Hi all. Just a short note to say happy holidays, whatever that looks like for you. I’m heading off on a road trip with my partner and family to Townsville for a few weeks. The road trip will take a few days. I have posts planned (scheduled or mental drafts.) See you on the flip side.
Hi all. My holiday was awesome, I had a great time. Since I got back on Saturday, I’ve been tidying up a few things and getting others sorted. My placement starts next week in Paediatrics (yay!!) after all.
For the holiday, we stayed in Ubud in a villa there – Kano Sari. Our suite was lovely, and the place had a pool, massage facilities, and a common area with things to do. Plus aircon and free wifi. 😉 Breakfast was provided each day on a rotating menu; it was very yummy, with fresh fruit, muesli, fresh juice and different hot options. Our suite was near a river that ran next to the villa, which was nice. The one downside was the number of stairs we had to climb to go between the common area (pool, dining, lounge room) to our suite.
Ubud is located in the “uplands” of Bali. Nearly everyone keeps chickens – we were woken by the roosters most mornings (who then proceeded to crow all day – “up at cockcrow” should really be “up at first cockcrow”…). The surrounding area has lots of rainforests as well as terraced rice paddies, and Hindu religious practices are a big part of life and the local culture.
Activities
We fell into a pattern of doing things around Ubud in the morning, then coming back to the villa after lunch and spending the afternoon relaxing. A nice balance of seeing the sights (it was, after all, my first trip to Bali) and having some chill-out time. Bliss!
Apart from activities around the villa, which included reading, swimming, and a couples massage (highly recommend getting the traditional Balinese one – so relaxing!), our activities including local exploration on foot and, via a hired driver arranged through Kano Sari, a few activities further afield.
I’m glad we arranged this, because the traffic and driving conditions are best navigated by a local. Most locals travel by motorbike due to the narrow roads – the main cars are chartered vehicles and taxis. About the latter – unlike Australia, in Bali it’s perfectly reasonable and acceptable for drivers to ask if you want a ride. Get used to saying, “No.” very firmly as you walk past the calls of, “Taxi?” (they tend to leave the “you want a…” bit out – faster that way. 😉 ).
In Ubud, we visited places such as:
The Sacred Monkey Forest, where macaques live – bold enough to steal anything interesting right out of your hands! We saw a macaque investigating a stolen bottle of hand sanitiser…wonder what he thought of the taste! Very curious animals.
The Ubud Central Market – come before 09:00 for the local market, and from 09:00-17:00 for the tourist one. We got a couple of souvenirs here – mine were earrings and a packet of rosella tea. I also spied Luwak coffee for sale here too! (If interested, check out this blog post of another tourist pair’s trip to the local market.)
The Ubud Palace and Saraswati Temple – both largely closed on the day we went there, but still interesting to look at. There are particular rules about visiting the temple – if it’d been open, I’d have had to wear a “temple sarong” and also would have been obliged to avoid visiting under certain circumstances.
The Neka Gallery, a collection of art from notable Balinese artists, Indonesian artists, and international artists, with paintings “inspired by the people and culture of Bali”. We were followed through the gallery by the caretaker, who made sure all the lights were on as we explored its two levels. It’s got a bit of an indoor-outdoor feel, with the rooms structured around an open courtyard.
On the last day, we walked around Ubud again to see parts of the town we hadn’t seen before, before checking out of the villa and going exploring further afield.
Further afield, we visited:
Petulu village (on Thursday evening) where the white herons roost each night (quite the spectacle). We sat in a little rooftop family-run cafe/bar and watched the herons come into roost on a nearby tree.
The Rice Terraces, which one could walk along and through using special paths, paying “upkeep payments” along the way. The walk was fun, though at times you had to watch your step!
At the terraces, they had a giant swing which swung you (in a harness) over the fields!
On our way to the airport to go home, we stopped by Seminyak Beach for a look. Nice sunset, but not much else for us. (Plenty of stalls selling booze, but no ice-cream!)
