Oh civilisation, how I have missed thee

Just back from eight days in the Vegas. E and I travelled over on our own and K joined us after four days - our first real time apart with E around. A few minor travel stresses - eg, scrambling to connect the car battery while the babe screameth in the blazing sun, shoehorning him into a too-small capsule in a hot car, a non-sleeping baby for the first few days - but on the whole, really positive. 

 

I got a badly needed massage, haircut and counselling (useful but I nearly swallowed my tongue when I paid the bill), a visit to the craniosacral therapist for E, and some bricks-and-mortar retail therapy. (My online procurement now verges on embarrassing and is the butt of jokes amongst the rangers who collect our mail... though is totally reasonable given I did not shop for E when pregnant. And, hello, live on an island. But I digress.)

 

The city. We stayed with friends R + J and little M for three days. We walked every day and clocked up quite a few clicks to and from the local Fountain Lakes. I even had mini-conversations with other peeps-with-prams. I procured the boy some decent bibs (why oh why are they mostly all crap? and velcro, bane of my laundering life), more clothes (hello size one!), toys (sounding the death knell to our boycott of plastic toys) and a cute owl moneybox and even cuter fairtrade owl backpack. We borrowed a playmat - one of those types with the arches which you can dangle stuff from - and an activity station that he can sit upright in. Both of which he LOVES. Why I did not get these types of things sooner... *Bats head* Other purchases: a second carseat to follow the other recently acquired one, and a cot.

 

Some interesting stuff. The craniosacral therapist felt inside E's mouth and knew he didn't take a dummy. Huh. She said he had a very high palate. And because of that, probably wasn't drawing so well during breastfeeding. Huh. And that would affect my supply. Huh. Wow. She also said his gums were very inflamed. Which we knew. But at the back too. Hmm. Odd. This week molars, next week puberty? She also thinks he should have some relief soon from his reflux. We live in hope.

Our craniosacral visit was followed by a very satisfactory hour of book browsing and purchases at Riverbend and Lifeline in Bulimba, punctuated with caffeine and facilitated by a long-sleeping baby.

I also met up with a girl who was interested in donating breastmilk. At my fave cafe in Paddington, from the days when I lived down the street and around the corner. She had a little boy, the same age as E, and it was so good to chat about baby stuff with someone of similar ilk. We traded birth stories and ate breakfasts in the early afternoon. And the boy? Surprisingly OK - even smiling across the table at the other baby. Not sleep deprived/crying/a vomiting volcano/crazed with hunger/cranky/high maintenance as I'd feared. Holy crap! I felt human! And walked away with just over a full feed of milk for E. Happy!

What else? We had a visit to premmie playgroup at the hospital, which I've never been convinced we learn anything from, but we go anyway just in case. Got the boy registered with Medicare, FINALLY, after months of dodging inquisitions at the doctor's/hospital ("uh, we've just lodged the form..."). But most exciting, E had his first food - watermelon. Did his eyes pop out of his head or what? Totally not what I had planned but it just sort of unfolded at R + J's. Probably nice for him in the stupendous heat anyway.

 

And. Underscoring my reconnection with civiliation, the girls who were in my midwifery group are planning their first meet up. And kindly scheduled it to coincide with our next trip over! Will be my first official 'mothers group'.

And the learnings. Yes, I realised I have been way too isolated. That I can do this trip on my own. That it's hard work, alone or not. That I have a couple of willing babysitters that I totally need to call on. That the boy will refuse to sleep, and cry, and cry, and cry. And though I will also miss out on sleep, this is not too dissimilar to being at home. And EVERYTHING WILL BE OK. And I LOVE living on an island, at a lighthouse, away from people and the crazy, concreted, smelly, loud, shopping-malled world, but I also need people and the crazy, concreted, smelly, loud, shopping-malled world, sometimes. (But not too often.) And E does too. For all the non-sleeping, he thrived in new environments. He charmed people wherever we went with his huge cheeky grin and screechy giggles. And got to spend time with his Nana and other little people. 

