First, Sydney Pictures
Horned Lizard
Sunday, April 06, 2008
Saturday, April 05, 2008
Berkeley Hills Ride
Today was a beautiful day for a reprise of the Berkeley Hills ride. Kekoa, Roberto, and Ryan PC Gibson joined me at the starting point where the Western Wheelers were, but we opted to go our own special route. The weather was cool, but with fantastic views of the Bay, where San Francisco was foggy. Looking to hurt ourselves, we went up El Toyonal and Loma Cantadas from Wildcat Canyon road for a bit of a gratituous climb. Unfortunately, Kekoa developed a cramp up the first Bear, and had to bail via the Happy Valley route back to BART.
The rest of us tooled along on Reliez Valley road and the bike path into Moraga, and then rode up Pinehurts in the afternoon, where I ran into Greg Merritt. Greg and I had a nice chat, and he rode with us the rest of the way and showed me a new path to the BART station. At 62 miles and 6660' of climbing, it was not bad for what will likely be my last long ride in the Bay Area for a while.
Friday, April 04, 2008
Australia - Part 10 - Diving the GBR
I woke up at 5:30am, took a quick shower, packed my stuff, and then set off to wait outside my hostel's front door. Already there were two other people who were also part of the dive package that I signed up with.
A quick peek at the dive crew that I signed up with. They are Pro-Dive, and I found them using Google. Search terms I used were "Dive Great Barrier Reef" and "Dive Package GBR". I found numerous crews and finally picked them because they seemed to offer the most for my money. 480 dollars covered 3 days 2 nights of diving (11 dives total, including 2 night dives) and lodging and board. Also included is all equipment. As such, it seemed the best deal all around.
Anyhow, Ben and Roos (pronounced Rose) were already waiting outside the hostel's front door and I joined them. We talked a little bit about our various dive expeirences, and it was obvious I was the newest diver having just been certified before my trip to Australia. Ben's already had 9 dives as did Roos. A few minutes later, we were joined by Sanne and Diana, both also of Dutch nationality and both enrolled in the Dive Certification program ran by Pro-Dive. They were gonna get certified while out diving in the Great Barrier Reef. I was most certainly envious as they were going to get certified in probably the most picteresque dive spot in the world! At the same time, 4 of their 11 dives were going to be wasted on skills, so perhaps I didn't envy them as much as I did. =)
About 10 minutes later, a Pro-Dive van pulled up and we all piled into it. One more pick up at another hostel later and we were in front of the Pro-Dive shop. I dropped off my bag at their luggage drop (we were only allowed one small bag with the necessary clothes and stuff needed for 3 days/2 nights), and registered with the dive crew. I showed Tristan, the dive master, my certified diver card and was soon waiting around for everyone else to finish registration.
Pretty soon we were all repacked into the van and were off to the boat. Greeting us was breakfast (bread, fruits, and beverages), and we all got settled into the boat dining area. A roll call was done and a safety number was given to each of us (I was #9). In all, there were 32 of us, and about 2/3 of the divers were undergoing certification. The crew consisted of 6 people and were Tristan, dive master, Mark, skipper of the boat, Jay, Eri, and K (short for karou) as dive instructors. Rounding them out was Yukari as our chef, also termed the most important person on the boat. =)
Tristan was pretty much the de facto spokesperson for the entire crew and he was both incredibly funny and clear about all topics he broached on. He gave us the once over about the boat and emergency procedures, making a rather dull subject incredibly interesting, and told us to strap in for a 3 hour boat ride to the first outer reef that we would be diving from. Also room assignemnts were given out (I was roomed in with Jay, one of the dive instructors).
So began the journey out of Cairns, the weather didn't look too great, and everyone who were prone to sea sickness took their medication, meanwhile I went above deck to take a look.
A quick note about the boat. It was obviously fitted for 38 people and purpose built for diving/snorkeling, a double decker boat with 3 levels (engine deck, dining deck, upper deck with rooms on all decks), the dining deck had an external area which was where our dive prep area was (tanks, wetsuits, and weights were all hanging out here), and finally there was the upper deck which was the only area that smokers could smoke (given that they dumped ashes and butts into a specialized container) and where people could sunbathe and enjoy the best view possible of the seas. Also on the upper deck was the bridge where the skipper also slept.
Since we were just leaving Cairns, I decided to go top deck to get the best possible view of the city of Cairns. At the same time, I also realized I forgot my dive log book, but fortunately had my blackberry where I was going to log all my dives. As the most important part of the dives were bottom time, max depth, and location, I decided having buddy or divemaster signature wasn't all that important anyhow. Not the most official, but its a honor system anyway.
Anyhow, top deck...from up top, Cairns looked pretty unimpressive. There were only a few high rises and was pretty flat all things considered. As unimpressive as it was, I decided to just chat with my fellow divers and found most interestingly that the passengers consisted almost 90% full of Europeans. =) Most prominent were the Dutch, British, and the Germans/Swiss-Germans. The Japanese were fairly well represented as well if you counted the crew...but as part of the passengers, there was only one.
I managed to chat up with one of the Dutch couples around and found out that he was an economics professor on exchange currently. He travels all around Australia and gives talks and holidays on the side. We briefly discussed economic theories and then had a good discussion about Google (I told him where I worked, something I don't usually do on trips). I noted that Hal Varian worked for us and he was both delighted and surprised. Later on his wife expressed how delighted she was to meet someone who worked at Google...but her delight was geniune and I remembered how friendly and warm the Dutch people were.
Yet another interesting thing of note, this time about the Dutch. =) The Netherlands consist of 12 provinces, and only 2 of the Provinces are actually called Holland. The rest of them aren't, and you can always tell if a Dutch person is from one of the two Holland provinces or not because they'll always refer to themselves when asked about Nationality as "Holland". The rest of the provinces always refer to themselves as "Netherlands" =) Apparently there was a bit of a dispute about the whole country being called Holland in the 80s and since then, the country has changed its name to "The Netherlands" =) You can tell that folks from the province of Holland have a hard time changing that habit though. =) Irregardless of how they refer to themselves, the Dutch are easily the most congenianl of Europeans that I've met, always well spoken in English and incredibly friendly.
Asides aside, the trip to the Reef was a little bit bumpy and I noticed a few people throwing up or not feeling well. The trip out to the Reef took about 3 hours, and I just enjoyed myself chatting with the various passengers and also getting my scuba gear ready.
Soon enough, we were at our Dive site, and they sent the students out first. Tristan gave us a briefing and also told us that he was going to lead the first dive. A few things I noticed...I got certified in the US and was used to things like PSI for air and feet for depth. Well, in the metric system, they use Bar for air and meters for depth. Meters to feet I can get, but bar instead of PSI threw me in for a loop. Add to this that their low air sign is 70 bar (whereupon your dive stops and you make your ascent to the surface), and I was thoroughly disturbed. Not so much that I couldn't figure it out, but enough that I decided I was going to just play it safe the first few times out.
My dive buddy was Ben, a young strapping Brit who was also the person I met outside my Hostel. It probably wouldn't matter for the first dive since we were going to be all with the divemaster, but still, having a buddy is always a good thing!
Soon enough, we were all in the water, and descending. My first time at the GBR! For the first dive, I didn't bring my Camera as i wanted to get used to my other unfamiliar equipment first. I also wore the wetsuit they provided for the first dive, thinking the water might be a bit cold. As a consequent, I had a hard time descending since I wasn't weighted enough. The divemaster had to slip another weight into my BCD before I could descend. With that part out of the way, we began the dive.
And it was a bit of a personal disaster as far as good dives were concerned. I only lasted 22 minutes before I hit the 70 bar mark and had to ascend. We were only halfway through the dive, and me and 3 others were forced to ascend and kick our way to the boat. I also didn't see much the first dive since I was too busy avoiding getting kicked or running into other divers. I also resolved that I probably wouldn't go on another dive master led dive since it meant that the group we were in, all 10 of us, were too squished in together. Reminders from my dive instructor in California came about when he said that we might not have as good a time on a big boat due to crowding came back to my mind.
Back on the boat, we had a surface interval of one hour before our next dive. In between the first dive and the next one, they started the advanced diver's course. The next dive was unguided and I resolved to sip my air more carefully. Additionally I also decided that I'll break the limit of 70 bar and hit 50 bar before I started my ascent. I had figured out that starting at 200 bar mapping it to 3000 psi meant that they wanted us at the boat with about 850 PSI worth! Where I got my diver's certifiate, we started our ascent at about 500 psi or about 30 bars, so it meant they wanted us out with about 20 minutes less dive time.
I'm not such a good diver that I could consume so little air in that time period...so i decided to just report 10 bar more than what I had anytime asked me how much air I had.
My next dive was far better. At around 38 minutes, it meant I nearly doubled my time in the water. I also went deeper than i ever had at abou 19.1 meters.
The diving was quite incredible. It was my first time in the corals, and the seas were alive with colors. Corals, fishes, anemones, and all the other denziens of the seas. Once I was more relaxed about my breathing, it truly was like gliding through a colorful underworld. Quite the difference from the drab colors that Monterey presented.
After the second dive, we arrived back at the boat in time for lunch and more surface interval. Lunch was a simple affair, cold cuts, bread, salad. We ate rather heartily and then the weather took a turn for the worst. It started raining. Fortunately that doesn't have much affect underwater aside from our visibility becoming worse.
The third dive went much the same as the second dive, except this time I took my camera with me. It took quite a bit of concentration to use since everything was different underwater. We took our time and I took as many pictures on as many subjects as possible. One thing about underwater photography is that your subject is fickle (fishes) and buoyancy is very hard to control.
After the 3rd dive came dinner. It wasn't a memorable affair, but it did its job. The food wasn't bad, but at times it was plain.
Right after dinner was our night dive. Tristan gave us the briefing and led the dives for the advanced students. I was led by K as I had never done a night dive before.
Night diving differs quite a bit from day diving in that everything seems different. There are no obvious corals and you have to look for all the fishes. On the other hand, you see completley different fishes and life...I also saw my first job. Seeing as how I didn't think a camera would show up much of anything, I didn't bring it with me.
The night dive also proved to be my longest dive, at 40 minutes, finally I was getting good at controlling my air!
One thing I realise from writing these logs is that my report is quite dry. The actual expeirence isn't! It was quite fun and the dive briefings were always incredibly interesting due to Tristan's very wry sense of humor. These are unfortnately things that I cannot convey in a report...I could have filmed him giving the briefing I suppose. =)
Another thing I realized...the divers undergoing certifications could not dive more than twice a day! So they couldn't go on their night dives, and they had to skip a dive in between. So Their dive trips went from 11 to 7! And they pay a little bit more. One more thing to note...if you wish to dive the GBR and want to do a liveaboard course, don't. You'll enjoy yourself more if you come pre-certified!
A quick peek at the dive crew that I signed up with. They are Pro-Dive, and I found them using Google. Search terms I used were "Dive Great Barrier Reef" and "Dive Package GBR". I found numerous crews and finally picked them because they seemed to offer the most for my money. 480 dollars covered 3 days 2 nights of diving (11 dives total, including 2 night dives) and lodging and board. Also included is all equipment. As such, it seemed the best deal all around.
Anyhow, Ben and Roos (pronounced Rose) were already waiting outside the hostel's front door and I joined them. We talked a little bit about our various dive expeirences, and it was obvious I was the newest diver having just been certified before my trip to Australia. Ben's already had 9 dives as did Roos. A few minutes later, we were joined by Sanne and Diana, both also of Dutch nationality and both enrolled in the Dive Certification program ran by Pro-Dive. They were gonna get certified while out diving in the Great Barrier Reef. I was most certainly envious as they were going to get certified in probably the most picteresque dive spot in the world! At the same time, 4 of their 11 dives were going to be wasted on skills, so perhaps I didn't envy them as much as I did. =)
About 10 minutes later, a Pro-Dive van pulled up and we all piled into it. One more pick up at another hostel later and we were in front of the Pro-Dive shop. I dropped off my bag at their luggage drop (we were only allowed one small bag with the necessary clothes and stuff needed for 3 days/2 nights), and registered with the dive crew. I showed Tristan, the dive master, my certified diver card and was soon waiting around for everyone else to finish registration.
