Samurai Soup

Merry ‘Ol England

rominnoodlesamurai — Fri, 25 May 2007 16:17:03 +0000

Welcome Friends, Family, Romans, Countrymen…. to another fantastic trip documented by yours truly. This time, I’m in the northern hemisphere, not to far from the Prime Meridian, in good old England. Well, London, to be specific. I arrived via Emirates yesterday morning at 0700 and was greeted by, typically, a long line. I anticipated meeting someone, the Queen or a rockstar no doubt, but alas, it was just a customs agent… a surly one at that. So, after have my bum checked out (gotcha) I went on to find the “tube” and make my way to Bloomsbury. There, I stayed in the Gower St Hotel. The room was TINY but it made up for the miserable plane seats (don’t get me wrong, Emirates is an excellent airline but those seats are horrible, not matter what airline you fly with, if you’re over 5’5″) I walked around a bit after booking my hotel. Wandering through a bit of Soho, I found myself close by the Thames, so I crossed it… on a bridge…. walking…. with a bunch of people….. I’m not sure why I just elaborated on that like I did but …. what the hell. Soon after making a u-turn on the bridge, I spied Big Ben and the government buildings. I crossed back over the Thames and headed for the landmark. On my way, I found the awe inspiring Westminster Abbey…. which was, of couse, beautiful. I was by too late for service but I’ll try again tomorrow. On my pass, I took in the abbey, the government buildings, and surprising amount of GREEN, (it’s everywhere…. you never know how much you appreciate photosysnthesis until you’ve spent 6 months in the desert). On my way back, I stopped in a pub for a nightcap and then turned in around 2100. This morning I woke up without an alarm clock (imagine that) around 0700, just in time for my continental breakfast and coffee. I found the hostel we’d be staying at and stashed my bags there whilst I made my way down to the train station to meet Carrie, Blake, Matt, and Dewayne. Unfortunately, it was a lost effort as they experienced some sort of travel issue and will not arrive until tomorrow. I’m typing this from a Costa Coffee shop on New Oxford St. near the Museum district, where you can see replica Rolls Royce taxi cabs, double decker buses, and bikes motor by. The people here are well dressed and generally (the women) are very pretty but everyone is sort of, aloof. However, when you do have the chance to interact with them, it’s a pleasant experience. Well, off to get some dinner. So far, I’ve satisfied my urge for decent chinese food by going to two Thai food restaurants :O I’m hesistant about eating anything other than traditional english breakfast but we’ll see. Talk to you soon.

Kuranda, Dehydration, and Leaving Cairns

rominnoodlesamurai — Tue, 23 Jan 2007 23:55:53 +0000

G’day folks. Sorry I haven’t written much of late. Loads of late nighters on the town and late mornings with walking taking all the time in between.

Monday, we travelled into the mountains again, this time on the Skyrail system. You can take a cable car, or gondola, up a cable system to a town called Kuranda. Kuranda sits atop the mountain system to the west of Cairns and is near all the old Gold mines formed back in the late 1800′s. The view is spectacular from the cable car and, yes, I took loads of pictures, which can be seen here. Once in the town of Kuranda, we made our way to eat and check out the sites. In the town, they have a zoo-like attraction where you can see a number of Aussie animals: koalas (which you can take pics with), Kangaroos, crocodiles, frill neck lizards, wombats, heaps of exotic birds, a butterfly dome, etc. They even gave you the ability to feed the Roos with feed they provided. Kerry did this and there are pics, here.

We were supposed to travel to Cape Tribulation yesterday but we decided, instead, to have a nice, relaxing day in town, shopping and eating some local food. Cade and Kerry went didggeredoo shopping, whilst Andy and I had a look for a bag so he could bring extra goodies home to you guys. We ate a fairly large brekky at a popular local, called the Lillypad. They have a number of dishes, including vegan dishes, with huge portions for a reasonable, Aussie price. Awesomingly enough, they had freshly squeezed apple juice, which I consumed unhealthy quantities of. After brekky, it was time to shop! I picked out some intersting gifts for some of you folks back home (sorry, Andy can only carry so much, so some may feel left out .) We walked and shopped for a while before I came across an art gallery near the center of town. They were advertising a travelling, 20th century, Chinese prints exhibit, so I had to check it out. Very cool stuff there. I bought a book of selected prints from the exhibit which explains that the woodblock print-making art has been around for a very, long time in China. It began with the Tang Dynasty in the early 600′s, with it’s peak in the middle of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) and a decline at the end of the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911.) I’ll try and find a link so you can get a grasp of what I’m talking about. Here you go.

We fly out of Cairns today, which I’m sad about. If we had booked our entire trip on the reef, that would have been awesome, although I might have a very difficult time adjusting to land, once back: it’s been pretty difficult to adjust to land legs in the short time that I’ve had them off the boat. We say goodbye to Andy at this point, which I wish we also didn’t have to do. He’ll stay here for tomorrow and the morning of Friday, when his plane leaves around 8 am. I’m very happy he was able to make it here and hang out with me for the 10 days we’ve been here. He doubles as a nice pillow Alright, so now I have to go again, I’ll write from Sydney next!

