Resonant Constellation

Over the past winter break, I accompanied my father on a trip to Australia to recover temperature sensors placed there last year. This travelogue is a day-to-day account of that trip

DAY 0: TRAVEL 1/2/2009
10 AM (NM)

This day began much as the others over break have, I was woken up far too early and pried out of bed by nagging. Break has been kind of odd, being home after so long away. Soon enough, however, I was at the Albuquerque airport. The ‘short’ 2 hour flight to LAX was uneventful and boring, so not the worst plane flight ever. Arrival at LAX was interesting, as we taxied past all the Qantas planes which we’d later be boarding and arrived at the exact opposite end of the terminal. After a considerable hike across LAX, we arrived at the Qantas check in desk and got our tickets. I was able to upgrade to the seat just behind dad, which you’ll see later is going to be beneficial.

We got through security pretty quickly and generally without hassle. After security, of course there were no good restaurants to go to, so we ended up enjoying a very fine dining experience featuring in a starring role two turkey sandwiches which I am relatively sure had roughly the same moisture content as the Atacama Desert in Chile. After this refreshing intake of sustenance, we finally located our gate for our flight and proceeded to stake out a position near an electrical socket with which to enrich our gadgets with tasty electrons.

This left us at the gate with about five hours before the flight. When we sat down, we were the only people in sight, alone in a darkened, under construction terminal with half of the ceiling missing. Slowly, ever so slowly, people began to appear for the main event, namely a zillion planes departing for every corner of the world. Every location on the departures board is a place I’d love to go, and guess what? I actually get to go to one of them!

Now comes the most interesting part of our adventure so far. It seemed that almost out of nowhere thousands of people appeared all of a sudden, and as we were sitting directly on the main highway of foot travel we had a front row seat to the chaos. And true chaos it was, a teeming mass of humanity seething across our vision, seemingly hundreds every few minutes.

Of note, there were many, MANY asian people, including several crews for a Japan Air flight. I must point out at this time that Japan Air stewardesses have the coolest hats ever. If you’ve never seen them, it’s useless to describe, but they reminded me of some sort of flat fish. We also saw several Qantas employees file past, most of whom turned out to be our crew. As I was watching the crowd, I noticed that every type of ethnicity was represented, from classic aquiline English, to Indian, to American, to Middle Eastern, to East Europe. Oh, and did I mention the Asians? There were a few of them.

During this time, I went back through some of my old photos and adjusted them for upload to the internet. In this region, I’m more than a bit of a perfectionist, so only the very best get out. I bored of this after about an hour, so I began to just observe the people just passing us by, which was entertaining enough to occupy me until the plane arrived. I was happy to see that gaussian statistics were truly borne out. If you try to track any characteristic of people passing by, you will find very quickly that the fundamental theory of statistics holds rather nicely.

While our plane was dallying in the pre-board stage, I met a fellow undergraduate science major on a research trip to Tahiti to study tropical fish. He seemed a personable enough fellow and we generally had an entertaining conversation discussing the utter chaos around us. At this point our plane began boarding in actuality, and I bid him farewell, very likely never to see him again. My row number range was finally called after quite some time, and a rush of people got in what can loosely be described as a line, though I would not like to see the type of non-euclidian space where that is considered a line.

After a few minutes of no line movement, the gate agents announced that “Surprise! There’s not enough busses to take you to the plane! You get to wait an extra 10 minutes in this madhouse.” Busses? I thought, Isn’t this an airport? 10 minutes passed and they announced…that we had to wait for an extra 10 minutes. Because the plane was experiencing “lighting difficulties.” At this point, I’m wondering how long it takes to collimate the headlights on a Boeing 747. Apparently it takes 20 minutes.

But seriously, I later found out that the problem was that lights in the cabin could not be turned out (even later, this turned out to be the lights IN MY SECTION). By now I’ve stopped worrying that things don’t really make sense, I just want to get to Australia. I am finally admitted to the much heralded bus, and O what a bus it is! One of those two section dealies with the rubber flexie joint in the middle. I noticed a rather nervous looking couple on the bus just in front of me, which I felt to be odd, but I didn’t comment. An unnervingly long ride across the tarmac later, we were disgorged by the wheeled wonder and we entered a special terminal boarding building.

It was kind of like a shrine to planeness, and I soon found out that we were in this odd, inconveniently remote location by the divine grace of the U.S. Customs agency. Joy of joys! I think I’ve discovered a new gold medal contender in the Olympic Extreme Downhill Stupidity competition. They’ll have their work cut out for them, though, the current champion the Transportation Security Administration always brings their A-game.

Returning to my main train (or bus as the case may be) of thought, I was seated next to the nervous looking couple from the bus who I found out were Australian. Imagine that. My guess was that they just didn’t like flying. I always find this odd, as every time I get in an airplane, I am amazed by the experience. “I’m flying through the air! HOW DOES THIS WORK? HOOOOLY SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT!” I want to shout. I find it an exhilarating experience.

We taxied all the way to the end of the runway, you know, where they have barriers to stop the runaway planes and sundry? We finally took off almost an hour late and I realized immediately that this plane Does. Not. Screw. Around. There are four engines, and each looks roughly as big as the city busses that I ride in to school. The takeoff powerup is so smooth we can barely feel it, and we climb at a constant angle for several minutes without so much as a jolt. The now distractingly nervous couple sitting next to me decide to move to another pair of free seats with more room at the back of the plane, which gives my dad a chance to come join me and spread out. This results in an incredibly comfortable arrangement and as soon as may be I began my first movie, “The Dark Knight.” This movie was incredible, but as this is not a movie review, I’ll save the pontificating for another day.

During the movie, we had dinner. I chose to have the chicken with cous-cous, which also came with a mini salad, a roll, a little brownie for desert, and some very fascinating utensils. I must say, I thoroughly enjoyed dinner, and afterwards the package of sweets and hot chocolate they gave us was much appreciated.

