England won a game!!!!

Lots to tell you about since the last update, so reading glasses on
everybody.

For those of you that heard rumours that England actually won a game, they
are actually true. 68 days since I left home, finally got to see them win
(although against New Zealand, not Australia) in Hobart on Tuesday.

Sydney for New Year lived up to all expectations, the fireworks were just
fantastic. I had a great view of the harbour, with the opera house in
front of the bridge. I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of looking at that
combination. Stood at Mrs Macquarie’s Point, with at least 25,000 others
just on that site alone. I knew I had to keep my good position so I was
fixed to the same spot for 3 hours. Definitely worth the wait though.
There’s a few pictures on the Flickr site
(http://www.flickr.com/photos/howcro) and I’ve got a couple of videos too
that I will be uploading when possible.

For the first week of 2007 spent time exploring and having lots of fun in
Sydney. I don’t know what it is but it just has a completely different
feel to all the other Aus cities. Went to the 5th Test Match for 2 days,
same old same old! At least the series being 5-0 makes it memorable, i
think its actually quite funny that it was a whitewash. Roll on 2009, at
least all the Aussies will have retired by then.

While in Sydney – went on cruises on the harbour by day and by night, went
to the aquarium, went up the Sydney Tower, a tour inside the Opera House,
a ghost tour of The Rocks, and saw Sydney FC take on New Zealand Knights
in the A-League (Nz won 1-0). Also went to the twenty20 cricket game which
was a lot of fun, much more entertaining than test cricket and a fun
atmosphere. The Australian batting was excellent, great to watch with some
absolutely huge sixes. England’s batting was as usual.

Then last week, flew to Melbourne for five days. Visited Pin Oak Crescent
(a.k.a. Ramsay Street, Erinsborough). Much smaller than it looks on tv,
and yes they are real houses with real people living in them! Also visited
the school, which nobody really recognised, and the promised star meeting
was a bit disappointing because it was darcy tyler. Didn’t even get an
actor who’s currently in the show! They weren’t filming either as they
were still on break for christmas. Couldn’t come all this way and not
visit the set though!

Also I went to Albert Park, where the F1 Grand Prix is held every year.
Its unbelievable how different it is, I just couldn’t get my head round
it. So much upheaval and change involved, it is almost unrecognisable from
the grand prix track (it is a street circuit, i.e the track is public
roads for the rest of the year)

Went to the Melbourne one day match, Australia vs England, no need to ask
who won. Also met up with an Aussie friend I lived with at uni in my first
year, which was really good as I hadn’t seen him for 3 years.

Now in Hobart, Tasmania. Site of England’s first tour victory! Hardly
convincing but a win nevertheless. That’s the last time i’ll watch
england, one game to go on sunday is Australia vs New Zealand. Think I’ll
be an honorary Kiwi for the day.

Then its back to Sydney for the last week and returning home just in time
to see Chelsea humiliated by Forest in the FA Cup. (OK that’s optimistic
but you’ve got to be when you follow England cricket for this long!)

Thats all folks,
Howard

The Sporting Times

An affectionate remembrance

of ENGLISH CRICKET

which died at the SCG

on 5th JANUARY 2007

Deeply undeserving of a large circle of sorrowing friends and acquaintances.

R.I.P.

 

N.B The body will be cremated and the Ashes should remain in Australia.

 

(Sydney Morning Herald, 6 Jan 07)

Noel Gallagher live in Perth

From Perth Concert Hall, 16 December 2006. 

Latest update from Aussieland

From thu 21 dec to sun 24 dec we hired a car and drove down the Great
Ocean Road in Victoria. It is a long and twisting road next to the ocean
so it was great fun to drive, it would be a perfect rally course. also
drove through varying weather conditions, including heavy fog and rain!
got to see lots of different rock formations that had been formed by the
ocean, the most famous of those being ‘The Twelve Apostles’. Other
formations included Loch Ard Gorge, Gibson Steps, The Arch, London Bridge,
and the Grotto. Pictures of all these are on the pics site
http://www.flickr.com/photos/howcro. We stayed overnight at Torquay,
Apollo Bay and Geelong.

since then, came back to melbourne on christmas eve and are just about to
leave for sydney tomorrow (saturday) evening. Christmas Day was the
coldest christmas on record in melbourne (about 14 degrees, with strong
winds), and there were showers throughout the day! It even hailed at one
point, and they say melbourne gets 4 seasons in a day so the weather here
is really unpredictable. it was a strange feeling on christmas day, didn’t
have christmas lunch because it was $150 per person (60 pounds). Santa did
pay me a little visit so i got a couple of nice presents.

