Australia 2019 – Day 48 – The last day

Alas, it is time to say goodbye to Australia and bring this trip to an end ☹

I woke up in my space capsule, took a shower, had a good breakfast, and loaded like a burrito walked the 6 blocks to the Australian Museum, where I was planning on spending my last morning in Sydney. It was a lovely walk, but I got there at 9 am, half an hour before opening time. Normally I would not mind waiting for half an hour, but I am feeling “bloated” with intestinal gas, and I could have used immediate access to the restroom. I walked up and down outside, not wanting to embarrass myself by passing gas in front of the 20 or more teenage girls waiting in line. Finally they opened and I rushed in to seek relief. Ahh!

The museum is in many senses a Victorian era exhibition of curiosities, but they had an interesting exhibition about the struggle between Aborigines and Europeans, and the slow acknowledgement of the first ones as the First Australians (1965 to 2005). Interspersed were displays of aboriginal artifacts, and recounting of their legends. A fascinating film showed the discovery in central Australia of an old lake bottom (very shallow lake) with footprints on it, as would have been made by people going back and forth across the shallow lake, with kids horsing around. One of the set of footprints has been interpreted as being from a one-footed man hoping on his way (of course they are full of it, because the “hop prints” were separated by a good 3 meters from each other; I bet it was a man floating in a canoe, and guiding his way across the lake by pushing against the bottom with his dangling foot). But the interesting part is that the bed on which the footprints are preserved has been dated between 16,000 and 20,000 years ago. Somebody has determined that Aborigines migrated into Australia from Papua New Guinea 60,000 to 40,000 years ago, and these dates are now part of the “original” legends told by the descendants of those First Australians.

Damn, I need to go back to the restroom. My tummy hurts.

The museum also has a hall with deadly Australian fauna, where I saw the biggest crocodile ever, all sorts of snakes, poisonous fish, talon-wielding platypuses, sharks, wild-eyed cassowaries, but alas, no bird-eating spiders. In typical Victorian fashion there were cases packed with kangaroos and wallabies, bats and owls, possums and bandicoots, echidnas and pangolins, and every possible type of bizarre animal found in this land. Thylacines (or Tasmanian tigers) lead the list of the species now extinct.

Hold on, I need to visit the little boys’ room.

They had a very fine display of prehistoric animals that became extinct at the end of the last glaciation, including giant wombats and fierce looking giant kangaroos. Going one step farther the exhibition included some of the main types of dinosaurs found in Australia (which are the same we know from South America and Africa, since at that time all these landmasses were welded into Gondwana). One particularly gruesome exhibit had a full-size T-Rex being dissected by a group of nerdy Mesozoic zoologists, which had already removed the stomach, heart, and ovaries, and were in the process of cutting off one of the legs. Sicko!

Really? Is this eruption in my vowels never going to stop?

Finally, there is a hall dedicated to South Pacific masks, which would bring joy to the heart of my friend Bob. Me, I am sure I wouldn’t find it all that fun to walk through my house at night having all those scary demons and spirits watching me from their pegs in the wall.

Alas, all to soon came time to visit the facilities one more time and head for the airport, which was the easiest thing in the world because the train station a block from the museum is on the direct line to the airport. It took me no more than 20 minutes to go from museum to the check-in counter, and in another 10 minutes I was already in the vast departure area of the international terminal. I had managed my money pretty well, and on my last day I had no more than AUS$ 1.50 in my pocket. But at 1 pm I still had four hours to wait, and everybody was having lunch. But maybe I should skip lunch to give my tummy a chance to rest. But there were stacks of delicious sandwiches tempting me. But I would not like to get on board with an overloaded stomach. But what if I faint of hunger waiting for my flight? At the end of 10 minutes of struggle I converted a few US dollars into Aussie currency, had a pastrami sandwich on rye (hey, if you are going to overindulge why do it meekly), and am know writing this coda to my travels. I am sure I will survive to travel to some new place in the near future.

Finis

Australia 2019 – Day 47 – Sydney, Day 2

My hotel is the coolest hotel ever! It is a backpackers’ place called Space Q Capsule, where the dorms have space capsules instead of bunk beds. Direct out of Star Wars, the capsules open with a swipe of the card, and glow in the dark with a soft blue light. The capsule itself is maybe 10 ft long, 5 ft wide, and 5 ft tall, so it is quite roomy and comfortable. The command center allows you to plug your iPhone and listen to music, adjust the air conditioning, and sweep close the door of the capsule. Everything is space-age clean and comfortable (I am going to guess it is quite a new remodel, or otherwise they do a great job at keeping it clean, functional, and space-age modern!).

I was out in the street by 8 am, intent on visiting first the fish market and then the Australian Maritime Museum. I had not problem finding the right streets, but it was a good walk and I didn’t make it to the fish market until 8:45 am. In very Aussie style the market was advertised as the biggest in Asia, but no, it is OK, but nothing compared to the fish market in Tokyo, or even the Pike Street Market in Seattle. Still, there were all sorts of trucks loading fish for distribution in the city, and there was a nice touristy area with huge displays of fish, crabs, lobsters, and shell fish, and with nice eating areas. For me it was a bit early for fish, but there were some hardy souls already having a sushi breakfast. DJ would have loved to see the enormous blue crabs and king crabs!

Another brisk walk brought me to the maritime museum, which in my mind I had made the unofficial high point of my visit to Sydney. I have a thing about maritime museums, having visited very fine ones from Tierra del Fuego to Norway. On approach I saw that they had the typical collection of historical vessels, including a cutter and a “tall” ship with one of her masts stepped down. It was a funny, fat vessel, and it was clearly being worked on. As I mentioned the top of her foremast had been disassembled, and there were a couple of sailors working on the rigging of her main mast and her mizzen mast. On approaching her I was finally able to read her name: HMB Endeavour. What? It could not possibly be the Endeavour, James Cook’s first command? It wasn’t and it was. The original Endeavour was captured during the American war of independence, and sunk off the coast of Rhode Island in 1778, but in 1990 the Australian Maritime Museum undertook the construction of the replica that now stood before me. The bark was a collier used to transport coal (hence her stubby shape) prior to the time when the Royal Navy bought it to send it to the South Pacific, under the command of Lieutenant James Cook, in 1769. How I would have liked to go on board!

I stepped into the museum, as eager as a kid, and gladly paid the AUS$ 32 entrance fee, only to find out that most of the museum was free, and what I had just paid for was to visit the warships and submarine that are part of the collection. Rats! The museum was pretty good, although not the best I have seen, and I completely skipped the section on naval warfare, which Australians seem to have such a liking for. I had a lot of sightseeing to complete, so I decided to go take a last look to the Endeavour before moving on. Surprise! The Endeavour was open to visitors, and my paid fee entitled me to step aboard. Oh, it was such a thrill. Man, once on board and in a deck covered with all sorts of rope, capstan, four gigantic anchors, and a rudder bar that swept most of the after deck there hardly seem to be enough place for its complement of 100 sailors, 12 marines, three officers, the four scientific gentlemen, and its master and commander. Below deck was the living space of all these people, mostly in a space that was at best 5 ft high; the only way to be there for any length of time was to crouch, sit down, or lay down. The officers fared a bit better (but not much), and the great cabin felt like the most luxurious space ever. It turns out they had opened the bark to visitors because on this particular day there were a bunch of school groups visiting the museum, and of course they wanted for them to see the jewel of the collection. And then I heard something that interested me greatly: HMB Endeavour sails for several months of the year, to visit foreign ports or to accommodate for school visits around Australia; needless to say I have signed up for the 2020 season, volunteering (and paying for the privilege) to be part of the crew to sail her from Sydney to Cairns in summer 2020! How cool would that be?

The last part of my hop-on hop-off tour visited the east part of the city, which is mostly residential and absolutely beautiful. With looks of the Pacific to the east, and of the many bays that form Sydney Harbor to the west, this part of town is the place to live. The houses are grandiose and sell for millions of dollars, and I can see that retiring here would be mighty fine. One of the highlights of the eastern tour is Bondi Beach, which apparently is world famous among surfers, and rubs elbows with famous beaches such as Waikiki or Santa Cruz. It even has its own TV show, highlighting the excellent work done by its beach rescue team. Unfortunately in winter it is cold and windy, so besides us crazy tourists there were only a couple of even crazier surfers (my guess is that they were foreigners that just had to check surfing Bondi in their bucket lists).

I wrapped the afternoon by going to visit the Opera House, although I was not able to get inside. There were an insane number of tourists, with Chinese dominating the ranks, so it was hard not to be in someone else’s shot, or to take a picture without having a tourist making rabbit ears with her fingers at you. It is a beautiful structure with a myriad angles to it, and I have no doubt it is one of the most photographed buildings on the planet.

I walked all the way back to my hotel, and almost there I took a right when I should have taken a left, and found myself in the middle of Chinatown. Good, I think I will have a dozen barbecued duck wings for dinner.    

