We flew into Sydney on a Wednesday morning. It was October 23rd, which was the middle of spring, and it was a beautiful, sunny day. We were very excited. As long as we can remember, we have always wanted to go to Australia. We both wanted to visit Australia out of a general interest in seeing faraway places and a love of travel. And of course, who doesn’t want to see koalas and kangaroos in their natural habitats? But Australia held additional attractions for each of us. For me, growing up surfing in SoCal (southern California) there was the attraction of the surf culture. And for Janne, growing up in Denmark, she had always wanted to see the world-famous Sydney Opera House designed by Danish architect Jørn Utzon.
Over the past 15 years, we had endured two false starts in making our way to Australia. I was supposed to go on a business trip with a colleague in 2003. We had planned to add a few days after our business was concluded and tackle the Great Ocean Road that runs along the south east coast and is said to be one of the most beautiful road trips in the world. Alas, it was not to be. That trip fell through when, just a couple months before the trip, my colleague left the company. Then, around 5 years ago, our daughter looked seriously into doing a semester abroad in Hobart, Tasmania. Well, there was no way we were going to send her down there and not check it out ourselves, so we bought a travel book on Australia and started doing research. But our daughter decided against a semester abroad and that trip didn’t happen either.
Now, fast forward to 2019 and we were finally in Australia. To be honest, I wasn’t quite as excited about getting to Australia as I might have been previously. At this point in my life, I am more interested in visiting places that have a very different culture to my own and, well, my fear was that Australia would be pretty much like the USA with a few notable differences like hotter weather, exotic animals, people speaking with an accent and following sports like rugby and cricket. On top of that, I have two bad shoulders so, enjoying the ocean to the full extent (surfing and scuba diving) was out of the picture. Don’t get me wrong, I was still excited to be in “Aussie” and ready to explore and experience it to the fullest, but it wasn’t on my top 10 list of places to visit. Janne, on the other hand, was still super excited to get to Australia – and that was great!
We arrived in Sydney with my parents. They had rendezvoused with us about two weeks prior in New Zealand and we had about a week to spend with them in Sydney before they headed back home to Manhattan Beach, California. We arrived without really understanding where we were going to be staying. We were going to stay with my parent’s friends Andrew and Kerrie. My parents had met them around 20 years ago when my Dad traveled to Australia on business. We knew they had an apartment in Sydney but that is all we knew. We didn’t know where in Sydney. We didn’t know if it was in Sydney proper or out in the burbs and we didn’t know if it was a large or small apartment. Kerrie met us at the airport and we headed for the apartment.
As we left the airport, I could see the high-rises of downtown Sydney – or the “CBD” as they call it here (Central Business District). We kept heading straight for downtown. Before we knew it, we were in the middle of downtown on a business day morning thick with pedestrian and automobile traffic. As we were staring wide-eyed out the window and drinking in our first taste of Australia, it was announced that we were nearly at our destination. I said “Really? Your apartment is right downtown?”. “Yep” was the reply. “We are right by Darling Harbour”. SCORE!
The apartment was in a perfect location. It was a short walk to Darling Harbour and from there you could easily catch a ferry to other parts of Sydney. Alternatively, you could walk a couple of blocks from the apartment and be at the metro or bus station. Sydney has a pretty good public transportation system – at least in my opinion. During our time in Australia, I did hear comments more than once on the TV or radio indicating that Sydney’s public transport system was lacking in comparison to some other Australian cities, but we thought it was great and we used it extensively.
We really enjoyed Sydney. We found it to be a beautiful, cosmopolitan city. It had beautiful harbors and coastlines and there were many parks and green spaces within the city. We were eager to explore, so we dumped our bags at the apartment and then headed off on foot. First thing we did was walk down to Darling Harbour to catch a ferry. If you ever go to Sydney, I wouldn’t bother to pay for a touristy harbor cruise (unless you want a sunset dinner cruise or a narrated tour or something like that). Instead, you can simply catch one of the low-cost ferries and take in beautiful views of the Harbour Bridge, the Sydney Opera House and more. Within an hour of leaving the apartment, we had taken a ferry from Darling Harbour to Circular Quay. On the way, we passed under the Harbour Bridge and passed right by the Opera House. From there we walked around the city.
