Things I do when I am bored...

... I calculated that during my holiday I travelled 43,200 kilometres or 26, 844 miles. Luckily it was by aeroplane.

New blog

I will update this travel blog with video and bits and pieces as I sort through my files. However, for my local activities etc, you can go here

What have you done today to make you feel proud?

Well, one week later and I think I am finally over the jet lag. The flight home was not too bad actually. From San Francisco to Sydney I had a seat behind the bulkhead which meant more leg room (YAY!) and I could even be a ruffian and put my (shoeless) feet up.  Managed to actually get some sleep.

The young couple sitting next to me were lovely. He was Canadian she was an Australian living in Vancouver. She was taking him for his first visit to the big brown land.  She and I spent an amusing few minutes during takeoff filling him in on how to be a Canadian in Australia. It was hilarious. He had a great sense of humour and provided some hysterical alternative meanings for the pictures on the aircraft safety card.  I considered throwing her off the plane and making off with him... sigh.

Anyhoo, the plane landed in Sydney and I cried. What a wuss. Then we all piled off the plane and I sprinted to the baggage claim to get my bags so I could check in at domestic and catch my connection to Perth. I had two hours. You would think that enough time yeah, expecially as I already had a boarding pass.  Clearly you have not been to Sydney airport lately.

What a @#$%&! #$%@#*&! mess.  First my bags were the last ones off I kid you not. Then I had to sprint to the other end of the terminal to transfer to domestic. The queue of people who wanted to do the same thing actually snaked from the check in counters back into the main terminal.  They only had four counter positions open for people trying to get on flights to all cities in Australia. There were hundreds of them.

Finally got through and bags checked in.Had to queue for customs.  Had to queue again for security.  There were two security check stations. Two.  TWO!!!!!  I looked at my watch and knew that my flight was nearing closure and I still had to get across the tarmac on the shuttle bus. What a total cockup Sydney airport is.  How did they manage during the Olympics???? How embarrassing was it to hear international visitors who had just had very long flights complaining about the facilities?    Bad airport. Bad. The thing is, you now have to go through Sydney when you fly in to the east coast no matter what city your destination is.  My bags had to come off and go through customs in Sydney and couldnt go through to Perth so I could go through customs there. What pillock thought of that?  Even people with a short flight to Melbourne had to do the same. Anyway, it ended up that I made the transfer to the domestic terminal and RAN full pelt to catch my flight.  Just made it.  I have not had to do that in any other place I have been in the world.  Catch up Australia. I mean seriously. Jeeeeeeez.

I had a whole row of seats to myself so stretched out and watched Perfume (Alan Rickman -  sigh), The Dead Girl, and half of Becoming Jane.  Ate food.

Jess and Here Be Dragons were at the airport to meet me. They were holding signs that read: "Welcome Dee. World Traveller" and "Dee, friend to the stars (in particular
Alan Rickman and Daniel Radcliffe)" 

I laughed out loud and hugged Jess and we both promptly burst into tears. LOL.

It has taken me a week to unpack, wash clothes, tidy the house and stop waking up at 2am starving hungry.  I think I am in the zone now.  I also immediately got sick with a cold that both Brenda in California and Jess at home had.  Also, have to get some tests done early next week for a worrying health problem that raised its ugly head when I was in San Fran. So, a bit of a downer there but hope that it turns out to be a false alarm.  I will be back at work on Tuesday and life will assume normal-like proportions from then on.  This is seriously depressing. I am already planning my next holiday abroad which is likely to be New Zealand as things go.

I will be flying to wherever December Boys premieres (Adelaide?) in September and might be going to Melbourne with The Fringed One and Here Be Dragons to see Order of the Phoenix in July.

Perth is small. It is soooooooooo far away from well, anywhere. I feel so out of it here.  Well, I did expect some effects from being away and seeing the world didn't I? 

LOL I had become surpirsingly used to going into a supermarket and seeing 65 varieties of everything.  Shopping back home was a bit of a shock.  However, we have what we need if not everything we want.

So the time has come to end this blog which is a bit sad really.  So to stop the girlie wah wah tears, I am going to start a new blog and post to it.  Enough weird stuff happens to me here to warrant a home-style place to post pics and stuff.  Once I have the thing built, I will post a link here and on Dan's site.

For now, the dream has come to an end. Thank you to all of you wonderful people. I had such a great time meeting with you all and seeing your cities.  You all have a room here if you become insane and want to visit the west coast of Australia.

Keep it real.
Dee

Vancouver and San Francisco

Want to know what this Bill Reid sculpture is all about? Go here

You gotta love it when a naked man greets you at the anthropology museum of the university of British Columbia.

Packing by backpack in SF...

The view from the top of Lombard Street. The windiest (as in bendiest) street in the world. And below the view from the bottom.

Pier 39 Fishermans Wharf SF

Fog creeping up on unsuspecting island in the bay.

Me dining in Sausalito...

