Perth & Margaret River

After being in Australia for two and half years, it was high time to get across the country to Perth, in Western Australia!

Perth, in my opinion, is Australia's most beautiful city. The city skyline is classy, not cluttered and the whole city has that "new car" feel to it. It has miles of white sandy beaches without any of the rowdy drunken backpackers of the Gold Coast.

More importantly, Perth is home to two fellow Canadians, Kara and Lach. I won't dare tell you how good they are at hosting guests, lest they not be available the next time!

After having a night of fantastic wine and some of the best home-cooked food in the Southern hemisphere, we left Perth and toured down south to the Margaret River wine region taking in in all the sites. The area is absolutely gorgeous and the weather couldn't have been better!

Here's a small taste of what we saw:


Busselton Jetty, the longest wooden jetty in the Southern Hemisphere at nearly 2km.


The beer sampler from the Colonial brewery near Margaret River.


The precise location where the Southern Ocean (or Antarctic Ocean) meets the Indian Ocean. They tasted the same to me...


A Blue Tongue lizard giving us attitude near Meelup Beach, WA.


This was so cool! This is NOT a bird sanctuary, this is a regular old city park in Perth. The birds will fly down and land all over you if you bring them some bird seed!


Kara and Lach, our Canuck counterparts to the West! Thanks guys and Happy Birthday Kara!

South African Safari, Pilanesberg

After a seven hour drive back to Johannesburg yesterday (having also completed a very full eight hour day on site), today was a good day for some R&R. I went up to Pilanesberg to take a game drive!

Like the Ngorongoro crater, Pilanesberg was formed when a giant volcano expanded without exploding, building pressure and finally collapsing in on itself, creating perfect conditions for a large concentration of wildlife.

I had an excellent day spotting three white rhinos (but not getting a good enough shot off with the camera before they lumbered off), several elephants, a giraffe, impala, warthogs, zebras, wildebeests, a big male lion in the grass, monkeys, hippos and even a family of banded mongoose (related to the meerkat).

Here's a few of the better photos:


Mother Zebra with her little fella.


A family of three white rhinos!


A family of elephants going for a drink. There was five of them!


A herd of blue-gnus / wildebeests.


Musina, near the Botswana and Zimbabwe border, is where I was working this week. It's a fantastic little village on the edge of civilization and home to the diamond miners. Hundreds of people from Zimbabwe flood into Musina every day to purchase fuel and food which have become somewhat of a luxury in their country. Hundreds of donkeys and mules flood into Musina from Botswana because they have nothing else to do for fun.


I'm off to bed, thanks for reading!

Dolphin Diving in Zanzibar

Another very late Africa trip post but I want to get the last of the trip photos up before a whole new year begins.



We took a dive off the coast of Zanzibar in an area that was supposed to be too far north to sight dolphins but still a great dive site. After we completed our first dive, having seen loads of amazing colourful fish, a large family of dolphins came swimming into our area!





Our captain turned the boat and told us to get our masks and snorkels on. We dove off the side of the boat to intercept the school and got some really amazing up close experience with the grey bottlenose dolphins!





After touring the islands we stopped in Stonetown. In the days of tall sailing ships, Stonetown was a huge trading port for spices grown in the area.

The winding narrow streets are filled with people instead of cars and the huge wooden doors have large spikes embedded on them to keep the elephants from busting in for a drink of water!







We also had a completely random encounter with two people that we met on Kilimanjaro, Steffi and Daniel from Germany!



We had met these two on our very first day at the bottom of the mountain, getting prepared to climb. We ran into them again in the Ngorongoro crater on Safari just by chance at a hippo pool. Incredibly, we saw them again at the very end of our trip in Stonetown on Zanzibar!

We had a fantastic dinner together. It was an excellent way to round off the African leg of our trip!

Safari on the Serengeti

Procrastinate? Nooo not me, never! October wasn't all THAT long ago was it?

Our Safari in Tanzania (in October) took us from the base of Mount Kilimanjaro to the Ngorongoro crater and the Serengeti with a final stop at Lake Manyara. The pure abundance of wildlife was astounding.

We were extraordinarily lucky. Many visitors never see a single Cheetah, we saw two. Many people never get to spot a Leopard in a tree protecting its kill; we could have yanked the tail on one, and again, we saw two! It eventually got to the point where we would actually say "Hey, another big male lion with three or four females over there... but I'd have to use the zoom lens so... carry on."

Of the roughly 2600 photos from our Safari in Tanzania, we've managed to pair it down to a "top 100". Here's a small sample:

If you'd like to see the rest, just drop me a line and I'll send you a link to the album.

Golfing with the Sharks

The truth really is stranger than fiction, especially when it comes to my post about golfing in Australia!

Apparently I made a mistake when I mentioned the man-eating crocodiles in the water traps: sorry, I should have said "man-eating sharks".

For those who thought I was exaggerating:
"WATER hazards tend to make a golfer shake at the knees at the best of times, but Carbrook Golf Club has taken this element of fear to a whole new level. The course’s main lake is now officially a no-go zone because it’s riddled with 'a significant number' of man-eating bull sharks of all sizes."

Read more about it here and see the video:
http://golferpacific.com.au/process/myviews/golfpac_article.html?articleId=1323

A bit about Bull Sharks: One of the deadliest sharks off the East Coast of Australia, the bull shark is well known for its unpredictable, often aggressive behavior. Unlike most other marine sharks, bull sharks tolerate fresh water. They can travel far up rivers. As a result, they are probably responsible for the majority of shark attacks on humans that take place near the shore.

Funny enough, I have a two-for-one pass to golf 18 holes at Carbrook any day of the week and it's just 30 short minute drive south of our house!

Easter on Fraser Island

The Easter Bandicoot was good to us this year. Instead of chocolate, he brought us Sheryl and Steve, our good friends from Canada!

