Newcastle Baths

RODEO DRIVE
December 26

Graffiti is not restricted to state park plant life. Some other Peter left his mark on a Rodeo Drive tree, two blocks up from the shops. Note the chandelier street lamps, and well-earned naps at LAX, as we wait late at night for our delayed flight to Fiji after a day of driving and walking around Santa Monica, Topanga State Park, Sunset Boulevard, Bel Air, Beverly Hills and Hollywood. Nick's succinct take on L.A. was that it wasn't as "Hollywoodish" as he thought it would be. There was a lot of construction around, and it probably didn't help that it was garbage day on Sunset Boulevard and everyone's trash cans were at the curb. Sarah and I pointed out to Nick that we were actually seeing some of the better, wealthier parts of the city and that there were miles and miles of poor neighborhoods out there.

Topanga State Park

Day after Christmas, 2006

Word of the day: Dry.

Topanga is entirely within the City of Los Angeles, just off of Sunset Boulevard and next to Will Rogers State Park in the Santa Monica Mountains. Dry and dusty, but still a nice walk. At the top of one of the trails, Nicholas and I had a sweeping view of Santa Monica and the coast, and we could just see the skyline of downtown L.A.. Also of note was a low layer of brown smog hanging over the valley. Nick was impressed by this explicit example of air pollution. He also thought we did a good job making it to the top of the mountain. I liked the stand of cacti covered with graffiti.

Hideaway Resort--Fiji

December 26 - January 1, 2007

According to Peter ... The picture below is us in our house taking a picture from inside. Our house number was 303. The picture on the left is a swimming pool. I liked it because it had a gigantic water slide. Inside the building behind the pool there was pool (billiards) and ping pong. I won two games of pool. One night, there was firewalking. The people had to walk on hot coal and at the pool there was fire and water coming out of the top of the blue tower at the same time.

According to Chris - The resort was loaded with Australians, and it didn't take long to figure out that for Australians and New Zealanders, the South Pacific islands are the equivalent of our Carribbean islands--a fairly easy and inexpensive tropical getaway. Fiji is at about the same latitude as Haiti. Newcastle's local newspaper, the tabloid Herald, was giving away a week in Vanuatu.

This is from some handwritten notes dated December 31: "Nick and Pete left the cottage about 30 minutes ago in search of Jenga, a block stacking game, at the recreation area next to the bar and restaurant at the pool. When Sarah and I got there we learned that Nick had won an ice cream eating contest. Peter was excited for him and explained that they had to keep one hand behind their backs, and the prize was chocolate mixed with the vanilla ice cream. Peter, by the way, did not compete because he doesn't like ice cream."

Sigatoka, Fiji

December 28, 30, 2006

We made two visits to Sigatoka, the nearest shopping town to the Hideaway Resort. There are three or four villages between the resort and Sigatoka, but they had only one or two or no small shops--mostly just modest homes lining Fiji's main road, the Queens Highway, a two-lane challenge that required a number of stops for cows in the road.

Speaking of driving, I had the memorable experience of flying 10 hours from LA to Fiji, landing at dawn, renting a well-worn white Toyota from Eurocar then driving on the left side of the road, for the first time since our 1994 trip to England, for two hours. It was probably better, however, to practice the left-side thing on a two-lane, generally bumpy and narrow road, rather than on the busier Australian roads.

Gregson Park Banyans--Hamilton, NSW

These trees--about 15 of them-- are located in Gregson Park, a mid-sized, turn-of-the-20th century, Victorian-style park in Hamilton, five minutes walking from our first rental house and a block off of Beaumont, the main shopping street. The park also has two tennis courts, and a lawn bowling club with two large bowling lawns. Lawn bowling and tennis club's are big social organizations here. Many neighborhoods have at least one, often both, and they include club houses and sometimes pubs and restaurants. Gregson Park also has a rose garden, greenhouse, playground, a couple of cannons and assorted war memorials. Plenty of enormous fruit bats, too. They swoop in every evening from Blackbutt Reserve to feast on the figs in the banyans (more on the bats in another post).

Sarah on the Beach

We arrived in Newcastle the afternoon of January 2 but didn't venture to the beaches until two days later. Every first view of a new location was astonishing. This is at Bar Beach, a 5 minute drive from our temporary headquarters in the neighborhood of Hamilton. Immediately behind Sarah, at the based of the near cliff, is a wide outcropping of enormous flat rocks filled with pools of water and sea life, a bit like coastal Maine, we thought.

Newcastle!

First Impressions of Newcastle:
Sunny, 70's, not hot most of time. It rained a couple of times, but only lightly.
Our driver from Sydney told us of his lifelong dream to become a Greyhound Bus driver in America.
There are lizards on the wall of the courtyard where we are staying.
There are white Sulphur-crested cockatoos in the park. Their call sounds like an old witch with a case of bronchitis.
There are black and white magpies which make a beautiful sound like tubular bells in the morning.
Almost everyone wears flip-flops (called thongs).
Everyone says "No worries."
There are coffee shops, but you can't get decent coffee. Instant coffee with a lot of milk and sugar is coffee. In a coffee shop, "American" coffee, brewed in an espresso coffee maker, and with a lot of foamy milk on it kind of reminds you of coffee, but it could be made with tea and you wouldn't be able to tell.
Luckily there are Greek immigrants in our neighborhood. I bought greek, i.e. exotic coffee and when I am feeling energetic, I use the stove top percolator. Chris just switched to instant and adds two packets to the cup.
There are enormous fruit bats called flying foxes that live in the park and fly in the evening. They are cute. Each one is the size of a kitten.
Passion fruits are great for breakfast and convenient to eat. You cut in half and scoop out the seeds. The taste reminds me of grapefruit.
The doves have a tall pointy crest on the top of their heads. Otherwise, they are your basic doves.
Cheddar cheese is called Tasty Cheese. Sharp Cheddar is called Extra Tasty Cheese.
Vegemite is salty but may be good for you. I didn't check the label yet.

MYSTERY ISLAND
New Year's Day, 2007

According to Peter (who is helping me post this blog entry), the picture on the left shows us going to Mystery Island on a big sailing ship. We went scuba diving (actually, snorkeling) on the glass bottom boat (below). We also had to use the glass bottom boat to get from the sailing ship to the island. During the snorkeling, we stopped at the sailing ship to pick up food for lunch (see the fish on the grill, below).

On the sailing ship, there were people from Fiji playing guitars. They played "When the Saints Go Marching In" in a funny version. One verse was, "When the rum makes your bum numb"! Another was, "When the whiskey makes you frisky"!

It was called Mystery Island because it wasn't labelled on any maps. It was so small that it only took us about 50 seconds to walk across it. There was a turtle nesting place at one end of Mystery Island.

Five hour flight to Los Angeles. USAir only brought along "20 or 30" meals that had to be paid for--first come, first served. The movie was the Christmas one about Ralphie from Cleveland who wanted a BB gun for Christmas. Had to pay $5 for headphones. The majority of fellow passengers seemed to be engaged with their own personal electronic devices. The woman in the row in front of and across from me watched Nicholas Cage's recent movie about 9/11. Strange choice for a flight across the country.

We were all impressed with LAX, especially the public art and architecture around the airport ... [MORE TK]