Sydney Mardi Gras Memories 2009

Another Mardi Gras in Sydney has come & gone and this year was nothing short of fabulous!  So many thanks to so many people who made this year's party so much fun.  Joe, Jim, Mike, Rick, Christian, Sam, James, Bruce, Jonny, Al, Phil, Chels, Roddy, Rossco, VB, Andy, Pete, Craig, Javier, Oaksie, Bruce, LADave, Darren, Gibbo, CP, Graham, Pete, Jon, Peter, Silvio, etc etc etc. 

But a huge special thanks to our friends Bram, Walther & Bill who travelled to Sydney from Holland. 

Love you guys !!!  We had a blast !!!  Can't wait for next year :)

Some of the highlights:

Opera Bar, Fag Tag, first night, Bram & Walther beat the jet lag & made it easily through until Midnight!

     

Lazing around the NSW South Coast - hammocks, drinks, internet, newspapers, beaches & barbeques

      


And being not-so-lazy: feeding roos, singing 60s songs to the jukebox, lots of beer & wine 

    


Automatic candles, glow sticks, steak thermometers and laser bellies

    


Press button Barbeques, white sand, Jervis Bay, Green Patch, sausages, rissoles & willie wagtails


    


Kiama blowhole, lighthouse, ocean pools, Werri Beach, fish & chips, SPANK swimsuits


    


Pre-Party drinks at Jim & Joe's, harbour party, then dancing at Mrs. Macquarie's Chair


    

Mardi Gras 2010 – Bring it on !!

Sri Lanka came & went and I really enjoyed it this time.  Before leaving I'd spoken online with an Aussie/English guy, bloomsbury, who is living in Colombo.  We caught up a few times while I was there and he showed me the 'cool' stuff which I missed the first time.  I really enjoyed it and look forward to going back sometime.  Being so close to India during the Mumbai situation was a little spooky but if you worried about drama all the time then you wouldn't go anywhere. 

Next stop was Beirut, Lebanon.  Having been to the Middle East several times now I was pretty sure I knew what to expect but every trip is an adventure and Lebanon was definitely that.  

I arrived at night and had been travelling all day so I got into the hotel and crashed.  And what a surprise when I woke up and opened the curtains in the room.  Check out the view:

 

I suspected I was onto a winner here.  Stunning hotel with fantastic views of the Mediterranean.  It was time I went out for a walk and checked this place out. 

About a 5 minutes walk along the Sea's boardwalk were the Rawcheh Rocks.  This city is really funky.

  

I'd made friends with my cab driver the night before and he said if I wanted a city tour to give him a call.  So I rang my buddy Ali and he came around to the hotel and took me out to Sida, about 30 minutes from Central Beirut and one of the oldest areas in Lebanon.  I walked out to the Castle of the Crusaders, and took photos back of the city.  The history in Beirut is so impressive.


  

The next day I booked a tour of Baalbeck and Anjar - both archeological sites.  I'd never clambered over Roman ruins before and I'm glad I did, it was a good choice.

 

The tour also stopped at the Ksara (Winery) Caves.  I didn't even know wine was stored in barrels in caves - apparently not only Lebanon but also in France & Italy.  It was a bit early in the day for wine tasting but that didn't stop me - no big surprise - I tried them all.

 

It was a great day, good company on the tour and a knowledgeable and really pleasant Lebanese tour guide.  The Lebanese were really welcoming & friendly.  And they love speaking about their country and happily answer questions from everything about nightclubs to tourist attractions to their problems with civil wars.  Of course there is a bit of a dark side to the country but it's not troubling, you can walk the streets safely, everyone speaks English (if not, definitely French) and I felt at ease speaking to the big Lebanese soldiers wearing SWAT gear and carrying machine guns.  In fact I did that more often than I probably needed to ;) 

The trip home was a long one, and I was happy to see Pete at the airport.  We're waiting for another gig in South Africa or Turkey which means I'll take him with me.  Hopefully in 2009.

Everyone who knows already is asking how my trip is going and for those of you who don't, I'm back in Colombo this week.

I arrived in Sri Lanka last night, Saturday night, after a VERY long trip via Dubai.  For anyone needing a geography lesson, and don't be ashamed if you do its not all that obvious, but flying from Sydney to Dubai, then to Colombo is BACKTRACKING in a big way.  I knew this and knew of the 12 hour layover and my method behind the madness was so that I could fly Emirates again.  The last two times I've flown with them were really good (check out my previous entries) so it made sense, I was flying Emirates & to hell with the EIGHTEEN extra hours it would take me to get here! 

And I goofed :(   The 15 hour flight from Sydney to Dubai was tragic.  I ended up in the last row of the airplane, squashed between half a window and one of only two working toilets in economy.  And yes I can say now that everytime you flush that very loud toilet on an airplane the person in the last row hears it just as loudly as you do.   The plane was full, uncomfortable, the meals weren't adequate, the personal tvs weren't working properly & the staff became rude as I became more agitated.   I went to the Customer Service desk on arrival and for my inconvenience, Emirates put me in an aisle row & treated me royally on the 3 hour flight from Dubai to Colombo but the damage I'm afraid was already done.  Should I come back I will be flying with Singapore Airlines,  Sydney-Singapore-Colombo, 12 hours, no mucking around.  

