Non Extreme to Extreme!

What a(nother) fun weekend I've just had. From a not so extreme 'sport' to a much more extreme and fun one!

We went to Ian's 29th birthday party on Saturday afternoon to evening. Ian is the support guy who works for Wallingford Software over here for those who don't know. He's from Sydney so knows most of the area quite well. He held his party at a lawn bowls club! It was quite a good idea as it was a cheap venue and it was a lot of fun to have a go at lawn bowls.

I was imagining that we would be surrounded by old age pensioners but most of the people there were quite young and also having a good time.

I had a good time and also got to know a few of Ian's friends as well. This first photo is of Roger having a go at the game. I think the awkward pose is just a strange camera shot rather than him doing an impression.

I even won a couple of my games while playing in teams, but it helped that I was in a game which turned out to be quite competitive with Ian's friends.

On Sunday Roger and I arranged to go mountain biking around the Manly Dam course. It's rated as an intermediate course apparently so there's nothing like being chucked in at the deep end again for me as it was my first time.

This is Roger at the start of the course which is a short cycle from the Manly ferry. He's done this course at least once before so had an idea of where to go and what it was like.

It's been a sweltering weekend over here with temperatures just above thirty degrees. It reminds me how hot my apartment gets when it's warm here. At least the hot weather makes cycling a very pleasant pursuit for a weekend.

This is a view from one of the higher points of the course. There were some lengths of the course which were very 'technical' as Roger puts it. What he meant was that they were quite tricky and either very difficult to ride up or quite scary to ride down!

I was expecting some tricky moments but nothing prepared me for how rough some parts were going to be. The uphill parts were the most difficult as you need to maintain quite a bit of momentum to keep moving, especially when you come across some steep and rough rocks which were almost bigger than the wheels on my bike!

Going downhill was much more fun though. I say fun in that you have no choice but to keep flying down the rocks on your bike hoping that you can maintain balance and don't come to a sudden halt into a rock or tree beside the track.

Even though some bits were very scary it was also lots of fun. I came off my bike in a controlled manner quite often when going up hills and loosing momentum on the big steep rough rocks. Going down hill was loads of fun and when you're moving at quite a rate and your bike is bouncing up and down quite fast below you it was fantastic!

There were a few moments when I could have come off and if I had fallen off it would have resulted in quite a messy accident but fortunately I maintained my balance and had a big smile on my face. I did fall off once unexpectedly, but fortunately I wasn't going very fast, but I did fall into a bush and get some twigs in my face for he pleasure!

The above photo is me on the ferry on the trip back at the end of the day. You can just about make out the mud from my knees downwards. There was even more mud on my bike though! I'd love to go again (and again).

Even better was that I came across a great ice cream stall at the Manly Ferry port. It has 32 flavours of milk shakes! I was like a kid in a sweet shop, I wanted mango, mint choc chip, chocolate and coffee flavours, but not at once. I eventually settled for coconut after changing my mind many times. :-)

Mohamed Visits and Horses.

Mohamed, our boss at Wallingford had been visiting us for the past week to see how we're getting on. As you can see from the photo we're working very hard and even Mohamed had to join in our work.

We had a really good week while he was visiting. We each took it in turns to show him around Sydney and where we lived. I took him to the Orbit bar for 360 degree views of the Sydney skyline while having some cocktails. We then went to the very swanky Wildfire restaurant near Circular Quay. The service there is very good but the food not quite fantastic for the prices that we paid. Oops, wrong photo, this should be the one that I want to show:

I had a great chance to go horse riding over last weekend. We should have gone the weekend before but it was all rained off. I still managed to cycle down to the Centenary Park stables in the rain though which was really good fun.

Here you can see me bonding with my horse, Dave. Most of the time he was more interested in eating rather than moving anywhere. Can you see the fear in my smile?

Once you get on the horse the higher up views are quite good. I can well see why police use them in crowd control. Talking about the police...

This is Allen doing his impression of one of the Village People. His horse was rather more frisky than mine. It kept wanting to move as soon as it got the chance. While my horse needed quite a lot of effort to get moving.

I was all set to do my impression of Indiana Jones on my horse but Dave wasn't having any of it. He would barely move when I was in the paddock and would only trot once another hose was in front of him that he could follow.

