Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Time to Relax
We got a really nice hotel suite while we stayed in a city called Surfer's Paradise. Because of the wedding, we spent more time here than any other stop on our trip and took the time to relax a bit.
The first part of our trip was full of early mornings and busy city bustling while this stop was much more about sleeping late, reading, and watching music videos on Australian TV.
Watching videos was a much more pleasant experience than the equivalent activity back here in the states. I found out that Silverchair is still really big over there along with another band I'd never heard of called Powderfinger.
I took a lot of comics on the trip, and I got to read some of them in 'Surfers'. I also went to the bookstore and bought a bunch (like 4) foreign affairs mags and journals which I dug into during the trip.
Reading list included but was not limited to:
Transformers - Infiltration and Stormbringer
--These are both trade paperbacks which means they collect a series of individual comics into one magazine sized paperback
book
Star Wars Legacy Vol 1; Broken
--Also a trade paperback
(Adjectiveless) X-MEN
--I read about 15 or so individual comics from the no adjective X-Men series. L has a subscription and I got caught up on those just before issue #200
Wired Magazine
--It was July and I was reading February and March
Texas Monthly
--Surprisingly good - I think I read April and June
Harvard International Review
--Volume 29, Issue 1
National Review
--June 25, 2007. I barely made it into this one but picked it up again when we got back
The first part of our trip was full of early mornings and busy city bustling while this stop was much more about sleeping late, reading, and watching music videos on Australian TV.
Watching videos was a much more pleasant experience than the equivalent activity back here in the states. I found out that Silverchair is still really big over there along with another band I'd never heard of called Powderfinger.
I took a lot of comics on the trip, and I got to read some of them in 'Surfers'. I also went to the bookstore and bought a bunch (like 4) foreign affairs mags and journals which I dug into during the trip.
Reading list included but was not limited to:
Transformers - Infiltration and Stormbringer
--These are both trade paperbacks which means they collect a series of individual comics into one magazine sized paperback
book
Star Wars Legacy Vol 1; Broken
--Also a trade paperback
(Adjectiveless) X-MEN
--I read about 15 or so individual comics from the no adjective X-Men series. L has a subscription and I got caught up on those just before issue #200
Wired Magazine
--It was July and I was reading February and March
Texas Monthly
--Surprisingly good - I think I read April and June
Harvard International Review
--Volume 29, Issue 1
National Review
--June 25, 2007. I barely made it into this one but picked it up again when we got back
Um, I just had a huge post erased by an unhandled IE exception. You'd think those clowns at Microsoft could figure it out!
Here is a picture from our hotel room window on the 'Gold Coast'
Friday, October 12, 2007
The Next Wonder
We flew from Uluru to Cairns (Try not to pronounce the R). This is pretty much Great Barrier Reef Central. It kinda felt like a mix between Cancun and Disney World.
We didn't have much time here but our hotel upgraded us to a corner suite looking over the Bay and Marina. I wish we could have spent more time in it.
We booked a diving trip on a boat right outside our door in the Marina that took us out for snorkeling and diving. We had never been diving before, but decided to do it anyway. It was awesome!
The diving highlight was probably getting to touch a giant clam - CHOMP. It didn't chomp me but it did blow out a bunch of cold sea water like it was exhaling - very cool.
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
More Australia
We traveled from Sydney to the middle of the Australian continent and a place known to Europeans as Ayer's Rock. Its been given back to the native people of the region and then rented out from them as a national park where two sandstone rock formations protrude like great stone memorials to a time on earth that was probably pre-plant life.
The most famous rock is called Uluru while its neighboring friend is Kata Tjuta which is pictured here. Its actually several different rocks that have been exposed after - well - a really long time.
The rocks are sacred places to the local aboriginies and some parts are off limits. For anyone searching for a modern reference point on these, you may have heard of them because of the infamous "The Dingo Ate My Baby" stories. That family was camping next to Uluru when their baby went missing.
