Category Archives: Australia

Again Sydney

Tasmania was an after-thought. Actually it came as a piggy back to a better planned two-week travel/hike in New Zealand. For family reasons I wanted to come early in this part of the world, before arriving in NZ, to get adjusted to the local time and the local driving – on the left side. And hiking all days is the perfect receipt of avoiding getting COVID in New York…

I read a bit and also spoke with some Aussies about Tasmania and all I got was that it had a great drive on the Eastern Coast, from Hobart all the way north. But when I started to read in detail, I realized that my 5-day trip would not suffice. The island seemed extremely interesting and I was more and more puzzled why people were not raving about it. I found some blogs a bit more detailed but still I could not gauge the exact number of days needed for covering all its national parks.

Queen Elizabeth Gallery, Sydney, Australia

So I upped my planned stay in Tasmania from 5 days to two weeks, thinking that I would spend a bit more than a week in the island and the rest of the time in Australia. I’ve been in Australia six years ago, so where should I go now? Perth was too far, Darwin too hot, Adelaide for hopping to Kangaroo Island – too complicated and Brisbane way too big of a city. So I started my hikes in Tasmania and the more I traveled, the more interesting locations I found to spend time and less days were left in my two weeks allotment to spend in Australia.

Circular Quai & the bridge, Sydney, Australia

And so tramping through the national parks of Tasmania I ended up using all two weeks discovering this amazing land, once discovered by Abel Tasman for the Dutch and later by so many unfortunate inmates populating the British gulag of its time. I loved it so much that I decided to spend all my 14 days in Tasmania and fly from Hobart to Christchurch, NZ with the mandatory airline stop in one of the two big cities of Australia. But searching for flights I realized that all connecting flights would have arrived in Christchurch after midnight where no rental cars or hotels were available and spending the night in the airport did not make sense. So, in the end I decided to stop for one day in the Sydney and get a next day morning flight to New Zealand. I got off the plane and started to walk in a sultry 98F Sydney’s botanical garden, its boulevards crisscrossing through parks and green thumbs all the way to Darling Harbor, continuing on its commercial streets, galleries and bridges, starting and ending in front of the magnificent opera house and remembering the great time I spent here in an era that seemed like lifted from a dream where the word “pandemic” was not yet known by the world.

Red Moon

The first I noticed was the silence. It’s strikingly quiet in Hobart. I was on streets lined up with houses and I could not hear a whisper. It seemed that everybody was sleeping.

Hobart like all Tasmania seems the epitome of chill. It seemed like a remote realm undiscovered by tourism in spite of relatively numerous independent travelers and hikers. This lack of tourists stems probably from the lack of accommodation offered in some of the destination, like Cradle Mountain where is hard to get a reservation of any kind, so a bunk bed in Discovery Park is the go-to for many hikers. There are very few tourist buses that you encounter on the way. The roads are mostly paved, all in very good condition. On any dirt road a regular car would pass with no issues.

The relaxed atmosphere extends to restaurants that close their kitchen around 7:30pm and chances to remain not fed for the day are tangible if you arrive late. I learned this early schedule the hard way; my first nights I had to beg in shock for a dish of whatever they had left if I was even a bit late after the kitchen closed. And that may have meant 7:35pm. However you still have a beer of other drinks late. Store and tourist places are closing around 4pm and everybody seems to enjoy this life style and chill with friends or at home, minding their own business because tomorrow is another day. But this gives a pleasant vibe to the people who are cheerful and extremely polite, always welcoming you with a smile.

In the morning cafes open early and lots of locals hang out having breakfast and chatting while others walk Hobart’s streets going to work. But few restaurants, if any in Tasmania countryside offer breakfast. In Hobart, the restaurants stay open a bit later but is still better to have dinner early to play safe.

This was my last night in Hobart. I came in Tasmania planning a fast trip of several days and after two weeks I was regretting that I had to leave. My pensive mood was shared by a red moon that rose over the city, an obvious but not much celebrated event, noticed mainly by the tourists who were hanging out late in the harbor.

Bruny

Bruny Island – two of them actually, North and South – is long. The crossing ferry tickets were purchased online and showed while boarding the ferry with no scheduling required. The ferry runs very often and after a 20 minutes crossing you are again on land. The drive to the tip of the southern island to the national park takes about 70 minutes, part of it on a dirt road.

The lighthouse, the second oldest in Australia, offers every half hour a tour that is relatively OK with some great views from the top. There are also some interesting hikes around it if time permits.

Bruny Island Neck connects the north to the south island, Tasmania

But no matter how you try, with the time spent on crossing and driving through the islands, there is not enough time in a day to do more than one hike. And based on the local advice I chose the Fluted Cape Circuit following a trail climbing steadily through an eucalypt forest with razor grass bushes on the ground.

The Fluted Capes, 6 in total, confer amazing views over the ocean and the rocks around, spectacular drops plunging into the blue waters underneath. The drops are awe-inspiring and inviting but quite dangerous to approach them even for taking a picture.

The entire Fluted Cape circuit takes about 3 hours depending on the time spent admiring and photographing the capes.

It was a debate on the Internet about choosing between Maria Island over Bruny Island. And the winner is for sure Maria Island for its treasure trove of endemic animals that you encounter effortless there. In entire Bruny Island I saw only one rabbit on the penguins’ rookery but no penguins because they come out only after dusk. Except that lonely rabbit the only other beings I encountered were only tourists shuffled in buses, a thing that I did not see while traveling in Tasmania. The island proximity to Hobart makes it a target for tour groups.

Green Algae and blue waters in Fluted Cape Circuit, Tasmania

Another notable aspect is that there is only one gas station in the island that takes only debit card and few food options.

Tarn Shelf

The next day in Mount Field, the 16 km dirt road to Lake Dobson ends at the beginning of the hike through the alpine land. The tarn shelf has a collection of alpine lakes – tarns – and the hike skirts them on boardwalks or scrambling rocks. By each large tarn is a hut in an environment that in bad weather may be quite uninviting.

There are lots of tarns, many small and several large and you can walk and return the same way or simply do a loop following the contour of some larger lakes. The vegetation on the way, both the alpine and down the valley is impressive. The bushes are so diverse and unique with smelly leaves and flowers.

Many of the plants and trees are vestiges tracing back to the Cretacic, something that only Tasmania can offer that I was lucky to learn by meeting two biologists on the way. Even if the dry Pine Pencil Trees were once related to the American sequoia this happened about 125 million years ago…

The loop is long – 10 miles – and poorly marked but hard to miss, descending steeply through a brook’s channel in an environment that may offer some encounters with snakes.

Again on the road

After two days of perfect weather the Cradle Mountain returned to its habits and the clouds came low veiling everything around in a wet mist. So it was the time to leave Cradle Mountain and stopped on the way in Sheffield, a town of murals where I met Pedro, the traveling lama.

The drive to Mount Field makes for another long day of driving. Mount Field is a national park of waterfalls and tarns, small alpine lakes hung by mother nature close to the skies.

The 4.5 hour drive – it’s long to get to Cradle Mountain but it’s also long to get out of it no matter where you may go – was not the most interesting in spite of a collection of lakes on view. But driving down from the mountains helped improved the weather and the sun broke through the clouds.