A man with a real chicken puppet in a street in SF.  Doesn't everyone?

The wattle tree in my backyard.......

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So this is it...

... the last day.

I am sitting in the lobby of my hotel in San Francisco waiting for Mediterre to pick me up for a last whirlwind tour of the sights before she drops me off at the airport. My flight to Sydney is at 10.20pm. It is all over. I am pretty sad for a range of reasons and will be glad to get back home and process all the stuff that has happened and the stuff that did not get to happen.

I need to post pics of my last few days in Vancouver and the time I spent here in San Francisco. SanFran is pretty cool. I got to do some stuff like watch sealions basking, swimming, fighting and making hideous noise down at Fisherman's Wharf; I rode on a cablecar; shopped in Macy's; went over the Golden Gate Bridge; had dinner in Sausalito where I watched the fog come in over the bridge; went to see Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf at the Golden Gate Theatre; had coffee in the Haight; roamed around Chinatown. Drank California wine which is pretty good; Walked up and down hills. Saw lots of hills. Did I mention the hills? You can hang glide off these hills. Seriously.

So it's not all bad really.

San Francisco is quite like Perth in a lot of ways. They have like almost more eucalyptus trees than at home. In fact, the street trees are almost the same as those you find in Perth. Hell, they even have bottlebrush trees. The people are friendly and the weather is mild. It was lovely and warm while I was there with temps in the 30's. The locals complained about the heat. However, I renewed my tan which had faded alamingly during my time in cooler parts. I really enjoyed the freedom of just wearing tshirt and jeans without jumpers and coats etc.

I am now faced with the trip home. Only 2 more flights. How strange is this feeling? I feel like I have been away for years. Once I get back I will finish off this blog with photos and stuff that I have missed out in previous posts. For now, I will try to get my head around the fact that this epic journey is nearly done and wish you all love until next time.

DUST IN THE WIND -KANSAS
I close my eyes, only for a moment, and the moment's gone
All my dreams, pass before my eyes, a curiosity
Dust in the wind, all they are is dust in the wind.
Same old song, just a drop of water in an endless sea
All we do, crumbles to the ground, though we refuse to see

Dust in the wind, all we are is dust in the wind

[Now] Don't hang on, nothing lasts forever but the earth and sky
It slips away, and all your money won't another minute buy.

Dust in the wind, all we are is dust in the wind
Dust in the wind, everything is dust in the wind.

It is going to be so hard to leave here...

This is the forest walk at the other side of the Capilano Suspension Bridge. The trees are magnificent, tall and straight and beautiful and so GREEN.  Some of the views I saw when I was there were so beautiful it sort of hurt.

OK, so you can see right up my nose but check out what I was looking at...

And at the end of it that wonderful time in the forest, I got to hug a bear.

In other news...

Em and Dee travel by toy ferry to the amazing market place of Granville Island.

The ferry dudes were er... friendly.

This is what Vancouver looks like.

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Whoops, I did it again...

This is a stylised raven an image of an animal that was central to the First Nations People of British Columbia. The art of this area is absolutely amazing and so my Canada tattoo had be something that had meaning on a deeper level.

If you want to see some more examples of Haida art, go here or here.

Oh Em got herself a little tatt as well. Hers is a reference to her profession as an archaeologist. Cute, huh. It's a trowel and brush.

Vancouver

I am in Vancouver. It reminds me a bit of Perth mainly because there is a lot of water right near the city. It is a very pretty place with mountains as a backdrop.

We arrived via the ferry from Swartz Bay which is just out of Sidney. Then we took buses and taxis into North Vancouver where our motel is. On the ferry over we had dinner OMG. Buffet style all you can eat (is reminded again of Homer Simpson). YUM.

The motel is very comfy which is great but next door there was a family of Loud People with a child who obviously has ADHD because at 1am they were still rolling up and down outside the rooms on a skateboard. The family had obviously missed out on door closing lessons in childhood because all they seemed to do when opening and closing doors was wind up and SLAM. I found myself fantasising about all sorts of booby traps within their room and piano wire across the path to deal with the young skateboarder. (note to readers: I am not normally a violent person)

Anyhoo on Sunday morning we went and had Dutch pancakes for breakfast. This is a ZOMG situation, people. I think I died and went to heaven.

After that we went here. It was AWESOME. I tell you, again AWESOME. I hugged a tree and also a giant stuffed bear outside the giftshop.

Then we went off to the Vancouver Aquarium which is in Stanley Park, the much beloved public park of Vancouverites. It has been badly damaged in the ferocious storms that the NW coast suffered this winter but it is still gorgeous (like me, LOL). The Perth equivalent would be Kings Park except Stanley Park is like, flat.

The aquarium was great. Everything there is the Largest in the World (except for the sharks) The otters are HUGE and sooooooooo cuuuute!!! I saw Beluga whales. They are all white and are amazing.

I will post pics in here but now have to go eat brekkie and then out for more fun.

Byeeee. Love you all.