April 1, 2001 - Sunday - Sydney / Palm Beach
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| Top of cliff before Palm Beach, New South Wales, Australia |
This morning Colin and I went to Yum Cha along with a bunch of his friends - Yum Cha is the Australian name for "Dim Sum". After brunch, we headed north to the snobby beach retreat of Palm Beach. It was fairly scenic on the way up there and we passed several none descriptive small towns. After winding through some spectacular mountain drives with coastal views, we finally arrived in Palm Beach.
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| Para-Surfing at Palm Beach, New South Wales, Australia |
There were a lot of people swimming and people in the far distance doing a sport I haven't seen before - para-surfing. Basically, they surf the wave while hanging onto a rectangular parachute high up top. It looked wickedly fun. We caught the sunset after hanging out at the bay for a while and then headed back to the City.
Mike invited us for tea and I met his landlords - Dennis. Dennis used to do piano performances but hasn't done it for more than 10 years. He's got a collection of more than 1 thousand piano rolls for playing on the several player pianos scattered throughout the house. It was like visiting a museum. He's also got one connected to his computer so he could record the piano rolls or whatever he plays on the piano directly onto the computer.
It was actually a fairly high tech set up and I was pretty impressed by it. Those 3 old farts sat around and sang a lot of piano songs from the 20's and 30's, which I didn't recognize at all except for "Happy Days are Here Again". I only hope I will have a group of old good friends like that when I'm their age.
April 2, 2001 - Monday - Sydney
After saying good-bye to Colin, I updated the web site then headed out to meet up with Matt and the German guy. It was drizzling and showering lightly. Kings Cross reminded me of New York City where people and the streets looked dirty and ugly. Drug transactions occur on the streets regularly as I stood there and waited.
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| Matt, Joerg, and "The Baron", Outside Sydney, Australia |
I went to the hostel and met up with Matt. Matt has a car and was offering rides up to Cairns so I figured it would be good to meet the people I'll be traveling with for the next month. The German guy was nowhere to be found. I chatted with Matt, who seems like a fairly friendly guy and it looks like we would get along. He's 25 from Birmingham, England and we chatted with a drink at a bar.
I later found out Birmingham in England is like West Virginia of the States, where people sleep with their cousins, sisters, and relatives, and they talk with a drawl. I haven't lived in England so I didn't see any of that in Matt.
The weather is cool, autumn is in the air and it's time for me to move on again and continue north. People I've met who are not backpackers often asked me if I get tired of traveling and if I will settle down. I haven't found a place where I'd like to settle for more than a month yet. Maybe in Sydney, but the weather is getting cooler here.
Sure it'd be nice to settle but I'm reaching the point where I'd feel comfortable living out of my backpack. It's always nice to settle for a few days or a week in a place but I've always felt at the end that it's time for me to move on. "But I still haven't found what I'm looking for".
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