2007.5.26, Water Children by Wendy MacLeod. UW school of drama. The battle of reproductive rights from a view of an actress. Entertaining, well acted.

2007.5.11. Seattle Opera "La Boheme"

Fabulous stage and lighting design. Sweet music. New singers.

Australia trip summary (2007/4/16-5/3)

Australia:

Could be a pleasant country to live in. Peaceful, far away from everyone. Mixed cultures. No interesting food. People are humorous and very friendly. The lady at the rental car booth at Melbourne airport called me "love"!

Vast territory: from desert to reef, tropic north to ski in Victoria. Distances are dauntingly large. Had to pay $80 for extra miles once.

Unique fauna and flora. However most exotic places are either hard to reach or armed with harsh climate.

Best country to see the reefs, especially in 20 years, where everywhere else corals are killed off by bad environmental practices.

Too far to visit: 20+ hrs flight from Seattle.

No history, except for the Aboriginals. But they are pretty much in oblivion of the mainstream society.

Lessons learned:

Stuff as much as allowed into carry-on luggage.

Take only half of the clothes you think you need.

A better time to visit may be spring, for the flowers.

Part 4 of 4: 2007.4.28-5.3 southern Great Barrier Reef - highlight of the trip. Warm, high in mid-upper 20C's.

4/28. 10:30, 2hr boat ride from Gladstone marina to Heron Island (1hr ahead of mainland), a natural coral cay. First explored by the turtle soup industry in 1920s, now a resort, plus a marine life research center. Zoned in the national marine park, nothing can be collected, all garbage has to be taken out to mainland. No running water on the island. Reverse osmosis is used to desalinate water. Solar panels on every roof. friendly and knowledgeable staff. No camping allowed on the island. No vehicles. No stores except for one small souvenir boutique. Beach and coral practically right out of your door. Idyllic. All guest rooms are unlocked. Birds walk into your room.

Took a guided bird walk at 3pm. Saw a Lesser Crested Tern with a cute hairdo, a Ruddy Turnstone turning a stone, a female Lesser Frigatebird with threatening beak, lots of Eastern Reef Egrets (both white and gray), many Black Noddy who shit everywhere, a baby Wedge-tailed Shearwater (or a mutton bird) fluffy in the borrow, countless Buff Banded Rail who steal your food.
Afterwards, snorkeled in Shark Bay. Watched the beautiful sunset, saw some Stingrays and Whiprays. On the way home, met a small group of women and kids watching over a turtle hatchling struggling his way over the beach, walking along him to protect from the harm of the gulls. Was sad to see him engulfed by some fish, only a few seconds after he reached the sea.

4/29. Huge breakfast. Snorkeling at Gantry. Got many scratches on the knees because the tide was too low. Dived at 3pm. Put on a shorty wet suit to keep me warm. I was very nervous for the first half. Kept close distance to the dive master. Saw a big head Tasselled Wobbegong shark, a Whitetip Reef Shark, two huge Rays, and countless colorful fish. Ran out of air faster than my peers. Got a bit seasick waiting on the boat, but was exiting.
Snorkeled in the afternoon in Shark Bay. Float with a large school of big Sweetlips, saw a school of yellow Unicorn fish. On the way back, 5-6 rays, and many turtle hatchlings walking towards the ocean, adorable. Alas, most of them snatched by the gulls.

4/30. 9am dive. On the way out, saw a dolphin swim with her calf! On the way back, a group of about 20 rays hanging out at the harbor. Didn't see anything exiting underwater, so I erased my name from the sign-up sheet for the two subsequent dives. Walked around the island. While waiting for sunset at Shark Bay, saw a ray flying for a split of a second, some sharks and a big turtle. No hatchlings tonight.

5/1. Snorkeling in the morning at Shark Bay. Swam after a shark for a bit. Guided Reef Walk at 3pm. Saw lots of aliens. A kind of conch that sticks his two eyes out when you have him shell-side down on your palm. Three and half slimy green Sea Hares. Learned quite a bit about the countless ugly Sea Cucumbers.
Walked to Shark Bay at sunset, saw 2 turtles twice, some White-breasted Sea Eagles, Bar-shouldered Doves.

