365 Challenge

Hey everyone,

I've not posted on this site for a while as the 365 challenge is taking up all my blogging allocation! There's quite a few new updates on that site so either click on "the 365 Challenge" on the left hand side bar------->

or you can go to it at http://365skilz.blogspot.com

I promise I'll post more on here soon.

Cycle Chat

Just a wee update on my times (as I've broken the 45 and 35 min barriers now).

To work - 43min 22sec

Home - 34min 54sec

Obviously the next plan would be to try and beat 40mins to work and 30mins home but I don't know how possible that'll be but I'll keep you in the loop

How Many Tankers can you Count?

We were at Nobby's beach at Newcastle and there were several folk in the water trying to catch a wave. As it is the norm here, they didn't seem out of place. However, Newcastle is a massive port town which is a world power in coal exports and as you can see from the above picture, there were loads of tankers floating close to shore. I counted 29!!! and I was shocked that people still swim in the water here. Click on the image and see how many there are.

Cessnock (with an Australian accent)

On the way to Newcastle, the the bus went through this little town which wasn't much bigger than it's Scottish namesake. They were similar in name only though (as the picture shows) and the main street reminded me of "Rock Ridge" from the film Blazing Saddles. Once you go any distance out of Sydney the towns all begin to take on this American-style architecture. As Isla said, you automatically expect everyone in these towns to have an american accent.

I had to take this picture on the way out of Cessnock as Susan was mentioning how funny the names in Oz are. Try saying this quickly with a mouthful of yabbies...

Pelicans

We used Newcastle as the base for our trip to the Hunter Valley. While we were exploring we came across this wonderful sight. There was a bunch of guys fishing on a rocky outcrop and getting totally soaked. A couple of them broke off from the main group to clean and gut the fish out. Within seconds they had this massive audience of gulls and pelicans. It was really cool watching the birds waiting patiently wait to be fed the innards. Incidently, don't you think this looks just like the East Coast of Scotland.

One for the Doctors

After our cycle up to Summer Bay from Home and Away (or Palm Beach as it's really known) I filmed this clip to show some of the Docs back home what they are missing from a lifestyle point of view.

Click here to see what Doctors in Australia get to see every time they look out the Hospital window.

Sikh and ye shall find...

The one thing about trying to save the world and be all green and consciencous about carbon emissions etc, is that if public transport goes off-line then you are screwed.

That's what happened tonight. I finished my shift at 6pm and got to the train station at 6:30pm. However, when I arrived, there was a train at the platform and two others on either side of it. None of them were moving anywhere and in the distance a fourth train had arrived and sat on the outskirts of the station doing nothing.

After waiting for 20 mins in confusion there was an rubbish announcement that said something along the lines of, "Erm, Hi. I'm afraid that the we will not be moving. We will inform you when we have some more information."

Well I waited about 20 minutes more and there was no announcement and still no movement. I phoned the help line and an automated message told me that there was a carriage broken down on the Harbour Bridge however they had put no buses put on as yet and they had no idea when the train problem was going to be sorted out.

After an hour of waiting I decided that I was going to have to take a taxi home. Normally I would have had my bike with me but the bloody thing had a flat this morning so I had taken the train to work. I walked out onto the main road and waited for another 10 minutes for a taxi to go past. Eventually one turned up and stopped for my hail.

It was a Sikh bloke in his 50's and he seemed quite decent. He was Punjabi and once he heard that my dad was Indian his chat became diamond.

The ride took about 15 minutes and in that time he passed on some of the most amazing advice ever. His points were (in no particular order)...

1. Don't ride your bike in Blacktown as it will get stolen from you.

2. Money isn't everything - you can't have anything if you don't have a life?!?!

3. Australia is a great place to live.

4. You don't understand why you Dad behaves the way he does until you are a Dad.

5. Have a son before the age of 35 and he will be strong.

6. Have a child soon just to "try it out".

7. Don't eat in restaurants or hotels as they recycle unused food from your plate.

8. Hotel owners don't eat at their own hotels - they only eat at home.

9. Don't trust anyone's cooking except your wife's.

10. Isla should cook all my meals.

Quality. It was pretty good banter and it killed the time. However, I didn't realise that the meter was spinning round at warp speed and when we eventually got to my street it was touching $40. Crap.

