for those opposed to lows

well i really did standby on my plans to cairns(pronounced cans in case you didn't understand my rhyme scheme). i've been living on the tropical magnetic island just of the coast of townsville queensland for the last 3 weeks or so and i intend to be here for a few more. 9/10 of the island is a national park, there's about 15 different beachs, one road about 10km, and apparenty there is the most wildlife per square kilometre in all of australia.
i got a job as the 2nd chef in a restaurant called swanson's . i also got my own house for super cheap that i'll be renting for the next month or so. i'll be able to save some good coin since there's not much to spend your money on and all the hiking trails and beach dwelling is free. i'm also getting paid even better than my leaving rate as head chef at my last cooking job and it's just a starting wage!

so coming over to the island i took a vehicle barge which was so rocky i had to sit on the bike the whole time and just try to keep it steady. started driving the perimetre of the island and was blown away by the views; in particular seeing oz from beyond a short distance of ocean water. once i got to my camping destination i saw a sign for cooks wanted and imediately knew i would be staying here for a while.

since then i've hiked countless hours around mountains and boulders separating beautiful white sandy beaches each one with it's own unique personality. yesterday and the day before i went snorkling with my lady friend mikala whom i met on the island the first week i was here. we swam amongst all kinds of tropical fish, coral, reef sharks, sting rays to name a few. breathtaking . the hikes are always really interesting too. mikala's job here is being a ranger for the zoo that's right beside the restaurant so it's like having my own personal forest tour guide telling me what each animal and plant is and what it does etc. there's really such an abundance of things to do here that don't cost a cent so i'm able to save my money for the next leg of the trip.

my camera is being really weird and i can't preview and chose the pics i want so whats up here is kind of a crap-shoot. that's the jist of my life so far here; i've met some really good people too, and many of them spend there island life pursuring the arts who then make up an interesting bunch. it's really nice to become familar with locals too instead of only talking with travelers and backbackers.

i started working on a bamboo version of my xaphoon. it acctually works! (although it's a little flat.)
those are lorakeets which are everywhere like the sparrow or seagull here, i call them mini parrotsthats a curlew which screams like a small child in the middle of the night, really freaky sometimeskoalas are protected everywhere in oz but one of the only places their population is growing is magnetic island everywhere else they mainly only have 2 babies that survive thus only replacing the 2 that created them.these guys are in my house all the time.art projectmikala in the middle of creatingmy first beach boulder walk here, which was not the last.

stand by on plans to cairns

So i've made it as far as townsville now... looking back on the last week since i left brisbane on saturday was one of ups and downs. this time not the roads but in myself. it can be a lonesome journey sometimes. and alas, manny has abandoned me; he only got as far as brisbane and felt at home and is planting roots. i'll see him when i go back that way though. and benni is planted too for a while , i met up with him again in bunderburg... nice town, i may go back to check it out for a while.

i spent a couple days in a hotel in prosperpine just to get my back feeling better. i can only do a couple days in the tent now in a row, i guess i'm not as young as i used to be. that being said this journey has been good but i've decided not to circumfrence the country, instead i need a home base. after travelling up to cairns next i'll probably head back down south via a different route and find that launching point. travelling allday everyday is in every way tiresome and not enjoyable, but if i break it up it's awesome. from the home base (in which ill find some work before i go broke) i can do separate trips to all the different states. i still have melbourne in mind for that it's pretty central to everywhere else i want to go but who knows.
so there's frogs and lizards and sugar refinaries everywhere(this one was my fav. maybe jzeros next psychic pollution cover?)

what a nice frog...

...to eat!
lots of the landscape is pretty barren wasteland. dryed up creek beds pass by mile after mile and i wonder what they are like during the rain season. oh that's also influencing my decision not to go around north ... monsoons + tropical storms is no place for a motorbike and tent. also abandon cars littered every so often makes me realize the auto theft here is real.
also i saw my first kangaroos!
i was wondering if they were only mythical creatures. 3 weeks in and i hadn't seen any. still no koalas though....or crocs. apparenty over on magnetic island, just a 20 min ferry from townsville, are lots of wild animals. it's also really interesting to listen to the chorus of birds in the morning. different mix every day i wake. some sound like monkeys, others finish each others beautiful songs.


bamboo! ahh made me think of the old watering hole.

big guy, little guy and other guy.
i also crossed the tropic of capricorn for the first time in rockhampton.(well i guess i did in the plane) but it was still pretty neat since i'm a capricorn.i can see the constellation here too i don't think you can in canada. i never even knew it is a SEA goat not just goat. huh. well now we know.
did you know? australia doesn't use the penny. everything is rounded to the nickel. genius!

where i am

i'm actually in mackay now. + i'll do some posts when i get to townsville. i'll probably stay in that area for a while just to much to say and i gotta find out where to sleep in the next hour.

awesome possum/

so ive been in brisbane for a few days now dont really like it much better than sydney but its ok. its been super hot since i crossed the border into queensland probably on average 28-35 deg and my face burnt the first day being here leaving a lovely outline of my sunglasses.


