"Tourists don't know where they've been; travellers don't know where they're going." Paul Theroux
I think this makes us travellers, then. We've come to the official end of our travelling for this year, and we're sure to be off again in the future, but we definitely don't know where we're going! 

In the last ten months, we've travelled Australia, been back to the UK, had a week in Spain, had a long weekend on the Shetland Islands (yes, ok, this is still UK, but it's closer to Norway so gets listed separately!), been trekking in Nepal, and had 10 days in Hong Kong. During this time, we've been on no less than 21 flights each, and our bags came with us the whole way. Amazing!! And to quote Theroux again: "You define a good flight by negatives: you didn't get hijacked, you didn't crash, you didn't throw up, you weren't late, you weren't nauseated by the food. So you are grateful." And so, we are grateful.

If you've got time to read the blog, we'll tell the last part of our tale. But since we've not updated this for a couple of months, it's likely to be a bit wordy, so here is the brief version:
We had about five weeks back in the UK, visiting with friends and family, going to Ele and Tom's wedding (awww), walking the Pennine Way with the Chops and David and Louise, and looking at our old house in Wolvercote (rented out to people, how weird to see their photos on the wall instead of ours!). It was absolutely brilliant being back - being home. It's going to be hard to squeeze all that into our next (much shorter) visits. The Shetland Islands are spectacular and remote, and four days are not enough to do them justice. Our week in Spain (the annual Rampton Family Holiday) was great, despite not actually seeing much (any) of the country - we spent the whole week melting by the pool in the 38 deg C heat. 

Next came trekking in Nepal. What a fantastic experience - 16 days walking, and four passes over 5,000m, through some of the most remote mountain countryside in the world. We both stayed healthy and fit and enjoyed it immensely.

Our last stop was Hong Kong. We managed to coordinate with most of the Frawleys (sorry Kerrie and Audrey couldn't make it!) for at least a few days and had a great time going to Disneyland, shopping in markets, going out for posh dinners and eating unknown foods from street stalls. The Frawleys Go Bonkers in Honkers.

So we arrived back in Ballarat yesterday. Next stop: jobs (anyone looking for a vet in Melbourne??), a house, and most importantly, picking up the Chops from quarantine on Saturday. Then we can tackle the biggie: Where to next?



From our travels around Australia:  

Well, they LOOK super cute and innocent! But let me tell you, they like sandwiches, and are not afraid to fight for them. I was making sandwiches in preparation for a walk up a mountain at Wilpena Pound (Tom was off somewhere), and up hopped these two kangaroos in the picture, and their two mates. First little dude hopped up and tried to get into the bin, and I thought, awww, cute! Then big dude hopped up and tried to grab a sandwich, and I thought, awww, cute! Then he REALLY tried to grab a sandwich, and I thought, no, come on now, move away. Then he really REALLY tried to grab a sandwich, so I pushed him away with a bread board. Then, well, he got cranky! Up on his tail, head back like they do when they're boxing, reaching for me; me with a bread board and a saucepan, tonking him on the nose (not a good idea!), shouting at him to bugger off and make his own sandwiches, him getting taller and more cranky looking and more grabby grabby with his front paws, looking like he was considering using his back legs (right up on his tail at this point)... You get the idea! I was at the point of thinking I ought to give him a bloody sandwich (not a vegemite one though, we were running low and every sanga was rationed) when he got bored and wandered off. At about the same time as Tom wandered back. Phew.

So, here is a good roadsign on South Australian roads.  There is another fine example on the photos page. Its very good and memorable and probably does a good job EXCEPT that people see the sign at 100kmh, then screech to a halt, do a U-turn in the middle of the high way, get out of the car, stand in the middle of the road and take a photo! (Yes this might have included us as well...).

Does anyone remember the scene in the '80s classic Crocodile Dundee, when Mick Dundee causes a buffalo to collapse by using 'heavy metal' fingers at it? Well, this is the buffalo, and he's called Charlie and lives at Adelaide River Roadhouse in the Northern Territory.

Today's TFA deserves two photos. This is how many mozzies there are here. We've both been bitten by all of them. (Tom multiple times.)

They just don't make thongs (as we must call them now! None of this flip-flops business!) like they used to. Tom has now bought his third AND fourth pair. Here he is saying goodbye to pair number 2. He is also sporting a fine pair of sideburns, you'll notice.

There can be up to a million fruit bats in this colony in Nitmiluk NP. A MILLION! That's a lot of fruit (although, actually, they eat blossum). It's also a lot of noise and a lot of flapping and a lot of eau de bat.

