Flinders Ranges and Wilpena Pound

My biking ‘mate’ Tom West once told me that a visit to the ranges was like no other… and definitely well worth it. Besides, the lonely planet guide to Adelaide and South Australia dedicated a whole chapter to it so it must have been something.

Indeed it was. The 5 hour drive to the 'Flinders' featured perfect roads surrounded by empty and flat landscapes. Somehow, the changing scenery, despite being mostly flat and arid, afforded a charm that just made the driving time fly by.


My flatmate Pierre and I pitched some tents, spent the night camping at Wilpena Pound and the next day tackled a 24 km (return) hike that involved reaching St. Mary's Peak (the highest point within the Flinders Ranges).

And this would be a panoramic shot of Wilpena Pound... from the peak. (Click on the picture for a better view)

And this would be the other side of the ranges seen from the peak...

Tom West was absolutely right. Cheers mate.

I've Been Around

Since my last entry, I had upgraded my travelling potential by purchasing a car. Even better, they had assigned me to a different post in the department that gave me regular shifts of "7 days on... 7 days off". What better way to use those 7 days off than to travel around Adelaide (and far beyond!) and to see what Australia had to offer. Needless to say, I made the most out of it!

Deep Creek Adventure

Here's another letter I sent home... I've been a lazy blogger lately. Besides, I figured it would be a waste of effort to type and tell the same story anyway.

Its been quite a busy week. For one, I must say that those night shifts really took a lot from me. As many of my co-workers say... its the idea of entering the hospital for a shift (at 10 PM) when you just got out the same morning (at 8:30 AM). There's a long gap in between for sleep and all but I was never really best at spending the day hours sleeping. I'd get maybe 2 hours then wake up... do another 2 hours... then wake-up again. Bottom line is, it really screwed-up my body clock and left me all fatigued.

Well, all is quite well and back to normal.

My network of friends here in Adelaide is rapidly expanding. The Filipino hospital community is taking good care of me. One of the nurses in emergency, Benny, invited me to join him for a day trip down south the other day. I gladly agreed... I've been quite eager to get a glimpse of the countryside.

We left Adelaide yesterday morning at around 6AM and headed south to one of the nearby parklands. Apparently, he was set to meet some other friends who had taken the journey the day before and had camped out for a night. We got to the parkland after an easy 1.5 hour drive through some very beautiful scenery.

Not bad for a toilet-stop view...

The roads were in excellent condition... except for the parkland areas which were more of a rocky concrete. In any case, even that was not bad enough to slow down the KIA Carnival family car we were riding in. There was absolutely no traffic, and the only trip time limiting factor was the varying speed limit set on certain parts of the road. It was interesting to find that the Expressway was "one-way". At certain parts of the day it would be open in the south-bound direction... and on other times... it would flow on a north-bound direction. And after 12 MN... it would be closed. Weird... really weird.

Despite only being 1.5 hours away from Adelaide, there was a good 10 degree drop in the temp... which I did not quite anticipate... so it was a long chilly day for me. At one point, I found my teeth uncontrollably chattering (was that the right word to use?).

The campsite was pretty much exactly what I expected it to be. The only thing missing was the campfire. Its the dry season so there's no burning off. (from nov. 1 to April 1.) Gas powered stoves are allowed though. The group consisted of 3 other families... all filipinos... other than Benny, 2 other nurses from other parts of the hospital and another one whom I assumed was not in healthcare. Lots of kids running around.

This would be the tuyo-reeking campsite and the bald guy would be Benny...

Despite being in Australia, it was as typically pinoy as it could be. The morning air reeked of the smell of tuyo. There were 3 varieties of adobo... one from each family I assume and of course... rice as staple. There was bagoong and puto... but this time, no mangga and diniguan. The families were as good hosts as you can imagine any Filipino family to be... very hospitable.

We spent much of the morning just sitting around drinking beer, sharing stories while playing Pusoy. I was initially up by 20 dollars after the morning but I ended up down by 10 when we left in the afternoon. It wasn't a bad price to pay considering food and beer was pretty much free the whole day. As we were playing cards, the wives and the kids went out for some 'bushwalking'. There were trails all over the park... well maintained with trailmarkers indicating distance, level of difficulty and average time to complete. I imagine they would have made really good biking trails but I didn't have my bike with me... and for some reason, there was no mention as to whether biking was allowed in the walking trails. Some people don't appreciate bikes zooming past while they are walking, so in may parks, they make distinctions between biking trails and walking trails.

In the afternoon, we were supposed to go fishing at the far end of the park. About 20 kilometers from the campsite. The area featured some really beautiful mountain sides where people go rock fishing. The place was called blowhole. Unfortunately, it was a bit too rocky and the fishing enthusiast in the group said that though it would make a good fishing ground... you'd end up snagging your line quite often... which would not be as much fun. So fishing would just have to wait another day.

