Three Weeks Down Under
We returned recently from 3 weeks in Australia – two weeks of business for Chuck and a week of “holiday” at the end. By the way, it’s a LONG way to go! We left London at about noon on Friday, 27 January, and landed in Sydney at about 7:00 p.m. on Saturday the 28th – with a 2 hour stop in Singapore along the way, to refuel the plane. Sydney is 11 hours ahead of London – so the total travel time was about 20 hours. But it was worth it.
We were in Sydney for a total of 7 days – a free day on Sunday, followed by a 5 day series of conferences, exhibits and meetings (for Chuck) during the week. On the following Sunday, 5 February, we flew on to Melbourne where we stayed for 2 days and nights. Chuck had meetings there with researchers from the Australian Defence (British spelling) Science and Technology Organization and the Cooperative Research Center for Advanced Composite Structures (go ahead, say it fast five times). While in Sydney we were with several of Chuck’s colleagues and several spouses. We traveled to Melbourne with Jim and Susan DeCorpo – who we were with last summer in Greece.
From Melbourne it was off to two days in Canberra. Chuck’s business here was with the University of New South Wales as well as the Australian Defence Forces Academy. Then it was on to Brisbane for further meetings – and a reunion with the DeCorpos.
Our vacation time started with a flight to Cairns, in northern Queensland. (It takes a while to get used to the idea that traveling north in “Oz” means getting warmer; and, of course, February in Australia is akin to August in the northern hemisphere.) Cairns is a very popular tourist destination, though we were there after the end of the high season; it is on the coast, with the Great Barrier Reef just offshore and a “wet tropic” rainforest a few miles north of the city. Both of these are UN World Heritage Sites and it is the only place in the world where two World Heritage Sites actually meet, as the reef and rainforest do at the coast just north of the city. Naturally, while there we visited the Reef for a day and took a day-long trip into the rainforest. We also spent a day exploring the “tablelands” just the other side of a small mountain range behind the city and one evening at an aborigine culture center where we saw demonstrations of their rituals.
All in all, we both liked Australia very much -- all five cities we visited were interesting (well, Canberra, being a planned city, was a little less fun than the others). We commented frequently on how clean and modern everything was -- the people were very friendly everywhere. It is a country on the move -- with a land area almost exactly the same as the U.S., but with only 20 million people. The largely-desert "outback", comprising most of the country, imparts a frontier-like feeling, probably much like that of 19th century America. We most definitely would like to return.
Other articles give more details about each of these stops along the way. For a picture or two from each city, see: http://chuck.smugmug.com/gallery/1218206/1/57005033
We were in Sydney for a total of 7 days – a free day on Sunday, followed by a 5 day series of conferences, exhibits and meetings (for Chuck) during the week. On the following Sunday, 5 February, we flew on to Melbourne where we stayed for 2 days and nights. Chuck had meetings there with researchers from the Australian Defence (British spelling) Science and Technology Organization and the Cooperative Research Center for Advanced Composite Structures (go ahead, say it fast five times). While in Sydney we were with several of Chuck’s colleagues and several spouses. We traveled to Melbourne with Jim and Susan DeCorpo – who we were with last summer in Greece.
From Melbourne it was off to two days in Canberra. Chuck’s business here was with the University of New South Wales as well as the Australian Defence Forces Academy. Then it was on to Brisbane for further meetings – and a reunion with the DeCorpos.
Our vacation time started with a flight to Cairns, in northern Queensland. (It takes a while to get used to the idea that traveling north in “Oz” means getting warmer; and, of course, February in Australia is akin to August in the northern hemisphere.) Cairns is a very popular tourist destination, though we were there after the end of the high season; it is on the coast, with the Great Barrier Reef just offshore and a “wet tropic” rainforest a few miles north of the city. Both of these are UN World Heritage Sites and it is the only place in the world where two World Heritage Sites actually meet, as the reef and rainforest do at the coast just north of the city. Naturally, while there we visited the Reef for a day and took a day-long trip into the rainforest. We also spent a day exploring the “tablelands” just the other side of a small mountain range behind the city and one evening at an aborigine culture center where we saw demonstrations of their rituals.
All in all, we both liked Australia very much -- all five cities we visited were interesting (well, Canberra, being a planned city, was a little less fun than the others). We commented frequently on how clean and modern everything was -- the people were very friendly everywhere. It is a country on the move -- with a land area almost exactly the same as the U.S., but with only 20 million people. The largely-desert "outback", comprising most of the country, imparts a frontier-like feeling, probably much like that of 19th century America. We most definitely would like to return.
Other articles give more details about each of these stops along the way. For a picture or two from each city, see: http://chuck.smugmug.com/gallery/1218206/1/57005033
posted by Chuck and Kathi Calvano @ 3:02 PM
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