Australia 2019 – Day 46 – Sydney

I landed in Sydney at 6 am, and it received me with open arms. First, the transfer to the city is a snap with the train (AUS$ 20), which 15 minutes later deposited me in Central Station, a bare three blocks from my accommodation. I got there around 8 am, and they kindly allowed me to leave my backpack there, so I could go explore the city unencumbered.

I was waiting to cross the street back to Central Station, when this young man handed me a free invitation to breakfast! It turns out a new Vietnamese restaurant was opening, and as part of their promotion they were inviting the first 100 customers to a free (small) dim sum breakfast and tea. I think I had the honor of being customer number one, so I got received with many smiles.

After getting a cup of coffee I walked around for a bit, and at 9 am boarded the hop-on hop-off tourist bus that was to take me around the city, looking at the main points of interest. I bought a 2-day deal that included a walking tour through the old part of the city (which I decided to take right away) and a harbor cruise (which I reserved for the sunset hours).

The city was established on January 26, 1788, as a convict colony of the Brits, on both sides of a bay formed by a good size stream (the Trunk stream, which has since been constrained to a pipe). On the east the British established a typical expat community with gardens and mansions. On the other side, “over there by the rocks”, was the penal colony. Convicts were sentenced to hard labor for 7 or 14 years, which at the time meant cutting sandstone blocks for the construction of the genteel portion of the town (women convicts had less strenuous sentences). A convict who completed his or her sentence was given a certificate of freedom, and it is from these freed men and women that Australians descended (arguably most Australians can track their ascendancy to a convict, since deportation ended only in 1860). The penal colony was known as The Rocks, a name that the neighborhood still proudly bears. Although the neighborhood of The Rocks was in danger of being razed to the ground to make room for new development, some very serious heritage activism saved it, and now one can visit there some of the oldest standing structures of Sydney, including the oldest pub in Australia (the convicts were paid in rum) and the oldest “hospital” (the name given to an open courtyard where the naval surgeons did their best to keep the convicts alive).

The Rocks are the same Triassic fluvial sandstones I described in the Blue Mountains earlier in my trip, which I will now formally define as the Convict Sandstone, but I fleetingly saw from the bus a structure that reminded me of soft-sediment deformation, which is suggestive of a deltaic environment of deposition (or maybe a small delta formed in a lake, just like I have seen in Mono Lake?).

The tour through the city was delightful, and easy as pie. My deal also included an elevator ride to the tallest structure in Sydney, the 320-m Sydney Tower Eye, from which the sights of the harbor were absolutely amazing. Sydney harbor is the ultimate ria embayment, with dozens of arms of water surrounding the small islands and peninsulas that formed the ridges between watersheds.

Back to the bus I realized that I was going to cut it quite close if I wanted to make the last harbor cruise at 4:25 pm. I made it there at 4:20 pm, with 5 minutes to spare. Alas, there was no sunset to be seen because the sky was cloudy, but I enjoyed great views of the Sydney Bridge, the Sydney Opera House, and the skyline of skyscrapers behind them. The bridge was built in 1923-1932, as part of Australia’s “New Deal” to provide employment during the Depression. It is a fine piece of engineering, but legend has it that Sydney residents did not trust the pure steel trusses structure, so the designers added four stout pilons, two on each side of the bridge to reassure the citizens (but the structure is not attached to the pilons, which are there strictly for decoration). Still, as the inauguration day approached, and the town was invited to come up on the bridge, there were many that feared the bridge would plunge into the bay if the whole town were to step on it. The engineers then loaded every available locomotive on the bridge, to show that the structure was perfectly safe, and inauguration day was thus a rousing success.

The iconic Sydney Opera House was designed in the 1950’s by a Danish architect, was started two times and torn down because the wings were deemed unstable, and it was not until new advances in structural engineering were made that it could be completed, on the third try, in 1970. The only rules of the architectural contest had been that (1) the structure should be ageless in style, and (2) it should be uniquely representative of Sydney. Over the last 50 years this jewel of Sydney Harbor has demonstrated these requirements were met ten-fold!

As the night set in I took the long walk across the Sydney Bridge (just about the only thing that is free in this town), and under a gentle rain got a magnificent view of Sydney, clad in diamonds of light, proudly announcing to the world the spirit of Australia.

Australia 2019 – Day 45 – The Darwin Show

I have reserved today to visit the Darwin Show, which we would call the County Fair. My particular interest are the animals, and perhaps the crafts exhibitions. Regarding the latter, I want to buy for Ronnie a genuine boomerang, and what better place to get it than at the show, where aboriginal artisans are glad to show their crafts and share some of the ways in which they are made.

Of course there would be fine specimens of cattle, pigs, and sheep, but the real uniqueness of the show would be the displays of the best specimens of kangaroos and crocodiles. Kangaroos are a source of meat, and as I described elsewhere the meat is tasty, a little sweet, and not gamey at all. Of course kangaroos are the native species best suited to deal with the dry climate of Australia, and they have no problem reproducing in captivity. Besides they can be a source of milk, butter, and cheese. Farmers being farmers, I delighted in anticipation on the fight demonstrations (a natural behavior of kangaroos, who from early age learn to exchange blows with each other), the jumping contests, and the herding demonstrations of the most important working dog, the Australian Shepherd.

Crocodile farmers are a more scrappy lot. They raise sweetwater crocs for their meat because in two or three years they grow to a teenage-size of 3 to 4 meters. On the darker side of the trade they sell the blanched skulls and totally creepy hands (I can well imagine the response of the US Customs officers if I were to land in SFO with a crocodile hand… yeach!). They may also raise a few saltwater crocs for periods of up to 5 years for the sake of using their skins on tougher merchandise such as cowboy boots (I believe the softer and more pliable skin of sweetwater crocs is best suited for wallets or dress shoes). The industry is looked at with disdain by aborigines and eco-minded folks, but for your average red-neck Australian crocs make for great fun in jumping competitions (jumping straight up out of a water tank to reach a dangling piece of meat), and in races, where two or three crocks race to reach a rapidly retreating piece of meat.

It would have been great to have seen all these marvels, but the truth is that I didn’t because the dumb show was held only on Friday and Saturday, and by the time I got there on Sunday morning all I saw were the stragglers and rather limp cleaning crews. So don’t believe anything of what I described in the first three paragraphs, which are completely the product of my imagination and disappointment.

Well rats! What am I going to do with myself today? I drove around aimlessly for a while, looking at parts of the city I had not seen before, but being Sunday the place is rather bland and boring (Saturday night is big party time, so I suspect that half of the population is sleeping off the hangover). I went back to the seashore, where I found a path down the porcelanite cliffs that took me into the Doctor’s Gully, named after the doctor in one of the early expeditions, who found a good spring in this gully that for years provided for the fresh water needs of the population. Not surprisingly the gully hosts a luxurious abundance of plants and trees. 

My meandering brought me to Mindil Beach, which is the gathering place for the sun lovers of Darwin. It was deserted, probably because it is a bit too sunny and hot, but the Farmers Market was setting up, so I bet the afternoon is going to be quite lively.

Eventually I made it to the botanical garden, where at least I could walk in the shadow of the trees to escape the heat of the day. I guess it must be a botanist dream to work in a place like this, but to the normal person one green tree pretty soon starts to look like … what the ****? … just around a bend I have literally stumbled upon a colony of giant baobabs. The baobab is the strangest tree in the world, and to see several of them assembled together is like meeting an army of giants, each with three or four tiny heads on top of their enormous bodies. You do remember, don’t you, that one of the greatest concerns of The Little Prince was to weed his tiny planet at least once a day, to make sure that one of those weeds wouldn’t grow into an enormous baobab tree that would take over the whole planet. Remind me to show you a photo of this unusual tree, which I have also encountered in Madagascar and, of all places, in a tiny island off the coast of Rio de Janeiro.

So that was my day. A bit surreal and with lots of free time to sit under a baobab and ponder the true meaning of life.

P.S. I finally made it to the airport around 9 pm, for the 1 am flight to Sydney. Being there so early I thought it would be safe to take a little nap, so I set my alarm to sound at the time boarding was supposed to start (I live in fear of missing my flight since that happened to me 20 years ago and had to spend an extra night in Portland, Oregon). But you know how it is with boarding, which is always delayed by 10, 20, or 30 minutes, so after waking up when the alarm sounded I sat groggily for about 5 minutes and promptly fell asleep again. I didn’t wake up until I heard the announcement THIS IS THE LAST CALL FOR QANTAS FLIGHT TO SYDNEY. I woke up slowly, stretched and yawned, and approached the counter only to find out I was the only passenger going to Sydney. Wow, I wonder how they can keep this route open if it is so unpopular. I walked down the gangway and stepped into a completely full airplane! 200 pairs of eyes watched me angrily as I sundered onto my seat, buckled on, and promptly fell asleep again.

Australia 2019 – Day 44 – Kakadu National Park

Nothing like a cruise down the East Alligator River to kick off the day. Our guide was a middle age Aborigine who laid down the wisdom of the ancients pretty heavily on us. His reasoning was “We are still here after 40,000 years, ergo we know what we are doing.” Fair enough, but the native Australians have the same problem that native Americans have, in that the allures of civilization, such as old trucks and alcohol, “distract” them from their simple, virtuous lives. In this case the native people of Kakadu National Park, which amount to about 15,000 people in an area of close to a million acres, keep producing babies but their numbers continue to steadily decrease. The native people are the formal owners of the land, which they lease to the government to use as a national park.

