Way back in July I made a blog post about the top 5 things I looked forward to doing in Australia. While I obviously wasn't able to fight a kangaroo, I was a little disappointed that my trip home would not feature a visit to the wondrous rock formation known as Ayers Rock. There simply wasn't enough time to squeeze another destination into an already fully loaded travel agenda. My family and I decided to forego a trip to Ayers Rock in order to spend more time in our other, probably more worthwhile destinations. So we booked a flight from Perth to Cairns.
Now Australia is bigger than most people think, so a flight from Perth to Cairns is quite a long way. Australia's main airline Qantas doesn't fly the route directly, as far as I know, and almost any flight plan from Perth to Cairns stops in Brisbane first. Sometimes, though, the route involves a layover not in Brisbane, but in a little single gate airport in the center of the outback. Our flight plan was the one that included the stop at this little airport, which is known as the Ayers Rock airport.
I was really excited to hear that this would be our layover. I wasn't sure to what extent we would be able to see the giant rock, since our layover lasted a very quick 2 hours, but I figured since it was so massive and in the middle of nowhere, it must be visible from the plane at least. And that is why my sister I fixed ourselves to the airplane window as we prepared to land, near the end of the flight. My dad, against everything I'd ever learned from riding in planes all my life, insisted we take some pictures with his camera, an electronic device no less. We did end up getting some good pictures from the air though because just as we were about to land, we spotted the rock, quite close to the airport and looking massive amongst a flat and barren outback. I fully expected to be able to see it from the ground.
I eagerly made my way off the airplane, but was immediately caught off guard by something quite sudden and unexpected. The moment I stepped out of the plane and onto the stairs outside, I was hit with a hot wind like nothing I'd felt before. It felt like someone had just opened an oven door. I soon found out that the temperature was 109 degrees. I'm pretty sure I'd never been in that kind of heat before. It was a dry heat though, and I think I finally found out what the heck that meant because even though it felt like a sauna outside, it wasn't too unbearable.
The second thing I discovered upon disembarking the aircraft was more of a disappointment. The landscape which had looked completely flat from the air was actually relatively hilly, blocking any possible view of the only reason anyone would think about coming to this airport in the first place. Obviously anyone who really wanted to see the rock, took a car from the airport and drove to the resort nearby. I was disappointed, but I wasn't ready to give up. I tracked down a bloke in a bright yellow vest who appeared to be an airport employee and simply asked if there was any way I could see Ayers Rock from the airport. He responded by saying that most people just hiked about five minutes up the road and over the hill to get a pretty good view of the thing. I relayed the message to my family and grabbed my camera. Unfortunately, due to extreme heat and extreme flies, not all members of my family were able to make the trip, but someone had to watch the bags too. The hike wasn't bad, and after pausing for a brief while to convince myself that the local deadly snakes would be too afraid of me to stick around the area, i was able to reach the top of the hill. And there was my reward, a giant rock formation, one solid piece rising out from the ground and dominating an otherwise vast and barren landscape.
Ayers Rock was quite a sight to behold, even if it was still quite a ways off in the distance. The pictures I took won't do it justice. It is one of those things you have to see with your own eyes to truly appreciate. Either way here are my pictures. I don't have the ones from the plane cause they were taken with my dads camera, but if I do get a copy of the photos, I'll be sure to post them. After taking an ample load of pictures, we made our way back to the airport and waited for our connecting flight to Cairns, which would prove to be a much different destination than the hot, arid desert outback of Ayers Rock.
After most of my Notre Dame classmates had left Perth to begin their own travels across Australia and ultimately back home, I was still hanging around Tommy More eagerly awaiting the arrival of my parents and my sister. I was excited to have the opportunity to show them around UWA's campus and Perth. Playing tour guide, however, was a much more stressful job than I had originally imagined, and I found myself relieved when we were at last on the plane out of Perth and onto new adventures that were out of my hands.
I won't take up too much space on this stuff, since essentially I showed my family around the places I've been talking about and showing pictures of all semester. Basically, they arrived on Sunday afternoon, and I met up with them at their hotel shortly after. A good son probably would've been there to pick them up at the airport. In my defense, I had no reasonable means of getting to the airport. They also booked the flight that landed in Perth around the same time as the start of the fourth quarter of the Notre Dame vs Pittsburgh football game. Regrettably, I chose watching the game over picking up my family. Well, no, I regret nothing, not even firmly believing that Notre Dame would go BCS bowling this year at the start of the season. I don't want to have my faithfulness tainted when they win the national championship next year with their new coach. But I digress. In short, I met my parents and sister at their hotel and their was much rejoicing. It was great to see them after so long, but my brain was having trouble comprehending that they were actually in Australia with me.
To start off, I showed them around the University of Western Australia's campus. Then we went across the street to St Thomas More college, and I showed them were I'd been living for four months. They couldn't get over how strange the coed bathrooms were. Another thing that was very strange to them but all too familiar to me was the Australian Crow. Upon hearing the bird for the first time, my sister stopped and looked at me and said "What is that?!" The Australian Crow is one of the most annoying birds in all the world. They sound like a cross between a crying baby and a sick cat, and they are all over Perth. They never shut up either. But don't take my word for it, this video will help you understand (I got this from youtube. I did shoot my own video, but this one is much better).
Yeah, crazy right? Believe I know all too well. They start at about 5am and go all day. But I won't dwell on those birds anymore because I'm free of them now. Anyway, back to the trip. After leaving Tommy More, I took them to Fremantle for dinner. We went down to the beach so they could all touch the Indian Ocean. We had dinner at Little Creatures, a popular local brewery. By the time dinner was over, my party was beginning to feel the affects of some 30+ hours of traveling without a good nights rest, so we all went straight to bed after that.
The next morning I took them to Kings Park. Unfortunately, the season of spring was ending and the wonderful flowers of the botanical gardens that I took pictures of a month earlier were no longer in bloom. We did get to experience the spectacular views of the city that Kings Park has to offer. After Kings Park, we went into downtown Perth and had lunch in the Hay Street and Murray Street Malls, the main place to shop in downtown Perth. After lunch we got ready for the part of the day that I was most excited for, a bus tour. I'd spent a lot of time after finals researching tours around Perth, trying to find the right one. I wanted to go back to Caversham Wildlife Park so that my family would have a chance to see kangaroos and koalas while in Australia (cause who goes to Australia without seeing kangaroos and koalas?), but I also knew that they were interested in visited a winery to taste some fine Australian wines. I only had one afternoon to fit in two completely different activities. Luckily I finally found a tour bus that combined a trip to Caversham with a trip to the Sandalford winery.
I was really impressed with the tour too. The driver was very informative, and I was surprised at how much more I learned that I hadn't already discovered in my semester there. Even at Caversham, where I'd already been once before, I realized there were a lot of things I'd missed the first time around. The best part was being able to finally sit back and just be a tourist again. I had my day and a half run as tour guide, and it just wasn't for me. But my family seems to think I did a good job.