Pretty soon we were all repacked into the van and were off to the boat. Greeting us was breakfast (bread, fruits, and beverages), and we all got settled into the boat dining area. A roll call was done and a safety number was given to each of us (I was #9). In all, there were 32 of us, and about 2/3 of the divers were undergoing certification. The crew consisted of 6 people and were Tristan, dive master, Mark, skipper of the boat, Jay, Eri, and K (short for karou) as dive instructors. Rounding them out was Yukari as our chef, also termed the most important person on the boat. =)
Tristan was pretty much the de facto spokesperson for the entire crew and he was both incredibly funny and clear about all topics he broached on. He gave us the once over about the boat and emergency procedures, making a rather dull subject incredibly interesting, and told us to strap in for a 3 hour boat ride to the first outer reef that we would be diving from. Also room assignemnts were given out (I was roomed in with Jay, one of the dive instructors).
So began the journey out of Cairns, the weather didn't look too great, and everyone who were prone to sea sickness took their medication, meanwhile I went above deck to take a look.
A quick note about the boat. It was obviously fitted for 38 people and purpose built for diving/snorkeling, a double decker boat with 3 levels (engine deck, dining deck, upper deck with rooms on all decks), the dining deck had an external area which was where our dive prep area was (tanks, wetsuits, and weights were all hanging out here), and finally there was the upper deck which was the only area that smokers could smoke (given that they dumped ashes and butts into a specialized container) and where people could sunbathe and enjoy the best view possible of the seas. Also on the upper deck was the bridge where the skipper also slept.
Since we were just leaving Cairns, I decided to go top deck to get the best possible view of the city of Cairns. At the same time, I also realized I forgot my dive log book, but fortunately had my blackberry where I was going to log all my dives. As the most important part of the dives were bottom time, max depth, and location, I decided having buddy or divemaster signature wasn't all that important anyhow. Not the most official, but its a honor system anyway.
Anyhow, top deck...from up top, Cairns looked pretty unimpressive. There were only a few high rises and was pretty flat all things considered. As unimpressive as it was, I decided to just chat with my fellow divers and found most interestingly that the passengers consisted almost 90% full of Europeans. =) Most prominent were the Dutch, British, and the Germans/Swiss-Germans. The Japanese were fairly well represented as well if you counted the crew...but as part of the passengers, there was only one.
I managed to chat up with one of the Dutch couples around and found out that he was an economics professor on exchange currently. He travels all around Australia and gives talks and holidays on the side. We briefly discussed economic theories and then had a good discussion about Google (I told him where I worked, something I don't usually do on trips). I noted that Hal Varian worked for us and he was both delighted and surprised. Later on his wife expressed how delighted she was to meet someone who worked at Google...but her delight was geniune and I remembered how friendly and warm the Dutch people were.
Yet another interesting thing of note, this time about the Dutch. =) The Netherlands consist of 12 provinces, and only 2 of the Provinces are actually called Holland. The rest of them aren't, and you can always tell if a Dutch person is from one of the two Holland provinces or not because they'll always refer to themselves when asked about Nationality as "Holland". The rest of the provinces always refer to themselves as "Netherlands" =) Apparently there was a bit of a dispute about the whole country being called Holland in the 80s and since then, the country has changed its name to "The Netherlands" =) You can tell that folks from the province of Holland have a hard time changing that habit though. =) Irregardless of how they refer to themselves, the Dutch are easily the most congenianl of Europeans that I've met, always well spoken in English and incredibly friendly.
Asides aside, the trip to the Reef was a little bit bumpy and I noticed a few people throwing up or not feeling well. The trip out to the Reef took about 3 hours, and I just enjoyed myself chatting with the various passengers and also getting my scuba gear ready.
Soon enough, we were at our Dive site, and they sent the students out first. Tristan gave us a briefing and also told us that he was going to lead the first dive. A few things I noticed...I got certified in the US and was used to things like PSI for air and feet for depth. Well, in the metric system, they use Bar for air and meters for depth. Meters to feet I can get, but bar instead of PSI threw me in for a loop. Add to this that their low air sign is 70 bar (whereupon your dive stops and you make your ascent to the surface), and I was thoroughly disturbed. Not so much that I couldn't figure it out, but enough that I decided I was going to just play it safe the first few times out.
My dive buddy was Ben, a young strapping Brit who was also the person I met outside my Hostel. It probably wouldn't matter for the first dive since we were going to be all with the divemaster, but still, having a buddy is always a good thing!
Soon enough, we were all in the water, and descending. My first time at the GBR! For the first dive, I didn't bring my Camera as i wanted to get used to my other unfamiliar equipment first. I also wore the wetsuit they provided for the first dive, thinking the water might be a bit cold. As a consequent, I had a hard time descending since I wasn't weighted enough. The divemaster had to slip another weight into my BCD before I could descend. With that part out of the way, we began the dive.
And it was a bit of a personal disaster as far as good dives were concerned. I only lasted 22 minutes before I hit the 70 bar mark and had to ascend. We were only halfway through the dive, and me and 3 others were forced to ascend and kick our way to the boat. I also didn't see much the first dive since I was too busy avoiding getting kicked or running into other divers. I also resolved that I probably wouldn't go on another dive master led dive since it meant that the group we were in, all 10 of us, were too squished in together. Reminders from my dive instructor in California came about when he said that we might not have as good a time on a big boat due to crowding came back to my mind.
Back on the boat, we had a surface interval of one hour before our next dive. In between the first dive and the next one, they started the advanced diver's course. The next dive was unguided and I resolved to sip my air more carefully. Additionally I also decided that I'll break the limit of 70 bar and hit 50 bar before I started my ascent. I had figured out that starting at 200 bar mapping it to 3000 psi meant that they wanted us at the boat with about 850 PSI worth! Where I got my diver's certifiate, we started our ascent at about 500 psi or about 30 bars, so it meant they wanted us out with about 20 minutes less dive time.
I'm not such a good diver that I could consume so little air in that time period...so i decided to just report 10 bar more than what I had anytime asked me how much air I had.
My next dive was far better. At around 38 minutes, it meant I nearly doubled my time in the water. I also went deeper than i ever had at abou 19.1 meters.
The diving was quite incredible. It was my first time in the corals, and the seas were alive with colors. Corals, fishes, anemones, and all the other denziens of the seas. Once I was more relaxed about my breathing, it truly was like gliding through a colorful underworld. Quite the difference from the drab colors that Monterey presented.
After the second dive, we arrived back at the boat in time for lunch and more surface interval. Lunch was a simple affair, cold cuts, bread, salad. We ate rather heartily and then the weather took a turn for the worst. It started raining. Fortunately that doesn't have much affect underwater aside from our visibility becoming worse.
The third dive went much the same as the second dive, except this time I took my camera with me. It took quite a bit of concentration to use since everything was different underwater. We took our time and I took as many pictures on as many subjects as possible. One thing about underwater photography is that your subject is fickle (fishes) and buoyancy is very hard to control.
After the 3rd dive came dinner. It wasn't a memorable affair, but it did its job. The food wasn't bad, but at times it was plain.
Right after dinner was our night dive. Tristan gave us the briefing and led the dives for the advanced students. I was led by K as I had never done a night dive before.
Night diving differs quite a bit from day diving in that everything seems different. There are no obvious corals and you have to look for all the fishes. On the other hand, you see completley different fishes and life...I also saw my first job. Seeing as how I didn't think a camera would show up much of anything, I didn't bring it with me.
The night dive also proved to be my longest dive, at 40 minutes, finally I was getting good at controlling my air!
One thing I realise from writing these logs is that my report is quite dry. The actual expeirence isn't! It was quite fun and the dive briefings were always incredibly interesting due to Tristan's very wry sense of humor. These are unfortnately things that I cannot convey in a report...I could have filmed him giving the briefing I suppose. =)
Another thing I realized...the divers undergoing certifications could not dive more than twice a day! So they couldn't go on their night dives, and they had to skip a dive in between. So Their dive trips went from 11 to 7! And they pay a little bit more. One more thing to note...if you wish to dive the GBR and want to do a liveaboard course, don't. You'll enjoy yourself more if you come pre-certified!
Lea is Famous!
My friend Lea Kissner got interviewed for a Women in Engineering event. Like many of my other friends, she's a very direct person, and I enjoyed reading her interview:
In terms of being a woman in computer science, you have to just realize that some people are idiots. And you're unfortunately going to have to deal with some people being idiots.
When Lea was shopping for a bike, I was appalled by some of the responses she got from bike shops, even some really well-respected ones! Just like computer science, cycling (at least when you're talking about the nice bikes I like to ride) seems to be very male dominated, and this attitude towards women in cycling or in computer science is very harmful to the sport, hobby, or profession.
In terms of being a woman in computer science, you have to just realize that some people are idiots. And you're unfortunately going to have to deal with some people being idiots.
When Lea was shopping for a bike, I was appalled by some of the responses she got from bike shops, even some really well-respected ones! Just like computer science, cycling (at least when you're talking about the nice bikes I like to ride) seems to be very male dominated, and this attitude towards women in cycling or in computer science is very harmful to the sport, hobby, or profession.
Thursday, April 03, 2008
The Most Expensive GPS Mount...
Lately, Pardo and I have been making jokes that we've been running the most expensive bike shop in the world out of his garage. Obviously, we're being facetious, but the amount of engineering time we've put into our bikes have been enormous, and at Pardo & my billable rates, would be incredibly unprofitable if we had tried to do bicycles as a business (the average bike mechanic in our area probably makes $20 an hour, with the good ones earning as much as $40 an hour --- really good mechanics make 6-figure salaries at the BMW dealerships). At one point we had Lea building wheels in Pardo's garage, and of course, that meant that we were spending on the order of $600 of engineering time per hour. Of course, if the average bike mechanic paid as much attention to detail to our bikes as we do to ours, we'd be happy to pay $40 an hour.
Well, I recently wanted a 31.8mm space grip type mount. It turns out that all existing mounts (including my favored Nitto Lamp Holder) are designed for 25.4mm handlebars. I did, however, find the FSA Control Center mount, and bought it. To my disappointment, mounting my Garmin 76CSX on the mount was too much --- the unit shook and vibrated all the way down the road, making the display absolutely worthless.
Well, any other bike shop would have given up and told me to buy a Garmin Edge 705 instead, but the most expensive bike shop in the world does not give up that easily (after all, we're open even on Easter Sundays)! Pardo machined a couple of aluminum mounts to fit the carbon fiber rod that came with the FSA Control Center, mounted it to my bars with a couple of hose clamps, and a little bit of fiddling later, we had ourselves a working GPS mount for the 76CSX unit that works very well, and is in fact, probably overbuilt. The total weight of the mount comes up to about 150g, which is a bit on the heavy side.
Another interesting thing is that the Garmin 76CSX when turned on, disables the 2006 MHR Sigma Computer, which really surprised me --- both units are supposedly passive receivers, but I guess the circuitry in the Garmin confuses the Sigma. Not a problem, since the 76CSX contains a barometric altimeter anyway, so we're still good to go.
Kata Tjuta Pictures
Eventually I will split out the pictures for all of the walks, but for now this will have to do. These are pictures for the Kata Tjuta walk.
Australia - Part 9 - Kayaking, Daintrees, and a Nice Dinner.
Today was an early get-up at 7am. My Kayak trip was booked at 7:40am. I cleared out the bedsheets, packed my stuff, and went and stood to get ready for my Kayak trip. Only one other person was coming that I knew of, and promptly at 7:40 the trip set off.
We had a couple to pick up from the Beach house a few miles up from the PK Jungle Resort, and after we had picked them up, we were off.
The group consisted of the Guide, Marco, a swiss youth, a British couple whose name i can no longer remember, and myself. We parked not too far from the Beach house and started making our way into the rain forest. Picking up our gear, paddle, life vest, and a dry bag, we then set off to the beach where the kayaks were.
The kayaks were a simple affair. Sit-on-tops that were practical in the very calm, very flat water in the Daintree area (the Great Barrier Reef protected most of the beaches starting from Cairns onwards to Cape Tribulation from swells, hence the very very flat waves hitting the beaches), a sturdy paddle, and a life vest that i didn't bother wearing. Dragging out the kayaks onto the water, and off we went.
I've previously kayaked lots of times before, but I have to say this is easily one of the easiest kayaking trips I've ever had. The water was flat and the wind was non-existent. We started at the north end of Cape Tribulation, and paddled south Cape Tribulation and through to the next beach. We then made a pit stop at the beach and did a nice beach walk. Along the way, our Guide showed us the wildlife on the beach, the surrounding coconut trees, and entertained us with anecdotes of stories he's heard or seen.
We then paddled back to the original beach and had ourselves some coconut. The guide instructed us in the correct method of dehusking and opening a coconut...the flesh was firm and tasty, but not quite the way I'm used to. I'm more used to the meat being a little bit less firm and crunchy, and the Guide told me that that meant the coconut was overripe and a little bit old.
