Gig: Grafton Primary @ Transit

Grafton primary put on a great show at Transit, and best of all it was free. The place was completely packed with a huge line outside.

4 stars.

Whitewater rafting on the Sydney olympics course

I was in Sydney for a family event and decided to make a side trip to 'whitewater stadium' in penrith. This was the venue for the Sydney 2000 Olympic whitewater events, and it is a really impressive place. I paid my $80 and got myself on a raft with 7 others, and a grumpy guide called Craig.

Spent about 20 minutes getting kitted up, safety briefing, then onto the conveyor belt for our first trip through the course. The water is pumped through the course by massive turbines and can be set for grades 3 to 5. For rafting trips they set it to 3. It was awesome fun, and pretty much non-stop whitewater, as soon as you got through, you were back on the conveyor for another go - think we got about 10 trips in total. It may not have had the good scenery of rafting I have done in NZ, but it made up for it by eliminating any stillwater paddling.

We did one whole lap spinning in circles and we also spent some time 'surfing' - getting the raft stuck sideways in a violent bit of water that guaranteed a flip. This is pretty dangerous, and you wouldn't do it on a real river, but it was cool. As promised, the raft flipped :)

I have a new found respect for the whitewater kayaking guys - they were cutting around the rafts with ease and practicing their rolls in the whitewater.

Linux conf in Hobart

Had a great time in Hobart:

• Climbed all over Mt. Wellington and drove to the top. Saw the octopus tree and ran into some climbers at sphinx rock lookout - awesome view.
  
• Went to wrest point casino for a function.
  
• Danced at 'The Observatory', a pretty cool club near Salamanca Place.
  
• Caught up with friends at Mezethes Greek Taverna, had a great seafood platter.
  
• Hung out at bars and restaurants in north hobart.
  
  
• Walked around the botanic gardens and the domain.
  
• Went on the cascade brewery tour. Our tour guide was hilarious. I liked the idea of the 'First Harvest' beer - using freshly harvested hops rather than pellets, but not the taste.
  
• Made friends with some bogans while playing pool at the 'Welcome Stranger'
  

The 2008 US Presidential Election

This one has been a while coming - I started writing this almost a year ago. We lived through the craziness of the 2008 US Presidential election, returning to Oz just before the election. I followed the whole thing with a keen interest and we even managed to see Obama give a speech.

Most Australians have a pretty low opinion of the whole process, so I thought I'd run through some things I learnt and try to give both perspectives.

AUS: The whole process of having primaries is flawed (especially caucuses), unfairly favours the early states, "Democratic" nominations can be overturned by super delegates, and effectively means you have two elections. Why not just let each party internally decide who they think their best candidate is? It would cut a big chunk of time off the 2-year process.
US: Because the process is so stage-managed and every position carefully polled, it needs to go on long enough that Americans can glimpse some reality through the campaign armour. The state order thing is stupid, but we are trying to fix it. If we get it wrong, campaigns will cost even more money.

AUS: The process requires so much money that only multi-millionaires can be president. Is that democratic?
US: Yeah, it sucks.

AUS: Why do newspapers endorse candidates? Doesn't that kind of go against the impartiality ethic? Seems wrong, but I think I like it.
US: I guess the editors are expressing their opinions as private citizens.

AUS: How will ex-criminals who have done their time ever feel like part of society if in lots of states they are permanently barred from voting? What is wrong with letting everyone vote regardless of whether they have been in, or are currently in, prison? Is it because they are most likely to be poor and African-American, and therefore vote democrat?
US: We're supposed to be punishing criminals: those who break the rules don't get a say in the making of the rules. What if all criminals voted for an anarchist?

AUS: In the elections of 1876, 1888, and 2000, the candidate who won the nationwide popular vote did not become President. Buh? The electoral college system seems to have created a really expensive way to end up with the wrong rich dude.
US: Read the wikipedia article. There are some good reasons for it. Really.

AUS: Why is voting optional? This seems to give the media and pollsters too much power: "CNN says Obama is going to win, so I don't need to go vote". Americans (actually, most people in most countries) love complaining about the government, but Americans don't even bother choosing who they will complain about for the next few years.
US: Why would you want people who don't care voting in the election?

AUS: Why the gap between the election and inauguration? You picked a guy, why not let them do the job?
US: Hey, the gap used to be 4 months, be grateful for small mercies.

Why camping in bear country sucks

We were reasonably familiar with the whole bear-country camping game before we started this trip, but camping in grizzly hot spots like Yellowstone, the Tetons, and the Rockies brought it to a whole new level.

Bears were never far from our minds, and now I can sympathize with Americans that are petrified of all the things that can kill you in the Australian bush. Give me deadly snakes and spiders any day, here's why camping and walking in bear country sucks:

• Don't leave food unattended at any time, even while you are preparing it. Food (and all rubbish) needs to be stored in bear bin or hard-sided vehicle, with everything not already vacuum packed in air-tight containers (we used dry bags).
  
