[The following was all written down in a Moleskine journal during my walkabout. Mostly copied down here word for word...]
Monday 7th Feb 2011
I woke up at 3am and couldn't sleep anymore. This often happens to me before big trips - or even the night before important engagements such as job interviews. It's not even that I'm nervous or stressed, I guess it's just the anticipation...
So I log onto the Internet and look up some TripAdvisor reviews of the budget hotel that I booked in Sydney (I was in a hurry and didn't look it up carefully earlier when I actually made the bookings). The news is not good: "Hotel from Hell!", "bed bugs", "Worst hotel in town!", etc. What did I get myself into?
I make my way to the train station, and it's a beautiful, cool summer morning. This is where it sinks in that I'll be sitting on a train for 12 hours today, so I pace around a bit and stretch my legs till the last moment before boarding and sitting down.
CountryLink trains are quite unremarkable. At first they seem like glorified commuter trains, and it's hard to imagine that they ply a good chunk of the east coast of the continent. When you first see the inside of one, you think it's just a local area commuter train. But once in motion, the service and culture that comes out is pretty good - and it starts to feel that you're on this thing for a long haul.
We arrive in Sydney on time at 8pm. I'm actually slightly nervous, and I don't know why. I guess it's a combination of a 12 hour train ride and those damn nasty hotel reviews. I make my way up to the block where the hotel is - and it looks super dodgy. Even benign businesses like hairdressers have bars on their windows here - and the general feel of the neighbourhood is a little spooky too - it feels like I'm in a David Lynch film. The whole block seems to be populated by weird-looking drifters and derelicts.
As soon as I register in the hotel and get to my room - I breathe a sigh of relief. The bad reviews were either extremely out of date or very exaggerated. Don't get me wrong, it was a BUDGET hotel all right - the rooms felt a bit like tiny, sparse, single-bed hospital rooms. But it was basically clean and decent.
So I go out and get a pub meal for dinner, have a couple of beers, and head back to the hotel to get some sleep.
Tuesday 8th Feb 2011
I'm meeting my friend DJ tonight. Let me tell you about DJ: him and me grew up together in Yugoslavia in the 1980s. The last time I saw him was in 1988, when my family and I moved to Australia. Thanks to the wonders of Facebook, DJ found me online a few months ago. He works as in IT consultant in Sydney at the moment, so this was a great chance to finally catch up. We decided to meet at dinnertime, when he gets off work - so I had a day to kill in Sydney.
So I took a ferry ride to Parramatta to finally see the full scale of the harbour, and to get an idea of what Parramatta is like. I was actually pleasantly surprised! Parramatta tends to have a reputation for being a bland outer industrial and business district - but it's actually a pretty vibrant, multicultural hub of mixed activity. Quite possibly more vibrant than the actual CBDs of smaller Aussie capitals. The highlight of the trip was watching a middle aged American couple trying to buy ferry tickets with American money - I know it's terrible - but I got a good laugh out of watching that!
Later on, DJ and I met at the gates of Chinatown, at 7:30pm. We walked around for a bit and decided that good places in Chinatown would probably be too noisy to have a quiet dinner conversation, so we headed down to Darling Harbour to find a quieter restaurant.
As you can imagine - a good portion of our conversation was shop talk! Having burned out with my fulltime job and considering contracting for my re-entry into the workforce - DJ was the perfect subject for my brain-picking. His specialisation is rather specific and niche, but I'm sure a lot of what was said applies to ANY kind of IT contracting - and there were a lot of interesting insights.
After dinner, we took a long walk around Darling Harbour - more shop talk, plus reminiscing about our childhoods. Since it was a work night (for DJ), we didn't go drinking, and instead split around 11pm.
Wednesday 9th Feb 2011
This was the laziest day I ever spent in Sydney. The weather wasn't great, so I took a ferry over to Manly and just hung out to kill some time. In the afternoon I headed back to the hotel and just rested and did some reading.
Pub dinner and a couple of beers in the evening, and an early night for my last day in Sydney.
Thursday 10th Feb 2011
Heading to the Blue Mountains today...
Truth be told, I was sort of glad to be checking out of that budget hotel. Not so much because it was especially bad or anything, but more because I knew how much more comfort I would have in Katoomba - I was booked into a boutique B&B. Also, I'd been itching to get away from the city and into the peace and quiet of nature.
So I get to my B&B and sure enough - it's awesome. On the southern edges of town right near the
Three Sisters, and a very cozy little place. It had a reading lounge with a log fireplace too, which would be awesome for those freezing cold Blue Mountains winter nights.
I go for lunch at a Chinese restaurant in town - and am very impressed. For those who don't know - Chinese restaurants in Australian country towns don't tend to be all that good - at least not in an authentic way. They tend to serve up modified "Australian Chinese" fare - which often turns out to be too much like the sort of stuff you find in bad food courts. But this place was really good. About as good and authentic as anything you'd find in Chinatowns in Australian capital cities. The real giveaway that it's good and authentic is that all the mainland Chinese tour groups who come through Katoomba seem to be eating there - and mainland Chinese tourists are notorious for wanting real Chinese food and not being adventurous with eating local food when travelling.
Friday 11th Feb 2011
This being my only full day in the Blue Mountains, I decided to make the most of it - so I went for a big hike. And I mean, it was a Big Hike. Up at dawn, and then a solid 5 hours of walking before lunch - and this all on rough trails mostly marked "Hard", with only a few "Medium" stretches.
It was quite hot and humid too, so this kind of strenuous rainforest bushwalking was taking its toll. I was completely drenched by 1pm, and decided it was time to head back to town and grab some lunch. Naturally, I went to the same Chinese restaurant again!
Then back to some more hiking in the afternoon...
Saturday 12th Feb 2011
I woke up early to catch the train to Sydney - to meet a connection to Coffs Harbour at 11:30am.
The NSW central and north coasts were actually nicer than I expected. Actually, I didn't really know what to expect, but still - they were impressive. Green, hilly, fertile, pretty looking countryside.
I sat in the air conditioned train all day, so it was a bit of a rude shock getting off the train at Coffs Harbour - VERY warm, very humid, very sticky. And this was at 9pm at night.
Sunday 13th Feb 2011
This being my only full day in Coffs Harbour, I decided to make the most of it. The heat and humidity in the morning weren't as bad as the previous night, so I casually walked down into town. My motel was some distance from the main high street near the beach, so this was a half hour walk.
The sky was starting to look quite threatening by late morning, so I dropped into an Internet cafe to see what's going on - and heavy monsoonal rain is forecast for the area for the next 2 days - starting tonight around the Coffs Coast! So I head back towards my motel to be closer to home base - also knowing there is a pub nearby there where I can get some lunch.
It turns out that Sunday is Crab Racing Day at this pub! Here is how crab racing works: a bunch of crabs are put under an upside down bucket in the middle of a special table with raised edges - much like a pool table without the holes. The table also has a finish line drawn in a big circle all around the edges. So when the bucket is lifted, the race is on - and the first crabs over the line are the winners (Gold, Silver and Bronze, naturally). The crabs are hermit crabs with uniquely painted shells, so it's easy to tell them apart.
Of course, this being Australia, this crab racing isn't entirely just for fun - it's a betting game. The beneficiary is the local helicopter surf rescue service. Still, I couldn't get involved in the betting. The prizes were all either local services, or heavy stuff such as a case of beer - neither of which are really practical to win when I'm just backpacking through town and will be gone tomorrow. But at the end, I did give the charity a handful of my loose silver change (about $5 worth).
As expected, in the late afternoon it started raining - HARD! And it didn't stop for the next 24 hours. So I spent this last night in Coffs Harbour chilling in my motel room with a sixpack.
Monday 14th Feb 2011
Took the train out of Coffs Harbour for Brisbane today. It wasn't purely a train ride though - we got transferred to a coach at Casino - near the NSW/Queensland border.