We then got dropped off to our respective hostels where I took a quick shower and met up with my coworkers & friends. It was then off to back to Cairns! On the way back, we stopped for fresh made ice cream. It was simply delicious and little did I know it was the start of our four ice cream day. =)
My Coworkers & friends dropped me off at my hostel and we went off to their hostel. We wanted to have dinner, but first we had to return the car and they had to check into their hostel. I also stopped at my dive shop to get fitted for the wet suit. =)
Dinner was a rather spectacular affair, we had berrimundi, and a seafood platter that consisted of crab, craw fish, fish, prawns, fries, and calamari. We made short work of the platter and was out of the restaurant by 7pm. We then went off for more ice cream and some shopping of souvenirs. The night market was quite good for souvenir shopping because everything was about 50% off what I saw in Sydney!
At the end of the day, I went back to my hostel, put my stuff in the Laundry, and got ready for the start of my Dive trip. 6:15am pickup meant yet another early start to my day.
I should expect it by now, but I realize that on my holidays, I always wake up the hell earlier than on my work days. =)
We had a couple to pick up from the Beach house a few miles up from the PK Jungle Resort, and after we had picked them up, we were off.
The group consisted of the Guide, Marco, a swiss youth, a British couple whose name i can no longer remember, and myself. We parked not too far from the Beach house and started making our way into the rain forest. Picking up our gear, paddle, life vest, and a dry bag, we then set off to the beach where the kayaks were.
The kayaks were a simple affair. Sit-on-tops that were practical in the very calm, very flat water in the Daintree area (the Great Barrier Reef protected most of the beaches starting from Cairns onwards to Cape Tribulation from swells, hence the very very flat waves hitting the beaches), a sturdy paddle, and a life vest that i didn't bother wearing. Dragging out the kayaks onto the water, and off we went.
I've previously kayaked lots of times before, but I have to say this is easily one of the easiest kayaking trips I've ever had. The water was flat and the wind was non-existent. We started at the north end of Cape Tribulation, and paddled south Cape Tribulation and through to the next beach. We then made a pit stop at the beach and did a nice beach walk. Along the way, our Guide showed us the wildlife on the beach, the surrounding coconut trees, and entertained us with anecdotes of stories he's heard or seen.
We then paddled back to the original beach and had ourselves some coconut. The guide instructed us in the correct method of dehusking and opening a coconut...the flesh was firm and tasty, but not quite the way I'm used to. I'm more used to the meat being a little bit less firm and crunchy, and the Guide told me that that meant the coconut was overripe and a little bit old.
We then got dropped off to our respective hostels where I took a quick shower and met up with my coworkers & friends. It was then off to back to Cairns! On the way back, we stopped for fresh made ice cream. It was simply delicious and little did I know it was the start of our four ice cream day. =)
My Coworkers & friends dropped me off at my hostel and we went off to their hostel. We wanted to have dinner, but first we had to return the car and they had to check into their hostel. I also stopped at my dive shop to get fitted for the wet suit. =)
Dinner was a rather spectacular affair, we had berrimundi, and a seafood platter that consisted of crab, craw fish, fish, prawns, fries, and calamari. We made short work of the platter and was out of the restaurant by 7pm. We then went off for more ice cream and some shopping of souvenirs. The night market was quite good for souvenir shopping because everything was about 50% off what I saw in Sydney!
At the end of the day, I went back to my hostel, put my stuff in the Laundry, and got ready for the start of my Dive trip. 6:15am pickup meant yet another early start to my day.
I should expect it by now, but I realize that on my holidays, I always wake up the hell earlier than on my work days. =)
Wednesday, April 02, 2008
Pictures are up!
Not all of them, but about 2/3 of them.
First up are the Kakadu Pictures:
Second up are the Cairn Underwater Pictures:
Missing are the Ayer's Rock Pictures, which are coming right after I finish splitting them up.
Enjoy!
First up are the Kakadu Pictures:
Second up are the Cairn Underwater Pictures:
Missing are the Ayer's Rock Pictures, which are coming right after I finish splitting them up.
Enjoy!
Australia - The Daintrees ( Part 8 )
Cairns to daintrees
I woke up at 6:50am to catch my shuttle up to the daintrees. The recommendation to go to the daintree was made to me by my coworker V who's been diving to the GBR before as well and told me that it was a must see.
The tour books also recommended it highly as well.
So I booked myself a tour even though I kind of wanted to stay in Cairns. Cairns was kinda cool even though its completely touristy. Actually, even though I've been holidaying for the last two weeks, I haven't seen any touristy spots so perhaps it was a relief for me to see one. :)
Anyhow I had two days to kill before my diving trip, so I decided to visit the daintrees. The daintrees was a rain forest system that's supposed to be the oldest in the world, but all the brochures recommending it made it seem more like an amusement park than anything else.
The pickup was right outside the hotel at 7:40 and I was waiting with another bloke from England.
We were picked up promptly and I found myself in the backrow of a 24 man bus. This made me more glad my kakadu tour was only a 9 man tour. This group was also far less lively but perhaps given the time, it made sense that everyone was trying to recover from the night before. :)
I decided that I wanted to do a kayak tour as well as the night walk during my time at the daintrees. As I didn't prebook these tours, I had to wait until I arrived at the hostel I was staying at to book my activities.
We then set off on the way up to the daintrees along what is supposed to be a beautiful stretch of beach laven road.
Well, the results weren't quite what I expected. :)
The stretch of road up to the daintrees, while pretty and laden with a few beach views, is for the most part, flat and boring.
The views are pretty, but its for less than an hour and it never gets very high. Compared to something like highway 1 off the california coast where it extends for over 400 miles of coastland, and this is pretty much a letdown.
And the mosquitoes. We had a pitstop at one place for toilets and snacks and the bus driver basically told everyone to put on bug spray, or buy some. :/
Having been bitten badly already in Darwin, I wasn't going to take the chance and decided to buy the local brand of bug spray. As it didn't have DEET, I was wary about how well it would work.
I sprayed it on nonetheless and hope it'd work.
The next stop was for a riverboat cruise. This was the cruise to cross the Daintree river (normally not crossable unless you're on a cable ferry).... but they did more than just ferry us across the river. They explained a bit about the local ecology as well as try to find crocodiles. Total time spent on the ferry was about an hour, of which 30 minutes of it was spent sleeping by me. The crocodiles was fairly unremarkable as all they did was sleep on the banks, and most of them were quite small. Of course, I had the jumping croc cruise from Kakadu to remember, so I mostly just ignored the crocs and wished they did more mangroves cruising.
At one point, the ferry operator asked for a show of hands on who wished to look at crocs versus mangroves, and i believe I was the only one asking for Mangroves. =) Needless to say, I spent the time after that sleeping.
After the ferry, we were back on the bus, and I spent the rest of the time sleeping. We had a short stop at a boardwalk walk through the rainforest, but I felt that the walk was incredibly rushed. We didn't stop to look at anything, and I'd liked at least 30 more minutes than the 10 minutes or so that it took for the guide to blow through the tour. Advise to those who wish to do the Daintrees, forget the tours, rent your own car!
We arrived quickly at PK Hostels, a self declared "Jungle paradise", although I had a hard time seeing what was so parasidic about the place. =) It was your average hostels with a few private rooms, a kitchen, a few shower stalls, and a small pool.
I settled in quickly and went off to buy some food, seeing as how nothing on the menu pleased me.
It was during the cooking of my lunch that my next pleasant Australian surprise came around, and that was the visitation of a gigantic lizard. =) This lizard crawled around the kitchen, looking for food, and just sunning itself on a sunny patch when it was bored of tramping through the garbage bins. Surprisingly agile, it jumped on the garbage bin a couple of times thinking perhaps it was food. I have yet to identify the species of lizard, and it terrorized a few other kitchen folks, but I thought it was a great addition to my Australia Expereince.
I then spent the rest of the day in the pool, visiting the rather flat ocean (made unswimmable currently because of Jelly fishes), and surfing the internet.
I had just posted my last blog entry "I'm sorry i summited Uluru" when a "hey Sy! What are you doing here" greeting reached me. I turned around and was surprised to see a friend of my coworker at the Internet Center.
After a few quick enquiries and greetings, I realized my luck must have turned dramatically because my coworker has a working blackberry charger! =) So my fears of not being able to wake up early enough during my flight back from Cairns was no longer a problem. Even better, they had a car, and would be happy to taxi me back to Cairns after my kayaking trip tomorrow. They had just finished their own dives and was currently here for their night Jungle walk. I had thought about joining it, but apparently it was very full. =\
But all the same, my luck had changed, and i was the happier for it. =) Plans were made to meet up with them tomorrow.
Later on in the evening, more happy coincidences occured as I met Corin and Sven from my Kakadu trip. We had quite a bit of a happy reunion and lots of talk were made about how our times were passed since we last saw one another.
I retired very happily that night, meeting new people, meeting old friends, seeing new sights, that's what travelling is mostly about to me!
I woke up at 6:50am to catch my shuttle up to the daintrees. The recommendation to go to the daintree was made to me by my coworker V who's been diving to the GBR before as well and told me that it was a must see.
The tour books also recommended it highly as well.
So I booked myself a tour even though I kind of wanted to stay in Cairns. Cairns was kinda cool even though its completely touristy. Actually, even though I've been holidaying for the last two weeks, I haven't seen any touristy spots so perhaps it was a relief for me to see one. :)
Anyhow I had two days to kill before my diving trip, so I decided to visit the daintrees. The daintrees was a rain forest system that's supposed to be the oldest in the world, but all the brochures recommending it made it seem more like an amusement park than anything else.
The pickup was right outside the hotel at 7:40 and I was waiting with another bloke from England.
We were picked up promptly and I found myself in the backrow of a 24 man bus. This made me more glad my kakadu tour was only a 9 man tour. This group was also far less lively but perhaps given the time, it made sense that everyone was trying to recover from the night before. :)
I decided that I wanted to do a kayak tour as well as the night walk during my time at the daintrees. As I didn't prebook these tours, I had to wait until I arrived at the hostel I was staying at to book my activities.
We then set off on the way up to the daintrees along what is supposed to be a beautiful stretch of beach laven road.
Well, the results weren't quite what I expected. :)
The stretch of road up to the daintrees, while pretty and laden with a few beach views, is for the most part, flat and boring.
The views are pretty, but its for less than an hour and it never gets very high. Compared to something like highway 1 off the california coast where it extends for over 400 miles of coastland, and this is pretty much a letdown.
And the mosquitoes. We had a pitstop at one place for toilets and snacks and the bus driver basically told everyone to put on bug spray, or buy some. :/
Having been bitten badly already in Darwin, I wasn't going to take the chance and decided to buy the local brand of bug spray. As it didn't have DEET, I was wary about how well it would work.
I sprayed it on nonetheless and hope it'd work.
The next stop was for a riverboat cruise. This was the cruise to cross the Daintree river (normally not crossable unless you're on a cable ferry).... but they did more than just ferry us across the river. They explained a bit about the local ecology as well as try to find crocodiles. Total time spent on the ferry was about an hour, of which 30 minutes of it was spent sleeping by me. The crocodiles was fairly unremarkable as all they did was sleep on the banks, and most of them were quite small. Of course, I had the jumping croc cruise from Kakadu to remember, so I mostly just ignored the crocs and wished they did more mangroves cruising.
At one point, the ferry operator asked for a show of hands on who wished to look at crocs versus mangroves, and i believe I was the only one asking for Mangroves. =) Needless to say, I spent the time after that sleeping.
After the ferry, we were back on the bus, and I spent the rest of the time sleeping. We had a short stop at a boardwalk walk through the rainforest, but I felt that the walk was incredibly rushed. We didn't stop to look at anything, and I'd liked at least 30 more minutes than the 10 minutes or so that it took for the guide to blow through the tour. Advise to those who wish to do the Daintrees, forget the tours, rent your own car!
We arrived quickly at PK Hostels, a self declared "Jungle paradise", although I had a hard time seeing what was so parasidic about the place. =) It was your average hostels with a few private rooms, a kitchen, a few shower stalls, and a small pool.
I settled in quickly and went off to buy some food, seeing as how nothing on the menu pleased me.
It was during the cooking of my lunch that my next pleasant Australian surprise came around, and that was the visitation of a gigantic lizard. =) This lizard crawled around the kitchen, looking for food, and just sunning itself on a sunny patch when it was bored of tramping through the garbage bins. Surprisingly agile, it jumped on the garbage bin a couple of times thinking perhaps it was food. I have yet to identify the species of lizard, and it terrorized a few other kitchen folks, but I thought it was a great addition to my Australia Expereince.