It felt like we were away forever. The house is a festering mess, but it's good to be home. We picked zucchini and tomatoes and basil and rocket from the garden and had a late dinner of fritatta. The boy slept well but woke in the pre-dawn. Life chugs on. I will be taking mental health breaks more often, methinks.

glee. a weekend retreat

Life has been a bit of a slog lately, largely due to a full-blown case of work irks. I can handle just about anything the desk throws at me. It’s when they stop throwing it that I start losing it. Thanks to Queensland school holidays and a progressive female Premier, the past few weeks in the Army have been so DULL I’ve wanted to bore my eyes out with a rusty drillbit. Dwelling on the dismal imbalance of it (time is short, there are so very many things I want to do, and there is so very much to be done) has been doing my head in. That and doing the shuffle between the 'Hill and the bus (which is now in Brisbane after K relocated from the coast), which is driving us both a little nutty.

So it was perfect glee to spend three whole days (and one of them a Monday!) in Cougal, New South Wales beside the Border Ranges National Park with friends of K’s who moved from 'the Rock' earlier this year to run a guesthouse on 200 acres. This weekend they hosted a bunch of women on a dance retreat. With a baby due any day, K's mates invited us to hang out as back-up hosts in case baby decided to show up, which, thankfully (not being acquainted with home births) he didn’t. So we hung out, washed a few dishes, pulled a few weeds and made daily trips down to the creek to swim and sprawl on sunny rocks with books. Aah! We awoke after slumber-licious nights to the sound of bellbirds and whipbirds (not at all like the crazy alarm-birds at the ‘Hill which have learnt to mimmick every alarm clock in the south Brisbane neighbourhood). We played with a dreamy-eyed toddler and an old dog from the desert. And chatted to I and T about their life running a guesthouse in the bush. And daydreamed (well, I did) about the many possibilities in their extremely large commercial kitchen...

Photos to come, since my camera inadvertently went home with K in Barry, in the continuing saga of 'where's my stuff?' that accompanies the dance between two homes.

dear universe

I barely know where to start. The past few weeks have been chockers. A three-week intravenous hit of culture and people I love. Between mud-camping at Woodford for the Dreaming Festival, Melbourne to see friends whilst dosing on food, Dali, design and high-street-retail love, and Binginwarri to gather wild mushrooms, chase wombats and get trounced by the relics in the Winter 2009 Pictionary Play Offs, I’ve barely been home.

Or alone.

And now that I am both, I’m feeling kinda sad.

I’ve been given a fair bit of prodding in recent months to think about the shortness of life. Today another good soul passed away. I am sending warm thoughts to his family and friends. And acknowledging life, the precarious privilege.

Dear universe, I am paying attention.

turning circles

Was highly amused today by colleague’s description of current machinery-of-government changes: “government agencies have the turning circle of a large aircraft carrier”. Well. I thought it was hilarious. Maybe I’m just a wee bit over-invested in work. Hardly surprising I guess given my daily remit to turn tepid horse poo into something highly desirable. On the turning circle of a gnat. With the reflexes of a reef fish.

Humph.

You know when you exclude something from your life for a higher cause (like chocolate, though that’s just stupid) it automatically appears all around you like an evil cherry to tempt you from your commitment?

An adventuring friend emailed last week enquiring my interest in

"Diving in the caves of Mexico
Walking across the Pyrenees from Atlantic to Mediterranean.
Ride around Ireland. I think it would be neat to then ride around northern France.
Annapurna crt or even an Island/Mera peak trip in Nepal.
And something still tugs at me to go back to NZ and paddle around Marlborough sounds and hike some of the classic areas in the south.
And I keep coming back to the idea of a trip into Northern India."

Money in the bank. Money in the bank. BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH can’t hear you can’t hear you not listening WHAT?

The trips in bold are my picks. I will covet and store these away, to be dusted off when I've grown the acorn stash a bit bigger. And meanwhile content myself with curry-from-scratch, the ABC’s India and Ravi Shankar's back catalogue.