Blowhole, Deep Creek Conservation Park, SA

I saw a trailmarker at blowhole labelling the Heysen trail. The Heysen trail is South Australia's longest walking trail. It extends from the far south... to somewhere in the outback. A total of 1200 kilometers long. The trail is continous and is marked periodically. There are actually quite a number of enthusiasts who complete the entire length of the trail (naturally, on foot). I hear that the whole journey could take around 30-40 days. You even get a certificate for completing the whole course. (sounds like something I'd like to own sometime.)

There's a mountainbiking equivalent and its called the mawson trail. This one though extends only 800 kilometers and it starts from Adelaide. I'll complete it someday when I find the time, and more importantly, someone to travel it with me. Any takers?

I saw my first kangaroo yesterday.



Actually, up close, I was only able to spot 2 wallabys. These are the small varieties. They're about 2-3 feet tall. Apparently, the other types grow to be just about as tall as an average adult. They are really quite interesting creatures... I was able to go within 2-3 meters without them minding my presence. Quite cute. Quite common too. When we drove towards blowhole, there was a field that was just littered with them... pretty much like cows grazing in a pasture.


The park also offered a good variety of birds. Its a big change to what you see in the Philippines. Lots of bird species in Australia. In fact, even when I just sit around the back garden at home, you see a lot of species just passing by. Can't say I know their names though. In the park however, its quite common to find a group of wild cockatoos flying by. Also spotted a handful of kookaburras and magpies. Good thing the others knew what they were called. I tried a couple of photos... but none were really of good quality. Sorry. At one point, we were having a snack around the table when one of the magpies just swooped down to join us in snacking. It just stayed on top of the table picking on some of the leftovers. Didn't even mind our presence. Had we been in the Philippines, you could be sure that that bird would be in a cage by now.

Communing with nature is not always as good and sweet though. The flies around here are something else. And they are really annoying. Eventually, you just concede to having them around. Sometimes you get 10-15 of them swarming your t-shirt. What makes them worse is that they are extra aggressive. You find them landing on your glasses and even crawling on the inside of your lenses. Even worse when they decide to check out your nostrils. Kaunti na lang masi-singot mo na sila. Despite having the same appearance as what we have in the Philippines, the flies around here must be of different genetics though. You are actually able to swat them with your bare hands... and with less effort than swatting a mosquito too... and that's something you can't say about a Filipino-bred fly. Back home, you just raise your hand and the fly would have caught on to your intentions already. Here, I was actually able to kill a fly unintentionally by rubbing my hands on my forearm to generate heat.

All in all, it was a really good day... a much needed recharge after 5 days of night shifts.

From Left: Ed, Alvin, Cris and Moi.

Pizza woes...

My blog is suffering from a lack of entries. The most probably reason? I have terrible attention span. I remember that one of the pediatric milestones developed at an early stage is an attention span of at least 45 mins. I must have skipped that one. I have several entries saved in my computer for previous articles which are somewhat half complete. By the time I find myself resuming the entry... the chain of thought is completely gone... thus rendering the article useless.

So, that means that I have to get to the point before I lose interest in producing this post. (40 mins remaining... before my attention runs out....)

I woke up really bored today. No agendas whatever. I had bought a couple of textbooks yesterday and I was quite keen to start studying. But as most students know by heart... there is a certain inertia that has to be overcome before you actually develop the pace and momentum of studying. (Must have focus....)

Unfortunately, though I wish I could say that I had the will power to overcome that inertia... after 30 mins of reading I had to succumb to reality... I had my limits.

Looking for something else to do... I decided to try my hand at the kitchen. I've been spending considerably more time cooking in the kitchen lately. Living alone has some distinct advantages... one of which is the luxury of being able to survive a cooking blunder. At least if you mess up with your food, you can find consolation from the fact that only you will be suffering for that meal. Besides, there are always frozen meatpies to fill the void if you really created a disaster.

Last week I tried my hand at pasta. When you really think about it... cooking the pasta sauce is fool proof. Just toss in all the ingredients in a sauce pan... saute them a bit and voila! You'll probably have a greater chance of erring in overcooking or undercooking the pasta.

Then there was the Curry. Chicken curry... which was good... but not excellent. My french roomie gladly took 3 servings of the dish... which at least disspelled any suspicions of mine that he was just being polite about my cooking. But then again, he had just returned from Sydney and his end of the cupboard was quite low on groceries... so maybe he was just really famished. In any case... my curry probably tasted no better than those instant packs where you 'just-add-water'. Mediocre at best.

