The Great Barrier Reef

Hi folks, Simon here. I thought it was about time I posted my Great Barrier Reef blog. While I've been waiting to find a web cafe/ hostel that allows you to upload photos, Pete's been nudging me now and again, getting upset about the chronological order of the Blog. Although I still havn't found somewhere to do the photos, I'll add them as soon as I can.

Although the reef is called the Great Barrier Reef, it is actually made up of around 2600 different reefs. The Great Barrier Reef is 2000km long, starting just south of the Tropic of Capricorn. The Great Barrier Reef stretches along the Queensland coastline from just north of Bundaberg right up to Far north Queensland and the Torres Strait. Due to the reefs amazing and spectacular natural beauty the Great Barrier Reef was declared as a World Heritage Area in 1981.

The reef is called the 'Barrier' Reef because it is an outer reef, situated along the Australian continental shelf with the channel between the coastline and the reef reaching a depth of about 60m. The other type of reef is a 'Fringe' reef, which is situated along the coastline of land and islands.

There are a few conditions that are required for healthy growth of coral. The water must be salty, clear and not lower in temperature than 17.5 degrees and lower in depth than 30 metres. An amazing sight is seeing the spawning of the coral, which happens in late spring/early summer and is often called an 'underwater snowstorm'.

The reef is home to a few dangerous creatures, although you may see reef sharks there are no noted attacks on visitors. The most dangerous things in the Barrier Reef is the coral itself (if you touch them you can cut yourself as well as damage the coral), Jellyfish and Scorpion Fish.

Peter D, my little brother, was due to fly up from Sydney on the Monday to join us in Cairns while we busied ourselves getting excited about the prospect of diving on the most famous Reef in the world. Pete R and myself had been diving quite recently in Thailand where Pete successfully completed his Advanced Open water course and I stepped onto the first rung of professional diving by completing my Padi Divemaster course. So we had both blown away the cobwebs and were ready for some exciting diving. My Bro hadn't dived for a matter of years and was quite eager to remember what gear he would need, and after a little research, turned up with some sleek new Fins, Mask, Snorkel and Knife. Very Keen. Sarah in her new found condition was unable to dive but after some quizzing of the local dive operations, we settled on a boat and crew that promised some excellent Snorkelling to boot.

The "Spirit of Freedom" is a 40 metre luxury vessel capable of catering for 20 guests. I say luxury because after diving in the Irish sea from a converted 18M fishing trawler that smells of fish with 15 Male divers all sharing the same bunkroom and head (toilet) , virtually anything would seem luxurious in comparison. To be honest though when we all arrived at the Dock it soon became apparent that this was a truly professional operation. When you are quite used to arriving at a tiny Scottish fishing port to find your boat at the end of a row of about five others. Climbing down a wet and cold, steel ladder in the dark whilst wearing a 20kg Scuba kit, 5kg weightbelt and carrying two bags, then making your way accross five boats that move apart with every wave, and negotiating with a drunken, scowling, crew member aboard each one.....being greeted at your vehicle and told to leave your bags for the crew to take below while you are welcomed aboard by the boat "Director of operations" and his crew seemed indulgent if not a little alien!

After a brief tour of the boat and the arrival of the the rest of the divers, we got underway at around 11am on day 1. After a short steam north east from Cairns harbour we anchored up for our first dive. After a lot of fumbling and trial and error, I got all my gear on whilst taking excited glances at the clear blue water. Stepping to the back of the boat, as the two petes finished kitting up, with a beaming grin, leapt from the boat. And as my bubbles cleared around me, it became quite obvious this was going to be some very special diving!

Brisbane or Bust! Arlie Beach and the Whitsundays!

The Whitsundays are a bunch of islands numbering around 70 odd... ranging from liddle tiddlers to big ole jobs... Here... Have a look yourself... -link to follow- :P

Airlie beach is the place to launch to the Whitsundays from - a place of young backpackers all doing the same things - which is pretty much the same as they were up in Cairns and Daintree and probably everywhere else in Oz - and that is, getting drunk and up to mischief - knowing they haven't got the mummy's and daddies around to tell them off... it all gets a bit tedious - I've not been very impressed with the ozzie Backpackers to be honest... but... hey... they're young carefree and enjoying themselves so who am I to judge. I'm just an old git these days who like his early nights and sleep, which sometimes is a rather incongruous to staying in backpacker places (i.e. the Townsville place being a prime example)

Asides from this, Airlie Beach is a really 'cool' place to be... and it's obvious there's a lot of posing going on and shops dedicated to selling bikinis and board shorts and the like.

We stayed in a backpackers place the first night, and took advantage of a last minute Yachting tour around the islands that they were offering with free accommodation there upon return... so hell, why not, it seemed like a good deal...