5/2. Walked to North Beach through Pisonia forest after breakfast. Bird dropping drapes everywhere. Snorkeled at Shark Bay. Saw two sharks and my favorite school of big fish. Felt cold after about an hour in the water. Dried myself under the sun and took a nap. On the way back, rescued a baby turtle.
3pm, while my diving buddy went for the 5th dive, I checked out a book titled "Reef Fish Identification Tropical Pacific". We've seen: a couple species of Butterflyfish, some kinds of Grouper, of Wrasse, of sandperch, many yellow Longfin Bannerfish, black-white Bi-color Angelfish with yellow tail, and Bluespine Unicornfish who looks like having a 3rd eye.
Waiting for sunset at Shark Bay has become my favorite moment.
Dinner has only two options: $45 or $50 (with desert or cheese). Well prepared, beautifully presented, portion is on the small side.

5/3. Check-out. Swam to Shark Bay with snorkel. Proper shower facilities for departing guests. 2pm Boat transfer back to mainland. Gladstone marina is reasonably pretty: big lawn at waterfront. Downtown is a short ride away across a bridge, but is plain and depressingly boring. Half an hour is sufficient to check out every store front. Retired to the room with 2 bottles of beer. A few dozens of green lorikees gathered up on the palm trees outside the hotel after night fell.

5/4. 6:45am flight to Brisbane. Huge airport requires a train ride to the international terminal. Took almost an hour in queue for check-in again. 12hrs later arrived at LA exhausted. Had to go through customs with all the luggage and re-check-in everything for Seattle. Nothing is lost this time.

Australia. part 3/4. North End

Australia trip, part 3 of 4: 2007.4.23-27. North End (hot and humid).

4/23. Arrive at Darwin ~2pm. Felt like an oven. Headed east on Arnhem Hwy to Mary River Park with A/C in full blast. Saw many cathedral termite mounds along the road. Overnight in the park with a couple of small geckos. Walked a bit towards the river. Trail overgrown, partly flooded. A few Rainbow Lorikeet sang from the trees on the lawn. In the evening, saw two giant spiders in the laundry room.

4/24. Witnessed two wallabies fighting while having breakfast. 9am river cruise along Mary River. Almost no other tourists. The season hadn't started yet. Just end of the Wet. The water level was still high and many roads remained closed. Only saw 3 Freshwater Crocodiles on the river bank and one salty of over 2.5m long. Saw a black bittern, a White-breasted Sea-eagle, a few of Rainbow Bee-eaters, some Buff-breasted Paradise Kingfisher, Azure Kingfisher, hundreds of Flying Foxes.

Continue east to Kakadu National Park. Checked into Aurora Kakadu an hour later. 10km east, Mamukala observation deck overlooks a lovely large swamp partly filled with water lilies. Saw two Double-barred Finch, a Sulfur-crested Cockatoo.
~30+ km further east is the township of Jaribu (a better choice for accommodation location than I had picked), center of the park road system. A mile or so south on Kakadu Hwy, is Bowali Visitor Center. Was showing an interesting movie about the park. No AC. There was smoke and fire by the road close to the visitor center. Part of the fire management program the park has adopted from the old aboriginal practices.
Headed north for 43km to East Alligator area, the spot for Barramundi fishing. Didn't see any crocodile along a riverfront trail (closed due to floods).
Ubirr, 3km further north, is a wonderful area with a concentration of aboriginal rock art. A short climb to the top of a rocky outcrop leads to an inspirational view of Nardab floodplain: white cockatoos flying above, wallabies jumping about, reflection of the sunset on the swamp.
Twilight doesn't linger here. Little frogs climbed on the pavement, especially on the bridge over South Alligator River. Probably have run over hundreds of them on the way home.
Barramundi for dinner. Tasted like trout.

4/25. Awoken with 10+ Little Corellas in front of the window, trying to catch the water condensation from the tip of the air condition pipe. Two wallabies were munching on the lawn. Birding at the river crossing 2km east of hotel: a lot of Glossy Ibis, Great Egrets, Pied Herons, Radjah Shelducks, 2 Magpie Geese, a Black Bittern, a Bush Stone-curlew.
Tried fishing at the muddy shore of the South Alligator River. No luck. Even lost the hook. Tried my luck around sunset over a little creek before the bridge. A little unnamed fish caught my hook by so much surprise that I lost the reel in the process. Didn't even put any bait on. The next half an hour, nothing happened. After putting some entrails of this fish on the hook, finally caught 2 even smaller catfish. Saw many white egrets resting on top of trees. Dinner: BBQ-ed fish.

