I arrived in Xi'an by plane from Shanghai. Or rather, I arrived 50 km from Xi'an by plane and into the city proper by bus. Not far from the central area where I was dropped off is the southern gate of the city walls beside which are two youth hostels. Ori, an Israeli I'd met in Kunming, happened to be in town already and so I went to the hostel he was staying at and checked myself in. In spite of being in a new city with some world-renowned sights, however, I felt myself more checked out than in. It was already July 29 and I was flying home August 5, and I think as time wound down I was starting to mentally prepare. As well, you may have noticed that since northern Vietnam, my pace of travel has been restless, relentless, and reckless. In any case, I arrived wanting to leave, ready to go home, and not at all in the mood for exploring a new place, finding my way around, and so on. But it was July 29, and I had only one week in China left, so regardless of how I felt, I hit the town.
The day's explorations brought me back through to the centre where I'd arrived and then north into the city's famed Muslim quarter. Despite what you may have heard, people in China do have religious freedom. That is to say, they have the right to believe or not believe what they want. What they don't have is the right to organization that in any way that the state feels threatens its total control over the lives and minds of its peoples. So while there are Catholics, for example, you won't be finding catholic schools. While there are Tibetans with their own language, schools in Tibet do not and cannot teach in that language. And so yes, there are practicing Muslims all over China and I was wandering around the streets where many of those living in Xi'an dwell and work. Aside from the mosque, the main sight here is one of my favourites: food. Fried flat bread, lettuce, and potato made into a sandwich with some sort of spread for the low low price of 2 kwai (30 cents). Mmm. Mutton soup with sesame, noodles, peanut, and more? Yum! Honey and sesame desserts mingling with a dry powdery sugar-almond concoction? I wandered the streets for quite a while sampling various fares until I could sample no more. On the walk home, I passed a bunch of people dancing in the streets while a band played and watched and listened for some time, realizing again that I was lucky to be here. Home would be coming soon enough.
The next morning I woke up early, which is to say too late, to check out the Terracotta warriors. They're outside the city and I was booked on a trip through the hostel leaving at 9:00. I grabbed a breakfast to go and was second-last on the bus and then we were off. I'll say here that I never realized how much there is to do around Xi'an, albeit all in different directions. There's a small panda sanctuary here, though it doesn't come close to being in the same league as the more famous one in Chengdu (which just celebrated two cubs, I hear). There's the warriors. There's a collection of impressive imperial tombs. The city itself. And enough more (that I can't recall right now) to make me consider a stop there on my return to China. For now, just the terracotta warriors. On the bus with me was an English expeditionary group that was combining travel with philanthropy and I thought it a great trip. They're doing a project near Lijiang soon and I gave them some tips for the area.
And then, at last, we were at the Terracotta warriors. It's amazing to think that this find was not made until a farmer stumbled on it 30 years ago digging a well, especially when you see the size of the endeavour. Old emperor Qin (China's first emperor, 230 BC) decided when he died he wanted enough soldiers to continue his rule into the afterlife. While my idea of heaven doesn't include a Chinese emperor or stone warriors, he certainly took enough with him to give someone a headache. Almost 8000 soldiers were hand-crafted, painted, and buried in a tomb he had made for himself. In the meantime, he went on to standardize the Chinese characters still in use today, gather the disparate pieces of China under one banner, and start the building of the Great Wall of China. To be fair, he had an early start as a 13-year old. What he left, the wall, the army, and the country, are in various states of disrepair but all remain to this day. The soldiers themselves fought and lost their first battle not long after his death and so many were found in pieces hacked apart by angry peasants but some remained intact. The main location of them, Pit 1, is a sprawling covered area with buildings and a healthy dose of soldiers some repaired, some intact, and some scattered on and in the ground.
The army had structure, and there was a general's tent, there were archers, chariots, infantry, cavalry, and different ranks. Every soldier had a unique and interesting face which itself is a marvel. There are two other pits open to visitors, both of which are neither as big or as populated, but which have their own charms as archaeological sites. After a visit to all three and a factory where souveneirs are made (I got to craft my own soldier but didn't recruit him) it was back to Xi'an for more muslim food and a bit of catchup with Ori. We were both pretty tired and were going to go see a movie but settled on a DVD of Stardust which is a fair adaption of a good book by a great author (Neil Gaiman). My final day in the city on the final day of July was spent visiting sites I'd been too lazy to investigate before. I went up to the bell tower and drum tower, witnessing an excellent performance at the latter, and then grabbed a bike and rode around the 14km of city walls in just under an hour. While it's not especially interesting visually, it is simply one of those things that must be done because it can, and despite the bad bike and cobblestoned thumping I received, it was well worth the effort.
As I returned my bike atop the walls, I heard some very ominous and powerful drums being played in the south gate and went to investigate. Although it was being played by smiley women in costume, it was an imposing sound and I could imagine it striking terror into people attempting to attack the city. It had been a busy day and was growing late, so I went back to the hostel and grabbed a pizza while I caught up on my internet. The pizza took an hour and I was worried about missing the train but I managed to get it finally and shared a cab to the station with two English girls that I'd met earlier. The three of us, after boarding our overnight train to Beijing, my final stop on this oh-so-long tour, played a Chinese dice game in the dining car as the countryside passed unheeded in the night. Of the many, many rounds we played, I did not win even once. It was good-old embarrassing fun and before long I was in my hard-sleeper bunk crying myself to sleep. I woke up and July had turned to August, the people in my cabin had stayed up talking the entire night, and I was in the Olympic city. Beijing awaited, and unlike my arrival into Xi'an, I was thrilled.
The small plane flew over the flood plains of central Cambodia, the green rice paddies of its western borders, and down to the sprawling city that was Saigon, Ho Chi Minh. From above, it was an interesting study in organic urban design. Streets sprawled along paths of least resistance between commons and the rest, it seemed, sprouted from those in random directions as the buildings alongside grew fat on the traffic of the more successful roads. I was in jeans so that I wouldn’t have to pack my large shoes in my backpack and a long sleeved thermal top to protect against the air conditioning. At 31 degrees in Vietnam’s largest city, both would prove a bit warm. Waiting at customs, an English girl came up to me asking if I was Dean. It turned out I had met her when I was hanging out with James in Siem Reap, however briefly, though I not only didn’t remember that her name was Sanna (short for Susannah) but I couldn’t recall her face. Having quickly admitted this, we passed easily through customs, grabbed our packs, and headed out to negotiate our way into the city’s heart.
We grabbed a taxi for $3 and he drove about 20m before stopping and asking for the money up front. We refused and were about to leave the cab when he grunted and started driving forward. Then we got to the gate and he wanted $5 from each of us to pass through. This hadn’t been negotiated and I felt pretty certain that was steep so we did exit the cab and walk out of the airport roads on foot. On the other side, two motorcycles were waiting and I managed to get them down to 40000/bike ($2.50) but Sanna wasn’t interested in hauling her stuff on a bike so we went in a metered cab. After all our work to avoid being scammed, we went in a metered cab. Of course there’s nothing legitimate about these meters. The second you’re not looking they jump from 60000 to 90000 dong, when the whole ride is supposed to cost about 50000 in the first place. So, our taxi cost $14 in the end which isn’t a lot in the grand scheme of things, but we were charged almost five times the real price and the jerk had the audacity to insist we were short changing him on the currency exchange.
I parted ways with Sanna pretty quickly as she is traveling on vacation money and so is quite happy to stay in places well outside my budget – nevermind transport. I found a place for $8/night right off Pham Nga Lao in the backpacker district, one of the cheapest I could find though quite expensive by my standards. It was at Godmother’s and I liked the staff and the godmother as well. Then I met with Sanna for a late lunch and we began our explorations right away. It’s interesting seeing how other people travel. She had her guidebook in hand, something I almost never do, and it made for a pretty efficient walk to our destination, the Temple of the Jade Emperor. We kind of did a combination of getting the general direction and landmarks en route with choosing streets by feel and rough general direction. It was a good mix and we crossed some interesting shops and other temples en route. The Jade temple itself wasn’t remarkable from without, but inside was great. Incense clouds gave the temple a smoky mystique as most of the light was from candles or streaking through the haze to shed a soft light to the rooms. Everywhere, some very human-looking papier-mâché figures watched with a decidedly sinister gaze.