Food
We ate out for lunch and dinner during our stay, meaning we got to try a few different places, and dishes. Sometimes we planned where we’d eat, other times we found them when hungry. We usually ate in warungs (“small eateries” or “general stores”, depending on context) or occasionally at restaurants.
Hands down the best place, in my opinion, was the Wild Ginger Warung, where we had our first dinner in Bali. A true family-run restaurant.
I had Ayam Goreng Kecap – “Chicken cooked in Putu’s Special Sauce with White Rice” as a main and a Pisang Goreng – “Fried Banana with Coconut and Brown Sugar” for dessert. Also, I had a Ginger Fizz – “Lemon, Honey, 7Up, and Ginger” to drink.
Another place I enjoyed was called Bebek Bengil. This was a restaurant that was the priciest of the trip, because it specialised in the Balinese speciality “bebek bengil”, which translates to “crispy duck”. It was lunch on our first day.
I ended up having a very spicy Nasi Campur Bebek (“mix of everything”): “Balinese Nasi Campur with Crispy Duck, Boiled Egg, Fish Satay, Balinese Vegetables and lot more”.
My partner had the actual Bebek Bengil: “Half a duck steamed in Indonesian spices and deep fried for a crispy finish … served with steamed rice and Balinese vegetables”.
For a drink, we had a fresh coconut each.
Other food places included the following:
Casa Luna, which was dinner on Thursday evening. I had a special vegetarian dish of tofu and Cassava, Moringa and other green things, accompanied by black rice and a spicy sambal dressing.
To accompany it, I had a glass of brem, Balinese rice wine. Quite potent – I drank it “straight”, but there were options for adding fruit to it to turn it into a cocktail-style drink. It was closer to a spirit than a wine in a sense.
Warung Semesta was lunch on our last day, at a vegetarian “eco-friendly” place. I had Gado Gado and a strawberry milkshake/ smoothie.
Warung Babi Guling Ibu Oka was our destination for lunch on Wednesday. I can’t remember exactly what I had – maybe nasi babi guling, which is rice with pork. “Babi guling” is a special Balinese dish made with suckling pig. It wasn’t as nice as the Bebek Bengil, in my opinion. (No photo for this one – my phone must have had a low battery.)
Nomad was where we had lunch on Thursday. It was clearly geared towards tourists, but still yummy. My partner wanted pasta and we ended up there. I had Tagliatelle A’la Nomad – “Homemade tomato tagliatelle with chicken, spinach and red onion… in a creamy white wine sauce and parmesan cheese.” I had a delicious mango drink that literally tasted as if fresh mango had been liquefied into a drink. I really like the freshness of Balinese juices and drinks!
Jaya Fried Chicken was where we had dinner on Wednesday. My partner spotted it on our travels and suggested we try it. It’s the Indonesian version of KFC. We had a special of theirs and due to a language barrier, it ended up being slightly different to what we’d imagined. But still an interesting experience. Plus iced tea, so yay!
Maccas: included because we got this as an easy dinner on the way to the airport, to compare Indonesian Maccas to other countries. I had a McSpicy, which had nice chicken in it. Indonesian Maccas provides a complimentary chilli sauce with their orders.
This week I’m off overseas for a short holiday to somewhere I’ve never been before. It’s been planned for a while and I am very glad that it’s here. I hope to not do much while I’m there.
My flight leaves 🛫 in a few hours. First I have to get to the Airport though. The busses providing Melbourne’s outer-Metro link will get me there.
Oh and btw: a friend dyed my hair yesterday. See the red tips?
See you later!
My Japan trip was really really fun. We experienced a lot of Japan, its food, its people, its culture. I was quite busy so didn’t end up publishing any more trip posts. But here’s one and the other one or two will be up soon, once I’ve had a chance to do some work for MIV. I’ll update you on that front tomorrow…
Day 4 consisted of exploring various places in Kyoto. A few stand-outs included Nijojo Castle, the Nishi Market, a couple of shrines and Kinkakuji – the Golden Temple.
Day 5 was the start of our Japan Rail Pass. We used the Shinkansen (bullet train) to get from Kyoto to Hiroshima and Miyajima.
