Köln Karneval and Snowboarding

Before Maren and I went snowboarding in Zermatt, I headed over to Köln for the culmination of Karneval. Mainly it consists of everyone dressing up and partying for the whole week. I got to experience the city on Friday night, the Ghost Parade on Saturday and then a float parade on Sunday - where there was a lot of chocolate and flowers thrown at the crowd! "Camillaaa!" And when I say everyone dresses up, I mean EVERYONE!! I was pretty impressed to see all sorts of characters, there was a lot of effort made!

The Ghost Parade started out as an anti-war protest during the 1st Gulf War, and everyone dresses up as ghosts, vampires, etc. I was glad that Maren convinced me to make the effort to wear the skeleton costume - see the results below.

On the Sunday I had the privilege to dress up as a Kangaroo, and perhaps i'll get around to posting a photo or video or two. In the mean time, here are a few photos from the proceedings, plus a few from our time in Zermatt ...

Everyone ready to go

Maren being Boney M!

Maren and I try to scare people at the Ghost Parade.

Clair, Maren and Matt taking a break.

The Matterhorn.

Matt, Clair and I on the piste.

It's been a while!

It's been quite a while since I wrote an entry! Largely due to living a pretty manic life flying between London and Cologne. Nevertheless, I wanted to get back into my blogging - even if it's just for my friends in various countries, and particularly Oz!

So - it's late, and I spent more time playing around with video editing than I expected (and I still can't work out how to get a better quality version out yet because it's all in German!) but here is a little video of Maren and I in Switzerland from a couple of weeks ago.

More posts to come!

G'bye Australia!

It's time for this geeza to get back to Europe. My time here in Australia has been truly amazing, as you are no doubt aware from my entries on this blog. The best part of the trip though has got to be the people, and it is a genuine shame to have to say goodbye. However, nothing is for ever, and I am sure I will return in the future.

The collage above has a few of the people I have met along the way, perhaps you can see yourself in there? I have to say a huge thank you to Kylie and the Hallorans, for adopting me even though i'm a pom; James, for being a great mate and helping me out so much; My best regards to everyone else, may your future plans be hugely successful!

Next stop, London!

Jackarooing in Oakhampton

The second major activity Maren and I did, whilst she was over here, was our five day Jackaroo & Jillaroo course on the Oakhampton station, near Manilla, NSW. We got the train up the day before and hung out in Tamworth (typical country town) and the next day we headed to the station. At first we thought we would be inundated with young, German backpacker girls, as these filled the YHA, but luckily they were heading to Leconfield, which is the station advertised in the Lonely Planet. Our station was much quieter and the group consisted of a S.A. family, Maren and myself - much better!

There were many activities planned for the week and yet it was still pretty chilled out, 7.30am starts and finishing when the sun set at about 5.30pm. Day 1 was getting to Oakhampton, introductions to the family, looking around the place and catching kid goats for the males to be ringed. It transpires that Maren is a pretty good goat catcher!

Day 2 we got into the shearing shed, where Marshall introduced us to the world of sheep. Wrestling them down, crotching some and shearing others was a great experience. Carting a 70kg sheep about sure gets you tired though and you have to be impressed with the guys who manage to shear 200 a day! Once we'd shorn a few we headed out to do some drenching, mouthing and drafting - the latter of which earned me a beer for a complete draft ... nice! Each evening we helped feed the various animals around the station, the goats, the lambs, the deer, the pig, the cows, and even the joeys!

Day 3, and it was time to saddle up! Once we prepared our gear out we went to get the horses. I started on Cliffy, but soon changed over to Billy, an ex-polo and race horse, whilst Maren was on Cliffy. It was good to be back in the saddle, though I confess to being rather sore! A morning of practice riding, lunch, and then off for a trek in the surrounding hills. It's a beautiful country and it felt really good to be riding out there. We were joined by Kim and Bob: locals who made sure we didn't go too far off track! Bob being a true Bushman, and at 80 years old still spritely to jump on a horse and go out and muster the cattle ... impressive! We were also joined my the irrepressible James, who runs the station.



Day 4 started with a long horse trek through the surrounding country. In the afternoon we got serious (kind of) and headed to round up some cattle. Mustering a mob from the paddock through to the pens near the shearing shed so a couple of the male calves could be castrated. Heading out we really felt what it would be like to be a part of a working station, and it felt great! Once there we got to the business in hand: castrating two of the males, and tagging them. Maren volunteered for the second calf and as I held it against the run she got in close with the sharpened knife to do the deed. I was getting pretty scared of the skills that Maren is starting to pick up, especially after learning to use a cattle whip properly!



Day 5, and sadly the last one on Oakhampton. Again we mustered the cattle back to their homes and cleaned up the saddles, etc. Then we headed out to burn out some cactus weed, nearly starting our very own mini-bush fire in the process, but it was all under control of course! Afterwards we did some fencing - that staple of a station-workers routine.

