Category: Australia

Total Miles Traveled: 61,992

The Sydney Opera House.   The quintessential symbol of Sydney and one of the postcard shots people take home from Australia.  The unique architecture makes it a fun photography subject, though in person, I’ll have to admit it isn’t as impressive as it is in photos.

A couple photos of the opera house:

The rising moon was just in the right spot:

Lots of geometric patterns to take photos against:

After taking a quick look at the Opera House, we wandered up to the Rocks area which had a street fair going on and tons of people enjoying the sun outside.

Lots of aboriginal street performers…

Oddly enough, the most interesting and memorable thing we saw in our short time in Sydney was this building.  It’s a restaurant/bar COMPLETELY built out of recycled materials – with the kitchen, bathrooms, and rooftop bar built in to the cargo containers you see below.

Inside, the decor is pretty spartan  All the glasses are made out of wine bottles cut in half.  The forks and knives look like they are cut out of the wood tongue depressors doctors use.

Upstairs, above the restaurant, is a rooftop bar with planters that grow all the herbs they use in the restaurant.

And the kicker was the toilet.  Yes, the toilet.  When you flush, the faucet turns on for you to wash your hands as it refills the tank.  And the door to the bathroom?  It’s made out of one of those long plastic folding tables.  Brilliant.

Sydney was a nice city, unique in its own way but not unlike many other cities we had been to.  Some might vehemently disagree with us, but maybe it’s because we’re not really city people.  But, what’s cool about cities is all the creativity and interesting stuff you can find when you really look for it.  This restaurant was a good reminder of that – to go in to a city or place looking not just at the big, obvious tourist highlights, but looking in the cracks, exploring, talking to and paying closer attention to the locals.

Have a look at all of our photos here:

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Total Miles Traveled: 56,551

We did not originally consider going to Tasmania.  It wasn’t anywhere near our radar screen.  But… the great thing about travelling is talking to other travelers.   We spoke with the many Aussies we’ve met along our travels and they all said we must go to “Tassie”.  They promised stunning scenery, great food and wine, and a relaxing almost ‘spiritual’ vibe.  They were right!

Our port of entry was Hobart – the capital of the small island off of the southeast of Australia.  There are about 500,000 people who live on the island and Hobart is home to half of all residents.  We arrived on a very sunny Sunday during a boat show and regatta. The marina was filled with beautiful boats of all sizes, many with beautifully colored flags.  Not a bad way to start our visit!!

There was a professional sand castle builder who reminded us of our friend Whitney who likes to build big, complicated sand castles.  We suspect Whitney  is jealous of this guy’s sails!!

A fishing vessel carrying lobster traps.  Yummmmmm lobster….

Hmmm.. skater dudes here sure do look a lot like skater dudes in the US!

Downtown Hobart.

Boat makers show their wares…

To see all our photos, check out our slide show:

[flickrslideshow acct_name=”tony-chen” id=”72157626109134054″]

Total Miles Traveled: 56,177

The Great Ocean Road is one of the big highlights of visiting Melbourne – dare I say, a ‘must-do’.   With great weather, it is a beautiful drive up the coastline to the southwest of Melbourne, with the crown jewel being the 12 Apostles (pictured above) near the end of the road.

We took a one-day tour with Gray Line.  Not cheap, but you won’t have to drive and can spend all of your time enjoying the scenery or napping.  Make sure to: line up early to get your pick of seat, sit on the left side of the bus, on the upper deck.   If you have more time, you can drive yourself and stay a night or two along the way.

As you can see, it’s reminiscent of the California coast.

There are many beaches… and many famous surfing spots.  The scenery just doesn’t get old…

Then, you come to the 12 apostles.  Each big rock “island” is an apostle.  Though now there are only 8 because 4 have been worn away and have toppled.  This area had some spectacular scenery:

There was also an element of danger (gasp!):

Some really nice rock formations and color from rain and erosion:

Another apostle:

And here’s how it looks and sounds live.  Instant relaxation when you visit it in person.

Here are all of the photos from our journey down the Great Ocean Road:

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Total Miles Traveled: 55,900

Melbourne is listed as one of the most livable cities in the world and we could see why.  It’s got a little bit of everything: urban sophistication, a cafe/coffee culture, lively restaurant and bar scene, sports culture (Aussie-rules football originated here), stunning nearby beaches, wine regions, and an ethnically diverse population (they even have real mafia wars! No joke!).

