Wow, going through the pictures to refresh my mind at this point. So
much has happened since!
But I need to finish AUS to continue with the rest. So here goes!
The Spartan race pictures, as promised:
as if I can do monkey bars...
The gladiators were distracted and I tried to sneak passed....
Glorious!!!
After Melbourne the plan was to go to Adelaide. Meeting the newfound family and go to Kangaroo Island to make my Australia adventure complete. I must say, I loved flying around the country! So low key and easy, and cheap too. I still must figure out if I can pool all my miles in one place and make them count for something…
Adelaide from the air was so different from the other cities I had visited. While Sydney (New South Wales) and Melbourne (Victoria) were more organic in form, this South Australia city was planned, and you could tell. It felt a bit Dutch, even, with all the squares and lines.
My hotel was the Majestic Rooftop Hotel and it was the best room I had the whole trip (finally, a bath! I could soak my sore after Sparta body). I walked into town soon after checking in and also felt a bit in Holland. No Hema, though…
By this time, I had been by myself for a bit and was craving some interaction, some fun conversations, but this city was so not the place for it. I had all my dinners by myself again, while there were other tables with people sitting by themselves as well. The one time I asked this elderly gentleman, who was walking towards his table (and book) with a new glass of wine if he wanted to join me and my book, the reaction was: I don’t want no hanky panky!
So yeah…(he apologized later)
me at dinner, most nights
Majestic or what?
On the second day that I was there, I had a date with my new family. I do not know all the details and I will research this to the bottom when I am home, but the short version is: the brother of my grandfather who was thought lost at sea, was not lost, he was just in Australia and had a whole family there. So I was to meet his daughter (Aunt Penny), her daughter (Tracey) and her daughter (Claudia). It was so special and weird too, to see this group of people walk into the hotel and immediately knowing who they were (mannerism?) and at the same time not recognizing anything in their appearance as the Bradshaws at home (the Caribbean side of the family has a bit more color mixed in :o) ).
The family! Penny, Tracey and Claudia
We drove to the seaside and had lunch (this side of the family does wine at lunch, my kinda peeps) and caught up a bit. It is good to know that my cake genes are traceable from all sides. I really hope they can make it to the Caribbean on a cruise soon.
The next day I went on a tour of the Barossa Valley. Again, really tried
to make some friends, but even with the golden icebreaker from Uluru (so, how
much do you think an ice-bear weighs), nada. I bought a bottle of award winning
red to take home (it got home perfectly and we drank it around Christmas) and
had a lovely day.
Very old port
Cousin Tracy picked me up the next day to go to a koala conservation center
where you could hold a koala for a picture, but it was just too hot, even for
humans. But I still had Kangaroo island on the planning, so I was not worried. As we were not allowed to hold the animals, the keeper made close ups with our phones for us.
bummer
too cute for words: Potoroos!
Makes you feel like they will be making you a dress for the ball soon, so Disney like!
one hot koala
only koala i hugged
Only to be ready at 6 am the next morning for pickup and to be told by a
very horrid driver: tour is off! And have the door slammed in my face. I called
the tour operator to be told that the weather was too heavy for the ferry and
that I could reschedule. I was leaving for Sydney the next day, to fly back
home 2 days later, so that was the end for cuddling koala’s for me :o( .
But I was ok with leaving
Adelaide, back to friends in Sydney for Friday drinks! It was the Friday of all
the office Christmas parties in the Central Business District and it was brilliant
to see the shoes coming off and the usual stiff people going all Geordie Shore
in the streets.
rain and traffic jam made us late for our date
I want to go back, these where awesome bars
My last day in Sydney was a treat! We got tickets for the races from
Roos’ roommate and that was an experience not to forget! We met lovely people
who taught is the great rules of betting:
1.Never drink alcohol when you bet
2.Check your ticket before you walk away from the
desk
3.When it rains, bet on a grey horse
4.When push comes to shove, forget your excel sheets
and go with your gut
We had a great time
The next morning quite early it was time to start the monster trip.
For the not
runners under you: In the context of sports, tapering refers to
the practice of reducing exercise in the days just before an important
competition. Tapering is customary in many endurance sports, such as long-distance
running and swimming. For many athletes, a significant period
of tapering is essential for optimal performance (could not have said
it better myself, Wikipedia)
After all
of my adventures in this neck of the woods, I will hit the ground dead, then
pick my corpse up and start running once I am back on the island. For the first
time in maybe 10 years, I will be home for the end of year week. And for the
first time in 8 our little nuclear family Eman-Bradshaw will be complete!
So, no time
for jetlags and lollygagging, there is fun to be had.
