Surf’s Up on The Weekly Web

I don’t know about you dear reader, but I spend far too much time online. Some of my online discoveries find their way onto this blog in some shape or form, while others make their way to my Twitter feed and Facebook page. I have so many sticky notes cluttering up my desktop that I thought I might try a weekly Surfing The Web round-up of the best items I find online each week, and share them here. Speaking of surfing the web, I can’t think of better way to kick off this post than with an article looking at the beginnings of the internet.

The Life and Times of the World Wide Web

My internet service provider is the source for this Out Of The Archives piece about the origins of the Internet, or the World Wide Web as it was initially referred to by Tim Berners-Lee, the man who had the bright idea to begin the project in the first place way back in 1989. Some much has changed in the few short years since the advent of the internet, that it seems odd to think this groundbreaking, world-shaking service has been around for less than 30 years. 

By the way, the image seen above shows the world’s first internet server. I don’t know what the specs for the computer were, but I suspect they were not all that great when compared to today’s super fast computers with their almost unlimited storage drives, and ultra-sharp display monitors.

Read the full blog post here and make sure you follow the link to the world’s first web page.

- o0o -

NYC's Racist, Draconian Cabaret Law Must Be Eliminated 

For “the greatest city in the world,” New York has appallingly few places to dance. The next time you find yourself confined to toe-tapping to a tinny Top 40 song in a sports bar, or clutching an $11 Heineken in a booming EDM hall, you can thank the city’s cabaret law, a 90-year-old edict that despite being racist in origin and outmoded in practice, remains a very convenient cudgel for the city to wield against local businesses. Many valiant attempts to repeal it have been made over the years. None have succeeded.

So begins a piece by Lauren Evans in a recent issue of The Village Voice, one of the most venerable of New York City’s free ‘street’ papers. Lauren goes on to report that the law, which dates back to 1926. In its current form, the cabaret law prohibits dancing by three or more people in any “room, place or space in the city... to which the public may gain admission,” and includes “musical entertainment, singing, dancing or other form[s] of amusement.”

Read the full article here… 

- o0o -

Jimmy Breslin: The Last Word

I discovered the writing of Jimmy Breslin less than twelve months ago, and I have been making up for lost time ever since. At last count, I have eight eBooks by Jimmy Breslin on my iPad, and I am working my way through all of them slowly but surely. Sadly, Breslin, who was 88, died earlier this year after long and illustrious career in journalism, which he followed up with an equally illustrious career as an author of (mostly) crime novels, which drew on his many years as a reporter in New York City.

The New York Times’ ‘Last Word’ series are video obituaries of prominent Americans, among them politicians, sportspeople, writers, directors, and musicians. 

Here is an obituary from the New York Times that provide more information about this man. If you are into reading, I highly recommend that you seek out his books in printed form or in electronic form. You won’t be disappointed.

Vancouver Island’s enchanting quarry gardens

Quarries are not generally noted for their elegance, but the glorious Butchart Gardens on Vancouver Island show a makeover at its very best. Amanda McInerney paid a visit the Butchart Gardens on Vancouver Island, off the coast of Canada. The gardens have been developed on the site of an exhausted quarry owned by Robert Butchart. In 1909, when the limestone extraction was completed, Robert’s wife Jenny set about turning the quarry pit into a sunken garden.

Read the full article here…

Australia’s Northern Territory

My one and only visit to the Northern Territory took place in 1983, during a brief visit to Alice Springs and Uluru (previously known as Ayers Rock). Somewhere on my Bucket List is a plan to visit that region of the Northern Territory we call the Top End. Thankfully, Monica Tan, writing for the Guardian, has put together a comprehensive guide to the Northern Territory that has reminded me of my previous all too brief visit, and reminded me as well, that I need to see more of this amazing country.

Read the full article here…

A Tale Of Two Sydney's

Screen grab from The Guardian

Ouch! Look at that headline from The Guardian online this past Saturday, April 1st. For a moment or two I thought it might be an April Fool’s Day joke, but no, a young Dutch man, Milan Schipper, thought he had grabbed the bargain of lifetime when he scored a cheap flight from Amsterdam to Sydney, Australia.

Schipper’s plan was to backpack through Australia, taking in its lush coastal landscapes and white sand beaches before heading to college after the Northern summer. Since he knew it was late summer in Australia, he came dressed for the occasion—in a T-shirt, sweatpants and a thin jacket.

Instead, the Dutch teenager found himself 10,000 miles away from Sydney, Australia – staring out at a snow-covered, frozen landscape – as he realised that he had accidentally booked a flight to Sydney, Nova Scotia, a municipality of 32,000 people on Canada’s east coast.