As it stands now, you’ve caught up all the way to us, and we’re only 5 hours into the flight. In Sydney time it is nearly 11 P.M. which makes Albuquerque time about 5 in the A.M. This is the point when, if I am on the ground and still awake, I usually say: “Shit, I get way too into Call of Duty, I can already see the sunrise. Time for bed!” and promptly spend another hour online before passing out. So, dear constant reader, I believe I shall bid thee adieu for now as I try to get my sleep schedule on Sydney time. More when I awake.
LJS-1/3/2009: 11PM (NSW), 5AM (NM)

Day 1: Sydney 1/4/2009
8 AM (NSW)
We’re still on the plane here and breakfast was just cleared away. I slept wonderfully, a full 8 hours almost without interruption. When I heard that the flight would be 15 hours long, I never imagined that I’d actually be comfortable. One small tidbit I forgot to mention was the complementary care packages that the airline gives us, including:
1 Toothbrush & toothpaste
1 lanyard (?)
1 Sleep mask thingie (you know, the kind you put over your eyes when it’s bright out and you want to sleep–I’ve always wanted one of these and now that I have access I think I’ll be bringing home 5 or 6).
1 pair of socks (????)-This, of course, is too small for me. Perhaps I can construct something useful out of toothbrushes, socks, and lanyards to pass the time. If you see something about this on the nightly news later, you’ll know what happened.

I feel that it’s important to update you on where we are now. Currently, my screen tells me that we are nearly 11500 meters above sea level (we’re still over the ocean), and about 11000 km away from LAX. This number is so staggeringly large, it is nearly incomprehensible. Soon, however, the (what is it, western? eastern?) coast of Australia should become visible out my window. We’re seated on the starboard side of the plane if, as I suppose, starboard means right. My view is out to the starboard bow, where I’ve been keeping a periodic watch out for Romulan Warbirds. So far they haven’t dropped their cloaking devices.

I also feel that it is noteworthy that we are moving at approximately 880 kph. Though others may be annoyed that the entertainment system had to be re-booted for 30 minutes, I’m just in awe of the fact that we’re actually FLYING THROUGH THE AIR. REALLY FAST. Maybe I’m just weird. I am also intrigued by thinking about the differential equation that describes the thrust required to propel this plane at such a fantastic velocity (v=880 kph in the Australia hat direction). I wonder what the fuel consumption of the engines is, and just how much power they put out. Yeah, I’m weird.

Good news, now, though. Outside my window I believe I can see my first glimpse of the (mumble) coast of Australia. I honestly have no idea which direction is which anymore, this southern hemisphere shit is just bananas. Time to destination is now ~1.5 hours. We’re actually passing Brisbane now, which I find to be interesting, as one of my favorite video game reviewers, Ben “Yahtzee” Croshaw lives there. On the world map, our plane icon is nearly above Sydney, though we still have over 1000 km to go. This just reinforces the fact that the earth is BIG. Super big. Sometime while I was sleeping we passed just 60 km off the coast of the Hawaiian Islands, somewhere else I would like very badly to go to. Current Info Summary:
Outside Temperature: -59 degrees C.
Altitude: 11582 meters
Ground Speed: 824 kilometers/hour
Distance to Sydney: 942 kilometers
Distance to LAX: 11221 kilometers
Time to Destination (estimated): 1:25 (H:M)
Time Since Departure: 12:47

RIght now it’s 8:54 AM on Sunday the 4th in Sydney and in Albuquerque it’s 2:54 PM on Saturday the 3rd. Our time machine apparently worked, and we have been transported forwards a day. Interesting note: we crossed the international dateline and the equator where they intersect. We were at the middle of the world! So, my friends, this will be my last entry from the plane. My next entry will come when I am settled in my hotel room in Sydney, Australia. We’re staying at a Holiday Inn, which just seems weird. Don’t they have Australian hotels? We’ll see.
LJS-9:00 AM (NSW)

12:40 PM (NSW)
We are officially in Australia! For the most part, it looks like a normal place, but when you look a little closer, you’ll realize that some things are just a little different. The trees I can see out of my hotel window are of some unfamiliar species, probably eucalyptus, the names of places and even common food items are a bit off here, but the most off putting is the cars.

As Australia is a relatively isolated continent, it stands to reason that they’d have their own cars. This unfamiliarity with the species of car coupled with the plain fact that they are on the wrong side of the road…well, it is simply disturbing. The day, however, is absolutely beautiful; a balmy 80 degrees with slightly higher humidity than I’m used to (we are right next to the PACIFIC FREAKING OCEAN after all). The Sydney public transit system is a true marvel with wonderful double-decker trains. Our hotel here is just two blocks away from the train station, and that station is only two stops from the terminal.

I must note here with a bit of distress that we are in what seems to be the city of Botany Bay. Those of you Star Trek fans out there may understand my trepidation (I’ll be looking out for sand worms and such), however, the fact that nobody has mentioned Alpha Ceti V yet is promising. At this point, the sun is pretty much directly overhead, so there’s no shadows to work with. This simply adds to my confusion. I don’t have too much more to add at this point, so I’ll leave you until tonight.
LJS-12:50 PM (NSW)

5:16 PM (NSW)
We’re back from our trip to the circular Quay, but before I can talk about that, I have to comment on four stories I just saw on the news here. The first was about a young boy from Sydney who had survived being bitten by a death adder. My favorite video clip on this story included a grown man in a Football uniform (this is European football, mind you) holding the hand of a very little girl, and searching through bushes with a cricket bat at the ready. The second was about a drive by shooting on a residence in Adelaide which injured two children. One of the neighbors interviewed said: “It’s scary. I mean, you hear about this kind of thing in America, but it just doesn’t happen here.” The third story was about a car which had been set loose at the top of a hill and careened into an occupied home. The last involved a high number of shark sightings near Sydney that lead to massive beach evacuations. I don’t know what you’ve experienced, but I just don’t hear about that kind of thing in America.
 Seriously, though, watching the news here made me realize that life here is very similar to life in the U.S. Surprisingly so, in fact, which is why I was a little put-off by the comment made about shootings in America. This is clearly a reflection of the remaining international resentment and just plain anger leveled at America since we invaded Iraq. I’m not going to say that America doesn’t deserve criticism: I don’t think it was a great idea to begin with and even without that it was horribly mis-managed creating a much worse situation. That’s neither here nor there, however, my point is that people are far more like us than some of them would like to admit. I find this kind of hypocrisy refreshing, it shows me that Americans aren’t the only misguided fools in the world, we’re just the most prolific. It’s like the eminent sage (and my personal philosophy guru) George Carlin said: “When you’re born you get a ticket to the freak show. When you’re born in America you get a front row seat.”

Anyway, back to our touristy part of the day. We began by getting back on the train and heading further west (I think it was west–the sun is not in the right place, and the moon is upside down here, so I really have no idea what’s what). We first went in search of lunchage and found a pub-looking place in downtown Sydney called “the Observers Bar,” on Observatory Hill. You can tell why I liked the place, any time you combine observatories and beer, I’m happy.

