Post Fourteen: Blues, Babies, Battlestar Galactica

A quick stop at Parc Olympique first

Today was off to the BLUE MOUNTAINS!

View from Flatrock

 When one thinks of Australia one really doesn't think of 'rainforest'. However, just west of Sydney is a large rainforest national reserve called the Blue Mountains. Today I awoke super early (yes dear people, early) to sneak in a quick workout before heading to catch a tourbus out to these amazing hills.The trip took awhile, Sydney is very large, but once we were on the ridge of the mountains it was really mountains as far as the eye could see. Apparently the reserve is larger than the area of northern Ireland! The pictures really don't do them justice.

Our bus included: Jim, our wonderful and knowledgeable guide, four people from Canada and their (rather fussy and loud) baby girl. She was screaming half the time, and of course, no apology from mommy and daddy...oh well, as well as a couple of neat people from America, an Aussie, and two sisters from Sweden.

Jim was great. We learned all about some of the history of the mountains (e.g. the road was built in 8 months by convicts, where as now they are trying to expand it and it is planned to take 25 years...chew on that!), the flora, and the secrets of mountain rains.

Our bus stopped at a few amazing lookout views, including flatrock, the three sisters, and Katoomba falls. We did a little light hiking in these areas before breaking for the Aussie on-the-go lunch of meatpie (and maaaaaybe an Anzac cookie). After this, we walked down the 1,000 stairs to the bottom of the valley. During this walk it poured rain (fitting for the rainforest) for about 10 minutes, making the waterfalls (usually mere trickles) cascades of gushing water, just for us. Nature really put on a show for us, there was sunshine, then a huge thunderstorm, then waterfalls (including some that only occurred when it rained hard), and clouds on the mountains. We even got to see some fog that was almost good enough that our view became invisible, almost, not quite.

Not even Katoomba falls, this is apparently usually "just a polite trickle"

The rest of the tour group then took the steep railway back up to the top whilst I commenced my climb back up the 1,000 stairs. It was quite the trek, but I enjoyed the physical nature of the hike. I cannot wait to go back, or go to the outback and just hike and hike and hike!

Couldn't resist

Sydney is a great city to be sure, but I love love nature and I much enjoy walking through it an enjoying absorbing it as much as possible. Especially when it is as interesting and different as the Blue Mountains (which are incidentally blue to to the haze from evaporating eucalyptus oil). It was very refreshing to experience some real and different nature. Now I want more more more!!!

Post Thirteen: A Taste of 'Real' Australia

Wildlife World, the Aquarium, Paddy's Markets, and the Rocks (again).

It has been a weekend of discovery!

Early morning Saturday began with a trainride to Haymarket and Paddy's markets. a huuuuuuge building filled with stalls mostly selling junk...but there were some treasures, and most of it was alooooot cheaper than one could find the same junk anywhere else. There was also a rather large fresh fruit and veggie market from which I bought a peach. YUM! DLC so far has had apples and oranges...other than a banana from the wellness table this is all the fruit I have eaten. Thus the peach was divine.

Frilled Lizard

From there it was a lovely walk down Darling Harbor to the Aquarium and Wildlife World. WW was first, there we learned all about some of Australia's native (and apparently very very poisonous) spiders, snakes, lizards, and mammals. I saw a wombat and it has been confirmed that (for me anyway) they are way cuter than either Koalas or Kangaroos. Other than learning that the funnel-web spider lives in cities such as Sydney and is undetectable by people, very common, and also the most dangerous spider in the world... The main attraction at the wildlife place was the giant 5 meter (16 foot) saltwater crocodile named Rex. He was very active and put on quite the show for us onlookers. Things to know about this lovely lizard, apparently he was discovered in a residential creek/wetwater area a few years ago when just one too many of the neighborhood dogs had gone missing.