One of the things we were most excited about experiencing in Australia was the unique wildlife. We really didn’t count on seeing any cool animals until after our time in Sydney was over and we headed to Cairns, but we had only been walking in Sydney for a short while before we saw some cool birds. First, we came across some ibis. Ibis are relatively large birds that get to be about 2.5ft (75cm) long. They are mostly white with a black head and a long down-curved black beak. We got excited when we saw our first one. It didn’t take long for us to see several more. It also didn’t take us long to realize that our excitement about them was telling the world around us that we were tourists. Ibis are very common and seem to be regarded as pests by most Aussies. Apparently, ibis are notorious for digging in trash. They are commonly called “bin chickens”.
Not long after we saw our first ibis, we came across a flock of sulphur-crested cockatoos. These are beautiful white birds with bright yellow feathers on the top of their heads. To our uneducated eyes, they looked like large white parrots. And they weren’t in a cage or in an aviary or anything like that. They were just flying around free and hanging out on the grass in the park. They didn’t seem to be too worried about people. We were able to get quite close and take pictures. One even walked up to Janne when she was sitting down and bit her shoe! The cockatoos are also viewed as somewhat of a pest by the locals – although to a lesser extent than the ibis. This is because the cockatoos are very loud and they can destroy certain plants that bare seeds or fruit.
Later, that same first day, we came across a kookaburra. Aussies seem to hold more affection for kookaburras than the dumpster diving ibis or the noisy cockatoos. Kookaburras are carnivores living largely off mice, snakes, insects and reptiles. They have a unique call and are often called “laughing kookaburras.
As I mentioned previously, Janne was quite excited to check out the Sydney Opera House. And thanks to our fantastic hosts, Andrew and Kerrie, we did just that. Andrew had “connections” through his work and was able to get all 6 of us tickets to not one, but two events at the Opera House. One performance was popular music and the other was classical. The Opera House was very cool inside. It had a lot of light wood (which is not surprising coming from a Danish architect).
One thing we both noticed about the Opera House (when viewing it from outside) is that the roof was not as white as we had imagined or remembered from pictures we had seen. I’m not sure why, but the roof looks brighter and whiter in pictures than it is in real life. This was even the case in the pictures that we took so it wasn’t that we happened to visit when the roof was a bit dirty or something.
Other highlights of our time in and around Sydney included several more ferry rides, walking across the Harbour Bridge, visiting Bondi Beach, exploring a Chinese garden, visiting the maritime museum, enjoying a “secret garden” that Kerrie and Andrew took us to (where we heard, but didn’t see, kookaburras) and taking a day trip to the Blue Mountains. Bondi Beach is definitely worth checking out. Probably the most famous beach in all of Australia, it is large and horseshoe shaped. I took a quick dip and had a pleasant realization on my way back out of the water that Bondi is a top optional beach for the ladies. I wanted to rent a SUP (stand up paddleboard) but they only rented regular surf boards. The day trip to the Blue Mountains was cool. We visited a park with some good nature walks and a cable car. The Blue Mountains are beautiful but we weren’t blown away. This is because we are spoiled having made numerous visits to places in the western U.S. like the Grand Canyon, Zion, Bryce and Yellowstone - not to mention that only two weeks prior we were cruising through Milford Sound in New Zealand. Overall, we really liked Sydney. We came to think of it as being similar to Seattle only with better weather, a more cosmopolitan population and a lot less homeless people.
On Oct 29, we said goodbye to my parents and our hosts, Andrew and Kerrie, and headed to the airport to fly to Cairns. Australia is a huge country. Unless you have a LOT of time and a LOT of money, you aren’t going to be able to take it all in in a single trip. You have to make decisions about what you have time to see and what you will have to skip and maybe hit next time. We decided that we would tour Australia in a clockwise fashion. We would skip Tasmania, South Australia, Western Australia and The Northern Territory and travel from Cairns south to Melbourne (skipping Sydney since we had already checked it out). If you think of Australia as the face of a clock, we would hit Cairns (about 1:00), then Mackay (2:00), Brisbane (3:00), Melbourne (5:00) and finally, The Great Ocean Road (5:00-5:30).
Cairns (pronounced “Cans”) is a city of only a little more than 150,000 in the far northwest of the Australian state of Queensland. The main attractions for tourists coming to Cairns are the tropical climate, tropical jungles and proximity to the Great Barrier Reef. After 4 months in the New Zealand winter and early spring, we were ready to get to some sun and sand. I knew we were in the right place for that when I was waiting for our bags at the Cairns airport and came across a vending machine selling flip flops!
We only had a few days in Cairns including a 3-day house sit where we would be looking after 2 dogs. We would have pretty good accommodations during our time in Cairns. Before and after our sit, we would stay at a Hilton DoubleTree hotel right on the water (using up those last Hilton points from my business travel days). The house sit itself, was actually north of Cairns in an area called Trinity Beach. The walk to the beach from the house sit was only about 5 minutes and the home had a pool.
