Brisbane first. The girls stayed with a friend in Noosa so Sean and I and the wagon drove into the city on our own. I found it was set up much like Melbourne (though not nearly as good), and we wandered the downtown strip or ‘mall’ as they seem to think it’s called around town, and across the river for some library/art gallery exploring. Da Vinci’s inventions were on display, and some impressionist art from the US. In the afternoon we found a great hostel (Bunk: recommended) – having finally given in to the winter nights – had a nap and set out for dinner, dancing and some pool to cap off the evening.
One of our last stops on the east coast is the infamous Byron Bay, though according to our new local friends the commercialism has all but killed the old atmosphere of cousins meeting up and playing together on summer weekends. Thanks to Marika, Sean’s coworker in Korea, we find ourselves with yet another awesome ‘couchsurf’ and at the mercy of a lovingly generous family, staying at their caravan for the week while they are all at work. But they wouldn’t take off before a great little visit – us, the parents, the aunt the sister and husband, and two beautiful little blond girls who kept us all entertained – and a delicious meal of steak, rissoles (delicious Aussie-ified hamburger patties) and shrimp. And even still, the goodbye hug from little Carrie may have been the best part of my day.
We are in heaven. We shopped ourselves silly, planning delicious meals for every day of the week and treating ourselves to all the sweets and treats the budget has denied. We have passed the last few days playing cards, watching movies, laying in the waning sun, walking along the beach. Down by the river, black from the tea tree oil, the brightly coloured clouds reflect vividly when the sun goes down and the birds soar in nature’s temporary show. We are a true family this week, visiting a few of the tourist attractions nearby, and returning ‘home’ after.
Nimbin was definitely worth a visit. In March they hosted MardiGrass, a festival to protest the unfair illegality of marijuana, and they seem to live off that high all year long. Drug paraphernalia and slogans line the streets here, as do the police cameras, constantly watching for dealing of the harmless green plant. The town’s museum is the best part, old rusted hippy cars bear rainbow slogans of a simpler, more beautiful life, of living with nature, trusting yourself and spreading love. It’s meant to be a place where people can express themselves, or their anger, and to commemorate a history we are all part of. For me it was a great reminder of a colourful past and of all the reasons to let the little things go.
Three more glorious caravan-filled, worry-free days await us now.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Crossing the Tropic of Capricorn
Back on the mainland, we drove south to Airlie beach for several hours spent at the swimming hole lagoon and a movie night huddled close in our tent. It was definitely getting colder. In Rockhampton a few days later, we couchsurfed with a Spanish world traveler on vacation in Australia from his latest walk: from Spain to Iran on foot, where he met problems with the visa process and was forced to take a break. The final goal is Nepal and he is waiting for the end of winter to resume.
The endless coast trailing in front and behind, we drove across the Tropic of Capricorn, further into our own personal winter. In Hervey Bay we found a great little stop to set up camp and sit in the bar by at night playing board games by firelight. Then, to spice things up a bit, we decided to jump out of a plane.
Of course, being who we are it had been planned for days, though it didn’t feel very real until the morning of. Or maybe not even then; I was waiting to be terrified and it just never came. One adventure to the next: out of the van, into the suit, into the plane. The smallest plane I have ever been in, over the most beautiful coast – sandy Fraser island with massive inland lakes, ocean tides and sandbars creating so many colours of teal and turquoise beneath the perfectly cloudless sky. Sean and I went up first, and when he toppled out of the door, feet over head over feet, then my heart dropped but there was no time to think, just a fleeting thought of oh wow I really am going to do this and I was out the door too, freefalling, tumbling, arms in then out, feeling the freezing cold air on every part of my body and at the same time not feeling it at all. Sensory overload they say. When the instructor pulled the cord with a jerk we floated over that view for as long as my mind could manage to stretch it out – it was amazing. The island with the surrounding ring of fire made of sun, sand and water, the creatures in their ocean world below, the silence pounding in my ears, except for my laughter and heaving breathing. Floating slowly down, to the excited girls waiting for us on the beach, where we unwrapped the bulk of parachute cloth and euphoria and walked back into regular life once again.
Now it’s really cold at night and tenting in Noosa, the unique little town of dredged river and million dollar yachts on a surplus of waterfront property, is only slightly bearable. We have a great spot by a wide section of river, sandy enough to lay and read and lots of eager fishes and boaters to absently observe.
The endless coast trailing in front and behind, we drove across the Tropic of Capricorn, further into our own personal winter. In Hervey Bay we found a great little stop to set up camp and sit in the bar by at night playing board games by firelight. Then, to spice things up a bit, we decided to jump out of a plane.
Of course, being who we are it had been planned for days, though it didn’t feel very real until the morning of. Or maybe not even then; I was waiting to be terrified and it just never came. One adventure to the next: out of the van, into the suit, into the plane. The smallest plane I have ever been in, over the most beautiful coast – sandy Fraser island with massive inland lakes, ocean tides and sandbars creating so many colours of teal and turquoise beneath the perfectly cloudless sky. Sean and I went up first, and when he toppled out of the door, feet over head over feet, then my heart dropped but there was no time to think, just a fleeting thought of oh wow I really am going to do this and I was out the door too, freefalling, tumbling, arms in then out, feeling the freezing cold air on every part of my body and at the same time not feeling it at all. Sensory overload they say. When the instructor pulled the cord with a jerk we floated over that view for as long as my mind could manage to stretch it out – it was amazing. The island with the surrounding ring of fire made of sun, sand and water, the creatures in their ocean world below, the silence pounding in my ears, except for my laughter and heaving breathing. Floating slowly down, to the excited girls waiting for us on the beach, where we unwrapped the bulk of parachute cloth and euphoria and walked back into regular life once again.
Now it’s really cold at night and tenting in Noosa, the unique little town of dredged river and million dollar yachts on a surplus of waterfront property, is only slightly bearable. We have a great spot by a wide section of river, sandy enough to lay and read and lots of eager fishes and boaters to absently observe.
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
The Relentless Allure of Island Life
Magnetic Island. The moon pulls the waves and the waves pull us – the sun pulls the earth and my shoes push the gravel of the intricate paths between the island’s bays. Time is drawn out and away, to the poles of the earth, our field of vision narrows to repel all negative details of living life on earth. The strength of the sun makes my skin bubble and sweat, I am warm to the core, positively relaxed.
Attracted by the promises of all things tropical we came for two days and stayed for six. Camping on a koala reserve for $12 a night and awakening to the calls of a hundred different birds each morning, the island life has once again sucked me in and it will be hard to leave. The people are friendly and helpful, including several volunteers from oversees like us who found a place to work for accommodation and a community to be part of for a while. The koalas are cute and cuddly, if only for the four hours a day they are actually awake. The hammocks by the pool have had my name on them for several days in a row now.
Our direction is south but the iron in my blood has found the source of its attraction for now.
Attracted by the promises of all things tropical we came for two days and stayed for six. Camping on a koala reserve for $12 a night and awakening to the calls of a hundred different birds each morning, the island life has once again sucked me in and it will be hard to leave. The people are friendly and helpful, including several volunteers from oversees like us who found a place to work for accommodation and a community to be part of for a while. The koalas are cute and cuddly, if only for the four hours a day they are actually awake. The hammocks by the pool have had my name on them for several days in a row now.
Our direction is south but the iron in my blood has found the source of its attraction for now.
Cairns
Almost as soon as we turned east off of A87 the creeks suddenly had water, the trees were greener and taller, flood markers lined the highway and the roads wound twisted and narrow through mountains on either side. We could taste salt in the air at last.