After WW it was on to the Aquarium, a neat place that is alot bigger than it looks, the Aquarium has rather large sharks, some dugongs, jellyfish, eels (I do not like these critters, too close to leeches I have decided), some huge sea turtles, and all manner of tropical fish (that I hope to see some of perhaps in their natural habitat maybe on a visit to the reef? possibly?). I also noted the Giant Cuttlefish. there is a documentary on these extraordinary creatures that I watched once upon a time, they change color, and some grow really big while others are smaller but smarter, sounds boring perhaps but it is worth the watch. It was really fun to see some real Australian Wildlife, even though it was behind glass, I think there are some (like the sharks) that I prefer that way...

In the tunnel

Nurses Walk and Surgeons Court, right near the old hospital of course!

Finally we went from there to the Rocks again. We went to the free museum on the history of the area, enjoyed a meat pie in a quiet backalley, sampled local honey (quite good stuff really), then meandered around until finally departing and returning to Uni from Circular Quay. Oh! Also, in the Rocks this day I discovered the Anzac Cookie! an excellent confection made of brown sugar, a little coconut and macadamia perhaps, and oats and butter and honey, it really is a delightful cookie. Now that I have made that discovery, they will be the end of me.

All in all, a fairly straightforward Australian filled day.

Post Twelve: First Week

Ok Macquarie, it has been a difficult ride, but now I think perhaps things are finally sorted out between us.

First week of classes was pretty much ok, I had one major problem on Wednesday when a prof surprised us in class by saying that the 2 hour lecture was going to be only an hour each week with a mandatory discussion class on Tuesdays...problem was I had previously scheduled classes on for all of the times the mentioned Tuesday!!! ERG! I was able to switch some stuff around so it was all taken care of, but the principle of the matter remains the same...and this Prof STILL has not even given us a syllabus so we really have no idea what the heck is going on in this course.

Other than this hiccup, I am thinking that I will like my classes alot. They have interesting material combined with stuff that I really couldn't learn anywhere else (e.g. Aboriginal Studies). My Philosophy of the mind/body(brain) problem class is perhaps the most intriguing class I have ever taken, I cannot wait until we get into the meat of the course. It is all about the idea of the consciousness vs the brain, are they separate, what is consciousness, etc.
Today we discussed Descartes theory of Dualism which proposes that the mind MUST be separate/different from the body because one cannot fragment the mind into pieces, whereas one can certainly cut up the body/brain.

Also, another nice aspect of classes is that (with the exception of this one problematic class), all of the class lectures are recorded online so one can listen to them later if one needs to. So the frantic note taking is a little less frantic.

In other news, I am going to try to join the Water Polo team. It sounds like if I have never played before that doesn't really matter (sort of like Womens Hockey at LU), so I am looking forward to seeing whether this is the case!

Other things I have discovered

1.) Aussies NEVER walk on the proper side of anything, if you are walking on the Left side of the sidewalk, they are on the right (coming at you), likewise if you switch to the right, inevitably farther down you are going to have people on the left side! There is no rhyme or reason to it and NO ONE will move for you, they WILL run into you first. I may try the technique of just stopping (instead of stepping to one side) and see what happens...

2.) Cars will stop nicely for you at the crosswalks ONLY at Uni. downtown Sydney they will come within an inch of hitting you. e.g. if you are crossing and they are turning left they will stop, wait, then go when you are an inch farther than their bumper. However, at Uni they will always stop, which is very very nice when one needs to get to class.

3.) I do not know if this is an Aussie thing, or just MQ. But there is absolutely nowhere to sit and study except the Library, or ones own room. The class buildings are just classrooms that are locked if they are not hosting class. Also, of these buildings, most of them only have classrooms that open out to the open air, so there isn't even the possibility of sitting on the floor. It makes getting to class early a waste of time, because once one gets to the classroom vicinity one has nowhere to be...

4.) Kms are alot harder to run than miles when one is used to miles. Because one gets to 3.0 Km alot faster than 3.0 miles, but of course it takes almost 5 km to be 3 miles and when one sees the 3 on the screen it is difficult not to be done...also when one has not run consistently since...January...that might have an effect too...


Lastly, there was a double rainbow over my dorm the other day. Double rainbow song anyone?