“I thought I was going to Australia, but that turned out a little different,” the 18-year-old told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation on Thursday.

During a stopover in Toronto, Schipper began to have doubts about his destination after he noticed that the plane lined up on the tarmac was a lot smaller than he thought it should be.

His suspicions were confirmed after he boarded and checked the flight map on his seat screen. “I saw the flight plan was going to go right, not left. It was about the time that I realized there was another Sydney,” he said. “I felt terrible. I think I swore in my head for like 10 minutes. But there was nothing I could do about it because I was already up in the air.”

Sydney, Australia.                             Sydney, Nova Scotia
(Images: Jason Reed, Steve Wadden/Reuters)

On landing in Sydney, Nova Scotia, he discovered the locals were bracing for a snowstorm expected to bring strong winds and 10 to 15 cm (four to six inches) of snow. After Schipper spoke to airline representatives and explained what had happened, he ruled out heading straight to Australia—which would have cost him another €1,500 ($1,600), and another 30 hours of air travel—and decided to fly back to Amsterdam instead.

Incredibly (or so it seems to me), an American woman on the same flight as Milan Schipper made the same mistake! And this incident is not the first time travellers have confused the two Sydney’s. In 2002 two British teenagers ended up in Sydney, Nova Scotia, while trying to visit Australia, as did an Argentine tourist in 2008, another Dutch man and his grandson in 2009, and an Italian couple in 2010.

Clearly, it helps to have more than a passing knowledge of world geography. It also helps to pay a lot more attention to the booking process.

The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia

Tree form (detail).
Click here to see the full work... 

During my stay in Melbourne in January, I paid a visit (as I always do), to the Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia (the initials stand for National Gallery of Victoria).

This is one of the great Australian galleries, and its proximity to Federation Square and the heart of downtown Melbourne ensures that there is a constant stream of local and international visitors strolling the centre's wonderful galleries and excellent exhibitions. Entry to the general collection is free, while special exhibitions require paid entry.

The Ian Potter Centre is home to some of the most iconic works of Australian art from many of the country's most celebrated artists. Here you will find Russell Drysdale, Albert Tucker, Frederick McCubbin, Tom Roberts and many others.

Collins St, 5p.m. (detail).
Click here to see the full work...

"In the early 1950s John Brack adopted Melbourne's urban environment as his subject, recording the shops, bars and workplaces of the city with an ironic edge. In Collins St, 5pm, Brack's depicts Melbourne's financial hub at the end of the working day, it's uniformly dressed office workers streaming homeward. By personalising each figure Brack points to the enduring presence of the individual."

"Shearing the rams, (see image below) by Tom Roberts, is a response to the nationalistic sentiment that developed in Australia during the late 19th century. It reflects the emergence of a national identity defined through heroic rural activity and the economic importance of the wool industry.

The painting is based on a number of preliminary sketches that Roberts completed on the spot at Brocklesby Station, Corowa, New South Wales, in the late spring of 1888. He returned during the following two spring periods (shearing season) to work on the painting."

Jarlu Jukarrpa (detail).
Click here to see the full work...

Paddy Japaljarri Stewart was an Australian Aboriginal artist from Yuendumu, in the Northern Territory. Wikipedia provides this introduction to Mr. Stewart:

Paddy Japaljarri Stewart (circa 1940–2013) was an Australian Aboriginal artist from Mungapunju, south of Yuendumu. He was chairman of the Warlukurlangu Artists Committee. Stewart was one of the artists who contributed to the Honey Ant Dreaming mural on the Papunya school wall in 1971 - the very genesis of the modern Aboriginal art movement.

In 2004 Stuart Macintyre wrote in a A concise history of Australia that Paddy Japaljarri Stewart "...evokes the continuity of dreaming from Grandfather and father to son and grandson, down the generations and across the passages of time..."

Lost (detail).
Click here to see the full work...

"The theme of the lost child in the bush had a long literary and artistic tradition in Australia and was still topical during the 1880s. Lost was the first of Frederick McCubbin's 'national' pictures: paintings of Australian subjects which culminated in 1904 with The pioneer."

There is much to see and enjoy here, and the Ian Potter Centre is one place I make sure I visit over and over again whenever I am in Melbourne. Don’t miss it.

* * *

Location:
Federation Square: Cnr Russell and Flinders Streets
Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. 
Ph: +61 3 8620 2222
Online at Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia... 

* * *

Shearing the rams (detail).
Click here to see the full work...

Note: unless otherwise noted, text in italics indicates content adapted from the information cards placed alongside each of the above works of art in the Ian Potter Centre.