The yacht tour was on "Freight Train" an old Racing Yacht - we were on it for 3 nights, staying on board the yacht, anchored in serene bays overnight - sounds all very swish doesn't it? And it would have been were it not the fact we were, sharing with 15 other Backpackers and the 3 crew... not to say it wasn't worth it - it was a great experience and gave us a good insight into the potential of the area.

When we got back to shore we stayed overnight in our FREE accomodation and then decided to splash out on something nice... I think travel fatigue had set in and wanted some creature comforts, especially after the cramped conditions on the boat, so we located a place called "The Organic B&B" and booked ourselves in for 2 nights there. It was very, very nice... modern, swish and with a Gourmet breakfast to boot... Sarah took advantage of the on site massage - lucky girl.

During our stay here, we hired a Speed Boat for the day, taking advantage of simon's motor boat license...

We spent the day buzzing around the islands under our own steam (or should I say diesel?)... this was a lot better... great to make our own decisions rather than having to stick to a predetermined itinerary that you just know a million and one other people have done already... the best bits were finding our own deserted beaches to eat watermelon and just relaxing on our very own desert islands...



Then there was the dolphins and turtles we saw whilst getting a little lost (not really - our handheld GPS we've got really came into it's own this day). Overall though... Really really enchanting... those dolphins are something else... :)

One of the hilights for sure.


Next Stop: Fraser Island.

Brisbane or Bust! The Townsville/Ayr Fiasco.

Seeing that simon's not had a chance to update the blog with the dive pictures he was supposed to and wanted to write about I thought I'd update y'all with what we've been up to... perhaps he may place a dive post at some point but until then you'll have to wait for pictures I'm afraid...

So where were we? Oh yeah... North Queensland... Cairns, Cooktown et al...

Well, we've been in New Zealand for nearly a week now - but before I go on about here let's do some catch ups.

Rewind to 4 weeks ago... we were in Cairns, waiting for our trip on the Spirit of Freedom, our 4 day liveabord Scuba thing on the Barrier Reef... I won't wibble on too much about it... suffise to say it was another great dive experience... the only picture I have on me now is this one...

...Courtesy of Peter, Simon's Bro... that's him on the left - we're just about to head into the briny blue for some deep sea exploration mission on some crappy, boring reef, full of really rubbish and not interesting fish and sea life like sharks and stuff... no honestly it was really not worth writing about - Peter's saying "What!? We're supposed to go in there?" - Simon's doing his Paris Hilton wobbly head impression... and I'm doing my Blue Steel look... as yer do... :)

Anyway... enough of that trip as that's supposed to be Simon's domain and I'm not gonna go on about it anymore... besides - it was rubbish so there's no need to say more :P

So, what happened after Cairns? Well, we had to get to Brisbane at some point to get our flight over to New Zealand, but before we could do that we had a fair few number of miles to travel... as you can see from this link. How many miles is that? A fair few! So we hired a car and set off for our first destination - Townsville.

Townsvilles a small place town I suppose... I guess the name itself suggests that? We stayed in a crappy hostel overnight and decided pretty much to move on immediatly... the intention being to try and hit one final dive site - "The Yongala Wreck" - supposedly THE best dive site in Australia... we wanted to find out if it was true. There were trips from Townsville, but we'd been told to go to Ayr as there was someone there who could get out to the wreck in the morning and be back by the afternoon - which sounded great as we were on a tight schedule!

So, we headed down to Ayr, which can only be described as the armpit of the backside of nowhere... we called this organisation, the "Yongala dive company" from Townsville the previous day - and they said they wouldn't be heading out for a day or so and to check by their office the next day. We were very lucky to find it - but they said to call back again the following day at 3pm... there was loads of spaces so no worries - so we decided to hang around Ayr overnight and the following day we'd explore the area... (which mainly consists of a million square miles of Sugar Cane Plantations, the odd creek, road, crossroads, bridge, burnt out cars, farms, that kind of thing.)


We stayed Overnight in rooms over a pub - which was again not exactly the best place we've stayed. Bar downstairs, Bottleshop next door, 'Bistro' attached to the back... Imagine your stereotype of an Aussie pub... you've got it... that's what it was like... but it was alright I suppose - besides we didn't venture downstairs.

The Following day we tried to find some things to do whilst waiting to make the call at 3pm... I wrote a Blog post in some hideous backwater 10 pin bowling alley place with an attached 'cyber cafe' - just as I'd finished the post the bloody PC crashed before I'd managed to post it... which really put me in a right old mood - especially having some bowling alley staffer explaining to me about computers... oh the irony! (especially now since that happened this blogger auto saves your posts - grrr!!!!?!?!)