I then spent the rest of the day in the pool, visiting the rather flat ocean (made unswimmable currently because of Jelly fishes), and surfing the internet.
I had just posted my last blog entry "I'm sorry i summited Uluru" when a "hey Sy! What are you doing here" greeting reached me. I turned around and was surprised to see a friend of my coworker at the Internet Center.
After a few quick enquiries and greetings, I realized my luck must have turned dramatically because my coworker has a working blackberry charger! =) So my fears of not being able to wake up early enough during my flight back from Cairns was no longer a problem. Even better, they had a car, and would be happy to taxi me back to Cairns after my kayaking trip tomorrow. They had just finished their own dives and was currently here for their night Jungle walk. I had thought about joining it, but apparently it was very full. =\
But all the same, my luck had changed, and i was the happier for it. =) Plans were made to meet up with them tomorrow.
Later on in the evening, more happy coincidences occured as I met Corin and Sven from my Kakadu trip. We had quite a bit of a happy reunion and lots of talk were made about how our times were passed since we last saw one another.
I retired very happily that night, meeting new people, meeting old friends, seeing new sights, that's what travelling is mostly about to me!
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Saturday's Ride
Trip Report:
Lea, Roberto, Mike Samuel joined me at Foothill and Homestead, followed by Marie-Claire, a cyclist who was meeting up with the WW. Since we all agreed that we were slow, we decided to get a head start on the ride and got going before the D group would swallow us up.
Sure enough, they caught us at the Mt. Eden/Stevens Canyon intersection, and though we took advantage of a rest room stop to get ahead to Redwood Gulch, we were soon enough passed by most of the folks. This was Lea's first time up Redwood Gulch, so she took her time, and we were dropped by the WW group at that point.
The climb up 9 was easy and uneventful, though it threatened to drizzle on us a bit. Along Skyline, the hoped-for view of Monterey Bay was missing, but the descent as fast and beautiful as usual, and we enjoyed the one lane section past Black Road which was very lightly traveled. Summit road was also quite pleasant, giving us lovely views of the fog shrouded Redwoods of Big Basin.
After crossing over 17, we violated traffic law by riding wrong way for 10 meters onto Mt. Charlie Road, which spat us out after a twisty windy descent onto Old Santa Cruz highway. I found this route a couple of years back when I discovered that Summit road between 17 and Soquel San Jose was just a bit too heavily traffic'd for my taste, and the sharp left turn onto Old Santa Cruz highway at the bottom of a 50mph
descent was too frequently done with impatient drivers sitting right on the back of my fender.
Old Santa Cruz highway was quiet and fun on Saturday, with speckled sunlight coming through the trees in the wooded sections. Taking care to stop at the stop sign where I got a traffic ticket last time, we eventually popped out alongside 17 and entered the highway for one block to Alma Bridge road, where thanks to Alex Knowles, we found the entrance to the Los Gatos Creek trail across the street from where the old bike path entrance was. The descent on the West side of the dam was new to me, and while it looked scary, was easily negotiated on a 25mm tire with little use of brakes. Unfortunately, on the flat section of the trail, Roberto had a diversion type fall caused by a protruding rock on the trail. The fall bent his rear dérailleur
hanger, but since we were near Los Gatos anyway, we rode onto main street, and went to Summit cycles where it took only 30 minutes and $25 for them to fix the hanger, easily done while we had lunch at the mediocre sandwich shop next door.
At that point, Lea was walking kinda funny, so she called Chris for a ride home while Robert, Mike and I rode the easy route back. We rode about 76.5km and though the altimeter said 2600m, I discounted that as being ridiculous (probably caused by the changing weather conditions) and will stick to the Western Wheeler estimate of 1200m or 4000'.
Lea, Roberto, Mike Samuel joined me at Foothill and Homestead, followed by Marie-Claire, a cyclist who was meeting up with the WW. Since we all agreed that we were slow, we decided to get a head start on the ride and got going before the D group would swallow us up.
Sure enough, they caught us at the Mt. Eden/Stevens Canyon intersection, and though we took advantage of a rest room stop to get ahead to Redwood Gulch, we were soon enough passed by most of the folks. This was Lea's first time up Redwood Gulch, so she took her time, and we were dropped by the WW group at that point.
The climb up 9 was easy and uneventful, though it threatened to drizzle on us a bit. Along Skyline, the hoped-for view of Monterey Bay was missing, but the descent as fast and beautiful as usual, and we enjoyed the one lane section past Black Road which was very lightly traveled. Summit road was also quite pleasant, giving us lovely views of the fog shrouded Redwoods of Big Basin.
After crossing over 17, we violated traffic law by riding wrong way for 10 meters onto Mt. Charlie Road, which spat us out after a twisty windy descent onto Old Santa Cruz highway. I found this route a couple of years back when I discovered that Summit road between 17 and Soquel San Jose was just a bit too heavily traffic'd for my taste, and the sharp left turn onto Old Santa Cruz highway at the bottom of a 50mph
descent was too frequently done with impatient drivers sitting right on the back of my fender.
Old Santa Cruz highway was quiet and fun on Saturday, with speckled sunlight coming through the trees in the wooded sections. Taking care to stop at the stop sign where I got a traffic ticket last time, we eventually popped out alongside 17 and entered the highway for one block to Alma Bridge road, where thanks to Alex Knowles, we found the entrance to the Los Gatos Creek trail across the street from where the old bike path entrance was. The descent on the West side of the dam was new to me, and while it looked scary, was easily negotiated on a 25mm tire with little use of brakes. Unfortunately, on the flat section of the trail, Roberto had a diversion type fall caused by a protruding rock on the trail. The fall bent his rear dérailleur
hanger, but since we were near Los Gatos anyway, we rode onto main street, and went to Summit cycles where it took only 30 minutes and $25 for them to fix the hanger, easily done while we had lunch at the mediocre sandwich shop next door.
At that point, Lea was walking kinda funny, so she called Chris for a ride home while Robert, Mike and I rode the easy route back. We rode about 76.5km and though the altimeter said 2600m, I discounted that as being ridiculous (probably caused by the changing weather conditions) and will stick to the Western Wheeler estimate of 1200m or 4000'.
Review: Welcome to Your Brain
Welcome to Your Brain is a strange beast: it's basically a neurology coffee table book. Physically, it's large (both wide and tall), filled with illustrations and sidebars.
The authors write in a breezy, easily readable style (for an example, see their article about Exercise and the Brain for the New York Times. Each chapter covers a specific topic (e.g., adolescence, aging, or happiness). Furthermore, there are sidebars either dispelling myths, giving useful tips, or providing some relevant information as an aside.
As I was reading the book, I found lots of useful tips, some more so than others (for instance, how to improve your ability to multi-task by playing video games). As I read along, I found that in many cases, a lot of the information provided by the book I already had read, in some other places, but the book does package them all very nicely in one place. The biggest problem I found was that on a linear read through of the book, the sidebars are very distracting and I find my reading flow interrupted in more than one chapter because the sidebar seemed so interesting.
The book was enjoyable, though I would check it out from a library or wait for the paperback rather than paying full price for it. In any case, you should take a gander at their New York Times article linked to in the second paragraph to see if their writing style suits you.
The authors write in a breezy, easily readable style (for an example, see their article about Exercise and the Brain for the New York Times. Each chapter covers a specific topic (e.g., adolescence, aging, or happiness). Furthermore, there are sidebars either dispelling myths, giving useful tips, or providing some relevant information as an aside.
As I was reading the book, I found lots of useful tips, some more so than others (for instance, how to improve your ability to multi-task by playing video games). As I read along, I found that in many cases, a lot of the information provided by the book I already had read, in some other places, but the book does package them all very nicely in one place. The biggest problem I found was that on a linear read through of the book, the sidebars are very distracting and I find my reading flow interrupted in more than one chapter because the sidebar seemed so interesting.
The book was enjoyable, though I would check it out from a library or wait for the paperback rather than paying full price for it. In any case, you should take a gander at their New York Times article linked to in the second paragraph to see if their writing style suits you.
Review: The Fortune Cookie Chronicles
When Jennifer 8 Lee visited Google, she gave her presentation about this book. Interspersed with video, photographs, and appropriate slides, she gave a rapid-fire talk in 40 minutes, covering the main themes of this book, intriguing enough for me to start reading that very afternoon while I was in the doctor's office.
Each chapter of this book is like a column in a newspaper --- it can be read independently of all the others. Topics covered range from the origins of the fortune cookie (which turn out to be Japanese), the nature of General Tso's chicken (which turned out to be a New York innovation), to how fortunes themselves get written.
Injected into all this are notes about the nature of being a Chinese immigrant from the 1800s to the modern age. Like her, I observed many Chinese students studying majors because their parents made them --- luckily for me and my brothers, we were all born engineers.
Most practical of all is an article about the Greatest Chinese restaurant in the non-PRC and ROC world, and her selection both surprises and intrigues me --- a Chinese restaurant in the greater Vancouver area that serves Chinese food Western style but has a first generation Chinese immigrant clientèle.
All in all, an entertaining and easy read (perfect for an airplane), but I would go for the Kindle edition or wait for the paperback --- there are no photographs or pictures in the book, which means that electronic form is the cheapest and best way to get it.
Each chapter of this book is like a column in a newspaper --- it can be read independently of all the others. Topics covered range from the origins of the fortune cookie (which turn out to be Japanese), the nature of General Tso's chicken (which turned out to be a New York innovation), to how fortunes themselves get written.
Injected into all this are notes about the nature of being a Chinese immigrant from the 1800s to the modern age. Like her, I observed many Chinese students studying majors because their parents made them --- luckily for me and my brothers, we were all born engineers.
Most practical of all is an article about the Greatest Chinese restaurant in the non-PRC and ROC world, and her selection both surprises and intrigues me --- a Chinese restaurant in the greater Vancouver area that serves Chinese food Western style but has a first generation Chinese immigrant clientèle.
All in all, an entertaining and easy read (perfect for an airplane), but I would go for the Kindle edition or wait for the paperback --- there are no photographs or pictures in the book, which means that electronic form is the cheapest and best way to get it.
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Review: A Feast for Crows
A Feast for Crows is the most recent of George R. R. Martin's as yet incomplete Song of Fire and Ice series.
When I first started reading the series several years ago, it was wonderful. The characters were real and intriguing, and it seemed as though on every page, something was happening. It did irritate me that he made use of the cliff-hanger too often, ending a chapter at a particularly interesting moment and then starting the next chapter from a completely different character's perspective.
This latest book, however, is a disappointment. For one thing, not all that much happens. There is a main thread, which is Queen Cersei managing to make a hash of things as the regent for the Kingdom, but everyone else was more or less treading water. The characters did not get very much development, and the cliff-hanger of the previous book did not get resolved or even moved forward! It took me more than 2 weeks to get through this book, and I'm not sure I got very much for my money (and I did not pay money for this book).
Not recommended. I'm afraid that Mr. Martin is going to go the way of Robert Jordan, who turned what was going to be a 7 novel series into one that was so drawn out (by lots of novels where nothing happened) that he died before finishing the series. I guess I will give his next few novels a pass as well.
When I first started reading the series several years ago, it was wonderful. The characters were real and intriguing, and it seemed as though on every page, something was happening. It did irritate me that he made use of the cliff-hanger too often, ending a chapter at a particularly interesting moment and then starting the next chapter from a completely different character's perspective.
This latest book, however, is a disappointment. For one thing, not all that much happens. There is a main thread, which is Queen Cersei managing to make a hash of things as the regent for the Kingdom, but everyone else was more or less treading water. The characters did not get very much development, and the cliff-hanger of the previous book did not get resolved or even moved forward! It took me more than 2 weeks to get through this book, and I'm not sure I got very much for my money (and I did not pay money for this book).
Not recommended. I'm afraid that Mr. Martin is going to go the way of Robert Jordan, who turned what was going to be a 7 novel series into one that was so drawn out (by lots of novels where nothing happened) that he died before finishing the series. I guess I will give his next few novels a pass as well.
Friday, March 28, 2008
Review: Kindle
With the upcoming move to Munich, I realized that my usual habit of checking out books from the Santa Clara County Library or the Mountain View Library wasn't going to be easy to sustain. Yet while it was possible to order English books from Amazon Deutsch, paying for Euros while on a U.S. dollar denominated payroll didn't sound very smart, neither did accumulating lots of paper at a temporary stay. One reason I gave up buying books wasn't because of the cost, but because of the space.
