Buzzing in Brisbane!

25th - 28th April

Arrived in Brisbane on ANZAC Day. 25 April is probably Australia's most important national occasion. It marks the anniversary of the first major military action fought by Australian and New Zealand forces during the First World War. If you're as ignorant as we were, here's a bit of the history.
 
"Anzac" stands for Australian and New Zealand Army Corps. The soldiers in those forces quickly became known as ANZACs, and the pride they took in that name endures to this day.

When war broke out in 1914, Australia had been a federal commonwealth for only 13 years. The new national government was eager to establish its reputation among the nations of the world. In 1915 Australian and New Zealand soldiers formed part of the allied expedition that set out to capture the Gallipoli peninsula in order to open the Dardanelles to the allied navies. The ultimate objective was to capture Constantinople (now Istanbul in Turkey), the capital of the Ottoman Empire, an ally of Germany. 

The Australian and New Zealand forces landed on Gallipoli on 25 April, meeting fierce resistance from the Ottoman Turkish defenders. What had been planned as a bold stroke to knock Turkey out of the war quickly became a stalemate, and the campaign dragged on for eight months. At the end of 1915 the allied forces were evacuated, after both sides had suffered heavy casualties and endured great hardships. Over 8,000 Australian soldiers had been killed. News of the landing on Gallipoli had made a profound impact on Australians at home, and 25 April soon became the day on which Australians remembered the sacrifice of those who had died in the war."

What has struck us about this bit of history is the plucky determination and courage of the troops for whom the war must have felt a million miles away from their everyday life. Very humbling. 

We received a lovely warm welcome in Brisbane from Anne Maree, a distant cousin from Maggie's mother's family. She lives in a traditional Queensland home on stilts with some lovely features including stained glass, pretty ceilings and a verandah to help keep cool in the very hot summers. Such a sensible design!

Brisbane's an interesting City with lots of high rise, modern buildings interspersed with older gems such as the Town Hall and Treasury buildings. 
 

Brisbane City

Town Hall Auditorium

Town Hall

A living statue

From suburbs such as the one that Anne Maree lives in, the public transport is fantastic. We had a choice of train, bus or ferry to get into the City. This time we used the bus but on our last visit we used the Sea Cat Ferry service which is also a great way of keeping cool in the hotter months! Lots of parks and public spaces in and around the City. 2013 is the 25th anniversary of Expo 88, the international event that put Brisbane onto the world stage. The legacy of Expo is evident in the fabulous public space around the river in the middle of the City. A city "beach" provides a chance of a dip and there are lots of interesting buildings such as the Nepalese Pagoda below.

Nepalese Pagoda

Amazing birds even in the City Centre

Australian white Ibis

We're heading North to the Sunshine Coast next for a few days rest by the sea.

Chilling out in Melbourne

April 20th - 25th

Got back from Central Australia without incident and settled into a cabin on a camp site in Melbourne that we'd chosen as it was described as a "Country" location and we wanted some rest. So when the planes started flying over at 4.30am we were not impressed! Suffice to say that after some frank discussions with the camp site management team who need some customer service training, we moved to a much nicer apartment, ironically much closer to the centre of Melbourne but in a much quieter location in the trendy suburb of Richmond.

Spent a lovely few days mooching around the City and its suburbs. Melbourne at this time of year is distinctly Autumnal and we even had rain! This is a lovely City with an eclectic mix of interesting older buildings intermingled with new high rise ones. Even in the rain, there's a great atmosphere here. Lots to do that's free (or by donation only) including an impressive art gallery and museum of the moving image in Federation Square. 

View toward St. Paul's cathedral from Federation square

St. Paul's Cathedral

Flinders St Station

Two wet tourists (Katie please note Mags jacket is Dare2B)

Some really interesting buildings hidden in tiny lanes

 Melbourne's suburbs include some great beach locations including the cosmopolitan St. Kilda, just a few minutes away from the City on the fantastic tram service that makes Melbourne so easy to navigate. 

Pier building, St. Kilda

All sorts of zany arts and crafts here but you have to watch out for the giant fruit!

We found a really great selection of fresh fruit, delicatessen items, bread and vegetables in the famous Victoria Market in the City centre. Well worth a visit but don't go when you're hungry!

Almost as good though on a much smaller scale was "Thomas Dux" greengrocer in Richmond. A very dangerous deli cum bakery cum all sorts of nice things. Very useful as it was just down the road from our accommodation and we had the delight of entertaining two visitors for dinner. Such a treat when you're traveling to have somewhere with a kitchen and enough space to cook dinner for 4! 


Our dinner guests were the delightful Sam (Sparrow) Dobson and his

Fiancé Lauren. Sam's my god daughter's brother and he Lauren are lucky enough to have been travelling around Australia for about 18 months. It's about 8 years since we've seen Sam and he's grown into a very personable young man. Mind you, not sure when Lauren ever gets a word in edgeways!