Mount Field is a beautiful park and the waterfall trail is easy and very popular. It’s a 2.5 hour loop that passes three waterfalls, Russel, Horseshoe and Lady Barron, crossing on the way in a depth of a forest of very tall trees, an absolutely impressive sight.

Lady Barron Falls, Mount Field, Tasmania

The Devils

Around Dove Lake, Cradle Mountain, Tasmania

After the yesterday’s hike everybody talked about getting it easier. To everybody’s surprise the weather held with blue skies and warm weather in a climate where the descending clouds rarely let you see the rock comb of the Cradle Mountain peaks.

A easy walk does not mean a short walk, and again at Dove Lake bus stop I started a hike/walk around the lake through forests of banksia and manuka bushes, the gem flower related to the famous honey.

The walk climbed to Wombat Pool where no wombats bothered to show up and climbed further till it reached its top from where descended onto Crater Lake and further towards Ronny Creek.

Waldheim Chalet, Cradle Mountain, Tasmania

A short detour to Waldheim brought us to the first chalet built in the park by the charismatic Austrian traveler Gustav Weindorfer who settled here for good, inspiring lots of people with his enthusiasm for the mountain. On the way to Ronny Creek some wombats decided to make a show attracting the attention and the cameras of many tourists gathered on the boardwalks. The Cradle Mountain valley boardwalk was next, a relaxed walk in the middle of nature, with few other travelers on the a built-up boardwalk that stretches from Dove Lake to the Ranger station, a total of 3 hours one way walk.

But even with 9 miles of walk the day was easy so I had time for a visit to the Tasmanian Devils Conservation Project, right at the entrance to the park and watch the devils and the quolls at their feeding time.

Summit

Trails always start flat, inviting, seemingly a walk in the park. Nice lakes, flat paths and in Tasmania lots of boardwalks covered in wire netting that would arrest slipping but built to protect the fragile environment of the trampling tourists’ boots. And Cradle Mountain’s hikes are no exception. The mountain is crowded with tourists and served by a bus system that dropped me to Ronny Creek where I started the hike.

Marion Lookout, Cradle Mountain, Tasmania

The weather was impeccable that is very unusual for this part of Tasmania: warm and blue skies with 100% visibility. I pondered upon various hikes in Cradle Mountain but I never contemplated to climb higher than Marion Lookout, a spectacular viewpoint over two lakes at the bottom and a large valley.

The Cradle Mountain summit hike is rated as “hard” on AllTrails and Komoto and I had nothing to prove anymore for hiking it. But as things evolve organically I spoke with some hikers who advised me to continue from Marion Lookout to the Flat track, a trail unfurling right under the peaks with a further descent to the lakes. But once arrived to the base of the Cradle Mountain summit, the path that can be easily distinguished in the image above was packed like a boulevard at rush hour. Everybody and their grandmothers was going to ascend the summit. The estimate time for the hike varied between 2-4 hours return, quite a margin.

It did not seem so bad, and the weather was perfect so I decided to join the crowds going for the summit. What few who started the ascent knew was that the hike up was actually not a hike but a climb and this became obvious after about half an hour of hiking up the mountain.

The well maintained path built in steps morphed in a hop over a collection of small rocks. But soon the small rocks became boulders and further up they morphed into huge slabs. At one point all you could do was climb one slab at a time and jump to another. Lots of people lost their enthusiasm garnered at the base of the summit and abandoned the trail.

Climbing seems to me like meditation. It’s a process where you empty your mind and the only thought is to the next grip. How stable it is? Can it hold? How about the next step on that indent in the rock? One grip, one step and another grip. You move up gently, swiftly, in no rush and no other thought bothers you. It’s not fear at all, it’s simply focus.

I used to free climb in the Romanian Carpathian for a while. Nothing technical, no ropes, climbing on tracks that were considered easy. But as easy as these tracks were any slip or failed grip would send you tumble in the best case scenario to a hospital bed if not to death. Since those times I fell in love with “bouldering” and I tried to do it every time I had the chance. But no matter how much I love it I did not expect to have to climb huge slabs for 90 minutes continuously.

The peak that is only 1505 meters was first climbed in 1937 by Henry Hellyer and a big cylindrical monument is built on top to commemorate the event. The peak has an extended top, covered by the same large slabs and people were all over it taking picturing and posting from the top.

The descent was as challenging as the ascent, if not more, and the long legs helped a bit. But it took almost the same time as the ascent and after about another 90 minutes with aching legs I reached the cabin at the base of the summit.

But the pleasant descent from the base of the summit towards Marion Lookout hid what I thought ended up being the worst part: the descent down to Dove Lake on a path fenced almost on its entirety by chains, a trail cut in very steep cutting rock. This was the most unpleasant part of the descent, even worse than the descent of the summit. But after 8 miles in 8 hours I finally found myself slumbered on the bench of a bus bringing me back to the Discovery Park at the entrance of Cradle Mountain National Park. The entire trail’s elevation gain was more than 900 meters.

At the Summit base of Cradle Mountain Summit climb, Tasmania

On the road

It’s all good when you are driving on the Eastern Coast of Tasmania. Distances are not long and in two hours at most you reach another great national park. The road is known as the Great Eastern Drive. But when you reach St Helens it’s time to leave the East Coast and cross inland towards the other coast.

But luckily the road offers you lots of opportunities to stop and hike on the way and the waterfalls on the way to Derby make for great hikes. St Colombe can be reached after a short walk in a forest made out of the largest ferns imagined. You feel like in Cretacic if it happen for you to remember how it was in those times 🙂

On the way there are old pubs, like the Pub in the Paddock with its Drunken Pig, one of the oldest in Tasmania, a resting place for Harley bikers.

Further we passed Derby that feels that is ridden by mountain bikers that swarm in town coming from allover and continuing to Bridestowe Lavender Farm where unfortunately the lavender was already cut and all we got was some lavender ice cream.

The goal of the day was to arrive at Cradle Mountain that can be reached nonstop in about 5 hours drive from St Helens. But we kept stopping on the way in lots of interesting places including a tropical forest with myrtle trees as old as Gowanda, the ancient Southern continent that once encompassed all lands of the Southern hemisphere, now separated by oceans. And it’s a lot of talk, maps and explanations about Gowanda down here.

Launceston is the second largest city after Hobart, Tasmania

Fire over blue waters

Rise with the sun to witness the mesmerizing spectacle of Bay of Fires’ explosion of colors, a moment of unparalleled beauty offered by the painted red hues of its rocks.

With dazzling white beaches, pristine blue seas and and boulders adorned with vivid orange lichen the Bay of Fires has earned global acclaim. Its enchanting landscapes evoke awe and wonder from every fortunate visitor. I took an almost 8 miles hike through the shaded path of the forest emerging from the sandy beaches from Skeleton Bay to Dora Point stopping to take pictures of the red rocks and touching occasionally sugar-white beaches.

Spanning a majestic coastline of 50 kilometers, the Bay of Fires extends from the captivating shores of Binalong Bay in the south to the iconic Eddystone Point in the north. Bay of Fires is at the end of the scenic Great Eastern Drive towards St Helens, a road that I kept hearing about when I searched Tasmania’s wonders.