We went to the cricket on Boxing Day, the biggest event in the Australian
sporting calendar. The crowd wasn’t as big as expected because of the
inclement weather, but there were still just under 90,000 there. Saw Shane
Warne take his 700th wicket which was a great moment, but another useless
England performance. Went to the second day as well, Aussies dominating
again. 4-0 in the series now and almost guaranteed to be a whitewash.
Luckily I’m not a major cricket fan, although it has still been a very
disaappointing series for england fans.

Went on a tour of the Telstra Dome today, another big sports stadium in
melbourne. Got to go in the exec boxes, media centre, press room, dressing
rooms and on the pitch, which was cool.

Next stop is Sydney for New Year’s Eve, which I am really looking forward
to. The fireworks will be awesome, from the sounds of things we will need
to get a good position early in the day as people start gathering from
midday onwards. Then its the fifth test match, the last in the series.
Also theres a twenty20 cricket game which should be exciting, and there
will be plenty to do besides that. In 2007 we are going to a few one day
cricket matches in Sydney, Melbourne and Tasmania, so there’s about a
month left for me here.

Happy New Year.

Adelaide to Alice to a big rock

It’s been a while since the last update, that’s because I’ve been about 400km from anywhere in the middle of this country. Had an excellent time at Ayers Rock/Uluru, walked round it (10km/3 1/2 hours) and took a ton of pictures, and saw it at sunrise and sunset. Also we visited The Olgas/Kata-Tjuta, a series of smaller rocks but just as interesting as the big one. Because the rock is so big you can walk round it by yourself and not see anyone else very often! There’s lots of holes and caves that you don’t see from far away so it was definitely worth walking around. We did it very early in the morning so it was cooler than later in the day.

 Also another thing I liked about the outback was the clear night skies, there were so many stars to see. Fascinating to see them, but the only ones I could identify were Orion’s Belt.

To get to Ayers Rock we flew from the nearby town of Alice Springs. When I say nearby,  I mean 465km or a five hour drive. There is not much to do in Alice, a guy I spoke to said the only thing to do is watch the traffic lights change! However we were only there for one day, we arrived on the Ghan train from Adelaide.

We had a good time in Adelaide although probably spent too much time there as there wasn’t that much to do. However we went to three days of the test match (including the last day, sat amongst the delirious Aussies!), a great white shark museum, saw the Ashes urn, went to a exhibition about Don Bradman, went to Mt Loftly lookout, and had a brief tour of a chocolate factory.

And today we went to the first day of the third test match in Perth, the best day we have been to so far. 12 wickets and 300 odd runs, and finally Panesar played! We had a great seat five rows from the front, and it was good to see England putting the Aussies on the rocks for once. England to win the series 3-2, you heard it here first!

 That’s all for now folks.

Photos

I have uploaded a few photos from the trip so far, you can view them by clicking on them on the right sidebar from this page. Alternatively visit http://www.flickr.com/photos/howcro.

 And England are going to win the Ashes 3-2, you know it makes sense.

Me holding a koala at Australia Zoo!

Me holding a koala at Australia Zoo Originally uploaded by howcro.

Brisbane Adventures

We are in Adelaide now and its cold! We have been to the first two days of the test match, and there’s been a very cold wind and no sun so it’s been freezing. Last night I went out in jumper and trousers and was still cold. And the first day we got here (Thursday) it was sunny and clear outside, then suddenly there was a big thunder crack and it poured it down with rain! Shower only lasted 2 or 3 minutes, but it is sure is strange weather here. Almost like being back at home!

 Had a fantastic time in Brisbane, despite the beating the Aussies gave us in the cricket. We went to days one and four of the test match, a tour of the XXXX brewery, a bus tour round the city, visited Wet’n’Wild waterpark, met my old friends the crocodiles (among others) at Australia Zoo, and went on a cruise down the Brisbane River.

There was a great atmosphere at the cricket, plenty of England fans there to banter with the Aussies. We had excellent seats and the weather was hot and sunny, so the only thing we could complain about was the result. However having been to the first two days of the Adelaide Test, things are looking up – but England would be lost without Bell, Collingwood and Pietersen.

On Monday we went to Australia Zoo and had a great time. The place is huge, and we needed the whole day to do it all. We went to a show in the Crocoseum which was short but sweet, nothing compared to the jumping cruise from earlier in the trip. Saw giant turtles, crocs, dingoes, koalas, tigers, elephants, snakes, a sleeping (maybe stuffed?) wombat, lizards, and much more. And also got to hand feed kangaroos! That was cool, we bought some food and then went into their enclosure and they came and ate out of my hand. In addition, I got my picture taken holding a koala! There was also a long row of Steve Irwin tributes, tons of khaki shirts signed front and back by visitors. It felt strange him not being there as his face was everywhere and it was very much the house that he built. They also had a guy walking round in a costume of him, which I found a bit weird.