That night I moved out of my room in Tommy More at last. I was the last Notre Dame student to leave. There were still a few Australians left, but for the most part the place was empty. It was sad walking down the steps out of Tommy for the last time, with all my bags in tow, but we had an early flight to catch in the morning, and a new day meant exciting new places and exciting new adventures.
Okay so to start off, I've been home for a little over one week now. I definitely should have started posting some stuff about the trip home on here sooner, but I took a little time off, a vacation from vacation I suppose. Anyway I'm finally ready to upload all the pictures and stories from my travels on the way back home with my family. We covered a lot of ground. In just under two weeks we visited places in 4 different Australian states (which are much bigger than our states), and we explored New Zealand's south island as well. Just to give you an idea of all the traveling we did in the short amount of time, here is a list of all the airports I visited in just 11 days:
Coming up, a detailed blog post for each place we visited. This will only include places where we actually stepped out of the airport, so Auckland and LA don't count and Detroit isn't relatively all that interesting of a place either.
Hi. I've just paid for a bit of internet in Cairns. I've been traveling around Australia with my parents and sister since Sunday. It has been awesome, but there has been little time for blogging. I'm about out of internet time so I'll have to write all about it when I get back home in Michigan. Cya!
Today Vanessa and I went to the Aquarium of Western Australia (AQWA). The aquarium is a collection of fish and sea creatures from Western Australia's 12,000 km of coastline. AQWA is located at Hillary's Boat Harbour, which is about a 20 minute train ride from Perth. Hillary's Boat Harbour turned out to be a pretty cool place so we stuck around for dinner as well. I honestly wished I had discovered the place sooner, but I suppose its distance from Perth explains why it took me until my last few days here to venutre that far by train.
The aquarium was pretty cool, especially because it exclusively featured fish from Western Australia. The best part by far was the underwater observation tunnel, which is pictured below:
I also took some video in the tunnel, and managed to capture a pretty funny moment having to do with a certain disoriented sea turtle.
After the aquarium, Vanessa and I walked around the boat harbour a bit to check it out. It wasn't long before the smells of the all the cafes, kebab stands, and gelato shops had us, well at least had me, getting pretty hungry. The choice for dinner was easy. Last week for my birthday, Vanessa took me to a place called Australia's Finest Burgers a.k.a. FAB (I guess they liked FAB better than AFB). As it turns out, not only was it Australia's finest burger, it was the finest burger I had ever had in all my life. The apparent secret was location. All the ingredients in the burger were from local sources. The beef was from the Swan Valley. The bread was baked fresh. Even the lettuce tasted amazing. In fact, even all the pictures on the walls were taken locally at locations around Perth (many of which I had been to). So naturally my choice at Hillary's Boat Harbour was the second and only other location of FAB in Australia. I ordered the exact same thing and again it amazed me. I only wish I had discovered the restaurant before my last two weeks in Perth. I snapped a picture of the super sandwich along with all the fish in the aquarium and put it in an album right here. Enjoy.
I finally finished up with all my finals. Well I finished up with all my finals two days ago, but I've been at the beach since then so I really couldn't get anything up here until now. It has felt great to be without the burden of studies on my shoulders, but it is also a little sad too as everyone is starting to leave Tommy More. Indeed a few Notre Dame students have already left and begun their traveling experience throughout the rest of Australia and beyond. Luckily, Andrew was able to get our whole group together one last time for a photo:
Only Mike, who was still in the hospital (though finally out today), and Kelsey are missing from the picture. Also, the two other exchange students in Tommy More this semester, Alice (Nebraska) and Jonathan (Italy), are in the picture too.
Now that I'm done with school, I'll be spending the next few days packing, buying souvenirs, preparing for my family's arrival, and trying to squeeze in any last minute adventures that I can find.
I have a final on Friday as well as next Monday and Wednesday, so I wouldn't expect any new posts or anything interesting in that span of time. I haven't and won't be doing much other than studying as final exams in Australia are worth a much more significant part of your grade than they are back home. My Materials final is worth 70% of my final grade. Meanwhile, the temperature has been in the high 80s everyday this week even though I can't enjoy it. Luckily, when I finish with exams on the 11th, I will have until the 15th to enjoy the beaches before my parents and sister arrive to visit and I begin my long journey back home.
If you've been wondering where the heck I've been all this time, then this blog post is for you. I've got plenty of pictures of the University of Western Australia's campus, as well as St Thomas More College. Since the first week I got here, I've been telling myself that on a nice sunny day I need to go out and photograph the campus. Well, four months later I finally got around to doing it. I suppose the benefit for you is that by now I actually know what and where everything is. You can see it all right here.
Here is a quick sneak peak of the main building, Winthrop Hall:
Also, as was pointed out to us on our first tour of campus, there is a terrible mistake on the main building's clock. How this mistake was made and why it was never corrected is beyond me. First person to spot the mistake and comment on it wins a prize. Obviously, if you're a fellow Perth program Domer, secretly checking my blog for inaccuracies, embellishments, and lies, you will win nothing.
Oh yeah, on a final note: Happy Halloween! In case you were wondering, they do not celebrate Halloween in Australia at all. However, I bought a bag full of candy at the grocery store today just to feel at home.
*** I've received a complaint that my St Thomas More picture album doesn't include a picture of my room. I'm sorry for this, but after four months of living in it, my room isn't exactly picturesque. Please refer to an older blog post here for some pictures of my room. ***
At one of our pre-study abroad meetings last year, some students who did the Perth program the year before told us about how they all took a trip to Rottnest Island for a few days at the end of the semester. It sounded like a pretty good trip, so naturally we all decided to do the same thing this year. Everyone formed into cabin groups (6 people) and planned their own trips. Because of everyone's varying schedules, we didn't plan the whole trip together. Different groups arrived and left on different days, but for at least one or two days we were all there together. My group was there for four days (Monday through Thursday).
Rottnest Island got its name from Dutch explorers who first discovered it. Little creatures known as Quokkas inhabit the island and were mistaken by the Dutch to be large rats, who named the island Rottnest (Dutch for Rat's nest). While the island does have a terrible name, it is actually a very pleasant place and a popular vacation spot. There are no cars allowed on the island (except for service vehicles), so everyone uses bikes to get around. The island is good for snorkeling, surfing, whale watching, and fishing. The beaches are really nice too, if the conditions are right. Unfortunately for us, the conditions were not very good during our time there. It was cold and rainy on a few of the days. Worse than the bad weather though, was the flies. At the begining of summer in Western Australia and after a good rain, swarms of flies come and bug the crap out of everybody. Nobody told me about this before I got here, but they are awful. They came out the day we left for Rottnest and were there the entire trip. They swarm you and try to get in your eyes and mouth and ears. Obviously they can't do you any real harm, other than drive you mad. Even with the rain and the flies though, the trip was pretty fun. See it for yourself.
After many months in the dark, I was finally able to locate the software on my computer that is capable of turning pictures taken in panorama mode into actual panoramas. You won't see anything new here, but I think these pretty cool either way. Click on the photos to enlarge them.