I love my little pad. I love walking to and from work (pity about the intervening hours). And yoga. And having stuff. Like a garden and a sandwich press and proximity to friends. But as you can see from my capacity to be disproportionately amused by inconsequential tripe (above), sometimes life at desk just doesn’t cut the ghee…

master of unravelled plans and small detours

Ah Byron. A two-day detour into green rolly hills, rainbow-glimmery waterfalls and surf, where land prices make you cry and German snowboard instructors make you want to learn to surf. Again. And then go to Tibet. (After I just narrowed the focus of my wanderlust down to Western Australia. And India.)

There’s something frivolous about taking the long way home. And unravelling plans into the wind.

I was in Byron 15 years ago, pretty much to the day. (Before it was completely besmirched by the likes of Dominos and Supre, promulgating their cheap-ass chain-store mediocrity to affluent city-slaves searching for something they don’t realise is long since gone and which they have effectively helped kill off. Not that this was intended, nor that I can separate myself from them. But back to topic...)

I’d dropped out of uni for a semester and headed, for the second time, to Byron, to think and be. OK, there may have been some cavorting too, of the kind that it is natural for an academically focused 19yo to do when unchained from her small world. I hung out with loads of people from all over the world. I tried to surf. I sailed a hobicat. I stole a hubcap/ashtray from the Railway pub. I tried … a lot of … um, different stuff for the first time.

Oddly, I feel closer to my 19yo self than my 19yo self would have liked. (If my 19yo self could see me now.) Crazy to think that I knew back then that I was on the wrong path. Crazier still that it took me 15 years... 15 YEARS GODDAMNIT!! to alter course. Even more pathetic is that I still don’t have a clue where I’m going!

But maybe that’s OK, in some small, skewy, not-the-Hollywood-ending kind of way.

On my 19th birthday, I hitch-hiked from Byron to Nimbin with an English lad. I remember not quite knowing whether we would make it there, and if we did, where we would stay. We made it to Nimbin. That night I stayed in a little house which belonged to friends of friends, and fell asleep under a window of stars, stoned to the eyeballs, as two girls made love in the next room. It remains one of my most spontaneously lived birthdays, and one of the few I actually remember.

the next part

Freedom. So elusive. Perhaps fortuitously so. Its attainment forces a very personal issue. How to use it? Given every liberty, what should we do? How to start tomorrow? These thoughts taunt me right now. For tomorrow I must answer them.

The Hope Vale project has finished. There’s loads of cool stuff that I could relate (eating turtle, kayaking from North Direction to Lizard Island, the impossible cuteness of a wordy two-year-old, meeting people living the cruising life, all the cool places I've seen/been, etc). But I’m sort of consumed at this late~early hour by crisis-of-purpose thoughts. After an exhausting but happy month, that now familiar blank canvas stretches out before me. Uncontracted infinitum. I know myself better than ever. But there is the interminable tension between wants and needs, habit and change. Between possible paths, divergent values. And of course, between two (geographic) states.

There is no rational reason that I should be so nervy about not knowing what I’m doing beyond next week, and where I’ll be doing it. So why is it doing my head in? Exhaustion? The perpetuity of uncertainty? I wish someone would bloody hire me to do something fantastically cool for the next few months and I could just put these stupid thoughts to bed. For now.

Since I'm asking, a sleep-in without a wordy two-year old who awakes at sparrow fart would also be grand. Please. Thank you. And now, me to bed...


--

Looking forward to:

Spending overdue time with friends in Brisvegas (and having the next 10 days sort of planned)
Officially resigning from my cushy permanent gig for the still wide unknown
Clean hair, clean fingernails, clean clothes, clean bed, etc.
Retaining inspiration aka a sense of infinite possibility

mayi dupbar*

It's always about the food.

Up early on our day off. Can’t sleep in (damn diurnal rhythms). Pelican’s tech-guru N and I prep pancakes on the barbie with fruit salad, yoghurt and honey (the maple syrup went out in sympathy for the armies of bananas which have fermented on this trip). A lovely long brekky with coffee and tunes.

