Train trip from Sydney to Brisbane/Bundaberg

 This was a night trip of over twelve hours and was probably the most difficult one we'd made. For some reason our seats were double booked, although we booked them first, but we offered to change seats to make it easier. The woman who sat behind us had a baby who screamed until about midnight and the train car creaked and groaned like a ship’s mast in a tempest. We though certain as we pulled out of the station that they would stop the train and change cars, but they kept going. It made it all the way to Brisbane (most people here pronounce it: briz' - bun) where we changed trains after a four hour stopover. Not much else to tell about this part of the trip since it was dark outside.

(Beerwah is the stop to take to see Steve Irwin’s, Australian Zoo.)

Between Brisbane and Bundaberg rise the Glass House Mountains. Some are short peaks while others are upthrusts of rock that stand a few hundred feet above the land around them. They start near the coast around Landsborough (some miles north of Brisbane) and march inland for a number of miles. They were named by Captain Cook on his voyage to Australia.

There are a lot of man-made watering holes for cattle and sheep. Just about anywhere there is a hill, ravine, or gully they can dam up one end or dig out a hole and bank the downward side, a pond is created. Not only does it serve for watering stock, but the native animals can make use of the water supply, as well.

Gimpie, a city south of Bundaberg, used to be a fairly large gold mining area but now boasts of only one working mine. Most gold production now is near Ballarat or near the northwestern area of Australia.

Rain followed us up the coast. As we approached Gimpie North, the rain is falling steadily, which makes the locals on the train happy since they've had ten years of drought the last twelve years.

This same area also has fertile land that supports a number of cash crops: pineapples, macadamia nuts, apricots, sugar cane, and grapes. There are also plenty of beef cattle raised in this area, while rum is the major product of Bundaberg. A man in the seat next to us said we had to visit the distillery to get some free samples, but we never made it there. (Maybe next time.)

The land also has many forests of the normal variety of trees native to Australia that grow on the hills and valleys that predominate the land just inland from the coast. There is an invasive species called Bracken Fern that covers a good portion of the ground beneath the forests along the coast. We saw a few kookaburras and were told that kangaroos also were sometimes seen in this area.

Travel by train is second nature in Australia. All the major cities have underground trains and there are five or six lines that run across the country from city to city. In the east and southeast, the trains run daily, or up to several times daily, but in the west and central portions of the nation, they may run only once a week.

We saw two kangaroos hopping across a field after being scared up by the train about an hour and a half south of Bundy. (What a lot of the locals call Bundaberg.) There is a range of mountains or hills that stand between the train route north and the coast that is part of the Great Dividing Range.

South of Maryville (75 miles or so south of Bundaberg.) the soil is poor and there are huge, hard ant mounds. They occur around the country where similar conditions prevail. On some trees there are large black spheres bound around the trunks or branches. These are termites that will eventually kill the tree by eating it away from the inside.

Next Chapter: Bundaberg and the Great Barrier Reef

"But he who is greatest among  you shall be your servant. And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.  Matthew 23:11-12

Ballarat, Victoria - Center of Gold Mining

West of Melbourne the land turns somewhat drier. Prickly Pear cactus grows head high in the more arid areas, and the land rolls away to a range of low mountains. Stubby wiregrass grows anywhere there is a small amount of moisture and proliferates in the lower cuts and marshes. The land is better for ranching: sheep, cattle, horses or rabbits, than it is for growing crops. In some areas, erosion has exposed the gray and white slate and limestone rocks on the surface. Stands of eucalyptus gather in groups around low ponds and gullies or otherwise grow anywhere they can find a foothold in any soil that provides a small amount of moisture.

Firs and pines grow beside eucalyptus along the higher elevations but are scarcer in the lowlands. As you approach Ballarat, the land rises in a series of rolling hills and low mountains. The soil turns to brown and is excellent for growing hay and pasture grasses.

