Desert Dork diaries

My last trip took twenty days, 5750 km and pretty much all my energy. Nevertheless, I stopped by and enjoyed the desert, exploring its nooks and crannies. Here are some snapshots.

The field season from the 4WD

It's been busy.

It feels a tad unfair to keep saying that, but it's true. It's no excuse in itself, but it's definitely a reason. When I'm back from a field trip, or even simply tired from a long day at work, I simply have to get lost.

Lost in bad TV, in eating junk food, in playing games online. Yes, very unhealthy and unproductive – and that's the worst part. It took me long enough to start doing something actively, but even riding my bicycle has become quite hard with all the bad weather, as well as some technical issues.

Excuses, I know – but let me slide for a bit longer...

I spent most of the day yesterday lazing around and eating. Yes, eating. I had to pay my parent back, so I was down to my last 12 dollars for almost 10 days. As you can imagine, it turned out into a daily going-through-drawers-looking-for-coins ritual. But I survived.

Preparing cottage cheese with sour cream, spring onions, radishes and garlic, including fresh bread, made me think of Croatia. Well, Bosnia in fact, but you know what I mean. Being that Saturdays are usually the busiest on Skype, I used the time to talk to family and friends.

There's a lot of planning ahead: first of all, I'm going to Croatia for my annual leave in August, so there's a lot of excited people with ideas in their minds. Exciting as hell, as I'll only have three weeks and I don't even want to lose an hour I don't need to. On the other hand, it's hard to organise things from half a world away, but luckily the people are awesome, so they're coming up with options.

Secondly, my sister is going to be coming over for a visit in December/January, which will be exciting. I don't really go out as much as I'd like (and should), so it'll take some more preparing and planning to go to some nice places. That'll hopefully get me out of the house as well. She's working on booking a flight, applying for a visa etc.

Exciting times.

I also talked to my mum, who asked me if the time's running fast. It took me a couple of seconds to analyse that, after which I realised that it actually isn't. The last nine months just flew past, but the time has slowed down in a way – of course, only in my head – let's not get philosophical.


The next couple of weeks is going to be busy. I spent the last week on a very long, but fun survey. We went down to an area where I haven't previously been, so it was exciting to see emus, kangaroos, a snake (scary!), drive over sand dunes, revving through the sand etc.

The next week is going to keep me busy at the office; finishing up my report, preparing for the upcoming survey, and then reports following after that. I'll need a couple of weeks to wrap up all of that, which will make it mid July and it'll almost be time for my annual. Yay!

Oh, and I got myself a new phone – a smartphone – so I'll hopefully be able to update on the go easier. Another yay!

Here's a couple of photos from the last trip (it's very hard to choose), so take a look at what it's like (hover with your mouse to see the description text), have a nice Sunday and simply enjoy...

A couple of days in Sydney (with tons of photos)

I've been busy and around since I got here, but I'll try to write down a little track log and post some photos. Please note that I stuffed myself three times already today, so there's not much blood left in my brain.

Here goes!

My mate K picked me up from the airport and took me to his place. It's a lovely apartment situated halfway down a staircase in North Sydney, overlooking the bay. A couple of big tree branches, home to at least half a dozen kinds of parrots, blocks a bit of the view, but no one seems to mind.

We take the bus into the City, over the Coat Hanger, and meet up with M, a friend's friend who has the keys to the apartment. We're running a bit late, but we have a short drink at the Opera Bar. We grab some lunch (I can only remember nibbling on some onion rings - there was so much food in between) and head off to Darling Harbour for a drink or two.

On day two we head off to Spit Bridge (funny, I know) and take the scenic walk to Manly Beach. It's a long walk, but the views are so worth it. It takes us about 2.5h to cross the 10km stretch. Two swims, one close accident and a wave-catching-run into a lady in the shallow, and we're off to lunch. I decided to skip my visit to the City, so we went back to K's place and lay on the couch like a couple of walruses.

It took me a while to find R & B's place the next day, but after I left my stuff and took a shower, I was on my way back into the City to meet up with M & I. They took me around the Darling Harbour, to the Opera house and into the Royal Botanical Gardens. Drinks and food.

Today I went to Parramatta, with the first Governor's House and the oldest cemetery in Australia. A road trip to the Featherdale Wildlife Park for some koala, echidna and wallaby cuddling. Drinks and lunch at an Irish place, then a short visit to M & I's place and a dinner at an Italian restaurant. Full up to my teeth, but we still had dessert.

I just went through all the photos and realised there's tones. Here's a portion of those, in no specific order. And I'm off to bed, since R & B are flying in tomorrow early morning.

Strike that - today early morning.