If you have read the previous blogs, you know we love the beach. Australia certainly has its share of beautiful beaches. Having said that, going to the beach in Australia is a different experience than anywhere else we have been. Of course, you need to always respect the ocean and take the normal precautions: watch for rip tides, be aware of what the tide is doing (rising or falling), don’t turn your back to the ocean when in the water, know what is on the bottom (sand, rock, coral, etc.). But Australian beaches cause you to take your caution to the next level.
First, there are more deadly sharks in Australian waters than the U.S. or other places we have visited. Granted, the chance of being attacked by a shark, even in Australia, is very, very low, but when you see caution signs and nets placed in the water to keep sharks out, sharks kinda’ stay top of mind.
OK, set aside the shark issue. Depending where you are in Australia, there are still other deadly critters that you need to be aware of. Let’s talk about saltwater crocodiles for a minute. These are truly fantastic beasts. They look like dinosaurs. They are the world’s largest living reptile species growing up to almost 20 feet (6m) long and weighing up to 2,200lbs (1 metric ton)! When they hunt, they lie in wait, partially submerged or completely underwater – able to hold their breath for up to an hour by reducing their heart rate to just 2-3 beats per minute. So, just because you have been vigilant since you arrived at the beach 45 minutes ago, it doesn’t mean they are not nearby. If that’s not enough to give you pause, their powerful jaws are filled with 64-68 teeth and they possess the greatest bite pressure ever measured in a living animal! We went to several beaches with posted crocodile warning signs.
Do your best to compartmentalize the sharks and crocs in your mind and head for the water. Oh wait, what about the “stingers”? There are numerous venomous jellyfish found in Australian waters including the Box Jellyfish and the Blue Bottle (also known as the Portuguese Man-O-War, and actually not a jellyfish). Jellyfish are actually the threat that I was most concerned about. They can be very numerous, they can be very hard to see and, depending on the type, they can be one of the most venomous organisms on the planet.
One type of Box Jellyfish, the Irukandji Jellyfish is transparent, and its bell is only about a half inch (1cm) wide and its tentacles can measure anywhere from just an inch or two (2-5cm) to over a yard (1m). The Irukandji's small size and transparent body make it very difficult to see in the water. Unlike most jellyfish, which have stingers only on their tentacles, the Irukandji also has stingers on its bell. Irukandji jellyfish have the ability to actually fire stingers from the tips of their tentacles and inject venom. Australians will check local websites to find reports on current “stinger conditions” before going to the beach. Many beaches have “stinger nets” in place but these provide no guarantees. Many beaches also have “vinegar posts” on the beach providing vinegar to be used in case of stings. It was a “Wow!” moment for us the first time we saw a vinegar post as we had never heard of them before.
As mentioned, we did a short house sit at Trinity Beach, just north of Cairns. We were looking after 2 dogs: Spot, a Dalmatian/Pit Bull mix and Luna, a French Bulldog. Each day we would walk the dogs on the beach. I’ll never forget the first day we walked them. We arrived at the entrance to the beach and there was a sign warning of crocs in the area. “Okay”, we thought. Then, once on the beach, we saw one of the “vinegar posts” which we had never seen, or ever even heard of, before. So that heightened our awareness of the stinger threat. We proceeded to walk along the shore and down the beach. After a couple hundred yards, Luna sniffed and licked a jellyfish that had washed up on shore. So that totally freaked us out and we watched her closely for any adverse reactions. Thankfully, she seemed fine. Later, on that same walk, as we were heading back home, we were still watching Luna for any ill effects from the jellyfish and then we see that Spot has dug up a crab the size of a baseball and is crunching it in his powerful half-Pit Bull jaws and he proceeds to swallow it before we can stop him. That led to us stressing over Spot’s bowels for the next 36 hours. Exciting times!
Croc warning sign. Vinegar post. Luna, the jellyfish licker.
While in the Cairns area, we took a day trip to Kuranda. Kuranda is a small village of only around 3,000 people located north east of Cairns. It is located in a tropical rain forest at about 1,000ft (330m) elevation so it can be a little cooler than Cairns. The best thing about Kuranda isn’t the village itself, it is getting there. You have 3 options. You can drive, take a train or take a gondola. We decided to take the Kuranda Scenic Railway up to Kuranda and then return on the Skyrail Rainforest Cableway. The Scenic Railway is a train that takes you up through the rain forest and past waterfalls while the Skyrail is a series of gondolas that take you down over the rain forest canopy, past waterfalls and across a river. Both take about an hour and offer great views of mountains, rain forest, waterfalls and the ocean.