Both Maren and I wished we could have stayed longer and under different circumstances we certainly would have done. Sometime in the future hopefully! We both would highly recommend Oakhampton for anyone wanting to experience a bit of true Aussie life on the stations! James, Belinda, John, Bob, Kim and Marshall really looked after us and we'll head back at the drop of a hat!

More photos can be found in the album:

Oakhampton

Aug 20, 2006 - 58 Photos

East Coasting

It's been a while since I have had a chance to post an update because I have been pretty busy with my travels and making plans for the future. Here I'll try and fill you in, so prepare for quite a read.


It all starts with Maren arriving and both of us flying straight up to Ballina to attend the Splendour in the Grass festival at Byron Bay, joining Kylie and Karen. The festival was great fun and we saw some good acts! To add to the fun we spent most of the time tramping around in ankle deep mud and running for cover when the heavens opened.

Whilst in Byron I gave surfing a go, and lo and behold I actually enjoyed it! And because Maren is a bit of a surf nut it wasn't long before she was the proud owner of her very own board. Our justification being there are plenty of surf spots to try out on the drive down to Sydney. The rest of the week that we spent in Byron involved surfing, chilling out and walking around, and sadly it came to an end soon enough ... time to get the car!

More Byron Bay photos can be found here.

After saying goodbye to Kyles and Kaz at the airport in Ballina, we jumped in our 'sporty' Hyundai "Getz" and drove back up to Byron to get the surfboard and bags. Once lashed to the roof we set off on our adventure, first stop the hippie drug-infested town of Nimbin. We raced through the winding roads and made it around 4pm ... which gave us about enough time to have a coffee and look around. Nimbin is indeed a strange place to visit. Just walking down the 'high' street (sorry, had to!) you see more people off their head than in Kings Cross (Sydney) on a Friday night! We then headed back south to the contrastingly serene, Lennox Head where we found our first campground of the trip.

It's been a while since I have been properly camping, and I had forgotten how much fun it can be. A simple pleasure I derived, was using a $14 meths stove to boil our tea and heat our cheap tinned food. We felt a million miles from civilization, and that was a good thing!

The next morning Maren jumped into the water with her board whilst I supervised from the comfort of the beach. Tempted though I was to get into a damp wetsuit and go into the cold water, I wasn't interested today. Passing Ballina for the last time we just had to stop at the "Big Prawn" but then we were on the road again to Evans Head on the way down to Yamba, staying at the "Fishermans Haven". Something of note for anyone thinking of traveling the east coast of New South Wales in winter, as we have done, is the number of old people you will encounter. We were the youngest in the whole campground by a good 30 years it seemed. We were surrounded by the grey army, and their caravans and RVs! Everyone was terribly pleasant and were probably wondering what on earth we were doing running around with a surfboard in winter!

The next day started with a torrential downpour, and with the wind whipping our little tent around I rather hoped it would stay attached to terra firma. Once this had started abating we quickly packed up the car and set off for Yamba to get a coffee and plan our route. As the rain was lashing down we looked on over hot lattes glad to be out of it. Little did we realise that the straps we used to tie the surfboard down were acting as channels for all this water, straight into the car. Arriving back, we found the seats sodden and the cup holders full of water - naturally laughter was the only answer!

Onwards and downwards, in a very damp way, to Woolgoolga - a jaunty little town with a couple of very nice beaches and some easy relaxed waves. We didn't really have much luck with the surf on the trip all in all, but as I was a total beginner and Maren still learning we were happy to practice in the white water, and Woolgoolga was a pretty good place to do that. So we decided to stay a couple of nights, and even got chatting to our neighbours (Martin and Penny, heading north, old-ish, nice caravan unit, etc ;-) I hired a board the next morning and started to get more into it, even standing up for long enough to wonder what to do next! We even contributed to the local economy by stuffing ourselves to bursting at the local Mexican restaurant. I'm sure the people of Woolgoolga will fondly remember the couple that stayed with them for those two days in July!

But being young and dynamic we couldn't stay in one place too long .. oh no! Off we went over crazy, pot-holed back roads through Coffs Harbour (where we dutifully stopped off to see the "Big Banana" ... and rather wished we hadn't!) and made it to Nambucca Heads. Lunch, coffee and a photo exhibition were all over before we knew it and we were heading towards South West Rocks and our campground for the night at Arakoon. On the way we took the drive through the beautiful Way Way forest and it felt like we were really seeing a lot of the area! Consequently we arrived pretty late at Arakoon, and so a walk after dinner, looking for Kangaroos (of which we saw several), was all we could muster before turning in for the night.