I’d been to Melbourne 5 years ago for my friend Jinah’s wedding.  When we visited this time, she had 3 kids under the age of 5 running around the house.  Quite a change from when we were in b-school!

Anyway, here are some scenes from the city which has a very compact city center.  This is a view down Flinders Street next to Federation Square (also pictured above), which has very interesting architecture.  For example, the ground isn’t flat – it has many angles and slopes, like the building you see below.

There’s a nice riverfront area with parks, bars, and cafes – all very walkable.

The city also tolerates (encourages?) graffiti art.  There’s even a map at the tourist center that shows you where to go see the best graffiti!  Here’s Union Lane in the CBD (central business district).

Chinatown is also an attraction, though I’m not sure why.  It’s much like Boston’s, only 2-3 blocks.

The Chinese tourists find Chinatown to be fascinating:

Ahh, there we go – this is why Chinatown is interesting… there’s a restaurant named after Lisa’s family – the Westlake restaurant!

Then we headed out to St. Kilda, a nearby suburb on the beach.  Here’s the sunset at the beach:

Then, on our final days in Melbourne, we made it out to the Mornington Peninsula, southeast of Melbourne, where there are a lot of cool-climate wines being made – think Oregon or Washington State.   Worth a visit if you have some extra time in Melbourne.  Thanks, Jinah, for providing us with a place to crash!

Cool photo of the peninsula:

Next up, we visit the Great Ocean Road, southwest of Melbourne, which is a bit like the California coastline.  Here is a slideshow of our photos in Melbourne:

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Total Miles Traveled: 54,208 (We passed the 50K mark!  This means we’ve circumnavigated the earth at its equator more than 2 times!)

After Madives, we rested for a few days in Bali.  We got massages at our favorite massage place Jari Menari … 3 days = 3 massages!  And we caught up with my friend from business school KW Low.  How did we know KW would in Bali?  We didn’t!  But he posted about going there on Facebook.  Gotta love Facebook status updates!

After resting in Bali, we arrived at our first English-speaking country in over 6 months.  We were thrilled to be able to read signs and communicate with the locals!   After going through a VERY rigorous baggage screening process (Australians are fiercely protective of allowing in any bio agent that can hurt their agriculture industry), we made our way 3 hours south to Margaret River Valley – one of Australia’s ‘premier’ wine regions.   So what were our first impressions about Australia?  Two things – one good and one not-so-good.

First, the good:  the area seemed unusually vibrant.  The colors were super crisp.  It was like walking around in a photo-shopped world.  We asked a few locals about this super-color effect.  They offered us 2 theories — (1) very little pollution and (2) the angle of the sun since Perth is very far south.  Regardless of the reason, our photos turned out great and we didn’t need to do anything to make them so!

The second – and not so good – we noticed how fricken expensive Australia is!  We call it “stupid expensive”, but not because it’s anyone’s doing.  It’s the exchange rate/weak US Dollar.  In years past, the US $ was stronger than the Australian $ so prices were discounted or even fair.  Now the currencies are 1-1.  NOT FUN!  Here are some examples:

Appetizer (what they call ‘entrees’) at a decent restaurant = $20-30

Entree (what they call ‘mains’) at a decent restaurant = $35-50

Dessert at a decent restaurant = $15-20

Subway footlong sub = $12

And … per the photo below… JRR Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings book is $40 (in the US it would be ~ $25 or less)

But putting costs aside, we very much enjoyed our first few days exploring the west coast of Australia.  We tasted the wines in Margaret River…

We also visited the local Boranup forest, featuring karri trees.  The light through the trees was stunning!!

And after a few days getting to know the wines, we drove back up to explore Perth.  The photo below is taken at the Little Creatures Brewery / restaurant in the hip and trendy area of Fremantle.

We LOVED the Little Creatures micro-brew.  Every one of their beers is superb, but pale ale and bright ale are still our favorites!

We also found – but did not try – another local delight…  really??

Perth is the most remote city in the world, with the nearest major city, Adelaide, over 1,500 miles away.  It’s also where a lot of Australia’s wealth is generated, from all of the mining operations which are now buoyed by China’s demand for building materials.

The city reminded us a lot of San Diego with beach community after beach community going up and down the coast.  In fact, Western Australia also reminded us of the US.  It was like we were in an alternate reality complete with high real estate prices that California is known for.

People from all over the world flock here to take part in the water-related sports.  The wind and kite surfing looks pretty good.

Here’s the well-known Cottesloe beach:

To see all our photos, check out our slideshow:

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