Making Tracks

So there I was at 10:32 am, sitting in theatre 13 at my local Megaplex waiting for the 10:15 am start of Dallas Buyers Club, and wondering why it had yet to begin. Finally, at 10:40 the lights dim and the pre-show adverts and previews begin. Another ten minutes and ... Tracks, the new Australian movie unfolds on the big screen.

Dammit, I'm in the wrong theatre!

Since it is far too late to find the right screen I figure one film is as good as the next. As disappointed as I was to miss Dallas Buyers Club, I am delighted that I got to see Tracks, a movie I really enjoyed.

Filmed mostly in outback South Australia (my home state), and the Northern Territory, the movie recounts the 1977 trek Robyn Davidson made across 1700 miles of Australian desert. The trek became the cover story for the May 1978 edition of National Geographic magazine, and subsequently the story of her journey was recounted in her best selling book, Tracks, published in 1980.

I’ve never read Davidson’s book, so I can only assume this film is as true to her story as modern movies are capable of depicting it―short of her story being retold in documentary form.

Robyn Davidson was born on a cattle station in Queensland. Tragically, her mother committed suicide when Davidson was 11, and she was largely raised by her father's unmarried sister. She went to a girls' boarding school in Brisbane, where she received a music scholarship but did not take it up. Elements of her background are recounted in the film in the form of flashbacks.

In the 1970s, Davidson moved to Alice Springs where she trained camels for two years, and learned how to survive in the Australian desert. All this was in preparation for the journey across Australia she was then planning. This period of her life is depicted during the first third of the film.

In 1977, Davidson set off from Alice Springs for the west coast, with a dog and four camels. Apparently, she had no intention of writing about the journey but eventually agreed to write an article for National Geographic Magazine. The American photographer, Rick Smolan (with whom Davidson had an “on-again, off-again” relationship during the trip), became the official photographer for the journey. However, Smolan did not travel with Davidson, but instead arranged to meet her at designated points along the way during her nine-month trek.

Screen shot from the film, Tracks

There is much to like about Tracks, not the least of which is the stunning Australian landscape. Mia Wasikowska, as Robyn Davidson, is often dwarfed by her three adult camels, and all in turn, are dwarfed by the vast desert locations that form a vital part of this incredible story. As a backdrop, the Australian outback, as depicted in the film is immense, hot, and unforgiving, especially to those who venture out into it uninformed and unprepared. Clearly, Davidson had done her ‘homework’, and was as well prepared as she could have been, given the amount of time she devoted to working with camels and learning to live in that harsh environment before starting out.

Apart from the small number of profession actors in Tracks, the film makes generous use of numerous non professional actors, particularly members of local Aboriginal communities. This gives a sense of authenticity to the film, especially with the introduction of Roly Minuma as Mr. Eddie, an Aboriginal elder who escorts Davidson through territory containing sacred sites that are normally off limits to women. Mr. Eddie also imparts important cultural information during the shared part of their journey.

Since the early 1980s, there have been at least five attempts to turn Robyn Davidson’s book into a film. Among the actors mooted to play the lead role have been Julia Roberts and Cate Blanchett. The idea that Julia Roberts might have been required to adopt an Australian accent for the film makes me shudder just thinking about it. Cate Blanchett on the other hand seems just a bit too elegant and sophisticated to fill the role. But maybe I am being too harsh.

Mia Wasikowska on the other hand, brings a certain vulnerability to the role, which I think it calls for. Cleary, Davidson’s journey from the centre of Australia to the Western Australian coast must have taken enormous amounts of courage and resourcefulness. Yet as depicted in the film, she also had to deal with many moments of doubt, loneliness, and sadness, and Wasikowska portrays all that and more.

While there are a couple of scenes in Tracks which didn’t quite ring true, I can only hope they did in fact occur during Davidson’s trek. It would be a shame to find that the scenes were introduced into the film simply to add some drama to a story that surely must have had more than enough moments of genuine drama to fill 100 minutes or so.

Screen shot from the film, Tracks

I kept hoping and waiting for a great ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ moment in Tracks. That is, something inspired by the scene in David Lean’s movie when Omar Sharif, as the character Sharif Ali appears out of a desert mirage in a beautiful long shot that has become a classic of modern cinema.

There were several moments in Tracks when I thought the audience was about to be treated to a similar scene, but numerous edits and close ups destroyed the effect. Maybe the director John Curran, and editor Alexandre de Franceschi wanted to steer clear of such a moment to avoid charges of plagiarism. If so, that’s a pity. I myself would have regarded it as a tribute to David Lean, but then, I was neither director nor editor.

In the trailer below you can catch a very quick glimpse of one of these scenes at the 1:36 minute mark.