As it turned out I did managed to do some trotting and then even managed a gallop at one point. I now know why women generally prefer horses! When you're trotting along you have to try to time your own bouncing up and down with the horse movements. Most of the time you find yourself bouncing down when the horse is moving up. Quite awkward as you can imagine!

Once you start to gallop though it's a different story altogether and the horse movement is much smoother and as a result much more comfortable. The only problem is to be able to control the horse as everything is moving much quicker.

Here you can see all the riding team. Unfortunately taken by the instructor with my camera phone as no one had bought a decent camera along for the ride. From left to right is Jennifer, Joe, Allen, Roger, Me and Deirdre.

Roger probably did the best among us as he had ridden quite often before and knew how to get along with his horse. He was quite happily trotting and galloping around. He even helped hose down and put his horse to bed.

I quite enjoyed the horse riding. If someone had asked me to go before I went last weekend I would have been indifferent about it. But now I would jump at the chance to go again. It's not something that I would push to do again but given the chance I wouldn't turn it down.

My final day and which blind date I went for...

On my final day here I managed to delay my check out time at my hotel so I could enjoy some of the facilities. My flight wasn't till after lunch so I had half a day free to relax.

And, relax I certainly did! I was booked into a 5* star hotel as I wanted to spoil myself for my birthday. The place was quite deserted as it was the low point of the tourist season. I had the hotel pool and surrounding sun lounges to myself till eleven.

It was absolute bliss to sun myself in the morning sun and take a dip into the pool whenever I wanted to. I couldn't imgine a better end to my short break and two long days walking than to relax in the sun beside a nice pool. I must admit that it did cross my mind to delay my flight back to Sydney and take another day holiday. I could have quite easily done so but figured I'll have other holidays later on next month and it was quite expensive to stay here another night.

On my flight home I took some good photos of some of the Australian landscapes.

Here's one of the massive salt lakes that are in the centre of the country. Very impressive from this height, possibly less so from the ground level.

I've had an amazing four days holiday on my own. Seeing Uluru was good, the Olgas impressive, but the long walk around Kings Canyon was something else!

If anyone reading this has a chance to visit this area of Australia then I would recommend that the visit Kings Canyon above all else, despite the attraction of Uluru, the canyon is much more spectacular. Where else could you walk right up to the edge of a 100 metre drop with such fantastic views?

The King and his Canyon.

What can I say about Kings Canyon. Well it is a three hour drive there, four hour walk up and around the rim and back down, then a three hour drive back, that's it.

I almost had a bad accident on my way there. I was much to busy admiring the James Range on my right when I looked back to the road I had veered off to the left. The road is basically just a one lane tarmac strip and I veered off it and then overcorrected to the right went a little sideways and slammed on the brakes. Left some very long skid marks and just managed to maintain control of the car. The last hour of my journey was much less eventful as I barely took my eyes off the road.

I suppose I had better let the pictures do most of the talking. I was very impressed with the Kings Canyon and I can highly recommend it if you are near there and have the energy. Unlike the Olgas there aren't any water points along the 6km loop and I did run out of water before the last couple of km.

Accompanying me on my trip around the rim were Betty, Martha, Ken and Brett. They were my constant companions, buzzing (flying) around my head all day much to my annoyance. They weren't that bad and it was the winter so I can imagine it being much worse in the summer time.

Me near'ish the edge!

You can see the 'beehive' domes which have been created by weathering.

You eventually end up walking along the edge of the left hand side later on.

Me even closer to the edge of the 100m drop!

The view looking back from the third photo.

The canyon rim.

At the end of the canyon creek you can climb down some wooden steps to see a small water area called the Garden of Eden!

This guy was busy sunning himself at the top of the canyon and posing for me too!

Enlarge this photo and read the sign. I though it was quite funny, but obviously not for what it actually meant.

I stayed at Kings Canyon till just before sunset and then started to make my long journey back to the Uluru resort. Once it got dark about an hour into my journey, I was even more surprised by the amount of wildlife around the roads. Roger had warned me to be wary of animals running around the roads at night so I was possibly expecting a kangaroo or two if that.