been hanging with manny again and always finding fun stuff to do during the nights. last knight we witnessed a possum fight in a tree which was quite entertaining & we found a giant chess board and played king vs king... it ended up being a stalemate. the night before we had shopping cart races and went to a fake beach in the middle of the city which had fake sand and a giant clorinated pool.


although i'm having a good time, i'm getting the same itchy feet to leave brisbane as well and get up to cairns (pronounced cans). probably the most beautiful land and the furthest north ill go. i'll be travelling up the sunshine coast which will soon be great barrier reef teritory. i can't wait....

oh yeah if you ever want to get ahold of me text or call 0011 61 414226563.


true or false, there are more kangaroos then humans in australia?

pacific coasting roller coaster roads

so i made it up to brisbane 3 days later, a few muscles sorer, and a couple extra pounds of dirt on the bike, which i cant stop calling goldy even though i'm trying to come up with a more original name.

anyway got out of sydney finally at about noon after getting kind of lost on the way out. remind you this was my first real day driving in sydney and on the left hand side, kinda confusing at first but i think i got the hang of it now. i get as far as wyong about 3 hours into my trip and stop at a cafe for lunch and realize when i look the other way down the road it says "sydney 77". i've only gone 77kms and i'm 3/4 the way through a tank of gas... me thinks this is going to be one expensive trip especially since brisbane is only about 1000kms away.

once i hit some open road though, which isn't stop and start city travel, i can get about 200km on a tank. better. still think the bike needs a good tune up.

1st generation of luggage. have you ever seen a more ridiculous set up on a bike , oh.... well, if you've never seen my other touring set ups that is.

so to fill you in on the way i bike travel it's : wake up when the birds wake you up, drive as far as you can in a day(and obviously insert other stuff/activites etc. here) , then about an hour before sunset find where to lay your head for the night, preferably for free or close to free. the problem/advantage with this system is you never know what area/city/town/farm/ho(s)tel/rest-stop you'll end up in so it's impossible to book ahead. and i love it that way. benni had a great quote which i think i might steal: person A "where are you going to sleep tonight?" person B "i don't know?... where ever i wake up."

so anyway first night i only get as far as forster (pronounced foster like the beer, no aussie says the r sound). i'm in "the great lakes" region. and of course i laugh because we canadians know what great lakes are. suns coming down fast and there's okanagan sized mountains around so that'll cut a good 1/2 of light out of my time. so i took the first gravel road with the camping sign on it, soon to realize it's 10km of windy gravel roads with potholes everywhere. but suns setting fast and i got to set up before nightfall. first day riding a new-to-me bike down an unfamiliar road at dusk. great. it was the long weekend too so it was quite likely to be full. luckly i made it up and down and all around the shaky road & i got the last spot just in time, really, a car was looking for a spot right behind me. set up, and an aussie couple came over to chat and give me my first vegemite sandwich in oz. delicious, seemed i forgot to take any food or drinks even water with me. whoops.
i got to start rushing through this now it's costing me $5 an hour



2nd night i made it to the queensland border and what a sight! the road leading up to it was 25kms of wonderland. but i have very few pics to prove it, because while i'm trying to enjoy the beauty of the land again night is falling within the hour and i know i got about an hour left of riding through these windy hilly roads. worst of all my oil indicator light is flickering, bad news. i later find out it was just low but it was making me pretty nervous. anyway, i've never driven any road like it. majestic i guess would decribe it best. i had no time for photos except at the very beginning when i crossed the first of many single wooden bridges and... oh yeah! at the very end the road acctually turned into a roller coaster steep steep hills straight up and down about 6 times. i'll go back on my way down south again and set the camera up to movie capture to show u what i mean.
that's some of it anyway. this has cost me about $8 so far, and if i was making money at the time too it wouldn't bother me so much. you'll have to buy the book to get the rest of the story....

top of the (bottom) world!

it felt so great getting my last piece of mail today that enabled me to get my registration and plates. and yes i did finally get my business papers from rich a week and a half later(fyi if you're sending me a valentine card).

but what felt even better was riding away on my new bike! it handles so easily for that size of bike. i think i'm going to keep the fairing too, it's starting to grow on me and it would be a huge hassle to get and re-wire the signals and like the seca, the headlight is mounted in the fairing. too much trouble; i just need to enjoy the ride.

so as scheduled i leave tomorrow morning north up the pacific highway. expecting to meet up with manny in a couple days in brisbane. it's about a ten hour drive but i'm going to split it in two or three days ... hopefully. it's also labor? day weekend here so getting proper camping might prove difficult.
got all my camping gear today. tent, inflatable mat, cooking supplies. i'm going to have to downsize my stuff as i go since every nook is filled on the bike including both tank bags. so much for travelling light.

i'll put some pics up later on this post i just dont really have much time now, just wanted to let you know everything worked out so far and i get to start exploring the real australia and get out of this lost:city.

d.y.k.,the little blvds in the middle of the roads are called refuge islands?

beach song # 2

so yes, i ended up buying that guitar and aside from figuring out how to bring it along i think it has been my most favorite purchase in oz so far. below is a picture of someone else playing (cant remember his name).