Making our way back without the map was entertaining. It occurred to me that Saigon might have an English cinema in which I could finally see the new Indiana Jones movie, the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, so after taking a look at Notre Dame cathedral – yes, the French influence is quite strong here – we saw the movie at Diamond Plaza. And I don’t know what the reviews have been, but I really enjoyed it. I admit that it seemed a little more formulaic than the others as well as more unpredictably unrealistic, but overall it was good fun, full of archaeological lore, and action. Did I think Indy should get married? No. Am I glad the hat didn’t end up in Junior’s hands? Yes. Not that I’m so against expanding on the franchise, but there’ll only ever be one Indiana Jones. Perhaps this is how people felt about Bond once upon a time?
The next day was another early one as we headed out to the Mekong Delta. I had been following the Mekong River all the way from the Myanmar-Thailand-Laos border where the mountains of China can be seen in the distance. I spent two days on it from the border of Thailand to Luang Prabang in Laos and ate fish from it while in Vientiane. I slept on an island in Si Pha Don in the south of Laos where the Mekong swelled to 14 km across and crashed on all sides and I sat and watched the sunset on its banks in Phnom Penh. And now here I was at last, where the river meets the sea, where the path of my journey opens and spreads around the world on oceanic currents. But I will not be leaving Asia on these currents, at least not yet. A trip north through Vietnam and China (two countries that I suspect have a lot more in common with each other than anywhere else I’ve been) begins. We took a boat from Saigon down to the Mekong Delta which was the perfect way to conclude it, and then wandered around in that very vast area. In truth I could’ve spent days crisscrossing the delta but we had one and spent it take a little gondola ride among some of the islands, seeing coconut candy, cream, and milk being made, riding bike through the villages, and wandering the markets.
Back in Saigon, I went for dinner with several of the people from the tour at my guesthouse and then for bia huoi (fresh/cheap/draught beer) on one of the small streets nearby. Some of us made plans to investigate the Cu Chi tunnels, where the Viet Cong had really harried the US troops and found ourselves watching a propaganda film the next morning. Cu Chi; A land of peace, love, and the friendliest people on the planet. Cu Chi; A land where honey soaks the valleys and the sun basks local cherries to plump perfection. The picture is painted, rather without subtlety, and then come the satanic Americans and lay the whole thing to waste, throwing out their backs in hearty maniacal laughter as bombs fall from B-52s and childrens’ tears leave craters in the barren earth. After 15 minutes on the unmitigated evil of the US and heroism of the Viet Cong, the show is over and it’s time to go look at some of the horrendous traps that were hidden in the ground for Americans coming through the forest. Spike traps and rolling wheels that pierce groin and belly. I’m not meaning to take sides in this at all; even after all the museums I’ve visited I still don’t feel I know enough of the story. I just hate propaganda, whatever the source.
Reaction aside, the tunnels, like the traps laid for the Americans (and I should add Australians, New Zealanders, Thai, and French) were ingenious. They had systems and levels to keep the water out. They had clever designs to disguise the entrances. And they were designed to make traversing them simple for Vietnamese and difficult for Americans. The latter is a nice way of saying they were built small. I wandered through some of the tunnels and was bent half over trying to cross them – and I wasn’t carrying a backpack or any military gear. Then out of the tunnels and up for a quick drink at the café while AK-47 rounds were being fired nearby with incredible loudness and back to Saigon. I jumped off the bus home at the War Remnants museum and took a sobering look around there. The propaganda here was more subtle, but that didn’t stop scores of scathing anti-American comments in the guestbook, which I perused while waiting out the pouring rain. I was admiring a tank immediately after entering and three English ladies were talking nearby. One of them was venting at Americans quite vehemently on the Vietnam war and then, when asked by her friend why the US even came to Vietnam, admitted she had no idea.
For me, the point of these war museums is to see one side of the war. Ideally, you’d see an unbiased look at both sides, but such a thing doesn’t exist anywhere I’m sure. Certainly we know that there were plenty of people in the US who were against it and in other countries too, but if you’re only reacting to the propaganda, surely you have a bit more education before you weigh in with your opinions? The museum was enlightening for me in that sense, and I thought about England’s colonial times and wondered how ashamed this woman was of the various horrible things that England had done here in Asia in the name of colonialism. This probably wouldn’t have crossed my mind except that I’m reading a novel called The Glass House about that very topic, following a young Indian boy living in Burma through to his children, grand-children, and beyond. It seems as unfair to write or speak scathing remarks about the Americans – many of whom the museum itself documents as being against the war – as it does to hold modern English responsible for things that happened 200 years ago.
But I digress. A visit to the war museum which was enlightening in an unexpected way and then a completely unguided wander first to Diamond Plaza for a trip to Narnia left me exhausted. And so I returned to my guesthouse and then went to the markets for dinner. Food in Vietnam: I’m still figuring out what’s what, but I’ll say right now that they have some exceptional spring rolls. I know, it’s nothing exotic or amazing, but whether it’s the oil or the ingredients or what they’re wrapped in, they are exquisite. Pho, a noodle soup, is typical fare for breakfast and popular everywhere. At the markets, I had some scallops (which were more like oysters than what I know as scallops) in butter, garlic, and chives; I had spring rolls; I had fried morning glory, and I had two drinks. A veritable feast at a total cost of $6. It is my intent to take a cooking course as soon as I find a fairly reasonably priced one to better appreciate what is going into the food and what makes the really good stuff good.
My final day in Saigon I spent wandering the streets, which is a very dangerous thing to do here. Not that you’ll get mugged or anything, no no. You might get pick-pocketed if you’re really unlucky but generally the worst you have to deal with are kids insisting that you need chewing gum from them or sketchy people (all of whom work for the tuk tuk mafia) trying to sell books, carting around portable scales, and you name it. I even saw someone with a virtual aquarium’s worth of live fish making a sale. But these aren’t the dangers either. The danger is crossing. You have never seen such ordered chaos. Motorcycles, cars, busses, all vying for a clear path on the road, weaving in and out, across oncoming traffic and through it, onto sidewalks, you name it. And there is rarely a break in the traffic. What this means is when you want to cross, you must steal a page from the Old Testament and attempt to part the sea. The trick is to cross slowly, making eye contact and looking in the direction of oncoming traffic, and be consistent, predictable, and unswerving. You have to have faith that nobody is going against the flow of traffic where you cross, and you have to know when to turn your head to look in the opposite direction. It is generally before you think, as there is no real dividing line (there is, but traffic’s too heavy to see it and even if you could they still wouldn’t abide by it). Do this well, and you will cross the road. Fail, and a massive bus which stops for no man nothing may be scraping you off the grille.
Saigon was an interesting stop and an exciting change from the rest of Southeast Asia. I had been getting a little tired of the inherent sameness of Cambodia, Laos, and the Thai influence there. Coming to Vietnam is a new experience and has recharged my travel batteries. The people so far have been quite friendly, contrary to popular reports, and the city has offered up plenty of interesting activities. My last day found me in the Post Office admiring the train-station type architecture, and at the Reunification Palace taking a guided tour through the three floors of meeting rooms, suites, ballrooms, and bunkers. Mui Ne was next on the agenda, an impromptu addition inspired by a photo I saw in a travel agency and a realization that I had plenty of time to explore Vietnam so I might as well not rush from highlight to highlight. And so I leave you for now, heading north to the beach and beyond.
I found myself standing on the streets of Vientiane, the capital of Laos, wondering where I was and where I was going. Generally, a bus trip is ended at a known locale or with everyone else at the bus station. This trip ended with a quick turn from a rather majestic looking building into a small side street. It was hardly dire straits. First of all, I knew that we were close enough to the tourist area. Just before our abrupt side-street park, I had seen several places with signs in English for massage, food, and internet. And that majestic building had to be something important: it would surely be on my map. So with a close investigation, I discovered I was at the foot of the Lao Culture Hall and that there were several guesthouses in the streets ahead. I found a pretty decent one for 50,000 kip, the cheapest I was liable to find in the capital, and wandered around. I found myself on the Mekong river again. The Mekong and I had been on a parallel course from the Golden Triangle of Thailand, Myanmar, and Laos down to where I crossed from Thailand to Laos in Huay Xai, sailing two days together to Luang Prabang, and now here. Unfortunately, none of my friends had washed ashore in the capital with me, so I sat on the river having barbecued pork from a food stand, the two of us reflecting on the setting of the sun.
I’m often asked, especially in Asia where such a thing is unheard of amongst locals, how I can travel alone. Who will take my photo?? It has its ups and downs. Ups include a completely selfish itinerary. Where do I want to go today? OK, done. No conferring, no guessing if the other person is being nice or straight, no compromise with anything but your wallet and timetable. You avoid the occasionally awkward, “I want a day to myself” admissions, you meet new people a lot easier (you HAVE to), and if something really goes awry, you can twist the story however you like to anyone back home or simply never admit to it happening. As I enjoy laughing at myself as much as at others, this latter bit almost never happens. The pitfalls are that there are times when it is just you and you don’t want it to be, that you have nobody back home who will enjoy a travel story as much as you, and that things like rooms and transport are invariably more expensive. Vientiane is a place where it is good to have a travel friend, and I was without. I wandered the streets but found nothing social happening. At all. For the first time since… Chiang Mai, I spent the entire day and night without anything more social than a bit of time on Facebook and with Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman creating a Bucket List.