The train station in Ballarat is a long walk from anywhere. At least that’s the impression we got after getting directions from the stationmaster to the Best Western on Barkley Avenue. The stationmaster sent us on a long detour by mapping out things on our path that weren’t there: from streets to even a McDonald’s Restaurant. I didn’t think anyone could misplace a McDonalds! Luckily, we passed a tractor dealer who steered us back on the right path, unfortunately we retraced almost half the distance we had walked before we found the actual location of McDonalds. From there it was a mere two blocks farther.

Ballarat is, and was, the center of gold production in Australia. It may also have been where my ancestor, Herman Koester,  as a 15 or 16 year old boy ended up in the 1850’s mining for gold. This is the reason we came to Ballarat: to get a flavor of the area and what it may have been like during the mid nineteenth century. To assist with that, we visited a recreated site of the 1850’s called Sovereign Hill in which the original city was reconstructed over the top of one of the early corporation gold mines in the area. During our visit, cold though it was at Sovereign Hill, (It was like a cold, rainy, Florida winter day. (40 degrees, gusty winds, and rain)

We watched a wheelwright construct a wagon wheel from the basic components of wood and metal. His is the only shop in the world that still creates wheels the way it was done in the mid nineteenth century. Following this, we took a tour into the mine, going down 100 feet below the surface. Independent miners were able to mine the quartz rock, from which they recovered gold after crushing it, from a depth of up to 300 feet. Below that they hit the area’s water table and could go no further because they had no way to pump out the water. Corporation mines invested in steam equipment capable of pumping out enough water to allow them to tunnel down to 1100 feet.

Independent miners, and corporations as well, left some of the gold bearing rock where they were digging to hold up the ceiling. The timbers and trees that were also placed in the mines were simply to warn the miners that a cave-in was coming by the loud creaks and groans they would issue as the ground was collapsing above. It didn’t always provide enough time for them to escape, but it was the best warning system they had at the time.

In the mines around Ballarat, from each ton of quartz rock brought to the surface, the miners could expect to get ½ ounce of gold. Although, at times nuggets, such as the Welcome Nugget, could weigh up to 1200 ounces, they were rare and few miners could count on finding such a windfall. A regular miner working 6 days a week, 12 hours a day for the corporation made about $5.00 a week. (Which was a high wage job for the time and men flocked to the gold fields to get one, leaving Melbourne with a labor shortage.) Their day began when they came down the elevator and reached the first level of the mine. Their 12 hour day ended at the same place. If the elevator wasn’t operating, they had to climb out, which may take over an hour. (This was considered their own time and they weren’t paid for it.)

Ballerat has about 75,000 people living there today. Their downtown area is a mixture of small shops, public buildings, hotels, and banks, with a strip of parkland in the middle of Sturt Street which is also home to a band-shell, statues, and fountains.

There is a city bus but we (Cindy would say I) decided not to use which resulted in us walking about 15 miles in the two days we were there, many times in the rain. The weather was cool to cold and rainy, most of the time we were there.

*** 
Being confident of this very thing, that He which has begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. Philippians 1:6

Sydney to Melbourne, and Train Travel

We decided to travel by train while we were in Australia since I wasn't sure I wanted to brave the roadways here driving on the opposite side of both the highway and the front seat. Although, the pedals are in the same place so you don't have to change feet, too. Go figure that out! We were too late to purchase our passes online before we came to get the "Outside of Australia" rate so I came over expecting to pay more. We actually paid less because they only passes advertised were for 3 and 6 months. None of the intermediaries advertised that you could by 2 week passes for a lot less. (Which were all we needed.) We saved about half the cost, overall.

Riding the trains are like using any form of public transportation--you can't choose who will be sitting nearby. We've encountered a few characters while on the train, nothing really that would discourage us from using them again, from smells, to noise, and to a train carriage that sounded like the wheels would fall off at any time, to their most modern, the Tilt Train whose TV monitors buzzed all the way from Brisbane to Bundaberg, a 4 1/2 hour trip. It was the smoothest ride we had but the buzzing was absolutely annoying.

