We regret we didn't have the time to see more of Australia than mostly just a couple
of cities, but as we mentioned, listening to other fans tell their tales, as well as
looking at all the photos they brought back, kept us entertained for hours. The
person who had the best time of all was probably the Down Under Fan Fund delegate,
Janice Gelb, whose stamina for adventure (from what we've heard) goes far beyond
ours. Her traveling companion for part of her trip is the writer of this next
article, who also had her share of adventures, as we will read. Author's note: Some Mimosa readers may be aware that the anonymous 'travel companion' mentioned in this piece is in fact, the 1999 Down Under Fan Fund delegate Janice Gelb. Ms. Gelb's recollection of events may be a bit different than the author's, and she's not responsible for any statements made in the following literary work. For instance, she might deny all knowledge of a post-game event where we tried to see how many of the Magpies footy team members we could jam into a hotel room bathroom...  # # # #
There are no squirrels in Australia.
Strange, I know, but there it is. You can travel across the world and what do you
notice? An absence of bushy tailed rodents. I envision Australian tourists coming
to the U.S. and snapping photos of squirrels in the park."My word, Matilda, there goes another
one!""Quick, Clyde, before it gets
away!"Certainly it's no more strange than
an American tourist walking through Hyde Park in Sydney snapping photos of
black-billed ibises. They may be as common as red dirt there, but it's startling to
those of us not from Down Under. You'd be walking through the park, feeling like
you could have been in any major North American city and suddenly what would qualify
as an avis rara round these parts crosses in front of you and you realize
you're not in Kansas anymore.To say "I toured Australia in two
weeks" is a bit like saying, "I'm going to North America and I'm going to see
everything in 14 days." Clearly, one could spend much longer and not see everything.
But there were things about Australia both noteworthy and praiseworthy, so here are
some tourist notes you're not likely to find in your standard tour book:The toilets are very cool. All the
buildings we frequented, with the exception of the very oldest, featured two flush
options: light load and heavy load. Now, if you're a woman with a bladder the size
of an acorn who drinks water all day this is a neat thing. Instead of wasting ten
gallons of water every time you take a trip down the hall, you only use the minimal
amount necessary for the moment. Sometimes it took a bit of guesswork to figure out
which flush button was which, but it was worth the effort. You'd exit the bathroom
feeling like you'd done just one more thing to help out the environment and save our
precious natural resources.How come we can't get good dairy
products like the Aussies get? The milk, cheese and butter all had more flavor than
what's found in most American supermarkets and the variety was outstanding. The
yogurt in particular tasted like more than flavored library paste. Oh yeah, and how
come we can't get flavored tuna in individual little cans in the States? Or at least
I can't get it. They get grubs and little tins of tuna. We get Cheez Whiz and
Wonder Bread.Aussie Rules Football, or 'Footy'.
I'm not a sports fan. Definitely not a football fan. But my traveling companion
sat me down in front of a television in our hotel room with instructions to just
watch. Twenty minutes later I turned to her and said, "If American women saw this
it could change Sundays in the States forever." It was fast. It was easy to follow.
But best of all, instead of 250 pounds of overfed, overpaid, overpadded beef hurtling
down the field you had hunky young guys in shorts and sleeveless jerseys playing in
the mud. Real looking men, not caricatures. Eye candy for the ladies. You get the
idea.
Flying foxes in the Sydney Botanical
Gardens. They look like refugees from a Dracula movie, hanging up there and waiting
to swoop down on unsuspecting tourists. Or at least that's how they looked looming
over us.More food: Sticky date pudding. It's
a moist cake with chopped dates and sauce on top. Good stuff but it helps to have a
well-seasoned sweet tooth, able to handle something a bit cloying. But cutting
through the sweetness is helped by the coffee. Most of the time, when I ordered a
cup of coffee what I got was an eye-poppingly strong espresso. That would cut
through anything, including the fog of jet lag. Oh, and the Anzac biscuits! A
modest little oatmeal and coconut cookie with a history dating back to the Great War,
the Anzac biscuit is a delightful taste of Australia. Within three days of my return
home I began to experience withdrawal symptoms and did a web search for Anzac biscuit
recipes. Not surprisingly, there were as many variations as you would find for a
standard American chocolate chip cookie, but with a little adjustment and a hunt for
the proper ingredients (it's hard to find wattle seeds around here) I was able to
bake a batch and got rave reviews from family and neighborhood kiddies.Blue lights in the public restrooms.
Took me a while to figure out what was up with this. Was it to sanitize? Was it to
make you look like a corpse while putting on makeup? Finally, I saw a sign
explaining the lights. Blue lighting discouraged drug use. Sure enough, the next
time I looked at my arms under blue lights it was harder to see the veins. There
were also convenient and discreet needle drop boxes for those who needed them.Public transportation. I'm sure it's
not great everywhere you go, but in the cities we were in it was fast, convenient,
reasonably priced and perfect for tourists like us staying out burbs. The Melbourne
trams were especially convenient, though the Sydney bus system was also very good.