My "free" day in Colombo was very impressive.  I am really warming to this country and the people, and the city is so stylish.  I'd be happy to come back anytime.

More to come as the week progresses.  Watch this space.

It would be an understatement to say that last week was eventful.  My birthday on the 18th turned into my own personal nightclub & DJ party.  Things got a little quiet at about 3am - but the show must go on.   My buddy, DJ BEEFYBOY 

kept things up & fun. And my other good mate ICBEAR and I kept the dancefloor lively.  I was in my element.

Pete's (john_badger ) birthday was on the 26th so we had a nice dinner & catch up with friends on Friday.

I wish all I had to report was our birthday celebrations but sadly this isn't the case.  My ex - and dear & treasured friend - bigbait, checked into the hospital with what he thought was a bit of nasty asthma.  A week later he was diagnosed with Hodgkin's and had the first of 6 months of chemotherapy treatments.    I was there daily to listen to the team of doctors change their diagnosis every few hours.  I guess you could say it was like being on a rollercoaster.  We'd have given anything to have been on Magic Mountain at Gay Disney instead. 

It's like I get a break for about 12 months then something else happens.  "Hey John, you dealt with that last one, let's see how you go this time".  I couldn't even spell Hodgkin's before last week.  But everything will be ok.  <sigh>

Well, my intentions were good.  I headed down to Melbourne with the idea of upgrading my business computer to something zippy & current.  My plan, however fell on it's arse once I got there!  

My good buddy Luke (hardware/software/home PC wizard) it turned out wasn't running Vista on his machines and when I looked a little closer I wasn't ready for Vista either.  My business applications really aren't "Vista-friendly" so I thought, screw this, why create a problem that I don't have right now?  I'm going to coast along on XP for a little while longer.  

So my trip to Melbourne turned into a visit with my good friends Luke

and his partner Ken at their new place in central Melbourne.  

And they have an awesome abode!  I had some nice meals & a bunch laughs with the guys then grabbed the 2nd last flight (ever) to Wollongong - a tiny airport that's very close to our house on the South Coast - Qantas have stopped the route from Melbourne from this Friday.  Pete picked me up and we are now at the "weekender" where we'll hide away until Monday.  Bliss :)

I have never seen the area from the air as well as I did from the plane this morning and it looked great.  There was some snow on the mountains inland and then a perfect coastline.  It's good to be home.

Thanks guys for a fun couple of days.  We'll both be down to see you again soon, HUGSsssssssssssssss.

We've had fun here so far.  The little drive from Auckland turned into something bigger than we expected.  It's a few hour drive through a windy but scenic part of the north Island of New Zealand when you're travelling from Auckland up to Coromandel.  It took a few hours through a curvy road that hugged the coastline - would've been a hoot in a Porsche 911!   And we passed a few of those who were I bet were having a ball.

We stayed overnight at Coromandel - a little town nearly at the tip of the North Island.  There were only a couple of hotels in this place so we grabbed the one nearest to the pub & the restaurant.  The landlady asked if we were a couple - I said yes - and then when she saw our "couple" consisted of two men she told us we would get the one bedroom unit which had two double beds.  Before I gave her a lesson in diversity I asked if the price was the same and she said yes.  I said, fine we'll take it, knowing an extra bed would be a good place to store the luggage.  I didn't get to see her expression when she went to clean the room the next morning.

We drove down the east coast of the peninsula yesterday checking out hundreds of different scenery types in only a couple of hours.  They say that a small New Zealand has the landscape of every part of the world - beaches, volcanoes, desert, forest, glaciers and alps, all surrounded by water of some sort - oceans & lakes.  It looks really spectacular.

We're having a ball making fun of the Kiwi accents.  I went to a grocery store and asked if they had any Chip Dip to compliment the fine NZ red that we were enjoying back at our hotel room party.  I knew when I said it she wouldn't have a clue what I was talking about - she took me over to show me the stationery area.  I tried again " Chip Dip" .... then I said, you know, for "CHUPS".  She said, OH CHUPS!  And I ended up at the confectionery area.  I thought, we're getting close, and said to her, "Do you have anything that goes with the Chups?"  And she showed me the ingredients for home-made New Zealand dips.  Yum yum, it was worth the effort.  Pete earlier had tried to ask first for a "Cooler" (to store our ice and soft drinks), which confused the man so he then tried for an "Esky" which didn't work so ended up asking for a "CHULLY BIN".  The man said, of course we have Chilly Bins, but not many in the winter, mate.  Yer, we thought as much.

We like very much that Kiwi's have their own words for many things.  Put your shopping in the trundler then make sure it ends up in it's own park?  Love it.

We're in Rotorua tonight visiting some friends who are taking us to dinner then a thermal hot spring.  Back to Auckland tomorrow for the weekend.  We have tickets to Priscilla - The Musical, which should be a good one.  

Stay tuned, Auckland coming up ...