisters looks at it and encourages me to add more dots. I don’t get the point she’s trying to make and continue on my track. When she checks in later, I tell her I've completed my painting. She points out that a large section of my canvas doesn't have anything on it and encourages me to add dots to the blank area, picking up a brush to help me out.

We’ll have a chance afterward to share the stories behind our paintings, and I wind up being the first to talk about my painting because I remember the native word for an implement women use. At the end of my description I make a crack about the dots the woman made me add to my picture, and she tries to cover by adding symbolism to my narrative. I think I wound up upsetting her a bit, but I’m sure she’s past it by now. In my defense, we had purchased a painting earlier that has a small section that's painting in a solid color and not dots, but I really need to curb my wise-acre nature, even if the person I'm kidding will never see me again.

Surprisingly to me, we will fly out of Yulara. They only make a few flights to a limited number of destinations from that airport each day. It’s a pretty small plane, but the flight will be short enough, and Qantas leaves more legroom on their planes than airlines do here.

"That bloke in the hotel used to be a journalist.
Let's give him the standard pose"

We’re flying to Cairns, which Tony tells us should be pronounced as though we have Boston accents, so it comes out more like “Cans.” Cairns is the gateway to the Great Barrier Reef and a thorough-going tourist town. Need proof? Find Cairns on Google Maps and then ask the app to show you souvenir shops in the town. Lots of dots will appear.

Our hotel overlooks Cinnamon Creek, which empties into the ocean and looks from our hotel room more like a bay or inlet. All of our tour group have rooms facing the water, and the view is spectacular. Cairns is a tropical paradise, quite a contrast to the red, sandy landscape we’ve come from. Our rooms also have balconies, and Sharon and I will spend a good deal of our free time on ours, watching and listening to the birds, taking pictures or sitting in the furniture reading and enjoying the splendid weather.

We join the boys for dinner at Splash, a seafood place on the Esplanade, the main road/area fronting the waterside. We dine al fresco and one of the waitstaff who helps us is from Paris, her accent adding nice touch to the experience. The owners of the restaurant have their own trawler, so we’re guessing the food’s pretty fresh.

Foodie break: We eat a lot of seafood while we're in Australia. Why wouldn't you when you're on the coast much of the time? We’ll have prawns, which is what the Aussies call shrimp. Technically there’s a difference between the two, but they're all called prawns here. The ones I have at Splash are huge and delicious. We’ll also have the aforementioned shark, barramundi, scallops, calamari, baby octopus, etc., etc., etc. I loved every bit of it.

While watching morning TV one day -- morning TV shows are much like they are here, a mixture of hard news, not so hard news, and downright silliness -- one of the featured stories is how a group of researchers in Australia is developing larger prawns and hope to create a variety as large as a lobster – and that would still be tasty. Prawn steaks, anyone?

We stroll about on the Esplanade for a while before returning to the hotel. The next day will be one of the top highlights of the trip -- we’re going to the reef!

Part of the Esplanade at night. Reminds me of the old
Chesapeake Christmas display in downtown Fort Worth