However, along one thirty minute stretch of road I must have encountered half a dozen kangaroos in separate incidents, one dingo and a couple of rabbits! Most of them were obviously playing chicken and just darted out from left to right just as I was coming along. I had to slam on my brakes every time I saw them run out. One kangaroo and its offspring were in the middle of the road when I came around the bend! I would have taken some photos but I was a little busy trying to control my emergency stops.

Fortunately I managed to avoid them all and got back to the resort without hitting anything, other than the millions of flies and monster dragon flies on the front of my car. I think that having the kangaroos on the roads would be very good for the UK roads to keep the drivers speeds down and alert at night! I certainly didn't go past the recommended speed limit knowing that one might jump out from the bushes beside the road. Much better deterrent than speed cameras I think.

Miss Olga.

In the afternoon of my first full day after Uluru I went to see the Olgas. They are often overlooked as Uluru dominates most of the tourist itineraries. They are around a half hour drive from Uluru.

All I can say is that in my opinion they are much more impressive than Uluru. There is a long three hour walk that you can do that is called The Valley of the Winds Walk and allows you to walk though some of the Olgas. The views on this walk were spectacular and something I will remember forever, especially on my birthday.

It's quite a long walk at a 7.4km walk, but there are two water points along the walk where you can replenish your water supplies and take a rest in some shade.

Some of the views from when the rocks tower above you from either side are awesome. There were very few people doing the long walk, so I could quite easily get away from everyone and be on my own to enjoy the peace and scenery.

I stayed around the Olgas till after sunset and then headed back to my hotel. The sunset was quite good too as I managed to catch the moment when the Olgas change from orange to red to brown just when the sun just sets on the horizon. It was quite a colour change and took me by surprise when I was looking at the rocks.

Miss Uluru.

Well just like all the post cards and photos that you've seen of the big rock. This is it! To be honest when I first saw it it was wow, then as I drove around it to get my bearings, it was; well this is great but why doesn't it jump up and down or move about?

It's impressive at first but I quickly got a little bored of staring at it. It doesn't appear as impressive as the pyramids or The Great Wall. Probably because it's just a natural bug lump in the middle of nowhere. The land around the place is quite flat and just full of scrub. The air views were much better when flying in to Ayres Rock airport.

I was very surprised to see the number of people climbing up it though. Even though it's advertised everywhere that the people here don't want you to climb up it people still do. The reason that you aren't physically stopped from climbing it is because of the money that it brings in. I just can't believe the lack of disrespect that some people have though.

After checking into my hotel I walked around the Ayres Rock resort. I was surprised how touristy the place is. Despite it being low season there were quite a few tourists about. The place is hardly busy but there are enough people here to not allow me to be alone around the rock.

I watched the sunset from one of the viewing points today. I must say that I wasn't too impressed. After all I had heard about the amazing colours at sunset I was expecting more than I saw. Maybe it's better in the summer with a more intense sun. It was hot enough for me at 30 degrees and I can imagine it gets much worse in the summer. There were a few flies but not enough to be anything more than just a little annoying.

I've booked myself on one of the shorter guided tours tomorrow morning and am looking forward to walking around the base and watching the sun rise tomorrow morning on my birthday.

I managed to get up to see the sunrise at Uluru today. That means getting up at 5am for me as the sun rises around 6am here. I decided not to go to the designated sunrise viewing point for Uluru as it would mean the sun would rise behind you which is not what I wanted to see.

Instead I went to the same sunset viewing point that I was at yesterday. Needless to say that it was empty and there were quite a few cars and coaches that passed behind me on their way to the sunrise viewing point. I was surprised how many cars and coaches went there.

The sunrise view was good, but when the sun actually rose and I could see it rising up on the horizon the view was absolutely spectacular! I couldn't believe how beautiful it was to see the sun rising next to Uluru. I was very happy to be where I was and it really made my morning.

After seeing the sun rise I went for some breakfast and then went to a short two hour tour that I had booked yesterday. It was an interesting tour and outlined some of the methods of the Aborigines. The best part though was being able to have a go at throwing an Aborigine spear. I even managed to hit the dummy kangaroo on my first go too. Probably more by beginners luck rather than anything else.