Anyway... after that I was in a right old strop so we decided to get out of town and explore the sugar cane fields... But, you know, after about 300 miles of nonstop sugar cane it gets really quite boring and monotonous... we began to wonder whether there really was the need for all this sugar... climbing (in the car) to the top of a nearby 'mountain' lookout - the sheer scale of operations was nevertheless quite impressive - it was amazing to see the sugar cane field, stretching as far as the eye can see - the only breaks being the odd lake, river or forest - and of course the mountains in the far distance, presumably beyond those is Narnia - where I think they use all the sugar to make Turkish Delight... who knows? anyway... there's vast vast quantities - the whole area being dedicated to it...

Now, bearing in mind we could have been on the road heading south all day, we'd decided to hang around to see if the wind had died down allowing us to go wreck diving... we called the yongala dive company who were happy to say they were going out the following day... Great... Brilliant... where do we go and what time? But they'd already fully booked... bugger...! It wasn't even 3pm yet and they'd fully booked... we'd assumed they'd have put us down as part of the trip seeing that we'd called multiple times and even headed out to see them in the office in the naval of the armpit in the backside of nowhere... So, alas it wasn't to be... we sacked it off and decided to continue our road trip and get the hell out here... besides we need excuses to head back to Oz I guess.

Next stop - Airlie Beach.

Queensland trippin!

Hurrah for Picassa... it really is the mutts nuts when it comes to quick and easy image editing... and thanks to Matt (again) for the blog tips... :)

I think if you Click the above image you'll get a nice BIG version of it to have a shufties at.

It's basically a snapshot collage of our trip up North to Cooktown from Cairns, via Cape Tribulation, the Daintree River and back down south and beyond to the through the Tablelands, that's all the waterfalls and what have you.

Enjoy...! :)

Some Misc Photos...

Here's some snaps taken whilst one the road. It's been quite tricky (read: annoying) uploading so many so please, enjoy and savour them cos I'm not gonna do this again in a hurry.

What was it mum called them? "Stuffed pillows hangin round in trees..."

or something like that...

Great Ocean Road, Victoria - Aus

Kirsty and Sarah at some pretty place.

Great Ocean Road, Victoria - Aus

wooaaa!... It's a GIANT MOUSE with six legs! Australia's weird!

Hanging Rock, Victoria - AUS

Arrrr....

Hanging Rock, Victoria - Aus

Paragliding is easy...

Helmets on!

Bright, Victoria - Aus

...saddle up and clip in...

Bright, Victoria - Aus

... just run off the mountain...

Bright, Victoria - Aus

...and she's away...!

Bright, Victoria - Aus

Sarah's the speck on the left

Bright, Victoria - Australia

The 3 Explorers

Singapore

Speaks for itself?

Botanical Gardens, Singapore

Apparently not in Scotland...?

Singapore Botanical Gardens

Struggling with the Coconut.

Singapore

Have bike will travel.

Outside the Olembia (hostel) in St Kilda

St Kilda, Melbourne, Victoria - Aus

They Shoot...
Melbourne Cricket Ground, Melbourne - Aus

They Scored!

The demons are on fire! (despite losing in the end to Geelong)

Melbourne Cricket Ground, Melbourne - Aus

Kirsty and Sarah, and some apostles.

Great Ocean Road, Victoria - Aus

A few of the 12 Apostles.

Great ocean Road, Victoria - Aus

Colorful Beach Front Shacks, Brighton at Sunset.

Brighton Beach - Melbourne, Victoria - Aus

Happy & Sunny. Relaxing in Hammock with Shantaram.

Bright, Victoria - Aus

JAZZ HANDS!

The look of joy after doing his first few k's on a bike after months out of the saddle

Bright, Victoria - Aus

Melbourne GP!

AND THERE THEY GO!!!!

here's one for the history books...

I MTB'd around the whole of the melbourne grand prix course...

I don't know what my lap time was though as I thought I'd started my watch timer and hadn't... so...

...
...

I'm gonna do it again!

WEEEEEE!!!!

oh... I came first... :)

Yes it's been a while! Thailand to Oz

Well... I thought that whilst we were in Thailand mainly diving and stuff that it would probably be best to not keep posting posts that went along the lines of...

"went diving today... saw some fish... improved bouyancy control, finning techniques... etc..."

Thought that that might get a little dull quite quickly... hence the radio silence.

But what HAVE we been doing???

Well.. in brief.

• Diving in Ko Tao - Building up dive time whilst Simon been doing his Divemaster training...
• Eating - thai food mainly
• Sun bathing
• Swimming
• Sleeping
• Travelling

Left simon in thailand a week or so ago and left Thailand (via a quick stop in Bangkok) and flew into Melbourne... in Australia.