The rock and the flies

April 19th 

We couldn't resist another early start and thought that this morning we would watch the sunrise over Uluru from the sunset view point. Yes I know it's a bit contrary, but these early mornings are going to our heads! Probably not as good as the normal sunrise view point but interesting. 

Sun rise over Uluru from the West of the rock

Sun's up

With the sun comes the flies. Luckily we'd been warned about these and bought some rather ridiculous headgear. Daft we undoubtedly looked but they really helped to ward off the hundreds of flies. 

Warding off the early morning flies!

And finally, a UFO joined us in our morning watch!

Closer inspection may lead some to think it was a fly!

The rock that made our eyes sparkle but our pockets bleed!

17-18 April

Two days running we've had to set the alarm for 5.45am! This is getting too reminiscent of work. Yesterday was just to ensure that we made the airport on time for our flight to Alice Springs. As always we were early but arrived safely and drove the 450+km in our camper van to Uluru (Ayres Rock) without incident. The Romans would have been proud of the highways up here. Pretty much dead straight and and mostly through flat desert like land, so not fantastically interesting as drives go. 

However that was just preparation for the main event which was a major WOW! As the dawn broke we were on the viewing platform (with a few others!) to catch our first proper sight of the magnificent rock that is Uluru. 

Sleepy heads watch sun rise at Uluru

Sun rises over Uluru

 

Sun fully up

To understand Uluru's real significance you have to understand a bit about the basic geography of this area and something about Aboriginal thinking. 

The rock is in the middle of desert. It towers above acres and acres of bright red sand (even redder than Herefordshire soil), a few bushes and some weedy trees. It does rain here but at the moment it's hot (about 36 degrees C) and very dry. Keep expecting to see Hugh Jackman or Nicole Kidman ride up on horseback at any minute, though here a more common mode of transport would be a camel.

This part of the outback of Central Australia is a sacred place for Aborigines. Aboriginal culture says that Uluru was formed by ancestral beings during Dreamtime. The rock’s many caves and fissures are thought to be evidence of this, and some of the forms around Uluru are said to represent ancestral spirits. 

Of course having viewed the rock at dawn, we had to return to watch the sun set! The rock probably looks at its most beautiful at this time of day as it appears to glow red. 

Uluru as sun sets

Final view before the sun sets

Cave like part of rock which used to act as a kitchen

Kata Tjuta

 

Close up of Uluru

There is no doubt that Uluru and its near neighbour Kata Tjuta are magnificent sights in the midst of pretty arid desert. We walked around various parts of the base of both mountains (the locals ask you not to climb Uluru as it is sacred and it's too steep for amateurs like us). From the viewing points the rocks look smooth but closer inspection shows the many fissures and crevices that are a natural part of aging sandstone. They are both truly beautiful sights and you should visit if you possibly can.
 

This is the first time since arriving in Australia that we've seen much evidence of Aboriginal culture. What's striking here is the contrast between the effort that has undoubtedly been put into helping visitors understand how important Uluru is and something of the Aboriginal culture and the absolute rip off  that coming here represents!

The problem with Ayres rock and largely with Alice Springs, is that the only reason 99.9% of visitors come to them is to visit Uluru. That creates a monopoly on everything a tourist needs to come here. Flights, accommodation, car hire, fuel, food and drink are all exorbitantly expensive. Such a shame as it means that we couldn't spend money on local art work which would have been much more satisfying. Anyway, rant over. Despite the expense, we wouldn't have missed the experience for the world.

One final moment of mirth! In our rather hazy state predawn this morning, we forgot to disconnect the power lead from the camper van. (Yes those that read the blog will know that this has happened before but we are out of practice!). Unfortunately the incident was witnessed by several fellow campers, including our Aussie neighbours who took a photo of the connection box which had half come out of the ground! They confessed later that the photo was to remind them not to do the same thing. Or that's what they said. Will probably end up on Utube as an example of Pom intelligence!

G’day Roos!

15^th April 2013

We’ve been bemoaning the lack of Roo sightings since our arrival in rural Victoria and South Australia. Today that all changed! We started the day by watching some unusual, white Kangaroos lazing about. 

white Roo lounging

Close up of white Roo

Ready for action

 

As we drove through yet more boring plains and then entered the much more attractive and bumpy Grampion region, we spotted several groups of more traditional, brown Roos. Most were rather shy, bounding off when the camera got close but one group allowed us to get quite close. We think these Roos were tame ones. They seemed to be the green keepers on the cricket pitch in Halls Gap! 

More traditional brown Roo

Roos in the wild

Roos tending the cricket pitch

Not sure if this one is a bowler but he was certainly staying close to the wicket!

Also spotted a rather cute Wallaby but he was too shy to be photographed. Any one know the difference between a Wallaby a Roo? (other than size of course). Leave that one with you!