I had the “Famous Burger” which included, among other things, sauteed onions in what seemed like au jus, ham, at least two types of cheeses, and an egg, served sunny side up, on top of the whole deal. I also sampled a pint of beer, this called Toohey’s, which is apparently brewed locally in New South Wales. A dark beer, it was not as dense as Guinness, and quite reminded me of Murphy’s Stout, a southern Ireland favorite. I myself enjoyed it immensely.

Upon finishing lunch, we walked down the street a short ways to a hat shop, where I was able to purchase my very own Australian style hat with the side brim that folds up. I’ve always wanted one of these, so finally getting one, and in Australia no less, is pretty awesome.

We then set off around the Circular Quay (pronounced ‘key’) towards the famous Sydney Opera house. In a massive crowd of people, much like the crowd at LAX, we made our way slowly around the harbor, listening to various aboriginal DIdgeridoo groups playing next to the waterfront. Behind them sat a massive cruise ship, which from some angles looked quite like a building edifice and in it’s scope reminded me of the 747-400 we flew on.

When we got to the Opera House, I was surprised at how textured it is up close, being tiled with 1,056,006 individual tiles. We considered taking a guided tour of the complex, but upon assessment of our collective conditions, we realized that it might be a good idea to go back to the hotel. We got a few drinks and stopped by an ATM on our way back to the train, then took the exact opposite route back to our hotel. The plan at the moment is to eat dinner down at the hotel restaurant, get to sleep early, wake up at 6, and have breakfast. When that’s all done, we’ll take a taxi back to the airport and board our plane to Alice Springs in Northern Territory province (NT). The most intriguing thing about this location is that it is in one of Australia’s half-hour time zones, meaning that even though it’s 6:00 here, it’s 4:30 there. I find this mildly alarming. I’ll be back with more, probably on the plane tomorrow.

Last minute update: the sharks spotted were two hammerhead sharks lured to shore by a dead squid. At another beach, a lemon shark appeared for no apparent reason. People don’t seem too surprised or even worried. Note to self: stay well inland or buy a spear gun.
LJS-6:05 PM (NSW)

Day 2: Sydney to Alice Springs to Uluru/Curtain Springs 1/5/2009
9:30 AM
We’re about to board the plane here in Sydney after what I can only describe as the most ginormous screwup I’ve ever seen. Since my dad and I have the same name (excepting middle initials, which Qantas and the fracking United States goddamned Postal service cannot handle-yet another thing our two countries have in common), we use different titles to make airline reservations together. He registers as “Dr.” while I am merely “Mr.” at least for the next 6 or 7 years. I shudder to think what may have happened had I actually been a Ph.D. This apparently confused our robot overlords at Qantas, who immediately decided that no two people on the same flight can have the same name and promptly cancelled one ticket. Thus began an hour-long run around the Sydney airport, waiting in lines just to find that we had to go wait in yet another line where we could learn that we would have to call a special phone number where we could…you guessed it, wait on the line. At least that was a different type of line.

I know you can’t tell reading this, but I’ve just taken a bit of a break from writing in order to have myself conveyed via air pressure alone many thousands of feet above the ground. I will continue with my regularly scheduled ranting posthaste.

Right, where was I? Ah, yes. After finding out that one of our tickets was cancelled, we had to purchase another ticket at the service desk. Thank the maker that there was an open seat on this flight, otherwise we would have been totally screwed. However, despite all this bullshit, we made it, and our trip is salvaged. When we get back, however, we shall have speaks with the American Qantas representative, and I can assure you that pleasantries will not be topping the list of priorities.

The bright side to this all is that all of the Australian representatives we spoke with seemed happy and accommodating and were generally helpful, if a bit slow-paced. I assure you, if this had happened in America, we would have had some idiot attendant who could have screwed us up even worse. Now they’re bringing around drinks and sandwiches, so I’ll next speak to you from the middle of Australia.

EXCESS NOTE: On our way in to the airport, we heard a wonderful international news story about how Bill “I like mine with lettuce and tomatoes” Richardson, the wonderful Governor of New Mexico has resigned from his appointed Obama cabinet post. Why could that be? Could it be that he was called out on corruption? Bill? NEVER! It’s comforting to hear news from home and to know that things haven’t really changed.
LJS-10:30 AM (NSW), 9:00 AM (NT)

12:09 PM (NT)
It is now noon where I am, and I have entered a strange land. As soon as we got off the plane, I was greeted by a familiar heat that I recognize from the Tucson summer. It’s currently 38〬C and pretty dry outside, just as I like it. Still, the differences are very noticeable; the soil is almost a martian orange-red and the plants have a peculiar green color which seems rather influenced by the soil. Disembarking from the plane is interesting as well, as we exit through two large stairways at the front and back doors of the plane. The Alice Springs reminds me a little of the Albuquerque Sunport, though FAR smaller. In fact, thinking back to all of the airports I’ve been in, this one reminds me most of the Burbank airport in LA where you have to go pick up your bags outside and there’s only one terminal. It’s pretty obvious: if Alice Springs is the biggest thing around here, we’re in the middle of nowhere. Welcome to the outback!

We get our rental car and walk outside to be immediately assaulted by what I think must represent a good three thousand flies and small beasties of indeterminate origin. Based on this data set, I will conclude that Australia contains roughly…over a trillion flies. It’s good to know that my hat is effectively a flyswatter too, this will come in handy.

My next hurdle comes immediately, as we’re crossing traffic lanes. I glance to my right and see a car driving on the wrong side of the road. I am intellectually prepared for this and I have seen this in Sydney, but my instincts still are enraged by this atrocity. For a moment, I am rather alarmed, until I realize that all of the other cars are doing that too. Some strange madness grips these people and I think it’s too late to save them.

Our car is a Mitsubishi 380 (or so the clerk said) and blessedly has a powerful AC. I open the driver’s side door to get in and sit down. Again, my sense of normalcy is assaulted as there is no steering wheel here, nor are there any pedals. All of the necessary accouterments for driving are located on entirely the wrong side of the car. By this point I’m thinking it must be something in the water, but I bravely entered the vehicle nonetheless.

Dad takes the wheel and the mindboggling increases tenfold as we start moving. “And I thought it [looked] bad on the outside!” At the moment we are hurtling down the Stuart Highway at a blistering 130 kph (~80.78 mph). I’d like to note that roads in Australia are not entirely smooth, which leads me to believe that the Australians don’t completely understand driving, which is only compounded by the fact of their insane mirror road side reversal. It might be more useful for medieval jousting, but for driving a car the practice is questionable to say the least.

