Australia 2010

January 10 to 11, Gold Coast, Australia

Booked a tour to the Australia Zoo, the Steve Irwin zoo, the by Crikey guy!  On the bus and the driver was trying to find out if the road was open.  In the middle of the worst flooding in decades!  Turns out the road is open but the Zoo received 130 mm of rain the night before and is flooded.  They have closed for 2 days!  Instead went for a walk.  Got wet and dried off about 3 times!  Amazing.  Fairly   bright out but shower going through.  The wind has not stopped since I arrived.  Funny as you can stand out of the wind and not get wet!  Rain 'falling' horizontal!!!!!   Not the best weather for a beach resort!  But sure it is very nice when weather is good!

Not much to say as I have not been doing much.

January 7 to 9, Gold Coast, Australia

Flew to Gold Coast, only 2 hours flying.  Flew with Jetstar!  Talk about chaos in the airport!  Huge line ups, made worse by them calling people in line to the head of the line as their flights were closer!  Needs a lot of work.  But made it.

Only a 2 hour flight.  and then a 30 minute bus ride.  Weather is cloudy with sunny breaks, and showers rolling through.  But warm even with the strong winds.

Beach is amazing.  Huge, it runs for miles and the sand is very fine.

The area has many high rise apartments and hotels and way too much shopping for my liking, but oh well.

Have done lots of walking along the beach.  Interesting to see life savers along the beach.  In some places there are lots of people and in others very few.  There is so much beach.

January 6, Melbourne, Australia

Very lazy and have not been doing much.  Went over to friends place for a swim and over night.  Then they took me to Monsalvat, an artist's community in the suburbs.  Great location and the buildings, although only built in 1930s, looked very old.  Nice to just wander around.  A few pieces of art on display but no artists working.  

January 5, Melbourne, Australia

Had a great night as I went to a couple's place that were on the Iceland tour!  Was so nice to see them and hear about their trip through Scandinavia after they left Iceland.

December 31, Melbourne, Australia  Happy New year to all!

A couple of friends and I did the 'Edge' today!  This is on the 88th floor of new building.  It is a elevator type room that slides out from the side of the building.  Then after some sound effects of moaning and groaning, the glass clears and you can look straight down through the floor to the street below.  The views are great as was a super day for looking around the city, 360 degrees.

Then off to a New Years Eve Party.  Great time but home early at about 1.30 am

December 30, Melbourne, Australia

Did a day tour with friends to Cape Liptrap.  Great as sun shining and not too cool.  Had a great lunch in pub close to beach and then off to point.  Saw a lighthouse and an echidna along side of road.  Nice to get out into the country.

December 25, Melbourne, Australia

Merry Christmas.  Great day, weather was warm and spent the day with friends family.  About 20 people including 4 younger ones.  Ate way too much, of course, and Santa Claus even found me!  Received some great gifts from friends, even one from friends from home!

December 17 to 24, Melbourne, Australia

Just taking it easy

December 16, Canberra, Australia

Went to the Canberra Glassworks this morning.  This is an artist site in the old steam power generating station.  The glassworkers rent out the space to work.  The initially blow the glass but then work the glass with paddles to shape the designs.  Amazing what they do with glass that is glowing red hot.

Caught the bus to the Australian Mint.  This is the facility that makes all the Australian coins as well as coins for other countries.  Much of the plant is automated with robots.  They even had an 2010 Vancouver Olympic hockey puck with a lucky loonie on display.  

Had lunch in a quiet park in the city.  Seemed to be lots of Xmas parties going on.  Interesting to see people drinking in a public park!

People here are so polite.  Every time you get on the bus you get a 'good morning' or a couple of time a 'g'day' and everyone thanks the driver when they get off.  

December 15, Canberra, Australia

Up early and off to Australian Institute of Sport.  This is a 30 year old facility.  Built after a poor Olympic performance at Montreal in 1976.  Very hi tech training equipment is used.  All athletes are on scholarship.  Covers the common Olympic sports but also unusual ones like motorbike racing.  Very interesting.  The pool has underwater viewing areas as well as moving underwater cameras.

Then off to Parliament Hill for another tour.  Amazing building.  A lot of Australian woods used as well as European marble.  The Flag pole is huge and is directly over the centre of the building.  The view from the roof, under the flag pole is great.  There is a direct line to the War Memorial and the hill behind the Memorial.

Went into the House of Representatives and the Senate House.  Senators in Australia are elected.  Also sat in on a Senate Enquiry into the changing of bank mortgage fees.  Interesting as the bankers were there arguing about competition.  Could not make out the connection other than they will loose huge revenues if law changes.  3 Senators and 6 bankers and no one in the gallery.  But this has been going on for a while.

Then headed to the Old Parliament.  The old building is from 1923, but the redecorating is definitely mostly 60s and 70s.  Which makes sense as the new building was opened in 1988.

December 14, Canberra, Australia

tour of War Memorial

Walking tour of ANZAC parade, several sculptures dedicated to various war veterans.  All very interesting.

This is the street that runs between the War Memorial and Parliament Hill.

Headed off to the National Museum.  But only had about 1 hour to go through it.  Bit of a rush but not too bad.  Many exhibits about the history of Australia.  

There was a special Captain Cook exhibit.  That was interesting covering his travels in the area.  Also had some of his navigating tools on display.

There was also a huge exhibit of Aboriginal art work with the theme of the Canning Stock route.  This was a cattle drive route in Western Australia that ran 1000s of miles through Aboriginal lands.

December 13, Canberra, Australia

Up fairly early and off to embassy to apply for visa.  Walked!  Only took about an hour but then had to walk another hour to get money order to pay for visa ($119).  About half the price of the US visas but more than the Australian visas.

Amazing as even in morning the roads are not busy.  Not a lot of traffic.  Streets are great.  Big wide multi lane with huge medians which are grassed and treed.  Very nice.

Then walked into the city and to the tourist information.  Another 1 1/2 hour walk.  Got into a new hotel,  but fairly expensive at $139 but not much else around and this was the cheapest.  Government city causes this I am told.

Caught the bus back to other hotel to pick up my bag which made life easier, and then spent a hour down by the pool.  Very nice.  Sunny all day today which was great after all the rain the last few days.  Not hot but still sunny, about mid 20s.