:: Please take a look at the photos here.

Back In Cairns: My Vision Is So Messed Up… Land Legs Forgot Me….

rominnoodlesamurai — Sun, 21 Jan 2007 07:48:25 +0000

Just got back into town. Going to hit up the Woolshead and a place called the Pier for drinks and dinner. Will write more soon. Everyone is back with shark bites and sun-stroke See ya soon..

P.S. Stop commenting on my Test post you weirdos.

Time to hit the Reef… not litteraly

rominnoodlesamurai — Tue, 16 Jan 2007 21:03:59 +0000

Today, Andy and I hit the reef up with our SCUBA class from the CDC (Cairns Dive Centre). We’ll get there in time for lunch, then have a brief snorkel to get used to the water and our first dive, after that. I’m really looking forward to this excursion, if it’s anything like our pool dives. To be underwater, breathing like it’s natural is really, an uncanny feeling. Very peaceful and exhillirating all at the same time. In any case, we have to check out from the hostel and get our crap in the storage locker so, wish us the best and hopefully no serious harm They have cameras available for rent there onboard so I’ll try to snap some pics of the reef and it’s inhabitants. You should hear from us again by the 21st, or Sunday, as they have no wireless internet on the boat. Cheers!

Outback continues: Swimming in fresh water in a land known for it’s Crocodiles…

rominnoodlesamurai — Sun, 14 Jan 2007 10:41:52 +0000

Today, we visited our first stop on what is promising to be an excellent vacation: the Atherton Tablelands. The Atherton Tablelands is essentially a mountainous region between the east coast of Queensland, extending down into parts of New South Wales, and the great Dividing Range, on the other side of which is the vast expanse of desert in the middle portion of Australia. This area is filled with pockets of highland, tropical rainforests. They grow so well because of the highly active volcano in millinea past created great soil for growth. Our first stop on this trip was to a giant tree called the Cathedral Fig Tree. It is a tree that endures through life by slowly creating it’s root infrastructure around the host tree and then killing it off eventually when it is able to sustain on it’s own root, food, and water system. viewed here, here, and here.

To get to the Atherton Tablelands, you have to travel the Gillies Highway which is a horse cart and buggy dirt road, converted to a paved 2 lane highway circa 1959. The road is almost as curved as the famous curved highway in California, along it’s coast. It took around 30 minutes to make it up the mountain and into the tablelands. These turns, being made at 70km/hr by the way, are punctuated with these cliffs: view. Scarey, yeah?

We got lunch on around 12:30pm (chicken, tomato, cucumber, margerine, chilli paste, fresh bread) at the crater lake, Lake Eacham. Lunch was followed by a brief swim in the lake. Now, I have to tell you how comfortable I was swimming, in a fresh water lake, in a place KNOWN for its fresh and salt water CROCODILE population…. the swim was amazing. The water was nominal temperature (not too warm, non too cold), no exotic animal harrasment, no funny plantlife or mud squishing between my feet, etc. It was awesome. All except the picture in the back of my mind of a large, teeth bearing, Tony-eating crocodile swiming up behind me. It didn’t happen, thankfully. Pictures can be found in the gallery.

Other things I’d like to talk about but I’m far too tired and hungry to finish this in it’s entirety: Tree Dragons, Cathedral Fig Tree, Millaa Millaa Waterfall.

:: Please check out my gallery, posted with Picassa from Google: Atherton Tablelands trip

Why the Airline Industry should be more like Emirates Air and Virgin Blue

rominnoodlesamurai — Sat, 13 Jan 2007 12:17:46 +0000

Well, I finally made it to Cairnes. After a gruelling series of flights totaling 20 or so odd hours of flight time, we’re finally here. I have a series of pictures to show you but I’ll get to that in a second. Cade and I had a blast in Dubai. We flew through there on our way to Banghkok, Sydney, and, subsequently, Cairnes. The night we spent in Dubai, we had a marvelous spread of fresh sushi from everyone’s favorite show-off-chef establishment, Bennihanas. After that we had some drinks at the Millenium Hotel and went back to the hotel for rest before our 6 am wake up. We flew out on Emirates Air to Sydney, with a connecting flight in Bangkok, Thailand. So many hours on the plane, so little sleep. However, their (Emirates) provided probably the most comfortable flying experience I’ve ever had. I didn’t feel squeezed or kneecapped at all the entire flight. I had an aisle seat, so that may have had something to do with it but it was great. Their service, while slow on drinks (water: I dehydrate quickly when I try to sleep on planes… at least it feels that way), was impeccable. The stewardesses and stewards were friendly and apparently, they have some mandate to speak multiple languages amongst the crew memebers. I’m talking around 20 or so different languages between the pilots and the stewards.

So, we just finished dinner and I’m writing this. Cade and Kerry turned in early because Cade is exhausted. I’m still up and will remain so until 1AM this morning so that I can pick Andy up from the airport here. Their airport is tiny! But it’s surrounded by mountains, it’s unreal. So here are your just rewards for reading this awful post, enjoy!

Here’s back shot of where we’re staying, the Tropical Days

Edit: Check out all the uploads at: Full Gallery sperated by dates.