Alex

Hello!

Wow – we certainly have arrived in the tropics!

I completely forgot what high humidity and hot sun is like…

The view from the lounge at 5.30am

We touched down in Karratha (1,400km north of Perth) at 8.30am and it was already 31 degrees, and the humidity so high that a breath has that thicker-than-air feel to it like smoking a cigarette.

First impressions of Karratha are that it’s a dryer, more mining focused Tully – in that there’s nothing to do here! McDonalds staff seem friendly though – lots of fellow travellers and the accommodation is reasonable. With one very large problem.

No internet.

No internet in the house.

No internet cafe in the town.

…………………………………………………………

Aaaargh!

Hehe… no, hopefully next week when me and Sooji move to our long-term house (air-con broken now) we can come to an arrangement to get internet. Otherwise the other option is a portable modem – which would allow us to surf the net but spell an end to my business activities. I use about 0.7-1.5GB a day when busy, and the cheapest portable modem price is $100 for 6GB… bummer.

The only saving grace is that McDonalds has very slow free wifi in the actual store – so I may end up spending a couple of hours of my free time in there aswell…

We’ve  had a walk around town now and it seems that there is not a huge amount to do -  there is a swimming pool though which I’ll make full use of. Other than that, not too much to report yet.

We’ll both be going in later to see the manager and work out what we’ll be doing, so I’ll post again in the next few days with some pictures of the place.

Bye for now! Al x

A dusty Karratha from the air

Hello!

Well, a bit of an interesting blog post for you this time!

Australia Day! The Day Australia Stops Still. And Gets Drunk.

Firstly, me and Sooji went to celebrate Australia Day at Swan River along with half of Perth – which was great! There was a massive crowd and the city put on an aerobatic display with a stunt plane and lots of flybys which I loved – I really want to get up in the air myself some day soon.

The Amazing Finale

Then just as the sun went down two helicopters flew over the crowd – one pulling a huge Australian flag and the other shining a searchlight onto it, illuminating the flag in the night sky. That kicked off a fantastic, 30 minute long firework display with some great rockets. There were some I’ve never seen before – rocketry is getting cleverer.

Some amazing tricks - including a complete stall and tumbling, spinning fall (which he got out of!)

Then today we got up horribly early and went to Rottnest Island which is about an hours super-fast ferry ride from Perth. It was really beautiful, and we both did some snorkelling and took a shuttle bus around the place to different bays. We even had our own private beach that we found, with the brochure-like turquoise water dappled with darker blue and white sand. Reminded me that I am essentially on holiday – a welcome break from money/job/life worries!

The Beautiful Rottnest Island

We both got nicely burnt, and I managed to see a Quokka  (one of these: LINK) but didn’t get a picture. We also saw strange creatures that Sooji described as ‘Crocodile’s Nephews’ – and despite waving her arms and mimicking eating insects I couldn’t guess what she meant until we saw some – lizards!

The Crocodile's Nephew

But the real news I guess is that me and Sooji are flying north on Sunday (again, horribly early) to work in a restaurant! My long fruitless search for employment has finally bourne fruit! I found a job on the net –  we both applied and got the phone call today at the beach!

There is however, one small drawback…

The name of this restaurant….

Is…..

McDonalds.

Yes.

I’m flying 1,400km north to work in McDonalds.

But a dirt-poor backpackers gotta do what a dirt poor backpackers gotta do. Plus it pays $20 (£12) an hour full time – so even after tax (which I get back in June!) I should be looking at around $600 a week. After living off debt and family aid – that’s a very welcome amount!

Anyway – so me and Sooji are flying north and looking to stay a while up there and save a few thousand dollars.We’ll be sure to enjoy ourselves by travelling about a bit while were there – there’s some National Parks in the area and Ningaloo Reef (supposedly better than the Great Barrier) is not too far away for a weekend trip! I’m sure we’ll find plenty to do!

Then, when saying ‘Would you like fries with that?’ gets too much we’ll head off on a round-and-round-the-continent-we-go trip staying at farms and exploring the place (especially Tasmania which we like the sound of).

So, we’ll be saying goodbye to Perth very soon!

I think that’s all for now, I’ll be sure to post when we arrive in Karratha!

Keep in touch, Al x

Au Revoir!

Hello!

Well well, change is certainly in the air at the moment!

A couple of things have happened in the space of the last three days which has changed the game. Firstly, the job that I ‘got’ three weeks ago and stretched my finances to the limit in order to wait for, has fallen through. Bummer.

Swan River

And then an ominous shout of ‘Alex!’ from Sooji, interrupting my calm smoke in the sun, revealed a severe looking business woman at the door who demanded to know where her $3,000 was. She turned out to be the investment property manager who owns the house we’re living in, and she hasn’t had her rent for two or three months!

After many questions such as ‘Who are you?’, ‘Where’s my $3,000?’, ‘Is anyone on the lease actually living here?’ and ‘Is Aariz even in the country?’ I figured out that the guy I’ve been paying rent to for three months has been subletting the house to us all, and not passing on the rent to the actual owner. A great conversation (as you can imagine).

So, it turns out we’ve been squatting and have to move.

And as I mentioned, I have no job.

A short walk along the river

Sooji is also finishing work at the end of this month, so we’ve been talking over our options and decided that I’m going to call the farm in Tully again and see if they need an irrigation maintenance person. There’s a good chance they do as the whole area has been hit by floods again – which covers the sprinklers in branches and logs and drags the pipes all over the place.

If they can offer me work then we’ll head off on a roundabout route to Tully. If not, then we’ll look for another place here in Perth and I’ll be back to handing out CVs and calling every ad in the paper.

As for money – I have sold my trusty gaming computer that’s been gathering dust on my desk at home for 17 months, and have been shored up by a loan from the venerable institutions that are the BigBro Joe Bank, as well as the Penny Simpson Maternity Welfare Fund.

But, while things are looking decidedly uncertain at the moment with regards to money and shelter – the sun is still shining! It’s as warm as ever – today and Sunday are expected to be over 40 degrees each, which means Sooji will be sat in front of the fan as much as possible! :p No, really though everything should work out fine and I’ll be sure to keep a’posting to let you know what happens.

I hope you’re all finally starting to thaw out; here’s a picture that was shown on the Australian News which has been featuring the UK alongside the raging bush fires surrounding Perth.

A very cold Britain

I was actually in an outer suburb the other day and the whole place was thick with smoke – like a heavy mist from a fire just reaching the edges of the city.

Well I think that’s all for now, all the best, much love, Al x