Also, I have received the mail for this year's Humans versus Zombies at campus. Not even funny.
martes, febrero 28, 2012
jueves, febrero 23, 2012
Australia
Few things I have noticed during my stay.
- Don't do city tourism. Even though some of them are big, most of the time the monuments and activities will be dissapointing if you come form an European country (or a country that has more than 100 years, I mean). You can still find nice places in Sydney and Perth, but the real beauty of this country lies in the raw nature.
- Bubble tea and such. I have talked about this millions of times, but specially in Western Australia (I should just say Perth, there is nothing else there anyway). Drink it at least once, if you have not gone to China this will be a discovery. If you have, just enjoy the memories XD.
- Distances. They are huge. Everything is so far away that you can only travel by plane. East coast is better, tough
- Look at the sky at night. Southern hemisphere sky is beautiful and bright, and Australia's atmosphere is so clear you can actually see the black part of the moon when it's not full. I never got tired of it (Also: Orion in spring-summer sky)
- Vegemite. It's disgusting but you have to try it.
- Hitting a kangaroo when in a not-so-close to the city road is something that has a 90% chance of happening. Specially at dusk and dawn.
- People actually want to know about your day when they ask you. Yes, cashiers from supermarkets want to talk to you.
- Heating and good isolation of houses is unknown in this continent, I won't even go into the "blind problem", because only Spain has blinds by the looks of things. But then again, it's always summer in Perth, ISN'T IT? (Hint: no)
- Beware of the sun. Seriously. I have only got sunburnt after applying 30+ sunscreen once in my life. In Exmouth. (And I have been to Mexico, Cuba, Florida, Egipt and the South of Spain. Okay, I was not snorkelling for hours but you get my point)
- Eat kangaroo, crocodile and emu. You won't be able to do that again in your life. Kangaroo is actually one of the cheapest meats you can find at the supermarket, and it is delicious. Emu pies can be found in some of the road shops both sides of the Perth-Bunbury road (near Binningup there is a nice one). Crocodile is the trickiest, but hey, I can't give everything away, can I?
-Beware fo the wind. Windsurfing wasn't invented here without a reason, even in summer (or at least, the beggining of it) wind can make the sand of a beach hit you painfully and bury your towel in less than 30 minutes. It's pretty annoying most of the time and worsens currents when snorkelling (after all, why would you go to a beach in Australia if not for snorkelling?).
- Barbie is not a doll, and Brekkie is not a dog food brand. Neither is Bogan some kind of burguer. You need these three words, the rest of the australianisms are not that important, but these...
- Barefootness is commonplace, part of their culture. Actually if you see somebody barefoot in Europe, chances are he or she is australian. (And no, they do not understand why that is dangerous or unhygienic)
... I have more, but given the lenght of this post I may do a second part sometime instead of boring you to death in one text.
Few things I have noticed during my stay.
- Don't do city tourism. Even though some of them are big, most of the time the monuments and activities will be dissapointing if you come form an European country (or a country that has more than 100 years, I mean). You can still find nice places in Sydney and Perth, but the real beauty of this country lies in the raw nature.
- Bubble tea and such. I have talked about this millions of times, but specially in Western Australia (I should just say Perth, there is nothing else there anyway). Drink it at least once, if you have not gone to China this will be a discovery. If you have, just enjoy the memories XD.
- Distances. They are huge. Everything is so far away that you can only travel by plane. East coast is better, tough
- Look at the sky at night. Southern hemisphere sky is beautiful and bright, and Australia's atmosphere is so clear you can actually see the black part of the moon when it's not full. I never got tired of it (Also: Orion in spring-summer sky)
- Vegemite. It's disgusting but you have to try it.
- Hitting a kangaroo when in a not-so-close to the city road is something that has a 90% chance of happening. Specially at dusk and dawn.
- People actually want to know about your day when they ask you. Yes, cashiers from supermarkets want to talk to you.
- Heating and good isolation of houses is unknown in this continent, I won't even go into the "blind problem", because only Spain has blinds by the looks of things. But then again, it's always summer in Perth, ISN'T IT? (Hint: no)
- Beware of the sun. Seriously. I have only got sunburnt after applying 30+ sunscreen once in my life. In Exmouth. (And I have been to Mexico, Cuba, Florida, Egipt and the South of Spain. Okay, I was not snorkelling for hours but you get my point)
- Eat kangaroo, crocodile and emu. You won't be able to do that again in your life. Kangaroo is actually one of the cheapest meats you can find at the supermarket, and it is delicious. Emu pies can be found in some of the road shops both sides of the Perth-Bunbury road (near Binningup there is a nice one). Crocodile is the trickiest, but hey, I can't give everything away, can I?
