maynardcase.co.uk linkfest

Best Christmas lights display ever?

Pie-eating contest (might require IE)

A nice summary of the Sony rootkit debacle

URL-based riddles

Slot car racing

Stumbled across this article in the Economist about communication, and how a researcher developed an experiment to allow pairs of people to create a new language together.

The writeup of this experiment is very interesting and worth a look, if only for the cunning way in which the experiment was set up.

I’ve not actually been eaten by dingoes, despite rumours to the contrary. Apologies for the sporadic updates; internet access has been tricky recently.

The trip is over - I think we did about 2,800 miles altogether, a good proportion of which involved a two-day drive from the Fleurieu Peninsula near Adelaide to Canberra, via Mildura. It’s a long way! The experience has been great, seen lots of amazing things and drank some amazing beer… but it’s nice to be on the way home.

I’m writing this from Kuala Lumpur International Airport, where I have learned that sleeping on a bench in an airport isn’t as bad as it sounds. We’ve just got the 12 hour stretch to Heathrow now, then back home. I have lots of photos, and I’ll be writing up the rest of the trip with appropriate pictoral accompaniment for your delight and edification (or something).

A lazy last day in Sydney. We checked out of the hotel and had a wander down to the shopping district. We had some tasty noodles in the food hall of one of the department stores and then headed back to the Botanical Gardens.

Late afternoon we met up with a rather dubious shuttle bus service to the airport, but despite that we made it there alive, early and checked in. A few hours later, we boarded the plane and said goodbye to Australia with a beautiful moonlit view of Sydney.

The morning saw us driving back through the grimy industrial wasteland of the road through the Blue Mountains, back towards Sydney. We stopped off at the town at the entrance to the Mountains, Glenbrook, to see an ancient cave used by Aborigines. They made hand-prints with the local ochre on the walls of the cave, which are still visible (albeit through a perspex barrier) today.

The cave is along a track, accessible from a ten kilometer unsealed track road. Driving along these things is pretty good fun if you’re driving and scary if you’re not; dodging the pot-holes and seeing how fast you can go without actually damaging the car are the best parts.

The best part was when four kangeroos hopped placidly in a line across the road, seemingly unaware that we were braking sharply from 40kph not very far away.

We drove back to Sydney, planning on driving from the west into the city centre area, crossing by Hyde Park and then back to Kings Cross to the car hire depot. It didn’t quite go according to plan; initially we came up an unsigned fork which resulted in us going about 2km north-west into Sydney’s surburbia. Once we’d returned back to our route in from the west of the city, we had an encounter with a set of junctions that are amazing; there’s about six branches in less than a kilometer, all of which can change your journey dramatically. In my efforts to avoid the tunnel across the city we ended up going over the Sydney Harbour Bridge, turning around in North Sydney and finding a way through to the Harbour tunnel. After a hair-raising manouver to cross to the unsigned exit we emerged about five minutes from our final Kings Cross destination, and disembarked shakily into the drizzle.

Summary: don’t try and drive through Sydney, it’s a nightmare.

We finally got a taxi to the Intercontinental Hotel, found our room and made a trip up to the top floor to check out the pool (deserted and tranquil). Dinner was overlooking the Harbour, then a wander home to get some sleep in the vast bed.

We got our walking boots on and wandered down to the Three Sisters lookout, talking the path along to the Giant Stairway to the base of the cliffs. This is a fairly impressive flight of stairs, 170 metres of very steep steps hugging the cliffside. It took us half an hour to complete the descent and resulted in a couple of instances of “disco leg”! We then walked along the base of the cliffs through the forest to the base of the Scenic Railway, an extremely steep ascent back up through a crack in the cliff. Suffice to say that it was very exhilarating and I was glad that I’d taken the ride up and not down.

We made our way back to the motel via an old trolley bus, then headed off to Blackheath to view the Govetts Leap Lookout - another amazing view - and then onwards to Wentworth Falls.

The weather changed in the afternoon quite dramatically, dropping about ten degrees in an hour - sufficient to make the news in nearby Sydney, where lots of beach-dwellers had been caught unawares.

Once we’d had a break and recovered from the magnificent view fatigue, we went for dinner in the nearby Lilianfels Hotel, which was rather fancy. Definately the way forward: stay in cheap motels, eat in expensive hotels…

This morning was spent whizzing at high speed around Canberra. We initially drove round the corner and parked in the grounds of New Parliament House. It’s an impressive structure, but what is more impressive is the fact that the entire town layout has been designed around it. Coming from London, where the streets have evolved, this is quite a shock.

After having a wander around, we drove down past the Old Parliament House (an imposing but genteel building) to the National Gallery, where we had a quick look through the gardens.