The plan, for the moment, is to drive to a town called Stuart’s Well to stock up on drinks and other necessary stuff, then to proceed down south to Erldunda (one of many very odd names around here). I expect to see my first Kangaroo today, and this prospect has me somewhat excited. There Will Be Pictures. Besides that, we’ll be passing near to the geographical center of Australia today, which is also an interesting concept.Our last stop today will be Ayer’s Rock, the largest single piece of rock in the world, or so I’m lead to believe. I’ll write more when I get to the hotel room tonight.
LJS-12:49 PM (NT)

UPDATE: 1:37 PM (NT)
We’ve just finished a snack consisting of chicken crisps (ruffles like chips flavored of chicken) and bacon-cheese balls. These last are cheetos (yes, made by the same company) flavored with some strange sort of smoked bacon taste. I ate the whole bag and I’m still not sure if I like them or not, they are truly strange. I also had my first wildlife encounter with a few emus at the gas station. Another interesting note I’d like to make is that they have things called ‘floodways’ on their roads, which are the sites of truck snorkeling. Yes, truck snorkeling. Really, don’t ask. More when it happens.

2:52 PM (NT)
In Australia, adventure abounds. We stopped at our planed gas stop with half a tank left, only to find that they had run out of gas over half an hour ago. This was a little off-putting, though there were other gas stations (actually called petro stations here) nearby (within 50 k). We were asked for a lift by a German who had run out of gas while traveling with his family. They are apparently from Melbourne, and now live there, both of their children having been born in Australia. We passed the time to the next station amicably, talking about the geology around us (flat: imagine the U.S. Midwest with red soils, yellowish-green grasses, and eucalyptus trees and you’ve got it), the wonderful Australian hospitality, and the strange shortage of gas.

We dropped this nice German man off at the next available petro station (it had a single pump and looked about the size of a typical outhouse), and continued on our way. His plan was to hitch a ride on a car going back the other way. The last we saw of him, he was conversing with some fellow Germans at the one pump station. I feel my good deed for the day has been done. Now I want to see big rocks, kangaroos, and spectacular stars.

LJS-3:00 PM (NT)

9:12 PM (NT)
Before I get started, I just have to say again: this is a strange place.

Okay, here we go. When last I left you, I mentioned three things I wanted to see; big rocks, kangaroos, and spectacular stars. So far, two of the three have made appearances, with kangaroos slacking off today. This was slightly disappointing, but I still harbor hope for tomorrow.

After dropping our German friend off, we proceeded to Ayer’s rock (Uluru). Since our hotel was on the way we checked in when we passed by. Very quickly upon entering the park, the rock itself becomes eminently noticeable. It’s a large, orange-red formation, roughly rectangular in shape that juts up out of an otherwise flat plain. The soils for many miles around are an incredible and stunning red color, forming a truly martian landscape…if mars was carpeted in grasses and eucalyptus trees.

We turned off to view another neighboring rock formation first (the name of which escapes me right now) so that we would be at Uluru around sunset. This first formation was nearly the same size as Ayer’s Rock, but it was comprised of many different smaller formations, each pitted and wind-eroded over the eons into intriguing shapes. I cannot go any further now without mentioning the flies. I made a reference to flies earlier, stating facetiously that I Australia was home to over a trillion flies. This was intended as a comical over-exaggeration. Let me assure you in all seriousness that I now believe this to be an underestimate. As soon as I stepped out of the car, I came under fierce and constant attack by at least fifty of the little buggers. This occurred constantly and consistently anywhere outside the car. It was so bad at points that we cut short our photo taking just to escape the bombardment. I grew quite adept at getting flies out of the car once it had started moving.

Despite that, Ayer’s Rock (called Uluru by the natives) was spectacular, an unbelievably large rock pitted and ridged by winds over hundreds of thousands of years. With the light fading and about an hour’s drive back to the hotel, we decided to start back early before the wildlife began roaming around. It’s a good thing we did, because on our way back we encountered a wild herd of camels roaming the road as well as quite a few cattle. We eventually arrived back at the hotel, where we pulled around to our little cabin.

Outside our cabin, sitting quietly and observing the action, was a solitary emu. As we pulled up, the large bird stood and eyed us suspiciously. The sun had already set below the horizon, and darkness was dropping fast, so we flashed our lights at it to try to get it to move off. When an emu is incensed, it can move fast, and in my estimation they would hurt. This bird did not react at all to the lights, instead giving us a questioning look-over. Deciding that this emu was used to human co-habitation, we unpacked the car and carefully edged around the emu, which had been making low grumbling, almost burping noises for the past few minutes.

We decided to head over to the restaurant to catch some food, and with a quick detour around our feathered friend, we arrived in due time. We had steaks for dinner with chips and a small side salad. It was a simple meal, but very satisfying, made all the more enjoyable by an Australian beer, this time Cooper’s extra stout (for dad) and pale ale (for me). Dinner was over quickly, and we sat listening to other patrons, trying to figure out what language they were conversing in (my money is on Dutch). After paying the bill, we wandered out to catch a glimpse of the stars, and I must say I was instantly in awe.

The first thing I noticed was that Orion was upside down. Then that the pleiades and the hyiades were also oddly placed. The next most noticeable feature was everything else, which I had never seen before, including Canopus and the Magellenic Clouds. As my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I found that the array of stars was simply unbelievable, thousands of the little points twinkled down upon us. The most amazing thing was that the moon was still up. We stood, admiring this for a few minutes, and resolved to come back out in the wee hours to catch some truly incredible sights. At that point, we left to go back to the room, and an early bedtime. I’ll continue updates tomorrow, but for now, I need some sleep.
LJS-9:50 PM (NT)

Day 3: Curtain Springs to Coober Pedy 1/6/2009
2:42 PM (South Australia [SA])
Today has been relatively boring so far, as we’ve mostly been driving. Still, we’ve seen some interesting lizards and birds along our way. No kangaroos yet, however. We stopped in several places to get food, drinks, and most importantly gas. We’ve been filling up on gas like it was an obsession at practically every other place we pass. Since these places are at minimum 80 km apart, this isn’t TOO insane.

Outside it’s 41 °C (105.8 °F), and the land around us is entirely what one would expect the Australian outback to look like. There’s trees, grasses, and the omnipresent red soil, and hardly a sign of habitation aside from the road.

Last night we took some astrophotos, and while most of mine came out poorly, one or two turned out very well. Hopefully I’ll have internet so that I can post them to flickr and keep people at home updated. That’s about it for now, we’re headed to Coober Pedy, where we’ll be sleeping in an underground hotel. This shall be interesting.