Anyway, our guide took us to see crocodiles, and once again I heard that “sweeties” are no big deal, and are even fun to swim with, but “salties” have a mean disposition and are really dangerous. A salty can sprint from complete repose to the speed of a horse in but a few seconds, which has caused more than one death among clueless tourists. As we approached a ford, where some people were fishing with water to their ankles, we saw a big croc come to check things out. Needless to say, the fishermen promptly decamped.

We heard a lot of interesting stories about the seasons, the legendary barramundi (a fish that grows to the size of a large salmon), the birds, the plants, and the connection of the people to the landscape. The native Australians remain largely hunter-gatherers, and I was particularly fascinated by a demo of the way they spear-fish. The curious thing is that they use the technique of the atlatl or spear-thrower, in which a piece of wood the length of the forearm is used to propel a light spear. Silly me when I thought this was a tool used only in Mesoamerica; rather, it seems to be a tool that was “invented” independently in Mesoamerica, in Australia, and probably also in Africa and Europe as well. I believe in Mesoamerica its use goes back to 3,000 years ago, and in Australia it is represented in pictographs that are dated at 1,000 years ago.

Having completed my tour, it was time for me to explore the park, which is famous for at least three things: A good portion of it gets inundated if the rainy season is intense, and thus merits the name of The Wetlands; this year the rainy season was weak, so it looks more like the Drylands, but once you know what to look for you can easily distinguish the areas that are commonly flooded.

The second claim to fame is a long cliff, 30 to 50 m high, of Proterozoic sandstones and sedimentary breccias. The sediments accumulated in short fluvial systems (hence the breccias and prismatic cross-bedding), with sand dunes forming in the flood plain (hence the laminations and festoon cross-bedding), and probably transitioning to a coastal lagoon environment (hence the ripple marks). The sandstones are quartz arenites, and the oligomictic breccias are dominated by fragments of milky quartz. I wonder if anyone has prospected them for placer gold? The angular nature of the fragments seems at odds with the lack of feldspars in both the breccias and sandstones, which makes me think on the Eocene of California, where wet and warm conditions led to deep weathering of feldspars. Keep in mind that this was the Proterozoic, 2 billion years ago, when there were no land plants to form soils or retain the products of weathering. Another peculiarity of these quartz sandstones, is that for some reason they seem to be good seeds of lightening, so in the monsoon season the thunderstorms are truly spectacular, with hundreds or even thousands of discharges per hour. Lightening often causes fires, which do not rage uncontrolled because of the accompanying heavy monsoon rains; a natural system of checks and balances on the periodic renewal of the vegetation and the ecosystem. Finally, there is the puzzle of the formation of the cliff itself, since it runs for a good 50 km. I will advance the hypothesis that it was formed as a coastal cliff, at a time of high stand in sea level; of course, I have zero evidence for this hypothesis since I haven’t seen any young marine deposits anywhere.

The third call to fame is the presence of lots and lots of pictographs, ranging from graffiti scratched thousands of years ago by hooligan teenagers, to sacred drawings which likely had significance only as part of a ceremony, not unlike the sand paintings of the Navajo (archaeologists infer this from the fact that some pictures are superimposed one on the other at particular places). It is really hard to interpret what the pictographs represent (now I understand the puzzlement look of my students when I draw a diagram): I was so proud of myself when I saw a hunter using an atlatl, when the explanatory board only stated that this particular pictograph was “new” at less than 1,000 years old! I also recognized kangaroos, and with some prompting from the explanatory boards was able to identify a crocodile, and several barramundi arranged side by side (was this the home of the fish monger?). A few of the pictographs have been identified by the native Australians as representing some of their legends (fables that ended in some gruesome outcomes for the wrongdoers) and creation stories. The latter take place in what they call The Dream Time, when rainbow serpent came down from the clouds to form the rivers, the floodplains, the animals, and the people.

I thoroughly enjoyed my time in Kakadu National Park, but realize I am getting a bit tired of being a gypsy, never knowing where I will spend the night next. I started on my way back to Darwin, thinking that maybe along the way I could find a quaint little hotel to spend the night. I did find a “colorful” motel in the town of Humpty Doo (no joke, that is the name of the town), attached to the “world famous” Wild Hog Tavern. It was a dump, and the crowd looked like hard-core drinkers (many of them sporting Wild Hog T-shirts), but when I learned that the fee was AUS$ 100 per night I rebelled against the absurdly high prices the tourist must pay for rather sub-standard lodging. So I went all the way back to Darwin, back to my backpackers lodging. I think I am about ready to go back home.  

Australia 2019 – Day 43 – On the way to Kakadu National Park

I am glamping, seated in an air-conditioned room with TV at the Kakadu Lodge, but still having to go to the outdoor facilities like any ol’ camper. Considering I am paying AUS$ 185 for the privilege, I now feel obliged to make the most of my available privileges.

Going back to the beginning of the day, after leaving Darwin I ran a good 100 km to a decommissioned dam named Fogg Dam. This dam was built in the 50’s, when the powers that be in the Northern Territories province (one of the six states that form Australia) were trying to jump start the local economy by creating a regional rice agricultural industry (I suspect they got the idea from the Sacramento River rice-growing region). The Adelaide River was going to play the role of the Sacramento River, and a couple of small holding dams were built on tributaries of the Adelaide River. But they didn’t have a large volume reservoir to feed the system (e.g., like the Shasta or Oroville dams), and the Adelaide is prone to going dry in drought periods, so the whole scheme went bust. Fogg Dam eventually filled up with sediment, and it is now a wading-birds preserve. Unfortunately the crocodiles soon moved in, so bird-watchers have been warned not to walk along the dam. I am not a bird-watcher, so I took a happy stroll along the dam, admiring the birds and looking for crocs. Lots of the first type, none of the latter type.

Another 65 km brought me to the Corroboree Billabong, for the pleasure of taking an air-boat ride (you know the type from The Everglades in Florida, with a giant fan propeller in the back). As I mentioned before, a billabong is a slough (pronounced sloo) formed in particularly flat flood plains. When the Adelaide River floods, the water spreads over thousands of square kilometers, and fish and crocs move freely from the coast inland. As the flood waters recede, many of these visitors get stranded in billabongs, which hold water during the long dry season; the longer the dry season, the less water is available, so the crocs, fishes, and birds get concentrated in a smaller and smaller slough.

There are two types of crocs: The smaller and more elegant fresh water crocs are relatively shy and don’t pose much of a threat, except to birds. The bigger and much meaner saltwater crocs, or “salties” are the ones everyone keeps warning you about. They are big, they are fast, and they are not afraid to go after wild pigs or people. They can see in color, so they are particularly attracted to bright orange floating vests. We saw both types in our ride, and I can vouch for the fact that salties trigger our primordial fears. Our guide told us that she and her sons collect croc eggs in the off season, to sell them to croc farms where they hatch and raise them for their skin and meat. Each female croc can lay 50 to 80 eggs in a nest that she keeps at just the right temperature by adding rotting leaves for heat, or by wetting the mound to cool it down. Depending on demand, a viable croc egg can go for AUS$ 25 to 45, por a total payback of AUS$ 1,500 to 3,000. I am not sure I would like to gamble a foot at those odds!

We also saw quite a few big birds. We saw sea eagles with white heads, a dark-colored crane with an enormous wing-span, and any number of egrets and herons. An interesting factoid is that all these birds mate for life, and that if you see one, then his or her mate is probably within sighting distance. Our Aussie guide claimed that sea eagles are bigger than bald eagles, probably because she has never seen a bald eagle close distance!

Another 100 km brought me to the doors of the Kakadu National Park, which boasts being the largest national park of Australia. I am a bit under-impressed, no doubt because after another 70 km I was still crossing a savanna of little eucalyptus trees and dwarf palms (that is what you get with the big flooding). One amazing thing were the termite mounds, which form clusters of mud and sand ghosts, a good 4 m tall. Another feature worth mentioning are the burn areas you see everywhere; apparently the aboriginal tribes have used fire at the very start of the dry season as a way of keeping the low forest healthy. Setting the fires while the grasses and weeds are not completely dry allows them to burn “cooler”, so the fire cannot damage the trees, which simply shed their outside slightly burnt skin at the start of the next rainy season. Maybe we could learn something useful from the Traditional Custodians of the land for our own fire-management efforts in California. 

Australia 2019 – Day 42 – Darwin

After leaving the airport at 2 am in my rental car I stopped in the first quiet neighborhood I saw and took a long nap. Fortunately I rented a new Mitsubishi that reclines completely, so I was quite comfortable. At around 6 am I got up and drove to downtown Darwin, where I got early-bird parking at a parking structure. I am going to leave the car here, because Thrifty and the Northern Territories played me a dirty game and gave me a limit of 100 km free per day, after which they will charge me AUS$ 0.35 per kilometer. Imagine that, 100 km in Australia! Why, you can easily burn that going to the Men’s Shed. [Every small town in Australia has a Men’s Shed, which looks like a plain farm shed, but is where the bar is located.]