So I ordered a Kindle in February, waited a full month for the delivery, and received it on Tuesday. Lots of people complain about the supposed ugliness of the product, but since I'm not even cool enough to own a Mac, I didn't find the Kindle ugly at all. In fact, if Apple designed it, it wouldn't have a $20 user replaceable battery, so I'm actually somewhat thankful that Apple did not make this product.
The Kindle charges very fast. I plugged it in, went for a workout at the gym, and it reported a full charge by the time I came back. It comes registered to your Amazon.com account, and I was happily downloading book samples over the wireless connection. I dug up a 1GB SD card, and plugged it into the Kindle for additional storage.
The screen is as readable as advertised, though it's gray, not white. JPGs render beautifully as gray scale pictures. What really sold me, however, was Mobibook Creator. One of the problems I've been trying to solve, for instance, is that when I tour, I end up carrying a ton of paper with me, including the OCD travel guides. Well, Mobibook Creator would take an arbitrary HTML file and turn it into a kindle book, including rendering the diagrams quite beautifully (apologies for the blurriness):
I can't tell you how big a deal this is. One of my biggest complaints in the past was not having the entire Jobst Tour of the Alps collection with me for reference when I was touring, and this makes it possible to have the entire portable reference in a search-able form in a 10.3oz package. If you are planning to tour the alps, the $400 purchase of a Kindle will pay for itself in one trip alone, in terms of finding you better lodging and food. For good measure, I also scanned my paper collection of OCD pass guides into PDFs and converted it using Kindle's free conversion service to download it to my Kindle. The results aren't as nice as Mobibook Creator's output, but it was still largely usable.
The first electronic book I bought for my Kindle, ironically, was not at Amazon.com --- it was a subscription to the electronic version of Interzone Science Fiction Magazine on Fictionwise. This British-published award-winning magazine costs $80 a year to subscribe to from the US, but is only $24 in electronic format --- a true bargain in any sense of the word.
Another good source of electronic books is the Baen Free Library, which I've actually read from in prior years, but is a perfect match for the Kindle. My second purchase for the Kindle was an Omnibus of Tom Godwin stories at Baen's electronic books site. I would never contemplate dragging along such a volume onto a plane in my backpack, but in electronic format, size is simply not an issue. The other good source for free books is Project Gutenberg, which has many of the classic Jane Austen novels available for easy download.
I then tried a wireless purchase through the bookstore: Conan Original Stories for $0.99. The wireless transfer was fast and painless, but the text was mis-formatted --- an e-mail to Amazon's customer service quickly and easily reversed the charge.
It was a sheer pleasure reading from the Kindle. There's a little bit of glare if you're reading with light coming from a point source, but it is no worse than say, a glossy magazine. This is more than made up for by having a choice of font size, the legibility, and the ease of switching materials just because you're in the mood for a change. In fact, I'm afraid that I might start suffering from Kindle-induced ADD, where I read so many books at once that I end up not finishing a single one. This must be how television viewers felt the first time they held a remote control in their hand --- the Kindle is like having a remote control for your entire library of books.
The Kindle incorporates a web-browser which is surprisingly good --- it renders this blog correctly complete with the ads and pictures, for instance. The speed, however, is nothing to write home about, and this is not the intended use of the Kindle. The MP3 player that's built into the Kindle is also rather limited, allowing no selection of songs, for instance, and should be regarded only a stop gap for short train rides or when you are trying to shave weight to a minimum (e.g., on a bike tour). For an 11-hour plane ride, for instance, you are best off bringing a dedicated MP3 player as well
My Kindle turned out to be defective --- the battery only lasted a 8 hours with the wireless turned on (it's supposed to last 2 days), and about 14 hours with the wireless turned off (it's supposed to last a week). A call to Amazon's customer service resulted in their promising to ship me a replacement one as soon as it became available, but in the mean time I could keep using the one I had and just charge it more frequently. Customer service assured me that I had a rare unit, and most of the Kindles out in the field have more than satisfactory battery life.
Criticisms: The Kindle book cover is terrible. It weighs almost as much as the Kindle (8oz), and does not hold on to the Kindle at all! (It clings through a divot in the back of the Kindle, but the mechanism is incredibly unreliable) I replaced it with a Waterfield slip case for protection, and a Sea To Summit Ultra-Sil 2 liter Dry Bag for waterproofing when I'm riding to work with the Kindle in my saddlebag. The two combined weigh under 4oz and provide more protection than the case.
The unit does need a hold switch for the side buttons. It is definitely easy to accidentally tap the buttons when adjusting your Kindle in the default book cover. However, if you remove the Kindle from the cover and read it in your hands this becomes not an issue at all. I definitely think that the design could be improved quite a bit, though given that I detest the ipod-style of non-user replaceable batteries, I'm quite happy with the compromises.
The charger should have been an industry standard USB charger, given that the Kindle has a mini-USB port. This is one of those things where a consumer electronics company would have gotten it correct --- when traveling (and early adopters of the Kindle will largely be travelers), I simply do not want to carry a separate charger for my cell phone and my Kindle. (Yes, the iPhone has a special charger, but it also doubles as your MP3 player)
The book selection is also not quite there yet. I was very annoyed, for instance, that Iain M. Bank's Matter isn't available in the store. I was also disappointed that none of the Lonely Planet or Rough Guides type of books have made it into electronic form (these are the killer apps for the Kindle --- what would you rather backpack through Europe with? 5 pounds of paper books, or a Kindle?). A letter-writing campaign is in order here.
Despite all that, the last few days have had me happily reading various book samples from the Kindle store, and reading the material I bought and downloaded to it. In fact, it got to the point where I was annoyed at having to put down the Kindle, get out of my chair and grab a paper book to keep reading whatever it was I was reading before the Kindle arrived. This might wear off as the novelty of the Kindle wears off over time, but nevertheless, I am keeping this device, and will happily buy later versions if they incorporate new features.
If you are an outdoors person who loves reading (my brother and I used to go on back-country walks with 14 pounds of books), the weight savings and easy readability of the Kindle alone will sell you --- line up and buy one now! You will love it, and wonder why you ever hesitated when it came down to buying one. If you are a cycle tourist and the area you're planning to tour is covered by web guides, buy one as well. You won't miss the weight or the bulk taken up by paper. The way I see it, I read a lot more often than I listen to music (the ipod sold for $400 each when it was first introduced), and the $400 the Kindle costs is more than justifiable for an avid reader. In case you haven't figured it out yet, the Kindle comes highly recommended.
[Update: After 6 months of living with it, here's my long term Kindle review]
So I ordered a Kindle in February, waited a full month for the delivery, and received it on Tuesday. Lots of people complain about the supposed ugliness of the product, but since I'm not even cool enough to own a Mac, I didn't find the Kindle ugly at all. In fact, if Apple designed it, it wouldn't have a $20 user replaceable battery, so I'm actually somewhat thankful that Apple did not make this product.
The Kindle charges very fast. I plugged it in, went for a workout at the gym, and it reported a full charge by the time I came back. It comes registered to your Amazon.com account, and I was happily downloading book samples over the wireless connection. I dug up a 1GB SD card, and plugged it into the Kindle for additional storage.
The screen is as readable as advertised, though it's gray, not white. JPGs render beautifully as gray scale pictures. What really sold me, however, was Mobibook Creator. One of the problems I've been trying to solve, for instance, is that when I tour, I end up carrying a ton of paper with me, including the OCD travel guides. Well, Mobibook Creator would take an arbitrary HTML file and turn it into a kindle book, including rendering the diagrams quite beautifully (apologies for the blurriness):
I can't tell you how big a deal this is. One of my biggest complaints in the past was not having the entire Jobst Tour of the Alps collection with me for reference when I was touring, and this makes it possible to have the entire portable reference in a search-able form in a 10.3oz package. If you are planning to tour the alps, the $400 purchase of a Kindle will pay for itself in one trip alone, in terms of finding you better lodging and food. For good measure, I also scanned my paper collection of OCD pass guides into PDFs and converted it using Kindle's free conversion service to download it to my Kindle. The results aren't as nice as Mobibook Creator's output, but it was still largely usable.
The first electronic book I bought for my Kindle, ironically, was not at Amazon.com --- it was a subscription to the electronic version of Interzone Science Fiction Magazine on Fictionwise. This British-published award-winning magazine costs $80 a year to subscribe to from the US, but is only $24 in electronic format --- a true bargain in any sense of the word.
Another good source of electronic books is the Baen Free Library, which I've actually read from in prior years, but is a perfect match for the Kindle. My second purchase for the Kindle was an Omnibus of Tom Godwin stories at Baen's electronic books site. I would never contemplate dragging along such a volume onto a plane in my backpack, but in electronic format, size is simply not an issue. The other good source for free books is Project Gutenberg, which has many of the classic Jane Austen novels available for easy download.
I then tried a wireless purchase through the bookstore: Conan Original Stories for $0.99. The wireless transfer was fast and painless, but the text was mis-formatted --- an e-mail to Amazon's customer service quickly and easily reversed the charge.
It was a sheer pleasure reading from the Kindle. There's a little bit of glare if you're reading with light coming from a point source, but it is no worse than say, a glossy magazine. This is more than made up for by having a choice of font size, the legibility, and the ease of switching materials just because you're in the mood for a change. In fact, I'm afraid that I might start suffering from Kindle-induced ADD, where I read so many books at once that I end up not finishing a single one. This must be how television viewers felt the first time they held a remote control in their hand --- the Kindle is like having a remote control for your entire library of books.
The Kindle incorporates a web-browser which is surprisingly good --- it renders this blog correctly complete with the ads and pictures, for instance. The speed, however, is nothing to write home about, and this is not the intended use of the Kindle. The MP3 player that's built into the Kindle is also rather limited, allowing no selection of songs, for instance, and should be regarded only a stop gap for short train rides or when you are trying to shave weight to a minimum (e.g., on a bike tour). For an 11-hour plane ride, for instance, you are best off bringing a dedicated MP3 player as well
My Kindle turned out to be defective --- the battery only lasted a 8 hours with the wireless turned on (it's supposed to last 2 days), and about 14 hours with the wireless turned off (it's supposed to last a week). A call to Amazon's customer service resulted in their promising to ship me a replacement one as soon as it became available, but in the mean time I could keep using the one I had and just charge it more frequently. Customer service assured me that I had a rare unit, and most of the Kindles out in the field have more than satisfactory battery life.
Criticisms: The Kindle book cover is terrible. It weighs almost as much as the Kindle (8oz), and does not hold on to the Kindle at all! (It clings through a divot in the back of the Kindle, but the mechanism is incredibly unreliable) I replaced it with a Waterfield slip case for protection, and a Sea To Summit Ultra-Sil 2 liter Dry Bag for waterproofing when I'm riding to work with the Kindle in my saddlebag. The two combined weigh under 4oz and provide more protection than the case.
The unit does need a hold switch for the side buttons. It is definitely easy to accidentally tap the buttons when adjusting your Kindle in the default book cover. However, if you remove the Kindle from the cover and read it in your hands this becomes not an issue at all. I definitely think that the design could be improved quite a bit, though given that I detest the ipod-style of non-user replaceable batteries, I'm quite happy with the compromises.
The charger should have been an industry standard USB charger, given that the Kindle has a mini-USB port. This is one of those things where a consumer electronics company would have gotten it correct --- when traveling (and early adopters of the Kindle will largely be travelers), I simply do not want to carry a separate charger for my cell phone and my Kindle. (Yes, the iPhone has a special charger, but it also doubles as your MP3 player)
The book selection is also not quite there yet. I was very annoyed, for instance, that Iain M. Bank's Matter isn't available in the store. I was also disappointed that none of the Lonely Planet or Rough Guides type of books have made it into electronic form (these are the killer apps for the Kindle --- what would you rather backpack through Europe with? 5 pounds of paper books, or a Kindle?). A letter-writing campaign is in order here.
Despite all that, the last few days have had me happily reading various book samples from the Kindle store, and reading the material I bought and downloaded to it. In fact, it got to the point where I was annoyed at having to put down the Kindle, get out of my chair and grab a paper book to keep reading whatever it was I was reading before the Kindle arrived. This might wear off as the novelty of the Kindle wears off over time, but nevertheless, I am keeping this device, and will happily buy later versions if they incorporate new features.
If you are an outdoors person who loves reading (my brother and I used to go on back-country walks with 14 pounds of books), the weight savings and easy readability of the Kindle alone will sell you --- line up and buy one now! You will love it, and wonder why you ever hesitated when it came down to buying one. If you are a cycle tourist and the area you're planning to tour is covered by web guides, buy one as well. You won't miss the weight or the bulk taken up by paper. The way I see it, I read a lot more often than I listen to music (the ipod sold for $400 each when it was first introduced), and the $400 the Kindle costs is more than justifiable for an avid reader. In case you haven't figured it out yet, the Kindle comes highly recommended.