This is definitely a film worth looking out for when it comes to a cinema near you. But for goodness' sake―make sure you walk into the right theatre!

Here's the trailer...

More information

IMDb...Wikipedia…

Friday Photos: Morning Glory

The Morning Star, Venus, hovers above a rising sun

My photographs today, feature a selection of images taken during the early morning hours, either before the sun had risen above the horizon, or soon after. In the image above, you can see what is popularly known as the ‘morning star’, although the planet’s official name is of course, Venus (also known as the ‘evening star’).

Early morning countryside. Mr Fox is out there somewhere.

Early morning country field somewhere along Australia’s Mallee Highway (Route B12), not far from the Victoria country town, Ouyen. I remember watching as a fox slowly loped across this open field, while presumably on its way back to its den after a night out foraging for food. I had pulled into a parking bay along the highway the night before where I slept in the back of my station wagon.

The Mulwala Bridge linking Victoria and New South Wales

Early morning at Lake Mulwala, where the twin towns of Yarrawonga (in Victoria), and Mulwala (in New South Wales) are joined together by the Mulwala Bridge, seen here soon after dawn. The name, Yarrawonga, is thought to be derived from an Aboriginal word meaning ‘place where the wonga pigeon rested’. Mulwala derives its name from an aboriginal word for 'rain'.

Early morning fog haze over Sydney

The early morning sun is rising through a haze of fog in the image seen above. This, and the photo below was taken during a visit to Sydney in 2009. In the image below, the sun has risen higher and is burning away the morning mist to promise a beautiful day out and about on Sydney Harbor.

Early morning Sydney skyline

...

Someone to watch over me. My early morning 'angel'.

And finally, the early morning sun throws my shadow 50 feet just before continuing my 2009 road trip from Adelaide to Sydney.

Click images to view larger sizes.

Apple Maps Vs. Google Maps

Oh, dear. How could Apple get it so wrong? The problems with Apple’s new Maps app just won’t go away. In fact they seem to just go from bad to worse. Just today, Australian police have warned travellers using the Apple Maps app to be very careful about relying on the app to get them safely across this vast, and often unforgiving country.

This latest warning came after a number of travellers got totally lost on cross-country road trips due to the poor directions provided by the Apple Maps application.

A case in point: anyone travelling to the regional Victorian city of Mildura could end up miles from their destination if they use Apple Maps, as the screenshot below indicates. For both this, and the following Google Maps image, I sought directions from my home in Adelaide to Mildura.

Click to view full size

Mildura is shown here as being located somewhere in the middle of either an unnamed National Park, or in the Pink Lakes Conservation Reserve. It isn’t. As it happens, Route 3 in the image above is at least heading in the right direction (for most of the way), as can be seen in this next Google Maps screenshot.

Click to view full size

As can be seen, Apple Maps puts unsuspecting travellers smack dab in the middle of the now correctly named, Murray Sunset National Park. Google Maps also provide a lot more information including numerous highways, the names of country towns, and physical features in the landscape. Of course, as one zooms in to Google Maps, more and more useful information is revealed.

Hopefully, in the above example, people getting lost using the Apple Maps app should be able to find their way out of the National Park without too much trouble – providing other problems (lack of fuel, vehicle breakdown, etc) doesn’t stop them in their tracks. But as I’ve already said, Australia is a vast country, and the landscape, climate, and other factors have combined to trap unsuspecting visitors and locals on isolated roads, bush tracks, and even highways far from help, often leading to the death of more than one lost traveller.

The message the police issued today was clear –travellers embarking on long road trips this summer, should not rely only on the Apple Maps application. They should use a good highway map or atlas, and pay attention to highway signage.

The Reading List 3

Welcome to my weekly roundup of the some of the more interesting discoveries I’ve made as I wander the digital highways and byways of the Internet. This week we’re examining great train journeys.

The longest rail journey I’ve ever made took place back in the early 1970s when I travelled from Greece to London. To be quite honest, I don’t remember much of the journey now, but when I read Top 10 European Train Trips by Randall H. Duckett on the National Geographic Traveler website, it did trigger some long lost memories of that ride

National Geographic don’t mention rail travel from Athens to London in this feature (I don’t know if it is even possible to take a train from Athens to London anymore), but among their ten suggestions they list Switzerland’s Chocolate Train, the Trans-Siberian Railway (Moscow to Vladivostok), the Orient Express (London to Venice), and the Danube Express (London to Istanbul).