It’s a fitting start to our Sunday after Pelican's four huge days supporting a group of Hope Vale community members to retrace, by kayak, a sea route used by the Guugu Yimidhirr Aborigines to Lizard Island to collect (you guessed it) food: wild arrowroot and yam, clam shell, sea gull eggs, turtle, wangay, fish, dugong and pigeons. The original inhabitants paddled in dugout canoes from the main camp at Cape Flattery to Lizard, via Rocky Island, South Direction Island and North Direction Island.

Our first night’s anchorage is at Rocky Isle, a protected rookery for Torres Strait pigeons. We have time for beachcombing before picking up the kayakers who will arrive after their first day's paddle. The shoreline is paved with flat white stones and the sand is spangled with driftwood, prongs of bleached coral and manmade flotsam. We return to the boat with the kayakers and an armful of rubbish and rouse a few hands to help prepare the meal: freshly-hooked barbecued fish, jacket potatoes and salad. Camping is not permitted on Rocky so Pelican sleeps with 29 people under her wing.

On day two, the kayakers paddle from Rocky Isle to North Direction Island, which rises like a pudding from the sea. Our mooring there is tenuous, with gusts bulleting the boat, and reefs surrounding us. So after unloading support people and camp gear, Pelican and crew depart for the sheltered waters of Watson’s Bay at Lizard for the night and a quiet meal of ganguruu (kangaroo) and mediterranean vegies on the barbie (with thanks to E and crew for giving me the night off!).

We motor back to North Direction on day three to pick up all the kayakers. With 25-30 knot winds and a messy two-metre swell, some paddlers are not keen on completing the last leg to Lizard Island. With them aboard, we sail back to Lizard and moor at Mermaid Cove, a secluded bay where a rock ledge shelters a lively reef. It's decided that we'll wait to see if conditions ease enough to complete the last leg tomorrow. After a tiring day of loading and unloading people and gear, N and I squeeze in a late afternoon snorkel. Sunlight streams through the water onto bright blue, fat-fingered starfish. Giant winking clams and baby clam nurseries ogle us from below. Neon reef fish duck in and around coral bommies. We stick our heads up just in time to catch a sunshower. As we return to the boat a turtle swims by. What a world! After visiting the shore camp we enjoy a late dinner of baked spangled emperor, rice, cucumber salad and coconut-lime sambal.

Day four and we are three paddlers short. The kayaks must all be returned to Lizard. In the interests of logistics, I, along with two other Pelican crew, put my hand up to jump in a kayak. Not without nerves, as the instructors focus us on how to handle a capsize and our skipper talks about retrieval procedures. Conditions are still rough, with 25-30 knots, frequent gusts and lots of chop, but we're paddling downwind and have Pelican close by. As we launch the kayaks from North Direction Island, an eagle circles us overhead. I'm too busy staying upright to notice, but those remaining on Pelican declare goosebumps. This is the final leg of an historic voyage. After an hour’s paddling, we approach the shallow waters of the lagoon at Lizard, all eight kayaks with sails up, cruising the rest of the way in. A welcome party of three ngowia (turtles) greets my paddle honcho J and I as we are among the first to arrive.

What a journey. Kudos to the kayakers who completed it, and brought to life part of their cultural heritage. It is hard to imagine making this voyage in pursuit of food, as the Guugu Yimidhirr once did.

--

*Yummy food in Guugu Yimidhirr

postcard from cape flattery

At last... back where the sun shines! We are anchored at Cape Flattery, at the southern end of the Cape York Peninsula.

We sailed from Cairns a week ago, arriving that evening in Cooktown for a community sail the following day. We took a group of school students and marine scientists out to the reef to undertake water quality monitoring. After last dash provisioning in Cooktown (including an all-important last icecream for a month), we sailed to Cape Bedford, where we anchored for a couple of days, doing sail training. We've had five Hope Vale fellas aboard for the first week, undertaking training with us towards their coxswains certificates. Great bunch of guys (that's them above in celebration mode as we arrive at Flattery).

