Shanghai

We are in Shanghai at the moment! This hostel is amazing compared to the Hong Kong guesthouse - we have an ensuite bathroom, about 6 times the size of the one in HK, with a posh shower, a TV, a kettle, microwave and wardrobe. The train journey here (20 hours - overnight) was better than we were expecting. We bought a postable DVD player and some pirated DVDs in HK, and as the train had a socket we spent most of the time watching DVDs or sleeping. Despite the name, (we were on the 'hard sleeper') our beds were surprisingly comfy, very like the ones in HK, and duvets and pillows were provided.

When we got here, we had to find an ATM to get some money out, as the currency is different in HK and China. We asked a chinese man who didn't understand us, and the group steadily grew as we tried to explain. One guy eventually understood and led us off to find one - walking right down the centre of a busy road. We followed, dodging cars and mopeds, and found one eventually. We then needed to get a taxi to the hostel, but I had mislaid the road name. Found same group of chinese men who tried to understand my english writing (i had spelt the road name wrong) and offered to take us to a similar sounding road for 100 yuen (10 pounds). Nick was unsure, and we found a taxi rank with a guy with a computer and routefinder, who wrote down the actual name of the road in chinese symbols. We took his taxi, which cost 11 yuen. No seatbelt in the cab; lots of blaring horns to try and get pedestrians off the road. Saw quite a few people wearing surgical masks - this was the same in HK too - and unsure why. Could be pollution, or fear of catching an illness, or because they are ill themselves.

That evening we went out for dinner, and found a chinese place that had no english menu and who's waitress spoke no english. She chose out meal for us. 10 minute later, a basket of rocket, a plate on elongated mushrooms, what looked like dried skin and squid, came out. We dubiously picked some skin up with chopsticks, before being told to wait. A bubbling pot of stew followed, and was put in a gas stove on our table. I tried to eat some skin again, but in a blather of chinese, the waitress stopped me, and took my chopstick and started putting the skin into the stew. Aha. We followed suit, and the concoction was nice, if a little hot. We were unsure as to what the meat was - Nick said it was chicken, but it was very bony. I recollected one english girl telling me she had eaten chicken foot - I checked with the waitress, and yes indeed, we were eating chicken foot. I stopped eating the meat then.
We were unable to finish the meal (it was very spicy after a while, and even Nick gave in) and paid 50 yuen for a half eaten chicken-foot stew. An experience.

Hong Kong

Nan Lian nunnery

Nan Lian Gardens

Symphony of lights

On the 23rd May, we left Sydney and arrived (after a 14 hour flight, in which i got my tongue stuck to an ice lolly, and had to have it ripped off by Nick who was in hysterics) in Hong Kong. It was a bit of a culture shock after Sydney! We were attacked by hawkers telling us to come to their hotel, it was much better than the one we had booked, but eventually found Kowloon New Hotel. It was... interesting. There was no kitchen or living area, and the mattresses we were sleeping on were about 2 inches thick. The bathrooms were about 2 metres square, in which was crammed a toilet, a sink, and a shower unit. You had to squeeze in, as the door ricocheted off the toilet. You showered in the small area not taken up with the toilet and sink, and only on the last day could I get the hot water to work. The hostel was on the 13th floor of an apartment block, and out of the (tiny) window in our 6 bed dorm you could see lots of washing and air conditioning units. Otherwise, the hostel was fine!
Hong Kong is an interesting place to be - skyscrapers and neon lights everywhere. At first we thought it was cloudy, but were later told that the constant mist was actually polluted smog from the factories. We had dinner pretty much every day in the same place, apart from one time when we went to TGI Fridays, without realising how much it cost, and spent about 4 times as much on a meal as we would in a chinese restaurant (which is about 6 pounds for both of us). The place we usually frequented was lovely, and they had an english menu! They also gave us unlimited refills of jasmine tea. Tea in China isn't served in teacups, rather plastic beakers or glaases with no handle. However the tea is usually lukewarm rather than hot.

We went to Nan Lian gardens and Nunnery, which were beautiful. The nunnery was filled with golden buddhas, and it was a shame that photos were prohibited, although it was obvious why - they were obviously very important to the chinese. We also went to the Sik Sik Yuen Wong Tai Sin Temple, where I was asked to have my photo taken with some Chinese! A little girl came up and held my hand whilst her Dad took a picture - apparently we have to get used to this, as many Chinese have never or rarely seen foreigners (or 'aliens' as the chinese word translates to). We also visited the museum of history, which was interesting, although I think the chinese government might have had a hand in what was said. At night, we went to see the 'symphony of lights', a tourist attraction. Basically music is played as you stand by the water's edge, and you watch neon lights on the building on the opposite side of the water flash and move in time to the music.

Sydney

Nick on the yacht

Steph, Blake, Nick and I

After leaving Coff's Harbour, we took an overnight bus to Sydney. This was actrually better than expected, apart from about 5:30 in the morning, I started getting dripped on. Apparently, water had got into the air conditioning unit, and due to the motion of the bus, whenever we turned a corner the water would come out the air vent. Onto my head. Nick found this amusing; I did not!!

So anyway, we got to Sydney and eventually found our hostel, after a couple of wrong turns. Our friends who we had met in New Zealand were also staying at this hostel, and we were put in the same room. We had 10 days in Sydney, and spent this time relaxing and not doing much - we visited the botanical gardens, the opera house and the bridge, and that was about all the culture we got! We also went to the cinema to see '17 again' and drank a lot of goon and free champagne (at least, I did). The highlight of our time in Sydney was probably sailing with Warwick and Tracy, and having a pie afterwards (Nick claims it was the best pie he had ever tasted!). I would agree that Australians do good pies.