So today I thought I'd try my hand at Pizza. And since I had time to burn... I thought I'd make the dough myself too! My mom would have told me: "Ambisyoso!" But there was something in me today that made me feel quite invincible...

(uh oh... digressing... waning attention span.... 30 mins to go....)

So, transferred my laptop to the kitchen counter, set up the ipod's portable speakers (c/o Dr. Dents...) and I was off and running. Hi-tech cooking for idiots.

I surfed the internet, typed 'pizza dough' and good ol' Roberto was kind enough to provide me with a blow-by-blow account of how to produce my pizza dough. I couldn't lose... I am invincible!

Things really went well... exactly the way Roberto's Pizzeria had described it. That is... until I had to shape the pizza dough. Urk. No glamour in that one. This amateur had absolutely no idea how to mold that nice round elastic pizza circle. I mean, no question about it... the dough was good. I had the proper consistency. Hell I probably over kneaded it... but I was definitely missing the skill of having to mold it into a circle. (Don't even think about asking whether I attempted to toss it into the air.) Fortunately, and coincidentally, there was a cookie tray on the counter that Pierre had used the night before. (Ting!... Lightbulb idea!)

So I ended up with a rectangular pizza. Here's a picture....



Notice how utterly flawed the dough presentation is. Meantime, I had chucked a couple of tomatoes into the saucepan and had proceeded to create my pizza sauce... which was nothing compared to making the dough! Grated some extra sharp cheddar... tossed in an over generous supply of mozzarella (I came prepared...), minced a few garlic cloves... and sliced some pepperoni for good measure.

Here it is in the oven...



and here is the final product...

its a good thing that the dough ends up underneath everything!!! Otherwise, I would have failed miserably in presentation. But with all the cheese and toppings I added... the final product would have outdone any pizza chain anyday.

Did it taste as good as it looked? You betcha. The dough turned out to be great and the garlic and cheese was fabulous. Realistically though, the pepperoni I bought was a bit too spicy... but that didn't matter as much. And as Mr. Roberto would have put it...

Home made pizza dough, "from scratch," is without a doubt the single most defining factor that differentiates a great pizza from any other pizza that you will ever have. And, the personal gratification that comes of successfully making pizza at home for yourself, your loved-ones and your friends is unparalleled.

Well said, master. Well said.

And what did Pierre have to say about it? "Umm... it could do with some capsacium..." Urk. Just gotta love the French...

From the beach to the mountains....

Today was day 2 of a 4 day break. It also was a Sunday, which meant that 90% of Adelaide's stores would be closed. The other 10% would probably be some supermarkets, restos and those stores owned by Chinese proprietors. (In fairness, Dents' shop is closed on Sunday... not counting his emergency vaccinations, of course.). I woke up with absolutely no agenda except to eat-sleep-read a pocketbook-sleep-eat, etc.

But then, the weather was perfect today. Much like it was 2 Sundays ago, it was a perfect day for a ride. I looked out the window and the mountains beckoned for a visit... so I ate a quick breakfast, cleaned up 2 days worth of dishes and packed my bag for my trip. I checked out the internet and found a couple of conservation parks whose entrance was just 5-10 kilometers away.

First, I had to make my way out of the suburbs. It was good that Jiji gave me a large fold-out map when I arrived in Adelaide. She had bought one herself when she arrived but has rarely used it because of her work-home-work disposition. I took some side-streets as I hate travelling down main roads in a bicycle. As a driver, I never had any respect on the roads towards motorcycles and tricycles. I just assume its no different on this end of the planet. I got lost on several occasions and had to pull the map out of my backpack. It must have really looked amusing to have some guy standing over a bicycle on the sidewalk, with a large poster-sized pull-out map finding directions. I wasn't really completely lost as the hills overlooked the valley. Its pretty hard to lose sight of that... but I wasn't about to waste energy unnecessarily by pedaling my way around the suburbs.

Eventually, I found my way and level side-roads started to give way to uphill roads that snaked up the mountain. The good part was that not many people seemed to have been travelling the road. That way, it wasn't so embarrasing to be seen huffing and puffing despite engaging such a high gear. I kept my eyes open left and right for some fire-trails where I could jump off the main road and start exploring but unfortunately, most were gated shut. Its summer and there are fire-precautions for a couple of months... which probably led to the closing of the fire trails. I had to contend myself with the main road.

There were some interesting sights though...


The slopes of some of the hills were lined with plantations of cherries, lemons and plums... stuff you don't usually get in the Philippines.

I continued uphill but couldn't seem to find any more interesting vantage points. Besides, the scenery was pretty much the same. As I pedaled further, the air got thinner and my legs started to burn from the effort. Houses were starting to get sparse, and so were travelling vehicles. By the map estimates, I was a good 20 kilometers from where I started. It would be an awful place to get a flat... considering that I haven't bought myself a bike pump and a spare tube. To make matters worse, my cell phone was not charged. It was time to head back.