[Update: After 6 months of living with it, here's my long term Kindle review]
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Ayer's Rock II - Part 6
Today was yet another early morning wakeup. 6am. This time, to catch the sunrise at Uluru. Showered, cleaned up, and off in the car. By the time I got to the Sunrise Viewing Area, the area was already packed with about 200+ people, at least 3 tour buses and a few other cars around.
The sunrise was rather...normal. In light that the Rock got simply brigher and brigher, compared to the Kata Tjuta sunset of the day before, it was a bit of a letdown. Perhaps it was because there was so many more people, perhaps it was because I couldn't get the best possible viewing angle..but it felt a bit flat to me.
After the sunrise, my thought was to circuit the 10km road around the rock and see what its like....but when i hit the first parking lot, the Mala parking lot, I saw that the road to climb Uluru was open! I hopped on that opportunity and flew up the hill as quickly as I could. The entire path was about 2.6km, but with a very steep first 1km. It felt like about 1km altitude gain, but that'll be a bit too much. So its probably something like just 2000 feet or so.
In any case, the first climb was very short, only about 500 meters, but very high, so a lot of folks were in the path resting. After you hit the first flat summit, you continue on up for another 50 feet of altitude gain, but the longest part of the climb, distance wise. At the very top, you can see Kata Tjuta and get a nice panaromic view of the desert plains.
The locals consider it bad luck to climb the rock, and they highly discourage non-locals from climbing. The rock has great cultural significane to them.
Well, i guess my run of bad luck started not soon after I descended the mountain. I managed to lock my keys in the car! A 4km hike to the cultural center to make a phone call and 2 hours later, I got my keys back.
With the rest of the day sort of blown due to the heat that's now all over the park, i just went back to the hostel to take it easy. I returned to the park a few hours later to take in the cultural center and see the Uluru sunset. Before I left, I booked another tour, a stars tour...as Uluru is in the middle of the desert, with no light pollution, I thought it'll be the best time for me to learn more about the southern skies.
The sunset was quite good, much better than the sunrise, but not quite as good as what it would be in August or September, assured me a local. Apparently you get the colors of the rainbows just above the rock, and its spectcular! I just got the color changing, but thought it was quite nice nonetheless.
I retunred back to thoe hostel, got dinner prepared and eaten, and waited around for the stars tour. At the time the stars tour was supposed to start, a car screeched up to the curb, out hopped a person and he introduced himself to all of us as the astronomer. The show was being cancelled due to the clouds in the skies. I was disappointed as you could still see the southern cross and orion, but he assured us it would get much worse. Still, he pointed us to the southern cross, and I was just a bit bummed.
My luck got worse however...while charging my blackberry in the community room, my charger blew! it could have been worse (could have been the camera charger), but still..I guess summitting Uluru gave me all this bad luck! I had a very low charge on the phone as well and it worried me as i used it as an alarm clock as well...and i have a few more 6am pickups for both my dives and my flights back to sydney.
I'm using it only as an alarm clock now....so no more postings!
I'm posting this entry from an internet cafe...=)
ah well...I'm really sorry i summited uluru! please no more bad luck!
The sunrise was rather...normal. In light that the Rock got simply brigher and brigher, compared to the Kata Tjuta sunset of the day before, it was a bit of a letdown. Perhaps it was because there was so many more people, perhaps it was because I couldn't get the best possible viewing angle..but it felt a bit flat to me.
After the sunrise, my thought was to circuit the 10km road around the rock and see what its like....but when i hit the first parking lot, the Mala parking lot, I saw that the road to climb Uluru was open! I hopped on that opportunity and flew up the hill as quickly as I could. The entire path was about 2.6km, but with a very steep first 1km. It felt like about 1km altitude gain, but that'll be a bit too much. So its probably something like just 2000 feet or so.
In any case, the first climb was very short, only about 500 meters, but very high, so a lot of folks were in the path resting. After you hit the first flat summit, you continue on up for another 50 feet of altitude gain, but the longest part of the climb, distance wise. At the very top, you can see Kata Tjuta and get a nice panaromic view of the desert plains.
The locals consider it bad luck to climb the rock, and they highly discourage non-locals from climbing. The rock has great cultural significane to them.
Well, i guess my run of bad luck started not soon after I descended the mountain. I managed to lock my keys in the car! A 4km hike to the cultural center to make a phone call and 2 hours later, I got my keys back.
With the rest of the day sort of blown due to the heat that's now all over the park, i just went back to the hostel to take it easy. I returned to the park a few hours later to take in the cultural center and see the Uluru sunset. Before I left, I booked another tour, a stars tour...as Uluru is in the middle of the desert, with no light pollution, I thought it'll be the best time for me to learn more about the southern skies.
The sunset was quite good, much better than the sunrise, but not quite as good as what it would be in August or September, assured me a local. Apparently you get the colors of the rainbows just above the rock, and its spectcular! I just got the color changing, but thought it was quite nice nonetheless.
I retunred back to thoe hostel, got dinner prepared and eaten, and waited around for the stars tour. At the time the stars tour was supposed to start, a car screeched up to the curb, out hopped a person and he introduced himself to all of us as the astronomer. The show was being cancelled due to the clouds in the skies. I was disappointed as you could still see the southern cross and orion, but he assured us it would get much worse. Still, he pointed us to the southern cross, and I was just a bit bummed.
My luck got worse however...while charging my blackberry in the community room, my charger blew! it could have been worse (could have been the camera charger), but still..I guess summitting Uluru gave me all this bad luck! I had a very low charge on the phone as well and it worried me as i used it as an alarm clock as well...and i have a few more 6am pickups for both my dives and my flights back to sydney.
I'm using it only as an alarm clock now....so no more postings!
I'm posting this entry from an internet cafe...=)
ah well...I'm really sorry i summited uluru! please no more bad luck!
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Australia Log Part 5
[Posting for my brother, who's on vacation in Australia]
I know I've been labeling the days all off. But whatever, I will come back to fix it. For now, writing is more important.
So....woke up at 4am....3:30 really since I couldn't sleep anymore due to the room being too hot. We have AC, but the person sharing the room with me didn't want it on. Thinking it was cool enough, I acquiesced. And regretted it when I woke up.
Too many mosquitoes. I was bitten and heavily so. I probably tasted better than the older chap....oh well. Next time I'll stand my ground.
Anyhow. Woke up at 3:30pm and left at 4....the shuttle picked up at 4:20 and it felt like 33c.....I had already showered and was sweating immediately already....gosh, hard to believe people live here!
Soon enough the shuttle came....got on it and zoom! Off i went. The shuttle was nicely air conditioned, and I felt good for it.
No one was at the airport and checkin was a breeze. The flight had another hour to go, so I took a short nap.
The flight was made uneventfully and I got a glimpse of the sunrise....little did I know it was going to be the first of many sunrises for me :)
Arrived at Alice springs some two hours later and I had a shock. Alice springs is a desert....and it was about 15c cooler than Darwin! Near the bloody coast!
It was drier as deserts should be, but the cooler part I didn't get.
I guess Darwin really is at the equatorial point or something.
Thr layover at alice springs is 5 hours and unfortunately there was no shuttles running. And all cars were rented out.
I had to sit in the airport doing postcards and email.... A bit annoying, but what to do right?
I learned a lot about local alice springs history though, but there wasn't much to it....originally just a small colonial land....now the gateway to multiple tourists attractions like kings canyon, the mcdonnel mtn ranges and ayers rock.
The airport consisted of just one small display, that of a rolls royce.
It wasn't much, but I read the whole display. It was used a lot in the beginning to create runways for planes and other heavy duty work....a bit of a waste of a rolls but since it was so well built, it went on for many years. Now fully restored, it sits at the airport. :)
Bought a few more postcards and wrote them and soon enough the flight to ayers rock began.
I didn't really have a plan for ayers rock since it was so simple. A rock. You can climb it or go around it. There were also many guided tours for ayers rock as well, but so many of them looks so expensive that I decided to just rent a car. Even though it costed me 145 + gas, it was still cheaper than everything else I wanted to do!!! I wanted to see 2 sunsets, two sunrises, the cultural center, and all the hikes. To do all that would have run me close to 300 and I would still miss a few hikes!!!
So off at ayers rock airport, and off to ayers rock immediately.
Majestic. Monlithic. Those are two easy words to describe ayers rock.
But I wasn't going there today. I was going to kata tjutu, another smaller set of monolithic rocks much like ayers rock. There was a 7.4 km walk that I wanted to do called The Valley of Winds walk.
I got there at 3:30 and knowing the sunset was at 6:45pm knew I had 3 hours, or the recommended time to do the hike.
With that knowledge and two full 1.5L of water, set off on the hike.
It was beautiful. The afternoon hike made the individual stones look beautiful and they're incredibly vibrant in color and liveliness in their shapes and light.
The walk itself is divided into two rather distinctive portions. There are two lookouts and a lot of tours simply hit the second lookout and turn around.
To me, I would have been ashamed as the second half is gorgeous. The first half is mostly mountainous terrain, and the second half relatively flat plains.
From the mountains you get to see the rocks up close and personal, from the plains you get to see the rocks in its majestic glory. While I loved the up close and personalness of the rocks, the real view is in the full views.....still close, but far enough to appreciate its full glory.
I finished the hike in 2 hours....took a quick bio break and then went off to the sunset site.
There I saw the rocks change colors about 3 times, going from red, to orange, to a blazing yellow, back to dull red in the fading sun.
It was gorgeous and beautiful and made me more hungry for the days to come.
Off to my hostel!
I know I've been labeling the days all off. But whatever, I will come back to fix it. For now, writing is more important.
So....woke up at 4am....3:30 really since I couldn't sleep anymore due to the room being too hot. We have AC, but the person sharing the room with me didn't want it on. Thinking it was cool enough, I acquiesced. And regretted it when I woke up.
Too many mosquitoes. I was bitten and heavily so. I probably tasted better than the older chap....oh well. Next time I'll stand my ground.
Anyhow. Woke up at 3:30pm and left at 4....the shuttle picked up at 4:20 and it felt like 33c.....I had already showered and was sweating immediately already....gosh, hard to believe people live here!
Soon enough the shuttle came....got on it and zoom! Off i went. The shuttle was nicely air conditioned, and I felt good for it.
No one was at the airport and checkin was a breeze. The flight had another hour to go, so I took a short nap.
The flight was made uneventfully and I got a glimpse of the sunrise....little did I know it was going to be the first of many sunrises for me :)
Arrived at Alice springs some two hours later and I had a shock. Alice springs is a desert....and it was about 15c cooler than Darwin! Near the bloody coast!
It was drier as deserts should be, but the cooler part I didn't get.
I guess Darwin really is at the equatorial point or something.
Thr layover at alice springs is 5 hours and unfortunately there was no shuttles running. And all cars were rented out.
I had to sit in the airport doing postcards and email.... A bit annoying, but what to do right?
I learned a lot about local alice springs history though, but there wasn't much to it....originally just a small colonial land....now the gateway to multiple tourists attractions like kings canyon, the mcdonnel mtn ranges and ayers rock.
The airport consisted of just one small display, that of a rolls royce.
It wasn't much, but I read the whole display. It was used a lot in the beginning to create runways for planes and other heavy duty work....a bit of a waste of a rolls but since it was so well built, it went on for many years. Now fully restored, it sits at the airport. :)
Bought a few more postcards and wrote them and soon enough the flight to ayers rock began.
I didn't really have a plan for ayers rock since it was so simple. A rock. You can climb it or go around it. There were also many guided tours for ayers rock as well, but so many of them looks so expensive that I decided to just rent a car. Even though it costed me 145 + gas, it was still cheaper than everything else I wanted to do!!! I wanted to see 2 sunsets, two sunrises, the cultural center, and all the hikes. To do all that would have run me close to 300 and I would still miss a few hikes!!!
So off at ayers rock airport, and off to ayers rock immediately.
Majestic. Monlithic. Those are two easy words to describe ayers rock.
But I wasn't going there today. I was going to kata tjutu, another smaller set of monolithic rocks much like ayers rock. There was a 7.4 km walk that I wanted to do called The Valley of Winds walk.
I got there at 3:30 and knowing the sunset was at 6:45pm knew I had 3 hours, or the recommended time to do the hike.
With that knowledge and two full 1.5L of water, set off on the hike.
It was beautiful. The afternoon hike made the individual stones look beautiful and they're incredibly vibrant in color and liveliness in their shapes and light.