Darwin was settled in the early 1800’s, largely because the Brits didn’t want the French or the Dutch to get a foothold on their new sandbox. At the beginning it was but a cattle post where ranchers shamelessly dispossessed the native inhabitants of their land. In 1838, the surveyor of the 3^rd trip of The Beagle renamed the settlement Darwin, in honor of the naturalist that had accompanied the 2^nd trip of The Beagle in 1831-1836.

I limited my on-foot explorations to the touristy downtown, and can tell you that it is perfectly geared to receive hordes of tourists. Backpackers are very welcome, so you have lots of young people congregating around the pools of their hostels, no doubt recovering from a wild night in one of the many night clubs found in this area. In the morning the best the tourist can do is walk the waterfront. Darwin sits along the shore of a ria bay, formed by the rise of sea level into the stream valleys of a coastal watershed. If it had been a large watershed there would be one or more rivers feeding into the bay and then I could call it an estuary; but no, there is no significant river so it is just a bay. The city is underlain by a Cretaceous porcelanite (a quartz siltstone), not unlike that of the Miocene Monterey Formation in California.

World War II buffs would have many sites to visit since Darwin was bombed by the Japanese, and afterward was the headquarters of many air squads of the Allies. The modern citizen is likely to admire, in the distance, the modern facilities built to cool and liquefy natural gas being extracted from the Timor Sea to the west, as well as a supermodern loading facility for giant LNG ships.

I also spent lots and lots of money making reservations to go tomorrow to Kakadu National Park, which will include a fast air-boat ride in the Corroboree Billabong (i.e., a slough that is part of the estuary of the Adelaide River), a night lodging in the park (expensive!), and a cruise along the East Alligator River. I give you one guess as to what animal I might see in this cruise. . . .  Wrong! Alligators are only found in Latin America and the shores of the Gulf of Mexico. The misname of this particular river was the fault of a rooky biologist who sighted the animals from the surveying vessel and shouted: “Alligators, alligators!”

As I am writing this entry I realize I have miscalculated, and that I will have one more day in Darwin beyond the two I am spending in the Kakadu National Park. Hmm … this is where the 100 km per day is really going to put a cramp in my style.

Australia 2019 – Day 41 – A hellacious travel day

Today I will spend the next 24 hours travelling from Kimbe to POM (7 am to 8 am), POM to Brisbane (1:30 pm to 4:30 pm), Brisbane to Sydney (6:30 pm to 8:00 pm), and Sydney to Darwin (9 pm to 1 am the following day). What can I say? It will be hell.

The nice thing about a trip with three flight legs is that I got fed three times 😊

The Darwin airport was a zoo at 1 am. Where are all these people coming and going? It must be a big vacation spot.

Australia 2019 – Day 40 – PNG Day 13. The equatorial jungle

My last day in PNG, and I am faced with two choices. Climb the local volcano or go snorkeling. In retrospect it was a pity I chose the former (my reasoning was that I could do the latter in the afternoon) because it means that I will always wonder how wonderful the Kimbe reef might have been. On the other hand I was highly satisfied with my swim in Kokopó, so I will call it the peak experience and leave it at that.

I was supposed to be picked up at 6 am, and was given to understand that being late for the 7 am departure would be considered very bad manners to my fellow hikers. So I was ready at 5:45 am for pickup. Right. This is PNG, and punctuality is a notion they are completely unfamiliar with. My ride came at 6:45 am, and by 7:15 am I was hurrying to meet my group, already feeling their disapproval was over me. Got there and … nothing! My hiking partners, Jenny and Tim, are expat Australians working in PNG, and they have already embraced the concept of PNG time. They were enjoying yet another cup of morning tea, and making the last minute trips to the bathroom, so it was probably 7:45 am when we got started.

We were going to climb Mount Gabuanat (aka Mount Welcha), which was vaguely pointed out to us somewhere in the middle of the equatorial jungle (Kimbe is about 6 degrees south latitude). Tim Griffith turned out to be the chatty sort, and I learned he is a litigation attorney practicing in POM, as well as an author. His book, “Endurance”, is about the ordeal of the Shackleton expedition to Antarctica, and the two years the crew survived in the ice-locked ship Endurance. I must see if I can find it at the airport in POM. Jenny, Tim’s wife, is a consultant for the non-profit organization Save the Children, which I understand is trying to promote healthy food choices, particularly among the children. The every day diet is dominated by carbohydrates (taro, noodles, yams), with a little meat protein and very little veggies and fruits, so there is a lot of room for improvement. Better nutrition, and draconian measures to curtail the chewing of betel nut, would do a lot for the well being of this country.

Our two guides were local boys, who did their best to show us interesting trees, birds, and bugs. The jungle was alive with birds, among which I can list a bald eagle (not as massive as the American bald eagle) with white plumage in the head and a light brown body, horn bills (which make an ominous whooshing sound when they flap their wings), parrots, cockatoos, and an immense variety of other birds that make a tremendous racket. Add to that the chirping of cycads (the giant grasshopper, not the tree) that comes and go through the jungle, as if they were making the wave. With respect to critters, they were notorious for their absence, although we saw several large land snails, two mongo spiders, and one lonely centipede.

It was fun walking through the jungle, until it was not. At some point I got tired of slipping in the muddy path, climbing, and getting tangled in creeping vines, so I told the others to keep on going. I figured that with this luxurious vegetation the famous volcano would be little more than a jungle-covered mound. I was correct as to the outside, but the crater had some pools of boiling mud, fumaroles, and encrustations of native sulfur. It was OK, I had seen it all before, and in exchange I got a long rest and a nap. On retrospect it was a pretty but very grueling march, and by the time we got back to the village I was dripping sweat from top to toes. I had sworn I would not pursue death marches any more! What happened?

My last words of wisdom to fellow adventure travelers coming to Kimbe. Find your lodging and not even mention tours to your host. Just go to the central market and take PMV Line 1 to Walindi Plantation Resort. They will be glad to arrange tours for you. You could also consider staying at the Walindi Plantation Resort; you would be away from town, but you would not be missing much, believe me. Their website is www.walindi.com 

Australia 2019 – Day 39 – PNG Day 12. Back to Kimbe

I got to the Rabaul airport at 6:30 am, only to find out that my 7:15 am flight had been delayed until 8:30 am. Hey, no problem; this is PNG and I am just glad it was not cancelled all together. Of course I fell asleep in the waiting hall, and you can well imagine my panic when I awoke with a start, alone but for a couple of ladies, seeing the PNG Air plane taxiing out to the runway. I was ready to dash myself across the runway, but one of the ladies stopped me and assured me that this was not our flight. With trembling hands I pulled out my ticket and she confirmed that our flight to Hoskins was not taking off for another hour. I said something about how it would make sense for the airline to wake up the lonely sleeping passenger in the hall, but she countered with “But everybody knows you were going to Hoskins, so there was no need to disturb you.” Hmpf! Why is it that everybody seems to know my business here? Of course I fell asleep again, but this time my good Samaritan woke me up when we started boarding.

Once landed I took my PMV to Kimbe (front seat again 😊) and I had just started to walk toward my hotel when a random nice guy stopped by my side and offered me a ride to my hotel. Lovely! Once there Julie and the rest of the staff received me like the long lost son, and each one of them pumped my hand in welcome. Of course the good-for-nothing manager had not arranged anything for me, so I changed into my swimming suit and headed to the highway to take the PMV to Walindi Plantation Resort, which I understood had tours. I had to go to the center of town to take the PMV Route 1, but once again got front seat privileges. The driver was doing his business and didn’t engage in conversation, but was clearly measuring me up. Walindi is a tiny village way out there, so I had the chance to admire the oil palm plantations, some of the sleekest cattle I have ever seen, and the mountains in the background.

At Walindi I arranged a hike to the volcano tomorrow morning, and a snorkeling trip in the afternoon for very decent money. I also decided to get lunch there, during which I met the owner, and a charming family from El Salvador. Luis is the General Manager of the Puma Refinery in POM, and had to come to Kimbe to attend to some issue with the port storage facilities, so he had brought his wife and their 7-year old son along to make a weekend of it. He gave me his phone in POM, just in case my flight is cancelled and I get stuck in POM for the day. Nice people.

Then it was time to come back, and as I stepped unto the highway who shall I see but the same PMV I had taken on the way in. The driver called me and invited me to take the front seat, and as we crossed the little village of Walindi proudly showed me the new elementary school, told me about the town (he happens to live here), and stopped in the middle of the street to introduce me to his wife. Then he turned around and we headed back to Kimbe engaged in a tasty conversation. He dropped me off right in front of my hotel, and the whole of the PMV waved goodbye and wished me a good trip. Now … twice I have been brought to the door of my hotel, by people I had never seen before. How did they know? I think the whole town now knows I am here, and they have collectively adopted “the Mexican”. I am not going to complain about that. 

