The one that got away

The following is a big fish story.

In this case, it is TRUE though. I swear. Scouts honor.

I took a fishing tour in Darwin today, for a half day from 10 am to 2 pm. I made my way down to the harbor in the morning and boarded the small fishing boat. It had only 2 crew and 7 passengers, so we had a decent amount of room to move around.

We moved around a fair bit at the start, and right off the hop, an older guy on board snagged a fish, and while pulling it up, he got an even harder tug on his line and wrestled to get it up the rest of the way. When we got the fish up, there was a large Barracuda on the end of the line about 5 feet long. Turns out that inside the Barracuda's mouth was the fish the guy had originally caught, and the 'Cuda had grabbed it on the way up, hooking itself in the process. They initially tossed the Barracuda back, but it died anyway, so we chopped it up and used it as bait.

That, however, is not my big fish story, even though it was interesting.

As I kept on fishing, I finally got a bite, and hauled up a small orange fish, about 7 inches long. I was gong to toss it back, when the girl on the crew, Kara, came over and asked if I wanted to use it as live bait. The though never occurred to me, but why not I guess? Big fish eat small fish, right? So, I hooked it through the tail, and plunked it back in the water. Kara advised to check it every now and again, and if it died, to just toss it.

I waited a bit, nothing, nothing. Hauled it back up, yep, still alive. Sent it back down. Nothing happening again, so I started looking around.....and Wham-o! My fishing rod almost went flying right out of my hands. I pulled back on it, and the rod was bent near in half. The other person on the crew, a guy, came over and I told him that I had something big. He figured I had hooked the bottom is all, but I assured him, nope, I have a REALLY big fish here. Suddenly, the line let out with a high pitched whizzzz. He then agreed, I had something big.

I fought with bringing it in for the next 15 minutes or so, the guy on the boat laughed and said I would be there for a while by the looks of it. Unfortunately, it was about that time that the pulling stopped, and the line suddenly became light as a feather. Whatever it was, it had snapped the line.

The guy on the boat figured it was a bottom feeding shark, and said they could get up to 6 metres in length. He stated that they use 80 lb. test line on all their rods, so whatever it was, it was a good size.

Next time I catch up with a shark, it will be when I go cage diving with the Great Whites in South Africa.

Shampoo Counter

Lost another bottle of shampoo......

Great Barrier Reef

On Thursday, I went diving on the Great Barrier Reef. It was an all day trip and consisted of three dives, 2 of which we did in the same location and then we travelled on a bit and did another at a new location.

I set out from the hostel at about 7 a.m., after having got up at 6 a.m. The only problem was I hadn't got to bed until about 5 a.m., having gone out with a bunch of British people staying in the same room at the hostel. Surprisingly, I didn't feel too worse for wear, maybe all that a.m./p.m. court after working shift work all night is finally turning out to be useful in this case.

The hostel ran a shuttle that took me down to the marina, but I couldn't find where to go, so I stopped for a second, took out my wallet, and took out the card for the hostel I was at and asked them for directions. They pointed me the right way, and I walked over to the boat. Having got on, I went to pay the remainder of my fee for diving, and lo and behold - no wallet. I thought well, that was odd, I just had it. Checked all my pockets, nothing. Checked my bag, nothing. Riiiiiight, I left it sitting on a bench on the other side of the marina. Great. So, after sprinting across the marina, with several people moving out of the way and looking at me wondering why the hell I was running so fast in bare feet the early in the morning, I got back to the bench, to find it, of course, gone. I checked in one building, where they book tours, and fortunately, it had been turned in. I may be stupid, but I'm lucky.

The boat took us out to the reef in about an hour and a half, and we did our first 2 dives followed by lunch. Visibility was great, a lot of the dive masters on the boat said it hadn't been that good in 4 months. They also said the particular reef we were at doesn't get visited very often because it usually has poor visibility when the weather isn't so good, but we lucked out. They could've been feeding us all a line I guess, but who knows.

Both dives at the first site were great. Lots to see - all different kinds and colors of coral, giant clams, lots of different fish in giant schools, and of course all different kinds of plants. Each time we were under for about 25 minutes, which goes in a flash. As none of us were certified divers, we were forced to link arms and swim in a group, so the dive master watching over the group has an easier time controlling buoyancy, so you don't slam into the reef and damage it and cut yourself up in the process.