This surfing post is coming a little late, but I was waiting for this photo (courtesy of Sarah Gray). It was on Sunday, September 27th that a bunch of us went out to Trigg beach for a group surfing lesson. It was pretty much my first time surfing, and it was pretty tough. There were two instructors for about twenty of us, so they couldn't be of much help individually. I think more than a few times the instructor looked at me after I failed to ride a wave and said "Good job!", even though I knew I hadn't done anything right at all. The waves were huge, and it was difficult at times just to paddle out to them. So I found it easier to cheat and just got off my board and walked out there instead. I'm pretty sure that we were supposed to be trying to ride waves post-crash, but most of us paddled out to where the waves were crashing and got destroyed out there instead. I know that I myself had greatly underestimated the shear power of the waves. I remarked later that I had been thrown around so much that I probably was only holding onto my board about 10% of the time (luckily the boards have leases that hook around your ankle). At the very end I did manage to stand up on the last wave in. Unfortunately, this also came at the expense of Sarah Gray, who was also trying to stand up for the first time on her last wave in. I was pretty close to the shore already, and decided to just wait for a wave to come facing forward to make sure I had the correct position. Sarah was riding the wave right towards and had to yell and bail out at the last second. Instead of standing up, she hit me right in the back and actually gave me the perfect boost to get enough speed to catch the wave with balance, and ride the darn thing in standing straight up. I was thrilled. Sarah was not so much. I felt really bad and immediately took the blame for ruining her last chance. She was pretty upset but eventually forgave me. She of course was the only one who had the pictures from surfing, and as much as I wanted to put up a blog post about the experience, with pictures, I was afraid to ask her. It is good though, that it was all resolved in the end. Although, I did ponder later, who was really at fault? Had we been in cars, wouldn't I have been rear-ended?
Also it is important to note that this surfing experience took place during the stunning fourth quarter of the Notre Dame vs. Purdue game. When I signed up for the surfing lesson, I knew that I would miss the end of the game. However, I had been counting on a healthy Notre Dame offense to "make it rain" so to speak on Purdue, leaving the game well in hand by the fourth quarter. As you probably know, this was not the case. Instead, most of us were on a bus to the beach without a clue as to what the score was or who was winning the game, knowing that Purdue was getting ready to score the go ahead touchdown right before we left. Andy finally decided to call his parents on his cell phone to get an update. The update proved to be pretty unnerving. Purdue ahead 21-17... 35 seconds left... Notre Dame has the ball... 3rd down... on the 3 yard line! It was a crazy way to hear a game, listening to someone who is listening to someone else who is on the complete opposite side of the world and watching the game on TV. But the whole bus erupted when we heard that Notre Dame scored to win the game, and the bus driver, who had no idea what was going on, nearly drove right off the road. Anyway, I know it is kinda late to be going back and bringing up that game, but I felt like it was a crucial part of the surfing experience. In fact, for the first three quarters of the game I thought about faking sick just to get out of my commitment to go surfing, just because I wanted to see the game so bad. It turns out I did miss a heck of an ending, but then again, surfing in the Indian Ocean is a pretty special experience too, which I'm really glad I did in the end. Later I found out that back in Tommy More, the infamous internet had cut out again and nobody that stayed behind got to see the last play anyway.
Here we are waiting to hear what will happen on 4th down, 27 seconds to go
I mentioned in the last post that the Wardan Aboriginal Culture Centre was an especially interesting experience. We got to see how the Wardandi people made fire, and we got to hear the didgeridoo. Here are some videos so you can see what it was like.
First up is the making of the fire. The video is relatively long, but that only serves as a testament to just how difficult it can be to start a fire without using matches or lighters or petrol or anything else like that.
Next we got to hear the didgeridoo. First, our tour guide showed us the basics of how the didgeridoo was used for story telling. Then he had us help him laid down a beat, while he played away on the didgeridoo. He uses circular breathing, so he said he can play nonstop for over half an hour before getting tired.
I think the song sounds a lot like techno, and it's pretty cool too. He definitely made playing the didgeridoo look easy. Afterward, when we went back to Margaret River to stock up before heading down to Walpole, we found some didgeridoos in a local gift shop. Now obviously I didn't dare trying to play one, knowing how many hundreds of people had probably put their mouths on the thing, but a few guys from the group did. Instead of producing the awesome music that we had heard earlier, all we managed to do was sound like a 5th grader trying to blow into a trumpet for the first time.
Poll: I'm pretty sure that I had no idea what a didgeridoo was before coming to Australia, though I often said the word a lot in my head cause I liked how it sounded. Did you know what a didgeridoo was before you read this post?
Well I'm back from our 4 day trip down south western coastline of Australia. The trip was wonderful and a nice break from school work, however, when we got back it suddenly hit that there is only a week and a half of classes left in the semester. It is hard to believe that the semester is beginning to near the end. There is still a week and a half of classes, then a study week, and then two weeks of finals, but that will all be over before you know it.
But anyway back to the trip. Most of the details of the trip can be found in the photo album on picasa, which I will link to at the end of the blog in an attempt to avoid tempting the impatient. Here is a rough idea of what the trip encompassed:
Day one
Tour of Willowdale Mine and refinery
Visit to Margaret River and beach
Learned about town planning in fast developing rural areas
Day two
Explored the Canal Rocks
Wardan Aboriginal Culture Center tour
Wine tasting at Cullen's Winery
Day three
Walpole - Valley of the Giants Treetop Walk
Albany - Mt Clarence and the Anzac Memorial and Whale World
Learned about agriculture issues in Western Australia
Day four
Hike in Porongurup National Park
Tour of Kodja Place indigenous museum in Kojonup
That seems like a pretty loose itinerary when I put it that way, but you have to remember that many of these places were several hours drive apart. We also had to stay at a different backpackers lodge each night. You begin to find that there is definitely a wide range in quality of backpacker lodges, ultimately none of which includes a good hot shower.
There were several highlights of the weekend for me. The first being the Wardan Aboriginal Culture Center. Our tour guide showed us many of the traditional aboriginal tools and weapons and how they are used. He demonstrated the technique they used to make fire. The best part was when he got out a didgeridoo and threw down a good old fashion didgeridoo jam session around the fire he had "made from scratch."
Another highlight was the treetop walk at the Valley of the Giants. Although these Red Tingle trees don't grow quite as high as the Red Cedar trees in North America, I've never seen those ones so the Australian version was just fine for me. The Treetop Walk was amazing in that it took you up 125 feet in air. The walk was built when park rangers realized that having loads of tourists trample the ground around the trees was crushing the roots and killing the trees. And when trees are hundreds of years old, you can't really replace dead ones very easily. The walk keeps tourists off the ground as well as offering a spectacular view.
Probably the best view of the weekend came from Castle Rock. This was a rock formation at the top of Porongurup National Park. It took quite a hike to get to, as well as a little bit of tricky rock climbing, but it was well worth it. It wasn't sunny at the top, and the wind was out in full force, but the rocks were massive and you could see the land in all directions.