-Beware fo the wind. Windsurfing wasn't invented here without a reason, even in summer (or at least, the beggining of it) wind can make the sand of a beach hit you painfully and bury your towel in less than 30 minutes. It's pretty annoying most of the time and worsens currents when snorkelling (after all, why would you go to a beach in Australia if not for snorkelling?).
- Barbie is not a doll, and Brekkie is not a dog food brand. Neither is Bogan some kind of burguer. You need these three words, the rest of the australianisms are not that important, but these...
- Barefootness is commonplace, part of their culture. Actually if you see somebody barefoot in Europe, chances are he or she is australian. (And no, they do not understand why that is dangerous or unhygienic)
... I have more, but given the lenght of this post I may do a second part sometime instead of boring you to death in one text.
viernes, febrero 03, 2012
jueves, febrero 02, 2012
The Roadtrip
We were convinced to make it to Exmouth by my labmates, so we started planning a trip. There was a problem, though, we only had 7 days: From the 26th of December to the 2nd of January, 1300 kms to do and a truckload of stuff to see. If you have the bad luck of only having few days for this, you can take the advice of the tourism agency of Western Australia, which is boring, or do what we did:
Days 1 and 2. Perth - Northampton.
Stopping in Pinnacles, Cervantes (where all the streets are named after Spanish cities or territories) and Jurien bay. Now Pinnacles is a must, Cervantes has nothing unless you want to take a picture of a particular street name plate and Jurien bay is windy (at least when we got there). We ended up sleeping in a farmstay. The place was nice, the beds comfy, I could see all the stars forever and we found a spider the size of my fist. I totally recomend doing a Farmstay in Northampton.
Second day we went up to Kalbarri national park, saw many gorges and sweated a lot.
Days 3-4. Northampton - Shark bay (Denham)
Stopped in Northampton for a minute in order to take a picture and went up to shark bay after a swim in Horrocks. Denham has the shittiest accomodation in earth, I should say, but that did not stop us. We had a walk that evening in Denham and next morning: Monkey Mia. We expected to see dolphins, but it seems the average number of days the dolphins do not show up in Monkey mia is 5 a year. That day was the sixth day of the year and... they did not come. Just my luck. We had a walk and left for Francois Peron national park, which was closed for non 4WD cars. We could not even go in the National park, so we ended up going back and getting to shell beach (beautiful and really formed up only of shells) and to Port Douglas to see the pink lake. Believe me, it is pink, it is amazing and I have never seen something like that. (I hope the pink lake was here?)
Day 5. Shark Bay - Carnavon
We tried our luck that mornign too, and went to Monkey Mia again. Of course, no dolphins were to be seen again (seventh day in a row) and we just left the place in order to see some Stromatolites (that was also amazing) and end up in Carnarvon for the night. We had a laid back evening (the cabin this time was really good) played some Uno and this horrible Monopoly card game (I hate Monopoly as everyone knows). Next morning we saw the Memorial and the tourist information center in Carnarvon and left for Coral Bay.
Day 6-7. Carnarvon - Exmouth
After the dissapointment in Monkey Mia and the Carnarvon visit, we also got some mango smoothies from one of the local farms before heading to Coral Bay. The smoothie was amazing and I recommend going for one even if it is a detour from the planned route.
Coral bay is just OK, lots of people in what's not really a town but a tourist complex, with a hotel and a backpackers... and nothing else. Good for a swim and a picnic if the day is not too windy, and much better to go to nearby beaches that are not in the town but have snorkelling spots. Because I came here for the snorkelling, of course.
We got to Exmouth just in time to leave all our stuff and go to the lighthouse to see the last sunset of the year. There we met some spaniards that told us where to go to see turtles laying eggs so we went to do exactly that. It was a dark night and we coudl not see properly, but just as we sat in the beach, a turtle came out of the sea, walked inland and dig up a hole, I was beaming at that point, but my parents were freezing (not like I wasn't) and we left before she finished her hole. Orion was beautiful that night, and the rest of the stars bright as they always are in the southern hemisphere. It was a great night.
Next morning we went into every single beach of the Ningaloo reef park. So much snorkelling done, one turtle just appeared right before my eyes coming from a particularly big coral, fish everywhere, sea cucumbers and strong currrents all day long, beautiful sights. And I got sunburnt. I understand why aussies wear this wetshirts or whatever they are called. No, not wetsuits, I know what those are and this is different. That night we saw a bit of Exmouth (dead town, worse than Perth after 6 pm on a weekday, don't ever bother going) and went to bed early... next day was going to be a good one.