Another thing What Happens to Travellers is that a state of perpetual hunger sets in, brought about by constant exercise and lack of takeaways, always noticed at 11:05am (hence, ‘It must be Five Past Eleven’ is a simile for ‘I’m starving’). This phenomenon has exacerbated our first real horror story: after hiking up Piccaninny Gorge in the Bungle Bungles, our UHT milk was off, so we had to have Weetbix with boiled river water and no sugar for breakfast. NEVER AGAIN!!!!

This big beastie, in a tree next to our tent, was 12 inches long! Blimey!! I think it might be a goliath stick insect, for obvious reasons, but if there are any entomologists out there who know better, please let us know!

The Prison Boab Tree, 14m in girth, was used to hold Aboriginal prisoners on route from wherever they’d been kidnapped in the Kimberley to Derby gaol. 14 people could be stuffed in there at one time. That’s a lot of misery.

Eighty Mile Beach, about half way between Port Hedland and Broome, is actually 140 miles long (220km). We thought we'd run to the next corner.... We were running for a while....

At the top of Mt Bruce, Karijini, (right next door to Mt Sheila) (only joking), after 3 hours hard climbing, you will find a full bottle of water, hat, sunscreen, bandaids and a packet of 2 minute noodles in case you've forgotten to bring your own (and you happen to have brought a stove and saucepan). Also, hiking shorts are not cool.

A teeny tiny stone behind the disc does not mean the wheel is about to fall off, like it sounds. Thank you Mr helpful tyre and mechanic person in Tom Price for explaining this to us.

Ningaloo Reef is one of only 2 coral systems that have formed on the western side of a landmass - Australia's hot interior keeps the winds warm and the Leeuwin current system is warm too, so the coral is happy here. (The other reef is in Malaysia.) It's also the longest fringing reef at 260km - it's so close to the shore that you can happily swim out to it, unlike the Great Barrier Reef which is many kms offshore. This happy swimmer here is next to some staghorn coral, which is the fastest growing coral at 5 inches a year.

Billabong Roadhouse plays rock and roll music from the 60s over the loud speaker, has 70 quadragillion flies and was
43 C when we visited. It is not easy to take a self portrait through the wooden kangaroo cutout they have outside.

Fly nets are the new Autumn fashion. Trust us and buy up big (particularly the ones with the camo top). We're in the know. (They are also a necessity given the billions and billions of flies here with the hot weather and flooded Murchison river.)

So these are Quokkas - oversized hopping rats. An interesting thing to do if ever you visit Quokkaland (Rottnest Island): 1. Find a quokka, (not hard, they're everywhere), 2. cup your hands and pour some water in, 3. put your hands at quokka height and wait for the fun to start. 
NB: In no way are we advocating the feeding of wild animals, and we take no responsibility for any damage or injury resulting from being mauled by thirsty Quokkas.

Perth has a fitness circuit on the East bank of the Swan River (McCallum Park). Tom is doing the Ezy Rider. Enough said.

Walking through the bush yesterday, almost in the middle of nowhere (Leeuwin-Naturaliste NP), we came across a naked woman, having her photo taken, lounging across this log. We nodded in greeting, as if we were in the middle of Soho, and they carried on. Here is Tom re-enacting for you.
WHAT THE?!!!

We spent the afternoon doing this: Jump Track, Pemberton Mountain Bike Park, Rider level: Intermediate to Expert   The jump track is a fun and energetic long flowing jump track, featuring jumps with berms to keep the speed when required. This trail is designed to cater for intermediate riding levels at the introductory jumps and finishing with the Pro Line suited to experts. Jump face heights range from 0.8m to 1.5m.

Did you know that Aaron Sandliands of the Fremantle Football Club, the tallest man in the AFL, is 211cm with a size 18 foot?? It says so in this randomly placed picture at the Valley of the Giants Treetop Walk!! (Why?? We don't know.)

If only Tom had a club and a ball, he could have actually played a hole of the world's longest golf course... The Nullabor Links course covers some silly number of kilometers (3000?) from near Kalgoorlie in WA to Ceduna in SA. Instead here he is with a stick and some imagination...

A welder chap called Dillon broke the world record by catching (singlehanded, apparently) a 5.1m, 1.5 tonne Great White Shark with a ROD AND REEL in 1990 from Streaky Bay. Here is a picture of him eating me (the shark, that is, not Dillon the Welder) (in actual fact it was a 'she' shark, and they kept the ovaries and some vertebrae to study, and cut the rest up for bait. Poor wittle sharky shark!)