Big Trout

As promised, here is a picture of the Big Trout Motor Inn.



We stayed in a number of interesting roadside establishments in Australia. For less than the equivalent of $40 (US), we stayed in a four-bedroom beach cottage in Coffs Harbour. (OK, so it was the off-season.) We stayed in the Best Western Ambassador Lodge in Hervey Bay for slightly more. It was pleasant enough, if unremarkable. I've stayed in Best Westerns in a number of places, and the level of hotel varies enormously. I stayed in an absolutely stunning one in Innsbruck. This one I'll remember most for having to rouse the proprietors at the late, late hour of 9:30 PM. (People seem to turn in early in small-town Oz. Then again, it got dark at 5.)

Perhaps the best place we found was the "Pink Place" in Tenterfield (aka the Henry Parkes Motor Inn). If for some strange reason you find yourself on the New England Highway in New South Wales, definitely stay there. They had a deal on a room for around $65 (US) with a spa. The food was decent and also priced right.

The Big Trout was less exciting. Christina holds a dim opinion based on her having been woken twice in the morning by someone trying to get into the room to clean it. (Since we were only staying for one night, you think they could have let us check out first.)

Our final lodging was in the Lurline House in Katoomba. If you've stayed in a nice B&B in the UK, you know what to expect. A reasonable price, comfy rooms with antiques and breakfast made for you by the proprietor. We had a little trouble finding Blue Mountains accomodation (apparently the "Christmas in July" celebration is wildly popular) -- hence the night at the Big Trout, but the Lurline House fit the bill nicely.

Billabong Bob

On our drive up the Pacific Highway in Australia, we stopped at the Billabong Koala Park. In general, I lobbied for pushing on to our destination, and Christina lobbied for stopping to see the sights. We ended up doing a fair bit of compromising. We got where we were going, albeit a bit late some times, and we saw a number of sights along the way, albeit not all the ones we were interested in.

The Billabong Koala Park was one sight we did see. It appeared to be some sort of private nature preserve with a bunch of native Australian animals, including koalas, kangaroos and wallabies. It was neat to be able to see those animals up close, especially on our first day there. On the other hand, we felt kind of bad to see these animals cooped up like that.

While waiting for Christina to freshen up, I read a bulletin board with articles about the park and testimonials from visitors. I discovered that the proprietor, "Billabong Bob," was a fashion designer who had won Australian Gown of the Year in the 1960s. I thought this was an interesting, if specialized, piece of information, but was suprised to read about the 2002 competition in the next day's paper.

I also read a testimonial from a couple in New Jersey. As I said, it was really cool seeing these animals. But this couple described the visit to Billabong Koala Park as the best part of their trip to Australia. Unfortunately, this colored my impression of the whole place. I mean, the best part of their trip? What else did they see, the Big Banana? Australia is really an amazing place to visit, and I feel bad for them if seeing a koala was the highlight of the whole trip for them. I mean, it was in the top 10 or 20 things I saw.

Anyway, we stuck around until feeding time, which was a good thing, because we were able to pet the koala and the baby koala. I mean, when I think about it, it is pretty amazing. And a trip where that was the best part could still be a pretty good trip. This one was even better, though.

Big in Australia

One of the charms of driving around in Australia is the Australian penchant for building big versions of everyday things and putting them by the side of the highway. While there, we photographed the Big Banana and the Big Prawn. We even stayed at the Big Trout Motor Inn (picture soon to be developed).

World Heritage: Australia

Last summer, I mentioned that I had been to 7 World Heritage Sites. Since then, I've been to the University of Virginia (which I've changed my mind and decided to count even without Monticello) and last fall I visited the Tower of London.

In Australia, we made it to three World Heritage sites. One of these, as mentioned Wednesday, was the Great Barrier Reef. But before that, on the drive up, we stopped at Bundjalung National Park. Bundjalung contsists of littoral (coastal) rainforest, which is coastal rainforest. Because it's built on sand, it's fairly rare, and fairly fragile. Bundjalung National Park is part of the Central Eastern Rainforest Reserves. We also visited the Greater Blue Mountains Area (more on that later when the pictures come back).

So that's twelve World Heritage sites.

Hat Head

Sadly, my hair was not long enough to produce good hat head for this picture.