Day 8. The Return.
1200 kilometres in one day, from Exmouth to Perth, stopping for a short lunch and a smoothie in Carnarvon (because they were that good), and all the way down back to the only city of Western Australia in which its habitants count is over 40.000 people. (I have not looked it up, but I am sure I am not even exagerating).
Next post will have ... pics, because we all know it didn't happen if there are none.
We were convinced to make it to Exmouth by my labmates, so we started planning a trip. There was a problem, though, we only had 7 days: From the 26th of December to the 2nd of January, 1300 kms to do and a truckload of stuff to see. If you have the bad luck of only having few days for this, you can take the advice of the tourism agency of Western Australia, which is boring, or do what we did:
Days 1 and 2. Perth - Northampton.
Stopping in Pinnacles, Cervantes (where all the streets are named after Spanish cities or territories) and Jurien bay. Now Pinnacles is a must, Cervantes has nothing unless you want to take a picture of a particular street name plate and Jurien bay is windy (at least when we got there). We ended up sleeping in a farmstay. The place was nice, the beds comfy, I could see all the stars forever and we found a spider the size of my fist. I totally recomend doing a Farmstay in Northampton.
Second day we went up to Kalbarri national park, saw many gorges and sweated a lot.
Days 3-4. Northampton - Shark bay (Denham)
Stopped in Northampton for a minute in order to take a picture and went up to shark bay after a swim in Horrocks. Denham has the shittiest accomodation in earth, I should say, but that did not stop us. We had a walk that evening in Denham and next morning: Monkey Mia. We expected to see dolphins, but it seems the average number of days the dolphins do not show up in Monkey mia is 5 a year. That day was the sixth day of the year and... they did not come. Just my luck. We had a walk and left for Francois Peron national park, which was closed for non 4WD cars. We could not even go in the National park, so we ended up going back and getting to shell beach (beautiful and really formed up only of shells) and to Port Douglas to see the pink lake. Believe me, it is pink, it is amazing and I have never seen something like that. (I hope the pink lake was here?)
Day 5. Shark Bay - Carnavon
We tried our luck that mornign too, and went to Monkey Mia again. Of course, no dolphins were to be seen again (seventh day in a row) and we just left the place in order to see some Stromatolites (that was also amazing) and end up in Carnarvon for the night. We had a laid back evening (the cabin this time was really good) played some Uno and this horrible Monopoly card game (I hate Monopoly as everyone knows). Next morning we saw the Memorial and the tourist information center in Carnarvon and left for Coral Bay.
Day 6-7. Carnarvon - Exmouth
After the dissapointment in Monkey Mia and the Carnarvon visit, we also got some mango smoothies from one of the local farms before heading to Coral Bay. The smoothie was amazing and I recommend going for one even if it is a detour from the planned route.
Coral bay is just OK, lots of people in what's not really a town but a tourist complex, with a hotel and a backpackers... and nothing else. Good for a swim and a picnic if the day is not too windy, and much better to go to nearby beaches that are not in the town but have snorkelling spots. Because I came here for the snorkelling, of course.
We got to Exmouth just in time to leave all our stuff and go to the lighthouse to see the last sunset of the year. There we met some spaniards that told us where to go to see turtles laying eggs so we went to do exactly that. It was a dark night and we coudl not see properly, but just as we sat in the beach, a turtle came out of the sea, walked inland and dig up a hole, I was beaming at that point, but my parents were freezing (not like I wasn't) and we left before she finished her hole. Orion was beautiful that night, and the rest of the stars bright as they always are in the southern hemisphere. It was a great night.
Next morning we went into every single beach of the Ningaloo reef park. So much snorkelling done, one turtle just appeared right before my eyes coming from a particularly big coral, fish everywhere, sea cucumbers and strong currrents all day long, beautiful sights. And I got sunburnt. I understand why aussies wear this wetshirts or whatever they are called. No, not wetsuits, I know what those are and this is different. That night we saw a bit of Exmouth (dead town, worse than Perth after 6 pm on a weekday, don't ever bother going) and went to bed early... next day was going to be a good one.
Day 8. The Return.
1200 kilometres in one day, from Exmouth to Perth, stopping for a short lunch and a smoothie in Carnarvon (because they were that good), and all the way down back to the only city of Western Australia in which its habitants count is over 40.000 people. (I have not looked it up, but I am sure I am not even exagerating).
Next post will have ... pics, because we all know it didn't happen if there are none.
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