Bit of a perk for me to sit in on most of the training and beef up my boatiness.

On Tuesday we sailed north to Cape Flattery, where the Hope Vale community will set up camp on the beach over the school holidays. This will be the base for a whole bunch of activities, including digital storytelling (there is a whole media tent with computer editing facilities), a kayaking trip following a traditional dugout canoe route to Lizard Island, music and dance workshops, basket-weaving, spear-making, turtle and dugong research... and of course sailing!

Sailing north from Cape Bedford, we had a bumper catch off Low Wooded Isle, a favoured fishing spot of skip's which always provides. Northern bluefin tuna, spotted mackerel and coral trout: five in all. We have since feasted amply on sashimi and barbecued fish, rice and salad.

The only food issues so far have been frostbitten greens and fermenting fruit. Since we are quite remote and catering numbers are a bit 'fluid', I've been swallowing my tongue every time I see space appearing in the fridges! Have also been helping with meal planning for the community camp – up to 120 people for three weeks with only eskies, a simple woodfire grill and gurramah (underground camp oven) to play with. Luckily there is a cook in charge of the camp kitchen (I had been wondering!) and he used to be a chef in the navy.

Today was our first community sail at Flattery, with the marine scientist involving Hope Vale kids in seagrass monitoring activities. Privileged to have a traditional owner aboard. We are learning lots. Many dugongs sighted, one curling up through the water close by the boat.

Will write more soon - my battery's dying!

prorogue

(pro-ROHG) verb tr.: 1. To discontinue a session of something, for example, a parliament. 2. To defer or to postpone.

Sometimes new words come along at just the right time.

Spring has sprung and we are into our second week of continuous sunshine! Those of you living beyond the reach of proper winter will probably not understand my unfettered crazy-woman bliss. Suffice to say, it is like falling into a very deep mire of fetid baby-poo-like sludge while you’re sleeping and wondering, when you wake up, why everything is suddenly rank and it’s difficult to move without clenching inwardly against the tide of crap… until five months* later you’re miraculously hauled out of the baby-poo-like sludge, whisked to a day spa and washed, pummelled and spruced back to life, whereupon robed courtiers who look very much like Jemaine from Flight of the Conchords escort you to a candy-striped sunchair where a glass of bubbles awaits your pleasure as wardrobe, hair and nail attendants get to work on further sprucing.

Well, it is very much like this. Of course it isn't actually this. That would be stupid. Or very amazing.

But back to my main reason for posting. Tomorrow I leave the country. (Not Australia, Gippsland, aka the country. Ha!) For Cape York, via Cooktown, via Cairns, via Melbourne, via bus, train, J's place, train, skybus, plane, car, boat, etc.

I can almost smell the salt air! Yippee! does not even come close. Business as usual (winter, under-employment, everything in my life that doubles for baby-poo-like sludge, etc) is hereby prorogued for a month.

Spring has also returned my kitchen mojo, courtesy a genius creation of barley, mushroom and mozzarella burgers. Which are so meaty that I’m toying with getting the kids (the ones I’ll be working with, who only eat meat – and then only the lips-n-a$$holes kind) to make and eat!

Hehehehe. I am pure evil.

--

*because that is how long a real winter lasts.

potatoship to the camembert moon

Two weeks before departure for Cairns. Less, actually.

From my bolthole in the virtual Antarctic (aka southern Gippsland), I can’t quite grasp the subtropics. My disbelief starts somewhere around my ugg boots. And tapers off around my beanie. T-shirts and shorts sound about as appropriate right now, as, well… flying to the moon in a hollowed-out potato.

[Gah! Potato rocketship + moon-as-cheese = brain preoccupied with stodge! I know those moon mythologists have dibs on Swiss but I'm going for camembert. White rind. I think it works. Mmm, camembeeeerrt…]

Which brings me to my next challenge: getting my head around summer food.