So those are just a few things you should definitely look for in the pictures. Also expect to see some video from the trip coming soon as well. I'd put it all up at the same time, but uploading the videos can take forever and oddly has a low success rate even when they are loaded.
Poll: Will the #25 Notre Dame Fighting Irish finally turn the corner and beat #6 USC this weekend?
Bright and early Friday morning, we will all be embarking on our second weekend trip of the semester as part of our Notre Dame 1 credit class. Last time we went inland to Kalgoorlie, but this time we're goin' south along the coast to various places I can't remember. Let me look at the itinerary. Okay so it's Margaret River, Walpole, and Albany. Not that that really means anything to you. But then again that's why you come to this blog anyway, because you don't already know this stuff yourself. This trip is a little bit longer than the last one, as we won't be getting back to Perth until Monday night. So that's a whole extra day for the folks playing along at home. I'm sorry. I've wanted to say that all day, and I have no idea why. I guess I'm babbling because I don't really have anything to say other than that I'm leaving. So I'll just leave it at that.
The annual Tommy More Ball took place last weekend, and it was a really fun time. Everyone from college got dressed up in suits and dresses, and after a huge group picture on the quad, we all got in buses (double-decker no less) and headed off to the Parmelia Hilton Perth hotel downtown. The theme for the ball was Arabian Nights, though the only noticeable expression of the theme was the center pieces, which were nothing more than misshapen vases spray-painted gold. It was excusable though since there isn't much people could wear themselves to represent the theme. Although one guy (who's actually Colombian) wore one of those head things with his suit and looked something like an Arabian petroleum businessman.
Myself, I wore the dark brown suit I got last Christmas and matching brown tie. Luckily, I have many brown ties in my repertoire since seemingly every girl I went to a dance with in high school was determined to wear a brown dress. Anyway, something quite interesting happened when I started to get dressed for the night. I put my pants on and noticed they didn't fit at all. They were too dang loose and barely stayed up on my waist. Of course though, I knew my belt would fix that problem. I slid the belt through all the loops, and then I pulled to tighten it and watched in horro as each knotch slid through the buckle until even the final knotch of hope had come and passed. Even the last knotch on my belt was too large. Apparently, I've lost a bit of weight since I came to Australia. I've developed a few theories as to why that is, unfortunately none of which includes an increase in exercise. I'm pretty sure it is a combination of the lack of junk food in the dinig hall as well as almost no access to food outside of dining hall meal times. Originally, I thought these were horrible things, but I suppose they're good from a health perspective. In the dining hall I am forced to eat mostly fruits and vegetables (and meat mush as it has come to be called) and drink apple juice at every meal. On the other hand, back at Notre Dame I partook daily of french fries and cheeseburgers, only to wash it all down with a drink I refer to as "The Bulldozer", 2 parts Vault and 2 parts Mr. Pibb (I know, I know but I tried 1 and 1, it just isn't the same). Also with Reckers open 24 hours a day and conviently located right next door to Dillon Hall, I would frequent the place for late night smoothies and BBQ chicken pizzas (which are sorely missed). Nonetheless, I'm probably much healthier now than I was before, and in actuality I didn't really notice my pants being loose at all throughout the night. So in short, my pants didn't quite fit, but it wasn't a big deal. Dedicating this much blog space to the pants story probably wasn't worth it. I guess I thought it was interesting though. Moving on...
The food and service at the ball were excellent. A live band was there to play music, which turned out to be pretty good, though unfortunately for me, I grew up in the suburbs of Detroit where everyone was "hood" and only hip-hop music is played at dances. So I'm only familiar with the hip-hop dances, while Australians seem much more interested in live bands and rarely listen to hip-hop at all. Either way, the ball was really fun. Since I didn't take any pictures of the night, I've stolen a few from Vanessa.
Piyush, Kate, Me, Vanessa, and Kelsey at the Hilton
Piyush, Me, Tom, and Luke
After the ball, which ended at midnight, there were three buses giving everyone three options: go back to Tommy More, go out to the clubs, go to the Burswood Casino. Now I am not a betting man. But, I have heard that the Burswood Casino (the only casino in Perth) is a really nice venue and worth at least one trip. The casino was indeed a popular choice (at least among the Notre Dame students who had never been) and many of us piled into the Burswood Casino bus.
Arriving at the casino, it wasn't as impressive as I thought it would be. To start off, the outside of a casino at around one in the morning on a Saturday night is not where you will find the friendliest and the cleanliest of people. I also expected more theme and presentation, having seen casinos mostly in movies about Vegas. All I really got to see was a big room full of casino games, which I suppose is all a casino really is. In truth, we spent little time exploring, and I have no idea if there were restaurants or bars or more rooms full of games in the rest of the place. Anyway, when we got there we headed straight for the cashier to exchange our money for coins and play some games. I knew that we had a few hours to burn at the casino since the Notre Dame game would start at 3:30am, and there wasn't much sense in sleeping before then. So, I decided to put just ten dollars in (which gets you a lot less then $10 US anyway) and the cashier gave me ten shiny one dollar coins, with which to play the various games with fancy blinking lights and whistles.
Now before I tell the rest of this story, I must say that I do not condone gambling. It is a waste of money, and it can be addictive. Casinos are super profitable because the odds are in their favor, and even when people win they usually gamble the money away again. I don't think anyone should ever gamble. I'll be the first to admit that of course this makes me a hypocrite, being a story about gambling and all. But try to remember it was only $10.
*** After reading back through this post a while later, I noticed that the previous paragraph comes off as a bit more harsh than I had intended. I suppose when I wrote that I was worried about the effect my story would have on young impressionable minds, perhaps overly so. ***
Anyways, so there I was with ten dollars in my cup and a world of new and confusing games all around me. They had the standard casino games with poker, black jack, and roulette, but I don't like those games because they require some skill rather than blind chance. Instead, I went looking for the slot machines, nothing but chance there and all you have to do is push a button. I also sort of have a previous history with the slots. They had a casino on my cruise ship on senior spring break (see now it is beginning to sound like I gamble, but I can assure I have a strict policy of no gambling). I avoided the casino for most of the week, but since my friends were always in there, I decided one day that it wouldn't hurt to grab a handful of quarters (just 4) and maybe drop a few in a slot machine, just to pass the time. To my surprise the first quarter I played won me ten more quarters. A few minutes and a few machines later, I had of course lost a few quarters. Down to the last one of those ten victory quarters, I won again. This time it was 400 quarters! So in short, my first time gambling I won $100 playing on just one quarter. But I knew that it would be pretty unlikely for me to win like that again tonight, my second time at a casino. Still, I knew the slots were the only game for me.