But before
that, the last week in Australia will also be spend with family. While koala
cuddling was the main reason to go to Adelaide, it so happens that in this vast
country, that is where part the new Bradshaw branch is living. So more on that
next time.
This blog
is about the last days in Melbourne. What I hadn’t told anyone except my
emergency contact, is that I was doing a Spartan race on the Friday.
That
Was
EPIC!!
I am
bruised and battered and am sore in muscles that I forgot I had, but I am
hooked and will definitely be doing this again. (Actually am, March 10th,
in Vegas) Pictures take 2 to 5 days to come online, so those will added to this post as soon as I have them!
I was dead
on Saturday, so I mostly hung around, finishing another book, and letting my
mind do the heavy lifting. Going into the final week of my alone time for the
next months, got me thinking a lot about the future. And a little panic crept
in. I have no plans, no job, no idea what it will be. And for the first time
ever in my life I am feeling older. This might have to do with the other people
travelling around me, the backpackers counting their coins at the check out and
having to put thing back. I do not want to go back to that life.
And then I
got a grip. I remember when I was living in Bonaire, there was a couple, both
pilots, that was living there as well. They had traveled the world with just 1
suitcase. In that suitcase they kept white shirt, their stripes and a wok.
Everything else they bought on the spot, minimalistically. The lady pilot would
jump off the cliff in the back of their garden every morning and swim naked to
a buoy and later had a smoothie for breakfast with whatever fruit was in port
that morning. I remember thinking: that is what I want.
And now I
have this chance to start over and fill my life how I want it. Scary, but
exciting as well. Travel will be a big part of this new life. It is hard to
step out of the ‘normal’ and choose to live differently that ‘standard’ (the
2.2 kid, house, career life).
As someone
wise and more eloquent than me put it:
You should have been singing and dancing while the music was playing. I believe in that deeply. I would add, you should love, cry, laugh while you are at it. Find a way to give priority to things and people you are passionate about.
Book lovers will understand this: I just
finished a great book and I feel lost…This book is over 700 pages and is in
fact a horrible story, but so beautifully written I could not stop reading.
I have been reading a lot these weeks. Most
books have all these reviews on them, from writers I know and like, but still: most
books just don’t leave you wondering and hunkering to know what will happen
after the book ends, as if the lives and people really exist. Characters that
are human, imperfect, loving, fallible, likeable and summon emotion through
their emotions. And yet, this is not a book I will pass along, as the story is
so heavy. Let us just say that at a certain point I was sitting with my mouth
wide open on a full Belgian terrace just reading and flipping pages while
willing myself not to cry, thinking: “it is just a book, get a grip!”
But, I finished last night, so now I can move
on to other stuff, like start with this post. What I am doing these days is trying
to be more conscious of what I do and see on a daily basis, so that I can
recount it when I finally sit down to write. At times the blog is written in 1
go, other times a few days are what it takes. This will probably be one of the
latter kind, as I have many pictures to go through before I post. I kind of
gave up on videos, but might just give it a try on this Wi-Fi in Melbourne city
center.
Last post I have just left The Pearly Gates
behind and was off to Melbourne. I don’t know why, but in my negligible
research beforehand, the feeling was that I would like this city.
And I do. The original reason to come here is
the fabulous miss Fisher. The series Miss Fisher’s murder mysteries, that I
stumbled across on Netflix while I was down with the flu a year or so ago is
set in the Melbourne area and we all loved the series! I had looked up where it
is filmed and found out that Phryne’s house is a real building and made plans
to go there. Hoping to maybe catch some of the filming of the movie (yay).
Until my mom found out that the filming is in Morocco…(eye roll) But since I
was coming here anyway, I looked up races and found a race for a good cause and
signed up for that as well.
So off to Melbourne I went! There I met the
first person working in hospitality that I liked. Elena at the Mercury North
Melbourne was also a big fan of the show and could explain to me where the
house was, 7 minutes’ walk from the hotel. I walked there on day one. [And two,
and three].
I explored the city by tram that first
afternoon. Melbourne city center is very well connected with trams and within
the heart of the city the transportation is even free. I did the look around and
follow my gut and found a nice place to sit and have my first dinner in the
city.
Miss Phryne's house!
Yeah, food
Day two was for the exploration by foot. I
went to the Queen Victoria Market, where the produce and fresh cheeses and fish
looked so good!! Some souvenirs were bought, and I explored my first rooftop
bar in the afternoon.
A bit of Den Haag in Melbourne
Aussie hat!
I left the city by rail to pick up my bib for
the last 10K I had planned, changed hotels to a different, coastal part of the
city, St. Kilda. That was the quaint coastal place I was hoping for!