But surprisingly wherever I read a short descriptions of Tasmania or spoke even with Aussies all they mentioned was the beautiful East Coast road and nothing about the parks themselves. Finally reaching the end of Tasmania’s Great Eastern Journey I spent some time to discover the hidden gems of Bay of Fires’ Coast from the serene shores of the Gardens to the picturesque landscapes of Jeanneret, Swimcart, and Cosy Corner but with most of the time spent along Binalong Bay.

Wineglass

While In Tasmania, if you ask about various national parks, the one question that comes first is if you have seen the Wineglass Bay. This iconic place is also the crux of the most interesting hike in Freycinet National Park, a 10 mile loop that climbs to an overlook from where you get a perfect view of the Wineglass Bay, probably the most recognizable gulf in the entire Tasmania.

Its crescent shape bordered by a white sand corola is enticing and even you have no intention or reason to walk its inviting beach, you will do it for almost its entire length of 1.5 km. A bit more than half an hour across the land there are the beaches of the Hazards guarded by red rocks, two bays separated by a bit of land.

The Hazards, Freycinet National Park, Tasmania

Freycinet is Tasmania’s oldest national park. Named after the French explorer Louis de Freycinet who sailed through the area around 1800. The park is located on the breathtaking east coast overlooking the Tasman Sea and surrounded by the dramatic peaks of the Hazards. Its amazing views, the powder white beaches and its transparent blue waters make Freycinet the most photographed of all the national parks.

Cape Tourville, Freycinet National Park, Tasmania

If that hike was not enough a short walk on the Cape Tourville’s boardwalk will bring in front of your eyes, the same Wineglass Bay in the distance surrounded by tall peaks. On the opposite shore red and orange rocks are the domain of the sea birds.

You can spend days in the park enjoying its charming beaches, like Honeymoon Bay, lazying in the sun or chilling with a cold drink in sunset. But if all you have is one day for the park, the Wineglass Bay-Hazards hike will remain forever in your memory.

Honeymoon Bay, Freycinet National Park, Tasmania

Maria Island

Populated originally by the Aboriginal people of the Tyreddeme tribe Maria Island was also a convict colony of Australia. Convicts lived and worked here in two periods between 1825 and 1832 and later, in what is known as the probation station period – between 1842 and 1851. Also, the island was the gulag of its time for the Irish nationalists who participated in the Young Ireland Rebellion of 1848.

Structures from the these times are preserved in Darlington, a tiny hamlet with several buildings, actually the only preserved intact on the island. There are no cars in the island and if you want to explore further you may be able to rent a bike but walking is the better option.

From the 1880s, the Italian entrepreneur Diego Bernacchi set up island enterprises, including silk and wine production and a cement factory whose huge towers you see right in the harbor. The work in all these enterprises was done also by convicts.

But the island is not visited for these ruins but for the presence of all the endemic animals of Australia in this tiny island.

Hiking the island’s trails from the Painted Cliffs to the Fossil Cliffs you bump into hopping kangaroos, shy wallabies, tiny padymelons and unfazed wombats not bothered by the tourist attention that surround them with lots of cameras while grazing. They keep doing their thing and if the camera is in the way toward their burrow they will bump into it and continue to their home.

Tasman

Tasmania sounds quite exotic but its name comes from the first European explorer that stepped on this land, Abel Tasman. Tasman named the island after his trip’s sponsor Anthony Van Diemen the governor of the Dutch East Indies, so for a while the island was called Van Diemen. When the Brits took over they got rid of the Dutch name and in 1856 renamed the island in honor to Abel Tasman’s exploration. And Tasman is also the name of the national park located in, again, the Tasman peninsula close to Hobart.

Tasman Arch, Tasman National Park, Tasmania

This was the first park I visited in a one month trip that will span both Tasmania and New Zealand, planned to happen exclusively in the national parks of these two lands.

To enter the Tasmania national park you need a permit and if you plan to visit more than 2 parks the way to go is to buy a 2 month permit car permit for AU$89.50 that you leave on the car’s dashboard.

But before you enter the park you have to clean your shoes not to contaminate the park with foreign soil and seeds that may bring damage to the local species. You have to rub your soles and pump twice a disinfectant on your shoes.

Cape Huay, Tasman National Park, Tasmania

Tasman National Park has a number of hikes but the most spectacular are Cape Huay and Cape Raoul. I chose the first one that is accessible from Camp Fortescue, a 6.5 miles return hike to this spectacular Cape hanging somewhere close to the sky over the pristine blue water underneath.

But the hike is made out of lots of steps, way too many, all cut in the hills that after you complete you promise yourself that you will always ride elevators if you have the option. Entire hills are cut in thousands of steps and climbing them in the heat of the day was not … a walk in the park. The elevation gain was around 600 meters.

A little bit south of Camp Fortescue is Port Arthur, the in-famous prison that is part of Australia’s history and making. Convicts sent here were repeat offenders, but most of their offenses were petty crimes out of poverty and lack of chances. But once in Port Arthur the detention was equivalent with a death sentence.

Commander’s House, Port Arthur, Tasmania

The inmates were taught a trade that in the idealistic British Empire would help them become useful members of the society. The prison was actually a factory producing goods for the Empire. The first commanding officers were dedicated the cause of improving the life of the inmates but further down in time careerists officers used the prison as a stepping stone to jockey better positions filling their pockets by the selling on the side the goods of the Empire. But this was a white collar crime and even if they got caught nothing much happened to them except mentioned in the history books. Like today…

The Garrison Tower, Port Arthur, Tasmania

The prison, whose impressive large building you see when you arrive, was actually a huge complex, hosting the officers and their families with an entire garrison employed also for defense, lots of goods making shops, a church, post office, hospital, actually all the facilities of a town. With the only caveat that the inhabitants for which the town was built were convicts and most of them ended up buried here.

MONA

If this image confuses you, don’t worry. It’s meant to be confusing as MONA itself, a spectacular architectural and artistic effort, a museum cut deep into the ground just outside Hobart, Tasmania.

MONA is the brain child of David Shawn, a local dude who became a very successful gambler to the point that him and his syndicate were banned from all casinos. They were able to bet against the house and win constantly. David Shawn, with its long grey hair and non conventionally dress pretends to be in the autism spectrum that confers him an easiness with numbers.

Autistic or card counting, he was able to make millions winning in all sorts of bets, from cards to horses and at one point in life he had an epiphany that what he did with his life was meaningless and did not make any sense. So he decided to start giving back parts of the winnings back to his own community.

Anselm Kiefer’s Falling Stars/ Destruction of the Vessels at MONA, Berriedale, Tasmania

So he came up with the idea of a museum that would collect remarkable works of art. MONA stand for Museum of Old and New Art and as a theme is sex and death. According to his statement It’s not the theme he chose but the theme chose him through the work of the contemporary artists obsessed with this two.

Ai Weiwei’s White House, MONA, Berriedale, Tasmania

Currently his personal art collection is somewhere north of 3000 works of art. And to expose part of this collection he created this spectacular building underground, two floors dug into rock and filled it by art of all kind. There are no labels for any work but an app that you download that is connected by bluetooth to the rooms displaying the info about the art while you walk in. There are also rooms that are timed and you have to join with the app and be called later when your time comes. But there is no map of the museum and it’s your chore to look everywhere and find remarkable art. And it’s not obvious at all.