So I'm now officially the furthest I've ever been away from home which is a bit weird cos it's not that much different. I'm sure those that have been to Oz will no doubt agree.

We're staying in a hostel in a part of Melbourne called St Kilda.... it's like a little Brighton in that it's next to the sea, full of cafe's and trendy 'metrosexuals'... and according to locals there's about 4 girls to 1 guy and most of those guys are gay... so if you're straight and female, then finding a guy can be a bit tricky...

Been here for a little under a week now and it's a nice kinda town but we were keen to get out, and then easter happened!

Did everyone have lots of nice easter eggs? The Ozzys take easter quite seriously, not necessarily from the religious viewpoint... more like the fact it's a good holiday break for them... the last ditch at summer I suppose. Yes, the temperatures are dropping here, and whilst not exactly arctic conditions (or UK summer) it's a helluva lot colder than Thailand... put it this way, my fleece and softshell jacket has come out from the bottom of the rucksack.

We spent easter w/e in a village called BRIGHT, about 4hours north east of Melbourne in an area called the Australian Alps - which are 'kinda' alpiney... more like the highlands in Scotland - still, made a nice change from the flatness of Melbourne... We were invited up there by Kirsty, sarah's freind from school who's living and working out here now. She and some of her friends had planned a trip to Bright, and well, they kindly offered us to join them. The only catch being we had to make our own way. This involved a 4/5 hour train/coach journey starting at some ungodly hour... but hell... we're now hardened to this kind stuff so we accepted and met them the following day after they had driven up the previous night.

Something I've noticed whilst we've been travelling! I was always under the impression that driving on the left was not that common across the globe? But it seems that every country we've visited so far does... it's a subtle thing, but one that makes me happy when, say, crossing roads... whenever I've been in the states or mainland europe, I always found crossing roads quite unnerving... but well... none of that anxiety at all - yet. Which is nice.

Anyway, that asides. Bright was a nice break... Managed to get some Mountain Biking in! Weyhey!!! Dunno how far I went but I was out for a good 2-3 hours riding around the hills around Bright. Mainly on fire roads, terrain being very similar to places like Coed-Y-Brenin/Glentress... a little bit of single track, and the odd really quite gnarly downhill bits which I avoided... not really being that comfortable with the bike I'd hired to attempt such... A Kona, Cinder Cone, a XC bike with decent bits on it, but a Hardtail, so I struggled at first - it climbed really well, (better than my Patriot anyway [naturally]) and I was surprised to find that I really enjoyed the climbs more than the descents, but I suppose the kind of bike dictates the kind of riding...

Oh, and the highlight of the ride was chasing a 'roo (or maybe a wallaby) along a fire road for a good 1/2 mile or so... stupid dumb things, could have cut off into the forest but stayed boinging away in front of me until I think it realised I was not getting any further away... (I was going downhill at the time) and off it dived into the woods and dissappeared.

You don't get that in wales! ;)

We got back from Bright last night and Simon arrived from Thailand this morning. We have a week here in Melbourne until we head north to Sydney to meet up with Peter (Simons' Brother).

I hope everyone is keeping well, and apologies for the lack of updates.

TTFN!

P.S. Andy (west') - how's that longboard doing? email me some pictures dude!

Divemaster Training...

It's been a while since the last post.... nothing much to say really as we've mainly been chilling and soaking up the sun in sunny Koh Tao... well, it's not all sun, it has rained a couple of times but then it clears up and is sunny again! Hurrah!

Simon's currently 4 days into his Divemaster Training, he's due to finish on the 6th april... it's going well from all accounts, but I do think the sun and all the studying is finally getting to him... he's starting to do strange things, like getting ready to leave this morning for his early morning dive he managed to put his shirt on inside out AND back to front... and not even notice... he needs watching all the time...

He did his Emergency First Response yesterday (a kind of first aid thing) - and this morning he's on boat duty, surface support for the open water divers in training... then it's more of the same, lots of reading, and a few exams and what not.

Unfortunatly the underwater life here isn't as prolific as the similans, it's a good place to train and practice though as all the dive sites are really close to the scuba 'boot camp' we're in. thanks to Peter Dobson for the recommendation - it's really good actually, well set up, and a lot more of a younger crowd than we experienced in phuket, which seemed to be frequented by over 50 gents (replete with young thai ladies [and in some case young men] - heaven knows why?!) ;P - this place though is a lot more laid back, and best of all it's really condensed... the island is tiny and everything is so close... having said that we've not really explored at all... mainly cos we're so damn lazy.

Off on another dive this afternoon... but before that got some serious lazing int he sun by the pool...

Laters!

back from the depths...

Well... what can I say?