After lunch, we moved on the the second site, and had dolphins playing in the wake of the boat as we went. unfortunately, they didn't hang around.

The second site was not as clear as the first, but as we went out with a different dive master, she was comfortable just letting us swim freely as opposed to linking up, as long as we didn't wander off. It was great to be able to swim around without another person dragging you up or down and getting kicked from other people's fins.

Again, saw lots of fish, including some really large ones, like the one in the photo here - a Maori Wrasse. Docile, but large and somewhat imposing. After 25 minutes, we had to come up.

Talking to other people on the boat, they had the luck to see other things such as large Sea Turtles and Manta Rays.

It was a great experience, I encourage anybody who has the opportunity to try it sometime to go ahead and do it.

Cairns

So, I flew from Sydney to Cairns on Tuesday, about a 3 1/2 hour flight. I'm in Cairns until Saturday, at which time I will fly over to Darwin on another flight that takes about the same amount of time. Only plan for Cairns is to do some scuba diving on the Great Barrier Reef.

Around Sydney

So, basically every day, I head out on foot and check out the downtown area of Sydney. I've been travelling around on the subway and the ferries as well, which go all over the place.

I spent some time at the Australian National Museum, Sydney Aquarium, Sydney Wildlife Centre, Bondi Beach and the Blue Mountains.

The Museum was disappointing, not worth the price of admission. They had a new exhibit on dinosaurs, but having been to Drumheller a few times, I didn't find it as exciting as the 50,000 children running all over the place. Turns out it was the first day of the exhibit, and coincidentally, kids were out on holidays from school for the next two weeks. Perfect timing. After checking the place out front to back in about a half an hour, I went back outside into the downpour, and headed off over to the Aquarium and Wildlife Centre.

These two places were somewhat interesting, seeing a lot of things I've never had the opportunity to look at up close before, like sharks and sea turtles. They had underwater tunnels that went through pools they had for seals, and another that ran under where they had several Nurse Sharks, Sting Rays, Manta Rays and large turtles. However, you can only look at things for so long, so I moved over to the Wildlife Centre.

The Wildlife centre was a bit more interesting, they had Koalas and Kangaroos, large spiders and poisonous snakes, including an Inland Taipan, the most poisonous snake of all. For a fee ($$$) you could have your picture taken with a Koala bear, but seeing as it was sleeping, as were all the ones there, I decided to just take my own pictures. This place too, was over-run with kids.

Today, I hopped a bus and went over to Bondi Beach, which is a world recognized surf spot, as long as you're into surfing or are from Australia. So after a short ride, there I was, and there it was......a beach. Sand - check. Waves - check. Surfers - check. Sunshine - M.I.A. I caught the next bus out, and back into Sydney. There were no really interesting things to look at, so not much interest in hanging around there.

Did a little bit of sailing around the harbor that basically just allowed me to get some better shots of the Opera House, but there wasn't a lot more to it. I did miss my boat over to the Olympic park, so I will have to do that tomorrow. Then, tomorrow night, it's off to Cairns on another plane. I hope to get in some diving on the Great Barrier Reef for a few days, then on to Darwin to visit some friends.

Gee, that's a big bird....

Last night I went out on the roof of the hostel I am staying at just after sunset to have a look at the city skyline with all the buildings alight. I noticed a lot of birds flying around low overhead, I would compare them to the size of a really fat Crow.

The thing I found the strangest was that as they flew so low, they were totally silent. No sound from their wings, no noise, nothing.

It was only when I managed to see one that was backlit fly overhead and caught the shape of it's wings....

There were about 50-60 large bats circling overhead.

I went back inside.

Sydney on foot

Today I set out on foot to walk around Sydney's downtown. The place I am staying is relatively close, it takes about 15 minutes of walking before you hit the main downtown area, which is huge in comparison to any city I ahave been in to date. Blocks are long, and there is people everywhere, all the time. Given the city and greater area has a population of around 4.5 million, I guess that could be why.