And the trains running to the outlying areas were a big improvement over driving.The money. It's slick, it's plastic,
it's colorful. I imagine Aussies coming to the States must find our money very
boring. I know I do. The coins decreased in size as their value decreased with the
five cent piece the smallest. Paper money too varied in size as well as color making
it much easier to handle. And, since the Aussie dollar was worth about two-thirds of
the American dollar, you could get lulled into thinking you were getting a bargain
-- if the price looked good in American dollars, you knew it was a deal!The airlines! Oh man, I'll never
feel the same way flying domestic US airlines again. On a 90-minute Qantas flight,
passengers got two snacks. First, a bag of crackers and juice. Then, a meat and
cheese roll, fruit salad, cheese, crackers, and Anzac biscuits and a Cadbury
chocolate bar! The vegetarian tray that we got had a fruit plate in place of the
sandwich. Ah, airline travel the way it was meant to be.The Sydney Aquarium. A great way to
get up close to the aquatic wildlife of Oz without having too close an
encounter. An Australian saltwater crocodile made me feel just a bit inadequate as
a Floridian. Size does matter. Our bull gators don't quite measure up.Uluru (Ayers Rock) and Kata-Tjuta (The
Olgas) National Park. Everyone's seen pictures of Uluru, but the pictures can't
compare with the reality. It looks very sfnal, rising out of the red ground, a huge
red monolith surrounded by kilometer after kilometer of desert. And the ground
itself! Georgia has red colored clay but this dirt is red, a really deep,
rich, lush scarlet. Uluru itself changes color as the day changes. In the morning
and at sunset you see purples, blues, greys, all melding and blending as the light
moves. During the heat of the day the rock is a majestic ochre, catching and
reflecting the sun's light back to the desert. It's offset by a sky of a deep
cerulean hue, clear and absolutely cloud free during the dry season when the humidity
is at about one percent. Visiting the Rocks is one of those special experiences
that make you appreciate the variety and wonder of life on this planet, and how
fortunate we are in this day and age to be able to travel to these sites.The Floriana hotel in Cairns.
"Charmingly rustic" doesn't do it justice. The Floriana is a family owned inn, a
somewhat run down Art Deco treasure oozing faded style, rather like a retired chorus
girl dripping with Bakelite and rhinestone jewelry from her youth. The Floriana had
Deco furniture in the lobby, plank floors, and an eye popping pink, blue, yellow and
turquoise color scheme. The outside was draped with strings of colored lights. We
had a suite, a bedroom and sitting room with a second bed. The sitting room had bay
windows opening onto the east and the Bay and I was thrilled to think of sleeping
with the fresh sea breezes coming in, the birds awakening me with their gentle
morningsong.So after a stroll down the Esplanade,
the funky, tacky, backpacker-filled main drag of Cairns we returned to our little
treasure, the Floriana, and settled in for a good night's sleep. I drifted off to
the night sounds of returning guests and the rustle of the breeze through the palms.
All was calm, all was quiet.And then came the black
helicopters.Turns out our charmingly rustic digs
were next door to a regional hospital that serves Cairns and surrounding environs
and many of the patients are flown in by helicopter. In the middle of the night.
To a helipad next to my room.Now, I'm not a light sleeper but I
guarantee something right outside your window going WHUP WHUP WHUP and making enough
noise to wake the fish in the Great Barrier Reef at two o'clock in the morning will
roust anyone out of bed. And at three o'clock. And at four o'clock. And my travel
companion, who'd taken the interior room after I insisted I wanted to sleep near the
open windows slept like a baby. But really, the Floriana is a great place to stay.
Once.The Great Barrier Reef was, as
promised, spectacular. Even if you're not a scuba diver the tour companies offer
many options for seeing the reef from Green Island. My favorite was the Yellow
Submarine. It took you below the surface and around the reef where you could look
out portholes and admire the fish. Kind of a real life version of Captain Nemo's
Submarine.
In the Melbourne area there's
Healesville Sanctuary, the largest collection of Australian wildlife available for
viewing in one spot. And yes, Virginia, there were koalas and they were adorable,
but so were the echidnas, penguins, wombats, Tasmanian devils and the variety of
birds. The only disappointment were the roos, who were clearly on the dole. There
they sat, lounging, scratching their butts, smoking cigarettes, ignoring us, barely
moving. Their attitude couldn't have been plainer. "Tourists? We don' need no
stinkin' tourists!" I found out afterwards that kangaroos are most active around
sunrise and sunset when they're feeding. Otherwise their attitude is "bugger off,
mate!"And the Royal Melbourne Zoo with its
butterfly room is also a delight. Lonely Planet travel guide says the Zoo is "one
of the oldest in the world but it is continually upgrading the standard of the
prisoners' accommodations." The 'prisoners' seemed content when we were there and
included a platypus in a nocturnal environment and some friendly penguins.Were there negatives? Sure. The
graffiti was widespread, annoying and pervasive. Canned beets are considered a basic
food group. I never imagined I'd be ordering fast food and saying "hold the
beets."But other than graffiti and beets,
I'd recommend Australia as a vacation spot for any Yank looking to go someplace with
friendly natives, interesting sights and people who almost speak the same language.
I hope to return someday to see many of the things I wasn't able to cram into this
trip and spend more time learning about the people and places of the Land Down
Under.Oh yeah, and they had a nice SF
convention in Melbourne too. All illustrations by Kurt Erichsen |
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