went to bondi beach yesterday with a brazilian girl i met named luara, and met about 20 of her friends. the guitar i bought about an hour earlier was a hit as many there knew how to play so they just passed the guitar around and played between brazilian and north american songs singing loudly into the ocean.

it got really cold near the end of the day so went home changed and found out our hostel group was doing quiz night at a near by pub. so i made a team with 2 girls from holland named "the botanic gardeners" and we did fairly well. did you know australia was originally to be named new holland? well now we know.

itchy feet

as you can see i bought another instrument today. my first harmonica (that i can remember). i'm also eyeing up this 3/4 sized blue classical guitar that i could probably strap down on my tail box. it's the same color as my bike so i'll probably get it. i kind of miss the old house always having a guitar lying around to use or listen to someone else play.

most of the friends i've met have left today. benni went to bundaberg queensland to pick fruit, shane is back in melbourne area, jamie's long gone too up north of brisbane and manny's leaving tomorrow for brisbane. so i've had a mix of being excited and depressed today. i really want to leave sydney now and start seeing the real australia.

Ahh yes, also i spent my day travelling an hour by train to see my bike again. paid it off in full now so here's a sneak a peek pic.

there's still a few issues with getting plates on it and registration that will have to wait untill weds and hopefully, fingers crossed, i'll be on the road thurs. i'm still waiting for that package of stuff rich sent to me with my international drivers licence. they must be kayaking it accross the ocean.

computer troubles/sight seeing slightly

i forgot to mention i did some sight seeing with some of the guys, got in a car accident with a giant boulder (you allways gotta 'watch for falling rocks')but luckly benni saved me with his pocket first aid kit, then found some wine and cheese and enjoyed ourselves in a near by park by the wharf theatre. i think the summer of enjoying yourself is going to be quite long this year.





those are two austrian girls benni and i met and have been hanging with for the last couple days but now there off to new zealand. it's great knowing someone who speaks german it comes in handy from time to time.






so i think i've figured out how to put pics up now but its frusterating as per usual. the ones i really want to show you guys wont re-size but at least some work. sometimes i wish i was more of a computer geek ... but really not.

went to newtown just south of downtown today with a new oz i met named shane from outside melbourne to see a graffiti fest through all the back alleys. it was really cool. here's something if you have a friend named jeff with his birthay coming up (there's a really scary/happy ghost unerneath saying it, but again with the re-size prob.

yeah i now have figured out how to resize! ....but i still cant rotate the pics.

so now a few days later....
i now have some time to post since i've caught a cold and am resting up and staying pretty low key. i've met a few good people at the hostel i'm at 'nomad's maze'. they have day and night stuff planned for anyone there to do. so the first few days i did most of the night activities, which are mainly going to pubs and enjoying yourself. aside from the social aspect, usually a good free diner is involved with your first couple drinks covered as well so the night out is made for the traveller, dirt cheap.

i made a couple good friends to hang out with elsewhere through those nights; mainly a northern australian named jamie and a german named benni. benni's travelling the country kinda the same as me minus the bike and add a car but still starting out on his own.
he just got here too and just getting here and trying to figure out what all needs to be set up to get started here ie. tax file number, bank account, shopping for the outback etc. can be taxing; it's nice to have someone to bounce off ideas and questions.

Emmanual (the cook from vicious circle whose travelling oz the same time as me) came into town last night. he's been in melbourne for about a week and has some good stories. it's good to see my first familiar face from back home. did some sight seeing with him today and i think we're going to check out the opera house tommorrow.

supprisingly i've found quite a few people to jam with here. there was a 3 peice jazz band in hyde park sax, 3peice drums , and a bongo player. i'm getting a little better with the xaphoon and was able to play w/ them for a while (once the sax player figured out what key the xaphoon was in). at the very end of playing with them this oz was walking by threw down about 6 shopping bags and started freestyle dancing and singing while we were playing; it was pretty fun times.

also played with a guitar player last night while we we're in kings cross area near manny's (emmanual's) hostel and played more cover tune like songs. 'labamba' was definatly our hit. accidently broke the reed this morning and found a really great music store here called allen's. i nearly bought a ukelayle (sp?) for $25... we'll see about that one.

oh i almost forgot the biggest news.
i chose the bike......jzero, rich drum roll......................................................................................................
1981 Honda Goldwing GL1100 is mine! Dark blue almost the same as the Suzuki850, hard locking saddlebags, a tail box for even more storage and a really ugly fairing which i'll rip of to put my wind screen on (customizing to come after inspection). i'm pretty excited even in my non healthy state. so it's way out in the suburbs and takes me an hour and a quarter train ride to get to. i've put a deposit down and will be going back soon to pay the rest and pick it up. yeah!

this last week is feeling like the week before it. preparation. although i've been doing stuff and having fun it's still like it hasn't started yet. sydney is a huge city all full of tourists and travellers i'm sure it's not the same as the rest of australia. in time, we'll see. ... ..killing hours, filling power lines ha ha. i had to.