Oliver Beer’s Confessional, MONA, Berriedale, Tasmania

Among all works of art it’s a lot of “sex and death” and when I visited our obsession with after life was presented through a remarkable Eastern Orthodox icons exhibit. Most of the items were icons from Russia, Crete, Greece, Palestine and Syria. To facilitate the access, there is also a boat that bring visitors from Hobart that sails many times a day, filled up with works of art. Obviously, the museum is losing money in spite of great revenue from tickets but is supported by grants from Tasmania, Hobart and probably David’ s own gambling.

Hobart seen from Mount Wellington, Tasmania

I read about MONA but I was not sure that I could fit in my schedule but because I was still in Hobart running around to buy a phone SIM, I said “what the heck, let me go and stay an hour and leave from there to hike in Tasman National Park.” But this was a dream. I lost there most of the day immersed in the treasure hunt of finding art and in the art itself so no more hikes in parks that day. So for the afternoon I drove up Mount Wellington (not like Darwin who hiked there when he explored Tasmania) surrounded by throngs of Chinese and Indian tourists, all admiring the city from above.

34 hours

If it’s buzzing you the idea of going down-under you’d become obsessed about the flight. I was pondering upon it for a quite a while trying to search for the best option but no matter how you skin the cat it comes to about the same number of hours from New York to anywhere inside Australia. And if you count the hours since the time you left home to the time you’d finally arrive to your last destination, it comes to 34 hours over three flights. And I finally descended into Hobart, Tasmania’s capital.

Sunset on Mount Wellington, Hobart, Tasmania

The surfing lesson

We published an album of video frames extracted from the footage we shot in Sydney in Australia. We shot in many of the city neighborhoods returning each and every night to spend time under the spellbinding arches of the Sydney’s Opera. We explored and shot video in the islands that surround the city, in Manly, in Cockatoo with its spectacular venue for Biennial taking a bus to spend the day like the locals do in Bondi Beach from where we took the 6 km walk on top of the sea cliffs to Coogee Beach.

Surfing lessons in Manly Beach, Sydney, Australia

Lost in Chinatown

We published an album of video frames extracted from the footage we shot in Melbourne and Victoria in Australia. We hang out and shot in the city center walking its interior shopping galleries and the artsy squares, getting lost in Chinatown, spending time in the impressive NGV admiring its Triennial and finally relaxing with a beer by the Yara at dusk. From there we took a long drive on the Great Ocean Road stopping at the Twelve Apostles and backtracking through the surfer paradise of Bell Beach toward the Mornington Peninsula.

Chinatown, Melbourne, Australia

Fishing at sunset

We published an album of video frames extracted from the footage we shot in Queensland in Australia. We made our hub in the charming town of Port Douglas from where we sailed to the Great Barrier Reef where we dived and shot 4K footage underwater. From there we went to Mossman Gorge and Daintree National Forest hanging out with the crocs – kind of unfriendly. We drove all the way to Cape Tribulation and we walked several of the spectacular forest boardwalks before we returned and spent a little bit of time in Cairns.

Fishing at sunset in Port Douglas, Australia

Australian’s Outback

We published an album of video frames extracted from the footage we shot in the Outback of Australia. We shot first in Alice Springs, a town in the middle of nowhere but from where many spectacular adventures start. To the name of the town are attached multiple legendary feats related to Australia. From there we left on a multiple hours bus ride through the “bush” to hike around Uluru ending the day with a sleep under the stars listening to the howling of dingos and the snorting of camels. The following days we hiked in Kata Tjuta and Kings Canyon in Watarrka National Park, spending one more might under the spectacular show-sky of the Southern Hemisphere before we returned to Alice Springs for a some more sedate espresso cocktails on the main street.

A not so shy wallaby stalking us by the road, Alice Springs, Northern Territories, Australia

The Bridge

Sydney’s harbor seen from the Harbor Bridge pylon

Sydney’s harbor is dominated by the Harbor Bridge. It was built after many debates during the Great Depression keeping many people employed. It was inspired after Hell Gate Bridge in New York, the bridge that connects Queens to Randall’s island and it took about 60 years to be paid off.

Sydney’s harbor and the bridge access seen from the Harbor Bridge pylon

Anywhere you may go in downtown Sydney you’d see the bridge in each and every picture you may take. The walk on it is as popular as a walk on NYC’s Brooklyn Bridge and if you really want to get an edge of it, for a hefty price and dressed in a special suit you can escalate its top and admire the entire Sydney harbor unobstructed. More or less the same you can get if you escalate the 300 steps of its pylon but for a more reasonable entry fee.

Aboriginal on the Circular Quai, Sydney, Australia

It is hard to get close to the aboriginal culture in Australia. In all discussions we had and asked about this we got a sense of distance between the mainly white population and its original inhabitants. Glimpses of the traditional culture of Australia are everywhere, from the traditional dot paintings to the music instruments, the boomerangs and other objects but mostly they are commercialized by “white” galleries. We tried to understand by talking with the white locals what is the exact relationship with the aboriginals but few conversations were able to shed light on this tenuous situation. I don’t know if the aboriginals who were selling art on the Circular Quai were for real but they looked that were trying to capitalize on their culture.

Funerary totems in NSW Art Gallery

In any case the aboriginal art is present in all Australian Museums and represents one of the most interesting exhibits. Another aspect that stands out is the deep respect the Australians have for their veterans. The monuments that adorned their cities are just one aspect of this care and that is heavily backed by special clubs, events and a care for the health of these people. Anzac, stand for Australia and New Zealand Army Corp, and the monument in Sydneyis dedicated to the memory of those who fought and perished in the assault of the Gallipoli Peninsula in the First World War.

Anzac Memorial, Sydney, Australia

Beaches

Bondi Iceberg Pools, Bondi Beach, Sydney, Australia

The most beautiful beach in Sydney is by far Bondi Beach. Large and skirting a long gulf, Bondi is the place to be if you want to be near the ocean. It even looks also like an old English sea resort with a beach pavilion in spite being just half an hour out of the city center.

Bondi to Coogee coastal walk

But the main attraction in Bondi is the 6 km walk around the ocean on beaches and promontories that give spectacular views over the green waters and the surfers spending their days in the water. The walk starts from Bondi and goes up the coats to the Bondi Iceberg, a set of pools built right a little bit on top of the ocean where you can swim protected of jelly fish in summers but still feel like you are in the ocean.

The pools at Bronte Beach, Sydney, Australia

The walk continues even through a cemetery that holds the graves of the important personalities of the area overlooking picturesquely even from the graves the green waters behind and it follows the coast to Coogee where another pavilion from other times awaits for you with cold drinks.

The Gap in Watsons Bay, Sydney, Australia

Just another bus hop from Bondi is Watsons Bay with its famous Gap, the preferred suicide place on the coast. The whooping dropping cliffs are meeting the blue waters that splash in powerful waves the rock in a mesmerizing show of force. The entire area is fenced cautiously and watched by numerous cameras and help and support calling stations because an accidental, or intended, drop from the top means a sure death. A short walk from there through colorful flower bushes and other beaches may bring you to the end of the peninsula where a lighthouse stands. In the background you can see downtown Sydney that you’d reach by hoping a boat from the nearby harbor.

