Australia 1 - Adelaide / Flinders Range

Down under in Australia,  the "Old Geezer" is on the move again !


Adelaide

It wasn't anywhere near long enough but I've had a good break in Adelaide with my big sister Carole.  Carole never changes, she is always good humoured, good natured and I love her to bits.

And it was a real treat to get to see my nephew Richard and his children Carys and Dean.  Of course I'm biased but I have to say this is a lovely family.

It gives me an opportunity to practise my Australian,

" Goodonya  Rich. ! "

This picture of my sister Carole was taken on an overcast day at the top of Mount  Lofty and you can vaguely see the City of Adelaide behind her in the background.

Incredibly, this picture of Adelaide was taken seconds later from exactly the same spot  !

I think I am saying thank you to my wonderful Fuji SLR camera.

For camera buffs the shot was x10 optical zoom / x2.2 digital zoom,
1/1000 sec., F4.5., and cropped.


Adelaide is a very pleasant and fairly low rise city.
The atmosphere is calm and the people around here seem very laid back and friendly.

There are some lovely examples of heritage buildings dotted around the city.
Click on pictures to enlarge

And lots of

beautiful parkland

running by the river.

 The surrounding countryside is very pleasant and I'm glad I'm here in the autumn when everywhere is green. 

I brought with me a much needed gift from the U.K. .... rain  !!   (Not all the time though !)

As usual, I love to get out of the city to feel the real country
and I was not disappointed.

At  "cut-price rentals"  in Adelaide I hired a Toyota Camry for A$40 per day (£25) and unlimited mileage so I could go  "walkabout"  !
The paintwork had more chips than a fish shop but it drove well and I decided to drive up to the Flinders Range.

On the way I stopped off at a Town called Quorn - but I think it was closed.... !!   No people,  no cars,  nothing  !

To be fair it was Sunday, but there were some lovely old buildings and it felt like taking a step back in time.
The only thing missing was some tumbleweed rolling down the main street !!

                  

The open land on the journey up to the hills gave a hint of just how vast this country is.
Stopping for photographs was quite eerie,   I don't think I've ever heard such silence !

For 90 kilometres there was never anyone in my rear view mirror and I met only two pick-up trucks going the other way.
And this is nowhere near the real outback !!
I suddenly felt quite vulnerable without a mobile phone !

The good news  .....   I absolutely love it !

The not so good news .....   I can't stop singing  "Waltzing Matilda"  while I'm driving !!!

No I didn't hire a helicopter I robbed this from the net !
 because an aerial view is the best way to explain it.

St. Marys is the highest peak at 1200 metres

    I'm heading for
  Wilpena Pound in the
  Flinders mountains
  which is an amazing
  natural geological ring
  of rugged hills 17kms.
  long and 4kms wide.


  You would think it's an
  ancient volcanic crater
  but it's not,  it's a
    natural formation !

              

And,  near journeys end,  I was rewarded with a liquid gold sky.

I haven't driven a car for over a month and after 800kms today,  I think I will sleep well tonight !

Singapore

Saturday  11th  May

Houses at the side of the railway

Getting to Singapore turned out to be quite an adventure !

I had chosen to travel by train so I could see some Malaysian countryside.

The journey was great  - not fast  ( I'm not in a hurry !)  -  but very interesting.

The railway runs the full length of Malaysia from Thailand (Bangkok) in the north

down through Kuala Lumpur and on to Singapore in the south.

Singapore is an island State seperated from neighbouring Malaysia by the Straits of Johor.
Both road and railway cross the Straits on a causeway which is the only mainland link to the island.

Straits of Johor

The train stops at the last station on the Malaysian mainland, J.S. Sentral, where passports are checked before moving on over the causeway and on to Singapore island.

The railway no longer goes in to the old Singapore railway station (shame) but terminates at Woodlands checkpoint on the north side of the island.

Here you are processed through Singaporian Customs and Immigration.

Welcome to Singapore !

For the purposes of this Blog and in the interests of pursuing informative journalism !

Arrival at Woodlands Checkpoint

the "Old Geezer" stood on the platform and quite innocently took a photograph of the train

and also one of a station sign that simply said "Woodlands Check Point"

A hand appeared on my shoulder and I was promptly whisked away into a security office

where they wanted to confiscate my camera !!!!

Following a lengthy altercation and the " Old Geezers' " Academy Award winning portrayal of an ageing bumbling fool they relented and, calling on some additional colleagues to act as witnesses,  agreed to observe me officially deleting the offending photograph. I was then allowed to proceed.

Strange thing ... they allowed me to keep a photograph of the train in the station but not a photograph of the station sign !!
Don't ask questions John,   you have your freedom back !!