My first stop was to be the Opera House on the harbour, and along the way I had to pass through Sydney's Domain, which also has their Botanical Gardens. Every city I have been in in either New Zealand or Sydney has a 'Domain', which is a large park, somewhere close to the centre of the city. I didn't look around the gardens too much, I'll look there another day, as it is along the way to many places I want to go.

Getting to the Opera House, you can walk all the way around it, take tours inside, even get up to the large white shells that make up it's shape. The shells themselves are actually tiled, with cream colored tiles, but at a distance, and especially when the sun hits it, it appears bright white.

I then went over to the Harbour Bridge, another attraction where you can actually walk to the top of it's arch and look over the harbour. I didn't do that today, maybe another time. I was tired of all the walking I had been doing, and walked partly across the bridge to get some better shots of the Opera House, but that was all.

I looked around in some markets, and covered a fair bit of distance in the downtown area, but after looking at a map, I realize that I only saw part of what there is to offer, so back at it tomorrow.

Sydney

I'm in Sydney now, having arrived yesterday. Haven't had much of an opportunity to look around, but hopefully I can get around in the next few days and get my bearings, then post more updates.

News Flash...

I've decided that rather than wait around in New Zealand for the next month and a half, I'm going to be flying out to Australia on April 15th. See what happens after that.

My Night in Jail

After leaving Picton first thing in the morning, I was back on the road again pointing towards Christchurch. Immediately, I noticed how much flatter the roads were. No more hairpin switchback turns or continual uphill and downhill roads, there were long stretches of straight road, almost as far as the eye could see. The road tended to mostly follow the coast, and made for a nice drive, having Ocean on my left and Mountains on my right. Quite a diverse change of scenery and landscape followed, from tree filled rocky mountains similar to Jasper, to rounder, dry and dusty Mountains similar to the area around Kamloops.

Before I knew it, I was in Christchurch. It kind of sneaks up on you, not seeming like a big city at all. Once I got into the downtown area, I was surprised to find not a lot of really tall buildings either. It reminds me somewhat of Victoria. Lots of old buildings, churches, museums, all done with intricate stonework.

Now that I was here, I had to find a place to stay, and booked myself into 'Jailhouse Accommodation' for the night. A really unique place to stay, it is an old jailhouse that was built way back in 1874. It has been used as a jail for long term offenders, a remand centre, a women's prison, and a military camp before being bought and renovated into a hostel. Once there and having a look, it is a really interesting place to stay. All the original bars and steel doors are still in place, and they have even kept one cell in it's original form to go have a look. Outside, the walls still partially surround the jail. Overall, oddly as it sounds, the nicest place I've stayed since I got to New Zealand, has been in jail.

North Island to South Island

After leaving New Plymouth, I headed down the surf highway. After almost piling up the rental a few times trying to avoid people passing on hills or curves, I got back onto the main road into Wellington. It isn't so much a main road as we imaging back home, there isn't any 2 lane highways going on except on the expressway through major cities. It is the main highway, simply because they label it #1. In Wellington, I didn't know the ferry times, but figured the sooner I got there the better, so as not to get onto the South Island too late.

When I arrived in Wellington, I could already see that I was going to regret not having spent any time there. It's a city carved out of the mountains, right on the water's edge. I didn't get to see much of it, but from what I saw it looked great. Instead, I followed the (few) signs pointing to the ferry terminals and headed there. A few wrong turns and a few guesses, and I was in the right spot. I then had to go buy a ticket, and found that the ferry ticket was about the same cost as a flight from Auckland to Christchurch. Awesome. Walked back to my car and soon, the check in gate opened, where they let me know.......the ferry is running late. So, after a bunch of sitting around, it arrived, and we headed out from the port at about 7:15 p.m. The entire journey was then in the dark, so there wasn't much to look at.

I arrived in Picton and managed to find my way to the hostel by about 10:30 p.m., and pretty much went straight to bed.

Shampoo caper update

Make that on my 5th bottle of shampoo. Damn it.

Just because I'm bored, I added a "Shampoo Bottle Counter" to the right. I'm starting a pool to guess how many I will lose before I get home. Winner gets a prize. My guess is 23.

Southward bound....

Left Auckland today, heading south towards the South Island. Got a rent-a-wreck for a good price, and it's nice to be able to move around. Currently in New Plymouth. Again.