Australia 2019 – Day 38 – PNG Day 11. A nothing day.

Today I did nothing. I am staying at Taklam Lodge, which is a friendly but bare bones inexpensive lodging, with no amenities outside of the restaurant. They belong, however, to the owners of Kokopo Beach Bungalows Resort, which has a beach front, beautiful terraces, and a swimming pool. Well, since they have the same owners, the resort extends the courtesy use of its swimming pool to the guests of Taklam, so I took the opportunity of laying by the poolside, reading to my heart’s content, with occasional plunges in the pool to keep my internal temperature within comfortable limits. It was a lovely, lazy day.

I brought my Kindle along in this trip, and within it I have the collected works of Jules Verne in French, of Emilio Salgari in Italian, of Karl May in German, and of Edgar Rice Burroughs and Henry Ridder Haggard in English. Altogether about 500 different novels, so there is no way I will get bored for the next few years.

Australia 2019 – Day 37 – PNG Day 10. Attacked!

I started the day with the idea I could take one of the banana boats to one of the islands, and bum around there for a few hours. The lady at the front desk thought it was not such a good idea, because the banana boats are like the PMVs, which only run if they have enough customers. Normally they have a morning ride from the islands because folks there want to come shopping to Kokopó. Those same people go back to the islands in the afternoon, so there is another rush hour. I wanted to go against traffic, however, so I might get stuck there until 4 or 5 in the afternoon, and that seemed like a long time to wait.

Instead I took the PMV to Rabaul, because I wanted to look at the parts of town that were destroyed by the 1994 eruption. It was a pleasant ride because I took the front seat (being old and a foreigner I can claim the seat of honor) and because the day was overcast and not very hot (alas, that was going to change half-way through my walk). On the way there I saw a sign for the Japanese tunnels, and another for the Japanese subterranean hospital. I have no interest on visiting those tunnels, particularly since they were excavated by prisoners of war.

Rabaul is now dominated by the port, which is not attractive, but they have a brand new colorful market place, and in the past must have been a very pretty city. I have been told it was originally designed by German immigrants, and you can see it had a strict, right-angle trace (Stella would be glad to see alles ist in Ordnung) and wide boulevards. Evidence for the boulevards is still there, but the jungle has reconquered the spaces in between. Now and then you see the skeleton of what might have been a church or a warehouse.

The city was holding elections for city council, so there were small flags and notices reminding people to vote. Some volunteers were there to talk to the passersby, and there were a few enterprising folks selling cold water and sodas at the polling places. By now the day was starting to heat up, so a cold bottle of water was very welcome. One of the folks there asked me what I was doing, and upon learning that I am a geologist suggested I might go to the volcano observatory, pointing to a few small buildings way up on a ridge that extends to the west of yet another volcano (Tovanumbatir, which I think is a pre-caldera volcano that seems to have been nicked by the caldera rim). It seemed like a good idea at the time, so I went to the end of town, and took a PMV up the ridge, which dropped me off at the foot of an incredibly steep street.

I was just getting my bearings, and had confirmed with a couple of ladies who were chatting there that the volcano observatory was up the street, when out of nowhere this fury of a dog attacks me and takes a couple of nips at my calf. I was so startled. Of course, I immediately shouted at the barking mongrel, as did both of the ladies, and after I looked for a stick or rock to throw at him he finally retreated, proud that he had performed his duty. Really? Here I am, proving to the universe that PNG is a place friendly to visitors, and this stupid little dog comes in to disrupt my inner peace. You miserable cur, you would look just right in the display window of a Vietnamese restaurant!

It was a long, long way in the very steep street, with the hot equatorial sun directly overhead, so whenever possible I stopped to take a breather and look around. I ultimately concluded that the ridge I was climbing is formed by the Rabaul Tuff, the unit that formed as a result of the immense eruption that caused the collapse of the roof of the magma chamber to form the Rabaul caldera. The outcrops were provided by partial clearing of the vegetation around the entrance of three tunnels (bright light thought: the numerous Japanese tunnels were made possible by the fact that they were being excavated in the unwelded and barely indurated Rabaul Tuff). As far as I can tell there is a basal layer of airfall tuff, from which I managed to pry off a white fragment of rhyodacitic pumice with only a tiny flake of biotite. On top of the basal layer there are numerous flow units of ignimbrites. The fist-size pumice fragments are surrounded by a matrix of what now looks like a clayey sand, but which was originally a matrix of glass shards. The weathering of the matrix has given considerable cohesion to the unwelded ignimbrite, so the walls and roofs of the tunnels look as pristine as they must have looked when first excavated during WWII.

I finally made it up to the volcano observatory, but being Saturday the place was closed. The view of the caldera was open, however, and it was absolutely stunning. I must have been about 500 m above the level of the bay, and from this lofty elevation I could see, clear as day, the original trace and extent of the original city of Rabaul, which extended from the beach all the way to the base of the surrounding volcanoes. The big container and fishing boats looked like Ronnie’s bathtub toys, floating on the crystal-clear waters of the bay. Finally, the mighty trio of volcanoes—Kombiu, Takumau, and Tavurvur—look like little models made for display in the classroom. It must be pretty nice to work here.

The heat and the effort of the climb took their toll, and by the time I got back to my hotel my legs were cramping and hurting. I have been drinking water all along, but I think I need to drink a lot more if I decide on more hikes.

Australia 2019 – Day 36 – PNG Day 9. Snorkeling in Paradise

Australia 2019 – Day 36 – PNG Day 9. Snorkeling in Paradise

The big event of the day was a great snorkeling excursion. I had bargained a good price, assuming I was joining a group, so imagine my surprise when I got to the beach and found out that I would have a boat, a boatman, and a snorkeling guide all for myself 😊

It was around 9:30 am when we started, directly across the bay to the small Pigeon Island. This very small island has a wide fringe of coral, which easily quadruples its size. There is a gentle but well-established current from the open sea into the bay, so we jumped off the boat on the upgradient side and had an easy float with the current. The reef was beautiful! We had of course all sorts of fabulous fish, including the flute fish, which is as long and skinny as a flute, and all sorts of soft corals (at least at the point where we jumped into the water). My guide, Paul, had no hangovers about touching the reef (which I had learned in Australia is a capital sin), and amused himself tickling the corals or forcing the Clown Fish into hiding inside an anemone. Then we saw a pretty blue starfish, and another, and another, and in no time whatsoever the reef started looking shabby, as if we had crossed to the wrong side of the tracks. In reality, these starfishes were all members of the Blue Star gang, which spells really bad news for the corals, because the Blue Star gang members are ruthless predators of the soft corals. I was a bit sad about this, and every time Paul brought up a starfish I glared at it with accusing eyes.

Now, If I were a marine biologist I would immediately blame the invasion of the starfish on global warming, but the truth is that in every ecosystem there have to be producers and predators. I am glad to report that after a few tens of meters we crossed the tracks again, and went back to a vibrant, colorful reef community where brain corals and soft corals were joined by stiff upstanding sponges, echinoderms of the type called “pound stones” in paleontology, the odd sea-urchin, and no starfish. Paul also pointed out to me lobsters and prawns hiding in the rocks, and brought up a white sea cucumber (much prized by the Chinese for its medicinal powers), black and purple sea cucumbers, and a spotted sea cucumber that as soon as I held him very gently on my open palm started extending a mass of sticky “tentacles” that looked like a bundle of skinny noodles that stuck to my fingers like crazy.

In the meantime the boat had moved downstream, and escorted us to the beach, where we took off our gear to enjoy the superabundant lunch the dive shop had packed for us (tea sandwiches with tuna, cucumber, tomato, egg, and cheese in all sorts of combinations, plus a huge tray of papaya, star fruit, and pineapple slices). There are some advantages at being an only child.

For our second swim we crossed the bay in the direction of the airport, and on the way saw a school of flying fish, which can easily remain aloft for 10 m at a stretch. It turns out the airport strip was developed by the Japanese as they were planning the takeover of the South Pacific islands, and during WWII a Japanese Zero taking off from the strip was gunned down by the Australians and crash landed in the bay. The cabin and front of the airplane are easily recognized, as well as one of the wings, but the other wing and the tail of the plane must have been shattered by the fire or became detached on impact. Weird to see this man-made object in the middle of a reef. That reminds me, the trash that is so evident in the beach is nowhere to be seen on the reefs, which makes me think that it is incorporated into the sand drift of the beach and kept there to the great happiness of the reef and the tourists that visit it.

After another delightful float it was time for us to get back to the dive shop, and our boat driver treated us to a longer ride parallel to the coast, where we saw a school of dolphins, a peer built by the Germans in WWI (what were the Germans doing so far from Europe in the First World War?), a big land tract owned by the Catholic Mission (apparently acquired by bartering land for mirrors, knives, and other shiny objects), and the several large warehouses/stores owned by the Chinese. I should point out that starting 90 years ago the Chinese have distinguished themselves for their hard work and industry, so if today they own 95% of the retail in PNG it is not because they are crazy-rich Asians, but rather because they were the ones willing to be behind the counter from 7 am to 7 pm every day of the year.