LJS-3:21 PM (SA)

4:23 PM (SA)
Cruising along at 110 kph, we hit a rough section of road, seemingly made out of large, jagged pieces of rock. Immediately, the road noise increases about ten times, and the car starts vibrating. Soon enough it’s evident: we have a flat. Damn. Just to let you know where we are, the nearest mile marker tells us that it’s about 120 km in both directions to the nearest anything. Damn and blast.

A quick check reveals that our back right tire has blown, but thankfully we have a spare. A quick 25-30 minutes later, we’ve got the spare on and are driving again, only limited to 80 kph. This will get us to Coober Pedy with about half an hour left to check in to the hotel. If all of our remaining tires are sound. The road seems to be just as crappy ahead with no sign of stopping, thus completing the badness trifecta, or in other words; damn, blast, and double damn with an extra heaping of damn on top.

As it’s about 41 °C outside, the tire and all the nuts were roughly as hot as the solar chromosphere, which made the removal process just that much more fun. Now that we’re driving again, the music is off, and I’m listening to every tiny sound the road makes, practically jumping if it’s anything more than normal. I’m also watching the side of the road, and I notice that there’s dead tires all over the place out here. There’s even an abandoned trailer on the side of the road which looks like it’s been here a while. Really makes me feel confident.

We’ve just passed the 93 km marker to Coober Pedy, so we’ve got just under 1:10 to get there at our current speed. The state of the tires is truly worrying now, as they seem to be rather worn. If my guess is right, these tires have never been changed, which puts about 25,000 miles on them. This, clearly, is not good.

I am hopeful that the next time I take out this computer to write something, I will be in Coober Pedy. Until then, stiff upper lip.

QUICK UPDATE:
We also just passed an abandoned station wagon with all of the windows smashed in. Joy of joys.
LJS-4:40 PM (SA)

6:55 PM (SA)
We have arrived, blessedly without another blown tire. We’ve checked into our hotel, which is probably the most awesome hotel I’ve ever seen. It’s carved into the very rock of a hillside, and each room is it’s own little caveulet. This is super, mondo-cool. Coober Pedy is a pretty damned big town for the Australian Outback, and it has opal mines surrounding, and at times intruding into it.

We scouted out a tire-related place of business, and decided to eat at the local pizza parlor, “John’s Pizza Bar,” which apparently has wifi service, though my computer cannot connect. We ordered the plainest pizza we could get, just cheese and tomato sauce, though I was intrigued by the Aussie pizza (tomato sauce, cheese, ham, bacon, egg) and the Americana (tomato, cheese, ham, salami). What makes this last American eludes me, but I guess people here think that’s what we eat.

This brings us to our pizza, by all accounts a satisfying meal after our driving ordeal. Still, something was off, and I didn’t know what, until I reflected back on lunch when I had the Australian version of ketchup, which they call tomato sauce. Could it be? Yes, in fact, the sauce on the pizza is ketchup. Further proof that Australians don’t entirely understand pizza is their so called “Marinara” pizza. Marinara means a red tomato sauce without meat. Their Marinara pizza has: ‘tomato sauce,’ cheese, squid, cuttlefish, octopus, clam, mussels and prawns all marinated in “Italian herbs” (I’d guess oregano and basil) and cracked black pepper. Words cannot describe the bemused confusion I currently feel. Still, I like the idea of that Aussie pizza, I’ll have to bug some Tucson pizza company into making it for me.
LJS-7:23 PM (SA)

Day 4 Coober Pedy to Clare (SA)
12:30 PM (SA)
Well, today is going to be another day of driving, hopefully with all four tires intact by the end. We’ve got an entirely new one to replace the old flat, it looks a little out of place with the three others. Breakfast was interesting. Our choices at the hotel were: wheat toast or white toast. On these we could have: margarine, one of two different types of unlabeled and very strange smelling jams, or vegemite. I opened the vegemite jar and took a sniff. The only way I could describe the scent emanating from the thick, dark brown goo was…well, used motor oil and rotting vegetables. I’m pretty sure that Vegemite is another example of the great Australian sense of humor; Australian #1: “Let’s get this foul smelling stuff and make believe we all like it here. Then we can get a bunch of foreigners to eat it and we’ll see the horrible looks on their faces.” Australian #2: “Freakin’ brilliant, mate!” On second thought, this is far too cruel for the people out here, most of whom are incredibly nice. Or are they…?

After a piece of toast with butter, we went to downtown Coober Pedy and went into several opal shops to get some jewelry to take back to mom. As mom is very particular, we spent quite a bit of time in one shop, looking for just the right stuff. The guy who owned the shop (John of “John and Yoka’s Opal Shop”) was very helpful, and actually mines the opals he sells. He also is the owner and discoverer of the only known opalized fossil fish (very cool looking).

We had a real breakfast at a roadhouse on the way out of Coober Pedy and got stocked up on drinks and odd-flavored crisps. This time, I chose “Burger Rings,” which are like Cheetos, only rings, and they taste like…well nothing I’ve ever tasted before. I also got a Magnum Bar, as recommended by Pete and Sarah_P. I must thank them for recommending this, as it was totally awesome. We’re back on the road now, so I expect nothing until we get to Port Augusta or Clare.
LJS-12:48 PM (SA)

9:48 PM (SA)
We’re in Clare now, which I believe was settled by Irishmen. This is pretty obvious when you take into account the name (from Co. Clare in Ireland) and some local names here too (Daly seems popular, just like it is in the Emerald Isle, and there’s even an Ennis Park). The outback is behind us, and I’m a little sad, it was beautiful and fascinating country, even the bits that were entirely flat out in all directions. I wish I could have stayed longer in the center of Australia, but now we’re on the coast again. I really must resolve to come back.

We had thai food for dinner, and while it was not quite as spicy as the stuff I’m used to, it was still rather good. The scenery here is drastically different than what we’ve been seeing for the past two days. The trees are still eucalyptus, but a different species, and there’s a whole lot more of them. The grasses are also different, they are definitely yellower, and the dirt itself is brown instead of red. Still, the same slightly odd culture persists, and I find it rather intriguing. I must come back here some time when I’ve got a little more time to spend exploring.

I’ve yet to see a real live kangaroo, something which is making me rather annoyed, but I am assured by natives and tourists alike that they are, in fact, out there. Perhaps this is another Australian joke, like the vegemite. It’s kind of cold down here, dropping to about 20. Oh, I forgot, that’s warm for the rest of you, it’s winter back there. HA! HA!