Arrived in Brisbane at 9pm. I'm staying on the couch at my dad's serviced apartment here (he is currently working on a contract in Brisbane). This puts me in a somewhat lazy mood - not only because it isn't costing me anything to stay there - but I've also developed some blisters on my toes from all that walking in the Blue Mountains and Coffs Harbour.
Tuesday 15th Feb 2011
I decide to take a good, long, exploratory walk around central Brisbane. The weather is warm, humid, and showery - classic subtropical summer really - but I press on. I walk from early in the morning till after 2pm. Of course, given that I already had blisters on my toes, these now get full-on feral.
Wednesday 16th Feb 2011
I lance and clean up my blisters in the morning, and spend the rest of the day resting and chilling. This is the first lazy and relaxed "day in" I have on this trip - I spend most of it reading "
The Jungle".
Thursday 17th - Tuesday 22nd February 2011
Bumming around in Brisbane...
As said before, this always happens to me when I crash with friends or relatives on my travels - not much gets done in terms of touring, sightseeing, and other such special activities. Mainly lazy relaxation.
On the plus side - I did get a lot of reading done.
As for Brisbane itself - I did explore the CBD and immediate surrounds quite a bit. It doesn't have much on Sydney or Melbourne (in terms of being an equal as a large Australian city - it's really a lot like a smaller, watered-down version of Sydney), but it's got a very good Chinatown!
Wednesday 23rd Feb 2011
Off to Hervey Bay today...
For the uninitiated - it's pronounced HArvey Bay. This is something that got me the first time I looked the place up - under the wrong spelling because I was told about it verbally.
This is my first ride ever with Greyhound Australia. More or less what you would expect for a regular intercity coach service.
We arrived in Hervey Bay at 5:30pm. The town area was a bit more spread out and car-dependent than I expected. For some reason, I was picturing a compact beach esplanade and a busy and walking-friendly town right behind that. But it's not like that at all. It really feels more like a very sprawling, car-dependent suburban area, than like a friendly little tourist town.
Thursday 24th Feb 2011
Spent the morning walking around Hervey Bay. The main town beach was quite deserted - I'm starting to think that pretty much everybody who comes here must just use Hervey Bay as a base to go on Fraser Island tours - hence the town and its beach are quite empty. So I booked a Fraser Island tour for tomorrow myself!
It started raining in the afternoon - so I retired to my motel room with a few beers for an early night. It'll be an early start for the Fraser Island tour tomorrow.
Friday 25th Feb 2011 - Fraser Island!
Got up early to catch the courtesy bus to the barge landing for Fraser Island. The weather was perfect - slightly partly cloudy in the morning - but no real threat of serious rain. Relatively cool too - by summer standards here - high 20s only.
The Fraser Island barges are sort of like military amphibious landing craft - made to be packed with vehicles and people, with a landing ramp thingy on the front. The landings are just standard boat ramps - the barge simply rams up onto them as if making an amphibious landing on a beach.
Our tour guide puts us on a large 4WD bus - these basically look like standard buses, except that they're 4WD and a bit raised, and have big wheels. We are on our way...
To work around the tides that day, we are first taken right up the east coast of the island to the northern beaches. This is where we get to see a few special sites such as the mouth of a freshwater creek, a shipwreck, and some multi-coloured sand and rocks. Yep - doesn't sound too exciting, but it's actually much more interesting to actually see than to talk about. Fraser Island is that sort of place. Not so much there that sounds mind-blowingly spectacular when you talk about it (or even in photos), but it's really quite pretty and amazing to actually see.
Our tour guide gives up some excellent insights into the history of the island. Right from the Aboriginal history, through to the colonization, through to the present day. We don't get to see a dingo though - that's once tiny disappointment of this tour - but that can't really be guaranteed. It's not a zoo. :)
The highlight of the tour is hands-down Make McKenzie. This is a large, crystal-clear rainwater lake in the middle of the island, set among subtropical rainforest. It's easy to see why the Aboriginals called this place K'Gari - meaning Paradise. In all, Fraser Island was way better than I expected. When I read about it being a "sand island", I expected something much more desolate. But it's actually quite amazing what a varied and beautiful environment it has.