Little bit of NL in St Kilda
Not such good news from the loved ones front
The Friday I left for a tour of Philip
Island. We stopped at the Moonlit Sanctuary, an artisanal farm, the Nobbies,
The Koala Conservation Centre and the Penguin Parade.
At the sanctuary you could buy a bag of feed
for the animals, so of course is that where I went first. The park is filled
with amazing aptly and not so aptly named animals, and I would recommend this
unfancy and small sanctuary any day over a commercial zoo.
These are so common here!
Polly!
And I ran out of food :o((((
Yeah, we know...
Come to mama...
Duck for size reference
Bird with Lava complex
Not laughing...
Peacock-boo
The Nobbies
Australia has the smallest breed of penguin
in the world. I am talking at the max 1 foot (30 cm) high mini cuties, that
come home every evening and have to cross a beach to walk up to 2k to get to
their boroughs up the hill. The seagulls (bullies) standing on the beach are at
times taller than the penguins. The penguins wait up for each other and then
scuttle across the beach in formation to confuse the seagulls. No pictures were
allowed, but you can see it here:
Saturday evening, I went out for the first
time. Before that I had a poke bowl, but I think that and the crappy booze they
were serving did a number on my belly, I had to throw up a few times and had
gastrointestinal issues for 4 days. I will give going out another try this
week. This was not great. The drinking in was, though...
When I was up un Sunday I actually considered
not running the race. I have always learned, issues from your neck up, go run
and everything from neck down, don’t. But I thought: DL>DNF>DNS, I will
make it work for me.(Dead least is
greater than Did not finish is greater than Did not start). I had my first
portaloo puke ever (not to be repeated, lord…) and showed up at the cold and
windy start. We started off and I think over half of the crowd was walking, so
after a while I slowed down to a walk too. My belly was hurting so bad that I
thought I was going to have to leave the course for an emergency pitstop. The
sun broke through around k 3-4 and at 5K I could take my sweater off. At 7 I
was sure I could finish and I did.
Did laundry and very little else the rest of
the day, as the next morning I had an early flight to Ayers Rock.
This trip, in its entirety, has been a trip never to forget. But in this amazing trip, there are some extra high points. And visiting Uluru is one of them for sure. When I was little, that was before Wikipedia, whenever you had to make a report for school, you had to look it up in an actual encyclopedia. I remember flipping through the volumes just for fun and in the few colored pictures see things and places with wonderment. Ayers Rock, as in the book it was still named, was one of those. In 1985, after years of struggle, the area of Ayers Rock and the Olgas, was returned in custody of the indigenous people and renamed to its original name: Uluru and Kata Tjuta national park.
This was a very expensive part of the trip, as this is in the middle of nowhere and I still refuse to share a bathroom with 14 other people and need air conditioning to sleep in temperatures over 35 degrees Celsius. But those accommodations where not that much cheaper, so I just closed my eyes and booked. I booked tours at the same time, hoping to fill up the rest of my time on the spot. There is a free shuttle that picks up all the tourists from the tiny airport, and drives to the Ayers Rock resort, that is divided in several hotels. There is a town square with shops, a supermarket and tourdesks, some restaurants and post office.
As soon as I got to the hotel, I got liters and liters of water, as it was extremely hot and dry that you could get unwell easily by doing normal activity. I went by the scenic flights desk, since as a single traveler you can not book a trip beforehand, just hope that there is a group you can join. And I could join a helicopter trip the next afternoon, so yay.
The first day I went on a Sacred Places and Sunset tour. The Aboriginal ask for respect for their sacred places and ask not to take pictures, so there are none to show. It was lovely to see how the environment was explained by stories and fables, and to see how the knowledge is passed down from generation to generation.
With the bus we went around the rock, getting out at certain spots to hear the stories the guide would tell is. The sky was rumbling, and clouds were packing up, rain was expected, so for this once I left my backpack in the bus, as did several others.
When I got back to the bus, as one of the firsts, as I was climbing the stairs, I saw some of my stuff under the seats and remember thinking, huh what is that doing there…until the coin dropped as I got to my seat that the backpack that I had left under the seat was open on the seat, with most of the contents all over. My heart stopped. My passport was in that backpack. As it is not proven waterproof and it pours when in rains here, I did not take the bag with me. More people were getting on the bus as it started pouring down outside and finding their stuff al around. Luckily enough there was not much missing, some coins, my cold bottle of cola light and from another couple a credit card and socks. Very random stuff. They went through everything, and as I have been travelling for so long now and moving from bag to backpack to bag to hotel room, some stuff I just keep on me. I hope I will not find out later that more is missing, but I feel lucky that my passport and emergency credit card that were both in a secret pouch in the bag, were still there. They found them but left them.