Much of European train travel is about efficiency and comfort—punctually leaving and arriving and having a cozy seat or sleeper compartment in which to devour the latest issue of the Economist. But rail travel in the United Kingdom and on the Continent is also about experience: gaping out the window at Alpine glaciers, savoring gourmet cuisine in a restored last-century dining car. Accordingly, our ten favorite European trains don’t necessarily offer the fastest journeys—just the most memorable. All aboard!

-o0o-

12 of the Most Scenic Train Rides in the World

Not to be out done by National Geographic Traveler, the Boots n All website have coincidentally compiled their own list of the 12 of the Most Scenic Train Rides in the World.

In her article, Zoë Smith mentions Norway’s Flåm Railway, whose “…20km descent is amongst the steepest in the world, twisting through yawning ravines, cascading waterfalls, remote Nordic farmhouses and snow-dusted mountain peaks.”

While this 20km trip last barely an hour, Russia’s Trans-Siberian, journey takes a good week to traverse the 9,000km (6,000 miles) of track that snakes its way from Moscow to Vladivostok. And that’s without getting out along the route to explore some of the cities the Trans-Siberian passes through.

Like the Trans-Siberian, Norway’s Flåm Railway also gets a gong in the National Geographic roundup of great journeys.

Other rail journeys that rate a mention in Zoë Smith’s piece include the Canadian Rockies Railway, the Cusco to Machu Picchu (Peru), The Palace on Wheels (India), and The Ghan (Australia), which departs from my home town, Adelaide. If you are considering a train journey, both these articles are a great place to begin your researches.

More Information

National Geographic Traveler: Top 10 European Train Trips…

Boots n All: 12 of the Most Scenic Train Rides in the World...

-o0o-

Maeklong Market, Bangkok

Here’s one train journey that has to be seen to be believed, as a train passes through Bangkok’s Maeklong Market. On the surface this seems like a rather unremarkable event until you actually see how the stall holders and the train have found a way to coexist together.

In Review: Sean and David’s Long Drive

Sean Condon is a master of the quick quip, an eye-catching headline, and a connoisseur of the finest pomades*. As a young copywriter in an unnamed Australian advertising agency, Sean was bored, disillusioned, and desperate for a change in his environment, and his life. His answer? To undertake a long drive around Australia with his mate David O’Brien.

The result of their 6-7 week odyssey is what constitutes Sean + David’s Long Drive (Lonely Planet Publications, 1996. Republished 2009). In fact, the book is essentially a reproduction of the daily diary Sean kept throughout the trip.

To be precise, their trip didn’t take them around Australia per se, but through the centre of the continent. Roughly, the route they followed went thus (see map): [E]Melbourne to Adelaide (via the Great Ocean Road), then Alice Springs, Uluru (Ayers Rock), Tennant Creek, [B]Darwin, Tennant Creek (again), Mount Isa, Townsville, [C]Cairns, Townsville (again), then down the east coast of Australia taking in Surfers Paradise, Brisbane, [D]Sydney, Canberra, and finally back to [E]Melbourne. Whew! If that seems like a long way – it is. Over eleven thousand kilometres in fact.

Incredibly, Sean Condon didn’t drive even one kilometre of that total distance. It seems he doesn’t drive (or at least he didn’t at the time he and David undertook their journey), which meant that David O’Brien had to drive every one of those eleven thousand plus kilometres.

Sean Condon is a graduate of the Bill Bryson School of Travel Writing. (Actually, I just made that up. To my knowledge there is no actual BBSoTW, but if there was, Sean would surely have been a graduate of the Class of ‘96).

Sean, like Bryson has an acerbic wit, a talent for focusing on the odd, the banal, and the ridiculous as they travel across continents, and a talent too for writing about them with humor and occasionally something bordering on compassion and empathy.

Condon, I guess would be labelled a Generation X-er (he was born in 1965), and presumably he reflects the thinking – and lives the lifestyle – of that generation of thirty-something’s that are lumped within that catch-all label. Sean and David spend much of their down time (when not actually on the road), boozing, smoking, eating junk food, womanising, and boozing some more.

Come to think of it, they spend much of their driving time indulging in the same practices as well.

The book is not a travelogue in the usual sense of the word. If you are looking for specific information and advice about say, Alice Springs, or Darwin, or Charters Towers, you are only going to get the briefest glimpse from Sean + David’s Long Drive. A peak behind the curtain, so to speak. Partly this is because Australia – especially the interior, or ‘outback’ – is so vast, flat, and featureless, that the landscape seemingly never changes for hundreds of miles.

To break the monotony and boredom of the trip, Sean and David engage in small talk – lots of it – that covers their favourite music and bands, women they have known, and television shows that Gen X-ers grew up on. Shows such as the Brady Bunch, Scooby Doo, and other such fare.