Hornby Lighthouse, in South Head, Sydney, Australia

Markets

The fish market, Sydney, Australia

Besides its animated center Sydney has several quaint neighborhoods with a laid back atmosphere in the spirit of Australia. Glebe is one of them with quiet alleys aligned with attached smaller houses and an intellectual feel given by the many bookstores. In Glebe live a lot of students that go to the close by University of Sydney. But to get there you pass by the spectacular fish market full of displays of fish and all sorts of marine life.

Anzac Bridge, Sydney, Australia

The market is right on the water and has a harbor of boats that come early in the morning with the catch of the day right near Anzac Bridge.

Victoria Building Gallery, Sydney, Australia

On a different note as the fish market are the covered city galleries, actual passages through buildings full of shops and restaurants, that crisscross many blocks in the center town. The most famous mall is the classy Queen Victoria building raised at the end of the 19th century whose through access is open all night in spite of the shops being closed. From its third floor is a impressive view of the the hustle and bustle that happen on the lower floors.

Victoria Building Gallery, Sydney, Australia

Sydney’s islands

Surfers on Manly Beach, Sydney, Australia

For Aussies the beach is the haven and each and every time when they have a moment they go out to them. This in spite of the fact that the ozone layer, they say, is nonexistent in their part of the world and the skin cancer is more widespread that anywhere else. The beaches around Sydney are packed with all walks of lives. It is nice to see a group of small kids or pre-teens who all come by themselves and hang out at the beach or swim joyfully in the green seas. A short boat ride outside of Sydney is Manly Beach full of surfers of various ages.

To Sherry Beach, Manly, Sydney, Australia

If you walk out of the Corso, the main street full of stores, towards the main beach and start walking to Sherry Beach you may encounter penguins on the cliffs not bothered by the snorkelers who come close to them.

Manly Beach, Sydney, Australia

Another boat hop from Sydney is Cockatoo Island, once a penal colony. The old convicts’ barracks and the isolation rooms can be visited also. But what makes for a spectacular visit is the post industrial landscape left behind by the old dockyard. After it was used as a penal colony the island became the main shipyard of Sydney and operated this way till 1991 when it was closed. Since than the island was left in disuse with large buildings full of equipment, with electric panels in place, large cranes, and presses, all looking that were shut down just very recently.

Cockatoo Island was the old shipyard of Sydney

This year the Cockatoo Island buildings were commissioned to host large works of art from the Sydney Biennial. The settings for such an event could not find a more spectacular venue that the post industrial landscape of the island.

Biennial at the Cockatoo Island, Sydney, Australia

A large raft holding immigrants was displayed in one of the building in the part of the exhibit dedicated to migration. In another building surrounded by electrical panels looking almost ready to be turned on, on a screen was projected a video containing a huge eye in whose iris you could see images of bombing and nuclear explosion while in the adjacent room, that used to be probably welding place, a copy of the Big Boy, the atomic bomb deployed over Hiroshima, hanged from the ceiling looking like it was just finished to be crafted.

Cockatoo Island, Sydney, Australia

The Opera

Sydney Opera

When genius crosses path with a visionary politician miracles happen. This was in a way the story of Sydney Opera, whose architectural competition was started by the city’s mayor in 1956 following long debates in the city council for developing the harbor. The project proposed by an young Dane almost unknown was not even taken in consideration. But his luck turned when the famous architect Eero Saarinen joined the commission and his eyes fell on this overseen project. His insistence changed in a way the fate of a city and of the country when the architectural project of the Opera house was awarded to Join Utzon, the 38 year old from Denmark.

Sydney Opera

No matter how many images, videos, documentaries or features you may have seen about this impressive building it is a treat to be right near it and to walk around its platform following with your eyes the shapes of its shells profiled on the blue or dark sky.

Sydney Opera

It was for sure obvious for Saarinen who influenced the commission to chose this project that this building was way beyond its time when what was expected was practically a large beautiful box. In a way I parallel Utzon’s ideas with Gaudi’ Sagrada Familia and his concepts of architecture that were way beyond his time for the beginning of the 29th century.

The Opera’s shells

But the project implementation was a nightmare for the structural engineers as long as no real structural solution was offered. The debates kept going on and stalled the project till, again, Utzon’s genius came up with a partial spherical rib that would be manufactured off site as independent elements and assembled on site. The elements had a steel cable inside that would be tensed in location holding in the air the shells. These elements were meant to be left visible and create a rib structure that can be followed with the eyes till the top of the building offering a very pleasant look, in spite being made out of uncovered concrete.

Harbor Bridge, Sydney, Australia

The entire complex, the youngest building to be added to the UNESCO list of world heritage monument, is composed of three theaters and one opera house. The opera does not have indoor performances in the summer/fall but a special performance, this year of “La Boheme”, is staged right across the harbor, on a stage by the water that has in its background the Opera house and the Harbor Bridge. And for the show to be complete the performance is augmented by fireworks continued in the intermission over this spectacular background every night.

The fireworks, Sydney, Australia

Triennial

Yara River, Melbourne, Australia

The day was supposed to be rainy and it started already in the evening to be quite chilly. I was driven close to Melbourne by one of the friends and from there I took a commuter train, using my MyKy card, the card that gives you access to all transportation around Melbourne. The train ride and the look of the train stations reminded me of the London suburbs that I discovered way too many years ago. In a sense Australia preserves a reminiscence of Britain that you can see mainly in its suburbs but also in the way people act and dress in cities. The train chugged along and left me in Southern Cross station in Melbourne where for the second time in the entire trip I had to get cash in order to be able to store my luggage in the station’s lockers.

Triennial at the NGV, Melbourne, Australia

The Triennial at the National Gallery of Victoria, the prime museum of contemporary art is a remarkable event that take advantage of the large spaces of the NGV building. Large spaces in the building accommodate large works of art that are mixed with videos, mixed media and interactive works.

Triennial at the NGV, Melbourne, Australia

Coming a little bit late and having to catch a flight to Sydney in the evening I did not have too much time to spend in the city but I still was able to take a quick tour through some landmarks that I missed the first day.

State Library, Melbourne, Australia

Skirting around the ocean

The Twelve Apostles, Victoria, Australia

The twelve apostles were actually only seven. But they stood strong in the gale of Victoria’s southern ocean guarded by a impressively tall bluff probably more than 50 meters.We got here after about 3 hours of straight drive from Melbourne with a friend who lives there and wanted to show me the coast.

Twelve apostles, Victoria, Australia

Great Ocean Road is considered one of the best, if not the best, drive in Australia. It is relatively close to Melbourne, and it follows a V on the southern coast. But it is actually a long and arduous drive, especially if done in the same day. I wanted to rent a car and do the drive myself but my friend offered to take me there and we had a long catch up chat on the way. We started driving earlier than 7 AM and got to the spectaculars rocks where we were surrounded by large groups of Chinese each one of them having having at least one selfie stick.

Bell beach full of surfers, Victoria, Australia

From the Twelve Apostles the road returns following the coast overlooking the sea that many times reaches close to the road. Several resorts are aligned on the way, charming closing gulfs with large beaches, or spectacular heights from where you can see all the way down the green ocean. We drove for more than 5 hours on the road and stopped on the way at several lookouts. One of them is over the Bell Beach, the main beach in Australia for surfing competition.