I felt not quite ok, for the rest of the day. You feel violated, someone showed you that they could have really given you trouble, but did not. We did get to see a very unique Uluru, with waterfalls cascading from all sides.
The police was called, they came over to our next stop, which was the sunset with view on the rock.
I did make a friend, Tommaso was on the bus too and we met up for the worst pasta ever. He was leaving the next day, but we talked about travel and how lucky we are that we can travel even while we live where other people vacation (he is from the Garda lake area). I did not sleep well that night, dinner did not help with my stomach ache, I guess I was still stressed about the bus thing and it was hot even with the aircon on. So I did not go to the 4.45 am sunrise tour I had booked, I slept until 9 and had a slow and easy morning. In the afternoon I was picked up for the helicopter ride. Let me first say, I am happy I could go along with someone, otherwise I would have missed the best bit of this whole experience. But this lady was not a kind person. Spoiled is a good name for it. She was annoyed that we were flying into the sun (sunset flight, but hey), that no video was being taken, that it was a bit hazy. Please let me not become that person! But I ignored her and had an amazing experience.
As I was sitting there on Wednesday, enjoying my pizza and book, I heard it. The Dutchies have arrived. What took ‘em so long? They are EVERYWHERE, you would be standing in an Ugg store and hear: Kijk ma, deze zijn leuk voor thuis! But they got there only on my last day in Uluru.
The next day I went for the Fields of light dinner, an art exposition that is combined with dinner and a talk about the night sky. That was so much fun and impressive, and I finally met more people I exchanged social media contact with. Still waiting on that video from the Great Ocean road, though…The bus driver gave us the tip: as an icebreaker debate how much a ice bear weighs. So that is the standard question I will be asking people I meet from now on, it works :o)
My Uluru uniform
The landscape became more and more red and arid
First sighting!
Red earth, green grass and black trees
I look down and see: lipbalm, AA battery, bottle cap and more junk :o(
Waterfalls
This is funny
The next morning it was back to Melbourne,
where it was 38 degrees. I did mostly nothing (finished my book) and started
this blog.
But to answer the title song of this post?
I am happy most of the time. But sadness
sometimes suddenly flows over and through me like a tsunami and it physically
hurts. Even though I am not in an ashram, fasting and meditating and with a vow
of silence, being by myself and having many conversations with myself does
equate to some navel-gazing. In the second-best book I have read these few
weeks, Unsheltered by Barbara Kingsolver (author of one off my all-time
favorites The Poisonwood Bible), a mom and daughter have this interaction that
really touched me:
So I am allowing my heart to remember and
training my mind to be ok with that to heal the blows that both have had in the
last year.
Things I have learned:
The indigenous people have a very strong smell (nan ta hole solo, mi
tata dushi)
I had known that the Australians are hard, no nonsense people, but they
have to realize that they are dealing with tourists here. When it is coming
down in sheets and you have elderly people with you, you can not keep saying: It’s only water! as the elderly around me panic. At the Fields of light, with everybody (except
me) dressed up:“reckon you guys fancy a cooldown, it has
been so hot.”
I have
been lucky: I have at one point almost lost my phone but did not, the weather has been good: rain
when needed and none for my scenic flights, almost lost my passport but did not,
was sick but not out of commission, no snakes, no spiders. Yeah, all good.
My biggest
issue so far: nobody to
take pictures of me.
If you don’t like
selfie sticks and you are travelling alone, you’re screwed.
People
are shit. It is sad that I live in a world where there is a sign: do not poke
the animals with selfie sticks. And even sadder that people still do it. Taking pictures(with
flash!) when none are allowed, poking and yelling
at animals. It really pisses me off.
I remember when I as little, that all English I heard was American to my
untrained ears. Later I could tell the nuance and found out about the Brits.
Even later you could tell where in the country the person was from. I love the
language, I read mostly English. But Australian! This is not a pretty language!
Sometimes I just stand there, blinking…nope, could not make anything from that…
When I got to Uluru,thefirst person I saw was wearing a biba dushi Aruba tshirt. And from then on it was a
parade of destinations, from the Panama canal to Fiji. I want to resume the collection that my daddy started when I was growing
up.
The weather here can be crazy. In Melbourne on the same day, even in the
morning alone, they can get the wind from the arctic and the winds from the
desert and that can be a full 8 to 10 degrees real feel difference.
This country is huge and beautiful. I could stay here for a year and
still have things to see and do and do again.
The one perk of pay before you eat (and for me this is a thing in other
countries), you can just leave when you are done. It saves you the awkward
conversation:
“enjoyed your meal?“
“Euh, no.”
“Oh….”
“Yeah, sorry but it was really crap, I never knew pasta could do that.” I have just given up and accept that the food
ranges from fab to drab and the waitstaff is at best mediocre.