We drove over the (man-made) lake, past the Australia War Memorial and up a very steep hill to Mount Ainslie, where it’s possible to get amazing views of Canberra’s tidy well-organised streets.

Having seen all that Canberra has to offer, we hurtled down the highway, only diverting ourselves to have lunch in Bowral. Bizarrely we were very close to Fitzroy Falls which we’d approached from the other direction about two weeks ago! It wasn’t until then that we realised how close to Sydney we were.

After a long and frankly tedious drive along rubbish roads we finally started to ascend into the Blue Mountains. Unfortunately sweeping vistas were non-existent; rather depressing concrete-based views were more prominent. We headed to the Three Sisters motel in Katoomba (a rather disappointing town) and went for a wander to see the Three Sisters, a famous rock formation. It was at this point that the amazing scenery of the mountains finally revealed itself; quite astonishing views over the ranges covered in dense eucalyptus forest, with magnificent cliffs jaggedly pointing upwards.

Dinner: takeaway Thai; most excellent. Enlivened by me popping out to try to find an beer shop which turned out to be virtually non-existent. You would have thought that the Aussies would have more places to purchase beer, but there you go…

A long day of driving today; we got up early to make the most of the cool mornings and headed off with a full tank just before 8am.

One of the more interesting sights outside Mildura were rows of orange trees. Often along the road were little unmanned huts with bags of oranges hanging for $2 a bag.

The trip involved briefly heading through the following towns:
* Mildura
* Balranald
* Hay (bumper sticker available in garage: “Where the hell is Hay?”)
* Leeton
* Narrandera (lunch: a rather nice burger from the only shop open in the whole town)
* Wagga Wagga (suddenly mountains appear - astonishing, in comparison to the flatness of the plains)
* Yass (up in the hills, a lovely area)
* Canberra

Wildlife watch: today we caught a glimpse of what we think was a wedge-tailed eagle; quite an amazingly big bird!

Canberra is a strange place; only really forty years old, extremely carefully laid out, with the parliament as a focal point. We drove through to the Forrest area just south of the parliament building where we were staying. Once we’d got ourselves sorted out we wandered down the road to the Manuka area for a rather nice dinner at a nearby Malaysian restaurant, then home for some well-earned rest.

The total journey: about 800km in 9 hours and 20 minutes - an average of just over 85 km/hour. Not too bad, considering we had to stop for half an hour for lunch! It was a big relief to do the longest stretch of the holiday through the least populated areas without any problems.

Today was the first of two big days of driving; we left Victor Harbour and started heading back east.

Leaving South Australia was highlighted by a huge Dunlop tyre arch (presumably stolen from the last F1 grand prix) which emphasised the state’s phyloxxera-free status. Annoyingly the speed limit changed back to 100km/hr; no longer could we cruise along carefree at 110…

Wildlife watch: pretty much just a hawk flying overhead, and a kangaroo on the side of the road.

We arrived in Mildura late afternoon, after travelling about 440km. This town is rather larger than we were expecting, but the flies were annoying enough that we didn’t explore too much. It was rather nice to have a beer from the microbrewery in the centre, though.

Geeze, I really hate early morning starts, especially when you’re on holiday. However, we had a big day planned - a ferry trip to Kangeroo Island with a one-day guided tour of the highlights!

So we drove to Cape Jervis early this morning to get to the ferry for 8.30am, checked in and boarded the 9am ferry. After a relatively smooth crossing we made it to Penneshaw and boarded the coach, which headed off to Seal Bay to see the sealions. Amazing creatures, which are sadly endangered; it’s unlikely that the trips to see them will continue for too much longer. We were able to get within about 6 metres of them, and they obliged with some playfighting, territorial disputes and mothers suckling their young.

After that we had a barbecue lunch followed by a wander around to see some more koalas (yawn) and some Tamar Wallabies, which are extremely cute and relatively friendly.

We then headed off into the Flinders Chase National park which covers the west side of the island, heading first to Remarkable Rocks. These are more bizarre structures carved by the elements out of granite; they benefit from being on a huge plug of granite rising near the cliffs and surrounded by the bush.

We then did a bit of seal-spotting by Admiral’s Arch, another rock formation on the western point of the Island. The fur seals that live here were very playful; it’s amazing to just see them lying there looking at you (or more likely, each other).

Back to the visitor’s centre at the entrance to the park where we had a break to go kangeroo hunting; perhaps unsurprisingly there’s a few that lurk around there and are quite used to people. I was able to approach a few closely enough to tickle them under the chin!

Back home on the ferry, followed by a drive back to Victor Harbour via the local McDonalds for some greasy goodness.