We pulled into the Cairns info centre to be informed that the jellyfish nets had just been removed and that the following day looked likely be the best all year for a calm ocean and blue skies – would we like the last 5 spots on a snorkeling/diving tour on the Great Barrier Reef? Why yes, yes we would. The boat was packed with people to meet, and the endless buffets of food were delicious. Who knew there were so many shades of blue in the whole world? The reef looked exactly like all the pictures you’ve ever seen and was clear visibility to the bottom and calm as ice. I saw my first blue spotted stingray, an incredibly agile lion fish, watched a little guy clean under the gills of a massive gray reef fish (I am sure those both have more technical names) and escaped the ugly faces and sharp teeth of the red bass, though I am sad to say I missed a view of the reef shark that came close enough to some others for a good scare.
After a night out on the downtown grid lined with backpacker bars and hostels (and of course after the traditional start of goon – bad white wine in a 4L box) and three days on Ellis beach with our tents practically set up on the sand (and a common area with picnic table and fridge that we promptly moved into and made ourselves right at home), we headed north for the last time and into the Daintree Rainforest, the oldest in the world. The wildlife gets more exotic – a python in the parking lot, tiny green tree frogs in the shower, and long, thin black spiders the size of my hand. At our one night cabin retreat we exclaimed over several of these startling arachnids, yet by morning I had already placidly forgotten to zig zag my memorized, exaggerated path between the webs.
It was also in this very oldest of canopied wonders that I had my first experience with leeches – I have dreaded them since Thailand though somehow they have taken this long to actually materialize in my life (I did have a narrow escape in Sumatra and witnessed only the squirmy, bathroom floor aftermath). This time, after the shocking discovery followed by vicious murder-by-stick of the first one found on my ankle, it was routine checks for the remainder of the walk as they crawled from the mud up our shoes, dug their way into the mesh and through our socks, anything to reach the meals beneath our skin. Despite the group effort and the more than slightly increased speed at which we tackled the return path, there was even a big fat one on my hip later on in the shower – ew. Having survived the assault, I must say I am glad to have gotten it over with, though I am reluctant to acknowledge that unfortunately this does not necessarily lower my chances of a future encounter. And to think I was excited when the rain started – oh, exclaimed the adventure thriving part of my mind, how true an experience the universe has created for us here in the jungle of trees, look how the pretty mist sparkles in the sunlight, let’s take shelter under the umbrella leaves, oh I feel just like a creature of the earth…
We pulled into the Cairns info centre to be informed that the jellyfish nets had just been removed and that the following day looked likely be the best all year for a calm ocean and blue skies – would we like the last 5 spots on a snorkeling/diving tour on the Great Barrier Reef? Why yes, yes we would. The boat was packed with people to meet, and the endless buffets of food were delicious. Who knew there were so many shades of blue in the whole world? The reef looked exactly like all the pictures you’ve ever seen and was clear visibility to the bottom and calm as ice. I saw my first blue spotted stingray, an incredibly agile lion fish, watched a little guy clean under the gills of a massive gray reef fish (I am sure those both have more technical names) and escaped the ugly faces and sharp teeth of the red bass, though I am sad to say I missed a view of the reef shark that came close enough to some others for a good scare.
After a night out on the downtown grid lined with backpacker bars and hostels (and of course after the traditional start of goon – bad white wine in a 4L box) and three days on Ellis beach with our tents practically set up on the sand (and a common area with picnic table and fridge that we promptly moved into and made ourselves right at home), we headed north for the last time and into the Daintree Rainforest, the oldest in the world. The wildlife gets more exotic – a python in the parking lot, tiny green tree frogs in the shower, and long, thin black spiders the size of my hand. At our one night cabin retreat we exclaimed over several of these startling arachnids, yet by morning I had already placidly forgotten to zig zag my memorized, exaggerated path between the webs.