Coffs Harbour - dolphins and seals

When we were in Coffs Harbour, I went to a seal and dolphin sanctuary. It was chucking it down, and I had to walk 20mins to get there, so I was soaked. But it was definitely worth it!! I got kissed by a seal (it was just like a dog, but with fishy breath) and saw dolphins do some amazing stuff!! They managed to jump through hoops and do backward somersaults and oscillate their tails so they were standing vertically out of the water. You could also swim with them, but it was $300 (150 pounds) so I didn't!!

Kangaroos!!!

This was also at the koala sanctuary - we had great fun feeding the kangaroos!! Some were really quite pushy and tried to eat out of the bag, and would hop over to you so you were surrounded by them! They had the same kind of fur as the koalas - quite dense, not at all like cats or dogs. We have quite a few more photos and a video, but you get the idea.

Koalas, wombats and a cassowary

When we were in Brisbane we went to the Lone Pines Koala Sactuary with Amelia and the 2 girls she was staying with (whose names I have forgotten :s ....they were very nice though!!) We obviously saw lots of koalas, but some other native Aussie animals too. The cassowary is a huge flightless bird, just a little shorter than me, and I think it may be a dinosaur, but I'm not sure. You find them in the wild further up the East Coast and they're quite dangerous - they can kill humans. If you hit them with your car, I think it's like hitting a stag - they have a big bone-like thing on top of their heads like a rhino.

The, um, big crocodile! Finally!

Remember, we were about 1m away from this beast, with just a chicken wire fence seperating us...and a couple of old dears were getting really quite close to the fence!!

Fraser's Final Post

Hey it's Roz!! These are photos from our last day. We had all had a bit to drink by then...

This is Gregg and Jeffrey. Jeffrey was walking around with the bag of goon pouring it into everyone's mouths. By this point the entire truck stank of fish and we don't know why...the only thing in the truck that said 'may contain fish' was the goon...hmm...

This is Nick and me drinking the goon!! You can drink it out of cups as well, but they were all packed away and this is more fun!!

Even after we got back to the hostel we had a few bags of goon left, so we all trekked up to the sand dunes near the hostel and drank the rest! We managed to finish all the alcohol we took with us! Gregg had bought red goon (it comes like wine in red and white) and the red tastes awful - the only people who would drink it were me and a Israeli guy called Omri. Anyway, we all got trashed by about 6:30pm. Good times!! I think it was the best part of our trip so far!

Fraser Part 4!!!!

this is the back of our 4x4, it was a little cramped, especially because the icebox containing the beer and the goon had to be there as well...

the wreck of the maheno, this is a japanese ship that sank in a storm and was washed onto the beach, our campsite was located really close to the wreck...

this is the wreck photographed at sunrise, its really beautiful to see, but the march flies are a bugger... also, i was woken up at 4am by bloody birds singing after the storm... we were lucky enough to suffer a second horrible night :D but we were prepared this time, we placed all our tents right in beside the truck to get protection from the wind and raised the tarp above them all to offer some protection from the rain...

this is Gregg and Roz, i mentioned him earlier but the picture was difficult to see... he wasn't sober at any point during the trip :)

last bit to come...

Fraser Continued...

hello again :P

ok, so the top picture is of some group members enjoying our morning beer :D the guy in white is Ita, the guy in blue is Rick, the guy in red is Gregg (though hes mostly hidden behind Rick) and the one in the background is Joe...

the middle picture shows jeff holding the bag of goon, he is a lot like richard its scary :P... the 2 people next to him are janein and mark the dutch couple in our group... janein was unlucky, she got soaked on the first night and developed a cold :( oh well...

the bottom picture is of Becky one of our drivers, its too bad really, neither Roz of me are 21 so we weren't allowed to drive the jeep :( but its not so bad...

more coming...

More Fraser!!

more pictures :P

the first is of Ita and me making a shelter from the sun from a tarpaulin and some logs... it worked quite well but sand just blew under the van, bounced off the cover and flew into our faces :P

the second picture is of our first campsite. It was a really nice location... too bad that it pissed it down with rain for most of the night and the wind was really strong, our tents were really crap so they all leaked :S Some tents blew away while people were sleeping in them :(... needless to say none of us slept very well that night! Anyway the guy on the left is jeff (aka the naked dutchman: he spent a lot of time mooning the other groups :P)

the bottom photo is of our group in the back of the 4x4, it was... cosy...

anyway after a bad night we all decided it was best to forget our troubles with a 9am beer :P so started the next awesome day...

to be continued...

Our Fraser Island Trip

hey guys, these are the first photos from our fraser trip, more coming up in a mo :P...

well, as you can probably guess the top photo is of a dingo, there are a lot of those on the island, they like stealing food if at all possible... the rangers on the island told us not to let them, to discourage them by throwing sticks at them if need be...

the second picture is Lake Mackenzie a large fresh water lake, that was so beautiful... the water was so clear it was amazing... apparently the water is infused with tea tree oil from nearby plants, so swimming there is great for the skin...

the third picture is of our new friend Ita (short for itamar), hes from israel... and next to him is our pile of alcohol for the trip... bear in mind this was a 3 day trip, with 11 people in out group :)

the list : 150 cans of beer

10 boxes of wine (each 4.4litres) :AKA Goon

2 bottles of Vodka

:D

More coming up