Charging grass (a bed to hide charging cords for our new android family);
a sweet T-shirt; and
a handy keyring multi-tool that slips over a key.
Friday, 18 February 2011
ThinkGeek schwag
Charging grass (a bed to hide charging cords for our new android family);
a sweet T-shirt; and
a handy keyring multi-tool that slips over a key.
Angel Island: a great day out on the bay
Our second weekend in California, and already we had visitors! We met our Baltimore peeps and hopped on the ferry from Fisherman's Wharf for an excursion to Angel Island. When we arrived in the freezing fog we were wondering if we had made the right decision in coming - the views of the bay were nowhere to be seen.
California is doing its best to make us feel at home with all the gum trees and wattle, which is nice, and if the views weren't there at least the fog looked pretty.
Luckily the fog did lift, and Angel Island treated us to some fantastic views. Watching a giant wall of fog roll off the ocean and hit the Golden Gate was pretty amazing.
There is a lot of history on the Island. Amongst other things, it was the equivalent of Ellis Island for the west coast, i.e. an immigration processing centre. There is an interesting museum on-site in the old buildings. It chronicles the poor living conditions imposed on migrants, and the prejudiced procedures designed to keep people out that Barack Obama formally apologised for in January 2010.
You can camp on the island, and a number of people were doing that on the weekend we were there. It would be a great place to wake up and take sunrise photos of the bay, or tell a ghost story in some of the abandoned Fort McDowell buildings.
The ferry schedule gave us 11am-3:50pm on the island, which was plenty of time to circumnavigate it on foot and wander through the buildings and museum. Don't rely on the cafe being open - it wasn't for us and we were starving by the time we got back to Fisherman's Wharf.
California is doing its best to make us feel at home with all the gum trees and wattle, which is nice, and if the views weren't there at least the fog looked pretty.
Luckily the fog did lift, and Angel Island treated us to some fantastic views. Watching a giant wall of fog roll off the ocean and hit the Golden Gate was pretty amazing.
There is a lot of history on the Island. Amongst other things, it was the equivalent of Ellis Island for the west coast, i.e. an immigration processing centre. There is an interesting museum on-site in the old buildings. It chronicles the poor living conditions imposed on migrants, and the prejudiced procedures designed to keep people out that Barack Obama formally apologised for in January 2010.
You can camp on the island, and a number of people were doing that on the weekend we were there. It would be a great place to wake up and take sunrise photos of the bay, or tell a ghost story in some of the abandoned Fort McDowell buildings.
The ferry schedule gave us 11am-3:50pm on the island, which was plenty of time to circumnavigate it on foot and wander through the buildings and museum. Don't rely on the cafe being open - it wasn't for us and we were starving by the time we got back to Fisherman's Wharf.
Friday, 11 February 2011
"Australia's Favorite Cookie?"
They are the real deal, and taste exactly the same as far as I can tell. I'll let you know if we do a blind taste test comparison.
Next...Vegemite?
The breast views in San Francisco
On our first weekend in San Francisco the weather was beautiful so we took advantage of the unfogginess and checked out the 360° view from the Twin Peaks, the breast-like geographic centre of San Francisco.
And since the weather was holding, we thought we'd grab some cloudless bridge photos too.
And since the weather was holding, we thought we'd grab some cloudless bridge photos too.
Thursday, 30 December 2010
Top ten-ish songs of 2010
- Hot Chip - I Feel Better
- Duck Sauce - Barbra Streisand
- Pendulum - ABC theme news remix
- The Wombats - Tokyo (Vampires and Wolves)
- Ou Est Le Swimming Pool - Dance The Way I Feel
- Darwin Deez - Radar Detector
- Miami Horror - Summersun
- Yeasayer - O.N.E.
- Sia - Clap Your Hands
- Gypsy & The Cat - Jona Vark
- Yolanda Be Cool/DCUP - We No Speak Americano
- Cee Lo Green - Fuck You
- Crystal Castles - Baptism
Thursday, 23 December 2010
Christmas in Sydney
We made an overnight trip to Sydney this week for our visa interviews. There was just enough time to check out the Christmas decorations around the city. David Jones had their traditional window displays, which would make perfect horror movie scenes if you switched the Christmas carols for some ominous music - the marionettes are really creepy.
Less creepy and more awesome was the light show projected onto St. Mary's Cathedral. We didn't have a camera, but luckily someone recorded it for us. Check out the 'rain' that follows the architectural features at 8:00.
Less creepy and more awesome was the light show projected onto St. Mary's Cathedral. We didn't have a camera, but luckily someone recorded it for us. Check out the 'rain' that follows the architectural features at 8:00.
Wednesday, 24 November 2010
On the bus in South America
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| Ecuador bus crash 25/12/10, Photo: AP |
A nice bus doesn't help too much since the drivers are all insane. Overtaking on blind corners and driving far too fast for windy mountain roads with sheer drops are par for the course.
At one point we passed a massive truck that had tipped over on one of these roads, and I had an ominous feeling that we might be next. Thankfully we weren't, but there was a deadly bus crash in Ecuador shortly after we got back.
The other hazard is that you might get something stolen. We didn't have any problems with bags in the luggage compartment of buses, but someone on our tour got their bag slashed in the cabin on a local bus coming into Lima. The thief crawled under our friends' seat from behind and cut open their backpack as it sat on the ground at their feet. Nasty! The first our friend knew about it was when she picked up her bag at Lima and a whole lot of stuff fell out.
The moral of the story is to keep your bag in your lap, especially on local buses where people frequently hop on and off, facilitating an easy getaway. Unfortunately it makes an already uncomfortable journey just that little bit more uncomfortable.