It was also in this very oldest of canopied wonders that I had my first experience with leeches – I have dreaded them since Thailand though somehow they have taken this long to actually materialize in my life (I did have a narrow escape in Sumatra and witnessed only the squirmy, bathroom floor aftermath). This time, after the shocking discovery followed by vicious murder-by-stick of the first one found on my ankle, it was routine checks for the remainder of the walk as they crawled from the mud up our shoes, dug their way into the mesh and through our socks, anything to reach the meals beneath our skin. Despite the group effort and the more than slightly increased speed at which we tackled the return path, there was even a big fat one on my hip later on in the shower – ew. Having survived the assault, I must say I am glad to have gotten it over with, though I am reluctant to acknowledge that unfortunately this does not necessarily lower my chances of a future encounter. And to think I was excited when the rain started – oh, exclaimed the adventure thriving part of my mind, how true an experience the universe has created for us here in the jungle of trees, look how the pretty mist sparkles in the sunlight, let’s take shelter under the umbrella leaves, oh I feel just like a creature of the earth…
Monday, May 25, 2009
Desert Days
The desert road plays tricks on your mind, it’s long and straight and long. As Stacy says, you start to look forward to corners. I thought I saw a bridge in the distance, but it was only the road meeting itself at the horizon. The sky feels low all around you, as if the world has been stretched like a bad Ipod rip. I look for pictures in the trees or the clouds on the horizon to keep my mind alert. We have yet to see a kangaroo on the road (alive) but we did watch a pack of wild horses cross the road in beautiful gallops and disappear into the trees on the other side. I am amazed at how much the landscape changes – slowly I mean, but how diverse a desert can be. We drove through the moon planes at Coober Pedy, where chunks of rock litter the ground, patternless and ceaseless. We scrambled up huge mountains that seemed to be made of sand, in all shades of pink and rust, skidding back down again and scraping precious layers of skin. At Kulgera I wandered out alone to the highway at dusk just to be, to feel the earth around me, to catch the pastel panorama and to sing at the top of my lungs where no one can hear. At the Devil’s Rocks, boulders bigger than my house and red as the sea beg to be scaled, to be sturdy under our feet as I survey the miles of flat miles I can see into the distance. There are little bushes, or big trees, then massive termite mounds for a while and then nothing at all, just dirt and road, until the vegetation grows dry and yellow again and the whole world is reduced to just the primary colours and a few white clouds. And us. I even expected the towns to be much the same as each other, but the small settlements do manage a little personality. An op shop is good for a laugh, as was the ‘bush band’ we saw one Saturday night called the Roadies (as in, the guys that carry the equipment, aren’t cool enough to be groupies and definitely aren’t good enough to be up on stage in front of the audience??) which turned out to be an old man and his nameless instrument, plus a few hilarious Aussie outback noisemakers, and a woman who insisted on audience participation at any cost. We were the youngest people in the room by far, and we laughed a whole lot.
Every day we drive six or seven hours, stopping to visit whatever we want, to stretch, to eat or drink or take pictures. At night we set up camp in a park or on the side of the road and star gaze until we get sleepy, which is usually around 8pm – I have watched more sunrises than my life to date. In Alice Springs a guy gave us his apartment while he went to mend houses in the bush and we took over and charged everything and cooked our little hearts out. Life on the road has been sweet and simple. We are the looking forward to surf and sand.
Every day we drive six or seven hours, stopping to visit whatever we want, to stretch, to eat or drink or take pictures. At night we set up camp in a park or on the side of the road and star gaze until we get sleepy, which is usually around 8pm – I have watched more sunrises than my life to date. In Alice Springs a guy gave us his apartment while he went to mend houses in the bush and we took over and charged everything and cooked our little hearts out. Life on the road has been sweet and simple. We are the looking forward to surf and sand.