More tomorrow as the story develops.
LJS-10:18 PM (SA)

Day 5: Clare (SA) to Wangaratta (VIC)
3:44 PM (VIC)
Look around you. Just look around you. Do you see: a) A four meter long scale replica of a fish with a sign labeled “Big Murray Cod” standing about 1.5 meters from the fish and pointing directly into its mouth? b) A two meter long chainsaw that looks like it is fully operational sitting on top of a store front advertising new chainsaws? c) A combination compact disc, sewing machine store with a display rack of CDs outside filled with about 300 of the same exact sampler cd? or d) A major highway which does not, in the strictest sense of the term, have any signs indicating where or what, in fact, it may actually be? If you answered yes to any of these questions, you’re either in Australia, or you’re having a very bad drug trip. Either way, stay off the roads, they’re bound to feel about as even as, oh, say, a 1:16 scale model of the Chilean Andes.

The good thing about our epic, seemingly Gigameter drive today is that we’ve entered the state of Victoria, which is back on a normal time zone. Also, Vic has in effect a “Fruit Fly Exclusion Zone.” This concept, when reported to me by signs urging us not to take fruit into the state upon penalty of severe fines or possibly decapitation, seemed ludicrous. There are more flies at a single scenic viewpoint rest stop in the outback than there are grains of sand in the Gobi Desert. If the flies wanted to come into Victoria, there’s nothing the poor Aussies could do to stop the great black, buzzing cloud.

Seemingly, however, they have done the impossible as each time we stop, we no longer fill the car with so many flies that we can’t see out the front windshield (trust me, it happened). This makes going outside actually possible again, which would be a nice concept if we ever stopped. Today has GOT to be the longest driving day of the entire expedition because I saw a sign today stating that it was somewhere around 1100 km to Sydney. If we keep driving like this, we’ll run out of continent probably somewhere around tomorrow evening.

It would be very nice if we could actually spend some time in these places that we whiz by, some of them look very interesting. I’ve seen probably twenty signs warning of frequent kangaroo crossings, and even a couple warning of koala bears. I would dearly love to see either one of these critters, but it appears that we’ve come to Australia to drive, not to actually see anything along the way. I don’t particularly recommend this way of seeing Australia, as the road signage is…well, to call it poor would be an understatement. Let’s just say that in the Clare valley, I saw more signs directing me to local vineyards than I did for major highways, streets, or really anything else. Of course, this presupposes that the major highways in Clare actually have signs somewhere along them that are not related to wine. I’d like to hope they exist, but I never saw one.

Speaking of major highways, this seems to be another of those normal western world things that the Australians had heard about and thought was generally a good idea, but had never actually seen. I include in this list: pizza, spaghetti (served with baked beans for breakfast and apparently at no other times of the day, and of course swimming in “tomato sauce”), geographical variation, road signs, the internet, cereal (look up “Weet Bix” next time you’re on wikipedia, you’ll see what I mean), toast spreads (I think the world would be safer if vegemite were considered a controlled substance), the English Language…The list could go on for kilometers (something they do get right), but I digress. My problem with their main highways (example: the “Stuart Highway” which is, in the words of one resident: “The main route in central Australia from north to south,”). Not only are they uneven, they’re situated rather oddly. Perhaps it’s more accurate to say that the towns are built oddly around them. Most towns that this supposed “main highway” passes through are directly attached to it, many of them have driveways abutting directly onto the road, and ALL OF THEM MAKE YOU SLOW DOWN. This would not be so incredibly bad, except for the fact that there’s so many damned little towns that you’re in a constant state of slowing down.

What I’m used to in the U.S. (call me spoiled) is that the highways are separate from other road systems, requiring on ramps and all sorts of interesting, complicated clover patterns and flyovers and highly expensive bridges in order to actually get on the highway. Once you’re on though, nothing bothers you, it’s smooth sailing the whole way to your destination. No interruptions, no slowing down, and certainly no traffic circles without signs telling you which road is, in fact, which.

*Sigh* I guess I can only hope that the next few days aren’t so intensely focused on driving as they are on doing something (read: anything) else. As always, more as it happens.
LJS-5:00 PM (VIC)

Update: 11:08 PM (VIC)
Just wanted to say: we went out to a local golf course which supposedly was a great place to see kangaroos at dusk. We were there, conditions perfect, and yet…no kangaroos. I really want to see a kangaroo before I leave here, I don’t know when I’ll be able to get back and NOT seeing one seems somehow…wrong. More tomorrow.

Day 6: Wangaratta to Albury
11:15 AM (VIC)
Today is a sensor day, meaning that we’re going to be collecting (hopefully) six temperature sensors left in a meadow on a mountain. Today we’re passing into a region of Australia where most of the political divisions are called “Shires.” Also, we just passed a sign pointing to “Buckland.” I’m expecting some little people in green cloaks to come darting across the road riding kangaroos at any moment now. I can dream, can’t I?

We’ve so far passed two dead kangaroos on the side of the road, but no live ones, giving me to believe that they only exist in a state of being hit by cars. Also, a bunch of pine trees have been transplanted here from asia, which clashes with the native eucalyptus and other species. It almost makes me feel like I’m at home, if it weren’t for the kangaroo crossing signs and odd place names (Mt. Beauty, Dinner Plain, Yamaramagongon, Wagga Wagga, etcetera).

Perhaps one of the oddest things about this place is that it’s the middle of summer and there’s christmas decorations up everywhere. Children are all on summer vacation now, and they just had boxing day. If this does not seem odd to you and you are from the northern hemisphere, then something is seriously wrong. Seek help.
LJS-11:27 AM (VIC)

Quick Update: 6:42 PM (NSW)
We’re in Albury, having successfully collected all six sensors, all of which recorded data perfectly. Nothing else TOO interesting to report, except that we’re going to go looking for kangaroos early tomorrow. Horray!

9:08 PM (NSW)
We’ve just had dinner in an interesting restaurant called “Taco Bill’s Authentic Mexican Restaurant.” Walking along the streets of Albury, we espied this out of place establishment and paused outside, considering the menu. On the menu, we were surprised to see a “Nuevo Mexico Enchilada Plate,” Needless to say, we were overtaken by some insane urge to see just how odd the Ausies could make our native food, so we ventured inside.

I was surprised at the decor, which would not have been all that out of place in a Gardunos restaurant in Albuquerque. We ordered a pair of beers and each asked for the Nuevo Mexico plate, extra hot. This is, perhaps, where I made my mistake. When the waitress asked for hottness on a scale of 1-10, I said I’d like 100. When I got my plate and took the first bite, I had to sit back a little, as the food was spicy enough to nearly kill my tastebuds. The Australian idea of spicy is vastly different from the Mexican or New Mexican idea. Namely, the Australians aim for just getting things as spicy as possible, often just putting raw capsaicin on their food. In North America, the food may be just as spicy, but the point is not the spiciness, it’s the flavor.

After managing to get through the dinner and ordering milkshakes for desert, we listened to a rousing rendition of “Happy Birthday,” sung in a distinctive Australian accent and punctuated by cheers of “Hip! Hip! Horray!” I think we ought to send the owner of the restaurant some real New Mexican chiles, just to see how they react. In any case, my milkshake, a flavor whose name I don’t recall beyond the fact that it was 
“Blue Something,” was good and tasted of shortcake.

In short, we had a culinary adventure. Next time, I’ll be more careful.
LJS

Day 7: Albury to Goulburn
5:15 PM (NSW)
Today, our plan was to go to a wildlife sanctuary and catch some kangaroo &c. action. We had this mapped out, but for some reason we could not find the highway exit to the correct place. We ended up passing on it, since we didn’t want to have to turn back. My general attitude was: ‘Oh well, maybe there’ll be an opportunity later.’
We drove northeast and arrived for lunch in Coomba, where we had hamburgers which were truly splendid. After lunch and gas, we continued on our way, heading for the last sensor site at Tindury. Along the way, we saw several dead kangaroos on the road along with a dead wombat (surprisingly large). This proves that they’re still out there somewhere, just not anywhere we can see them. I have the sneaking suspicion that they’re always on the other side of the road from where I’m looking.
While driving up to the sensor meadow, we paused for a moment to get out the GPS system, and a local car stopped beside us.

“Do you know where you are?” the woman asked us. We assured her that we did, in fact, know exactly where we were, as we had just gotten out a GPS unit. We followed her down to the sensor meadow and parked the car. Outside, I instantly became aware of the sounds of the forest, including the call of a laughing kookaburra. This sound, along with other bird calls and the ambient sound of the forest made the experience truly eerie, like a primeval rainforest. After a short walk and a little trouble with the GPS position, we found the first sensor. On our way over to the second sensor, dad exclaimed sharply:
 “Holy crap, there’s a giant snake!” I stopped immediately. Giant snakes in Australia are generally not good news. I located the reptile, which turned out not to be a snake, but some form of really huge, poisonous looking lizard. I still have no idea what it is, but I’ll find out somehow. It was mostly blackish, but mottled with bright orange and a yellowish color. I took a few quick photos, and walked away carefully, paying close attention to the ground around my feet. We located the sensor quickly after this and scuttled back to the car.

We began driving again, but almost immediately we heard a disturbingly loud pop sound. After about twenty meters, the familiar sound of a flat tire filled the car. That’s right, folks, another flat tire. Now, I’m going to assume you’re probably a relatively intelligent person, smart enough to use basic deductive logic. Which tire do you think blew, one of the two front tires which are of the same brand, the back left tire, which is of the same brand of the tire that blew previously, or the brand new tire on the back right? If you’re a normal person, you’d probably guess that it would be the back left one, right? That type of tire has already been known to go flat, so it makes sense to conclude that it could happen again. Well, you’d be wrong there. You’d also be wrong if you guessed one of the front tires too. Yes, friends, it was the brand new back right tire that went flat.

I inspected the entire tire and discovered a ~1.5 centimeter gash across the treads of the tire horizontally. This is pretty much exactly the opposite type of breach than I would expect from a rock, which seems more likely to breach the tire along one of the grooves. This type of fracture seems more like a stress fracture to me, and since this tire is less than four days old, I have to conclude that we were given a defective tire. Horray!

As it stands now, we’re down from the dirt road and we’re passing Canberra, the capital of Australia. Our next stop is Goulburn, about 80-90 km away, or about an hour at our current max speed. Okay, dear constant reader. Hopefully next time I write will be when we’re safely in Goulburn.
LJS-5:36 PM (NSW)

6:51 PM (NSW)
Finally, after almost eight days of waiting, I have seen kangaroos. While driving just outside of Canberra, I noticed some animals that looked almost like grazing deer in a forest. Soon enough, we could see a field to our left, and there were definitely NOT deer, there were giant hopping rodents. We pulled over as soon as possible and walked a short ways back to the field, where I was able to get a ton of pictures of the ‘roos with my telephoto lens. There seemed to be a lot of big ones, and just a few little ones. A couple seemed to start a fight as we were watching, bouncing all over the place around each other.

When these finally hopped out of view, we crossed the road to see if there were more around. I was doubtful at first, but soon enough, I saw a group of three standing on a hillside, watching us as we approached the roadside fence. These were a little farther off than the first group (perhaps 300 meters). Soon, though, I located about twenty more, grazing near some trees to the right of the original three. Even more showed themselves by hopping around in the background. There were so many around that I began to think that all of the kangaroos that I hadn’t seen on our over 4200 km (and counting) drive had gathered here. Still, given population statistics, it’s possible that we passed many such groups on our drive and just never saw them. These odd little critters do blend into the grasses very well.

The best way to see them, in fact, is when they’re moving, a fluid, graceful, and surprisingly agile movement. As they jump, the tail balances the head, and both bob up and down like a lever set in oscillatory motion. Perhaps the most surprising thing about their movement was that they move so fast. I almost expected them to make a ’sproing!’ noise as they jumped about. I was also struck by the cranial similarity to north american deer. Imagine putting a deer head on top of a relatively shaggy and fat rat, giving it a very thick and muscular tail, and clown shoes for feet, and you begin to approach what a kangaroo looks like. Still, I think they look really cool, and mostly I’m glad that I got to see them.
LJS-7:07 PM (NSW)

9:56 PM (NSW)
I’ve just discovered what lizard that we saw, and I’m relieved to report that it’s a Blotched Blue Tongued Skink, a non-venomous lizard, and actually quite beautiful if you’re not scared shitless. Our wildlife tally includes: dead kangaroos, live kangaroos, a dead wombat, dead wallabies, a dingo, cows, sheep, horses, skink, cocatoos, emus, kookaburra calls, and signs for Koalas (just signs). So far, I have to say it was pretty awesome.

Today we also saw a giant sheep named “The Big Merino,” a statue of a sheep in a wool-intensive area of Australia. I got some great pictures in front of it. I sense some great facebook profile pictures coming on!

LJS-10:09 PM (NSW)

Day 8: Goulburn to Sydney
2:57 PM (NSW)
We have made it. Our long, sometimes arduous, often distressing, ultimately incredible roadtrip across half of Australia traveling over 4500 kilometers is finally over. The best part of this is that we no longer have our stupid Mitsubishi “Crap Mobile,” and we don’t have to worry about those damn tires ever again. I did enjoy the road trip when taken overall, but before I get into my conclusion-mood, let me summarize what we did today.

Directly after breakfast, we went back to the Big Merino, which was open. Inside, I found a beautiful looking Didgeridoo, which I purchased. I plan to actually learn how to play it when I get back home. When we purchased this, we were under the impression that the shop itself could send it to the U.S. for us, but once we had purchased it, we discovered that they actually didn’t. This was mildly distressing, as we now had an object which was a little over a meter long and basically no way (shy of bringing it on the plane) of getting it back. And of course, since it’s Sunday, no post offices are open.

We planned on asking at the airport about any post offices that might be open early Monday morning, but when we got there to turn in our accursed rental car, the ‘Shitboxe Deluxe,” we heard that there was a post office in the airport, and even better, it was open! This would never happen in the U.S., as most of the lazy-ass postal workers we have take every possible day off, and when at work, barely work at all. This discovery probably saved my life and/or back, as lugging the instrument through airports might not be great for my health.

A quick cab ride to our hotel, and we have arrived, free of the “Horrible Death Car of Extreme Unluckitude,” and ready to fly back home. At this point, our plan is to stay in the hotel for dinner and breakfast, and catch an early shuttle back to the airport for our epic 35 hour day. My next entry should probably be from the plane, as we’re flying Northeast over the Pacific.
LJS-3:21 PM (NSW)

Day 9+: Sydney to Tucson…I Hope
2:37 PM (NSW)
[/rant]Oh dear God, this is not a good development. I was sitting down near the terminal for our flight, QF11, hoping I only had an hour left to wait until our 3:20 takeoff time when a gate agent approaches the assembled passengers and says:

“Attention, passengers for Qantas Flight QF11 to Los Angeles, we’re sorry to announce that your flight has been delayed until…[wait for it] 6PM because of a ‘mandatory engineering check.’ We are sorry for any inconvenience.” AARG!

But seriously now, an engineering check? A mandatory one that takes almost three hours? EIther something is seriously wrong with our plane (I’m imagining that either our plane has literally fallen to pieces and that they have to put them all back together in order by hand, or that no two planes are, at this time, not on fire), or somebody screwed up big-time with their scheduling.

I wouldn’t even be so angry if it were just a 1 hour delay, or even a 2 hour delay, but 3 hours brings us dangerously close to our layover time in LAX. As it stands, I may just make my plane to Tucson if I’m exceptionally lucky, and I give 3:1 odds that dad will miss his plane to Albuquerque. I’d really really like to know just what the hell is going on with our plane and why, exactly, it’s going to take three fracking hours. I’ll update next time I hear something, probably bad news [\rant].
LJS-2:50 PM (NSW)

8:30 PM (NSW), 2:30 AM (AZ)
Holy shit, well, at least we’re in the air now. We took off an hour later than even our delayed time predicted, finally taking off just after 7 PM Sydney time. This is kind of screwing us over, as the four hour delay entirely eats up our layover. If the plane really hustles, we’ll make our predicted landing time of 12:10, but this seems ridiculously fast to me. Who knows, it might actually happen.

Still, this isn’t our originally intended plane, that one had a problem during regularly scheduled maintenance, namely the fuel pump on the number 3 engine was broken. Continuing our entertainment tonight, our new plane had “fuel discrepancies,” in the fuel tanks. JOY! So it took about an hour to clear that up, and we’re finally in the air. Jesus christ. By this point, I’m expecting the back right tire to go flat when we land. As it is, even if nothing else goes wrong, we’ll be hard pressed to make our connecting flights. At this point I really just want to get home in one piece.

Okay, friends, I’ll probably talk to you next either when I’m at home or when I’m waiting for another flight at LAX. Christ.
LJS-3:04 AM (AZ)

3:39 PM (AZ)
Well, I made it. Miraculously, I managed to get to my plane to Tucson on time. Unfortunately, Dad wasn’t as lucky, and he’ll have to get a later flight back to Albuquerque.

To catch you all up, our Qantas flight finally landed at 12:42 at LAX, and we spend about 15 minutes taxiing all over the damned place until we finally arrived at our satellite terminal with the busses (just the reverse of going to Sydney). This time, we waited ten minutes after the plane had stopped before they opened the doors (for no apparent reason). I rushed down to the bus and we got over to customs quickly. Mercifully, customs moved fast, and I was at the front of the Qantas International terminal by 1:20 PM.

A very friendly info agent helped me out by telling me where the Southwest terminal was and giving me the time. He said that it was an eight minute walk from where we currently were. I made it in six. Keep in mind as well that I was also carrying my 7-8 kilo bag without a trolley (you have to pay for them at LAX). I’m proud of how I did there. I’d also like to note that the Southwest terminal is located as far as physically possible from the Qantas terminal, literally the very farthest gate away of all of them. My wrists hurt now.

I printed out my boarding pass, got through security, and arrived at my gate at roughly 1:35 PM local time (luck was smiling on me for once today, it was about ten meters outside of the security checkpoint!). This gave me time to actually contact dad, who had just gotten his checked bag through customs, but was going to miss his flight. I’m sure Qantas will be hearing from him in the near future.

So, I’m in the air to Tucson, and this will be the shortest flight of my entire trip, clocking in at just over 1:20. I can scarcely believe that it actually left on time and that I had no problems with it. I must say, it is wonderful to be back in the United States. As much as I enjoyed Australia, I like being able to understand the accent without a conscious effort. I’ll make the next (and I hope to all that is good and holy FINAL) entry when I’m safely back in my apartment in Tucson which I hope is still in one piece after 20 days of my absence.
LJS-3:56 PM (AZ)

Closing Remarks (in Tucson):
Well, despite all the craziness on display today, I made it back in one piece and even on time. So what have I learned on my trip? Well one thing is that when traveling long distances in Australia, it is good to carry extra tires, perhaps even a whole set. I’ve also learned that left-side-of-the-road driving is just as insane as I’d always thought it was, and I doubt anything will change my mind on that point.

Still, many positive things have come out of this trip. I saw some incredible and unique creatures in Australia, and I experienced a wide range of environments and creatures. The broad strokes of the culture there aren’t so different from culture in the U.S. What makes it a unique place is the little things, small differences which often seem crazy give the country a decidedly foreign feel. All I can say now is that I had fun on the trip, and I can’t wait to go back.

G’Day, mate!
-LJS