Surfers at Bell Beach, Victoria, Australia

As the day was inching to the sunset we took the ferry from Queenscliff and cross into the Mornington peninsula at Sorento and drove through signs of jumping kangaroos – none showed up, though and I will leave Australia without seeing the most endemic animal of the continent – to my friend’s house and from there to some of his friends for a delightful dinner in a warm and friendly, typical Australian, atmosphere.

Melbourne

St Kilda Pier, Melbourne, Australia

What strikes you first when coming to Melbourne is how relaxed look to be its inhabitants, an atmosphere that becomes imprinted upon the city itself. It’s true that this is prevalent in the entire Australia – more to talk about this later on – but when you are in a vibrant city you expect a little of, you know, the craziness associated with the large cities that we are way too familiar in New York.

Melbourne skyline from St Kilda

And probably to make sure that I stayed in this relaxed spirit I hopped a tram in the morning and got in St Kilda, the sea side neighborhood full of interesting people drinking their coffee and reading their books like is nothing else to be done in the day, in cool cafes that align the main road.

Hugo is a rakali, native water rat, that is coming for food on the pier

St Kilda Pier is the place to be and you are there together with the penguins who come on the rocks in the evenings and with ratali, a species of native rats that come out all day if you know how to call them …and of course feed them.

The circular tram of Melbourne

Melbourne is a city with a vibrant cultural life, ease of moving around by bikes or public transportation, and lots of pockets of free Internet; a city full of cafes and bars that look to be filling to the brim in late afternoon by people coming out from work. It has a remarkable tram system that runs extremely often on most of the main streets that you can hop on free of charge if you go in a large swath of town that encompass the entire city center.

St Peter Catholic Cathedral, Melbourne, Australia

From St Kilda I hopped in the tram and went all the way to Fitzroy and Collingwood, with its edgy look, a larger immigration population, many beautiful and creative cafes and lots of antique and vintage clothing shops. All are aligned around Brunswick and Smith Streets that represent the main thoroughfare of the two districts.

Concert in Federation Square, Melbourne, Australia

It is a lot to see in Melbourne and not having enough time – time is always too short when you travel – I started to do a tour through alleys and streets in the relaxed style that characterizes the locals. From Federation Square, an interesting concoction of metal and glass cubes in whose main square was happening an open air concert, to Hosier Lane covered in graffiti, to the two cathedrals, one catholic one Anglican. Talking about the Anglican church, that guy Henry the Eight was quite a character if you think, not of what he did in his lifetime but for the heritage that he left behind, a sort of Brexit way before his time.

Hosier Lane is the graffiti Lane in Melbourne, Australia

We continued through the connected inside galleries full of glitzy shops connected to the outside one full of restaurants conduits of accessibility that let cross the entire city following their path.

Royal Gallery, Melbourne, Australia

I ended up where I started on the shores of the Yara river guarded day and night by the Melbourne high rises, an iconic image of the city.

Downtown Melbourne by the Yara River by day…

…and by night.

Rain Forest

Alexandra’s Point, Daintree Rainforest, Queensland, Australia

In the early morning we could not tell if the ferry got fixed. It was too late in the night for Fiona to call, the owner of the Pink Flamingo, the charming place we stayed in Port Douglas but she guaranteed that it will be running in the morning. This is the only way to connect the upper part of the coast to the towns down south and a lot of people depend on this ferry. On the past day crocodile tour the guide made an entire case for not building a bridge that may bring factories and development destroying the rain forest in the process, “and it if gets destroyed, is no reason for you to be here”

Watch for crocodiles….

And the predictions about the ferry went true so we zipped in no time over the river and started to drive in a tunnel of vegetation sometimes completely obliterating the sky. We stopped on the way at majestic beaches with the rain forest coming all the way to their virgin sand, with large palm trees leaning tempting to offer a touch of shade, with gulfs that were curving in front of us for more than a mile that held in them a crystal clean green water. And it was no soul in place and so we just found out that the beaches cannot be used because the crocodiles are of salt water type, the same we saw yesterday, and no matter that they prefer the river that has a lower salinity, they swim from one river to the other through the ocean and is advisable not to be in their way. More than that we were told that we better stay at least 10 feet from the ocean to make sure that a jumpy croc would not try a quick one on us.

…and jellyfish

But if somehow you escape the crocs, in the summer month the jelly fish are the ones that may send you to the pool. Each jelly fish station has a bottle of vinegar that may alleviate the stings but if you got touched by their tentacles you still have to pack and go to a hospital. So not too much fun in the water here on the Queensland coast.

Dubuji walk in the Cape Tribulation Rainforest

So we settled for some hikes into the rain forest and drove all the the way to Cape Tribulation where the resort’s huts where in the midst of the jungle and long monitor lizards were racing on the boardwalks. However we were wandering what the people who decided to stay there do if they cannot come close to the ocean.

Dubuji walk in the Cape Tribulation Rainforest

But we just found out that close by is a spectacular walk named Dubuji, a meandering boardwalk through various types of vegetation, all luxuriant, with large leaves covering our heads and mangroves large as a huge tree. It was a different forest than the one in Mossman Gorge and way more interesting.

Dubuji walk in the Cape Tribulation Rainforest

The sun’s light was filtered through the canopy giving special colors to the water at the base of the mangrove. The vines were climbing on the trees with extended roots to increase their stability. Beside Dubuji Walk there was also another walk through a mangrove forest that we skipped. We had to make it to Cairns to board a plane and we were concerned about the ferry’s possible delays. Besides from Cape Trib the drive to Cairns takes about 3 hours.

Rex Overlook on the way to Cairns

So the only stop on the way back was at Daintree Ice Cream, an institution in the forest that I think that is visited by everybody who comes this way. They serve a pre-packed 4 scoop ice cream from four exotic fruits they grow on their property but they accept only cash. It was the first time in 10 days when we used cash in Australia.

Cairns, Queensland, Australia

Land of the crocs

Mossman Gorge, Queensland, Australia

Green. Luscious green. The palm trees, the lawns, the sugar cane, the banana trees all have a fresh green color. You are surrounded by it and feel like it may not have been any other color invented in the world. And it’s April, meaning a sort of mid October for us in the Northern Hemisphere.

Mossman Gorge, Queensland, Australia

But we are also in the mid of a rain forest. The oldest and also quite a large one. And the only rain forest in the world that touches the reef. It extends toward the ocean and reaches the beaches of Queensland covering them in its overwhelming green bringing the palms and the vines to their sand.

Mossman Gorge, Queensland, Australia

We left in the morning with the intention to drive all the way to Cape Tribulation, about almost two hours drive from Port Douglas and we stopped on the way at Mossman Gorge, an aboriginal ran place. The place has a large network of hiking paths that meanders by the river and under a dense green canopy, through trees with extended roots and a dense spreads of vines.