On the way home, I decided to try another route. I came across a diversion which seemed to lead to a village at the bottom of the hills. I really wasn't sure where it lead, but I figured I could always take another U-turn should I get lost. Besides, I was still desperate to find a biking trail, so I thought I'd check it out. Aptly named Corkscrew road, it was a steep drop with lots of heavy banks. It was a lot of fun going downhill especially since the curves were so tight you had to lean your bike a good 45 degrees to make the turn. Fruits of the laborous uphill climb.

In about 5 km., I must have descended what took 20 kilometers to climb. I was not about to go back up!!! Fortunately, I ended up in another highway, north of the one I used to go up. Took a chance and headed in the direction I thought would lead me back to town. I couldn't say that the scenery was any better... in fact, it was mostly barren hills and shallow gorges (which probably explains why I don't have other pictures to share).

In the end, I came across a creek, followed the road beside it, and the creek eventually drained into the Torrens. And where there's the Torrens river, there's a bike path that led back to the city. It was a long roundabout but at least I knew I was headed in the right direction.

Total travel time for this trip: 3 hours 50 mins.
Estimated distance covered: ~ 40km.
Number of meat pies I ate when I got home: 3.

I checked the map only to find that I had made it beyond the conservation park I intended and was actually halfway to another. I've got a 5 day break after Christmas... about a week and a half from now. By then, I'm going to make sure I have the necessary tools and spares. Can anyone say overnighter?

Picture Album (part 2)

For some reason, the blog editor refused to add any more pictures... there must be a maximum number of pictures per entry... anyway... here goes...

Picture # 7 & 8 Torrens River / Convention Center & the river outlet.

The city of Adelaide was build beside the Torrens River. The river is lined by parklands and bike and walk paths. You can follow the river (by bike or by foot) down a good 10 kilometers and end up here...

Someday it will be 'me' on those kite-surfing boards...

Picture # 9 The O-bahn

Most people get around using the bus. As the bus leaves the city, some enter a guided railway track called the O-bahn. There are small wheels near the front of the bus that steers the bus as it moves along the track. The driver has his hands off the wheel and just floors the accelerator. It is by no means a world's first (German designed...), but certainly caught my attention.

Picture # 10 Royal Adelaide Hospital

Though I can't find a reason that this might be of interest to anybody else... this is where work is. This hospital pays for all my adventures.

Speaking of which, I better be on my way. Have a 1200-2200 shift this afternoon.

Picture Album (part 1)

The letters to home will have to wait. After scanning the past few exchanges... I figured that there were really no interesting stories to share. As many of those back home had requested for pictures, I treated myself to a digital camera (I left mine back home) after receiving my first paycheck. Or was it before? Hmm.... Anyway, they say a picture paints a thousand words... and since I'm in no mood to type a really long blog entry... I might as well let the pictures do the talking.

Picture # 1: Adelaide (as seen from Light Memorial)

As you can see, its not really such a big city. The tallest building is only just about 30+ storeys high. The central business district is separated from the suburbs (all around) by vast parklands (as seen here).

Picture # 2 Light's Vision

The city of Adelaide was designed by Col. William Light in honor of Queen Adelaide, the consort of King William the IV. The city streets are designed as a grid, with King William St. running in the middle and bisecting the whole city. Quite interestingly, names of streets (that cross the midline) change on the other side of King William St. Though it may add to a lot of confusion... e.g. Rundle becoming Hindley St... it supports the notion that "you never CROSS a king."

Pictures # 3 & 4 Two views of Rundle Mall

Rundle Mall is Adelaide's shopping center. This one was taken during the day. (Note the guy on the unicycle with a glass of water on his head juggling 3 aluminum baseball bats....)

and this one is the same street taken at around 8 in the evening on a weekday. Note the striking absence of people (considering its the central shopping area). Note how bright it is too. As it is summer, the sun usually sets at around 9:30 PM. It takes some getting used to.

Picture # 5 Botanic Gardens (Palm House)

Among those parklands surrounding the city is the Botanic Gardens... within which lies an elaborately designed greenhouse called the Palm House. There's no charge for entering the gardens and its common to find people just lounging around (even napping) on the park benches.

I'm guessing that one of the reasons it was built beside the Royal Adelaide Hospital is so that doctors would find a place to hang around and relax at the first sign that they were starting to 'lose it'.

Picture # 6 Glenelg

The suburb of Glenelg is Adelaide's portal to the beach. Its a convenient 15 mins. tram ride from the center of the city.

(Continued....)