The Grampions are quite impressive rocky bumps, a welcome change after the flat plains. Unfortunately it was pretty cloudy today so the photos don't reflect the true beauty of the region. 

 

We complete our drive back to Melbourne tomorrow and head off to Uluru (Ayres Rock) in central Australia on Wednesday. It’s been a nightmare trip to arrange. The norm routes are incredibly expensive so we’ve opted for the cheaper (nothing cheap about this trip in reality!) option which involves flying from Melbourne to Alice Springs and then driving a camper van to the rock, a round trip of some 950k or so. Getting hold of a campervan was somewhat tricky so we’d booked a car and hotels instead, only for a van to become available so at the last minute we went back to Plan A. Despite the administrative difficulties, really looking forward to seeing this iconic symbol.

A tip for future trippers. There are several web sites offering campervans at $1 a day if you drive them to prescribed spots within a certain time scale (usually short but you can extend the time by paying the norm rate for a few days hire). This would be a much cheaper way of doing this trip and a good way to get around the country cheaply as long as you don’t mind driving.

"Turning" Heads and the Sherlock Hundred

14th April

Sometimes the advantages of being in a huge landmass with a population smaller than the City of Leicester, become apparent. Spent our last morning in Adelaide at the Turner art exhibition. This was the exhibition that had been in London a year or so ago which we'd missed so we pitched up at the art gallery expecting to join a huge queue. We still bear the scars from the last major art exhibition we attended (Monet in Paris) which was unbearably overcrowded and hardly gave room to see the pictures. 

How fantastic then that we were able to waltz straight in when the art gallery opened, no queues and we were able to walk round the amazing collection of Turner paintings at our own pace. Fabulous! 

South Australia Art Gallery, Adelaide

From our limited time in Adelaide it appears that it's a lovely City. Wide tree lined streets, some interesting "old" buildings and clean and tidy both in the City and the suburbs. Great shopping too but we didn't have time to investigate that!

Museum of South Australia, Adelaide

Wide, tree lined streets in the Centre

Yesterday we spent the day in the Borossa Valley, about an hour North of Adelaide. Very attractive area with more wineries to the square inch than we've ever seen! As we were driving we only went to one wine tasting but it would be very easy to get legless here every day of the week. 

We decided to go to the Jacobs Creek winery. Mostly because it's a wine that we can buy in the UK but one that we normally dismiss! Having tasted a good selection of whites and reds we were favourably impressed with several and will look out for them in Tesco. Also visited a lavender farm which would have been more impressive earlier in the season (it's autumn here) but still smelt lovely, a sculpture park and a farm shop run by an Aussie TV Chef, Maggie Beer as well as some of the little villages. Great place for a leisurely mooch.

View over Barossa Valley, North of Adelaide

Set off on the 750+ kilometre trek back to Melbourne this afternoon. We couldn't resist a slight detour to visit the metropolis of Sherlock! This tiny hamlet has an important place in the history of the area. The Sherlock Hundred was created in 1899, named after a mate of the local Governor. It even had it's own railway station with station master in the early 20th Century when its pioneering occupants scraped a living from felling timbers for the new railway. 

Welcome to Sherlock, South Australia

A bit of history

Turton Track, huge trees, pancakes and miles to go before we sleep!

April 9 - 13th
Mike's ancestors have obviously been here us as just up the road from Gwyn and Di's house at Tanybryn, is a small road named "Turton's track". Very much a single track road, it has been metalled since our last visit and is a now a recognised (if rather slow and twisty) route. So far we've failed to find any of it's history so if any readers can shed light, we'd be pleased to hear!

The scale of everything in Australia is immense. In this area of Victoria, there are lots and lots of trees, many of them huge. Went for a walk around "Maits Rest" where there are hundreds of huge trees, many of them Myrtle Beech. Photos don't really give a true sense of scale or the beauty of the flora and fauna.

These can grow up to 100 metres high and some are up to 400 years old

Gives some sense of scale

Very Lord of the Rings!

When planning our travels, we're often caught out by the vast distances and time taken to drive them. We drove from Melbourne to Adelaide this week. Nearly 800 kilometres and took about three days with stops. Much of the journey was across vast areas of flat plain. Mike has dubbed these roads the "pancakes" because they are very brown and arid and boring as there's little of interest (and have no maple syrup on them!) Pretty boring driving but one of us has to be on "Roo alert" as kangaroos and various other wildlife have a habit of running out into the road when least expected. Unfortunately we've seen many more dead Kangaroos by the road side than live ones. However this week we have seen dolphins (by the ferry), kangaroos, wallabies, Emu's and some fabulously coloured parrots. Cockatoos are everywhere and certainly make their presence felt. They are very noisy! Less welcome was our close encounter with a Tiger snake. Luckily it slithered away quickly.

Tiger snake. Poisonous of course!

Emu strutting his stuff

Parrots waiting for breakfast at Gwyn's. The male ones have the red breasts