My main plan for Vientiane was to spend as little time in it as possible, so I went to the Chinese Embassy the next day to apply for a visa. First, however, I’d decided to see about changing my flight. As much as I didn’t want to get home in the autumn, I wanted to see the Philippines more, so I spent the morning on the phone with Air Canada and then STA Travel, whom I lovingly consider the most useless travel agents on the planet. Air Canada insisted I had to change flights through the agent, and of course they insisted I had to do it through the airline. I can’t believe I was foolish enough to lump a horrible airline with a semi-sentient travel agency. I managed to get both – after far too much cajoling – to check about changing dated and both reported there was nothing through until September. My own internet check revealed a flight on the 14 of August, but hardly worth the change fee. I am definitely coming home August 5. By now, it was afternoon and I went to the Chinese Embassy, negotiating a return tuk tuk trip for 20000 kip. I was told that even with a ticket out, I would be refused a visa without a ticket in and hotel accommodation booked. What with the Olympics, earthquake, and Tibet, they can’t be too careful this year, I suppose. Luckily, Dan, an American friend from Singapore and Luang Prabang had gone through all this already and had some web links ready for me when I came back from the embassy and started on the flight and hotel bit. It appears my first stop in China is to be Kunming, which should be a good base for exploring Tiger Leaping Gorge and hopefully a good jumping off point.
I came back and had an early dinner at an Indian restaurant that, somewhere, I’d heard was good. There was a German girl sitting alone and I asked to join her and we had a great meal and both took some travel tips with us. More and more people are telling me not to bother with Vietnam, and my new thought is to whirlwind it (unless I like it a lot), get a couple weeks in the Philippines, fly from Manila to Hong Kong and then to Kunming. Borneo is sadly off the list. Maybe. Again, traveling alone, I have nobody to commit this to. We parted ways after dinner and I spent the evening finishing A Darkness at Sethanon, the last book of the Riftwar Trilogy, and doing an awful lot of nothing. I actively looked for a nightlife again, but came home empty once more.
The next morning I was at the Chinese Embassy first thing. To get my visa in one day would require $62! Generally they cost around 20, but whatever, I just wanted it done and I’d heard Vientiane was one of the easier places to do it. Afterwards, dropped off by my 20,000 kip tuk tuk which I had to negotiate rather fiercely even having taken one the day prior, I went to look at the next step. Get out of Vientiane, that much was clear, but then? Pakse was the logical choice. It was where I was originally going to meet up with James for a kayak/canoe trip down the river to the 4000 Islands, again along the Mekong. But it turned out that all the busses there left at night and flights were expensive to say the least. I’m not much of a night bus or sleep en route person, though I’d like to be. But the thought of another day in this town didn’t fill me with excitement. I admit this judgement unfair. I had done no sightseeing; no temple gawking; no excellent food missions; no photography expeditions. But I wanted out all the same and it was just coming up on noon.
I rushed back to the guesthouse and managed a late checkout, went and grabbed lunch, and then the rain began. Deluge is a more accurate word, and I was running late for four o’clock, when I was to pick up my passport. I braved the rain in my poncho and stood getting soaked anyway trying to negotiate the proper price – 20000 – to go to the Chinese Embassy and back again. Standing in the rain and playing this game for the third time only to have him tell me such a thing was impossible and all but call me a liar when I told him this was my third such trip was too much. 20000 – yes or no? I’m getting soaked. No. OK, thanks, bye. Walking away, “OK, OK”. Fine. I walk back the 20m and he waits until I start crawling in before he says 35000. I am too livid to do anything but give him my most evil look and trudge off in the rain after another tuk tuk. Finally, I found someone who would do it for 20000 and we were off.
Getting stamps in passports is always an exciting part of entering a country. But getting a visa in advance – my first ever – is far moreso. A pretty piece of paper granting access to a fairly restricted country not only gives a rather ludicrous sensation of importance, but it also leads to thoughts of future travels: The Great Wall, Three Gorges Dam, Tiger Leaping Gorge, Hong Kong, sometimes thinking about places far away gets the travel bug going again. I’m thinking about the excitement of this and of being on a bus this very night to the south of Laos as I get back to the tuk tuk. Where do I want to go, he asks. I think this very polite as generally they just drop you where they got you, which, this time, was all I wanted anyway. 20000 more, he says. Ah! This old scam. Change the terms after you’ve started your business, but we had definitely agreed on a return trip price. The Chinese Embassy is in the middle of nowhere and why on earth would I book one way?
We argued back and forth for awhile where I not only made clear that we had already agreed on a return price, but that I had only paid 20000 for a return trip the two previous times I’d come. I’d had enough and walked away without giving him a cent. He wants to cheat tourists, he can foot the bill for the trip here or try to find another customer. My certainty in his dishonesty was affirmed all the more by the lack of resistance he gave when I started walking. No trying to get money for the one-way fare or anything, he just drove off. Of course, that could be because he thought I had no idea where I was and would never find a way home or a tuk tuk to take me. He was only half right. Since this was my third trip, and each time the driver had come a different way, I had a pretty good idea of what was where. I walked towards some markets and had a bit of a snack, some sort of rice/fish balls and satay, and walked some more. I ran into another tuk tuk driver that spoke very little English and had his friend negotiate. His English was great, and I explained my three trip story to him and he to the driver but still no budging. I said I didn’t think it was a fair price, thanked the interpreter, and was about to walk when they invited me for beer.
Now that’s a new twist. How much for the beer, I asked with a wry smile, wondering at their game. No, no, I buy the beer. So I sat down with Mr. Air (the interpreter) his girlfriend, and two tuk tuk drivers and between us we had four large Beer Lao and some snacks. Mr. Air was very friendly and chatty, also an engineer, and we got along quite well. He offered me a lift back since he was going that direction anyway, and then ended up giving me a bit of a tour of the city. Walking away from that scamming tuk tuk was the best thing I ever did. Exploring Vientiane more, I began to regret my hasty ticket out that very evening. The city is more like a collection of villages with a commercial centre at its heart, and I feel like with a bike I could’ve seen that side a bit more, not to mention had a good guide in an awesome Russian jeep quite possibly. After looking at Patuxai, the Laos equivalent of the Arc de Triomphe (built out of American cement donated for an airstrip), they dropped me off and I was soon on the bus with a familiar face from tubing, the Aussie girl who’d given me a lift on her tube, Hanna. As well, a Dutch girl named Sacha and a Polish couple.
The bus was beds, not seats, which I thought the greatest thing ever until I learned I’d be sharing it with a stranger. And then, when they boarded, it was two strangers, an older man and his grandson. Luckily they made a big deal about it and I wasn’t especially excited looking, and I got my own bed with probably the most legroom of all. Considering that no Asian trip is without breakdown, we made it uneventfully to Pakse at 7 AM, our only stops were to repair the air conditioner (it got quite hot quite fast in there) and in a couple cities. I wasn’t sure whether to spend the day in town or not, so I just tagged along with the Polish couple to go up the Bolaven Plateau to a town called Tadlo. I was going to go up there anyway, might as well keep on moving and get there today.
Although I had friends this time, it was a quiet place with little to do. We settled in at Tim’s Guesthouse and I wandered up along the river past some waterfalls and into a small village with goats and chickens and pigs running everywhere. I didn’t mean to get here, but as I walked up the riverbank I heard a giggling and some kids were running away at the sight of me. I stopped for a bit and they curiously looked around the corner and when I turned to look at them, off they went again. Then back once more to look and I thought it’d be funny to chase them so I pretended to start and they took off laughing. So it was I ended up in this quiet village with nobody that spoke English, kicking a wicker ball around with the kids, taking their photos and letting them take mine (none turned out) and so on. As I was leaving I noticed that one kid hadn’t run after me, he was still working on pounding rice into flour in a mortar and pestel. I took up the other one and helped him for a bit, mostly making a big show of it for the other kids. I made a sort of game of it and when I left, all were crowded around for their turn grinding.