I don’t think I learned anything new about Australia that I didn’t already know, and I learned a lot about Sean that I didn’t need to know. While the book is entertaining enough and easily digested, Sean’s humor and jaundiced view of the journey began to grate on me after a while, and it was all I could do to finish the book. Having said that, I must admit that Bill Bryson’s writing can have the same effect on me, so maybe the problem lies with me, and not with Sean Condon – or Bill Bryson.

I suppose that’s a roundabout way of saying, if you like Bill Bryson’s writing, you will like Sean + David’s Long Drive as well.

Details:
Paperback: 296 pages
Publisher: Lonely Planet; 2nd edition (February 1, 2009)
ISBN-10: 9781741795226
ISBN-13: 978-1741795226
ASIN: 1741795222

-o0o-

*Pomade
— n
1. a perfumed oil or ointment put on the hair, as to make it smooth and shiny
[http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Pomade]

-o0o-

Purchase Sean + David's Long Drive from Amazon.Com as well as other books written by Sean Condon via the links below.

Things You Discover Walking: Suburban Koalas

One of the fascinating things about nature, and the creatures that inhabit what is left of our wild places and natural landscapes, is how these creatures have learned to adapt to our suburban environments.

Whether we are talking about the bears and wolves in America, that weave their way through suburban front yards looking for sources of food discarded in compost and trash bins, or whether referring to the foxes that creep through Australian backyards searching for the occasional stray chicken – wild nature is closer than you think.

In Adelaide, where I live, native animals like the koala (please don’t call it a koala bear), are slowly finding their way out of the surrounding Adelaide hills into suburban back yards and parks.

Look carefully at the photo illustrating this blog post. Can you see it? There it is, perched on the fork of a branch calmly surveying man and machine as they come and go in the car park of the Mitcham Shopping Centre on Belair Road.

This is one of at least two koalas that I have noticed in a line of large eucalyptus trees that follow the path of Brownhill Creek as it winds out of the nearby hills on its way to the ocean. I assume the koalas have been following the river as well via the trees that line its banks.

Koalas are quite solitary creatures. They never gather together in family groups, nor do the males watch over a bevy of female koalas, fighting off the amorous approaches of other males of the species. They don’t mate for life with one partner, like some other wild animals do, and all in all, seem to be quite happy with own company.

Like kangaroos, koalas are marsupial animals, meaning that the female gives birth to relatively undeveloped young. A baby koala is referred to as a ‘joey’ (as is a baby kangaroo), and is hairless, blind, and earless at birth. The joey, which is only a quarter of an inch long at birth, crawls into a downward-facing pouch on the mother's belly and attaches itself to one of two teats, and there it remains for about six months, only feeding on milk.

It was interesting to watch people walking beneath this tree and its occupant – completely oblivious to its presence. I knew there was a koala in the tree somewhere, after noticing droppings on the asphalt below the tree. However, I must admit that even I was surprised by just how close to the ground this koala was.

-o0o-

Good Days And Better Days

George Lesses (January 4, 1941 – May 10, 2011)

“I only have two kinds of days – good days and better days.

And today is a better day.”

~ George Lesses (January 4, 1941 – May 10, 2011)

Blog posts have been a bit thin on the ground lately. That’s because most of my waking hours have been occupied by the extended illness, and recent death of my older brother, George.

While this may serve as an obituary of sorts for George, it is pretty much impossible to do justice to his 70 years in a few paragraphs. Family man and father, basketball player, coach and mentor, cabinet maker, carpenter and craftsman, athlete, grandfather (‘pop-pop’ to some, and ‘papou’ to others), brother, and lover of life. All these and so much more, sum up the many facets that were my brother and the life he lived.

I hope every family has a man like George in their lives. George was one of the pillars of our family. A man who always made sure to include everyone in celebrations - large or small. One of his personal motto’s was: We’re not here for a long time – we’re here for a good time. To that end, he loved organising family get-togethers, at which he presided over the bar-b-que or roasting spit, and it gave him no end of pleasure to see everyone eating, drinking, laughing and enjoying each others company.

George was the eternal optimist. The saying (and song), Always look on the bright side of life, could have been written for George. More to the point, he might as well have written the phrase himself, so much did he embody its spirit. But George lived by the quote at the start of this entry, which as far as I am aware, was original to him.

The story goes that George, who was a cabinet maker and master of anything involving the use of wood, was having a tough day with a couple of hard to please clients. At one point one of the clients, apologised – sort of – and suggested they were making his day harder than it needed to be, at which George said he replied to the effect: “Not at all. I only have two kinds of days – good days and better days. And today is a better day.”

And thus the phrase has made it into our family folklore.