To explain. I’m joining Pelican again (as cook) for a project with the Hopevale Aboriginal community. The itinerary goes something like this: Cairns-Cooktown-Cape Flattery-various islands-Cooktown-Cairns. Four weeks, a bit of sail training, a splash of kayaking, some turtle/dugong monitoring, digital storytelling, traditional craft-making... and boatloads of cooking.

So. I’m kind of hoping my kitchen mojo reappears. Soon. And in summer mode. About a month ago, some kind of evil winter slump repossessed my food inspiration. So I’ve been getting by on tofu stir fries and steamed vegies. Which I love. But not in a daily way! I suspect the mojo walk-out was in response to the freak-it’s-cold/regional-food-supplies-are-crap/why-am-I-in-this-puposeless-pit blues.

Am also hoping the four-hour flight triggers a reversal of hibernation-lethargy and reinstates former physical glory in readiness for the slog that is four weeks of creating food-love bounties from a rockin’ sweatin' galley.

But I guess this is all small fry. I'll be shootin’ for the camembert.

weekend in the big smoke

dawn smudge and a bleary-eyed bus ride.

small glitch at my accomms: no one home to let me in!

gawd how I miss this place. real coffee and real food on every corner.


light and shade. rain. sun. rain. sun. ah, must be melbourne.


tree baubles

upside down palm tree shadow in lake


laneway commissions... bah!

cheek and jowl

sport enough for me

maybe i could live here again?

dispatch from the arctic south

Our crossing of the much-maligned Bass Strait proved smooth and almost painfully uneventful.

First landfall was Bicheno, where we lost first mate to the real world but gained a very large cray from a local greenie friend of Pelican. Further south we did two schmooze cruises and generally impressed. Other landfalls were at Brian’s Corner, Schouten Island and Triabunna, a cute little fishing town opposite Maria Island where I scored a pair of leather driving gloves and assorted woollies from the co-op and opp shop respectively.

Brian's is an impossibly intact, unpeopled sweep of bay north of the Freycinet Peninsula. During a sliver of blue sky we dinghy ashore through shallows a-sway with mussel shell and sunlight glimmer. Rusty rocks and bottle-brown weed sit in clumps and curls on wet sand. Like winter woollies discarded by the shining bay. Wallaby tracks ply the sand. Stones and shells in marshmallow creams reveal the tide’s limit like a milk moustache. Dunes flecked with pale grass like whispering fingers beckon into the tea tree where it’s still and quiet. Shell-strewn understory. Needles and petal-leaved fungi. A billy missing it’s bottom hangs from a log. Gums grasp skyward to ribbons of cloud. Up the beach, there's an estuary and all is thick with bristle-yellow banksias.

We began our return early this morning with an all-girl crew. Am feeling mighty chuffed to remember my knots and other boat-y things after a four-month dry spell.

As for whales... they probably went north early given how bloody arctic it is. Yes, it's as cold as recalled and stupid me left my beanie behind somehwere during repacking. Thank gawd for the stunning views and Tassie pinot!

off again

The on again / off again Tassie sail is on again. So I'm off again. Ten days, leaving tomorrow night. A timely distraction from navel-gazing irks. And hopefully a chance to see whales. And hopefully not freeze to death.

I think I’ve mentioned how cold it’s been… and it’s not just my acclimatisation to the subtropics talking. Even the cat thinks it's cold (which I guess is not the bolstering this argument needs given the general heat-seeking tendencies of cats). Anyway... I know he's feeling the cold because instead of sleeping all day in his box, he makes frequent trips to the woodstove, where he sits and miaows to be let in, like it’s a viable doorway or something. Or a portal into cat heaven where there’s a pink velvet cushion bathed in 24-hour sun encircled by a low-flying flurry of moths.

But back to the cold… I’ve been to Tassie once before. I was nine. It was summer. We camped. It rained for three weeks straight. There was snow on Cradle Mountain. We nearly got blown off Mount Wellington. In short, we froze during what was supposedly the most hospitable season in southern latitudes.

So I’m not sure about the wisdom of ringing in winter in Tasmania. On a boat.

There had better be whales. Or a pink velvet cushion…

Joy to the world (and the pain of uninterrupted sitting)

I’m back!