Continuing the spirit of adventure I decided against getting a taxi into the City.

Following instructions from the "lonely planet" I got a bus to Woodlands MRT train station and then a train to City Hall which is a 2 minute walk to my hotel.

A bit slow but no problems and total cost of  S$3.20 = £1:70p !!

Visitors to UK must get quite a shock.

My first reaction was that this is just another Kuala Lumpur.
But it's not.  Even before you get into the city you can feel that this is a much different experience.








The first thing you notice is how clean everywhere is.





There is a wonderful blend of old and new  (More new than old )
( it has to be said ! )

There is the old, preserved and very famous.






















And the
( slightly ridiculous !)
 very new

Beautiful Canning Park







Great choice of restaurants and the lovely Singapore river.

Singapore is
A beautiful City at night.














Unlike Kuala Lumpur which seems to struggle for space,   Singapore feels wide open, very clean
and pretty much everything you could want if you have to be in a city.

If it wasn't for the draining humidity I could  almost  happily live here !


Now though, I'm off to visit my lovely eldest sister Carole in Adelaide, South Australia.
I'm afraid the blogs may dry up a little for the next week or two whilst I concentrate on family matters.

Then I'll be off to Cairns and the Great Barrier Reef,  followed by Brisbane, Sydney, Jakarta and Kalimantan,
where I'll be looking for Orangutans in the rain forests of  (what used to be)  southern Borneo.

The blogs will resume in earnest around the 28th of May I expect.

PLEASE    STAY  TUNED  !!
I enjoy your company !

North Vietnam to Kuala Lumpur

Hanoi is great fun but I want to see more of the country.

I spent my last day here travelling through the North Vietnam countryside,  looking at some towns and villages

and visiting Halong Bay in the Gulf of Tonkin.

I don't know what I was expecting in North Vietnam but I was quite surprised to see these town houses.

They are quite typical and not at all how I had imagined.

It's a style of building I've not really seen anywhere else.  A nice surprise.

This part of the world used to be known as IndoChina  and here in particular was very much French colonial.

But the tall narrow buildings put me in mind of Amsterdam and the Dutch !

I've been really lucky with the weather on this tour but today I've come to one of the most photogenic places and the skies are cloudy and grey !

The land here is limestone which,  due to erosion by the sea,  accounts for the strange shapes of  over 1900 islands in the bay.

There are caves and tunnels leading to eerily calm inlets surrounded by tall cliffs.  It's a bit surreal, like another world but the whole area is beautiful  (even when the weather's not good). 

There's a floating fishing village here as well,  this time on the sea. Apparently this area suffers from frequent typhoons and the huge island outcrops protect the village from the worst of the storms.  

Even so,  this fellah's not taking any chances.

A brick and cement structure on a boat !!






I promised a mention to some lovely friends that I met.

Claire from Brisbane

     

                     Leonard from Paris

Las hermanas felices de Ecuador !!

I love people who laugh and Pamela and Bianca laughed all the time

(when they were not sleeping ! )

A great day ended with a walk through two enormous caverns which have only been discovered as recently as 1993.

The caverns are of cathedral like proportions, with incredible stalagmites and stalactites.

I have discovered that photographing the inside of a cave is not one of my strong points so ....

.... they are called the Thien Cung caverns and you'll just have to go and see for yourself !

Sunday  5th May-  Kuala Lumpur 

So now it's time to say goodbye to Vietnam and the lovely helpful girls from my hotel who taught me the Hanoi version of the

Green Cross Code !!

Kuala Lumpur

Back to the land of Starbucks and MacDonalds.    ugh !!

What can I say about Kuala Lumpur ?

 It is a big city with some very tall buildings !!

Old Geezers definition of a city like this ...

... somewehere you have to go to get to somewhere else !  

I'm being very unfair,  if you like modern western cities then

Kuala Lumpur is ok.

It does have the magnificent Petronas twin towers.

It has an excellent transportation system.

And it is very clean.

China town and

Petaling St. Market

are fun places to go.

There is

a beautiful park with

a butterfly garden

and there is a magnificent railway station where you can catch a train to Bangkok, or Singapore, or ...  anywhere !

The problem with flying everywhere is that you don't see anything

So,  I'm booked on the 9am to Singapore.  The journey is 217 miles and will take 7 hours.

London to Manchester for instance is about 200 miles.

A 1st class seat in an air conditioned carriage cost me 34 Malaysian Ringitts  (£8.00p)

Are you watching  Mr. Branson ?

And I get to see the wonderful Malaysian countryside.

Next stop   ....    Singapore