After an entire lap around this casino, I realized that they didn't even have slot machines in the Burswood Casino. There wasn't any kind of spinning, matching games. Instead they had several strange games on computer screens that had strange images appear and if you matched some of them you won sometimes. I had no idea what the rules on any of these games were or how I could possibly win, but I decided they were better than video poker nonetheless. I walked up to one of these strange games and put my first coin in. The screen flashed, some objects appeared, the machine played some tones, and I won ten dollars. Well that was pretty easy, I thought. Now I had some insurance, and I could just play with my winnings and leave the place even no matter what. Not much later, however, I'd burned through those winnings and then easily convinced myself to start playing with the original money again. I decided to find a better game, though, hoping there was one that I could understand. After some searching and a strange belief that I had the special ability to sense a winning machine, I was intrigued by these two game machines that had been stuffed awkwardly in the corner of the room and just barely fit, as if the casino was trying to fill every possible open space with these money making machines (as if). The game was called Mr. Cashman (a coin with a top hat) and resembled a computerized version of plinko, the game where balls drop down hitting pegs and fall into certain holes at the bottom. The machine on the left was occupied by a guy, hesitantly standing more between both of them, so I crept my way onto the machine on the right, and he backed off a little. I put my coin in hit the button and watched as the virtual balls came down. I checked my winnings, 60 cents. But then something strange happened. All of a sudden a door appeared on screen. The door began to open, and who of all people should emerge but Mr. Cashman himself! Mr. Cashman began to dance around on screen as music began to play. I was wondering what the heck it all meant until the guy next to me remarked, "Wow, you're lucky. You're about to win big." Then Mr. Cashman went away and suddenly hundreds of golden balls began to fall. I watched in amazement as my winnings meter began to shoot up quicker than a pay meter at the gas pump. "I can't believe that. I was trying to decide which machine to play, and I picked the wrong one," the man said. The golden balls finally stopped falling and my winnings meter finally came to rest at $65. Happily, I collected my winnings and was ready to cash out, and as I did the man next to me casually remarked that this was the plot of the casino: you win big the first time and then it never happens again and your addicted for life. I didn't tell him that this was my second time playing and my second time winning big, but I did completely agree with his theory. Lucky for me Carnival Cruise Lines and the Australian casinos must not be in cahoots yet.
Anyway, I cashed out and kept the winnings and then waited around for the rest of my friends to finish. Sitting in a casino for too long with a pocket full of money is a bad idea. They did end up getting a little back, as I waited I may have put two or three more dollars in. Eventually, I found a machine that was a guaranteed winner every time: the coffee machine. It just made more sense to drop a dollar coin into something and know for sure you'd actually be getting something back. I got a black tea with sugar (cause I like things to actually taste good thank you), and hoped it would be enough to keep me up for the Notre Dame game. At this point, it was almost 3:00am and my friends were finally ready to go, so we piled in a cab and headed back to Tommy More.
We set up the projector in the Tommy More conference room as usual, but noticed that this weeks numbers were down. Only about 10 of us actually stayed up for the game, with the rest being unable to make it out of bed, either too tired or otherwise inhibited. Of course the Notre Dame football game again, for the fourth week in a row, came down to the final minute. And of course, for the third week in a row, the Tommy More internet frustrated all with its slowness and ability to shut off at the absolute worst time. We ended up having the watch the last minute on gamecast (no video, just updates), as well as overtime. In the end, we were happy for the victory, though the celebration was pretty weak given the state we were all in. We all went to breakfast in the dining hall afterward, by this time the sun had already been shining for a few hours. I ate some stuff and tried not to fall asleep on the table. Then I crawled into bed, knowing that it would take days to recover from the severe damage I had just inflicted on my sleep cycle. It had been a long night but a lot of fun. I laid my head on my pillow and closed my eyes, victorious.
Poll: This is a fairly lengthy blog post. I had only intended to write a paragraph or two but then I just kinda took off, which gets me thinking. If they made this blog post into a movie, do you think it would be appropriate to cast Shia LaBeouf as myself?
So it has been a little while since the last post, I apologize. I was going to talk about surfing and the Purdue-Notre Dame game, but I've been waiting for the sting of that loss to settle in a little bit. So that will not be mentioned in this post. Nope, I'm not even going to bring up Jimmy Clausen's touchdown pass to Kyle Rudolph with 25 seconds left in the game. It would be just plain mean to discuss that on here, so don't worry.
Anyway, I recently took a stroll through Kings Park to get some pictures of various flowers and plants and things. Not that I am into that sort of stuff at all, but I figured maybe some of you were. I think the title for this post is clever, though ironically almost all of the flowers I took pictures of were in the Botanic Garden in the park. But I mean how do you really define a wild flower anyway? Does the flower itself even know whether it is in the wild or not? I don't know but check out all the photos I took and maybe you'll find out.
Poll question: Do you think flowers in a botanical garden qualify as wild flowers?
***New Blog Feature! More information at the end of this post.***
This event happened a while ago, end of August probably, but I never got around to blogging about it. Basically every year the first year students (freshers) at Tommy More play a cricket match against the seniors (which I think means everyone else). It isn't a real match though, as the seniors heavily cheat to ensure they always win and that the event is no fun. Unfortunately, because this is the first year at Tommy More for us Notre Dame students, we had to play with the freshers.
Cricket is similar to baseball, but much more bizarre and much less interesting (I didn't think that was possible, sorry baseball fans). Two batters stand in the middle of a large oval, about 20 yards apart. The bowler (pitcher) stands next to one of the batters and has to throw to the other batter (throwing is different than baseball because you can't bend your elbow). There are no strikes, just a few wickets that the bowler is trying to hit. The batter is protecting the wickets. If the bowler hits a wicket, or the batter's leg unfairly blocks the ball from hitting the wicket, then the batter is out. The batter tries to hit the ball. If the batter gets a good hit, hitting the ball away from the quick reach of fielders, then he can decide to run. The two batters that are 20 yards apart then run to switch places (there aren't any bases or anything like that, just two home plates basically). Every time the batters switch places, a point is scored. When a batter hits a ball he doesn't have to run, he can just wait for a really good hit. One team bats until all of their batters get out (or if there's less than two batters I guess). A batter is out if the balls hits the wicket on a pitch, or the ball hits the wicket while the batters are switching, or if a batted ball is caught in the air. Cricket games can take up to five days sometimes, since there is no limit on time or number of pitches, it's just however long it takes to get the other team's batters out. Scores are usually in the hundreds. Absurd.
Well of course there is a video/slideshow thing I made to go along with this post. It won't give you a better understanding of the game, but it is kind of funny I think. A few notes before you watch: 1) We didn't play in an oval because all we had was our quad, so there is usually a whole half of the field behind the batter but we just had a building behind us. 2) We used garbage cans instead of wickets. 3) One of the rules of our game was you had to have an open beverage in your hand while fielding, to make it more interesting (by the way, they don't use gloves in cricket at all).
So about the new feature. I've finally figured out a practical use for the quick response buttons at the bottom of each post. Obviously no one is going to say they didn't like a post cause that is just really mean and hurtful, so I've moved away from post rating entirely. Instead, there will be a short yes or no poll at the end of each post. Now you, the reader, can interact with the blog like never before! Yay! (Check the Yes or No buttons next to the Quick Poll under comments)
Today's blog post poll: Have you ever seen a cricket match before?