Speaking of retail, yesterday I bought myself a PNG shirt to add to my collection of guayaberas and floral pattern shirts 😊

Australia 2019 – Day 35 – PNG Day 8. Tavurvur Volcano

5:15 am, my ride is here. To break up the monotony of the trip I have booked a ride to Rabaul caldera and its ring-fracture volcanoes. My driver is completely crazy, and he barrels down the narrow street at 100 km/hr, as if we were in a competition. My two fellow explorers are two young American men that seem oblivious to the dangers of the road and have their noses stuck into their cell phones.

Rabaul is at the very end of the beautiful bay formed by the collapse of the roof of a shallow magma chamber, a caldera (I am calling it a caldera although I have not identified a large tuff or ignimbrite to justify this designation). The bay is closed on the seaside by three active ring-fracture volcanoes. Kokopó is on the land end of the mouth of the bay, outside of the caldera rim. Rabaul was the main city of the region until it was destroyed by the 1994 twin eruption of Tavurvur and Vulcan. It is not that close to either of the volcanoes, but the wind was blowing the wrong way, and tephra started accumulating on the roofs of the buildings. A few of the owners took proactive measures and started sweeping the tephra off the roofs, and their buildings survived; most others fled in panic, the tephra accumulated, and the roofs collapsed under its weight. A good 70% of the city was destroyed this way, and most of it has reverted to jungle. There has been some reconstruction, and Rabaul still works as a container port (in a very reduced scale) and as anchorage for Chinese and Philippino fishing boats that sell tuna to PNG.

We blasted past the town and eventually made it to the cluster of three volcanoes that most of us foreign geologists associate to ring-fracture volcanism along the north edge of the Rabaul caldera. From largest (and oldest) to smaller (and youngest): Kombiu, Takumau (aka Turangunan), and Tavurvur. The fourth ring-fracture volcano is across the bay and is called … Vulcan. Notable eruptions happened in 1937, 1979, 1994, and most recently in 2014. In 1937 there was a twin eruption of Kombiu and Vulcan, and in 1994 there was a twin eruption of Tavurvur and Vulcan (twin eruptions, within hours of each other, are very rare as far as I recall). The most recent one, in 2014, only involved Tavurvur, which is the one we were going to climb.

The climb was rough, because the eruption landed huge blocks of jagged basaltic andesite all over the flanks of the volcano, so the slope is steep and unstable. The basaltic andesite is almost aphyric, vesiculated, and in rare instances formed thin rinds of glass on typical bread-crust bombs. One thing that I had not seen before was a field of landing craters on one of the plains at the foot of the volcano. The plain was being covered with pumiceous tephra 1 to 2 cm in diameter, when the volcano started hurling enormous blobs of magma (car-size blobs) that landed like mortar bombs and created craters, in the middle of which the blob spread itself like a big cow patty (if cows were the size of buses and could fly …). Sometimes the patty cracked to form a jigsaw puzzle of small blocks, which the locals collect to form small piles on the edge of the bay, which are bought by the fishing boats for ballast, for PNGK 50 per pile. Finally, some of the giant blobs landed at a low angle, and after carving their craters bounced out of them! It is a beautiful example of what physical volcanologists do in their spare time.

My guide was a local kid, Edward, who, upon discovering I was a geologist, immediately answered that he too wanted to become a geologist and study volcanoes and rocks. Of course I was not going to let this opportunity for some mentoring go to waste, so I gave him my standard talk about geology as a science and geology as an applied engineering discipline. I told him that in PNG they needed good geologists to continue the mineral, oil, and gas exploration, for geothermal development, to manage their water resources, and to work together with civil engineers. He was quite enthusiastic at the many prospects, and told me he wanted to go to Australia to study. He is still in high school, so I told him to work hard on his math, physics, chemistry, and English. All this time we were climbing and laughing, and I kept telling him about the rocks and the landforms. Once we came down he stopped for a second and told me with admiration: “This is the first time I speak with a white person, and it happened to be a geologist!” Since the kid was about 18 years old I take his comment as meaning the first time he has had a meaningful conversation with a white man. I was honored.

Huffing and puffing I made it to the top, and right in front of my eyes I could see The Gates of Hell. The crater, which previous to the 2014 eruption had been a mere bowl filled with “sand”, was now a jagged inferno where big fumaroles of steam and H₂S escaped with a hiss and a rotten egg smell. Big patches were coated with yellow elemental sulfur, and the rocks had been oxidized to blood red.

My adventure partners had brought a drone, which they used to film the steaming crater from every possible angle and elevation. I think they got the basic footage for the next B movie of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, and then some.

We were back in town by 9:30 am, which was a bit disappointing. For the PNGK 315 I paid for the tour (worth every penny just for the experience of seeing the crater and its fumaroles), I was hoping we would spend most of the day out there. I am afraid of getting bored here at the hostel. I have now planned on taking a PMV to Rabaul, and spending one of my empty days just walking around and saying hello to the people. Kokopó and Rabaul are completely safe, and people are not pushing any merchandise or services upon you.

Prior to midday I went down to the beach, and had the opportunity to regret how much trash was strewn on the beach and floating in the water. I promise I will stop bickering about not getting a free plastic bag at the shop, but I suspect that what is truly needed here are properly built and operated sanitary landfills. Trash is dumped in any convenient swell, and is not compacted or buried, so of course it disperses as litter. For the sake of cleaner oceans, next time there is a beach cleanup in California please invite me to come along and help.

Australia 2019 – Day 34 – PNG Day 7. Kokopó

At 10:30 am sharp, some of my friends from last night came to take me to the airport responding to a directive from Conrad. It turns out that Conrad, who had packed his family in the helicopter, is the big boss of the MP’s office of development. Let me unpack this statement. Each region is represented by a Member of Parliament, or MP. To take care of the constituency he or she runs what amounts to a development agency (whether out of personal funds or a formal allocation given by the federal government is unclear), which funds the first semester of students attending college, small business investments, clinics, and maybe even schools. Conrad is the chief of that development fund, and his subordinates Alphonse and Charles were the ones who came to take me to the airport. Conrad himself couldn’t come because he had a painful boil in his butt (I recommended compresses with hot water or a visit to the doctor).

I got to the airport at 11:30 am, and the flight didn’t leave until 1:15 pm, so I had plenty of time to snooze and listen to my audiobooks. 45 minutes later we had landed near the town of Kokopó, which in turn is close to the town of Rabaul. OMG, what a difference. The people here look happy and care free, they have a new spacious open market that is full of colorful clothes, vegetables, fruit, and the damn betel nut, which I believe is the curse of this beautiful country. There are also a fair number of parks, and my guesthouse Taklam Lodge is only a 100 m from the main station of the PMV’s.

Taklam Lodge has economy rooms for PNGK 165 (with breakfast) and offers all sorts of tours for snorkeling, diving, and visiting the Rabaul volcano. They can be reached at    (+675) 982-8870, or by email at taklam@kbb.com.pg Their website is www.taklam.com.pg

Australia 2019 – Day 33 – PNG Day 6. Disappointed?

I wanted to go snorkeling today, and yesterday I had indicated this wish to the young man who does the maintenance here, Lutta. “No problem”, he said, “we have a dinghy”. I was really thinking that Kimbe Tours probably had some arrangements with a diving outfit, because getting on a dinghy with the handyman didn’t seem all that safe. “I just need to talk with my boss.” “And where is your boss?” “Oh, he is asleep. He went drinking last night and didn’t get back until late.” Great, now I have to deal with a guy who has a hangover and will probably not be up until noon.

So I waited and waited, reading and snoozing in the beautiful back yard. I also had the chance to chat with the gardener Terrance, the maids Clara and Christina, Julie who is the desk manager, and Conrad who came in a boat last night and was putting his family and their innumerable bundles in the helicopter for a ride to their remote mountain home. Lovely people all, delighted to meet a Mexican and delighted to meet a geologist.

Eventually, around 11 am, Lutta told me he was going to the house to talk with his boss. I did mention to the desk manager that there didn’t seem to be any set arrangements for Kimbe Tours to offer any tours, and with clear disapproval in her voice she told me the story of the place: Kimbe Tours Guesthouse was established by a couple, who put real money and effort to create a first rate guesthouse; but then they divorced and she got the guesthouse. She didn’t really want to manage the guesthouse, so she put her good-for-nothing son in charge of it, and hired Julie to do the desk management. Since then the guesthouse has maintained itself on inertia and a well-trained staff, and no new ventures (like adventure tours) have been implemented. Lutta came back from his interview with his boss with a long face. Yes, of course they could take me snorkeling to a private beach, and drive me up to the volcano, but not today. These things need to be planned. So we will do it next week, when I come back from Rabaul. Rats!

Now what? Well, I had had a very nice time talking with the people around me, so I said I was going to go to the fish market and buy what I needed to cook lunch for us all. I gave Julie money to go to buy six loaves of sego bread. Sego is harvested from palm trees, and I understand it is the equivalent to the “fruit” that in other palms bears the dates. It is a staple of PNG folks, and it is cooked in all sorts of forms. In this particular case, it is covered by a thin jacket of bread dough, and baked in the form of a small baguette. Pretty tasty when fresh, and pretty disgusting when eaten the following morning for breakfast.