Diving in the similans in the andaman ocean has to rank as one my top lifetime experiences ever.

It's hard to put into words the sheer sense of wonder having seen first hand so much life underwater life in such a short space of time.

We began the trip a week ago now... we were taken from our little town in Phuket, a sleepy place called Chalong, and driven an hour or so north to the Thai mainland to a small port on the west coast. Via the airport to pick up the other divers who were to be our companions for the next 3 nights and 3 days... 5 Japanese divers, 4 guys and 1 lady, fresh in from there homeland, complete with there own kit and as is the typical sterotype lots of cameras...

We boarded the vessel "Harmony" at around 10pm, and we set off on the 6 hour voyage to the similan islands, far out into the andaman sea to the west.

The ship itself was about 25 meters long, with 3 floors, the first being our cabin areas, the loos, the galley and the dive deck, the second being the recreation area with TV, Dining/Briefing area, Bridge and Crew quarters, and the third being the roof, solarium, clothes drying area...


We we're roused from our sleep the following day at about 6.45am and prepared ourselves for our first dive... Sea sickness tablets taken, the rocking and swaying of the ship was a little unsettling at first, but after a while the 'sea legs' kick in and it becomes normal...

I won't go into details about each dive, but all in all we managed 10 separate dives over the 3 days, including 1 night dive, and numerous Deep dives (18 meters plus) - the deepest being around 35 meters... for the most part the visibility ranged from 5 meters to about 20 meters plus. And we visited about 6 separate dive sites, including the much famed Richelue Rock - which is literally in the middle of nowhere, with no land to be seen - quite a strange feeling jumping into open water with nothing to be seen for miles around...

Anyway... to cut a long story short it was ace.

Managed to go from crap diver with only 4 real dives (in a quarry) to a diver with now 14 dives under my belt, and in a location that's quite simply breathtaking. My first dive was well ropey, over breathing, crap bouancy control, quite anxious and nervous... byu the time we did the final dive my confidence had improved and skills to boot... I feel like a diver now... and I've passed my Advanced... which is great...

Simon's well on the way to staring his Dive Master training now, so he's chuffed too...

As far as aquatic life - loads of fish and stuff, loads of various types of coral, anemones, jelly fish, sharks, turtles, manta rays, sting rays, Trigger fish, clown fish (as in finding nemo), groupers (ugly but friendly) you name it... highlights being manta rays making an appearance round the boat earlier yesterday (we jumped in for a quick snorkel with them... graceful... and massive... 2 of them... about 3-4m's across... maybe bigger) and the other was swimming with a shoal... and I'm talking hundreds here... of meter long barracuda... totally mind blowing... I can't express how utterly incredible it's been...

It's difficult to fully explain and I'm incredibly honoured, it's just been quite magical. On the down side I got stung loads of times by small jelly fish and cut my fingers a bit (neither being too bad... the stings are like nettles... nothing a bit of wee wee can't sort out...) my fingers were cut whilst hanging onto a reef whilst gazing down into an abyss with a really strong current trying to push us back up and out...at like 25 meters under... which in recreational diving terms is deep... the deepest we've been was this yesterday when we dived down this coral pinnacle that starts at 20 meters below the surface and descends a long long way down... beyond 40 meters the limit set for recreational diving... beyond that is 'technical'.

I've learnt to stay away from various things too... like fire coral... urchins... and scorpion fish... beautiful but deadly... I shared a crevice with one whilst taking a peek at a tiny seahorse... the scorpions tend to stay static so it was ok... nevertheless quite nerve racking...

anyway... enough blathering on about diving...

If you ever get a chance to go diving then I'd thoroughly recommend it... especialy in tropical coral oceans...

What a blast!

Of to Ko Samui and Ko Tao for some more...

See you on the surface!

New Feature!

Please Note that at great expense, much time, consternation, confusion and help i've managed to add an 'RSS feed' to the page... Chris. you'll be very proud... as well as an Email Subscription option...

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

So if you want to receive updates automatically via email

whenever a new post is added*

then just type your email address into the field

on the right and click subscribe?

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Go on... you know you want to...

Big thanks to Matt for the heads up on this feature...

* without having to check the blog everyday (because I know that's what you're all doing) ;)

Bye bye singapore... hello Thailand..

Singapore was great... I'll go back there for sure... what a lovely part of the world... and we got to see some 'showers' too... quite a spectacle..

Big thanks to Matt and Bea - cheers guys, mostly appreciated - have fun and good luck with your stay. Hopefully see you again sometime? :)

Thailands nice...