LEI

Here's a photo from the plane we flew into Lady Elliot Island on the Great Barrier Reef. You can see the island itself (composed of dead coral) surrounded by a reef. The strip going all the way across the island is the "landing strip". It's not paved or anything; just clear of trees and stuff.

It was fairly amazing landing on this dot in the Pacific, tens of miles from any other land (except other reef islands). I was really amazed to get out of the plane, look to my left and see the Pacific, then look to my right and also see the Pacific. I don't think I'll soon forget that feeling.

Blogger Woes Solved

OK, I fixed the most recent problem with my weblog, so I hope to resume posting soon. The archives may be messed up for a while, though.

Sydney Observatory and other things

We went to the Sydney Observatory Tuesday night. They had a nice little evening program. It wasn't nearly as nice as the one at Kitt Peak, but it did provide the opportunity to look at Alpha Centauri through a telescope, something you can't do up north.

By the way, if you're ever in Australia, it appears that you can't buy cold medicine from a convenience store; you have to buy it from a "chemist" (pharmacy). You can, however, buy "Panadol", a pain reliever. I thought I was doing well by looking at the generic name, "paracetamol," to figure out the US equivalent, but I've never heard of paracetamol. Turns out it's also known as acetaminophen -- Tylenol. So don't go asking for Tylenol, look for Panadol.

Last night, we took the ferry to Manly for dinner. We ended up there at around 9:30, but we found a place that was still serving food (Australia seems to roll up its sidewalks early) and had some reasonably good food and an absolutely great passionfruit tart.

There's much much more, but I'm a little bit overwhelmed at describing it all, and I have a cold (see above). Certainly more to follow from me and also from Christina.

Sydney Harbour Dining

Well, the publishing didn't work yesterday, but so far it's working today. Once again, I only have a little bit of time during the conference's lunch break. I'm chairing an afternoon session, so I probably shouldn't be late.

After the conference yesterday, we walked down to the Rocks, which is where the convicts originally landed in 1788. It's been turned into sort of a touristy restaurant and shopping district -- it reminded Christina of Georgetown.

We stopped in an Aboriginal restaurant, which had kangaroo and other sorts of interesting meat. The sign said that it had traditional dancing, but the place was empty. So we stopped in to ask when they would have traditional dancing. The woman explained that they only brought the dancers in when they had at least 25 bookings. We asked when that might happen, and she told us last Saturday they had 40 people, but none of them had booked in advance, so there was no dancing. Christina took a card, and the woman wanted to know if we were really going to call to make a booking.

She seemed bitter, and I guess if your people's land is stolen, you have a right to. But my ancestors didn't steal her ancestors' land -- they were busy stealing somebody else's. All we wanted to know was when they might have dancing. We'll probably go back later in the week, and we may even make a booking -- in case there happen to be 24 other bookings (as now seems rather unlikely).

We walked some more until we got to the water, and we eventually selected Italian Village, which offered us a nice meal, washed down with a nice Australian wine.

Down Under

I've only got a few moments here...this is the first time I've had Internet access I could publish from.

Random thoughts:

• The water really does go the wrong way 'round down here, but I've never really paid that much attention to it going the right way up there.
  
• Australia is cheap. You get about 2 Australian dollars for one American, and a lot of times the prices look reasonable even before you divide them in two.
  
• Driving on the wrong side of the road isn't as hard as I thought it would be. Driving in Syndey, on the other hand, is ridiculous. Lots of one-way streets, lots of no-right-turn signs. The GPS has been a lifesaver.
  
• The Southern Cross is really quite striking, and I can see why various countries use it on their flags. The Milky Way is amazing...I can't believe I had to come down here to get away from the light pollution.
  
• A lot of times when Christina was driving, I'd look for the wheel, the brakes, or other things I expected to be on the "correct" side of the car. Last night when I was driving by myself, I got into the car, sat down, and then had to get out and get in the driver's side.
  
• This is a really empty country. It's the size of the continental US with 1/15 the population. And parts of the US are really empty. We've been travelling in the more populated part (east coast), and it's been at times like driving through rural Colorado.
  
• Australia is a relatively wealthy country per capita, but not per mile. So the roads don't seem to be as wide as we're used to. Except near major cities, you don't see anything bigger than two-lane roads.
  
• Australians don't seem to speed very much. I guess when you can get caught behind somebody doing 30 kph under the speed limit until you get to an overtaking lane, you have to have a relaxed attitude towards travel time.
  
• More later