Saturday 26th Feb 2011
Took the bus to Rockhampton today. The bus was due to leave at lunchtime, so I had some spare time and jumped on the Internet for a bit - and the news for travelling further north in Queensland was not good. It's been a very severe and active monsoon season, and the rains and floods are continuing up there. More rain every few days than what your typical temperate climate (such as Melbourne) gets in a whole winter! It doesn't sound too appealing for going further north, so I decide that I'll be turning back south after Rockhampton - and spend some time in Byron Bay instead.
Arrived in Rocky at 7:30pm. The numbers of bugs, lizards and cane toads were like a plague, which made for an interesting first impression of the place. Didn't do much that first night except settle into the hotel.
Sunday 27th Feb 2011
Woke up to the smell of cattle manure...
I had no idea until I arrived and read the motel's welcome booklet - but Rockhampton is the "Beef Capital of Australia"! What this means is that the main highway through town is a constant stream of live transport cattle trucks - accompanied by the wondrous "aroma of live cattle truck".
Took a walk to the CBD - which actually turned out to be quite pretty and historic. Lots of nice colonial era buildings, and a nice aspect to the Fitzroy River. There are crocodiles in this river, which, together with the coconut palms - which are everywhere - are a reminder that I am now solidly in the tropics.
Spent mid-afternoon sinking pints in an Irish pub. It was kind of an odd experience - a very typical Irish pub with the typical, cozy, Irish pub atmosphere - set amongst the heat, humidity and palm trees of the tropics. Of course, it's not like I haven't been in Irish pubs in a warm setting before (such as Melbourne summer), but still, the full-on tropical atmosphere made it feel unambiguously odd.
Having an early night at the motel - have to get up at 5am to catch the train back to Brisbane, and then bus onto Byron Bay.
Monday 28th Feb 2011
Woke up at 5am and walk to the train station.
I get on the fast "Tilt Train", and it turns out there's a problem. Due to a technical glitch, the train can do max 100km/h, instead of the usual 160. Oh-oh - I've only got 80 minutes for the connection to Byron Bay, and it's not a guaranteed connection because they're totally separate services. The initial estimates are that we probably won't make it.
Turns out that luck was on my side that day - I just make it! It was a long and rough day though.
I get to Byron Bay at 9pm, and am instantly hit by the Byron Bay vibe! The legends were indeed true! There really is something in the air here. Some kind of indefinable quality of tolerance, friendliness, and diversity. It's been a long day, so I settle into the resort for a good night's sleep.
Tuesday 1st March 2011
I wake up early and go for a walk around Byron Bay. I'm first walking around randomly, but then decide to go over to Cape Byron and the lighthouse.
The walk is great - but fairly exhausting in the heat and humidity - and with so many uphill and downhill bits. I see some funny-looking birds that look like turkeys in the bush, I look it up later and it turns out they're
bush turkeys - wow! Amazing how that works!
High points of the cape walk trails offer some great views - both of the ocean and the mainland. The peak of Mount Warning is a unique and clearly visible high point in the distance. As this is the highest point in the area, and the area is the easternmost point of the Australian mainland, Mt Warning is the first place in Australia to see the sunrise. The local Aboriginal people call the mountain Wollumbin - meaning cloud gatherer. It is considered a sacred place - so they request that people not climb the mountain.
I continue walking right through to the tip of Cape Byron - officially as far east as you can go on the Aussie mainland. By this time I am utterly drenched by the heat, humidity, and exercise. The forest walk - downhill off the cape and into town - is a welcome relief. After this, I get a pub lunch in town and head back to the resort for a swim in the pool. It's very refreshing after that long walk around the cape and Byron Bay town.