As far as the main lunch went, Lutta and I took a PMV to the open market place, bought a couple of pikes (and a snapper for my dinner later on the day), rice, oil, onions, garlic, green peppers, a papaya, and a couple of liters of coke. While we were there we stopped at the store where Lutta’s wife works and he introduced me to her. Back at the guesthouse I took over the kitchen, with the able assistance of Clara and Christina, and in half hour we had a delicious meal of rice and fish ready for everyone. This is PNG, however, so in the last minute people decided they had something urgent to do and we ended having lunch in three shifts. It didn’t matter, really because I had nothing better to do.

In the afternoon the easy conversation continued, with new people drifting in and out. I showed them pictures of the family, told and retold the story of the adoption of Ronnie, who everyone pronounced a very handsome boy. We talked about volcanoes and plate tectonics, about tourism in PNG, about where I should stay in Rabaul, and I even got an offer to drive me to the Hoskins airport tomorrow morning!

So no, I am not disappointed. I may not have had a sightseeing day, but I had a wonderful cultural day 😊

Australia 2019 – Day 32 – PNG Day 5. Kimbe Bay

3 am. My gracious hostess, Tomatha, woke up particularly early to drive me to the airport. Where on the world do you get service like that? Lodge 9 in POM has my total and enthusiastic endorsement. Andrew and Tomatha can be reached at 7684-5039 or 7181-0566, lodge9png@gmail.com There is no better place in POM for the ecotourist!

My 5:30 am flight with Air Niugini went without a hitch, and by 7 am I was tightly wedged inside the PMV (the minibus) that makes the 1-hour run between the airport at Hoskins and Kimbe Bay. Imagine a 7-passenger van modified to carry 12 passengers, and then crammed with about 20 people and you will have a pale idea of what the trip was like. Take into account that half of the people were chewing betel nut and had to spit from time to time, and that two guys felt the need to share a cigarette in the full vehicle. I tell you, if you haven’t traveled in PMV you may not really know the meaning of adventure travel.

During the drive we crossed hectares and hectares of oil palms, a unique type of crop that I became acquainted with in Malaysia several years ago. They are bushy palm trees that instead of bunches of dates produce bunches of a very oily seed. The pods of seeds are harvested and pressed to produce palm oil, which is then cracked in a small refinery to produce diesel and motor oil. Some folks don’t like them because it is Malay investment and required the clearing of enormous areas of tropical rainforest.  

I finally alighted in Kimbe Bay, and was sorely disappointed by what I saw. In the “downtown” area there is an open stadium, and a green area around the police station. Outside of that there are warehouses everywhere, some of which have been dedicated to supermarkets, banks, or a mixed bag of office uses. I couldn’t even see the bay, because as I discovered later the water front is taken by commercial developments. I don’t know about this place.

I was walking past a long line of people who were waiting for the bank to open, when I saw a middle-age lady with a kind smile, and stopped to ask her for the office of the boat to Rabaul. She gave me directions, but it was clear to see that she was very concerned about me. “You must have a guide”, she said, casting her eyes around her for someone to enlist. I assured her that I would be fine and started walking. Five minutes later her young daughter caught up with me, to tell me that her mother was coming to accompany me. Dear Anita arrived a bit short of breath, but she told me I could not possibly go alone (mind you, it was 8 am, a time when all the bad people are still in bed). So, as many other people I have encountered we had a good chat, she showed me where the port office was located (that is when I found out that the ocean was hidden behind industrial developments), and insisted to walking me to the Kimbe Tours Guesthouse, where she finally deposited me in Julie’s hands. We took the obligatory selfie and my dear good Samaritan went back to her line at the bank.

The Kimbe Tours Guesthouse is, at PNGK 220, considerably more expensive than Lodge 9, but it has a beautiful garden that is an oasis of peace in the middle of this industrial city. The price does not include dinner, but there is a common kitchen that I am welcome to use. Contact them at 983-4886 (landline) or 7349-9698 (cell), or by email at kimbetoursreservations@gmail.com

At 9 am I went to the port office, and found that the boat to Rabaul does not depart until Saturday, five days from now. Forget that. I then went back to the warehouses to look for the booking office of PNG Air, where for less than US$ 300 I got a round trip to Rabaul, starting three days from now. OK, I figure I can explore today, try to go snorkeling tomorrow, and then take the PMV to the airport around 10 am on the third day.

There is not that much to explore really, but there are three active volcanoes within sight, including two stratocones and the Talasea caldera. All three had fumarole clouds rising into the air. Just to remind me that I am in active plate boundary we also had an earthquake around 6 pm, which was strong enough to knock out the power and convince me to go outdoors. Everyone around here was very excited and at least three of them came to check on their Mexican. They are really sweet in their concerns, but it can get a bit unnerving being followed everywhere by a guardian angel.   

Australia 2019 – Day 31 – PNG Day 4. The Sogeri Highlands

Today Sunday I woke up late, and didn’t come down to fix my coffee until 7 am. The house was quiet and I read in peace for about an hour and a half. Then one of the daughters of Tomatha and Andrew came by and asked if I would care to go with them to church. I jumped at the opportunity, and found the three daughters all dressed up (18 to 22 years old, I think), as well as two of the three boys, Dwayne (12 years old) and Wayne (9 years old). We piled up inside a waiting taxi and went to the Salesian Seminary 2 kilometers down the road, and just got there on the nick of time as mass was getting started. Catholic mass, with all the familiar rituals but with actually pretty good singing of psalms (which in my experience is quite unusual). Catholics and protestants share the formal religions of PNG, but a lot of people hang on to animist beliefs and the presence of good and evils spirits. In the highlands, for example, some tribes favored construction of tree houses, good 10 m up the trees, to isolate themselves from the spirits that roam the forest floor (and also because once you pull up the ladder no enemies can reach you). The practice continues in modern form today, with houses built on stilts even in places where there is no flood risk. It may also be a way to control pests such as rodents and snakes.

The plan for today is to go up to the Sogeri Plateau, which rises to about 1,000 m above POM over a surprisingly short map distance. The “plateau” is a peneplane that is criss-crossed by shallow stream channels that can grow to become impressive gorges when they reach the steep mountain front. This plateau eventually becomes the foothills of the Owen Stanley range, that extends like a finger from the mainland of New Guinea into the islands of New Britain and New Ireland; this peninsula has a well-defined north-draining half, and a south-draining half (toward POM). In one of the first moves of World War II, the Japanese invaded the north-draining half, with the idea of from there occupying the full extent of New Guinea. But the Australians foresaw their move, and with a relatively small force trekked through the jungle along the grueling Kokoda track, to engage the enemy at Isurava. Bitter fighting ensued, and from February 1942 to January 1943 the Japanese gained ground little by little on their way to Port Moresby. But the Australian forces made them pay for every meter of advance until finally, when Port Moresby was almost lost, the Japanese command gave the order to “advance to the rear” and the exhausted Australian and newly arrived American forces harassed them all the way to the north coast, where a handful of Japanese soldiers entrenched themselves to sell their lives very dearly. The Kokoda Track has become a pilgrimage to many Australians, and is PNG’s challenge to the trekkers of the world, with nearly 100 km of steep, slippery slopes. I will have to do 97 km later, but this time got in 3 km of the track crossing the Varirata National Park.

But to go back to order of my narrative, after coming back from church we took the obligatory set of pictures with everybody dressed up, I sat to an excellent breakfast, and shortly thereafter Andrew, Wayne, myself, and Uncle Bruce got into the car of the latter for our mountain adventure. We climbed up and up following the Laloki River Gorge until we reached the edge of the Sogeri Plateau. Wayne, who reminded me a lot of Ronnie, kept us entertained by describing in exquisite detail the steepness of the walls of the canyon and how he was afraid that we would fall to our death. Eventually we started traversing the plateau, where gentle streams provide endless opportunities for locals to go bathing or for doing the washing of clothes. Our first destination was the Sirinumu Dam and Reservoir, which provides drinking water and power to POM. It was built in 1963, under the Australian Protectorate (PNG became independent in 1975), and is a simple gravity dam with all sorts of small power plants as the water flows down in penstocks from one to the other. There was a guy showing off his Jet Ski, and Wayne was suitably impressed.

From there we backed tracked a few kilometers to the intersection of the Kokoda Trail and the Varirata National Park, where Andrew and I went for a very nice nature walk along 3 km of the Kokoda Trail. Wayne had fallen asleep in the moving car, so he got to miss the walk. Poor kid. The day was beautiful and I could hardly see what was such a big deal with the Kokoda Trail. That is, until I slipped; man, this thing is like soap and it was not even raining!