Not much more to say really... other than it's really hot, really sunny and really quite beautiful... oh... and no litter... oh and everyone smiles here... it's such a happy place... it feels like we've died and gone to happy heaven. The drivers are a bit mental though... (the taxi driver drove at like mach 3 from the airport to where we're staying [in phuket] - then at some traffic lights he nodded off and pranged the car in front... still, he was laughing and giggling like an idiot which diffused the situation... like I said... it's happyland... bizarre) ...oh and finally the foods great... tasty tasty yum yum... (apart from the fish head soup)

Off to go do some diving off a boat for 4 days... it's a hard life.

So we'll be back then... (with some photo's)

Byeeeeeee!

Pools, Food and Shopping...

...not necessarily in that order.

Singapore is located on the southern tip of malaysia. An island, a city, a state and country in it's own right. 1 degree 17 minutes north of the equator it's safe to say that it's the furthest away from home I've ever been... and certainly the southest... Often sunny and often rainy the hot, humid environment making it perfect for the lush, green tropical scenery, from palm trees to banyan trees... the rainforest flora and fauna.

Simply put, it's a beautiful city - the antithesis of Delhi, Mumbai and India generally and relatively speaking quite a shock to the system. Everything here seems to shine, the apartment blocks, the skyscrapers, the cars, the people, even the containers in the perfectly neat container port as you enter the city from the airport seems to be like uber clean... it's really quite strange.

I'd heard stuff about singapore before - you know, how strict they are - the mosquito police, the chewing gum police, the M&S Poppyseed crackers police and such like... it's known as 'fine city' apparently... $50 for jaywalking, $500 for eating or drinking on a train, $1000 smoking in public places, and so on... oh... and death for drug trafficking... they're pretty tough on crime here. I expected to see cops on every street corner - a kind of militant utopia something akin to 1984 or probably closer to Brave New World only with palm trees and bermuda shorts... but it doesn't seem to be like that, at least not on the surface anyway and regardless of my preconceptions the crime rate is super low... so it seems to work.

Our experience here so far has been comfortable and strangely familiar, despite the heat and humidity. You're not stared at like you've got two heads (a common trait displayed by those in India and something you just get used to there) they drive on the left, the traffic lights are the same, as are the little green/red men at pedestrian crossings - these subtle things remind me of home, an obvious colonial legacy perhaps? Couple that with the strange feeling that you're also in a US city - the bright sun and the palm trees have a familiar LA feel, the roadsigns are very definately US influenced, and apart from the odd London Black Cab - the taxis here have a distinct american aroma to them, not to mention the skyline with it's loomin skyscrapers... very downtown LA. So, it's really odd in that respect a kind of clash of cultures - it doesn't feel at all how I'd expected SE asia to feel... that is until you look at the details.

The most obvious details being the people. As with most major cities in the world there's quite a diverse ethnic mix, the largest of which in this part of the world being from various oriental countries, starting with China, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, Japan and so on... there's a lot of Indians here too... then there's the westerners... the ex-pats the brits, the french, the spanish.. you name it - they're all here in their droves. And finally there's the tourists... all heading down to Raffles for the obligatory Sling...

We've been staying with Matt and Beatrice, freinds from London who moved out here 4 months ago. They're having a whale of a time from all accounts... and why not? (see great uncles matts travel diary for more details from singapore) We've been made very welcome and it's a lifestyle one could get used to given enough disposable income. Like I said, low crime rate, high standard of living, it's hot, it's sunny, it rains for sure but it's warm rain, plus you've got the rest of SE asia to explore right on your doorstep... it's really quite ideal in that sense.

My hang up is that there's a certain superficiality about it all. Don't get me wrong it is lovely - but there does seem to be an obsession with shopping... and not just shopping but shopping for all those branded items for branded items sake... the Dolce & Gabannas, the Chanels, and so on... you name it... it's here... and it's expensive... and people seem to be buying... it's a shoppers paradise. Mall after Mall after Mall after Mall... all seemingly linked via underground A/C cooled walkways. All well and good if you're into that kind of thing... give me TK Maxx and Ebay any day... :)

We arrived Friday. Spent the morning with sarah's parents as they were on the same flight as us heading out to New Zealand for a 2 week break. They had a few hours to kill so they escorted us to Matt and Beatrices, freshened up and headed out... we joined them for Slings at Raffles - followed by a large crab lunch down the road at some place I can't remember the name of... open air, by the river, down to earth, lovely food... The folks left us around 5pm and we settled in for the evening at Matt and Bea's apartment. This basically involved sitting around the pool, eating french cheese and bread (from the Carre Four here) followed by a dip in the aforementioned pool and then a warming jacuzzi. It's a hard life.