Yes people we have video. Mostly more of the same style videos as before. That means there is some kind of wildlife creature in front of me as I violently shake my camera back and forth while apparently running at full speed, causing extreme nausea for all viewers. I don't know where I learned this approach to video recording, but I vow to correct it. So anyways, here are the videos. Isn't YouTube great?
This one is of a kangaroo we spotted on Luke Bone's farm. His dad drove us around for a while looking for roos because they are always all over the farm. Unfortunately the roos were unusually shy this day, but I did managed to capture one hopping off in the distance.
Here's a rare echidna that had crawled into the middle of the road. This guy is like the Australian version of the porcupine. After taking a flurry of pictures, we left him alone. Then he started to move, so I quickly shot this video trying not to get to close. Of course he stops in the end and Mike informs me, "You scared him, Adam!"
Here is a video of the dolphins at Monkey Mia. One of the girls from our group, Kelsey, got picked to feed the dolphins but it must've happened right before I started taping cause I missed it. Nonetheless, I did get a bunch of complete strangers feeding dolphins, which is still pretty interesting I think.
This entry is a bit difficult for me to write. I am not really sure exactly how I should describe our spring break trip, as it is unforgetable in different ways. It started out with nine people who decided not to go to Bali or Thailand with the other groups but wanted to stay and explore Australia instead. I didn't know most of the other people in the group very well at first, but the most awesome part of the trip was getting to know everyone. Sometimes in a group like that you get a few people who don't get along with each other, at least that was my expectation. To my surprise, however, it soon felt like we'd all been friends for a long time.
That is partly what makes this entry so difficult for me. Two of my friends did not come back to Perth the way in which we had planned. Instead, they suffered a horrible accident and they are currently in the trauma ward of the Royal Perth hospital. I don't know exactly what is appropriate for me to say on here. I have never experienced anything like this before. I will say that it was an accident that occurred while Mike and JC were rock climbing, and I will say that it is a miracle that they are alive and without an injured head or spine. They made it through with only broken bones, which will heal and which will be normal again. The recovery time will be long, and I hope that you will keep Mike and JC in your prayers.
The other reason this is difficult is because before the accident happened, the whole trip had been going so well. I don't want to downplay the tragedy that occurred, but at the same time I don't want that to be the only thing that is remembered from our trip because it truly was an amazing trip and I know that my friends feel the same way. So let's take a moment to reflect on the severity and sadness of the situation, and then let's prepare to also accept the joy that surrounded this trip as well. We must reminisce on the good as well as the bad. Before I start to talk about the rest of the trip, I recommend that you come back and read about it later. I myself needed a few days after the trip before I was ready to publish all of the pictures and share about the many good memories we had.
I decided to do it differently this time. The whole trip is in one big photo album on Picasa. Click the link to hear about the trip. I say everything you could possibly need to know in the captions, so be sure to read those.
Unfortunately, I won't have any blog posts for a while. Fortunately, I'll be busy enjoying all the amazing natural wonders that Australia's West Coast has to offer. A few others and I are heading up the coast to Ningaloo Reef, the west coast's answer to the Great Barrier Reef, and we're stopping at all the interesting sites along the way. The trip itinerary includes:
Pinnacles - rock formations
Geraldton - town where an Australian friend lives
Kalbarri National Park - river gorges, rock formations, and hiking
Monkey Mia - feeding wild dolphins (dolphin mia makes more sense to me)
Shell Beach - literally
Shark Bay - hopefully not literally
Coral Bay - south end of Ningaloo Reef
Exmouth - north end of Ningaloo Reef
I've heard more than a few people say they think Ningaloo Reef is better than the Great Barrier Reef. Obviously the GBR gets the fame for its massive size, but Ningaloo is probably most prized for its isolation. Its benefit over the GBR is that it isn't packed full of people, development, and tourism. But no since gabbing on about it now til I've actually been there. So I'll see ya in a week.
*** For the record: Leaving Saturday morning and returning on the following Sunday *** *** Also, we won't be missing any football games thanks to sling box and carefully planned internet stops. Go IRISH!***
Sorry for taking so long. I know you've all been on the edge of your seats awaiting the arrival of the this post with much anticipation, but I've been incredibly busy with school work over the past week. But spring break is just 5 days away...
On the final day of the weekend, we packed up all our luggage, loaded it onto the bus, and left the camp school, headed for the National Mining Hall of Fame. Here we would learn a little bit about the history of gold mining in Kalgoorlie. Upon our arrival we were given hard hats and prepared to take a tour of one of the old mines. The mine we explored had 12 levels extending more than 120 feet underground. We only went down to the first level at around 30 feet below the surface. The mine shaft elevator was only large enough for five people so we waited in line and went down the tiny elevator in small groups. The elevator was extremely slow and in an emergency you would not want to be a miner stuck down in the mine waiting for a ride up on the lift. Luckily, the tour guide informed us that there had never been a single incident in all of the mine's history. There was also an emergency stairwell located in another part of the mine, which some of us took to get out just for fun. It wasn't fun though because it was a seemingly endless spiral staircase surrounded by rock wall, not for the claustrophobic. Neither was the rest of the mine either, as the ceilings in most of the tunnels were probably 5'5" or less. They make the tunnels just large enough for one man to push a cart through. The tour was interesting. They described to us how tunnels were made by drilling long holes into the rock wall, filling the holes with dynamite, blowing it all up, taking a lunch break while the poisonous fumes cleared, and then checking the newly formed tunnel with a long pole so that it didn't cave in on you. It sounded like a tough job, but apparently the money was outstanding. Below is a picture in the tunnels. That guy behind me is Nick, the tallest person I know. I imagine he wouldn't have made it as a miner.
After the tour down in the mines, we got to explore the rest of the Mining Hall of Fame. I'm not sure why it is called a Hall of Fame rather than a museum. I didn't see any of my favorite miners anywhere. The exhibits were pretty cool though. If you ever managed to make it out there don't miss the Mining Game. We also got to see how gold bars were made. They weren't actually making gold bars unfortunately, because they said anyone with a gun could easily rob them. Instead it was some kind of silver-nickel alloy. Interestingly enough one of the classes I'm in, Materials Engineering, deals a lot with the forming of metals and alloys and how they cool.
Upon leaving the Mining Hall of Fame, our bus headed for a sheep shearing station out in the middle of the outback. A station in Australia is the equivalent of a ranch in the US. The people who lived there were very nice for having 30 college students over for lunch. It was pretty cold while we were there but our hosts had prepared a bonfire, which we quickly huddled around. The food was excellent as well and we got to experience some Australian specific cuisine. They gave us three different kinds of meat on a kebab. The first was beef, a personal favorite. The second was goat. Goats are somewhat of a problem in Western Australia, as they are not indigenous but have thrived in the wild. What I didn't know is that goat is the most eaten meat in the world. The third meat was kangaroo! I'd heard a lot about kangaroo being a good meat but this was the first chance I had to try some since I'd arrived in Australia. Kangaroo is often eaten by tourists by rarely by Australians. I've heard two different reasons for this. One is that they can't get over the idea of eating their national animal. The other is that kangaroo is used for dog food, and no one wants to eat dog food. I don't think both can be true, as the second reason kind of throws the first one out the window. Either way, the kangaroo tasted pretty good. Like the goat meat, the kangaroo meat was very tender. Ultimately though, I found myself liking the beef best. But that's just probably because it's what I'm used to.