The walk itself is divided into two rather distinctive portions. There are two lookouts and a lot of tours simply hit the second lookout and turn around.
To me, I would have been ashamed as the second half is gorgeous. The first half is mostly mountainous terrain, and the second half relatively flat plains.
From the mountains you get to see the rocks up close and personal, from the plains you get to see the rocks in its majestic glory. While I loved the up close and personalness of the rocks, the real view is in the full views.....still close, but far enough to appreciate its full glory.
I finished the hike in 2 hours....took a quick bio break and then went off to the sunset site.
There I saw the rocks change colors about 3 times, going from red, to orange, to a blazing yellow, back to dull red in the fading sun.
It was gorgeous and beautiful and made me more hungry for the days to come.
Off to my hostel!
Sunday, March 23, 2008
Touring Configuration
All in all, the bike is now ready for Germany!
Australia Log Part 4
[Posted for my brother, who is on vacation in Australia]
Last day with kakadu and in darwin. Flight tomorrow is 6am. We get back in town at 6pm.
Ouch. Next time, I must plan a little better, but its tough.....more time spent leisurely means less time spent looking. But the alternative is a crazy packed schedule. Yucks.
Anyway!!!! Woke up at 6:30am......spent a few minutes mucking around and then woke up proper. Checked my camera, hey! It worked!
Splotch on the lcd, doubt it affects PQ, but will worry about that later.
We had breakfast after the usual morning duties....found out brinny had to sleep in the tenthouse due to someone stealing her bed! Grrrrr!
Still, she was in good spirits. We went off after breakfast to see the rock arts. As one of the more accessible spots, it was filled with tourists and even had a tour bus.
The last few days felt more like a regular camping trip with lots of leisure times spent around swims and whatnots.....today was the cultural and enrichment days....(Link to rock art stuff) for those interested.
The rock arts were interesting....some of them were 10k years old, some as recent as 40 or 50 years ago.......far more interesting was that most aboriginie arts is now on other mediums as they don't really have an attachment to the medium, but just the arts.
After an hour or so, we went to jajidu airport where jules caught a plane to see the jimjim falls. One hour of sightseeing by air, I thought about it but decided I'd rather save my money for other stuff.
She looked tired after her flight but said the flight was worth it. :)
We lunched in the meantime (same as yesterdays, sandwiches + leftovers)....and watched the videos they had in the visitors center.
Our next stop was at the bowali national park HQ. Another touristy stop and I picked up a ton of fliers and sent off my first postcards....heehee
Later on, about an hours drive, we stopped at a couple of termite mounds. These giants were really impressive and the biggest one easily stood at 4m tall. We stood around and took some pictures. Des later explained that termite science isn't as popular as other areas of etymology....hence not too much was understood as the other insects (I think its BS....), but did explain that one theory why they build up so high is so that in case of fire or drought, they have a vast food supply.
One of the mounds was also dead from attack of the ants....
And then that was it. One last pit stop and we were off back to darwin.
Last thoughts
1) The trip probably could be done cheaper if you were willing to drive a 4x4 and pre plan a lot. You could probably stay a little bit more comfortably as well with aircon lodges every night. The tour didn't do anything that you really couldn't do yourself.
2) A lot of how much fun you have on tours like these is expectations, group, and guide. We had a good guide, a GREAT group, and lots of good non-raining weather.
3) A bit too much swimming. I'd have liked to visit more sights than to swim as much as we did. That said, the swims were very very relaxing and I enjoyed it extremely so. The falls were beautiful if not majestic, and I really only missed the JimJim falls and the two tower falls (closed due to road conditions).
4) Great group. It really stands to reason, but we got very lucky we weren't in a larger group. With 9 of us and all of us willing to help with every task, all meals became fun, and everyone was in great spirits. In the larger groups that we saw, I saw a lot of splintered groups, and even with two guides, probably didn't get the care and attention that we got from our guides.
Also the seating arrangement of our LandCruiser was great. We sat facing each other and everyone had a view....also lots of conversation and fun was had due to us actually seeing each other. That wouldn't happen in a bus configuration where mostly you'd see the back of the person in front of you.
5) Also, 3 days is about right. Two days would have been rushed, 5 days might feel stretched (plus you'd get sick of your fellow tourists), so for my money, I recommend the 3 day tours.
My recommendation? If traveling in a group of 3 or more, self tour is a good alternative, otherwise for a good time, lots of in-car nap time, and quite a bit of adventure, get on a tour! :)
Also.....dry season, April to October is good as more sights are open. I was constrained by my schedule, but still had a great time. April would be best because the waterfalls are still full, but you get all sights. Temps are still high.....high of 30s and low of 17s in the evening......humidity is also lower, but honestly, you'd be hard pressed to say that's really comfy unless you compare to 33s in the day and 25s at night. :)
Do be prepared to spend about two to three hours on the road no matter what you do though. That's just how far darwin is from kakadu.
That's all for day four. Later in the evening.....brewskis with all my tour mates and some errands (towel!) And chores (laundry!). :)
Tomorrow, 4am wake up. Bleagh.
Last day with kakadu and in darwin. Flight tomorrow is 6am. We get back in town at 6pm.
Ouch. Next time, I must plan a little better, but its tough.....more time spent leisurely means less time spent looking. But the alternative is a crazy packed schedule. Yucks.
Anyway!!!! Woke up at 6:30am......spent a few minutes mucking around and then woke up proper. Checked my camera, hey! It worked!
Splotch on the lcd, doubt it affects PQ, but will worry about that later.
We had breakfast after the usual morning duties....found out brinny had to sleep in the tenthouse due to someone stealing her bed! Grrrrr!
Still, she was in good spirits. We went off after breakfast to see the rock arts. As one of the more accessible spots, it was filled with tourists and even had a tour bus.
The last few days felt more like a regular camping trip with lots of leisure times spent around swims and whatnots.....today was the cultural and enrichment days....(Link to rock art stuff) for those interested.
The rock arts were interesting....some of them were 10k years old, some as recent as 40 or 50 years ago.......far more interesting was that most aboriginie arts is now on other mediums as they don't really have an attachment to the medium, but just the arts.
After an hour or so, we went to jajidu airport where jules caught a plane to see the jimjim falls. One hour of sightseeing by air, I thought about it but decided I'd rather save my money for other stuff.
She looked tired after her flight but said the flight was worth it. :)
We lunched in the meantime (same as yesterdays, sandwiches + leftovers)....and watched the videos they had in the visitors center.
Our next stop was at the bowali national park HQ. Another touristy stop and I picked up a ton of fliers and sent off my first postcards....heehee
Later on, about an hours drive, we stopped at a couple of termite mounds. These giants were really impressive and the biggest one easily stood at 4m tall. We stood around and took some pictures. Des later explained that termite science isn't as popular as other areas of etymology....hence not too much was understood as the other insects (I think its BS....), but did explain that one theory why they build up so high is so that in case of fire or drought, they have a vast food supply.
One of the mounds was also dead from attack of the ants....
And then that was it. One last pit stop and we were off back to darwin.
Last thoughts
1) The trip probably could be done cheaper if you were willing to drive a 4x4 and pre plan a lot. You could probably stay a little bit more comfortably as well with aircon lodges every night. The tour didn't do anything that you really couldn't do yourself.
2) A lot of how much fun you have on tours like these is expectations, group, and guide. We had a good guide, a GREAT group, and lots of good non-raining weather.
3) A bit too much swimming. I'd have liked to visit more sights than to swim as much as we did. That said, the swims were very very relaxing and I enjoyed it extremely so. The falls were beautiful if not majestic, and I really only missed the JimJim falls and the two tower falls (closed due to road conditions).
4) Great group. It really stands to reason, but we got very lucky we weren't in a larger group. With 9 of us and all of us willing to help with every task, all meals became fun, and everyone was in great spirits. In the larger groups that we saw, I saw a lot of splintered groups, and even with two guides, probably didn't get the care and attention that we got from our guides.
Also the seating arrangement of our LandCruiser was great. We sat facing each other and everyone had a view....also lots of conversation and fun was had due to us actually seeing each other. That wouldn't happen in a bus configuration where mostly you'd see the back of the person in front of you.
5) Also, 3 days is about right. Two days would have been rushed, 5 days might feel stretched (plus you'd get sick of your fellow tourists), so for my money, I recommend the 3 day tours.
My recommendation? If traveling in a group of 3 or more, self tour is a good alternative, otherwise for a good time, lots of in-car nap time, and quite a bit of adventure, get on a tour! :)
Also.....dry season, April to October is good as more sights are open. I was constrained by my schedule, but still had a great time. April would be best because the waterfalls are still full, but you get all sights. Temps are still high.....high of 30s and low of 17s in the evening......humidity is also lower, but honestly, you'd be hard pressed to say that's really comfy unless you compare to 33s in the day and 25s at night. :)
Do be prepared to spend about two to three hours on the road no matter what you do though. That's just how far darwin is from kakadu.
That's all for day four. Later in the evening.....brewskis with all my tour mates and some errands (towel!) And chores (laundry!). :)
Tomorrow, 4am wake up. Bleagh.
Saturday, March 22, 2008
Australia Log Part 3
[Posting for my brother, who's in Australia on vacation]
I woke up at 6:30am.....and had to debate whether getting up or not into what I imagined was a mosquito deathtrap outside to pee was worth it. :)
While I debated such great matters of life and death, I begun packing and repacking. Yup, forgot towel, forgot swim trunks, its official, I'm an idiot. :)
I saw derek had got up as well and went outside, so the urge not lessening, decided to join him.
Oh yes, I also noticed brinny's tent had disappeared and assumed she's tented elsewhere. Once outside the tent, I realized where she had gone.
Yup, about 30 meters from the main camp :)
I found a convenient bush, given that the outhouse wasn't usable.
Dez was also outside and already awake. We exchanged greetings and he told me he moved outside coz he snores.....and well I had to admit the same.
The morning light was gorgeous.
Back into the tent, we started on breakfast while the rest of the people started waking up.
Breakfast was a simple affair.....cereal, bread (toasted on special toasters over the open flame), juice, and coffee.
Nescafe, mmm, how I miss you not. :)
After that, a quick pack and we were out to the bathroom, I had to shower (as futile as I knew that was, but a habit is hard to break) and got myself a bigger bottle of water (4 dollars).
We then hopped on the jeep, and day two began! We saw two dingos, my first of the trip. :). It tickled my fancy particularly because one of my coworkers for.a year is called dingo. :)
The ride was short, about 20 minutes on a dirt path, but we first stopped for water and toilets. At the ranger station, we saw that jimjim was closed and we had to fly to see it if we wanted to see it.
The next thing was a short hike, less than 3km.....the company got into another good conversation mode and we talked about all things like German hikers, the heat, our sweatiness, and the other people's plans after this trip.
Sven was off to Africa after, jules goes back to work, derek was off to Cambodia, janna was off home to Germany, brinny will be in Darwin a few more days before making her way to cairns.....scott and marlon are also in Darwin before they're off to Victoria.
So our first walk ended in the most spectacular waterfall I've yet to see. It was about 30 feet high and ended into a deep deep plunge pool. The water was cool and refreshing and everyone had a great time swimming, diving, snacking, funning all around.
We spent about 2 hours here, snacking on a cantaloupe and strawberries cream cookie. We later hiked out, and spent five minutes on the road later to our lunch spot. Lunch was sandwiches and leftovers from the night before.
After an hour of eating, we hiked another 20 minutes to yet another watering spot. This one was special in that it was layered like many towers.....there was a lovely overhang over the bottom pool where we started. further up was another layer.....
A minor personal tragedy happened in that while I was carrying my camera up to the second layer, my camera fell into the pool. I was quick enough to recover it and take out the battery and SD card, but still.....I feared for the worst.
Putting it on a high rock to dry on the highest point, I left it to itself and went off exploring the highest pool level. Above loomed a peak and derek and sven went off clambering on it. Taking a few steps but fearing further disaster, I decided to follow the girls and went off to the massage falls. So named because the falls was the most like one :). The others were too hard or too cold or too weak.
After a few more minutes of enjoying the pools, we went back to the lowest pools where janna was waiting (she said her feet weren't really for rocks....neither are mine, hence I wear my sandals everywhere I can :), that's the other thing, I'm very heavy of foot and can barely go over rough terrain with any speed unprotected).
We spent another 20 minutes before we went off to our campsite. Before that though we stoppedto gather firewood.....much fun was had by all gathering, breaking, and storing of firewood on the truck. Then it was off to the camp. We stopped to pay another 10 dollars each and then hit up our bunks....oohhhh air conditioned!!!!