We heard all sorts of birds, and I am sure cassowaries and wallabies were looking at us from the brush, but I never saw them. We did see the poor remains of a native tree house, and the mounds of leaves that the wild turkeys build to keep the eggs that their hens lay down. The hen then takes off to live a life of dissolution, while the male “hatches” the eggs by making sure that the temperature in the decaying leaf pile is just right. If it is getting cold he adds more leaves to the pile; if it is getting too warm he removes some of the leaves to let the pile breath. The wild turkey of PNG could be next year’s poster child for Father’s Day. 😊 

Mmm . . . PNG pit barbecue of chicken and yams, followed by a very spicy curry of chicken and noodles for dinner. Yummy! As I sat enjoying my excellent meal I had an easy conversation with Jennifer, who told me more about The Swamp (reminds me of the Brazilian Pantanal), where she lives and teaches. This is the swampy estuary that extends for a good 100 km between the mountains and the southwest coast of Papua. It is a water world where everybody moves in canoes, and where there is fish every single day for dinner. She is going back with 9 other teachers, first 4 hours by sea, and then 8 hours by motor boat up the particular river she lives by. I wish I could go with them.

Australia 2019 – Day 30 – PNG Day 3. Snorkeling in the Coral Sea

Last night, as I was enjoying a delicious dinner of rice, greens, and a pork chop, a woman came into the kitchen to cook her own dinner and of course we got talking (folks here are superfriendly and will not shy away from conversation with a Mexican!). Her name is Jennifer, and she is a high school teacher way in the interior of New Guinea, where civilization is hundreds of kilometers away. When asked about the origin of Melanesians she thought that, no, Melanesians are not a recent African migration. And when I asked her about the cost of basic things like milk or eggs, she looked at me with puzzlement and stated the obvious: “We don’t drink milk, and we get our eggs through barter”. What could be easier than that? She told me that she has to work against a lot of superstition with her students, because the idea that disease comes through poor sanitation sounds absurd to them; they have eaten with unwashed hands for generations, so the current bout of loose bowels or bloody sputum must be related to witchcraft [TB is a big problem in PNG because they don’t follow the treatment for the many weeks it is required, so antibiotic-resistant strains are affecting a lot of people.]. I loved talking to Jennifer, who is 42-years old and has an excellent head on her shoulders; I look forward to additional conversation tomorrow.

I slept the sleep of the tired tourist, but when I woke up at 5 am I was surprised to hear a party on full swing out in the street. Mile 9 is the place to be on a late Friday evening party that carries on until dawn!

I went down around 6 am, and saw that Tomatha had left the kettle and coffee ready for me. She is a sweetheart. I was half way through my first cup when Maria walked in. She is 61 years old, and is staying in POM (the name we natives give to Port Moresby) while waiting for her visa to Australia. It turns out her son lives down the block, but she prefers to stay in the lodge because she doesn’t want to butt in on her son’s life. Her son is in China, finishing his Master’s degree, and her daughter-in-law is going to Perth to finish her own Master’s in Economics. Maria is coming along with her, to babysit her four grandchildren. I suspect it is going to be a “tight” situation between Grandma and Mom, but you do what you have to do.

At 7:15 am Andrew and Tomatha drove me to the airport, to be picked up by the van that will take me to the coast, so I can then take the boat to Lion Island to go snorkeling. Tomatha arranged everything for me, for PNGK 150, and she even packed me a lunch. I am feeling very well taken care of. I was the first pickup of the van, which then went to The Gateway Hotel, to pick up a gaggle of Australians. The hotel had the same high security measures as the Laguna Hotel had the day before yesterday, and I noticed that it was the same company that provided the private guards: Black Swan Security. What a coincidence, only a couple of months ago I read a book by Chris Voss, Never Split the Difference, who is the President of Black Swan and was for 20 years the chief hostage release negotiator for the FBI. The book is the best I have ever read about how to negotiate a hard bargain (like, do not get the hostages killed), and Black Swan (a symbol for a nugget of information that will change the course of the negotiation) is making a mint based on the reputation of its President. Personally, I think the “high risk” is a legend fueled by Chris Voss to make mega-bucks from hotels, restaurants, mining companies, and oil and gas companies.

The gaggle of Australians turned out to be a group of paramedics who have volunteered their two weeks of vacation to try to start a paramedic service associated to St. John’s Hospital (I had never heard of St. John’s, but I believe they are an international, non-profit hospital operating group—a bit like the Red Cross). They were enthusiastic young and old people who were ready for a day of fun in the sea, so it was really easy to converse with them and join them in our snorkeling forays. We did two. The first one was easy-piecy because we were swimming direct from the beach of this tiny, paradisaical island (it even had its little palm tree). Worth-mention sights included some needle fish, a bright, electric blue, fat starfish, some sea urchins, and a great variety of colorful fish. I was goofing around in the shallow seaweeds, when I came face to face with a small leopard shark; with his whiskers he looked like an old Chinaman! I was so startled seeing it a few inches from my nose that I bolted, which scared the living daylights of the poor thing, so it also bolted. Close encounters of the second kind!

For the second swim I felt more adventurous, so I decided to swim all around our little island. I did not realize then that (a) the reef extended way the hell out there on the one direction, and (b) the tide was dropping. I ended being lost in a labyrinth of coral, often closed out by steep jagged walls and having to swim back out to deeper water. After an hour or so of this I looked up and I was barely a fourth of the way around the island. I had to suck it up and take the closest path to shore, which involved getting poked and cut by some rather jagged shallow coral. I walked the last 100 m to the shore, ouching and aweing as I stepped on the pokey coral. Never a dull day out on the reef.

Australia 2019 – Day 29 – PNG Day 2. Port Moresby

With a bit of delay, but with a big smile, my guide and his wife came to pick me up. Their names are Andrew and Tomatha; she was working as a petroleum geologist with Chevron and he as a geological technician/mud logger when they met, and after only five years they decided to quit the company to become lodge keepers. Lodge 9 happens to be in the Mile 9 portion of the city, and is basically their home with an additional building with 20 rooms for rent. They plan to feed me breakfast and dinner for PNGK 110, or about US$ 35, which given the alternatives is a pretty good price. Alas, no WiFi or internet access.

Andrew will be my guide driver for the day for about US$ 65, so shortly after we got home we made the plan of visiting the Adventure Park, the Nature Park, and the National Museum. The Adventure Park is a private recreation area but with a very modest entrance price of PNGK 5. It was a gift from a Russian who married a local gal, became a PNG citizen, made lots of money in mining, and eventually got elected as MP (Member of Parliament). The park was his MP present to his constituency, and is a delightful place that I am sure is packed with families on weekends. Not only does it have carefully manicured green areas, but also includes a Ferris Wheel, a Water Slide, playgrounds, and—the reason we came—an orchid garden/collection and an aviary with PNG birds. We are in the dry season, so very few orchids were in bloom (but these few were beautiful). Birds are birds, what can I say? But here the diversity of bird species is truly outstanding. There are no fewer than twenty types of Birds of Paradise (the national bird, represented in the national flag), hornbills (like a toucan but without the color), plus any number of parrots, parakeets, and doves.

Our second stop was almost like the first, but the Nature Park was established by the PNG University, again as an excuse to give visitors, both foreign and domestic, a chance to refresh under the green canopies and see the birds and other animals of PNG. The entrance fee, I will note, was PNGK 15 for me as a foreigner, and PNGK 8 for my resident guide. The park was delightful, and I had another chance to admire Birds of Paradise, crested doves, vulturine parrots, and any number of parakeets and cockatoos. Coolest was that they have several cassowaries (one came very close to my face and made the most awful squack), crocs, wallabies, and tree-dwelling kangaroos, so I finally came face to face with some of the critters I didn’t see in Australia.

The last stop was at the National Museum, which is side by side with the rather imposing Parliament Building. It may not come as a surprise that the Brits occupied PNG and established their rules way back then. After World War II they gave the Australians the oversight of the British Protectorate of PNG; the independent state of PNG is only 44 years old. In short, British institutions and system of government are everywhere.

The National Museum is OK, but is mostly populated by the artifacts that the various governors of the province collected in more than 100 years of colonial rule. They are beautiful artifacts, and bespeak of the rich spirituality of the native inhabitants of this land, but they are not organized in any way that might tell a meaningful story of the people, so I was a bit disappointed.

I did mention yesterday that I was a bit surprised that this is a black country, so I made the automatic assumption that its people had been derived from Africa, just like Haiti or Jamaica, which were nations populated by the slave trade. I am not confident that this is a feasible explanation for the people of Melanesia. First, many Australian aborigines are black, but do not have the facial features of Africans (but they have the tight curly hair). Second, natives can tell where people come from by assessing how “black” they are. For example, my host was telling me that he is darker black because he comes from the island of Bougainville, whereas “that lady is lighter in color because she is from Papua” (yes, I could see the difference in skin color tone, but it was subtle). Melanesia, both as a geographic region and an ethnic group, seems to be a second group of black people not easily related to Africa. [Third, and just to confuse the issue, slavery in the PNG area was thriving in the 19^th century and into the early years of the 20^th century, but none of the things I read attributes the black people to African descent; they are firmly referred to as Melanesians.]

My stupid ATM card has been rejected twice. I have AUS$ 1,500 and maybe US$ 500 on me, but I have to make sure I do not run out of cash.