In 2003, I wrote Good Days, Better Days, a song which adapted and incorporated part of the phrase, which pleased George no end. The song has always been a popular crowd pleaser whenever I performed it live, which you can see me doing in the clip below. George always enjoyed the song, and he was in the audience singing along on the chorus with everyone else when the clip was filmed.

It is a small but fitting tribute to a great man whose legacy survives in his two adult children, four grandchildren (with a fifth on the way), and in far more ways than I can hope to document here.

I’ll miss you bro’. This song’s for you…

Captain Cook Chased a Chook

Image: Portrait of Cpt. James Cook by Nathaniel Dance, courtesy of Wikipedia…

Captain Cook chased a chook all around Australia,

He lost his pants in the middle of France and found them in Tasmania.

~ Australian childhood/schoolyard rhyme

If Captain Cook did indeed chase a chook (a chicken in Aussie vernacular), all around Australia, historians have ignored the event completely. As for losing his pants in the middle of France, and the subsequent discovery of them in Tasmania…  well, the less said the better.

I mention this today, because it was on this day, two hundred forty-one years ago (April 29, 1770), that the erstwhile English explorer Captain James Cook sailed into Botany Bay on the Endeavour. The bay derives its name from the unique plant specimens retrieved by the botanists Joseph Banks and Daniel Solander who sailed with Cook.

This first landing on Australian soil by the English explorer led to his claiming Australia for the English Crown, although the first English settlement at Sydney Cove, in what is now The Rocks district, was to come 18 years later.

Captain Cook's landing place is now part of Botany Bay National Park which is not only a historical site but a place for seaside picnics and many leisure activities as well.

A modern replica of Cook's Endeavour is usually docked at the Australian National Maritime Museum at Sydney's Darling Harbour.

Image: Endeavour replica in Cooktown Harbour courtesy of Wikipedia…

More Information

Wikipedia…

Portrait of Cpt. James Cook by Nathaniel Dance, c1775, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich. Image courtesy of Wikipedia…

-o0o-

Charles Sturt [1795 – 1869]

Image courtesy of Wikipedia…

Raise a glass today to Charles Sturt (28 April, 1795 – 16 June 1869).

Sturt was born in India, and among his many titles were surveyor-general, colonial secretary, soldier, convict administrator, and public servant. Charles Sturt also became a renowned Australian explorer.

In December 1826, he embarked on the Mariner with a detachment of his regiment in charge of convicts bound for New South Wales, where they duly arrived at Sydney in May 1827. While in Sydney, Sturt became caught up in the age of exploration, and soon became obsessed with the idea of discovering the inland sea that many people thought filled central Australia.

Despite his lack of experience and qualifications as an explorer, in November 1828, Sturt received approval to proceed with his proposal to trace the course of the Macquarie River.

Thus, Sturt began a long and illustrious career as an explorer of some of Australia’s vast inland waterways that saw him and his colleagues trace the course of the Macquarie and Bogan rivers, give names to the Darling River (after then Governor of New South Wales, Ralph Darling), and the Murray River (in honour of Sir George Murray, secretary of state for the colonies). Sturt also gave name to Lake Alexandrina at the mouth of the Murray (after Princess Alexandrina, who eventually ascended the throne and took the name Queen Victoria).

More Information

Australian Dictionary of Biography Online Edition..
Wikipedia…

Image of Charles Sturt by John Michael Crossland, courtesy of Wikipedia…

Home Is The Traveller

Victoria Square fountain, Adelaide

Home is the sailor, home from sea,

And the hunter home from the hill.

~ Requiem, Robert Louis Stevenson

I don’t know why this couplet from the poem, Requiem by the poet Robert Louis Stevenson came to mind today as I made the move into an older sisters vacant apartment, but it seemed somehow appropriate. After living out of a suitcase for nine months, this solo traveller is finally back in Adelaide again and looking forward to exploring my home town in greater depth. Needless to say, it is great to be able to hang my shirts up again, keep my jocks and socks out of sight in the bedroom, and nice to display my books for easy and convenient access.

Most importantly though, it will be lovely to start blogging again on a regular basis. I set myself several goals and objectives at the start of the year, with regard to my blogging and writing, and all of them have been on hold since mid-January when my Sony laptop stopped working.

In particular I want to forge links with other bloggers and travel sites, which includes inviting guest posts from writers I hold in high regard, and in return contributing to travel sites I also find useful and informative – and most of all, trustworthy. To that end I have already started contributing guest posts to the artist-at-large website, and I have also agreed to contribute to the CheapOair website.

