HFDU - 27th Edition

Originally sent: January 26, 2006

Hi everyone, I'll start by saying that this is likely the second to last HFDU to come your way. My time in Australia is winding down quickly, but there still seems to be so much happening! I'll start with pre-Christmas……..

We have moved up in the trivia night world, officially earning the title of 2005 Bar 9T4 Trivia Champions after winning the last trivia night of the year the week before Christmas. It was a great win for our team, affectionately known as "The Dunderheids" ( a Scottish term as almost half the team is Scottish). Not only did the winning team walk away with a battery powered electric scooter, but we proudly carried home a championship trophy as well. No matter that it was made of plastic, it made us proud! As a twist, the winning team was required to participate in a skull off (drinking a glass of beer as fast as you can) to see which individual gets to claim sole ownership of the scooter. The boys decided to let the ladies have a go at the win, knowing that if they participated they would blow us away. I took the early lead, but lost momentum half-way through. My Scottish friend KD ended up claiming the prize after barely edging out HE from England. What a competition, and we all took rides on the scooter, that night, and many nights afterwards….

Speaking of scooter rides, Christmas Day was spent down in Port Melbourne at the home of fellow Dunderheids SR & KR (also from Scotland). We had a good old fashioned Aussie BBQ, played a bit of beach cricket, and took the scooter for rides in between. It was a good gathering of friends from around the world, spending the holiday with each other in the absence of family. It was the perfect last Christmas for me here in Australia!

My company again put on a spectacular event with the 2005 Christmas Party. The themes were a bit random this year, as there were 4 completely differently themed rooms (think pirates in one room, matadors in another, etc.) which made for an interesting conglomeration of food, games, and decorations. I stuck with the food in the matador room as it included freshly cooked paella, calamari cooked several different ways, chorizo sausages, sangria, and other yummy Spanish goodies! The "Glacier" room had bucket loads of fresh sushi and raw oysters (neither of which I touched with a 10-ft pole) and there was themed entertainment in each room as well. I took my turn at the "Dunk the Partner" competition, but unfortunately missed dunking the partner whom I primarily work for, which in retrospect is probably a good thing :-) We finished off the night at the nightclub downstairs and enjoyed looking at all of the amusing photos for days afterward.

On Boxing Day (December 26th), B & I flew to Western Australia for a 10-day trip. This was the last of the Australian states that I needed to visit so I had a sense of accomplishment when the trip was over. We spent some time in Margaret River, which is one of the most popular wine regions in Australia, and stayed in a fabulous guesthouse in the bush, with wild kangaroos and our very own spa! Margaret River also has many caves in the area, so we took a tour of one and got some amazing photos. After that we headed up to Perth for the next 4 nights. I had booked a hotel online based on photos, that seriously had to have been taken 30 years ago when the hotel must've first been opened. It was a dump, but B & I took it in stride and just laughed at the fact that the walls were thin and there was a neon flashing sign out the front of the hotel.

Perth is known for it's perfect summer weather, consistently being in the 90's and sunny for the entire season. Despite the fact that Perth had it's coldest December on record (mid 70's - which when you want the beach is a bit cold!), we improvised and kept ourselves entertained. We took a day-long deep sea fishing tour off the coast. We got up at 5:00 am in order to be at the dock by 6:10 am to head off on our adventure by 6:30 am. We drove straight out into the Indian Ocean for an hour and a half (about 25 miles), then fished for 6 hours before heading straight back in for another hour and a half (that's 9 hours on the water!). I'm honestly surprised that I survived and didn't get seasick. The skipper said that is was one of the roughest days that he's seen in a while (4 meter swells in the afternoon), and I came back bruised and battered from getting thrown around the boat, all at the same time that B was sitting down fishing and reeling in the big fish with a huge smile on his face. Not my idea of an optimal day, but it was his treat and I just stayed drugged up on seasick medication the entire day. B grilled the fish the next day at a public BBQ at one of the parks in Perth - yummy!

We also spent New Year's Eve in Perth, but considering that we were heading off on a ferry at 8:30 on New Year's Day morning, we took it easy and just enjoyed the street celebrations in the city. Lots and lots of drunk Aboriginals who were creepy, but entertaining at the same time! Rottnest Island lies a few miles off the coast of Perth and is an island that is only 7 miles long and 2.5 miles wide. There are two "settlements" on the island where vacationers can stay, but during the holiday period there is a 7 night minimum and a lottery drawn in August to see who actually get to stay there. Needless to say, we just took a day trip over on the ferry on New Year's Day and hired bikes to get ourselves around, as do about 90% of the rest of the visitors to the island.

Our first vision once off the ferry was the hung-over British backpackers that were lying all over the lawns. What a sight to see! Apparently the New Year's Eve celebration on the island is quite large, and we definitely saw the remnants of that! Despite that, Rottnest was one of the most beautiful places that I have been in a long time. The water was so amazingly clear and turquoise. We certainly got in our exercise for the day, cycling a total of about 20 miles through the hills throughout the day. It was one of the highlights of our trip!

Our last stop in W.A. was a small town called Cervantes. This town has only about 500 residents and is only know for 2 things: lobster and the Pinnacles Desert. We knew about the town because of the latter, but were pleasantly surprised to get freshly caught lobster at the local pub both nights that we were there. And it was reasonably priced since it was local. As the best time for photos of the Pinnacles Desert is sunrise, B & I got up before sunrise both mornings to see what the hype was all about. It was gorgeous, and the colors completely change from those at mid-day and sunset. Probably the most exciting part of the early morning adventure was the amount of wildlife that was on and around the road to the Pinnacles. We must've seen 2 dozen wild kangaroos, mostly in families of 3-5 hopping all over the place. I got some great video footage of them and some good pictures as well. It was really amazing to see them that wild and doing what they do best - eating & hopping! We also saw a pair of wild emus right off the beach, which is a rare find. Got some video footage of them as well. That would have been one of the highlights of our trip!

We came back to reality, which is Melbourne, just in time to head back to work. Luckily, January is an exciting month as we host the Australian Open, have a public holiday (Australia Day), and get lots of sun! B & I managed tickets to one of the quarter final sessions of the Open and really enjoyed it. The hype is so big down here right now because the unranked Marcos Baghdatis from Cyprus has made it to the finals, and with Melbourne having a massive Greek community, it's a bit wild. We got to watch him in action at the quarter finals and can't help but cheer him on for the finals! The heat has put a bit of a damper on the tournament, with officials having to call off the games on the outside courts. The main arena has a retractable roof, but that doesn’t really compensate enough for the heat when you're playing tennis! We also got to watch Lindsay Davenport in the quarter finals, although she didn't make it through to the semis. The tournament finishes up this weekend, when the city will go back to normal with all of the tourists gone.

Enough jabber from me. The next email you get will likely be saying farewell to this great country. Until then, I have lots of packing, celebrating, fishing, and cleaning to do to get ready for my departure. Not to mention getting organized for Thailand and Egypt…..

I hope all of you are well and I look forward to catching up with many of you in just a few weeks!