• Don't cook and sleep in the same clothes. Impossible! I only had room for one down jacket and it was damn cold...
  
• Don't wear deodorant.
  
• Don't cook tuna for dinner. Seriously bad idea, this was one of the mistakes we made in Shenandoah.
  
• Don't spill food on yourself or the ground.
  
• Don't have your period if you are a girl...
  
• Don't leave your pack on the ground with your back turned at any time. Bears lurk around back-country campsites where they have previously gotten access to food.
  
• Bear hangs (dry-bag on a rope over a high branch) at back-country campsites are fairly ineffective. Bear canisters are the only proven way to stop bears getting at your food. Just don't put it next to a cliff or lake because bears can't open them, but they roll really well...
  
• Announce yourself (yell!) around every corner to avoid surprising a bear. We used super-loud bear bells to avoid having to do this. The noise needs to be particularly loud near streams where it has to be heard over the flowing water. Unfortunately you scare pretty much all other wildlife by being so noisy. And you attract any problem bears that already associate humans with food rewards....
  
• Carry bear mace. Better than a gun, but unlike guns(!) you can't take it on an airplane, even in your checked luggage. Since it is about $60 per canister, there was no way I was going to buy a new canister at each location. So no mace for us.
  

The most annoying part is washing your dishes. Here's how you're supposed to do it:

• scrape leftovers into a plastic bag and put in bear proof bin.
  
• Fill bucket with water and wash dishes in it at your tent site.
  
• Scrape off floaties from water and put in bag in bear proof bin.
  
• Pour dish water into pit toilet.
  

Of course this assumes you actually have a bucket, which we didn't. So I had the pleasure of washing our pots and bowls over the open pit toilet (i.e. massive pile of poo), hoping I didn't drop anything. I'd recommend one of those collapsible plastic camp sinks....

The rangers killed a problem bear at our Grand Teton campsite a couple of months before we got there. There was a posted list of its activities that led to its death, there were about 12 separate incidents where it got food either by breaking into a vehicle or approaching humans. Unfortunately you can do everything right and still get approached by a bear if it has associated humans with food rewards...

O'ahu

O'ahu was definitely the big city compared to the other islands, but we had a great time chilling out for our final days in the US:

• Beaches.
• Pearl Harbor memorial, pretty amazing, built over the wreck of the USS Arizona.

• Our $3 lilo made an awesome glass bottomed boat for snorkeling at Hanauma Bay Beach Park, checking out fish and coral, well mainly fish, most of the coral had been stepped on by millions of tourists.

• Watched the Hawks take out the AFL grand final in a bar in Honolulu with bemused/bored Americans :)
• Ate lunch at Keneke's - a crazy fish and chip shop whose outdoor area was full of religious graffiti, mainly random bible verses and inspiration like 'Some know of Jesus, Some know Jesus!'
• Beach hopped around the northern beaches, which (in the winter) are home to the legendary waves you see in surfing videos. Amazing we swam at the Banzai pipeline beach, and there was no surf! We swam at four or five different beaches, it was great to get away from the touristy beaches and swim where the locals go.
• Found it amusing that Hawaii has an interstate freeway. Think about it.

I thought Hawaii was awesome, could definitely spend more time there. In a lot of ways it really is halfway between the US and Australia, some random stuff that made me feel at home: metric signs, egg on a hamburger, prawns instead of shrimp, tim tams (Malaysian export version!?), toilets instead of restrooms.

Maui

I think the big island was probably my favourite, but Maui was pretty good too:

• Did part of the legendary drive through the dripping rainforest to Hana, but were slightly unimpressed with the scenery. Also the scariest drive of my life with continuous hairpin bends, one lane bridges and psycho drivers.
  
• Haleakala National Park - more volcano :) Training ground for the Mars lander, we were above the clouds wandering around in the giant craters. Would be cool to do a multi-day walk through the volcano craters there.
  

Big Island Flora - What the?

Big Island....mmmm.....lava

The Hawaiian Big Island is awesome, and volcanoes national park is *the* place to study volcanoes:

• Walked on still-steaming lava in a volcano crater.
  

• Walked through a 390m lava tube, only 90m of which was lit. All the other tourists thought we were hardcore with our headtorches. Em freaked out so we probably did about 80m of very dark tunnel.
  
  
  
  
• Saw roads and areas of bush that had been destroyed by lava.
  

• Watched the glow of lava from the crater rim at night.
  
• Saw amazing waterfalls and rainforest.
  

Em gets her tough on

I'm as surprised as you are.

I wanted to do this walk in Grand Teton to surprise lake, which was 1km vertical and described by LP as a 'classic leg burner'. Needless to say Em wasn't quite as keen, and since she had an injured foot and knee problems I didn't hold out much hope of us making it to the top. Sure enough about 500m in there were tears and I said we should turn back.

To my surprise Em stubbornly refused to turn back, swallowed a handful of Nurofen (aka Vitamin I) and kept walking. Amazingly she made it the whole way, through freezing rain, injured foot and knee not withstanding. What a champion.