Mossman Gorge, Queensland, Australia

Mossman Gorge is at a relatively short distance of Daintree River, a river full of crocodiles, that bask in the sun on its shores. Thare are trips on the river to see them and we planned to take one of these trips the next day. So we went straight to the famous ferry crossing over the river that connects the lower part of the rain forest to the its northern side, more lush and more interesting. We were the third car in line but it looked that something was not right because the otherwise fast ferry looked stuck on the other side. After one hour of questioning and calls, while a huge line formed behind us, turned out that a cable snapped and the ferry would be out of commission for several hours. The operator canceled our RT ticket but she gave us cash for the credit card payment so for the first time we had in our hands Australian dollars. This is, almost exclusively, a credit card country, .

Croc in Daintree River, Queensland, Australia

We turned around and went to Daintree Village looking for the elusive crocs. And kept looking for them in two separate river outings the Daintree River Cruises, one of the many outfitters that do these trips on the this and other rivers, waiting for the ferry to get resurrected. Meanwhile a whole drama was unfolded on the other side of the river with a 1.2 km line of tourist buses waiting to cross and people being shuffled by the crocodile river sruises boats over the river for a more comfortable wait.

Looking for crocodiles in Daintree River, Queensland, Australia

We finished all the possible cruises and the ferry was still being repaired so we turned around and went back to Port Douglas for an early dinner.

Port Douglas, Queensland, Australia

The Reef

After several days in the outback you may feel that the entire Australia is a desert but when you fly into Cairns you are surrounded by the lush vegetation of Queensland. It’s like the desert never existed. It was humidity in the air and we drove – yeah, on the left side – through large plantation of sugar cane and banana all the way to the charming village of Port Douglas, one hour out of Cairns.

Cairns and Port Douglas are the two hubs for Australia’s main attraction, the Great Barrier Reef, a underworld marvel that spreads on the length equivalent to the distance between Maine and Florida. I did a little bit of research about how to visit and snorkel in the reef and we settled on Wavelenght, a boat run by local marine biologists that looked to be the best bet for a snorkeling trip.

But the weather started to be iffy, with high winds and a rain forecast and we had to see what better boat would fit this weather, especially because the prediction was for high waves and a very rough ride to the deep ocean.

In the end we chose to go with Calypso, that does the same route as Wavelength navigating around Opal Reef, but they have a bigger boat but they do also diving. But no matter how big was the boat the sail was extremely rough and the crew was standing around the 60+ people with bags in hands… just in case. A Dramamine pill though helped a lot.

Calypso sailed all the way into the ocean, about 90 minute one way, and they gave us suits to protect from jelly fish that may not have been so active now but are a menace on the coasts of Australia. We did three snorkeling stops, each for about one hour. After each outing the entire crew, supervised by a bearded captain was counting the people on the boat, asking everybody to sit still till the count is over.

The reef was spectacular and it looked so different in each location, in some places having more fish than in the other. However in terms of fish and marine life I doubt that anything beats the Red Sea. The Dahab’s Blue Hole in Egypt still remains one of the best snorkeling experience we ever had. But here you have the corals…After the third dive they packed all gear and snorkeling and diving suits and started to clean and prepare them for the following day tour. We sailed back on a less rough sea to the charming village of Port Douglas where life happens in a slow paced, relaxed, Australian way.

Hiking in Watarrka

The group we joined, collected by Mulgas Adventures was a treat for everybody. Mulgas’ requirement was 18-49 years and the spirit and the expectations stayed in these limits. There were 24 people from 8 countries from Europe, US and Australia and few, if any, ever slept in anything less than a comfy bed. They shared the stories and worked all together to cook the meals in a jovial atmosphere like they knew each others for years.

Priscilla’s crack, Watarrka National Park, Australia

After the last breakfast together we packed and went for a hike in Watarrka National Park, about half an hour drive to the camp where we slept over night. The hike was on the rim of Kings Canyon that you reach after you climb about 350 steps through a red rock landscape reminiscent of the rocks in Utah.

Garden of Eden, Watarrka National Park, Northern Territories, Australia

The red rock was quite different though from the one we knew from the US, looking like the skin of an animal creating spectacular dome formations. The canyon is well known in Australia and one famous local movie was shot here, “Priscilla Queen of the Desert”. There are staircases to access more heights and right in the middle of the hike is a beautiful place nicknamed “Garden of Eden” where the lights reflect majestically on the rock and also in the water collected at the base. From there you get all the way on top of the canyon that has one the faces perfectly flat, this point being a ceremonial place for the local aboriginal people. The hike was for sure very nice but slightly less spectacular than the hike we did in Kata Tjuta. Maybe only from our own perspective who hiked all the canyons of the South West USA.

Kings Canyon, Watarrka National Park, Northern Territories, Australia

It was the last day of a memorable trip for most of us. Some from the group booked a four day trip that would return them to Uluru and would fly the next day from Ayers Rock. They would sleep on more night under the stars at the first camp close to Uluru.
Matt made some calls and he drove us all to Curtin Springs where another Mulgas Adventure bus was waiting for us. So we said goodbye to our good friends for three days and started to drive back on Lasseter and Stuart Highway reaching Alice Springs after sunset, several of us hanging out together late in the evening for some well deserved drinks in town. Thank you all for such a great trip. Thank you Mulgas and thank you Matt!!!

Emu in the Erlanda Farm, Northern Territories, Australia

Sleeping under the stars

Swags

How was to be sleeping under the stars?” Matt started to unpack the food, a lot of food…., and everybody, men and women started to prepare dinner. After everybody got stuffed we were given the spiel about what is a “swag”. On their site it was stated that we will sleep in “swags”. In American English “swag” means something else so I kind of thought that it should be some kind of tarpaulin under which we sleep. But the “swags” proved to be some thin mattresses covered in a waterproof material that you put directly on the ground and …sleep under the stars inside your sleeping bag.

Kata Tjuta at sunrise, Northern Territories, Australia

The Milky Way was right on top of us and if I were not jet lagged probably I could have stay all night to watch a sky completely littered with stars like you have no chance to see in our towns because of the light pollution. When I woke up around 3 AM the moon have risen and all was covered in spectacular silvery light that is hard to forget. In the night you could hear the dingos howling not too far away and the wild camels snorting somewhere nearby. We woke up for the sunrise but the only thing I wished was to sleep the next night again under the stars. I’d try this in Long Island but I bet that I would get a racoon jumping on me in the morning.

Climbing in Kata Tjuta

The hike of the day was in a national park, Kata Tjuta, around some rocks named after a Russian Queen. They used to be known as “The Olgas” and they could be seen from the sunrise place from where we watched Uluru. Eventually, to mark its aboriginal roots, the rocks were renamed around 1900 Kata Tjuta, that means “many heads”.

Climbing Kata Tjuta

A lot of legends are associated with the rocks but as we understood they are kept secret and are not shared at all with outsiders. The only thing we could find out is that it is a place exclusively for men’s initiation and as a result the women are not allowed to come.

Kata Tjuta

For us it was extremely beautiful hike on a circuit that goes around and inside the perimeter of the rocks that took about 3 hours for a little more than 6km. After the hike we returned to the campsite for a quick camel burger lunch and took our backpacks and moved to a different location. On the way we collected a large amount of wood and made a big fire and ate the kangaroo steaks around it. Everybody gathered around the fire and ended up placing the swags close by it and went to a deep sleep under the same sky covered in billions of stars.