As most of you will know, I have been in Australia for nearly a year, and so the prospect of getting up early to take photos of kangaroos didn't really capture my heart. Especially when its pretty cold out and i'm wrapped up in a sleeping bag! But as this was as much Maren's trip as mine we wandered out, cameras at the ready. We found quite a mob, and even I was impressed to see them jumping about on the beach. Once we had satisfied our marsupial urges, we looked around the Arakoon gaol and moved on to Port Macquarie (via Crescent Head).

Port Macquarie is quite a picturesque little town, and the harbour is rather ... quaint. But we weren't here for quaintness, no, we were here for the Koala rescue hospital! Maren was determined to soften me up with exposure of even more marsupials! Before the tour of the hospital began we got a chance to look at Roto House, the home of Flynn (the famous surveyor of the area, not Errol, the actor!) and then we were amongst the little critters. Most had been rescued from areas under development where their natural habitat was being destroyed, others were from bush fires and others were just plain old sick. Cute though they were, it'd take more to soften up old 'hard as nails' Hodgson!

Because of the Koala factor we were racing like demons through the night (well, dusk really) on to Forster-Tuncurry and our final destination for this trip, Seal Rocks. This area is simply beautiful, and well worth the diversion to get to. Spending the night looking at the stars and listening to the surf, we were pretty sad to have come to the end of the trip so quickly. The next day we looked over the adjacent Treachery Rocks and started the drive back to Sydney. Our advice for anyone doing a similar trip would be to give yourself as much time as you can afford and then squeeze in a little more!

More east coast photos can be found here.


Once back in Sydney we caught up with friends and chilled out. We also headed out to the Blue Mountains, and on the way dropped in at Doonside (soon to be known as Doomside!) for the Featherdale Wildlife Park. The main reason for wandering through this Western Suburb hell hole was to get up close to Koalas (yes, that marsupial thing again!). Readers of my previous blog entry on Taronga will remember my doubts about animal enclosures such as zoos, wildlife parks, etc and, in my opinion, Featherdale represents the lower end of the conservation-entertainment scale. Whilst I believe it is a good thing for kids to learn about animals etc, I draw the line at letting them run riot amongst them! Animals are pretty hardy things really, but seeing unsupervised kids screaming around I did feel for them. It was great to get up close and see the animals, but I had an overwhelming feeling that it just wasn't quite right. After Doomside we got to Katoomba a little late, and sadly had to rush through the Three Sisters and down the steps. We still enjoyed it and was glad to have made the journey.

Travel Photos

It has taken me a little while, but I have finally sorted through my travel photos and published a few online.

I've published them in sections, which relate pretty much with the tours I did. Starting with the West Coast trip I did with Easyriders, then the time I spent in Broome, following that the Kimberley Ranges tour, then the Kakadu trip. Next there is the trip from Darwin to Alice Springs, then the Red Center tour, some photos from my time in Alice Springs and this is followed by photos of my time in Adelaide, and Kangeroo Island. To finish off the collection there are albums for my trip to Coober Pedy, and back via the Flinders Ranges.

Or, you can look at the albums front page here.

Or if you are really pushed for time I have collated a "Top 35" of images that I personally like.

I hope people get enjoyment from them. Of course there will be more photos from my upcoming east coast adventures.

Sydney Life

So i'm back in Sydney and sadly it seems like a long time since I was travelling around good old Oz. There really isn't much to report apart from i've been doing some web development work and thinking about what i'm going to do next.

One thing that has been taking my time is the sorting and publishing of my photos. It's getting there, but it's been a challenge. Most will be available via my Picasa web album page and i'll let people know when their tour has been published.

Next week Maren arrives from Germany and we, together with some local friends, head up to Byron Bay for the Splendour in the Grass festival and a couple of weeks exploring a bit of the east coast. Thank goodness, a bit more travel to keep me away from real work! I'm really looking forward to it, especially as I appear to be being convinced to try surfing. I will keep everyone posted how that goes!

Random photos posted here are Bondi beach; some parrots going mad for food on the way into the city; and a little bit of a sunset over Darling harbour.



 

Nearly time to go home.

Me on a Salt Lake heading to Coober Pedy

So somehow it is nearly time for me to return to Sydney and all that entails: my friends, my apartment, my cases of wine from Margaret River, and of course the prospect of work, credit card bills, etc.

It's been an awesome trip, showing me that there is so much more to Australia than I ever imagined. It has also instilled a feeling that I will return to some of the places to explore in a bit more detail!

The last trip involved me heading up to Coober Pedy, via the Barossa and Clare valleys, and then heading back to Adelaide via the Flinders Ranges, with Wilpena Pound being the highlight. It seemed to be a wildlife photo safari all the way - with lots of opportunities everywhere. It certainly kept me and my camera busy!

Sunrise at William Creek

Wedge Tailed Eagle

Kangeroo with Joey at Wilpena Pound

Emu in the morning at Wilpena Pound