Camp Moogerah

For my last six weeks in Australia I helped out at a “school camp” a couple hours west of Brisbane. I say “school camp” to evoke that general sense - it was open for individuals to come and camp on the grounds, for church groups to have retreats, and that sort of thing, though the whole property was ready to host several hundred kids in cabins should the need arise.

In any case, I helped out around the camp - and with the owner’s personal projects - in exchange for a bed and meals. As with previous hosts where I did some physical labor, it was a nice change from my vagrant routine. Painting, sanding, gardening, and that sort of stuff is good for the soul - when one is done with a task it’s evident. You see it. Unlike a never-ending set of essays to write/edit for a paycheck or making blog posts where the only metric of success is a number next to an illustrated eyeball (“views”), it is clear: I moved that plant from here to there and it looks good.

As nice as it was to find a routine, however, it’s not a riveting tale to retell. On a typical day I’d wake up, do a task, then spend the evening trying to put something on paper. The stories are in the cracks - the days where something didn’t go according to routine. Here are a few.

What does Brisbane rhyme with?

I set up a few days in the city to do a little sight-seeing before my Workaway started. As with the previous few posts, I don't know what to tell you.

City Hall was great - beautiful building, cool information, nifty museum inside. The museum tour kind-of sucked (Here's this painting, look at it later. Here's this exhibit, you can read the wall plaque at the end.) but it was free. The area around City Hall was pedestrian friendly and it was easy to get over to the city library, which was also beautiful.

Unrelated - I'm not sure why Brisbane has a "City" Hall but other cities have "Town" Halls.

I crossed the bridge(s) and checked out the museum area (including a cool ANZAC exhibit) and the State Library. The State Library had a very cool "maker space" / creative space area that seemed very pro-citizen. I saw more exhibits and all that good stuff.

Stylish Sydney

Will this be a long entry? Probably not. Sydney was great, though I spent a LOT of time in the State Library.

As mentioned, I made the right choice for once and took a daytime bus to Sydney. I finished a book (which book - Heart of Darkness, maybe?) and arrived in the evening. For the first time in the trip I had someone I'd previously met come through and offer to host - in this case it was Rebecca, who I'd met in Vancouver after the train trip across Canada.

There was a fair bit of relaxing, as I was feeling worn out.

Generally speaking, there was some ferry riding, some tour taking, and some pub visiting while staying with my friend. We won a pub quiz quite handily, then lost a different one quite badly. I'm not sure what all to write - I suppose I'll say the free walking tour in Sydney (and the one in Melbourne) were well worth going on.

Adoring Adelaide

Chances are, if you run in the same nerd circles as I do, the only reason you know about Adelaide is because one Brady Haran, of Hello Internet (HI) podcast and several YouTube channels (Numberphile, Objectivity, &c.), is from there. On HI there are several running jokes, two of which overlap for this story: there exist branded "hotstoppers" (small plastic plugs one can put in to-go coffee containers to prevent hot coffee from escaping) that the HI hosts give out and that one of the places you can always get a hotstopper is in the cafe at the base of an Adelaide skyscraper nicknamed the "Black Stump" (the future home to the HI museum!) despite both hosts now living in England. I've done more for less of a reason (see: "hey, it'd be cool to go around the world, I suppose"), so I got off the tour bus (Great Ocean Road & Grampians) and found myself in Adelaide.

As you may remember, I had some difficulty making friends and meeting people in Melbourne. I was, as I texted a friend, the angriest I have ever been for several days in a row. The tour was a delightful break from that - but was it a fluke? Was I just making friends with other tourists? A very slow check-in at my hostel had me fearing the worst.

Great Ocean Road and Grampians

Over a period of an hour and a half, we loaded a small bus full of passengers from around the world. I use "we" liberally - I was the first pick-up and, as such, I sat near the front and conversed with the driver / guide. After everyone was aboard, we set out on an absolutely delightful drive from Melbourne to Adelaide.

I'll be honest: I'm not sure what to include in this entry. The trip deserves its own entry for the sights we saw, the friends I made, and the general whole of the trip, but I'm struggling to write more than "we went to a sight, we were amazed, then we went to another sight and were amazed again" for a dozen or so stops.

More on Melbourne

Complaints about the people aside, I suspect I should give a proper account of my stay in Melbourne.

I arrived early-for-me in the morning after an overnight flight from Tokyo. I will never learn my lesson and avoid overnight travel - I was thoroughly lucky that my hostel let me in early so I could waste a day taking a long nap (then tossing and turning all night).

Moron Mansion, Melbourne

I love Melbourne. I hate the people.

Every moment of every interaction with every person here is an argument for the extinction of the human race.

Seagulls biding their time

In no particular order: