There's sweet FA in WA

And that's what's so great about it!

Western Australia or WA is Australia's largest state, and that pretty much puts it at about the same size of half of mainland Europe. Over the last week Emma and I have been exploring it, or a very small part of it, namely a 1500km long stretch of coastline that unravels north of Perth, in an attempt to get in touch with the 'real' Australia. We realised that the most economical way to travel through this part of the country would be to hire a car, camp in the bush and on the beaches along the way, and cook our own food.

Our route took us along parts of the coast but also over vast tracts of inland wilderness; the famous Australian outback. It is a unique experience to drive through such an environment. Seemingly endless sections of straight road are surrounded by a consistent mess of bush, tracks that venture off the road look promising but soon peter out into impassable quagmires of sand, and the occasional fuel-selling roadhouse provides the only major evidence of human influence in an environment that is simultaneously beautiful and inviting but deceptive and deadly. I suddenly attained a great respect for the explorers who first came to this continent and had the nerve to attempt to stray into the unknown red centre of the country in order to try to cross it from the south to the north. The first explorers to survive the crossing died on the return journey.

On top of experiencing the outback we found numerous deserted beaches and visited several national parks and marine reserves. Emma's writing more about one of the highlights of the journey, Ningaloo reef, in her blog, which you can reach via my sidebar.

I'm going to write a little about the intriguing stromatolites of Hamelin Pool, Shark Bay which we found on our second day, 800km north of Perth. Bill Bryson mentions these interesting biological phenomena in his hilarious book Down Under, and after having read the book in Peru I was keen to visit them if ever I had the opportunity to.

Stromatolites are deceptive. They look like rocks, and they more or less are rocks, but with an extra twist. They're alive. These intriguing creatures once dominated life on earth for 2 billion years. They consist of a primitive form of bacteria known as cyanobacteria, which collectively join together and trap sediment. Over time, this materializes into a tangible structure which, on a long enough timescale, grows and spreads. When geologists first visited Shark Bay they were amazed to find evidence of stromatolites living today, as it was previously believed that there were no modern day examples of an organism which once dominated the earth and eventually evolved in to all other living things. The stromatolites of Shark Bay exist because the hypersaline waters of Hamelin Pool prohibit any of their natural predators, which include sea snails, from grazing on them and destroying them. A different species of stromatolite exists somewhere in the Bahamas, and there exist freshwater versions in Mexico, but otherwise the stromatolites of Shark Bay are unique. It was amazing to gaze in to the water below the boardwalk and see evidence of one of the first forms of life that miraculously spawned out of the primordial soup.





Here are some more pictures from our trip.











We're now back in Perth and are looking forward to spending a couple of days south of Perth (in one of the wine regions, not coincidentally) with my cousin Emma. Then we'll be off to Darwin to spend a few days in Kakadu National Park (think Crocodile Dundee) before changing countries again. Indonesia beckons!

City, flight, city, ocean, city, long bus ride, city, cancelled train, city...

If the last week is anything to go by, Australia must be composed of a number of huge gridded cities, linked by extremely long roads.

I think that that is probably generally true, but not the whole truth. It's like saying that love is a chemical reaction between two people that invokes an emotional response in both. It is true but completely misses the point.

You see, the only Australia I've seen so far is the quite boring part of Australia, namely its cities. After experiencing Sydney I flew to Melbourne to meet up with Emma and Matt, and I was left a little disappointed. I'd heard people say that Melbourne was a world class city. It's world class in the sense that it's big and has lots of trendy wine bars. But it don't got soul. The highlight of our time in and around Melbourne was, to be honest, the latter; the around. The three of us hired a car to explore the Great Ocean Road. It is all three of these things, so top marks to the Victoria Parks Authority for naming it. Lower marks go to its park wardens, who evidently don't approve of people like me pulling handbrake turns in its car parks.

You see, the only reason I was pulling a handbrake turn was to achieve an optimal position in the parking spot. The fact that it was a disabled person's parking spot certainly did me no favours when I looked up to find the park warden looking up at me with an expression that included contempt, extreme disapproval and just a hint of admiration at the fact that I had the audacity to pull it off in front of him. He gave me a slap on the wrist and sent us on our way. I'm running out of time on this machine so I shall be quick - here are some pictures:







I'm really running out of time now so the story of our missed train journey will have to wait. Suffice to say I'm currently in Perth and Emma and I are heading on a 7 day adventure up the west coast. Bring on the real Australia!

A hop over the Tasman to the West Island

Or the name that the residents of this large, dry and deadly country like to call it: Australia.

After a couple of days in Auckland I stepped on a plane bound for Sydney, a city that until I was a teenager I always thought was the capital of Australia, before I found out the administrative centre of this former British penal colony outpost of a country is instead located in Canberra, which according to Bill Bryson is an infinitely more boring and frustratingly homogeneous city someway inland of where I am now. I'll take his word for it.

Sydney AIN'T boring. It's fragging cool, to use a pseudo-swearword-cum-adverb that I am known only to use when I'm praising something in the superlative. (The English experts amongst you would be correct but pinickity to remind me that the superlative of fragging would in fact be fraggingest; please don't waste your time emailing me). Anyway, to get back to the subject. I was quite taken aback when I had my first nighttime view down William Street towards Sydney's main CBD (it has two) on my arrival in the Kings Cross district. All the skyscrapers were lit up and shone high above the busy streets below. It really is a beautiful city at night.



Unfortunately the flash on my camera doesn't work. In fact, the camera makes crunchy noises when the lens comes out and as such, I don't have any good nighttime shots of this city, so you'll have to imagine it. I strolled down in to the city and explored some of the many parks before reaching the harbour. My stomach leapt when I had my first view of the Opera House. It looked great in the photos but it's something else to see in the flesh, glistening and crouching over the edge of the water. On the other side of the harbour is the rest of Sydney, and the Harbour Bridge hangs between the two like a coathanger destined for greater things.





For all of Sydney's charm I am, after all, on a tight budget, and when you are on a tight budget in a city where you could happily spend away the entire inheritance of an heir to the throne of a minor Emirate country in just one evening, you get bored quite quickly. Therefore, I'm quite looking forward to getting to Melbourne tomorrow. I've heard it's an equally fragging cool city. Possibly the fraggingest coolest nizzelest city in Australia.