One fun thing we did do in Kuranda was order an appetizer sampler plate of emu, crocodile and kangaroo. None of them were great. The crocodile was a bit like chicken and the other two were similar to a tough cut of beef.
After Cairns, it was time to head south to Mackay (pronounced “Mack-eye”). Our house sit in Mackay lasted a full month (Nov 7-Dec 8). We had booked it way back in March, so it was a long time coming and we were looking forward to it.
We were looking after one dog and 2 cats. The dog was a big boy named Diesel. He was a bull mastiff weighing in at well over 100lbs (50kg). The house was a 5-minute walk to the beach and the owners had a car for us to use. The weather was getting hotter but that was OK as the house had a swimming pool and the owners said we could use the A/C as much as we wanted during the day as they had solar power. It would be nice to get to Mackay for an extended sit. We would be there Nov 7-Dec 8. We had been on the road and moving non-stop ever since my parents rendezvoused with us in New Zealand back on October 5th. So, we hadn’t really had any down time for over a month. It would be good to actually unpack, and get in a rhythm. We could find time to get some stuff done like place overdue calls to friends and family, make some money (teach), pay some bills, book future house sits, book future travel plans, take care of some banking, get to a dermatologist, read some books, make some home cooked meals and just have time to gel out on the couch.
Mackay is not really a tourist area. It is a city in central Queensland, between Cairns and Brisbane, with a population of around 85,000. The economy is largely run on coal mining and sugar cane farming. When we flew into Mackay, there were large ships in the ocean off the coast. I thought they were oil tankers as they looked similar in size to what I was used to seeing off the coast back in SoCal. But when you fly out of LAX you will usually not see more than 1-3 oil tankers off the coast. I counted over 20 large ships off the coast of Mackay. It was really something to see. It made me think of the old WWII movie Midway. Anyway, I came to find out that the ships off Mackay were not oil tankers but were large ships for carrying coal. I learned these types of ships are called bulk carriers or bulk freighters or, colloquially, “bulkers”. They are called this because they are designed to carry unpackaged “bulk” items such as grains or, in this case, coal.
One thing I enjoyed in Mackay was taking Diesel for his daily walk. I would usually walk him just an hour or so before dark when the heat of the day began to dissipate. Often, I would come across large flocks of what I think were lorikeets but could have been a type of parrot. Whatever they were, there were a lot of them and they were very loud and very colorful. Sometimes I would forget where I was, and just be walking the dog and then see all of these birds and think to myself "Oh yeah. I'm in Australia - cool!".
The highlight of our time in Mackay, and all of Australia so far for that matter, has to be Cape Hillsborough National Park, located just 45 minutes or so north of Mackay. One morning we woke up at about 3:30AM so we would have time to drive to the park and walk out to the beach by sunrise. As dawn began to break, we enjoyed a magical experience. Out of the bush, wallabies and a couple juvenile kangaroos came out to the beach to forage for seaweed that had washed up on shore over the previous 24 hours. This is the only area in Australia where the wallabies and ‘roos are known to do this. It is a surreal experience. You are on a gorgeous beach, with a beautiful sunrise coming up over the ocean (remember, we are on the east coast) and between you and an island-strewn ocean, glistening in early morning sunlight, are about a dozen relatively large marsupials! The animals have become accustomed to a human presence during their morning forages since around 15 years ago, when tourists started arriving virtually every morning to check out the spectacle. It really was special. So much so, we went back for a second visit a week or so later. There aren’t many things that I would get up for at 3:30AM - let alone get up for at 3:30AM two weeks in a row. It is an experience we will not forget and one of the highlight moments of all of our travels - not just over the past year - ever.
Wallabies boxing on the beach.
Here she comes. Look out!
Speeding across the beach and then back into the bush.
Up close and personal with a juvenile kangaroo.
Here are a few final random pictures from our first six weeks in Australia. Many more photos can be found in the "Gallery" section of this website.
Our house sit in Mackay ended on Dec 8th. On Dec 9th we caught a flight to Brisbane to continue our “clockwise tour” of the eastern and south eastern coast of Australia. We are quite excited about our final month in Australia. We have a lot of, what should be, very cool things to do and places to see, lined up over December and the first week of January – not to mention Christmas and New Year. Happy holidays to all our friends and family in the USA and Denmark, as well as all of the new friends we have made around the world in México, Panamá, Spain, New Zealand and Australia.
¡Feliz navidad y próspero año nuevo!
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