After two months I’ve been reunited with laptop and 24-hour internet connection.

[Chorus of angels appears]

Have also been taking Vittoria intravenously.

Whilst idling over hilarious blogs.

And ingesting intestinally-threatening quantities of real cheese, olives, red meat and all kinds of not-white bread… and sushi from James Street markets… and field mushrooms on sourdough with mmm-gooey fetta and truffle oil from Cirque… but I digress…

So once the important business of essential-foods-I-haven’t-had-for-two-months had been fully rectified, I:

a) went back to bed and slept for a very long while

b) unpacked my things and pretended to be the Christmas angel, dispensing souvenirs like snowflakes to all within a five-mile radius

c) got in my car and drove from my former home (Brisbane) down the east coast (1,886km, if you’re wondering) to my almost-former home twice removed (parental home in Gippsland), somehow managing to stay on the left despite wanting to walk everywhere on the right, whilst throwing around credit cards to petrol station attendants and hoteliers like bloody Santa, as the business of uninterrupted sitting for two and a half days wreaked further trauma on my very-neglected lower back.

One hundred thousand dong for choosing C (since I'm at it anyway), obviously the least appealing option after travelling for two months straight, living out of a backpack for eight, being ‘homeless’ for a year, etc. (Speaking of milestones, kudos to me for staying off the dreaded cigs for over a year – a feat of increasing difficulty whilst on the backpacker circuit, as throngs of sleek twenty-something French/Dutch/German girls blew sexed-up smoke ringlets while I nursed my beer, reminding myself that my glory days of inconsequential bad behaviour are over.)

My reintegration with the western economic system is also proving a thorny beast. Almost swallowed my tongue when I had to fork out $64 for a three-star motel in Taree (ie, nowhere). This was after bargaining (a new learned reflex?) down a hotelier in Kempsey from $85 to $50 for a room, which I thought still too ridiculous for mortal consideration and drove on. Foolishly. If it wasn’t for still-fresh bruises from overnight buses in Vietnam, a complaining back and other things I need to remind myself of (see above), I would’ve unfurled a blanket in the back seat of the Hyundai.

Perhaps my problem is acclimitising to two-dollar bungalows with views like this:



A second chorus of angels appeared when I reached Gippsland, which is about three hundred degrees cooler than Vietnam. Yay. Two days ago I unpacked my things. And haven’t contemplated moving since.

PS Thanks to J and L for the bed, extended car-minding and exquisite anticipation of food needs. And to R (the cat) for putting up with a stranger in Her house during the day.

A note about photographs. Here are some. The rest are coming, along with a remedy for automated hyphenation and a classification system. Two months of travel = a shirtload of photos = a truckload of sorting, thumbnailing, uploading, uninterrupted sitting, etc.

missing in asia?

Oh dear, where have I been?

Pedalling out of Vang Vieng - bratpacker capital of Laos - past rice paddies and limestone karsts, receiving high fives in the saddle from little girls as I go. Scrambling round caves with glittery stalactites. All with lame back (cares to the wind, etc) which has finally stopped giving me grief.

Inadvertently gatecrashing a Laotian couple's valentine's dinner... at a bustling restaurant I spy what appears to be a communal table where people are waiting for it to be cleared. I wait too. The tables are cleared, separated, and there are two couples, two tables... and me! I share a table with the gracious Seng and Vern (who look about 12 years old but are, in fact, married with a six and seven year old!).

Bumping along potholes where roads should be, in sawngthaew (literally, 'two rows', in the back of a small truck). Trips are invariably long, hot, dusty and shared with whole communities, bags of rice and fresh produce, including live fish flapping in plastic bags. Eating en route is a prerequisite: street vendors shove bunches of radishes inside the truck anytime it slows and serve full-bowl meals during short river-crossings by barge. Old ladies chew betel and small boys pee on your leg (who needs nappies when your floor is dirt?) while the whole truck talks about the 'falang' (you) in Lao/Khmer, with much giggling. Still, this is first class compared with travel by motorbike, where whole families with sleeping babies, pigs, bookshelves and birdcages squeeze aboard.