And this is where, for now, the story grinds to a halt. I enjoyed my evening among the clouds on the plateau, and a nice swim in a waterfall after crossing what has to be one of the scariest bridges I’ve ever crossed. The evening was quiet which suited fine because it had been a long two days. Plus, the next morning I would be heading back down to Pakse, back down to the Mekong, which is starting to feel like an old friend. Maybe James wasn’t around, but I was still interested in a trip down the river to the 4000 Islands, 3 day trip or not. Either way, my fate and that of the Mekong would be the same. We would both flow through Pakse, down to the 4000 Islands, and from there into Cambodia before going out to sea. What lay downstream precisely, one never knows, but adventure is sure to be found.
It was April Fool’s Day when we left Taman Negara, the dark beating heart of Malaysia and one of the world’s oldest rainforests. Coincidentally, it was the name of the book I was reading at the time, a book by Bryce Courtenay (authour of The Power of One, which I’d thoroughly enjoyed). This was not a work of fiction however, it was the story of Courtenay’s youngest son, Damon, and his life growing up with hemophilia. Hemophilia occurs in different degrees; Damon’s cases was ‘classic’ or full-blown, meaning he had no blood-clotting Factor VIII whatsoever and required on average three transfusions per week. It was an enlightening book, I’d always assumed it meant that cuts and scratches were the problem here. Really, it’s the fact that small capillaries burst all the time, especially in joints, almost randomly – and of course bruises, which are essentially internal bleeds, are no picnic either. As a result of one of these many, many life-saving transfusions containing HIV, his life is forever changed and, ultimately, ended. It sounds gloomy, and certainly it doesn’t conjure images of hand-holding and skipping in the park, but there is, in spite of it all, hope, love, and the struggle for life, however tragic a life it may have been, which all conspire to produce a life-affirming and heart-warming read. I don’t expect this blog to have any such affect, dear reader, but nevertheless, let’s get out of the dark brooding forest to the sunny, warm, east Malaysian coast.
Kristoffer and I grabbed the 9:30 AM bus out of the jungle to the town of Jerantut. Thus we’d escaped the jungle. Not very epic, now, is it? In Jerantut, we discovered there was no bus out to the east coast, or Kuantan, our next transfer point, until 1:00 that afternoon. See, while my original plan and most itineraries travel up through the rainforest on the jungle rail, the fact was that I had done the best section of that already and also wanted to get off the tourist trail a bit to, hopefully, some hidden east coast gems. So we waited, or rather, Kris did while I spent a bunch of time on the internet getting FrankBlack.Net up to date. A new podcast, a new album, some singles, a news release, and my battery was soon depleted. We grabbed lunch, which was pretty good actually (I had a chicken noodle soup and the broth was terrific) and hopped back on the bus for Kuantan. We were trying to make it to Marang, up the east coast halfway to the back-on-the-trail destination of the Perhentian islands. It looked nice on the map and was nearby to an island a local had recommended to us, Pulau (Island) Kapas.
Unfortunately our arrival in Kuantan was just a little too late to catch the last bus up to Marang. We might have made it, but I had a craving for substantial quantities of beef and, for some reason, a root beer float, and there was an A&W laying in wait for us on arrival. By the time we walked to the bus station it was 20 minutes after the last bus had left. We quite liked Kuantan in its way, and weren’t too upset to stay here. We’d passed a pretty mosque on the way from the national to the local bus station, we’d found the people friendly and, for a big city especially, surprisingly excited to chat with westerners. Our excitement dipped somewhat when we found our Lonely Planet recommended hotel, a not-really-so-cheap dive that smelled faintly of urine and could’ve used a Lucille Ball style washing machine in every room. Maybe two. Still, it was the only place around for miles so we took our room and got exploring anywhere else.
We had a beer at a Chinese restaurant, found out where a disco was, and, heading in that general direction, stumbled across a bar. Here, we were hustled pretty quickly. A couple girls outside, certainly of no interest, were flagging us in and we were looking for another place to have a drink more lively than a Chinese restaurant. We thought that one beer here couldn’t hurt and soon we had a bucket in front of us. Fine. A few beers wouldn’t hurt either. The waitress poured our beer and then hers. Fine. A small glass of beer won’t hurt. They stood by us and pretended to be interested, for which I was both uncomfortable and grateful. First of all, we weren’t remotely interested. They were basically prostitutes in dress and action. Uncomfortable. Secondly, it was all an act calculated to make some other demographic, such as the guy sitting at a table near ours, continue to drink and patronize. For this I was grateful as it eased the discomfort.
We found our way out of there very quickly and found the disco which had a pricey cover and was dead. We also checked out the nearby swing club, equally dull. Our filthy bed awaited. First thing the next morning, we were out of Kuantan. I found an entry about Cherating that struck my interest and we made our way there. It was a quiet town, almost looking deserted perhaps because of the time of year. The beach was pretty nice though, and I had some fantastic roti canai (flat bread and curry sauce). We’d thought to stay but, while quiet and devoid of tourists, the town had nothing more to offer than solitude. I felt sure we could do better. We had lunch and read on the beach for a spell then headed up on the 2:00 bus to Marang. It took just about three hours and we stopped in the market for some delicious satay crab and fish. There were no boats left going to the island of Kapas that evening so we tried to catch a ride on a laundry skiff to no avail. It did, however, net us a ride from a local heading up in that direction though we paid full price (15 RM) for it.
And suddenly, we were in paradise. Pulau Kapas, stretching out before us as we left the Malaysian coast was exciting before we made landfall. On arrival we negotiated a dorm bed for 15 RM per night at the Captain’s Longhouse, right on the beach. Dinner with the captain and his crew was around 9:00 and cost 10 RM. Our beds were equipped with mosquito nets (which we’d discover to be essential), the place was clean, and our host was very hospitable. And, did I mention, we were his only guests? The island is very very quiet at this time of year, as they’ve only been out of monsoon season for 2 weeks. And both Kristoffer and I love it. We explored the island a bit before it got dark and had a drink on the beach as the stars came out. We joined the captain and some other locals for a delicious dinner and it felt very much like being a guest at his home, dining with family friends such as the dive shop crew, the chef, and some helpers, more than going to a restaurant. Dinner was fried whole fish, rice, curry, veggies, and is probably the most home-cooked thing I’ve eaten since I don’t know when. The whole fish in particular, which I’m not usually a fan of, was amazing and I went through a half-ocean worth.
We were up early the next morning, had breakfast (more roti canai, disappointing compared with my last exposure to this dish) and sat on the beach reading and waiting for the tide to come in to do some snorkeling. The captain took me for a tour and to meet the others on the island and I discovered another bar on the island with some great board games, particularly Settlers, which I’ve always wanted to try. Kris and I snorkeled part of the north side of the island though the sun was very strong and we cut it a bit short, then went back and played some Settlers until around 6 when the mosquitoes came out. He won every time, but I quite like the game. We went back and had dinner with the captain again, then returned hoping to find some company.
There were some other Danes and Dutch around, but they were, for want of another word, complete rejects. When we cracked open Settlers while they ate they made fun of us for playing it as a two-player game as though we were deaf or spoke no English. When I interrupted to explain that they were having dinner and we’d be quite happy to have them join us afterwards, they were dumbfounded and one of them recovered enough to say they’d played the game to death. Too bad, we’d been looking forward to playing the game properly, as it’s meant to be played with at least three players. We did invite them another time and still no. Eventually, as we played our fourth game, one of the girls came up and quite abruptly asked how many more games we were going to play, as though we’d been hogging it all night. Again, would you like to join us was a swing and a miss. Three strikes and we were out. They would not, they’d just been waiting all night (approximately one hour) for us to finish. OK, I understood. They wanted to play amongst themselves and didn’t want us in the game. Sure, we had it first, sure, we’d invited them to join, but now she was coming up and demanding that we stop so they can play and no, we weren’t invited. And how dare we be so rude as to play their game!? The last person this bitchy I’d met was a Swedish girl named Hannah that I worked with in Perth. But at least she had the excuse of being the only short, dumpy brunette in a country of beautiful tall blondes (who were mostly nice, I might add). Kristoffer still didn’t quite get it and asked if we could join them. Of course not. We could play chess. And we did; yet again I lost.
April 4 and our third day on Pulau Kapas brought the rain. Not torrential, just enough to discourage heavy exploration. Snorkeling would still be no problem, after all the water temperature is 30 on the surface and 28 not far below. It’s almost too warm. The sun came out soon anyway, and we made our way to the southern side of the island, hoping for some shark and turtle sightings. The visibility was pretty poor but it was a nice walk and we did spot some eels and the usual plentitude of fish. Back to the lodge, back for a game of Settlers which - finally - I won, and back for our goodbye dinner. Captain Sharrif Abbas and his staff went all out. We had sweet and sour and fried fish (both great), chap chai veggies, steamed veggies, rice, two different curries, and it was easily the best meal I've had in a long time. We stayed up late chatting with the captain before finally going to sleep.