Saturday we went shopping and eating in the day. We went out 'clubbing' at the night to 'Cafe del mar' where Pete Tong was performing. (He's a famous radio 1 DJ specialising in club tunes, been around for ever and is respected for his show "the essentail mix" which is generally on saturday nights when most clubbers are getting ready to go out) So he was here in Singapore - 'Cafe del mar' beach party... literally on the beach (some around here in fact - but it's not been built on this image) all very swish and trendy... complete with pool and jacuzzi. Naturally we all took our swimming gear and ended up in the dance floor (the swimming pool)... and so it was that at 1.30am I found myself lying on my back, staring up at the stars with palms silohetted against the half moonlit sky peppered with vague clouds - with pete tong striking up his set less than 10 meters away, surrounded by the beautiful people dancing, drinking and generally having a good time... quite a surreal moment.



Not long after that drying out on a lounger by the pool, Matt turns to me and asks "You know all those stories about ex-pats living abroad, working hard, playing hard and having the time of their lives?"... I nodded... "It's all true!"

So it seems.

It's a Goodbye to Incredible India. Part #2

Delhi to Agra and back again.

The Taj Mahal is one of those places that is as awe inspiring as you'd hopefully expect it to be. Not least the fact it's nestled in a place that isn't exactly the prettiest town in the world - Agra - as with most Indian towns and cities I've described so far, litter and poverty is as prolific here as anywhere else. There's just no escaping it. But somehow, because it's the home of the Taj Mahal, this aspect to indian culture appears more striking.

On the trip in from Delhi (the 7.15am - taj express, a four hour train journey) I noticed one stop prior to Agra station a group of sharply dressed young men get on the train and conspicuously scout up and down our carraige obviously looking for something... now, call me paranoid, but my first thought was of Goondas (indian gangsters) - perhaps mainly due to the fact the book I'm reading (Shantaram) focuses a great deal on the indian underworld and these guys seemed to fit the description perfectly of the hoods depicted within it's pages...

My second (and more down to earth guess, which turned out to be correct) was that these guys were the first wave of locals, scouting to see how many Goras (white tourists) there were to ply their trade - namely "the best guides money could buy" - it was no coincidence the well dressed young man who'd eyeballed me from across the carraigeway was the one who shadow us from off the train, along the platform, out of the station, across the car park and along the road for quiet a while, at all times explaining that we need a guide otherwise we'd miss out, and as he soon realised we weren't getting any rickshaws or taxis he began to explain that the taj was 9kms away and that we couldn't walk all the way... "we like to walk we said..." and with that, he gave up on us and ran back to the station...

You see Simon and I had devised a plan, a plan to avoid the high costs demanded of tourists outside train stations.... tourists either too afraid or inexperienced to step off the pavement and join the locals, walk the streets, avoid the traps. The trick to this is to be ignorant of everything around you and just walk... English find this very hard to do, they're far too polite - and it takes time to adapt... but we ignored the hawkers, the guides, the taxis wallahs, the rickshaw wallahs and moved beyond the range of the station by some way... eventually a rickshaw pulled up beside us as we were walking up the road towards the main town. "60 rupees" He said after we asked him to take us the red fort (which I should have called the Agra Fort - stupid me :S ) - naturally he didn't understand where this was and kept saying "Taj Mahal?" instead... we argued him down to 30 rupees and he happily agreed... 9kms later and a trip to his dad, to ask directions, we arrived at the agra fort... (30 rupees is about 32p)

Agra fort was built yonks ago towards the start of the 1st millenia (1000AD). Mughal empires rose and fell around it, destroyed, rebuilt, destroyed again and rebuilt, fortified further only to fall to the British who garrisoned it and turned it into an arsenal. It's an impressive size and much more ornate than the european equivalents, typical in it's Mughal stlying, taking its queues from islamic scripture and philosophy. It was the hub of India for centuries being the countries capital during the reign of the mughals (starting around 1550AD) - it's got quite a history.

One of the key aspects of the fort is it's the place where ShaJahan was incarcerated until his death after his son rebelled against him and took his throne - pesky kids, you just can't trust them. At the time I'm sure it was fairly bad for ShaJahan, but when actually visit his "prison" you realise that it's not exactly the Bangkok Hilton... more like Paris Hilton (the place, not the waif like, 'it' girl with a penchant for pink, small dogs, short skirts and naughty videos)

This Prison was luxurious to the max, more like a palace than a jail... but then again it WAS a palace within a reasonably small section of the whole of the fort. The saddest part is, is that this section of the fort and the prison overlooks the Yamuna River, gazing from here the Taj Mahal is clearly visible, the final resting place of Shah Jahan's beloved wife... a mere 2 km's or so to the east-south-east. It's from this vantage point he would have sat and remembered her never being able to visit the monument himself... until after his death.