Driving Music
Meet the gang: Mel, Stacy, Chris (thanks to an adventurous escape from girl troubles), Sean (thanks to the instability of Korean teacher employment) and I (funnily enough, that sounds like my family plus two) hit the road in our jam packed – and I am talking speed-bump-kissing, curb-hugging, bumper to the road, bags to the roof, eggs at your feet, guessing to change lanes packed – driftwood coloured station wagon and are off. We get far and fast, we have places to go. And between all the stopping to get ice cream and snacks, the daydreaming and window gazing, the vocal imaginings and the few chapters I can get in before feeling nauseas, what else is there to do besides listen to tunes? We can thank Apple’s well-paid marketers for the volume of variety available at our fingertips and also the most important rule of the road: driver gets veto power, no matter what.
So between the generation gaps, gender differences, cultural influences, and personality quirks, and because we each hail from a different part of a wholly diverse Canadian landscape, our little roadie crew of five get an earful as we put kilometers of desert between us and our Melbourne home-for-a-while.
When the old school 90s rock hits I have tuned right out, mostly because I know none of the words and was never cool enough as a child to be so up with the times. Blame oldest child syndrome. Blame my parents’ country albums. Sometimes female vocals tell us to live our dreams, love at any cost, or just relax into the moment. Often we sing along, us girls in the front seat. At other times we go way back to the days when hip hop was good and the depreciative listeners drown the noise with their own headphones as the car grooves to the beat. I must admit it’s hard to imagine a life of guns and violence under the bluest blue skies. And sometimes the screaming gets so loud and the drums so hysterical that all but the driver have headphones on full, and I think I’ll attempt murder if I take them off for even a minute. But then it’s all about compromise on a family trip, didn’t I learn that well?
So between the generation gaps, gender differences, cultural influences, and personality quirks, and because we each hail from a different part of a wholly diverse Canadian landscape, our little roadie crew of five get an earful as we put kilometers of desert between us and our Melbourne home-for-a-while.
When the old school 90s rock hits I have tuned right out, mostly because I know none of the words and was never cool enough as a child to be so up with the times. Blame oldest child syndrome. Blame my parents’ country albums. Sometimes female vocals tell us to live our dreams, love at any cost, or just relax into the moment. Often we sing along, us girls in the front seat. At other times we go way back to the days when hip hop was good and the depreciative listeners drown the noise with their own headphones as the car grooves to the beat. I must admit it’s hard to imagine a life of guns and violence under the bluest blue skies. And sometimes the screaming gets so loud and the drums so hysterical that all but the driver have headphones on full, and I think I’ll attempt murder if I take them off for even a minute. But then it’s all about compromise on a family trip, didn’t I learn that well?
Never Never Land
A glorious return to Korea. Flying from sun to smog, my rental phone beeps an unfamiliar tone to deliver messages of homecoming from the friends I left here eight long months ago. I unpack in Sean’s apartment, feeling, as I place my pink bottles on the sparse shelves, like the girl in How to Lose a Guy, but at the same time feeling giddily at home. The days ebb and flow around me in the big city. I cook, read, catch up with friends I didn’t know when I’d ever see again. I sleep ‘til noon, plans get made (and take hours to execute on the intricate subway system, only slightly underestimated once again after my eight-month absence) and I even manage to score myself a private school job where I can earn my plane ticket, break up the month+ long vacation I have undeservedly awarded myself, and feel the high of being back in front of a classroom of trusting faces. I say warm hellos to new people every day, and spend each weekend in places I had never been the last time: Kevin’s spinning mellows us through a Sunday morning lull, Seoraksan’s highest peak in Korea is closed (apparently walking causes forest fires at certain times of year? Must be all those untrustworthy smokers) but that doesn’t stop us from charging up hundreds of stairs and forgetting about the city for a while. I am back where wine flows freely, where I am comfortable among strangers and without words, where time yawns in a giant, Jung inspired collective unconscious-fueled bubble of dreams, chilled out music, midnight snacks and whirring minds, where anything can be bought on the street corner at any time and money effortlessly convinces you that it grows trees. No wonder people stay here forever…
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