The next morning we caught the 9:30 boat back to civilization, specifically Marang. We were hoping to catch a boat up river to a small fishing village, but with only two of us the cost was 100 RM to get there. Nope, we'll pass, thanks. So up to Kuala Terengganu we went on a public bus, packed like sardines, where we were greeted by a friendly local who 'loves tourists'. What he loves is getting money for giving them rides, it only took a couple minutes to get there, but that said he was happy enough to point us in the right direction and admit it was too close to worry about a car. One McDonalds sundae later (I said before, it's hot!) and we checked into our hostel. This town is famed for its cultural wares, arts, and foods. Kristoffer and I split up as my internet requirements were much steeper than his after several days in isolation. But I did get a bit of exploring done before we reunited and trekked to the south end of town for the food markets. It was a little late by the time we got there and somethings weren't available and others quite quiet. When there's nobody eating it can be hard to guess which places are good. We took a chance and failed. Horrible food. We didn't come all that way to have horrible food, though, so we found another place and tried again. Bingo! The food was great (though I was stuffed) and the waiter sat with us and taught us a bunch of Bahasa. Way to salvage the night!
Another day, another island. The following morning we boarded the bus to Kuala Besut and from there grabbed a ferry to Pulau Perhentian Kecil (literally, small Perhentian Island). We didn’t quite literally get a ferry to the island, however, much to our anger. Instead, after an unannounced park fee, a departure that was 30 minutes late, and a trip time that took 1.5 hours instead of the 30 minutes it was supposed to (meaning that we would’ve made it there faster with the cheaper slow boat) we arrived in the middle of the sea. From here, again completely unannounced, we had to pay for a water taxi to take us to the mainland. Now, when you buy a ticket for any other form of transport, you get taken to the place you paid to go. Otherwise, what did I pay for? In Malaysia, and I’d soon discover Thailand as well, they take you most of the way and somewhere that could only in the vaguest sense be described as your destination. Imagine boarding a plane and flying over the destination city and being told you had to pay $2 million for a parachute to actually GET to the city. Quite what you would otherwise do is beyond anyone. Jump? Sit stubbornly on the plane as it returned to where you started? Thankfully for Malaysian air travelers, it is impossible to pick up new passengers without landing.
I should mention I almost didn’t pay except that it occurred to me that my departure would require the water taxi all over again. Heaven forbid I get trapped in paradise! And it was a paradise. We had to walk the whole of Long Beach to find accommodation of a budget-nature but our last stop was a success. We stayed at a place called Rock Garden (known to locals as Rock Bottom for its price and probably the shanty hut accommodation as well) for 10 Ringgit per night each. It was a shanty hut, but it had a view to more than offset that, perched as it was up the hill. This also afforded a nice breeze, all too important in a room with limited hours of electricity and even then only to turn on a small light. Not by switch, mind, not in this establishment. To activate the light in Rock Garden, you got on the bed and screwed in the bulb. Or you got your quite-tall friend to do so. Still, the view! The view! Sitting on our balcony and reading was a thing of beauty.
We had dinner at a café called Daniel’s, which is sandwiched between two other lesser cafés, and wondered where everybody was. The Perhentians were hard and fast on the Malaysian backpacker circuit and there should be plenty of people here to hang out with. A couple girls did sit at a nearby table and after their dinner and ours, we asked to join them. So there was some other company to be had on the island, just not the amount we expected. We sat around the fire at a nearby bar and drank a few brew before retiring. I’d booked a dive for first thing in the morning, even before Kristoffer started his classes for his diving cert. It was to be my first wreck dive, called the Vietnamese Wreck, which went down when ferrying Vietnamese refugees. The visibility was poor but the dive was pretty cool in spite of the fact that I decided to join another group by accident going into the cavernous hull.
That afternoon I dove another wreck, one much more famous. It is a wrecked sugar ship, and while the circumstances surrounding its sinking are foggy at best, the water surrounding the ship was anything but. We had great visibility and saw schools of barracudas and all manner of creature. You could see the wreck from the surface and we descended the 24m to the large screw sitting idly since that fateful day in 2000. Coming down on the wreck I felt as though I was watching a documentary or something. The wreck sat there, rust red on a dark blue backdrop and as we descended we cleared the ridge created where the hull meets the deck in a largely intact railing and looked straight down the deck into the deeper blue below, as though doing a flyby. This dive, as you probably guessed, was excellent.
When we returned to land, I met up with Kristoffer who’d just done his first day learning to dive. He was pretty excited already and I suppose I was reminded of how lucky we were to be able to do what we were doing. I waited at Daniel’s where I met the owner, Amin, and chatted with him for some time before Kristoffer returned. Amin was telling me about his younger days bartending in Kuala Lumpur and how he still makes the best Long Island Iced Tea. Unfortunately, he can’t sell alcohol at his restaurant as the land is owned by the government, so I never did get to verify this. He also told me that even if he wanted to open a bar, because he’s a muslim, he would not be allowed ownership by the government. Nevermind that his interpretation of things are different from the official muslim stance of the nation, nevermind that he is supposed to be able to practice any religion freely, if he’s muslim, the laws for him are the old ones. Were he to have been born any other religion, however, no problem at all. An interesting double standard to say the least.
Amin whipped us up a BBQ that was delicious and really looked after us now that we knew each other a bit. I had squid and king fish, Kris had shark, and it was all delicious. The cost was basically $5 and we got drink, rice, veggies, and fresh catch from that day. You can’t beat that! I took a break from diving the next morning and went on a snorkel trip instead. 40 RM ($12) for an all day boat trip to six sites and a stop in a fishermans’ village for lunch. We had a good crew going out and saw some sharks, barracuda, blowfish, clown fish, and turtles. One poor turtle was unfortunately chased around the sea by 9 snorkellers for 10 minutes, a scene that must have looked hilarious from the air but decidedly less so from below. I made friends with two English girls on the boat, Sophie and Sara, and Kristoffer and I met them for dinner along with a rather aloof and unusual San Francisco native named Noah. And again, we stuck with our choice of Amin. Apparently Kristoffer had shown up in the morning with only 10 minutes to eat and asked for something quick. 2 minutes later, Amin was back with some rice and chicken that must have been for someone else, wrapped in foil and ready to go. And again, the food was excellent – in honour of all the barracuda around, I decided to try it and I must report it is quite a beautiful fish.
The five of us sat around at the nearby beach bar until Noah finally disappeared and then the four of us got along famously and had a great night chatting and watching fire dancing and looking up at the stars. They’re quite clear here, incidentally, and finally, finally, I saw the Big Dipper. It has been a while. It really was a special feeling when I looked opposite and saw the southern cross at the same time. What a feeling, to see both at once. I truly am at the equator, at the centre of the world, and for some reason I felt larger than life when I should have felt very small and insignificant. Orion was hunting around between the two constellations, ever hunting, and perhaps I felt something like that. We watched the sunrise (it was a late night, I told you) and I definitely slept in until about noon. I did nothing today but relax around the beach. And eat. I had lunch at Amin’s and he brought me what he considers his favourite shake, something he asked me not to divulge, essentially chocolate-banana with a secret twist or two, without my even asking. I should also mention that every newcomer to this island inevitably argues the merits of the various shakes and their superiorities. Mars, Snickers, or M&Ms? It turned out to be Mars, but Amin’s is a close second.
We did have dinner elsewhere my final night, a restaurant up on the hill with a nice view. We were stuck in the middle and a movie was on (300 – it still amazes me that such a small number of men could change the course of the world forever), so no view but for some Brits masquerading as Greeks. On top of that, the food was expensive and not especially great. We went down to the beach bar afterwards and had a couple drinks, Kristoffer and I, and swung by the English girls to say bye to them too. I had been traveling a long time with Kristoffer, and now again I was traveling solo. I had one more dive booked before I caught the noon ferry back to shore to do first, however. The kind people at Matahari dives had actually rearranged their dive schedule to accommodate me since I’d been trying to get to the most famous dive in the area, Temple of the Sea. That’s how people are here, very helpful and friendly. Although the girl that made it happen, really, was a Canadian I’m proud to say.