 We had a lot of fun at the waterpark on the Gold Coast, got a bit sunburnt though. While we were on the Gold Coast we went on a brief visit to Surfer’s Paradise. I was hoping to go up the Q1 tower (world’s tallest residential building) but they wouldn’t let us up there because the observatory becomes a lounge bar after 5pm and we weren’t dressed smartly enough!

Brisbane looks really good at night and we got to see that close up from the CityCat river cruise. It was a much smoother ride than the last time I went on a boat! (Barrier Reef)

That’s it for now. We are in Adelaide until next Friday, not got much planned as yet but will probably go visit the Ashes urn, and there’s a great white shark exhibit near our hotel that looks interesting. Then on Friday we are going on a train for 19 hours (!) to Alice Springs, and then flying to Ayers Rock.

Oh and one other thing – in Cairns I saw a sign outside a restaurant saying ‘No thongs allowed after 6pm’. What an odd request, I thought. Turns out thongs is the Aussie word for flip-flops!

I have uploaded a few photos, there is a link to them on the right sidebar.

 I will head back to my 5 star apartment by the beach now, which is very nice.

Who do you think you are kidding, Mr Ponting?

Greetings folks from sunny Brisbane, Queensland.

 The Ashes begins tomorrow, I am really excited. It has been hyped up massively over here, the Aussies attitude seems to be ‘we won everything before the 2005 series and we’ve won everything after’. The atmosphere tomorrow will be electric, and the English are taking over Brisbane already! Although I seem to get automatically associated with the Barmy Army, which I’m not sure if that’s a good or bad thing.

 Since my last update we have been in Cairns for 4 days, and for the first time we had a bit of wind and rain. On Saturday we went on the Kuranda Scenic Railway through the rainforest, and then came back down via the SkyRail cable car, they were both very interesting rides. Shared the cable car with a couple of old American women and they were crazy!

 On Monday we went to the Great Barrier Reef, it took 1hr 45m to get there by boat and it was raining heavily and strong winds when we got on. That made the trip a very rough ride, they gave us travel sickness pills but unfortunately they didn’t work. I was ok though once we reached the fixed pontoon at the reef and got chance to do quite a bit of snorkelling and see lots of corals and different fish.

 Anyone watching the cricket, look out for me. I hope England make a good start so we can give some more stick to the Aussies!

Dancing to the Crocodile Rock

Croc Jumping

Originally uploaded by howcro.

Crikey! Look at the size of that one!

I have been on two cruises involving crocodiles this week. On Wednesday we went to Kakadu National Park on a day trip (about 3 1/2 hours each way from Darwin). Kakadu is huge (19,804.00 km²) and home to tons of saltwater and freshwater crocodiles. I am not sure of the exact number but our tour guide said there is at least 85,000 in Northern Territory, and most likely over 100,000.

We went on a billabong cruise. There were lots of different types of bird, and with Kakadu being so big it felt like we were in a different country. The main excitement though was the crocs, we saw two of them. We got really close to the first one and it swam round our boat, probably eyeing us up for lunch. We didn’t disturb it, but it was clear it was letting us know who was boss, and we were trespassing on his patch! The second one was sneaking up on some ducks, but they scarpered before it had chance to attack. It was good to see them in their natural environment, and I’m sure there was a lot more of in there that didn’t make an appearance.

On Thursday we went on another day trip to Litchfield National Park, an another journey through croc-infested waters. We stopped at the Adelaide River and went on a crocodile jumping cruise (thankfully it involved them jumping out of the water, rather than me into it). The pictures showed a double-decker boat with windows on the bottom and an open area on the top. However that wasn’t in service and we just had a normal boat with open sides! And I sat at the side as well.

We soon found a croc, and the the tour guide tied a piece of meat to a piece of string on the end of a big stick, and dangled it over the edge. From the cruise the day before I noted that the crocs are dead silent when they move, and were moving very slowly. However the lure of food brought it to life, it was moving faster and tried to grab it by swimming past and doing an instant 180 turn. Then out of nowhere it jumped, most of its body out of the water and grabbed it. It was amazing to see them so close, there were only about a metre from our boat. We found four crocs on the hour-long cruise and they were all made to work for their food! Apparently their mind works like a serial killer, they sit and watch the habits of their prey, working out which is the weakest and when is the best time to attack. It was both exciting and a bit scary.

We also went swimming in the rock pools in Litchfield, which was a lot of fun and completely croc free.

That wrapped up our time in Darwin, and we have now reached Cairns where it is similar temperatures but slightly cooler and a bit less humid. Today we went on the Kuranda Scenic Railway and Skyrail through the rainforests, and on Monday we are going to the Barrier Reef. Tomorrow will used as it should be, a day of rest!

Video of croc jumping is below, and lots more pictures from the trip so far will follow shortly.