Byron Bay has impressed me and affected me more than any other place on the trip so far. It really would be worth coming back here again for a week, or even ten days. It's hard to put a finger on exactly what it is - I guess it's the hippie and alternative lifestyle heritage of the place, and the fact that it's a very compact and walkable town. It's amazing what a difference that can make to how attractive a place is. But mostly, it would have to be the diversity - you've got everything from the barefoot hippies to the super rich yuppies here. And everything in-between. It's definitely touristy, but not in a flashy and overcommercialised kind of way. For example, the locals take a lot of pride in their local produce, and there are a lot of local, independent food joints - no corporate fast food culture here.
I definitely want to come back again!
Wednesday 2nd March 2011
Leaving Byron Bay way too soon. Along with Katoomba, this is the only other place I really want to come back to again - for a longer and more dedicated stay.
I spend the morning looking into what I can do with the Sydney to Melbourne leg of the return journey. My initial idea was to travel along the coast and enter Victoria via the NSW south coast, into Gippsland. It turns out this isn't actually too practical - most of the transport routes run along the Sydney-Canberra-Melbourne corridor through the inland, so I scratch this idea and just decide to come straight back home from Sydney to Melbourne by bus on Friday.
Thursday 3rd March 2011
My train to Sydney from Coffs Harbour is running almost 2 hours late - DAMN! I had it all planned out too - arrive in Sydney at 9pm, early enough to get a nice dinner and a few drinks, etc. Being 2 hours late throws it all off. It's too late to have a slow and relaxing dinner, go for drinks, etc, and make much of the evening at that hour. Ahhh well. Cards, dealt, etc.
I arrive in Sydney at 11pm and get to my hotel - and realise it's actually a pub! Wow! I finally get to stay in a genuine Aussie pub hotel!
For the uninitiated: in Australia, due to some quirk in alcohol licensing laws, pubs in the past had to officially be hotels, so they all had a few rooms of accommodation upstairs - sometimes almost totally token. Of course, this overlaps somewhat with this function being a real historical function of pubs (especially in the countryside) - but the quirk in liquor laws kept it going, so every pub was forced to keep a few rooms of accommodation upstairs, even if they didn't really want or need that business. Anyways, I've never stayed in one of these before, so it was a new experience for me.
The room is comfortable enough. More or less like a normal hotel room. It's late, but hey, this is a pub! - so I head downstairs for a few cold beers. Then back to my room just after midnight to get some decent sleep. It's a 14 hour bus ride to Melbourne tomorrow.
Friday 4th March 2011 - LAST DAY!
14 hour bus ride back to Melbourne today.
I didn't realise until I got to the bus, but it passes through Canberra! Wow, I'll finally get to see the nation's capital!
Canberra wasn't on my list for my walkabout - even though it's on the way - for the following reason: it's said to be very spread out and car-dependent. I didn't really want the hassle and expense of having to get a rental car to get around town, so I decided to skip it.
So we stop in Canberra for lunch, and sure enough - the place looks pretty much like a bunch of far flung separate suburban estates. Apparently, this is how it was actually planned - as a bunch of distinct "towns", separated by parks and open green reserves. I personally think this idea was much better in theory than in practice - to say the least. The city feels extremely soulless and "over engineered" somehow. Just like it's missing the touch of real, natural human history and organic growth. I get this feeling with a lot of planned urban environments (eg. Docklands in Melbourne), but Canberra takes the cake.
Still, shouldn't judge too harshly. I only spent an hour in town for lunch, basically just passed through by bus. Didn't get to see any of the great national monuments or anything. This is the main reason to come to Canberra as a tourist. I really should do this someday. Of course, I'll come with my own set of wheels!
After lunch in Canberra, we town-hop through Wagga Wagga and Albury, and then express onto Melbourne. We cross the Murray river into Victoria at 7:10pm - finally starting to really feel like I'm coming home.
We get to Melbourne at 10:45pm. It's a beautiful, cool late summer night. Then I realise we're in March, so it's actually officially autumn now. Either way, this is my first refreshing cool evening in a long time - after almost a month of tropical or subtropical mugginess.
I get home at 11:20pm. The Walkabout is over.