So it was that I was on a boat at 9AM racing for Temple. We saw any number of things there, more barracuda, sea pillows, fish feeding on other fish, nudi branches, and we had great visibility. I was also impressed with my air supply. There were two of us with Hugo, our dive master, and the other guy went up pretty early while I waited at the bottom. Hugo and I spent another 20 minutes down there. I signalled that I was down to 50 bar as we were nearing about 8m, so we swam around at 5m for our safety stop and then just kept swimming. I was fine with it. At 5m, even if I ran out of air, I could do a straight ascent without a problem, assuming I didn’t want to grab Hugo’s octopus. 40 bar, Hugo asked if I wanted to go up. I waved him off and he laughed, or bubbled I guess, underwater, and we continued to watch big fish devour small until 30 bar when finally I thought, okay, we should ascend. We were the first two in the water and the last out, which is definitely a first for me, and I was smiling ear to ear at this and also all the things we’d seen underwater.
I got back to land and ran to Daniel’s for a quick brunch and to say bye and thanks to Amin. I had some Mee Goreng (fried noodles and veggies) and ran back, as it was ten minutes to 12. I quickly packed up my sleeping bag, which was laying in the sun to kill off any bed bugs that may have made it a home and other things, said bye to everyone at the dive shop, and ran to the beach to find I’d missed the boat. Amin came down from his restaurant next door seeing me all laden up and convinced the guy to speed me over to the big island to catch it before it went for the mainland. So it was that me and a Frenchman who, in a hurry though we were and with a much greater distance to go, was insisting he should still only pay the regular price. I told him we had further to go, no time to do it in, and to get in or catch the 4 o’clock, so he jumped in. I think he didn’t understand the situation at the time. The driver was asking us to pay him so I grabbed my wallet and out flew my ferry ticket. We circled back quickly, time eating away, and I managed to pluck it from the surface just in time. Back around again and towards the big island. The ferry was there and other boats were just finishing dropping off their passengers, but they must’ve seen us and waited.
Whew. We made it to the mainland. Talk about a busy morning. From there, I shared a taxi with a Dutch guy and two Irish backpackers to the border of Thailand. Our cabbie was pretty funny and interesting and the trip went really quickly. Share taxis are great in that they cost the same as a bus but get you there in 1/3 of the time. We crossed the very hot border without issue and grabbed four motorbikes to take us to the train station. With 10 minutes to spare, we boarded the train north to Hat Yai. Every step of the way, it was like the trip was pre-ordained to maximize efficiency and reduce waiting. We were now in Thailand, speeding north. At some point, a young girl, whom I thought was meant to be where I was sitting put her bag beside me. Then she walked down the aisle behind me. The Thai man across explained she was going to sit with her friends. Meanwhile, I had a bag that wasn’t mine beside me and when I looked back, she was nowhere in sight. This made me nervous, and with good reason. The Thai border is where most of the country’s muslims live, many of whom want independence, and already a few bombs have gone off. She seemed innocent enough, but who knows. It could be drugs or something else I wouldn’t want to have look to be mine. Drug dealers, by the way, are shot on sight in this country. But this story will continue next time. Take care until then!
As Christmas approached, I began to accept more and more that there would be no Christmas here for me. In addition to being all about family, all the usual cues were absent. Snow, cold, Christmas carols (I don’t listen to the radio, so I don’t hear anything of the sort), all absent. The decorations are definitely up, but I just wasn’t feeling it. The restaurant was busy, definitely that’s a Christmas-time cue, and then it completely died the weekend following Christmas. Then Christmas day came. I dressed for work like any other day, went downstairs, and Daren and Janine were sitting down by the Christmas tree wearing their red hats and telling me Santa had been by. And he got me a red hat too, not to mention a book called The Kite Runner. I have to say that this gesture and waking up to find people in the home besides me made me feel like it was indeed Christmas and there was something special about today. But special or not, I still had to go to work...
I got there early because it was going to be a very big day. And a hot day. In fact, it was 44 degrees Celsius, setting a record and giving Perth the distinction as being the hottest city on Earth that day. I showed up early so I could use the phone to call home, where it was still Christmas Eve, and wish my family a merry Christmas, and then it was time to run around and get everything done. Santa needed to know where to stand, what to do. Christmas menus needed to be on the tables. More salt and peppers needed to be found. Since we were adding a ‘starter’ course, more entrée cutlery needed to be found, too. And then it was noon, we opened the doors, and things went just fine. Sure, the power went out for about 45 minutes thanks to the fact that all our coolers and air conditioning overloaded the circuits, but we trucked on and everybody was quite happy with their meals. Even given the fact that they had prepaid for their meals and only had to settle their drink tab, we still got $600 in tips, which is pretty unheard of here in Australia.
We worked until about 5:30, and then Adam, Cam, and I caught a cab to Scannell’s where a Christmas party was just warming up. A bit of a swim, a few drinks, some bbq, and since we had Boxing Day off for our staff party, Cam and I didn’t want to get too revved up today, so we grabbed a cab home to rest for what would be our real Christmas. Doug and Tom arranged to pick me up and they were a bit late. We were supposed to be at the East St Jetty by 10:30 AM and we were picking up another couple at that point instead. I was worried we were going to miss the boat but we got there just in time to help load up. Whew. It was another scorcher, 45 degrees today, a beautiful shiny day to spend on a boat on turquoise waters sailing out to an island and going for a swim and BBQ. This day was a true Australian Christmas and I was so happy to have been here for it. We set off to the island and parked. You could see a bunch of sea lions sunning themselves on the beach, so I took a swim out there. I wish I could’ve brought my camera, I would’ve had some amazing photos, they really didn’t like being approached TOO closely, but I could get within 10 metres of them sunning and others alert on guard and it was just amazing to me to have them sitting there in the wild and to be right there watching.
I also donned my red santa hat and went for a swim and Crown Lager in the perfect waters and of course took part in the delicious buffet Warwick had provided. Steaks, scallops, prawns, lamb, salads, you name it, it was there. We drank champagne, we ate like kings, and sat on the beautiful waters enjoying the fruits of a very busy Christmas season. But all good things must come to an end, and we found the shore far too soon and after a bit of a situation involving someone stealing drugs from the ship’s medical kit, we were at the Newport having a few drinks, then at Megan’s house making what I can only imagine would be a horrible mess for the next day. I feel pretty bad for her.
I had the next day for recovery, and Daren made dinner, I made dessert, and we say around chatting before going to sleep. Then, some packing, and I was on a plane on the 28th for Sydney, where I would be celebrating New Years Eve. Virgin Blue, not as bad as I thought it would be, they even gave us free TV since the reception was so poor, but after watching a segment on an assassination in Pakistan – I’m so disconnected from world events here, both a nice feeling and disconcerting – I wound up typing up this blog and captioning some photos anyway. My pre-New Years resolution is to get this site back up to date before I leave Sydney, and I’m pretty on track to doing that I think. Anyway, I arrived in Sydney at 7PM and the North Sydney line was closed so I wound up on a bus and then not knowing exactly where I was. Carrying around all my stuff and trying to figure it out with sunburnt shoulders wasn’t as pleasant as it might’ve been, but I found Diane’s finally, and had some nice wine (yup, Rockford) with her and Craig.
The next day I went and picked up some hiking shoes since there were boxing day sales still on; I’ll need them for hiking in Tazzy and probably Asia, too. Then I met up with Jill, whom I met up in Darwin back in September, and Mel for some drinks in Darling Harbour. They were off for dinner and I decided that I’d watch Beowulf in the IMAX since I’d been wanting to see how this “new 3D” phenomenon I’ve been hearing so much about was going to pay off. To be honest, the movie itself wasn’t that interesting and the technology, while definitely adding a dimension to the show, didn’t seem that incredible to me. I guess years of 3D at theme parks and whatever has made it seem gimmicky instead of immersive, which is something I don’t think you want when you’re trying to generate verisimilitude. Maybe as more movies are made in 3D it won’t be as distracting. The next day was more catch up, another movie (No Country for Old Men) which was excellent, and grabbing supplies for my New Years Eve picnic. I got a hold of Andrew, who was coming down from Newcastle, Nathalie, who was coming up from Melbourne, and the English girls, and it seemed that everyone was content to meet at Mrs. Macquaries Chair, which is just as well, because that’s where I was going regardless.
So I woke up at 8AM the next morning, got ready and packed for the day, and was at the ferry by 9, though one didn’t come until 9:30. I knew the line would be growing and I really wanted to stake out a good spot – the gates opened at 10. I made my way straight to the line up and discovered it was HUGE. From the front gates I though I could see the end of the line way down the street, but it was just a slight curve and it kept going down Art Gallery Road, past the gallery, into Domain park, and wrapping around. I thought about walking all the way back and trying to sneak in, but no, it was my own fault for getting here at 9:45 instead of 7:45, so I bit the bullet and joined the line at the back. I made quick friends with some Americans in front of me and we had a pretty good time even waiting in line for the 3000 people ahead of us to have their bags searched. It took an hour and a half to get to the front, and they didn’t even search my backpack, I definitely could’ve brought in some champagne or spirits, but oh well. We spent a bit of time debating spots and I found one that I could fit that had a great view, but I couldn’t fit all my newfound American friends with me nor even any of the people that were supposed to be meeting me later, so I went for a different spot with them which still had a pretty decent view though no breeze. And it was HOT. This was probably the best decision I made that day, however, as it was good fun throughout the afternoon.
