ROB (TIYL) Pix

Gold Coast

There is not much to say about the Gold Coast -- If you have been to Miami, you would feel as though you were home. It was full of shops and restaurants. It was a casual a place as you have ever been -- flip flops, tanks and shorts were all that was required. As you can see in the picture, Rob was overdressed.
We stayed in Q1 which, at 80 some odd floors, is the world's tallest residential building -- that is at least until D1 (Dubais) is built. We were only on the 9th floor, but that was plenty high.




By this time, we were toured out, so we took it easy, shopped, ate, and just hung out.

On Wednesday, we started the 34 hour trip home again.

Lizard Island and the Great Barrier Reef

This was by far the best part of the trip for me, notwithstanding the fact that we had to fly to Lizard Island in a teeny-weeny 6 seater plane. The Island is north of Cairns. Rob, of course, was ecstatic.
These Lizards were all over the place
This is a view from our room.

This is my sea monster



We don't have any pictures of underwater, but that's where we were for 3 days. The island resort is built for only 80 guests, and there were only 40 there at the time -- it was like being on an uninhabited island. You could take a boat out anytime and find an empty beach and just hang out there.

We were water rats -- the diving and snorkeling was as good as everyone says it is. You could literally walk off the beach and into beautiful coral and gorgeous colorful fish. We saw huge sea turtles and clam shells big enough to be bean bags. On one day, we did a dive trip and Rob went down to the ocean floor to pet the cod fish. He saw sharks and I saw a sting ray.

I had to be dragged kicking and screaming off of Lizard Island.

Our next and last stop was the Gold Coast.

Cairns and the Daintree Rainforest

After the desert, we flew to Cairns and took a drive up the coast to the rain forest. It rained a lot there! But it was soothing rain -- torrential, but warm.
We toured the forest and then took a tour on the Daintree River, where we saw crocodiles and snakes. At one point, we saw a snake eating a tree frog. Not good for the frog.


Can you spot the spiders in these pictures? They were huge!!! As big as my hand.


Two days of relaxing in the rain forest and we moved on to the best part of the trip -- The Great Barrier Reef.

Uluru and Kata Tjuta

Uluru is in the middle of the country. It is a big rock. It has great spiritual meaning for the Aboriginal people -- but now it appeared to us to be more of a tourist site than anything else. Remember "Dingo ate my baby!"? This is where it happened.

We stayed in a "tent"
With a view of the rock from our window.

There were tons of flies


Here is a view of Uluru at sunset; we were too lazy to get up for a sunrise view.

This is a picture of Kata Tjuta -- another series of rocks in the outback.

Unfortunately, the weather was too overcast for a night under the stars, but one evening, we did get a look, and the galaxy was brilliant.

After a day and a half, we moved onto the rainforest.

Kangaroo Island

Here is a map of Kangaroo Island -- it is just off the coast of Adelaide.




We stayed at a B&B called Stranrear Homestead, run by Lynn and Graham Wheaton. It's a working farm and Graham and his son raise 6,000 sheep on 40 acres.


Lynn prepared the best food we had on the whole trip and we bought her cookbook so Rob can prepare the same meals for me at home!

We had 2 days of touring of the island -- first from east to west and second from south to north. Unfortunately, the island is in a drought, so it was very barren.
You can see here how desolate the Island is.

Here is a Kangaroo in the middle of the park. (Don't worry -- there are better pictures below)




It's a small island, so it doesn't have much of a post office.






We saw hundreds of seals and sea lions. They just hang out on the beach.





We also went to a place called "Remarkable Rocks" which some people describe as "Henry Moore meets Salvatore Dali"


Here are a bunch of pictures from the second day of touring

This poor bugger met his maker in the tree, but still made a good picture.
the little guy below is a wallaby.

The locals consider kangaroos to be pests (like our deer population), but the government won't let them do anything about it because of the tourism dollars involved.

After 2 1/2 days in Kangaroo Island, we flew back to adelaide and on to Alice Springs for a transfer to Ayres Rock.

Last Day in Sydney

Our four days here have flown by and we've done most things a tourist can possible do in that time:

Climbed the bridge:





On Sunday, we toured Paddy's Market, where everything that was ever "made in china" is housed under Queen Victoria Building.

On Monday, I left Rob to his own devices as I flew to the Gold Coast to meet with business colleagues for the day -- he'll tell you later about his wanderings.



Tuesday we took a boat cruise of the harbor:


This was a real treat. The weather wasn't that great, but we were the only passengers and were treated to a private tour of all the homes of the rich and famous and an excellent lunch of avacado salad and chicken with sweet curry. We moored by a beach for lunch and the sun came out long enough to burn us both.

After the boat cruise, we visited the Sydney Aquarium. This, as they say in New England, was wicked cool. They built tunnels of glass where you walk under water and have fish swimming above and below you.






Professional Courtesy


Today we leave and go to Straenrear, an old homestead and working farm on Kangaroo Island -- I'm picturing the "Thornbirds" and I think we'll be met by Richard Chamberlain and Barbara Stanwyck. We will do 2 daytime tours of the outback in 4WD vehicles. We also have an evening tour of playing with the marsupials scheduled. Of course, now that we have been told that 9 of world's 20 deadliest snakes are in Australia, I'm having second thoughts. Keep your fingers crossed for us!

Arrival in Sydney

Hello from the land down under!

It is 7:30 am and we are sitting in the club lounge overlooking the Sydney Harbor.


We can see the famous bridge (which we will be climbing in about 2 hours) and the opera house, which looks more like two viking helmets perched on the water.










Our highlights so far are that (1) I made eye contact with George Lopez at JFK airport (I always love a good celebrity sighting); (2) we saw two hen parties yesterday (bachelorette parties) -- one of which was all out -- there were three younger women totally punked out with the leather skirts, fishnet stockings, multi-colored hair and collars on; two older women dressed as princesses with tiaras and wands; two dressed as police officers; and the oldest woman, who was in her late 50's was dressed in her finest lilac dress with matching hat. i didn't have the guts to ask them for a group picture, but the ones below are decent shots; and (3) we saw a commercial being filmed about a block from our hotel.








So what about Sydney, you ask? Well, the weather is fabulous, and we took the obligatory town bus tour to get our bearings yesterday. All the buildings are made of sandstone, and they are all named after landmarks in London -- George Street; the Strand; Hyde Park; Queen Elizabeth Park; etc.; not much originality in the late 1700's I suppose. Later we walked along the harborside and then into the area called the Rocks which is full of good shopping. I didn't know it before, but apparently Opals are the gem of choice here in Australia --boy is Rob in trouble now!