Speaking with some of the people on the station, I found out some interesting stuff. First, much of the work force for the stations and farms in Australia comes from people seeking to renew their visas. In order to renew an Australian visa, one must work for 3 months on a station or a farm. This is a strange law, but one that is rooted in the fact that Australia is vastly underpopulated. There simply isn't enough people in the country. Which is mind boggling really, when you consider how hard it is to actually be allowed to come to Australia. The government is extremely careful about who they let in, with applicants waiting months and years for a chance. You can't come in unless you already have a job. It is quite a far cry from the United States immigration management, but perhaps you can only have that kind of control when your country is completely surrounded by water. I met a Canadian at football practice who was trying to renew his visa (I briefly played with the notion of playing football here after discovering there was a league with nine or so teams in the Perth area, but after a few practices, I found out they charged $400 to play and decided my money could be put to better things while in Australia). Anyways the Canadian guy, whose visa would expire in a few weeks, said that he was looking for a farmer to lie for him about the three months so he could renew, and apparently that isn't an uncommon practice.
One issue that the station owner got pretty heated about was the camels. Camels were brought to Australia for use in the arid outback in the early days, but now they have grown to alarming numbers. The station owner believed that the best solution to the problem is to start rounding up the camels and sending them to Africa, where they would be in great demand. They can't do this, however, because animal rights groups won't allow them to put the camels on boats. If the camels could feed starving people in Africa, is it right to worry more about the camels' well-being? The station owner didn't think so at least. And as far as foreign animals go, dogs, cats, camels, foxes, rabbits, dingos, it doesn't matter where they came from or even when (dingo came 50,000 years ago with Aboriginals), they're considered evil by most Australian environmentalists. That is partly why this sheep shearing station we were visiting had barely any sheep. The government kept putting stricter limits on the amount of sheep you can have per acre that the station has decided to switch to another business (and I can't remember what that was).
It was time to go back to Perth after the station, but that wasn't the end of the trip. There was one more memorable part. After boarding the plane, I took my seat which was an aisle seat in the very back row of the plane. In the window seat across from me was Andrew, and a man we didn't know sat down in the aisle seat next to him. Andrew and the man soon began a friendly conversation. A few minutes later, they were interrupted by a woman who looked like she worked on the tarmac. She asked the man to get off the plane and get his luggage out of the baggage container, the pilot had asked that he be removed from the plane. The man was livid and the woman asked that he please not make a scene so he eventually got up and left, escorted by a few flight attendants. I was very confused, but here is what happened. Now the Kalgoorlie airport is small (1 gate), so you go out on the runway and board the plane by stairs. The plane was fueling as we were boarding, and they ask you very specifically not to use your cell phones or such devices when the plane is fueling. This man had been gabbing away on his cell phone as he was waiting in the line for the stairs, perhaps he didn't know the rule. When the pilot saw him, he opened his window and yelled at the man to get off his phone. Now there are a lot of ways to respond to the pilot in this situation. Personally my list of responses would not have included "flip the pilot the bird." Unfortunately, that was this man's decision and he learned the hard way that you don't mess around in airports and you don't mess around with the man flying your plane. How do I know all these details? There are benefits to sitting in the back row. You are right in front of the flight attendants' seats. The last news I heard was that the police had arrived and had handcuffs out and ready. The man's famous last words as he got up to leave the plane: "I'm gonna clobber that pilot." Oh and I almost forgot, while Andrew had been talking with the man he found out that he'd just quit his job that day.
Here are the last of the Kalgoorlie pictures. PICTURES! Andrew's Pictures... don't miss the last picture, guess whose seat I'm sitting in.
***WARNING: This is an extremely long blog post, the longest yet. I advise taking it in chunks to avoid chronic back pain and eye problems caused by sitting in front of a computer screen for too long***
The first night staying at the camp school was rough. It wasn't a bad facility, about what you'd expect at a camp, but it was freezing cold that night. The building was not insulated at all and by nightfall the room was icy cold. I went to bed with all my clothes on, tucked under a bed sheet and three wool blankets and wearing a winter hat. Luckily that was enough.
In the morning, breakfast was served and tea was drinked (or drunk or drank or dranked or drunken?). Anyway I don't recall ever have any tea before this trip. I was completely surprised on my first taste about a month ago with just how awful and disgusting it tasted. What really gets me is that someone somewhere at some point in time made the first cup of tea. He tasted it. He realized that it was absolutely terrible. Yet, somehow more tea was made after that first cup, and now it's loved in every place the British ever colonized whose inhabitants didn't dump it in the Boston Harbor. Perhaps even more mind boggling is that me, a true patriot, someone who would've gladly led the charge on that tea ship back in 1773 if he'd only had the chance... how could I have ended up drinking nearly a dozen cups of tea in a weekend? Maybe it's all there was to drink at times or maybe the stuff just grows on you, I don't know. But I digress.
That's a picture of me in Menzies, our first stop of the day. I don't know how long the drive took to get there. I slept most of the way (looking at the outback gets redundant after I while), but it must have been at least an hour. Anyways Menzies was started as a mining town. It had gold for a while, but then it ran out. Most people left but a few still remain. The population is listed at 160 but the guy in charge of Menzies tourism that we spoke with said it was probably down in the 80s now. An interesting thing about Menzies is that it is basically the edge of Western Australia civilization. Head out to the east from Menzies and there's nothing but pure outback until you start to get close to the continent's east coast. While we were in town, Menzies was hosting the Grand Final (championship game) for womens netball. Apparently they have a league that includes all the small mining towns in the area. We watched some of the netball and cheered for the Menzies team who put on quite a show. I think the score was around 20-2 at halftime or something. I honestly don't think the players from the other town's team had ever played netball before. And for that matter you probably have never even heard of it before. It's like basketball except no backboard, players can only move within their positional zones (e.g. only two girls allowed inside the 3 point line), of course no 3 pointers because you're not allowed to shoot from outside that line, oh and did I mention you're not allowed to dribble or move with the ball. That probably wasn't easy to understand so I shot a short clip of the action. Menzies is in blue. (Ironically, they didn't have any nets on their rims while playing netball.)
My biggest gripe with the sport is that shots are only taken from about a foot away from the basket, and with contact being illegal, it becomes pretty boring when compared to basketball. Nonetheless, how many people can say they've watched a netball grand final between two nearly abandoned mining towns in the middle of the outback? Very few I imagine and that's what counts.