Topography between Sydney and Melbourne generally consists of rolling hills, pasture land, and rocky outcroppings interspersed with scattered forests of eucalyptus and pines.  Further south, the trees thin out and the hills flatten to present more of a tableland to the east with mountains rising in the distance to the west. Pools of water dot the low points and intersections between rises.

As the mountains draw closer, the trees and bushes grow thicker once again.

Thousands of sheep dot the meadows and hillsides like fluffy dandelions waiting for the wind to spread their seeds aloft. Beef cattle are nearly as numerous in the pastures as sheep and you may spot an occasional kangaroo or wallaby hopping quickly away from the passing train. Black and white magpies abound here and flocks of the swoop from fences and trees into the tall grasses. Bright yellow fields of Canola are one of the main farm crops of southern New South Wales and northern Victoria. They spread for miles on either side of the tracks, intermixed with dark green pastureland.

Clays of red, orange, and gold are revealed by the streams and rivers coursing through the uneven ground, spilling their colors to the sky.

It's a large country. From Sydney to Melbourne is more than an eleven hour train ride. We arrived after dark on Wednesday, September 26.

Next: Melbourne, Victoria

The Blue Mountains, New South Wales

Do you like to walk? A lot? I don't mean do you love to walk but do you like to walk far? If you do, the tour we took was for you. We were picked up at 7:00 in the morning in front of our hotel and there were only 5 of us so Rod, our guide (Nice Aussie name, eh?) decided he had enough time to take us to some more out of the way places he knew. Some of the roads were so bad I thought the van would break an axle. The views were spectacular. The Blue Mountains are not really mountains as you might think of them, but a number of ridges which have had the center or middle washed out by erosion. They get their name from the blue mist which is eucalyptus oil, secreted by the trees, mixed with mist that rises on the air currents.

We had beef pie for lunch (very delicious) which you eat by holding it in your hands, but we sat on the high point of a ridge, gazing out over the edge of a cliff at an unbelievable panorama. I said to Rod, "This beats eating lunch in an office," to which he replied, "This is my office."

We didn't see any koalas or kangaroos here. Apparently, the soil is too poor to provide enough nutrients in the eucalyptus leaves to sustain many koalas and it's not the best type of terrain for kangaroos. What we did see were quite a few cockatoos. The babies are dark so they can more easily hide from predators, but they really squawk when they get bigger to urge their mothers to bring them food. Mature cockatoos, as you know, are white.

We spent the entire day trekking through the Blue Mountains, walked about 8 or 9 miles, but it was all worthwhile.

Sydney, Australia, Part 3

The first settlers came ashore near present day Sydney in 1788, landing at a place called the Rock. Today, there are a number of shops and merchants there selling all kinds of wares. In my mind I was imagining a different place called the Rock with a number of shops built into the cell blocks of an ancient prison. (A number of early settlers of Australia were convicts from England, by the way.) The Rock actually turned out to be very much like St. George Street in St. Augustine, but with steep hills. We looked through a number of shops and in one I found my Aussie hat.

I never thought about what I might look like to the locals as I walked out of the shop wearing my hat, inspired by Crocodile Dundee. The next day our guide to the Blue Mountains said that only tourists around Sydney wear hats like mine, usually either Americans or Germans. Guilty on both counts, I thought, being an American of German descent. Still, I think I would have bought it anyway.

We took a ferryboat across Sydney Harbor to Taronga Zoo in the afternoon. (That's where the photo with the red kangaroos was taken.) It's a regular zoo with most of the animals in natural environments and some where people can actually interact with them. The most exciting part of the zoo experience was the bird show. The birds actually fly around free, some buzzing right over the spectators heads: owls, falcons, kites, hawks, cockatoos, etc. It's amazing how quietly owls can fly. It's practically impossible to hear them coming.

By crikey, Mates, it's time to end this blog and find my Way Out.