Hiroshima was sobering and a little eerie. We heard many stories of how the atomic bombing affected the lives of the people.
Miyajima was quite beautiful. We visited another shrine and went exploring and looked through gift- and food shops. We finished the day with okonomiyaki from a place next to Hiroshima station.
Day 6 was a travel day. After exploring the last thing on our list in Kyoto, the Place of 1,000 Steps (or Gates), we boarded a train headed towards the snow country. We changed trains at Toyama for a wide-view train, then travelled on to Takayama. The scenery was pretty good – enough deep snow to make me a little excited. But Takayama, while pretty with old buildings, had no snow. After another train trip, we arrived at our stop for the night, Kanazawa.
Day 7 was another travel day, from Kanazawa to Tokyo. We explored Kanazawa a bit before leaving, seeing another market and some gardens (and more snow! 😀 ).
We arrived in Tokyo late in the evening. It was Christmas Eve so after finally locating our apartment, we dumped our stuff and ended up going to a Vigil Mass at 22:00. Midnight in Australia. I mentioned it briefly in my Christmas post, but it was a moving experience.
That’s all from me for now, I’ve got a busy day ahead. Next up will be my White Christmas and related exploits before a final post after that to tie things up. Both of those will be out next week – tomorrow is MIV-related. It’s ONE WEEK OUT TODAY!
I haven’t yet had a chance to put together a complete version of days 4-7 of the Japan trip. Hopefully that’ll occur soon. Before a “days 8-11” post anyway.
Instead I’ve opened this draft about Christmas. It was originally going to be mainly a collection of Christmas songs, as I did last year, but then I got thinking.
Christmas and other Year’s End celebrations are a collection of rituals. There are the obvious thematic ones – religious and secular. Then there are the family/ cultural ones which are interconnected but distinct.
For example, I celebrate Christmas as a religious commemoration with Mass. While the way I believe has changed as I’ve grown up, being unable to continue the tradition of going to Mass at Christmas (and during the year tbh) would feel strange. So I’m glad we’re able to do it while travelling still.
Then there’s the secular side of things. Santa Claus promoting gift-giving and receiving with the “season of goodwill” – or season of consumerism! 😛 I follow the guide of “something to wear, something to read, something they want, something they need” when picking presents to give.
And the family traditions… each is different – and subject to change as circumstances change. Though this is where one feels a change the most.
When I was growing up, we’d open presents once everyone woke up on Christmas morning. We weren’t allowed to get up before 07:00 though. We might go to Mass at 09:00 or have gone the night before.
We’d have Christmas lunch at home and probably try out a few presents. The big event was in the evening. We’d head off to Grandma’s to see all the aunts, uncles and cousins on that side of the family. There’d be backyard cricket and games, plenty of talking and catching up, a large spread of dinner and dessert, then the family Kris Kringle.
If we weren’t at Grandma’s we’d have headed up north to see my other grandparents.
In recent years things have changed a little. I’ve moved away from the family home and I have a second family in my partner’s now too. I don’t know what the future holds, but last year had the feel of a new tradition being built. Not to replace the old entirely but to enhance it anew.
Then of course, there will always be years where circumstances are just different, full stop.
Like this year, where my Christmas might even be a white one.
Christmas carols
There are more carols than the following but here goes. Favourites
LaTUCS 2017:
Songs I learnt as four-part harmonies and sang with my choir this year.
Others:
Japanese Christmas:
Went to 22:00 mass and everything was in Japanese. But the parts of the Mass were familiar, and some songs sung were carols. If I had had the phonetic writing of words instead of just the Japanese characters in front of me, I could’ve sung them as I knew the tunes.
Hello all from Japan!
I flew out of Australia on Monday. We started the first leg at a very early hour, then had a lunchtime layover before starting our second leg.
Plane trip photos:
Remember Womble Bear? He’ll be in some of these photos – after all he is my travel bear now.
Our first night was spent in a lovely guest house only a short train ride from Kansai Airport. The managers were very welcoming and we slept on futon mattresses on tutami matting. A true Japanese experience.
We’re now staying in a tiny apartment in Kyoto.