Saturday, 20 November 2010
Chicha is an acquired taste: Ecuadorian amazon jungle
Watching one of the goriest movies ever made, hungover, on a bus that alternated between nauseating breakneck speed around corners and stopping every 100m for 6 hours or so was not the most enjoyable travel I did in South America. However, we finally made it to Tena, jumped in a ute, and were shortly in a village in the Ecuadorian Amazon.
The next four days were pretty fun:
The next four days were pretty fun:
- Sweating it up on walks through the mud and mosquitos in the jungle
- Seeing a cave full of creepy scorpion-like spiders and bats
- Killing gigantor cockroaches that climbed out of the toilet in our room
- Hanging out in the village, visiting the school, playing with the kids
- Eating and drinking all sorts of local food, including disgusting chicha made from Yucca (like a potato)
- Floating down a tributary of the Amazon in an inner tube
- Visiting a wildlife sanctuary that rescues animals from all sorts of bizarre situations (like anacondas from hotel rooms).
Tuesday, 16 November 2010
Dónde está Baños?
Baños (the town) is Ecuador's answer to Queenstown. It is also the word for toilet (well, more like bathroom), so we were used to saying "Dónde está el Baños?", which is fairly confusing when you say it in a bus station in Baños, as one of the girls on our tour found out...
The town is an adventure sport mecca. Sadly we only had 1.5 days there, so I opted to cram in rockclimbing, ziplining, and canyoning.
For rockclimbing it was just myself and a guide. We took a taxi to the cliff, where Paulo promptly solo-ed a 20m 5.9 in his sneakers (!?) to set up a top rope for me.
The rock was basalt, and super slippery. I did what he called the 5.9 comfortably, had a couple of rests on the 5.10b, and a really messy attempt at the 5.10c. I am sooo out of practice :(
A quick, head-first zip line across the river and it was back to town to meet the canyoning guide.
It was my first time canyoning, and I seem to remember reading that you are supposed to avoid canyons when it is raining due to the risk of flash flooding. This was making me uneasy since it had started pouring with rain at lunchtime and didn't look like stopping any time soon. Our guide looked at the water in the canyon and decided it was OK, which didn't inspire me with confidence but we went anyway. The guide, Marta (from the tour) and I abseiled down 5 waterfalls, ranging from 8 to 30-something metres. Awesome fun.
The town is an adventure sport mecca. Sadly we only had 1.5 days there, so I opted to cram in rockclimbing, ziplining, and canyoning.
For rockclimbing it was just myself and a guide. We took a taxi to the cliff, where Paulo promptly solo-ed a 20m 5.9 in his sneakers (!?) to set up a top rope for me.
me: Where are the bolts?
Paulo: At the top.
me: Aren't you using any protection?
Paulo: No, is easy.
me: OK...
The rock was basalt, and super slippery. I did what he called the 5.9 comfortably, had a couple of rests on the 5.10b, and a really messy attempt at the 5.10c. I am sooo out of practice :(
A quick, head-first zip line across the river and it was back to town to meet the canyoning guide.
It was my first time canyoning, and I seem to remember reading that you are supposed to avoid canyons when it is raining due to the risk of flash flooding. This was making me uneasy since it had started pouring with rain at lunchtime and didn't look like stopping any time soon. Our guide looked at the water in the canyon and decided it was OK, which didn't inspire me with confidence but we went anyway. The guide, Marta (from the tour) and I abseiled down 5 waterfalls, ranging from 8 to 30-something metres. Awesome fun.
Tuesday, 9 November 2010
North Peru: surfing and archaeology
Huancachao, home of a great surf break, and some amazing adobe archaeological sites.
Huaca de la Luna (The Temple of the Moon) is a adobe (mud brick) temple built in stages from 100 to 700 AD. Archaeological work to unearth the site only began in 1991, and revealed amazingly intact paint throughout the temple, and a huge multi-tier façade, the bottom tier of which was only uncovered in 2007.
Work is yet to begin on the adjoining Huaca del Sol, seen at the back of the photo below. This whole area is an archaeological goldmine, just waiting for someone to fund the digs.
We visited the rainbow temple and the only palace that has been unearthed from the giant complex of palaces called Chan Chan. It is the largest adobe city in the world, and covers 36 sq km. The partially restored Tschudi complex we saw was massive, and wasn't even the biggest in the area.
From Huancachao we travelled to Mancora, Peru's answer to Byron bay, near the Ecuadorian border. Great surf and a party atmosphere. I hired a board, but lacked any real surfing fitness so the paddle out battling a strong current was tough. Below is the view from our hotel, which opened straight onto the beach right at the surf break.
Huaca de la Luna (The Temple of the Moon) is a adobe (mud brick) temple built in stages from 100 to 700 AD. Archaeological work to unearth the site only began in 1991, and revealed amazingly intact paint throughout the temple, and a huge multi-tier façade, the bottom tier of which was only uncovered in 2007.
Work is yet to begin on the adjoining Huaca del Sol, seen at the back of the photo below. This whole area is an archaeological goldmine, just waiting for someone to fund the digs.
We visited the rainbow temple and the only palace that has been unearthed from the giant complex of palaces called Chan Chan. It is the largest adobe city in the world, and covers 36 sq km. The partially restored Tschudi complex we saw was massive, and wasn't even the biggest in the area.
From Huancachao we travelled to Mancora, Peru's answer to Byron bay, near the Ecuadorian border. Great surf and a party atmosphere. I hired a board, but lacked any real surfing fitness so the paddle out battling a strong current was tough. Below is the view from our hotel, which opened straight onto the beach right at the surf break.
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