We lunched during the heat of the midday sun and ventured onwards to the relative sanctity and peace of the Taj Complex. Having been a number of times I shrugged off the numerous attempts made by the guides at the gate, I also warned simon about the rigorous search the security/armed police make of your bags on entering... any contraband goods are carted away and placed in 'secure' lockers to be collected upon exiting... of course in typical style simon got away scot free even with all his fancy electronica... me? well... it seems MP3 players aren't allowed and neither are playing cards... beats me! So, those both went into the 'secure' unit... consisting of a metal box with no lock - you're then handed a hand written torn piece of paper with your inventory written in hindi and told "no lose, no lose, get later..." - fair enough... crude... but hopefully effective? So, sans Ipod and deck of cards we passed the gun toting guards and entered into the first courtyard of the 7th wonder of the world...

There are three gates into the first courtyard, we entered from the south, one of the lesser used entrances. The courtyard is flanked on all four sides with a covered walkway and small rooms. TMoving in from there are four lawns (no walking) and in the center of the yard is a large plaza. Exiting this plaza to the north is the Main Gateway that you pass through to enter the Famous Garden that sits before majestic monument.

Of course, much has been written of the Taj Mahal, some of it true, some of it myth. I can't add anything to what's already been written, suffise to say it is a marvel it really is. It's so familiar though that it can appear quite surreal at first, everyone's seen it - on postcards, on the TV and probably most regularly down the local curry house on the wall in some form or other. But none of that can prepare you for the real thing.

Initially we sat quietly, away from the crowds just soaking in the ambience. We had time to kill so we killed it. After an hour so it was time to approach the main event... we joined the masses and began our walk towards it. It looms and get's bigger and you look and gaze up towards it in fascination. It's then you realise you've got another 100 yards or so left before you reach the base. It really is rather big...


We left just before sunset in a bid to get my gear left at the gate and catch the train back to Delhi, having just been told off by machine gun toting cops to get off the grass... you don't argue with guys with guns... so we got off the grass - besides there were signs saying not to walk on the grass... and in india signs tend to be ignored so we ignored them... but still... guns... cops... it was a no win situation...

It was a good day. and as we were leaving the complex simon commented that "I won't forget that in a hurry..."

nuff said.

It's a Goodbye to Incredible India. Part #1

Yes, we've left India behind us now. Having divided our time equally between the south in the north of the biggest democracy in the world.

Two weeks in Kerela split almost evenly between Varkala and Kovalam. The former being a chilled out, traveller freindly hippy fest. the perfect place for us to wind down after our, quite frankly, crappy last 12 months. The latter being not as chilled out, 2 week package tour heaven (or hell depending on your perspective and as we know now, certainly not my bag) but we managed to continue to unwind and found some hope in an otherwise uninspiring location.

Two weeks in Chandigarh was more family orientated, food galore and weight inducing. The daily routine working itself into breakfast, followed by some difficult sitting in the garden, and maybe reading the paper, followed by lunch, an afternoon nap, rising early evening for Tea and Cake or biscuits, merging into early evening drinks (read whisky, beer, bloody mary, G&T etc) merging further into Dinner and finally to bed... this routine making up the skeleton of our lazy days in chandigarh. We expected nothing less and a great big thank you to Grandpa & Maaji and to Papaji & Amiji welcoming as ever. :) x

This routine was punctuated by the inevitable trips to sector 17 (shopping) sector 8 (shopping) aswell as a number of other sectors (shopping) not to mention the odd excursion to restaraunts - namely a chinese restaraunt the highlight being some awesome prawns, then a lunchtime buffet (chinese again) at the local taj group 5 star hotel, simply stunning food and service beyond compare (keep repeating "yes we are backpacking") and finally a more appropiate trip to KFC (more like it) - travelling on a shoestring never tasted so good.

The punctuations of the daily routines continue with our failed attempts to introduce an early morning (pre-breakfast) excercise in a bid to remove the imminent paunches we we're/are all developing...

...and finally no trip to chandigarh is complete without a visit to Nek Chands "Rock Garden" - we'd pontificated about this to Simon perhaps too much - in brief - Nek Chand was a municipal worker at the local dump when the city was first being constructed in the 50's - rather than dispose haphazardly of the construction waste he started to turn the waste into sculptures, forming them into bizarre shapes and building settings for them - all of this was against the rules, and when it was discovered the authorities were going to demolish it until there was a public outcry which saved the early works - he was granted a repreive and encouraged to do more - it grew and grew and is still growing now...

it is literally a load of rubbish and before simon saw it he thought all it was going to be "...just a few old bikes and oil drums" as it happens he was as impressed as I was when I first went and continue to be... here's some pictures that don't do it justice but you get the idea...

Part 2 coming soon!