Catching the train everywhere has been good so far (excepting yesterday morning), though it was easier once we didn’t have to carry our big luggage around. Also, maps and even the supposedly very good app can’t account for everything. So we’ve been very grateful to the friendly locals who’ve helped us out.
Yesterday was a full-on day. We started the day by exploring the edge of Osaka, near to where we were staying and the airport. We were going to walk it when the lovely guest house offered bikes!
It was the first time I’d been on a bike in a while and I was a bit wobbly at times. But it was so. much. fun. 😀 We cycled around down the main street of the area towards the beach. There were bike paths around there and we made good use of them. I’m quite pleased with myself, tbh. Especially since I even managed to go up hills a few times. The starting was the main annoyance because I was always a little wobbly at first, the bike weaving about a bit as I tried to push off effectively.
Some context: I learnt to bike ride late, because I have mild coordination and processing problems. It was difficult to balance and stay on the bike without wobbling too much to continue, and I hated hills because they were too difficult – a problem given that the area I grew up in was full of them.
My best biking experience came when we went overseas to Holland, which is super flat. At a bike path there, I could ride quite well. That was a while ago though and I haven’t really been motivated to practice bike riding.
This year, I’ve wanted to bring my bike from my hometown to Melbourne but haven’t yet. After yesterday, I’m re-motivated.
The other activity of yesterday was to go to Nara and see the Giant Buddha and the deer. The Giant Buddha is indeed impressive. Imposing and magnificent.
The deer were cute but also pushy. They know how to get food from humans. Did you know that an impatient or upset fawn sounds like a squeaky door?
I didn’t get many photos of the afternoon at Nara because my phone died on me. I’ll grab some from others later.
I got lucky on day 3 though – my phone lasted pretty much all of the day. After some mucking around with transport details (let’s just say trains can be confusing if you’re not a local, until you get used to them), we got the right train and settled in for a journey to Himeji Castle.
The Castle itself was pretty cool. Once inside the main keep we had to take off our shoes and replace them with provided slippers. Climbing steep stairs through the six floors to the top is tricky in slippers! The views were pretty good though.
The castle was refurbished only two years ago so we could see it in all it’s glory. It’s a magnificent structure.
We finished the day with a look at the harbour of Kobe on our way home.
Today we’re exploring Kyoto to see places like Nijo Castle, Nishiki Market, and Kinkaku-Ji (Golden) and Ginkaku-Ji (Silver) Temples, among others.
Writing this quickly before I head off to my last choir night of the year.
I’ll write a review of the concert I attended on Saturday (MonUCS’ “ORGANic Christmas”) tomorrow. I want to do it justice and time slipped by me today. In part because less sleep last night from a choir holiday party combined with the afternoon sun on a 37*C day is not conducive to productivity, I think. XD
Choir parties are the best – always great food and conversation with lovely welcoming people. Last night’s one had Karaoke even!
Carolling with MIV – and at LaTUCS’ own gig – has been really lovely this year. My favourite carols are a lot more complex now than the favourites I had when younger and it’s really nice to perform them with friends.
There are still a few chances to see the MIV carollers in the lead-up to Christmas, but I won’t be among them.
As of next Monday, I’m off to Japan on a family holiday until the New Year. I will try to keep you more-or-less abreast of our journey with the help of Womble again I make no promises as to when any updates will occur though.
Must dash to LaTUCS now….
Remember to buy concert tickets to see the MIV choir with soloists and orchestra perform on January 20th (less than ONE MONTH to go!!): Facebook event here and tickets here. Monday was spent getting decorations for MIV with other committee friends…. I’m getting excited now.
Oops! It’s been a while since I’ve posted one of these! I had them all written by the start of September…but general busy-ness has prevented me posting – just as it delayed my completion of the writing.
So, last time, Day 5 ended with us rolling into Algebuckina Bridge camping area. Day 6 begins here.
Day 6
The next day, I was up early, so I went to explore.