The park kept filling throughout the day and soon we had a friendly guy from Finland in front of us, Andrew showed with his Columbian friend, Nicholas, Nathalie showed with (eventually) her German friends, and some of Amber’s friends showed too. Although we were at the park 14 hours before midnight, the time flew. We played cards, chatted, drank, and joked around. Every hour from 1PM onward, something different was happening. The theme was “Having the time of our lives” and it was very appropriate for the day. Skywriters writing things like “Time Flies”, tiger moth biplanes doing stunts, cannon firings, and the list goes on. The sunset, a boat light show/parade, and then the first major event, the family fireworks at 9PM. Well. They were great. They put an hourglass on the bridge this year and it dropped a little ‘sand’ grain every five minutes until 9 and then thereafter. I was thinking they were going to have a tough time topping the family fireworks. Amber and I rejoined the gang from our vantage point and hung around until 10. Then, I decided I wanted to get a good spot now for the midnight fireworks, so I went with Nathalie and got a spot right on the water, or as close as we could get at any rate. Nobody else was interested apparently, but it was so worth it.
The countdown began and every five minutes another grain of sand and the circle around the clock lit 1/12 more. It was getting very exciting. 15 minutes left. 5 minutes. And then the pillars on the bridge started their countdown… 5… 4… 3… 2… 1. Pandemonium. Fireworks everywhere. “Happy New Year!” being screamed by 22000 people also in the park with us. Fireworks off the bridge, the hour glass turned over, and kept turning and then spinning, the water reflecting the shining skies. Off boats to the right, and in the distance, far away but over the opera house, the main firework show (they do the same fireworks throughout the harbour, except for the bridge, which was a special treat for those in the centre). And then they started launching them off skyscrapers in the city centre. It was a panorama of explosions and beauty and it just kept escalating. Especially the fireworks off the boats, it just seemed like they could get any bigger or more frequent, but they did. I tried to capture a bit with video and photos, but without a tripod and an ultra-wide angle lens, I might as well have been trying to capture the entirety of the Great Wall of China from 30m back. And then came the finale, which literally dropped my jaw and camera. A ‘waterfall’ of white lava off the bridge, fireworks in every direction, colour, shape, and size. 3D fireworks. All at once and the most amazing pyrotechnic display I’ll probably ever see. The New Year had reached Sydney and I thought there wasn’t a better way to conclude a year down under or start 2008. This was the grand feeling we always try to get on New Years but are always disappointed by when it turns out to be like any other night on the town.
We left the park and Andrew and I crashed at Amber’s place, the York hotel right in the city. The next morning we had breakfast with her and her parents and they all went to Manly, which I was going to join them on, but by the time I’d ferried to North Sydney, changed, got my swimming stuff, showered, and got a ferry back, it was going to be 5:30 before I got there. I got on the ferry anyway, thinking I’d grab a bite in Manly anyway if I missed them, but then as I sat on the ferry it was delayed and more delayed and 30 minutes later I decided I’d had enough. So I went and saw another movie, The Golden Compass which was surprisingly good. I’m definitely looking forward to a sequel. I saw Bee Movie the next day, which was likewise good, clean, Seinfeldian fun - the glut of movies is in part because I had a bit of fever and achyness and wasn't up for much else. When life gives you lemons, go see a movie! But my holidays have been anything but a lemon. The final two days were, admittedly, marred by some severe technical issues with FrankBlack.Net, but my stay in Sydney comes to an end tomorrow morning, when I fly to Tasmania for a couple weeks of exploration, outdoors, and hopefully not too much internet. But the conclusion of this post marks the first time my blog has been up to date since the beginning of August, so at least all my work has come to something. I'll let you know what my Tasmanian adventures come to soon.
We left Broome just after nine by the time we’d made some stops. Our group, this ‘we’ I spoke of, seems pretty good and adventurous, but I guess that’s what you’d expect from a bunch of people who answered a poster on the hostel wall. Greg, the organizer of this southbound adventure to Perth, worked with a company called All-Terrain Safaris doing trips across the Kimberly. Normally, as the wet season sets in, the vans get shipped back to Perth by train for service and storage, but he wanted to meander down the west coast. He struck a deal with the tour company’s owner that he would fill the bus to pay for gas and extra stress on the vehicle, and he could take anyone willing on the adventure. An open itinerary, estimating about two weeks to Perth, stopping whenever and wherever the mood struck us, veering off the beaten tourist path anywhere possible, and with some experienced guides and surfers. Estimated retail price: about $2000. Actual cost: $450 plus any food, park, and accommodation costs (which totaled about $200). If it seems to good to be true, you understand my hesitation to give my money all up front.
But it was true, and I was on a bus that morning, and after a few stops, it was off to… the middle of nowhere. One of Greg’s friends, Johno, had flown up from Perth and took some photos out the window of the plane – a little ‘advanced scouting’ if you will. So we took an overgrown track and cut across fields in the middle of nowhere to wind up in the most spectacular and isolated place. There was a massive expanse of pristine white beach, with no sign aside from a washed up buoy that any man had ever set foot here. We stood on red cliffs with moon pools below, looking on it in awe. A little further up was a tidal river that in low tide looked like a brown Whitehaven beach. Hermit crabs were scurrying everywhere and we set up camp. Greg caught a mudcrab, we watched the sunset, had dinner (including mudcrab), sat around a huge fire telling jokes, and our first day ended with fifteen of us asleep on the beach… only 14 would be there when I awoke in the morning.
That’s because Johno was already up and around, of course. People weren’t disappearing. At least not yet… we left (all 15 of us) with apparently no idea how to find the road or civilization again. At several points in the journey we weren’t on any track at all, just driving across the open savannah in a direction we hoped was southeast. We hit a path, drove past some cattle stations (we had to be careful as we were quite possibly trespassing at this point), decided to head to the beach and drive up it to 80 mile beach, hopefully arriving at a caravan park before running out of fuel. It would be a close call to be sure. We found a road that looked big enough to take us to the highway, then, after a stop for fuel, 80 Mile Beach! I was feeling lazy and we couldn’t really swim because of catfish, rays, and jellyfish, so I actually went for a very short jog. As extensive as the beach was, there were people fishing along what seemed the entire stretch. One of the more experienced ones had caught something so we watched him wrestle a big ray. Mike, Greg, and I kicked the soccer ball around, Nathalie and Greg played an improvised version of Connect 4 with red and white shells, and we drove to the middle of nowhere with a gift of some fish from our fisher friend. On through some really cool terrain, then we got camp set up in the middle of nowhere once more, then Johon and I made some sauce for the rich fish (featuring French onion soup mix, thanks Johon!), and the day was won.
Our first stop the next morning was Marble Bar, the hottest town in Australia. It once went 120 days without the temperature dropping below 40 – day or night. At 9AM, it was 36 degrees in the shade… bear in mind it’s early spring. There are a couple of pools that are pretty dry and dirty but regardless, more of the group went for a swim in Marble Bar pool. Then, after a bit of a chat about the old gold mine with a local, off to Karijini National Park, where we’d spend a couple nights. I played my new harmonica with Karin and figured out O When the Saints and then I learned some body slapping from her and a beer game from Julian. Leave it to the Germans.
We did some great hikes through Karijini’s many gorges the next morning, Oct 4 and our fourth day already. We walked up and down Fortescu Falls, swam in Circular Pool and the almost perfect Fern Pool. We did even more hiking in Karijini on the 5th, making our way down Hancock Gorge which is probably the reason Karijini is as famous as it is. Hancock was a great hike right down a waterfall into Kermit’s Pool. Some of the climbing was pretty treacherous, maybe 3 cms of ledge and a 20m-30m drop, but it was worth the vertigo. Julian and I explored further down to a place called The Chute, which is a nice visual description of the place. It was like canyoning in Switzerland all over again! But soon we had to leave and make our way to Exmouth. Yesterday, the game was anyone who used the words “beer”, “mine”, and “sorry” had to do 5 pushups, situps, or jumping jacks (I probably did about 50). Today, it was writing numbers on the wheel and when we stopped, the number on the ground had to pick a dare from the hat.