At least I got home. The cabbie had told me that there was 1000 people stranded at Central station and I was glad to pay the fare. My street is right by the station and there were at least 50 people standing waiting for cabs. It looked like he was in for a rich night.

I love photo shop...

This doesn't have much to do with Oz but I took this photo at the Sydney Wildlife World of a python. It's not a bad photo but look how much better he looks with a bit of tinkering on Photoshop. I love it! I'm almost tempted to put all my photos through this treatment.

CSI: Sydney

What the hell was going on here???

Simon and I had a couple of jars at the Stoned Crow and ordered 2 schooners of Bees Nees. It was not bad but when Simon got the the bottom of his glass there was a mental crime scene finger print effort going on with Simon's glass.

Don't know where it came from and it certainly didn't fit with either of our hands so we had to assume that the barmaid was mingin' and hadn't washed her hands. Yuk.

Chow Down Under Up Above!

Today was my first Saturday off in about 5 weeks and Isla and I pushed the evelope by cramming in as much as possible. We went to the Wildlife World and the Aquarium. However, far and away the best part of the day was lunch...

For Xmas Matt, KP and Nick had paid for us to have a meal at the top of the Sydney Tower. It had taken us a while to get round to booking it but today was the day and it was amazing.

We had the buffet option which let us spend almost 2 hours at the top of the Tower smapling all the tasty food. We also had a brilliant bottle of white to wash it all down with.

I can't even begin to tell you about the view. You really have to get over here and see it for yourself. Breath-taking doesn't even remotely cover it and the best thing is that the tower rotates so it doesn't matter where you are sitting - you get the full 360 degree treatment. The picture above gives you some idea but really it's nothing on the real deal.

MASSIVE THANKS to the gang for hooking us up with the meal. It was totally appreaciated.

Teppen Yaki

Last night was great. We managed to catch up with Kag and Simon for the first time in almost 8 weeks. We've been a bit poor at keeping in touch with them which is appauling since we only stay about 5 miles away from Manly.

Anyway, the guys cruised over to our neck of the woods and we took them for teppenyaki at one of the local Japanese restaurants in Crow's Nest called Hama. It was great fun and as always there was egg and rice flying everywhere as tipsy diners tried to catch food in their gobs. We sank a few glasses of red and then spent the rest of the evening in the Stoned Crow chatting and sampling a couple of beers.

A fantastic night which ended in promises of not leaving it so long till next time.

33C and Climbing!

I have to say that I'm really enjoying the cycling round here. The scenery is amazing and there seems to be an endless array of natural wonders round every turn. This photo was taken at Akuna Bay Marina where we stopped after a crazy downhill for some juice and bottle refills on yesterdays cycle.

Tony took this opportunity to explain how the local area has been formed over the millenia by the erosion of the plateau resulting in all these natural harbours and steep fijord-style lake sides (Where's Derek when you need him!) The unfortunate thing about that is that what goes down must come back up again so from the Marina we had an hour long slog back up to where we started.

The climb was pretty difficult but we all managed it despite the temp on my speedometer reading 33-35C. Marcus and I were a bit over confident and took up the dare to ride to the bottom again (when we were already 2/3 of the way up) and then try and catch the mountain bikers. I caught Pete but Kelly and Tony evaded my attempts at persuit.

All in all a fantastic day again with some very pleasant and well deserved beers at the Pymble Hotel as a reward. Incidently, don't you think the guy in this pic looks a bit like Sam Moqbel?

Spoke too soon!

Sorry but I couldn't help writing this story up. Not cause it's that interesting but because I wanted to use this title/pun.

Anyway, as you know I've been cycling to work every day. It's 18.3km each way and its uphill on the way in and down hill on the way back, more or less. When I did my first test ride to the hospital and back it took me 51 minutes to get there and 42 minutes to get back.

I decided to set myself the goal of getting a time of less than 45 mins to the hospital and less than 35 mins home. So far my fastest time home is 35:17sec so I'm almost sub-35, but last night in the pouring rain I blasted myself up the highway and to the hospital in 43:47sec which smashed my previous fastest time of 45:33sec.

I was so stoked up and ready to murder my time home that it took me a few moments to realise that something was wrong with the bike as I wheeled is out of the Emergency Dept this morning. The brakes at the back were rubbing on one side of the rim and altering their position made no difference as there was a hugh buckle in the wheel. As I was trying to figure out what to do with the wonky rim I realisd that a spoke was loose. Closer inspection revealed that it had snapped - how I don't know - and either caused the buckle or been caused by the buckle.