I have recently created a Twitter profile for the Compleat Traveller, which I hope readers will join, and participate in. I’m still getting my head around Twitter, trying to work out how it can work for the Compleat Traveller, and more importantly, how my participation on this social networking site can work for you, my readers. Like the links I am building with other websites, my intention with my Twitter profile is to form networking links with high value travel related companies and independent travellers, who have something of real value to contribute to readers of this blog.

So there you have it folks. Three months into the new year, I am only now beginning to get back to work, but I hope to make up for lost time with the help of my new laptop, and a compulsive back up plan.

Friday Photos: Angel Of Semaphore

Close: War Memorial clock tower and angel

In 1925 this war memorial and clock tower commemorating those who fell during the First World War, was erected on the foreshore at the ‘foot’ of Semaphore Road, in the suburb of Semaphore, Adelaide, South Australia.

Although this series of Friday Photos is titled, Angel of Semaphore, the monument is obviously not called that. However, colloquially the locals refer to the statue on top of the clock tower as either the ‘Semaphore Angel’ or the ‘Angel of Semaphore’, and that’s good enough for me.

Closer: Night falls over the seaside suburb of Semaphore

I shot this series of images late one evening after going for a long walk along the beach, which is a great way to relax and gather one’s thoughts after a long tiring day at the office – not that I worked in an office, but you get my drift.

Closest: the Angel of Semaphore keeps an eye on locals and visitors

Maybe I should have called this post, Close, closer, closest. Then again, maybe not.

It doesn’t matter how many times I’ve walked past this War Memorial, I have always taken the time pause and look at the angel. Lit up at night, it makes for a particularly captivating image, and I know I am not the only person to have tried to capture the monument as the sun sets in the west, and another long, hot summer day draws to a close.

-o0o-



The Aussie Way Of Greeting

Signage on Stuart Highway heading north from Adelaide

...

There's a great tradition still taking place on Australian country roads that has been around for many years, and long may it continue to be so. This tradition involves the practise of acknowledging complete strangers (but fellow travellers), as you cross the nation's highways.

This acknowledgment takes the form of a slight raising of the fingers of one hand just as two vehicles travelling in opposite directions pass each other. It is almost like a mini salute. You rarely have to take your hand completely off the steering wheel to execute this manoeuvre, and it can be so fleeting that if you are not paying attention, you could easily miss it.

I was delighted to see this practise still in use on a trip to Port Lincoln a few years ago (a round-trip distance of around 1300kms).

I don't know if this is a uniquely Australian practise, but it must surely be in danger of dying out as the years go by, and more and more cars take to our national highways. At some point it becomes impossible to acknowledge every driver you pass during a long trip. There are just too many travellers to greet. But it was not always so.

Back in the day, when we went on an extended drive through Australia's bush, there were far fewer travellers on our country roads. Back then, before the nation's major highways were even sealed, we would often stop and chat with fellow travellers to learn about the road conditions which lay ahead. Back then, you could travel, literally for many hours without seeing another vehicle on the road. So when you did encounter another car, you would always stop for a brief chat with the other driver.

Now of course, it is completely different. It is very rare to travel anywhere along our national highway system, and not encounter a continuous stream of vehicles, large and small on the way to somewhere else! Now, too, almost everyone carries a mobile (cell) phone with them, and you are never more than a few hours between country towns, roadside truck stops, and other forms of human contact. Add to that the increasing use of GPS systems, and it is almost impossible to get lost or be out of contact with another human for more than a couple of hours at a time.

I was thinking about all of this on my trip to Port Lincoln, when I began writing what I thought might be a song on the subject. In the end, it seems to have turned into a poem, but all it takes is the addition of a melody to turn it into a song, which I may yet do. Anyway, here it is...

THE AUSSIE WAY OF GREETING

© 2006, Jim Lesses. All Rights Reserved.

When you're driving on the highway,

And you want to say, "G'day"

To a stranger that is driving

Down the road the other way.

Just lift a coupl'a fingers,

Point them up towards the sky.

It's the Aussie way of greeting,

So go ahead, say, "Hi".

It's the Aussie way of greeting,

Nothing flashy, nothing grand.

Nothing over ostentatious,

Like the waving of a hand.

It isn't Regal; it isn't Papal,

It's never coarse, and never rough.

It's the Aussie way of greeting,

Understated - but enough.

It's the Aussie way of greeting,

From the people of the land.

If you ever need assistance

They will always raise a hand.

They will never leave you stranded

They will help you share the load.

It's the Aussie way of greeting,

And you will find it on the road.

It's the Aussie way of greeting,

May it live forever more.

May you never be too busy

Fellow travelers too ignore.

May you take the time to send one,

May it brighten up your way.

It's the Aussie way of greeting,

So raise your hand, and say, "G'day".