The trip to Exmouth was not a short one, and we stopped in Tom Price for a taste of ‘civilization’ and supplies for dinner. It turned out we didn’t need it after all, as we hit an emu on the road which gave us all a jolt. Johno (who else) ran out and carved it up for dinner while a few of us did some repairs. So dinner tonight was free from nature, roasted in the fire and pretty good considering it was roadkill. Check that one off the list, another first. Those keeping score will be happy to know that I had my first shower since Broome that night, too.
Our sixth day came too early, probably because of the party late the night before, and I had my second shower to wake up. So fresh! I’d wanted to stop in Exmouth, which we made it to by midday, and do a SCUBA dive, but there were only five of us interested, and Greg figured we’d have just as good a dive out of Coral Bay. Plus, we were already running behind schedule, almost halfway done and far from halfway down, so fair enough, but I was kind of choked since this was one of the main things on my list. We drove through a canyon en route to Exmouth that reminded me a lot of Drumheller back home, up to the tip of the peninsula, and down along the beach until we found a great site for camp. We set up shop and I BBQ’d some steaks, which were pretty good if I may say. Better still, though, were the chocolate bananas cooked in tin foil on the coals. You leave the skin on, slit the banana, shove chocolate in there, and voila… tastiness!
We spent the next morning in this little cove just outside the Ningaloo National Park – or so we thought. I went for an early snorkel and the surge was wild. The reef itself wasn’t so great as the beach were on is used to launch boats it seems, but it was nice to get up on a beach and snorkel. I took my harmonica and went for a walk up the beach, playing for about 30 mins or so and I felt very carefree doing that. I’m getting attached to it, I guess. When I got back to camp around noon, they were packing things up instead of getting started on lunch. We apparently slept somewhere that was no only in the park (though just barely) but also not a campsite (double oops). So we were off towards Coral Bay as quickly as we could. On the way, though, we found an absolutely STUNNING beach, probably my favourite beach in Australia after Whitehaven. Naturally, we stopped. There was a long sand spit that formed an island, overlooking a bay and some of the most turquoise waters I’ve ever seen. From the sand spit, Ningaloo Reef was not only close, but walkable, and pretty unspoiled. I ran (well, hobbled – I’d sliced my toe on a rock that morning) down the spit with my camera and attempted to capture it. Then I waded into the water with camera in tow and saw a big rock that seemed to be moving towards me – sure enough, it was the biggest stingray I’ve ever seen. It almost could’ve passed for an albino manta. Another suspicious rock caught my eye, and sure enough – turtle! It bolted when I stopped to take a photo, but I got a Bigfoot-style blurry one. And this was just walking in the sand!
We were so delighted by Windermandy beach, as I later learned it was called, that we stayed the night. The reef was likewise delightful, some amazing blue coral. The shallow water really made the colour stand out, too. Meanwhile, back on land, Johon caught a shovel-nosed shark and another fish, though we had tacos for dinner. That was after Greg got our bus stuck in the sand and we spent 30 mins getting out. So, it was a fun-filled day, and the halfway point of our trip was passed. October 8th, we finally made it to Coral Bay, not before getting stuck again on the beach track en route. Finally, a hostel, a bed, and sadly, Johon was in our room. No escape from the snoring menace. I booked a dive for the next day, and then walked down to the beach to snorkel the closer part of the reef. It was a great swim. I left my stuff at the rocks, walked up the beach and into the water, and came back with the current over the next hour and a half. So peaceful and a great reef for being so close to land. We had dinner and enjoyed the hostel bar’s happy hour and Jenga set before calling it a night.
Yup, October 9th and still going. I told you it was a long way down. I went diving this morning with Ken, Greg, and Ayumi (AKA Yummy) on the Ningaloo Reef. We saw some beautiful stuff though poor Greg couldn’t equalize and had to stick to snorkeling. A green turtle, nudi branch, sailfin catfish, giant moray eel, grey/black reef sharks, and a loggerhead turtle to boot. After diving, I got some much needed laundry done and filled out postcards I’d bought ages ago to send home. There’s a bay where the sharks breed nearby, so I crossed some hills to the beach and walked along. Due to my unorthodox approach (just me and the snakes!) I had the walk to myself, the value of which cannot be understated when traveling in a group and particularly with an iPod loaded with music I haven’t had a chance to sing along to in almost two months. So I walked to the shark nursery alone on the beach enough to listen to most of Crane Wife and Gossip Diet on the way. There were plenty of sharks in the water coming quite close to shore. I waded in to about knee height to get a good shot as they’re not generally dangerous but three sharks coming right towards me made me take a nervous step back which definitely scared them off and they never came close again no matter how still I stayed.
I walked back more conventionally along the beach and went for dinner with the Japanese contingent. The girl at the counter was very friendly and she gave us two family-sized pizzas and a seafood basket to share for $14. We met the rest of the group there and went back to the hostel where schenanigans including Twister, some pool throw-ins, and some friendly Germans ensued. Still, we did manage to leave by 9AM the next morning for the big trip down to Monkey Mia. For the first time since leaving Broome 10 days ago, I had 20 mins of cell phone reception passing through Carnavon and we stopped for a thermal bath at Peron Stationm, but otherwise the drive was uneventful. Oh, and since the peninsula is part of Project Eden, an effort to remove all non-native animals and restore decimated populations, we passed the fence that keeps the dogs, foxes, cats, etc out. Where it crosses the road is a sensor that plays a recording of angry dogs barking to scare them away. Supposedly it actually works.
Monkey Mia the next morning greeted us early as we staked out a place on the beach to meet the bottle-nosed dolphins that regularly come by. It was pretty cool to get so close to them. Cooler still, Greg got us a good rate on a boat trip out to sea for some dugong, dolphin, and hopefully whale action. We went out on a catamaran and our lot sat in the boom net off the stern which was really fun. We did spot some dugongs and dolphins also, well worth the $30. Back at the campground, the neighbour’s kids played some footy, soccer, and gymnastics with me and then we headed off down the peninsula. We stopped at an ocean park with a tiger shark, turtles, highly deadly sea snakes (which we petted, and no, they still had their venom). It was nice and interactive. We also stopped at the stromatelites, the oldest living thing in the world and what they think first produced the oxygen that made life as we know it possible on earth. They’re basically rocks that breathe, but I did get in trouble for walking on some in spite of a whole beach full of them for miles. Oops. We camped, as is tradition, in the middle of nowhere again, and man are the nights ever getting cold! I should’ve stayed in Broome. We played a pass-the-apple game and Greg passed around an emu egg made of pudding, we saw moons in spoons, and after a few cans (that’s right) of wine, sleepy time.
Our first and second glamorous stops in the frigid morning of October 12 were an abandoned lead quarry and then smelter. Then, off to Kalbarri National Park for a couple walks in the gorges, a walk to Nature’s Window, and lunch. The flies here are ridiculous. The park is amply supplied to provide no fewer than 100 buzzing, landing, and crawling on every visitor. And apparently, one of our guides has seen them 10 times worse in summer. No thanks. We went, after some great walking, to the town of Kalbarri where they weren’t as bad and swam in the cold river, then sat on the beach where I’m writing this now. Or at least, I was. I traded Perfume (an excellent read, by the way) and At Play in the Fields of the Lord (also very good) for two Michael Crichton novels. Incidentally, I read Air Babylon which was fast and surprisingly entertaining, in a single bus trip. When we got to camp, we found some more entertainment in piling up the swags and taking photos doing stunts, flips, and gymnastics. Another reason to love swags. We went for some fresh seafood for dinner and it was fantastic! $10 got us grilled Perch, fried Emperor, prawns, calamari, rice, salad, and fries, and it was all great. It was completely BYO, so families would come with their eskies, maybe sit around the fire, and eat fresh fish. Like a beer garden for fish. They also had a piano and it didn’t take much alcohol or convincing for me to give it a play.
If Kalbarri impressed me the day before – and it did – I liked it all the better the following day, October 13, and our last full day on tour. Just south is a beautiful, no, gorgeous trail that runs along dramatic cliffs plunging into the roaring turquoise Indian Ocean for 12km or so. As well, a few terrific surf beaches with what are said to be some of the best waves in the world. I don’t doubt it. Talk about a playground! We stopped at one beach tucked between the cliffs, though Nathalie and I spent the entire time playing on the rocks taking funny photos of each other. We made the Pinnacles that night just in time for the sun to go down, and had a late dinner in Hangover Bay, where we polished off our remaining alcohol. And soon, we were in Perth, and I was jumping off the bus to my hostel, one of the only ones to have booked ahead – and lucky for me, most of the rest of the group wound up in a hostel ridden with bedbugs. Accomodation is scarce here. So ends my last real road trip in Australia, but the adventures are far from over, as you are soon to see.