This called for some extreme tourism and thus a weekend on Fraser island, just off the coast of mainland Australia.

Visiting Fraser comes with some great benefits, namely, the fact that you need a 4WD with a snorkel to get around. The snorkel comes in great for crossing Eli creek on the East side of the island. When you're not driving down the beach or crossing streams, you're bouncing around the sandy 4x4 inland tracks.

As an added bonus, December's cyclone washed away parts of the passable beach, leaving a rocky moonscape to drive around on. The deep holes and steep climbs over slippery black lava rocks made for a great time!

It was like 4WD Fantasy Camp for Yuppies. We had a blast and the grins haven't faded yet!

My own personal accomplishments for the weekend:
1) Driving a manual transmission (my first post-op clutch).
2) Hiking in sand, very uneven and quite a challenge.
3) 5km trail hike in the middle of the island near a spot called Central Station.
4) Not rolling Chuggers (our 4WD) on the wet rocks of the washed out beach.

* I've only had my new leg for three weeks so the 5km hike and sand walking were both a big deal to us. The manual clutch was a pure bonus!

Swimming in Lake McKenzie was fantastic at the end of a great day of 4WDriving. The water was crystal clear and warm as could be. A couple of dingos even graced us with a little wildlife adventure on the shore at dusk.

A Few Fraser Facts:
- The island is considered to be the largest sand island in the world at 1840 km².
- The 120 km (75 mile) beach on the East side acts as both a highway and a runway.
- The original name of the island is "K'gari". It means paradise.
- Fraser island was inscribed as a World Heritage site in 1992.

We couldn't have asked for a better crew! Even "Chuggers", our 4WD, held off breaking down until after the trip was over when his battery went entirely dead for no reason during a quick stop at the carpark after we got off the ferry and back to the mainland. A quick rolling start / clutch pop got Chuggers rolling again and we managed to get him back to his home at the rental shop.


Photo: The crew with "Chuggers" our 4WD on the Eastern beaches.


Photo: Chugging over the sandy inland 4x4 tracks.


Photo: The Maheno, a shipwreck used by the RAAF in WWII for bombing practice.

Australian Wildlife Adventure

Dad and Verle left our place on Monday morning. It was tough to say goodbye but I'm really glad they had such a good trip. They're currently finishing it off in Sydney and fly home on Thursday.

We took them up to Mount Tamborine this weekend where we saw at least twenty bush-wallabies called Paddymellons in Palm Grove. Sunday night we went up Mount Glorious with the Graham clan for a BBQ and spotted both a large Goanna and a huge carpet python, about two and a half meters long!

This got me making a mental list of what they managed to see in the wild while they were with us around Brisbane:
- Koala
- Wallaby
- Kangaroos
- Spiders
- Water dragons
- Gecko
- Dolphins
- Bush Turkey
- Sea Turtle
- Possum (Brush Tail)
- Green tree frog
- Spotted brown frog
- Paddymellon wallabies
- Goanna (climbing a tree)
- Carpet Python
- Bats, bats, bats
- Cockroach
- Leeches
- Kookaburra
- Ibis
- Lorakeets

I'm sure I'm even missing a few more! If that's not a plug to come visit us, I don't know what is.
(note: wildlife sightings are extremely rare and cannot be guaranteed by Mike and Lisa)


Photo: our evening BBQ with the Graham clan.

Hopping Around Brisbane

Last Saturday we had a very welcome couple of visitors arrive. Nope, not another huntsman spider -- that was a few weeks ago -- this was my Dad and Verle from Canada!

After a very long flight, we picked them up from the airport and got them settled in at home. Maybe they were just delerious but they actually seemed to have some energy left! Must've been that last round of ice cream on the airplane. We expected them to be weary and need some time to recover but they were eager so we took them for an evening hike near Daisy Hill.

Mother nature didn't waste any time showing them why we're still living here!

On the first day we were all treated to a Koala in the wild, having a light snack high in the red gum tree just before sunset!

We also spotted a Wallaby in the forest, two big Kangaroos in a field and several white cockatoos flying overhead before the sun set on the day. We also spotted several huge Golden Orb spiders overhead in the dusk.

On the way home, we watched the giant fruit bats and flying foxes make their nightly migration in the hundreds (perhaps thousands) overhead just south of the city. Quite a site to see (and smell)!

They were in travelling-Canuck bliss and you read correctly, that was just day one. A hard act to follow!

Not to be outdone, day two did not disappoint. At Byron Bay we were treated to the site of a small band of wild dolphins jumping three in a row out in the surf!

We also spotted several large water dragon lizards on the cliffs overlooking the surf at Point Danger and watched wild surfers competing for bragging rights at the local competition that day.

Lisa took them for a great hike near Montville on Monday where they spotted a huge frog on the side of the hill nearby to a raging waterfall and Tuesday was spent exploring the city. We've had a lot of rain lately so the falls were very impressive to see!

This morning we dropped them off at the airport for a 6am flight out to "Aires Rock Airport" at Uluru and the 42 degree Outback.

I've been fussing around like a concerned parent making sure they pack and drink plenty of fluids at "the Rock", know to leave snakes alone and not to feed the dingos! It's really more for selfish reasons: it would just be embarrassing if they were the first tourists to die this year in a place so public as Uluru!

They'll be back for another visit before they head back to Vancouver in a few weeks. I can't tell you how great it's been seeing them!

For an encore, I'm hoping to receive my first prosthetic before they leave. I have now gone through the casting process and I was told today that the leg is being built as we speak! For some reason they laughed when I suggested they work through the night...

My new foot is on order and should be arriving sometime early next week. Here's hoping I won't have to be patient for too much longer, but in the meantime, these visitors from home are an excellent distraction!