Next up: the Blue Mountains

Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, Part 2

We decided to stay awake so we could adjust better to the jet lag. (There is a 14 hour difference in time between US Eastern and Australian Eastern.) We explored the Sydney underground subway system for a short time before we found the correct Platforms and trains. (Believe it or not, To get from Kings Crossing to Circular Quay [pronounced Key] you take the train from Platform 1 and after two stops you change to the train on Platform 6--but to return to our hotel you don't take 6 and then 1 you take 1 and 6 again. I still don't know how that worked, but it did--except the last time we went that route and then we took trains 1 and 5 coming back.

We took a tour of the Opera House and the architecture is stunning. Unfortunately, there was a performance going on in the main hall (there are several in the building) so we didn't get to see it. The person who won the design competition basically scribbled his entry on a piece of scrap paper which the original committee discarded but a later judge pulled out of the scrap heap and got it declared the winner. (Imagine one of the most distinctive buildings in the world not being constructed.) Originally, the building was to take 4 years to build and cost $7 million dollars. It really took 14 years and cost $105 million dollars. It was finished in 1973.

The roof is made of concrete sections which are covered by tile. (I'll try to remember to post a photo on Facebook later so you can see what it looks like.) Parts of the building are undergoing an upgrade which were designed by the original architect. (He died in 2009 so he didn't get to see his improvements finished. He actually never returned to Australia after the building was completed.)

We also visited the Botanical Gardens which is mostly a large park next to the Sydney Opera House.

This pretty much ended our first day in Australia.

(End of Sydney, part 2)

Australia: We've Arrived! (Sydney: Part 1)

We arrived in Sydney, New South Wales, Sunday morning at about 6:30 AM local time after an uneventful flight of 15 hours. Customs went quickly and we exited to the main terminal happy to be on the ground again. We were thirsty and went to a shop in the airport to buy a couple of sodas. I was shocked at the price for a bottle of Coke: $5:00! I thought that it was just because it was at the airport but we found out later that the regular price is $3.75 to $4.50 for soft drinks. (The price of food and drink is really high compared to the US, but more about that on a later blog.)

We next paid for a van to take us to the Pott's Point Holiday Inn. We followed a group of for about a quarter mile to a beat-up VW bus pulling a trailer. Behind it was parked a clean, white new bus and we all headed for that. "No, not the bus, the van!" our guide called out. We stuffed our bags in the enclosed trailer and then crammed ourselves into the small seats and off we went--for ten yards--and the bags fell out of the trailer. (Our driver had forgotten to close the gates.) He quickly stopped, mumbled something we couldn't understand, retrieved the bags and we were off again.

Most of the people in Australia are fairly easy to understand, but not our driver. He barely opened his mouth when he spoke, mumbling and slurring his words. His sense of direction was much better than his speech and we arrived safely at the door to our hotel. We were early for check-in (by about 5 hours) but the Aussie woman checking us in found us an open room and booked us in. We arrived on the third floor and opened the drapes to discover that we'd received an upgrade! We had a beautiful view of Sydney Harbor: the opera house, harbor bridge and the skyline of Sydney.

(End of Part 1)

Coming Trip to Australia & New Zealand

We're counting down the last two weeks until we take a much anticipated trip to Australia and New Zealand. Most of the time we will be "Down Under" we will be on vacation, but part of the trip will include some research in the Melbourne area about the Australian Gold Rush of the 1850's.

About 1852, one of my ancestors, as a fifteen year old young man, was basically forced to flee England along with his brother and were able to bribe a ship's captain to allow them to 'stow away' on his ship which was headed for Australia.

Sometime in the future I plan to write a young adult novel about my ancestor's exciting exploits on board ship and while he was exploring Australia and mining for gold near Melbourne in Victoria, Australia.

While in Australia and New Zealand, I will be blogging about what we see and some of our experiences there, some of which will be connected with my research for a novel. Hope you will join me.