We’d camped beside the Algebuckina Creek. According to an information booklet, it’s never run out of water since it was discovered. Or something like that…
The campsite was really just a spot to camp, without facilities. All necessary things had to be provided by the campers (us), which was an experience.
After breakfast, we drove around to see the actual bridge. The Algebuckina Bridge is disused now, but when in operation it was the longest rail bridge in South Australia at 583m.
It’s nice enough, I guess.
We soon drove on. We were aiming for Oodnadatta and Marla today. On our way to Oodnadatta, we saw the grader at work repairing the track, which was good – less bumpy track, hooray.
When we arrived at Oodnadatta we were pleased. We stopped at the famous Pink Roadhouse, where the walls, tables, chairs and other furnishings are various shades of pink. Like the roadhouse at William Creek, it functions as a fuel station, pub, general store/grocery, hotel/campsite area – and post office!
We bought postcards to send back home. We also bought lunch – six of the famous “Oodna-burgers” with a side of chips, coming right up!
Then it was back on the road, for the last stretch of the Oodnadatta Track. I’d read somewhere that this was the supposed to be the best bit, but it turned out to be the worst. Oops.
Finally, as the sun set, we turned off the Track onto bitumen road again. After 621km, we’d made it.
Hello Stuart Highway!
We kept driving and soon reached Marla. Which has apparently only existed as a township for thirty-five years….
Their campsite was full, so we pressed on to a rest stop closer to Alice Springs.
Scheduled post. Things are still busy. Had some fun over the weekend…if I get time I might tell you about it tomorrow/later this week. I also hope to schedule some more recipe posts soon.
Oh and a reminder that MIV2018 regos are open. I’ve finalised mine. 🙂
The old railway town had been abandoned gradually after it lost its purpose. A team of volunteers, plus a couple of farmers who own the homestead now, are bringing it back to life as a tourist attraction. We had a nosey around in the morning, discovering a memorial to soldiers from the town who’d served in WWI and WWII….
The town ruins….
And the now refurbished underground bakery.
We were really lucky with this – it’s only open at the moment for eight weeks of the year! And the bread is really good.
Look at that! The wheels of the cars had already gone off-road, but they’d be even dirtier by the time we were finished the Oodnadatta Track, which was ahead of us.
Marree marked the start of the track. As Womble and I discovered, the old train station is there, but there are no trains running through it anymore. The Ghan was moved some kilometres west due to excessive flooding from Lake Eyre, we found out later.
Soon enough we were at the entrance to the Oodnadatta Track – a gravelly bumpy track that more-or-less follows the route of the Old Ghan Railway (which had followed the route of the Great Overland Telegraph Line before it). Thanks to the efforts of early explorers, we can travel south to north today. It took explorer John MacDouall Stuart three attempts to blaze the trail between Adelaide and (near) Darwin. If you’re interested, I highly recommend a book by Bill Peach called “Explorers”.
There were plenty of things to see along the Track…
The first major sight, for me, was Lake Eyre South. That’s half of a life wish fulfilled. J I’ve wanted to visit since it had a massive flood some years ago. The images of how it became so vibrant, so quickly, captured my imagination. So the other half of the life wish will be fulfilled when I return during a flood time.
We ended the day with a campfire at the Coward Springs campsite.
I’ve been so busy lately with placement – either working (9-5, whew!) or relaxing. today marks halfway – already!
So here’s the latest instalment of the trip report, thanks to the bus’ free trip wifi.
After arriving late in Wilpena Pound the night before, we took it easy the next morning.
Including waking up late enough for breakfast to be lunch…
We took a look around, including at the Wilpena Pound Visitor Centre. The Flinders Ranges has some great scenery to explore on foot or by four-wheel-drive. It’s worth a whole trip of its own. Next time maybe.
And off we went again.
We saw plenty of scenery…
And were momentarily delayed when we came across a local lizard who didn’t want to move out of our way. (We interrupted his sunbaking, I think.)
I’m not sure if he was a stumpy-tailed lizard or bone-headed one. I’ll need to compare images.
Another nice sunset finished the day.
After a long day of driving, we found ourselves at a campsite on an old homestead that used to be a railway town.
myzania 