I was gutted, not because the wheel needs to go into the shop and not because I might miss our club ride on Thursday and not because I missed an oportunity to get a good time home - but because for all I know the brakes were rubbing the whole way to Hornsby last night and if they hadn't I might have pulled a sub-40 time out of the bag! I suppose I'll never know but... Grrrr!

Cheap as Chips (well Sushi Actually)

Mmmmmmm. Isn't this picture mouth watering?

Well it would be if you were a fan of sushi. In the UK I eat sushi every chance I get so it might surprise you to know that since I've got here I've only had one piece of sushi that I bought in the first week from small vendor in the city.

It was horrible and made me boke as it was full of some kind of mayo that was disgusting and made me feel like I was swallowing a tube of slime wrapped in seaweed. You get the picture.

Anyway, today I was walking passed the cafes near the flat and ventured a look in one that sold sushi. I picked up this take-away box for $6!!! Can you believe it? 24 pieces for about £2.40! In Ichiban in Partick the 12 piece mixed sushi platter is £12 (about 30 Aussie dollars) which I could use to buy 5 of these here - that would be 120 pieces of sushi. Chow-tastic!

As for the quality - well Ichiban wins by a considerable margin, however, it was not too bad and I can see myself getting back on the Sushi Train again (no pun intended for those of you who have eaten at "Sushi Train").

Track side screams

So I'm trying to stay awake as I'm on nights tomorrow and I tend to spend the night before hand awake then sleep the whole of the next day.

Things were peachy. Isla and I had been out for dinner and she had hit the hay. I'd spent about 30mins on the MSN to Sam and Nick and after they'd buggered off I was enjoying the solitude. It's amazing here typing on the computer out on the balcony with some quiet tunes in the back ground. Although it's 1am it's still 26C and there is a riot of crickets in the background. Ace.

Anyway, my peace was short lived as some mentalist American chick and her useless Aussie boyfriend started having a crazy finance related argument on the train platform out side. Of course, I spent most of it trying to discern what was going on (instead of going inside) and it turns out that during their time in the USA he had spent $400 and while they had been here she had shelled out $3000 and now she was skint and he was refusing to contribute to the rent because he didn't have a job and he was of the opinion that she should support him like he did when they were in the states.

That said, they had spend 2 months in the states and he only spent $400 so I don't know where they were staying but it seems to me that she has drawn the short straw, especially when he said, "I can't wait till the landlord throws you out!"

I don't think they should try to work things out!

Crazy Ghostbuster Weather

Check this out. I'm sitting on the couch watching "An Inconvenient Truth" when I turn to look out the window and what do I see? The pleasant day that had allowed an incident-free cycle had turned into the weirdest cloud formation and imminent storm conditions that you've ever seen.

I mean look at those bad-boy clouds! Where the hell did they come from? I reckon that the rest of the night is going to be filled with crazy lightning and ear-splitting thunder. I'm sure of it.

Biggest Loser!

We were addicted to the Biggest Loser when we were in the UK. It's a reality TV show that has fat people in a house for 3 months trying to lose more weight than the other contestants. There's a cash prize at the end of the show which is the incentive.

During our cycle today we happened upon this bridge which was at the bottom of Bobbin Head. I thought to myself "I recognise that!" so I took a photo. In the Aussie version of the Biggest Loser the contestants have to do this thing called "the walk" every now and again wher they walk over a bridge and end up making a decision that affects the whole game e.g. swapping team members etc. It's supposed to be in the middle of the jungle or something, but no... this is the bridge that they walk over. So infact what happens is that they must get dropped off by a car round the corner in the car park and then they head round to the board walk and it's all drama'd up to make it look like the outback.

Crap! I really enjoyed that part of the show and now I know there dirty little production secret. Not that it'll stop me watching the show you understand!

Bobbin Head Ride

We had an ace cycle today. It was a leisurely cruise down to Bobbin Head followed by a cycle back up to Asquith. We then cruised down to Waitara and had a few beers followed by the train home. There was 5 people from work there and I hope that our new cycle group grows enough that we have sufficient people to do this on a regular basis.