***Recommend taking a break at this time. Get a drink. Take a walk. Hug a child.***
After Menzies, we headed out for a picnic lunch in the outback near the special Lake Ballard. The lake is special because it houses an art installation called "Inside Australia". I'd also like to add, at the risk of sounding pessimistic, that the lake doesn't actually have any water in it. It was quite muddy while we were there so I guess maybe that's a lake half full. Anyways, the art featured in the lake is some 51 statues depicting people that were scanned in by computer and then had their massed reduced by two-thirds or something. I have no idea basically they look like skinny people and they all looked the same so I think computer scanning may have been overkill. Nonetheless, it was a really interesting place to explore, and I took the opportunity to try out art photography.
Now because the lake was so muddy everyone took of their shoes so they wouldn't get dirty. I myself, wanting to avoid having muddy feet for the rest of the day, chose to keep my shiny white shoes on. I figured I could manage by walking slow and watching my step, and I actually did make it with my shiny white shoes intact! Now I wasn't able to go quite as far as the shoeless crowd, but like our bus driver/tour guide said when I got back, "Once you've seen one of those statues, you've seen them all." I took a video to give you a better idea of the surroundings than pictures could offer. I apologize in advance, the narrator is terrible.
In between Lake Ballard and dinner we went on a nature walk at an abandoned sheep shearing station (ranch). There's not much to say about that as it amounted to walking around in a circle in the outback looking for interesting stuff and finding nothing. So then we went to dinner.
We had dinner at the Broad Arrow Tavern. Supposedly, the tavern is located in a ghost town and is the only thing left in operation. We arrived after dark, however, and I couldn't see anything other than the restaurant so who knows if it really was a ghost town. I can tell you that there was no source of light in any direction other than the tavern and looking out into the blackness just beyond was a bit eerie. The food at the tavern was great. I ordered the "Broady", which is a hamburger topped with bacon and a fried egg. I've noticed that many many burger places feature this kind of burger (including the Tommy More dining hall) and I imagine it must be the staple Australian take on the burger. It was excellent. Another interesting attribute of Broad Arrow Tavern is it walls. Every inch of the walls are open for patrons to write on, and just about every inch of the place has been written on. We managed to find an open spot up high and after standing on some chairs we wrote ND '09, surrounded by each of our names and hometowns. As I was signing my name, I began to wonder. This tavern was on the fringe of civilization, surrounded by dirt roads for miles in the most isolated state on the most isolated continent in the world, not to mention being located on almost exactly the complete opposite side of the earth from my home. Would I ever be able to come back to this place again?
So the first day of the weekend field trip started off with a little bit of trouble. We made it to our 6:15am flight out of Perth without any issues. The flight to Kalgoorlie went pretty smoothly, that is until we got to Kalgoorlie. Now I'm told that it rarely rains in Kalgoorlie, and that fog almost never occurs. On this day, however, both were out in full force. So as I was watching us pass through the thick clouds on our way down land, I was quite taken aback when the pilot abruptly gunned the engine and sent the plane swiftly back upwards into the sky. A few minutes later, the pilot informed everyone on board that it had been too risky to attempt a landing, given the weather conditions, and that he would "give it another go." After circling around again, the plane began its descent. The same thing happened. The plane bailed out and went back upwards again. Then the pilot announced that there would be a third attempt but that would be it. So after a third try which produced the exact same results, the plane headed to a different airport. That airport was, of course, Perth. We landed in Perth, and they refueled the plane while we waited patiently. Now having had to wake up so early in the morning for the flight, some of the members of our group had taken the opportunity to catch up on their sleep. Alex was one of them. Although, no one realized just how much sleeping Alex had been doing on the plane until after about 20 minutes of waiting, when he remarked, "This Kalgoorlie airport sure does look a lot like the Perth airport." He had slept through the entire flight, including the time spent circling Kalgoorlie and the extra 40 minutes to fly back to Perth! Nobody had told him that we'd come back to Perth! The whole group had a pretty good laugh.
Eventually, we got back on the plane and successfully landed in Kalgoorlie around noon. However, we were about 5 hours behind schedule. Worst of all, we missed the thing I was looking forward to the most, the Super Pit tour. It had been scheduled for that morning and our plane problem had caused us to miss it. Martin, one of the professors leading our trip, did inform me however, that even if we had landed the first time, the rain would have canceled the tour anyway. Bloody weather!
Fortunately, we did get to do all the other stuff that had been scheduled for the day. We visited the Departement of Ecology and Conservation (DEC), where we learned about the use of the land around Kalgoorlie. Interestingly, there are large quantities of government owned land which are not used for any purpose at all. There isn't really any use for this land, as it is all considered to be desert anyway. The government has set aside large areas within this land for the DEC, as a means to preserve the unique ecosystems in each area. There is one area, for example, that contains over 130 different species of eukalyptus trees. Although you wouldn't notice just driving by. Apparently, even the first British explorers fasliy categorized the region's vegetation as boring and unvaried. The eukalyptus is a thin, sad-looking tree with a lessthanaverage leaf count. You'll probably be able to pick it out in some of the pictures. Anyway, I learned that the Australians carry very much about the preservation of their land, ensuring that a sample of every single one of their ecosystems is set aside and maintained. The next perspective we got was from a group of Aboriginals who are trying to legally regain their ancestors land, thanks to a precedence which was recently set in the first case to award Aboriginals their former land. All you have to do is prove that your tribe lived in the area of question for more than a hundred years ago and that they've made good use of that land during all that time. Easy right? Well mostly, the Aboriginals gave us an insight into their struggles with the racist government growing up. They shared with us about the pride they took in "surviving" as a culture even though the government tried to "breed the black out of them", by putting the children in missionary schools. They also took us on a tour of a hill which was a former mine, but had been shut down when the Aboriginals determined it was a holy site for their ancestors. The mining company agreed to protect the land, but also built a tunnel underneath so they could access something near this hill, something big. I could first see it when I reached the top of the holy site hill. I could see the walls of dirt and rock that had been piled high, like mountains, along its edges. It was the Super Pit! And it was our next stop.
I was really excited to hear that we would at least be going to the tourist lookout because I'd heard even that might have been canceled. We did go, however, and nothing could have prepared me for the sight of it. As the bus pulled up to the top of the lookout, near the edge of the pit, you had to gasp. From the bus you could only see the walls of the pit, not the bottom yet, but it still looked like they were digging to the center of the earth. Someone in our group compared it to the Saurumon's giant industrial pit from The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (if you're into that sort of thing). It was quite an awesome thing to take in. Unfortunately, I imagine much of the awe is lost in the photographs I took of it. Nevertheless, the idea of these massive trucks carrying tons of rock out from the bottom of the pit, each truck containing maybe a few ounces of gold per load, is just insane.
Here's a picture of me at the lookout in front of just a portion of the Super Pit.
I'll talk about days two and three coming up. For now I've uploaded my day one pictures. And Andrew was again kind enough to supply me with some of his pictures.
WALTZING MATILDA Australia's unofficial national anthem. Means: Slang for traveling by foot and carrying one's goods on his back in a "Matilda", slang for bag