Me and jules decided to wait out our showers till the end of the evening and so helped out des with the chores.
Dinner was lamb chops, potatoes, broccoli, and stir fry. The potatoes were gonna be cooked in a coal oven though as were the brocoli for a portion.
So a fire was started and we fed the fire a bit trying to generate coals. The night was cool, so we started.a nice fire.
The rest of the evening was the same as before. Scott did the meat, the rest helped with the veggies and des directed.
Another kakdu dreams group came in the meantime and we felt very lucky because they were 15 in the group.
Nowhere as fun as our group I'd wager!
Space was an issue because there were only 15 bunks and 9 were already taken up by us. Much grumblings were heard by those in the other group. Poor planning perhaps?
We had a great dinner, this time supplanted with wine as we had a box of it from the general store on the campgrounds. It was a quick affair though as we had a chance to listen to two guides from another tour group....they were demonstrating both the digirubi with guitar accompaniment.......iit sounded great and the story goes as follows (insert story here)
Later on, marshmellows came out for the campfire and soggy as they were, was wonderful over the fire.
I went off for my shower and had a quick time of it as the camp had turned off the lights! Me being an idiot that I am, had also forgotten my flashlight (did not pack).. Fortunately derek was around and loaned me his and I finished my shower with some human decency :).
I then went back, checked my camera and then decided to let it dry a bit more. Derek had his laptop so we could see that my SD card was still alive. :). Happy about that at least!
The it was bid the rest goodnight and off to sleep hoping water would come out of my left ear......:)
This has been a great vacation thus far :)
I woke up at 6:30am.....and had to debate whether getting up or not into what I imagined was a mosquito deathtrap outside to pee was worth it. :)
While I debated such great matters of life and death, I begun packing and repacking. Yup, forgot towel, forgot swim trunks, its official, I'm an idiot. :)
I saw derek had got up as well and went outside, so the urge not lessening, decided to join him.
Oh yes, I also noticed brinny's tent had disappeared and assumed she's tented elsewhere. Once outside the tent, I realized where she had gone.
Yup, about 30 meters from the main camp :)
I found a convenient bush, given that the outhouse wasn't usable.
Dez was also outside and already awake. We exchanged greetings and he told me he moved outside coz he snores.....and well I had to admit the same.
The morning light was gorgeous.
Back into the tent, we started on breakfast while the rest of the people started waking up.
Breakfast was a simple affair.....cereal, bread (toasted on special toasters over the open flame), juice, and coffee.
Nescafe, mmm, how I miss you not. :)
After that, a quick pack and we were out to the bathroom, I had to shower (as futile as I knew that was, but a habit is hard to break) and got myself a bigger bottle of water (4 dollars).
We then hopped on the jeep, and day two began! We saw two dingos, my first of the trip. :). It tickled my fancy particularly because one of my coworkers for.a year is called dingo. :)
The ride was short, about 20 minutes on a dirt path, but we first stopped for water and toilets. At the ranger station, we saw that jimjim was closed and we had to fly to see it if we wanted to see it.
The next thing was a short hike, less than 3km.....the company got into another good conversation mode and we talked about all things like German hikers, the heat, our sweatiness, and the other people's plans after this trip.
Sven was off to Africa after, jules goes back to work, derek was off to Cambodia, janna was off home to Germany, brinny will be in Darwin a few more days before making her way to cairns.....scott and marlon are also in Darwin before they're off to Victoria.
So our first walk ended in the most spectacular waterfall I've yet to see. It was about 30 feet high and ended into a deep deep plunge pool. The water was cool and refreshing and everyone had a great time swimming, diving, snacking, funning all around.
We spent about 2 hours here, snacking on a cantaloupe and strawberries cream cookie. We later hiked out, and spent five minutes on the road later to our lunch spot. Lunch was sandwiches and leftovers from the night before.
After an hour of eating, we hiked another 20 minutes to yet another watering spot. This one was special in that it was layered like many towers.....there was a lovely overhang over the bottom pool where we started. further up was another layer.....
A minor personal tragedy happened in that while I was carrying my camera up to the second layer, my camera fell into the pool. I was quick enough to recover it and take out the battery and SD card, but still.....I feared for the worst.
Putting it on a high rock to dry on the highest point, I left it to itself and went off exploring the highest pool level. Above loomed a peak and derek and sven went off clambering on it. Taking a few steps but fearing further disaster, I decided to follow the girls and went off to the massage falls. So named because the falls was the most like one :). The others were too hard or too cold or too weak.
After a few more minutes of enjoying the pools, we went back to the lowest pools where janna was waiting (she said her feet weren't really for rocks....neither are mine, hence I wear my sandals everywhere I can :), that's the other thing, I'm very heavy of foot and can barely go over rough terrain with any speed unprotected).
We spent another 20 minutes before we went off to our campsite. Before that though we stoppedto gather firewood.....much fun was had by all gathering, breaking, and storing of firewood on the truck. Then it was off to the camp. We stopped to pay another 10 dollars each and then hit up our bunks....oohhhh air conditioned!!!!
Me and jules decided to wait out our showers till the end of the evening and so helped out des with the chores.
Dinner was lamb chops, potatoes, broccoli, and stir fry. The potatoes were gonna be cooked in a coal oven though as were the brocoli for a portion.
So a fire was started and we fed the fire a bit trying to generate coals. The night was cool, so we started.a nice fire.
The rest of the evening was the same as before. Scott did the meat, the rest helped with the veggies and des directed.
Another kakdu dreams group came in the meantime and we felt very lucky because they were 15 in the group.
Nowhere as fun as our group I'd wager!
Space was an issue because there were only 15 bunks and 9 were already taken up by us. Much grumblings were heard by those in the other group. Poor planning perhaps?
We had a great dinner, this time supplanted with wine as we had a box of it from the general store on the campgrounds. It was a quick affair though as we had a chance to listen to two guides from another tour group....they were demonstrating both the digirubi with guitar accompaniment.......iit sounded great and the story goes as follows (insert story here)
Later on, marshmellows came out for the campfire and soggy as they were, was wonderful over the fire.
I went off for my shower and had a quick time of it as the camp had turned off the lights! Me being an idiot that I am, had also forgotten my flashlight (did not pack).. Fortunately derek was around and loaned me his and I finished my shower with some human decency :).
I then went back, checked my camera and then decided to let it dry a bit more. Derek had his laptop so we could see that my SD card was still alive. :). Happy about that at least!
The it was bid the rest goodnight and off to sleep hoping water would come out of my left ear......:)
This has been a great vacation thus far :)
Australia Log Part 2
[Posting for my brother, who is in Australia on vacation]
Hot.
Humid.
That's what 33c (101 f) feels like in 80 percent humidity.
Last night was a short night, got to the hostel at 1am, kakadu dreams picking us up at 7am....woke up at 6:30am.
So it was good I slept on the plane. Its been a while since I stayed at a hostel and it took a while to get used to it. I also realized I forgot my towel....and with all stores closed on good friday, I'm kinda screwed. Time to sacrifice myself a t-shirt :)
So the tour guide came to pick us up at 7am....brought us down the street and I signed for the tour which was paid for already. In the tour is 5 ladies and 4 dudes....marlon(female) from France, scott from ireland, derek from Taiwan, jules the lone local ozzie, brinna from Switzerland, sven from Germany, and yanna, from Germany.
The composition thusly was 3 German speakers, 3 Chinese speakers, and 1 French, two dedicated English speakers ( though jules spoke a bit of Mandarin and French and German :))
Most of them are here on a working holiday and their stories of grape picking and banana lifting and watermelon carrying both made me envious and glad I never had to do that for my holidays.
But then the 3 months of vacation.....sigh.
Our guide was des. A local ozzie who's been guiding for 12 years now, 4 with kakadu dreams.
Our first stop was at the jumping crocs store. we stopped at the center and then got to hang snakes of our bodies for a while before they whipped us all on the boat.
Not more than 5 minutes have passed before the first croc came by and the boaters got it to jump.
It was.....amazing!!! The crocs came all stealthily up against the hanging pieces of buffalo meat and then dove a little bit before it came lunging back up towards the meat.
Rather spectacular (look at pics)
Later on in the boat ride, after four or five crocs, the boaters started attracting birds and they looked like falcons....but probably not. I got some incredible shots :)
A wonderful start to my ozzie vacation thus far!
The rest of the day consisted of.a few hours drive interspersed with a short 6km hike (return) into and out of a swimming hole.
The hike was quite flat with some small pond crossings....the hike ended into a few waterfalls (very small)....unlike most waterfalls iin the sierras where the water is fresh icemelt, the water here is entirely from the rain. Hence the water is not cold....quite warm and nice, but given the 33c temp, we'd rather the water was a few c's cooler.
After our hike and swim, we came out to a resort camp where most of us went for another swim, this time in a 2 million dollar pool. We spent about 15 minutes before showering. I sacrificed my tank top. :)
Then dez (our guide whose real name is boughton) brought us to our sleeping spots....a big covered tent with the sign (safari outpost) posted outside it. Inside the big tent, there was 8 smaller tents, some one person tent, some two person tents.
We prepared dinner, some chopping, some peeling, some mincing......in the end, we had a veritable feast! Wallaby steak, pork sausage, mashed potatoes, coleslaw, stir fry veggies.....it was sublime.
The path into and out of the camp was only passable via a 4 wheel drive road with some small pond crossings... So bathroom break after the meal was necessary.
Also, sweating began soon after the shower. :)
I went to sleep after the bathroom break and apparently snored loud enough to drive brinna out of the main tent entirely. "I had to move camp twice, she told me in the morning.".
Hot.
Humid.
That's what 33c (101 f) feels like in 80 percent humidity.
Last night was a short night, got to the hostel at 1am, kakadu dreams picking us up at 7am....woke up at 6:30am.
So it was good I slept on the plane. Its been a while since I stayed at a hostel and it took a while to get used to it. I also realized I forgot my towel....and with all stores closed on good friday, I'm kinda screwed. Time to sacrifice myself a t-shirt :)
So the tour guide came to pick us up at 7am....brought us down the street and I signed for the tour which was paid for already. In the tour is 5 ladies and 4 dudes....marlon(female) from France, scott from ireland, derek from Taiwan, jules the lone local ozzie, brinna from Switzerland, sven from Germany, and yanna, from Germany.
The composition thusly was 3 German speakers, 3 Chinese speakers, and 1 French, two dedicated English speakers ( though jules spoke a bit of Mandarin and French and German :))
Most of them are here on a working holiday and their stories of grape picking and banana lifting and watermelon carrying both made me envious and glad I never had to do that for my holidays.
But then the 3 months of vacation.....sigh.
Our guide was des. A local ozzie who's been guiding for 12 years now, 4 with kakadu dreams.
Our first stop was at the jumping crocs store. we stopped at the center and then got to hang snakes of our bodies for a while before they whipped us all on the boat.
Not more than 5 minutes have passed before the first croc came by and the boaters got it to jump.
It was.....amazing!!! The crocs came all stealthily up against the hanging pieces of buffalo meat and then dove a little bit before it came lunging back up towards the meat.
Rather spectacular (look at pics)
Later on in the boat ride, after four or five crocs, the boaters started attracting birds and they looked like falcons....but probably not. I got some incredible shots :)
A wonderful start to my ozzie vacation thus far!
The rest of the day consisted of.a few hours drive interspersed with a short 6km hike (return) into and out of a swimming hole.
The hike was quite flat with some small pond crossings....the hike ended into a few waterfalls (very small)....unlike most waterfalls iin the sierras where the water is fresh icemelt, the water here is entirely from the rain. Hence the water is not cold....quite warm and nice, but given the 33c temp, we'd rather the water was a few c's cooler.
After our hike and swim, we came out to a resort camp where most of us went for another swim, this time in a 2 million dollar pool. We spent about 15 minutes before showering. I sacrificed my tank top. :)
Then dez (our guide whose real name is boughton) brought us to our sleeping spots....a big covered tent with the sign (safari outpost) posted outside it. Inside the big tent, there was 8 smaller tents, some one person tent, some two person tents.
We prepared dinner, some chopping, some peeling, some mincing......in the end, we had a veritable feast! Wallaby steak, pork sausage, mashed potatoes, coleslaw, stir fry veggies.....it was sublime.
The path into and out of the camp was only passable via a 4 wheel drive road with some small pond crossings... So bathroom break after the meal was necessary.
Also, sweating began soon after the shower. :)
I went to sleep after the bathroom break and apparently snored loud enough to drive brinna out of the main tent entirely. "I had to move camp twice, she told me in the morning.".
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