4/26. Heading out the park along Kakadu Hwy. Most of the hikes were closed due to the high water level. Stopped at Nourlangie Rock. Fascinating rock art dated to possibly 5000 years ago. Elaborate paintings of naked match-stick people, and fat gods. A short walk up a large rock formation provides a fine view of the woodlands and AnBangBang billabong. However, less interesting than Ubirr, and too hot to linger.
2nd stop: Mardugal at Yellow River area. A pleasant 2 km walk in the woodland. Saw Red-winged Parrots, and Australian King Parrots.
An hour and half later on Kakadu Hwy is the boring town Pine Creek. Here, we turn north on Stuart Hwy (a main throughfare traverses the country: 1400Km south would reach the middle: Alice Spring). A few pink head Major Mitchell's Cockatoos here.

2 hours later is Litchfield National Park. Magnetic Termite mounds is the first stop. Around a hundred of these
tall, thin, flat mounds, oriented north-south. 2nd stop: Tolmer Falls. A short walk leads to an overview platform. Camped a minute walk from Wangi Falls, which was closed for swimming due to some minute probability of crocodile presence. Had dinner with my legs soaked in the water while the sun turned the rocks and water to crimson.

4/27. Woke up with 4 bloody mosquitoes in the tent and maybe 50 bites on my limbs. On the way out of the park, dipped into the "swimming pool" at Florence Falls. Perfect spot with no one else around. Walked up to the car along a creek, felt the temperature rising with each step. Breakfast at Buley Rockhole (not nearly as nice as Florence Falls). Then, non-stop to Darwin. Totally driven about 1080Km.

Arrived at Gladstone airport with one bag missing. Needed to turn the clock half an hour ahead.

Australia part 2/4. Ululu

Australia trip, part 2 of 4: 2007.4.21-23. Ayers Rock in North Territory (30 minutes behind Victoria).

4/21. Arrived ~1pm, sunny, windy, high around 33°C. Hiked the Valley of the Winds (7km) at Kata Tjuta (or Olgas, part of the $25 national park), since Uluru climb was closed due to high wind. These giant domes are conglomerate of cobbles and boulders, like sediment, cemented by sandstone. Water tanks are installed along the trail. However, its water tastes chlorine. Hard red earth, low shrubs, some blue and white flowers, birds chirping, a creek flowing. Very pleasant, if not for the numerous flies. On the way back, saw 2 errant camels.

4/22. Uluru. Uluru looks like one chocolate truffle dipped in coco powder from afar. The closer it gets, the alien it looks. Coarse grained arkose, punctured by large caves. Sure is impressive. The climb was closed due to "forecast rain". Did the short Mala Walk, saw some cave paintings. Mala is hare wallaby. Anangu called themselves the Mala people. This walk follows the ancient route for the ceremony which culminated on top of Uluru.
Drove east ~100km to see Mt Conner, another giant monolith now sits on a cattle ranch. The road stretches ahead endlessly. At the Curtin Springs inn and cattle station, a little cafe serves simple fares at the "BeerAndBullshit Conner", with a slogan:
In America, they have Bill Clinton, Bob Hope, Johnny Cash, and Stevie Wonder.
In Australia, we have John Howard, no hope, no cash, no bloody wonder.
The climb was still closed even the sun came out and no sign of rain. Had a lazy afternoon by the pool, due to heat. Walked to the Mutitjulu waterhole at dusk. Only encountered two tourists, yet hundreds of flies. This is my favorite spot in the area. Tried to wait around for Kangaroos. But none came.

4/23. Sunrise at Uluru. Lots of people, and not much color due to the overcast sky. Again the climb was closed.

Only guests can purchase alcoholic drinks in the resort, which operates the only stores in the vicinity. However, those who actually live here are the aboriginals. It's pretty depressing to see some of them waiting at the store front begging for beer from the guests.