Adventuring 'in the sticks' in southern Laos. After visiting the country's most significant ruins, a Canadian traveller and I baulked at a $10, one-hour return trip by chartered sawngthaew (a case of becoming accustomed to the local economy, the trip out there costing $1.50) and hoofed it before eventually flagging a lift in the back of a ute with some Chinese tourists - gratis. Ha!

Making my own (faltering) way off the beaten track... the Bolaven Plateau where I found my own private waterfalls and swimming holes replete with bamboo raft. There, after finally finding the only guesthouse in town, I drank beers with 'Bang', a teacher on the plateau (the only English speaker in town?) and a couple of Spanish blokes. After sharing his frustration at kids' lack of literacy/attendance at school etc, Bang gratefully received the books I bought in Luang Prabang for just this moment.

Hammock swinging in 'Four Thousand Islands' in the south of Laos with the emerald Mekong at my bungalow door. Bouncing along shady dirt paths by bike, dodging chickens, pigs and tail-less cats to gush over South East Asia's largest waterfalls before taking a quick dip at a river beach. Kayaking through the islands with a bunch of Spanish travellers. Sampling the national pride (BeerLao) as the sun sets over rice paddies where water buffalo graze.

Marvelling at crumbly Khmer ruins flanked with frangipani while propping the Cambodian economy with rampant spending after the glory days of low-cost Laos. Thankfully, options for 'conscientious' spending abound; I've directed my riel to support landmine victims, former street kids and people with a disability to support themselves. Also visited a wildlife conservation centre where I met the cutest ever baby leopards.

Continuing the food tour... organic mulberry pancakes with honey, butter and fresh lime; MYO spring rolls w loadsa herbs and dipping sauces; double espressos (AM) and BeerLao (PM); lychees, pineapple, mango, rambutan, dragonfruit etc; amok (steamed fish w lemongrass and coconut in a banana leaf); banana flower salad; pork, pineapple and coconut curry soup... too many temptations, too few mealtimes!

Ah, and Vietnam awaits. Bring on the nem (spring rolls)!

PS: have finally started downloading photos - to DVD, but of course can't find an internet cafe with a DVD reader I can use, so the wait for pictorial evidence that I've actually left Australia continues!

hot and bothered in kl

I'm in KL. It's about thirty thousand degrees. Or more. Last night I met up with Ren and J - friends from Brissie who are on the sad end of a Thailand beach holiday: aka they fly home tomorrow :(

What's cool about KL...
Dim sum and gigantic Tiger beer in Jalan Alor (a happy coincidence has me staying right behind the famed hawker food strip)
Donning headscarves in searing heat to see a mosque from the inside
The Islamic Arts Museum which I fled to escape the heat but which inspired with some really beautiful fabrics, ceramics, seals, metalwork etc from Asiatic cultures
Groovy kaftans at Little India night market
Food prep in Chinatown (except the stuff with the live chickens)
Dragging your toes through the grass where the old colonialists used to play cricket
Finally sitting down (preferably in shopping malls and/or taxis with air conditioning)
Taxi drivers who use the meter and then tell you the fare is 'whatever you want'
Bananas (very sweet)

Not so cool...
The heat
The headaches (see above)
Touts and dodgy taxi drivers
Strange beverages named Kickapoo Joy Drink
Petronas Towers... we snagged our free tickets to go up 41 floors to the skybridge but first had to sit through a propaganda reel which informed us that the opulent towers - headquarters of a devious oil company which apparently featured in some Connery/Jolie action flick I was disinclined to see - 'inspire Malaysia's young people to believe that anything's possible'. We suddenly felt like Bart et al watching Burns and Smithers give us the good oil about Springfield Nuclear Power Plant during a school-based screening of a corporate video. The three of us being marketeers in current or previous lives sacked their agency on the spot.

Fly to Chang Mai tomorrow (up in four and a bit hours... oh dear!)

x