A rock in the middle of Australia

Driving through the Australian outback

At 6 AM Matt stopped his bus in front of the hotel to pick us up. We booked a tour with Mulgas Adventures after we checked several days a number of accommodation sites that came up each and every time with absolutely no place to sleep around Uluru. It would not have been an issue just to drive there but still being the outback we had The accommodations in the area are few and quite expensive ranging between $300-$450/night but in spite of this no site turned any availability. However a number of outfitters offers very low cost 3-4 days tours from Alice Springs to Uluru and the one we picked was Mulgas Adventures that offered something quite interesting but also puzzling: sleeping under the stars.
Their logo: “WTF’s Mulgas?” But WTF they mean by: “sleeping under the stars”?

This is what happens if you don’t drink enough water in the desert

There are about 500 km from Alice Springs to Uluru, first on Stuart Highway that connects Darwin to Adelaide. Also Stuart was the original name of the town till Alice got involved with her waterhole to confuse the hell out of everybody. In the outback you keep driving fast and look for jumping kangaroos, but none came in our site. It’s nothing in between the two stops that are few and far between, mainly gas stations and a tiny restaurant. The rest is the bush on both sides with mulga trees and eucalyptus and occasionally dead trees burnt from lighting strikes. We stopped at a camel farm where all tours offer a camel safari, actually a glorious name for just riding a camel around a loop. I guess in the lack of any other transportation the camels, introduced in Australia by Afghans in 1860, were a solution but I doubt that Todd & Co enjoyed riding them. It bounces the hell out of you and I think the only worse thing is to ride an elephant.

Curtin Springs is one of the stops on the way to Uluru

After another stop in Erlanda we took a left turn on Lasseter highway, named in the honor of the guy who crossed the outback first time and discovered Uluru and we kept driving to Curtin Springs, the last stop before getting to our destination. The tours syncs well with the planes landing in Ayers Rock’s Airport and we picked up the rest of the group and went straight to the camp to leave the luggage and from there to the rock.

Uluru

Uluru is spectacular in its unicity. Just a large 364 ft tall rock in the middle of the desert with a circumference of about 10 km. It’s a sacred site for the local aboriginal people an the legends associated with it are numerous, some inscribed in their cultural center. But their secrecy goes to the point that you neither can take photos of them nor buy a brochure or booklet in the store.

The cracks in the rock look like opening to another universe.

The Pitjantjatjara Anangu society, the aboriginals of the area, is very well tiered and the business of men and women are totally separated, each keeping their secrets and legends from each other, and both of them protecting them in great secret from the outsiders.The rock and the entire park was returned in 1985 by the Australian government to the aboriginals who manage the place and try to impose the rules,one being not to climb the rock. Besides they request that some places considered sacred on the rock not to be photographed.

Circumambulating the rock, Uluru, Northern Territories, Australia

If coming in the steaming hot summer months you may have time to do a full circumambulation of the rock of the 9.9 km, but in this month when the sun sets around 6:30 PM we settled only for a drive around the rock and a walk of the front of the rock and the caves in the middle, full of old paintings.

Watching the sunset over the rock…

From there Matt rushed us to get to see the sunset over the Uluru, set a table and filled it up with a generous load of sparkling wine till the entire rock became sort of bubbly like in one of the local dreams.

…and ending a hard day with a (or more) glass of sparkling

A town named after Alice

Alice Springs at dusk, Northern Territories, Australia

This entire trip started differently. First, we never planned to go to Australia. It just happened because one of us had to work some days in Sydney. Because Australia was not on the radar, I never read about traveling there in spite that I read about of lot of other places I never ended up going. So when it became clear toward the end of March that it would happen, I started frantically to dig in books and sites to plan something on the knees. Besides, because the work schedule in Sydney was very fluid, I had to adapt and move destinations around to fit the best the 2 weeks available for hopping around the continent. Because of the nature of a large and sparsely populated continent I started, for the first time ever, to book in advance hotels, cars and flights. I never do this in advance. I usually do this on the spot on location, each day of the travel and I finally understood through what the people who like to have things planned in life go through. It’s terrifying… Let it flow and it will come smoothly.

Tip: While trying to book various flights we noticed that you could fly on 80K miles from US to Australia on all airlines with tickets bought one day in advance. It does not look that many people go that route.

Major Mitchell cockatoo drinking water

We packed sleeping bags near business suits, a suitcase near backpacks, and we boarded in the middle of, hopefully, the last snowstorm, at JFK the long haul flight with an intended 10 hours stop in LA. After a change of flight in Sydney to Alice Springs, we finally landed in the middle of Australia after about 41 hours.

Wallaby

Alice was the wife of the first superintendent of the telegraph, Charles Todd, and ended up somehow resting her name on the waterhole and eventually to the future town in the middle of nowhere. The town is right in the center of Australia and its existence sprouted from the fact that in 1872 was on the line of newly developed telegraph. The telegraph construction is a local legend, assigned to Charles Todd who was given 18 months to build the line from Darwin in the north to Port Augusta on the southern cost passing through Alice Springs, on terrain that was never explored. I seriously doubt that Verizon could do it even nowadays…
I guess that Todd was as surprised as us to notice how different are the animals and birds here. While walking the 3 km from town to the telegraph post we were surrounded by parrot like birds of different colors, wallabies sitting for photos and dingos, all surrounded like us by lots of annoying flies.

Royal Flying Doctprs Service old control room

Another remarkable feat is the fact that the Australians initiated in 1911 an aviation service to offer medical care for the people living in the outback. It is the famous Royal Flying Doctor Service that operates nowadays a large fleet of planes on a territory larger that the entire Europe. I guess when the doctor came they did not ask for what insurance somebody may have… It’s striking to realize that 100 years after the Aussies offered flying medical services for all these stranded people of the continent the US Congress tries in full force to limit the medical coverage for people.

The sunset is a special show for the town, the glowing sky inviting everybody on top of Anzac Hill. We joined the ceremony and later dragged ourselves to the hotel to hit the bed after 51 hours on the go….

The sunset show on top of Anzac Hill, Alice Springs

Snow again

Waiting to depart from JFK…

It looks like each time when I left New York this winter it was in the middle of a snow storm. It’s April and we just had another one…

We are on the way to Australia and when checking the bags we just found out that all US citizens need a visa. Surprise!!! You cannot check the luggage without it. Luckily it’s just a formality that can be easily obtained at the check-in desk applying on the phone. The flight is annoyingly long and we broke it by a long stop in LA. From here we have another …21 hours to reach Alice Springs in the middle of Oz.

..and arriving on the Santa Monica beach, CA

Roaming the world

FLYING MONK

Category Archives: Australia

Again Sydney

Red Moon

Bruny

Tarn Shelf

Again on the road

The Devils

Summit

On the road

Fire over blue waters

Wineglass

Maria Island

Tasman

MONA

34 hours

The surfing lesson

Lost in Chinatown

Fishing at sunset

Australian’s Outback

The Bridge

Beaches

Markets

Sydney’s islands

The Opera

Triennial

Skirting around the ocean

Melbourne

Rain Forest

Land of the crocs

The Reef

Hiking in Watarrka

Sleeping under the stars

A rock in the middle of Australia

A town named after Alice

Snow again