Gra Nomad Wanderings

Saturday, December 16, 2006

SOME STATISTICS





Photos here show giant Budha, part of the 26,000 km of Great Wall of China, Coult giving us some pointers re Beijing and meeting our daughter Deb and grandson Logan at Sydney airport.
Well, ’twas good to get home after the 10 month trip. Here are a few statistics. If you’re not into stats pull out now. OK? You've seen the photos! No problems!

During our trip we visited a number of countries and stayed with quite a few Servas hosts. Here are the countries visited and the number of Servas hosts we visited:
v Chile 0
v Argentina 1
v Brazil 2
v Peru 1
v Colombia 0
v USA 20
v Canada 2
v England 3
v Wales 1
v Ireland 3
v France 4
v Netherlands 0
v Belgium 0
v Germany 4
v Denmark 1
v Czech Repub 1
v Poland 1
v Austria 2
v Hungary 2
v Croatia 0
v Slovenia 0
v Greece 1
v Italy 2
v China 0
v TOTAL 51
Altogether we stayed 142 days with those 51 hosts. We also stayed with other friends and acquaintances (and a brother). There were 15 of them and we stayed a total of 63 days with them.
So the breakdown of the 309 days goes:
v Servas 142 46%
v Friends 63 21%
v Hotel/motel 50 16%
v YHA 32 10%
v B&B, pension 14 5%
v Pane/bus/ship 6 2%

On the cycling front, the year goes like this

Month Roadbike Mountain Tandem Total
January 350 55 0 405
Februray 0 42 0 42
March 0 0 200 200
April 0 20 233 253
May 0 0 215 215
June 0 3 374 377
July 0 0 705 705 big tandem month
August 0 85 0 85
September 0 12 83 95
October 0 8 152 160
November 0 0 0 0
December 140* 0* 0* 140*

So nearly 2,000 km on the tandem this year and a total of about 2,700 on all bikes. And there’s still a couple of weeks before the year ends. Maybe 3,000 km?

Well, we head down the south coast of NSW tomorrow (Sunday 17 Dec). Cudmirrah is about 50 km south of Nowra. It’ll be good to have a jog (or walk) on the beautiful beaches and have a swim in that lovely surf. I fear it may still be a bit cool. I’ll let you know. Who’d like to be there with us? Leave a comment or ring us on the mobile… 0411 386 814.

If you want a relaxed break – come and join us!

If I don’t blog for a while it’s because I’m spending a fair bit of time in the water.

Saturday, December 09, 2006

ARRIVED IN AUSTRALIA

YOU HAVE TO READ THIS RIGHT THROUGH...

Arrived Sydney Australia last Thursday after about 9 hours flight from HGK. Weather very different and much hotter than we have been used to. Some small trouble at Customs with bike wheels (clean of dirt) but Fay's bike shoes cleaned by courtesy of Customs officers. Australia seems a nice place to be, no one else has offered to clean our shoes on arrival. Met by a Margaret and and younger lady Deb, (who had a baby with her!). they greeted us like long lost relatives and insisted we stay at Deb's place without any argument. Deb even had a rent a truck for us, a silver Pajero 4WD, much bigger than our Peugeot from Europe, but also a diesel. Stayed a couple of nights in Sydney and met some other very keen bike folk( Jim and Lyn). Seems Jim is in charge of Bike for Bibles in this state or something so I will probably go for a bike ride with him as soon as possible. the banana split fits into the back of the Pajero easiily but it also has bike racks on the roof and Deb has promised access to some half bikes in the immediate future. The Pajero even has a pink and blue towel for each of us to use and a pair of leather gloves under the drivers seat when you go to a fuel station.
Anyway after a few days in Sydney this Deb and her hubby and little kid (Fay got on well with the little kid but at this stage he is not into biking so I am a little reserved about him!) Deb advised us she had a house for us for a week or so. It is in a place called Dubbo which was about 4-5 hours away from Sydney. The Pajero has a compass thing and Deb said "Just drive west for five hours." We travelled through a place called the blue mountains but they are much smaller than the mountains we are used to in recent ten months. No small narrow winding roads but plenty of smoke and bush fires. After a few hours the road flattens out and you travel much more easily.
The house in Dubbo is very nice and Fay has her own room and as there is no one else in the house I might even break convention and sleep in the same room. A small ensuite and also a separate bathroom. There, in the garage as promised, are some half bikes. A small problem not explained by Deb was that it seems we have to cook and wash up ourselves so had a look around Dubbo for a few shops and stocked up on some tucker. This seems a good place and guy could settle down here. No serious hills for a good bike ride though. Think Deb said we only have it for a week until the real owners come back; we have to go and live in a caravan in the next week or so but Deb said we can keep the Pajero for a little longer until we have to give it back to her. Think that is about all the news for now. We will have a look for a church tomorrow and probably go the Baptist Church. If I get up early I will go for a bike ride and look to see if anyone my age is playing tennis. Wouldn't mind a game. So that is the first epistle of our time in Australia, when I get a bit more time I will send photos of the Pajero, the fuel gauge, the compass thing, the mountains and even the people we stayed with or who met us at the airport.

The house in Dubbo is very nice and Fay has her own room and as there is no one else in the house I might even break convention and sleep in the same room. A small ensuite and also a separate bathroom. There, in the garage as promised, are some half bikes.
A small problem not explained by Deb was that it seems we have to cook and wash up ourselves so had a look around Dubbo for a few shops and stocked up on some tucker. This seems a good place and guy could settle down here. No serious hills for a good bike ride though. Think Deb said we only have it for a week until the real owners come back; we have to go and live in a caravan in the next week or so but Deb said we can keep the Pajero for a little longer until we have to give it back to her.
Think that is about all the news for now. We will have a look for a church tomorrow and probably go the Baptist Church. If I get up early I will go for a bike ride and look to see if anyone my age is playing tennis. Wouldn't mind a game. So that is the first epistle of our time in Australia, when I get a bit more time I will send photos of the Pajero, the fuel gauge, the compass thing, the mountains and even the people we stayed with or who met us at the airport.
Well, would you believe I gave my brother Alan power of attorney! Now he's even writing my blog for me! How cool is that? Yes, he wrote the above and emailed it to me just a while ago!
Even so, it's pretty accurate. Thanks Al. Not everyone gets a speech writer do they?
We are somewhat worried about the cooking aspect having not done much for 10 months. Pajero did run well and we won't be handing that back in the near future.
Hey it's good to be in own bed! And our grandson.... Logan Jack.... he's a corker! A bobby dazzler! That means I reckon he's tops!
We had a celebratory Chinese dinner in Sydney last night. Great to have Jim and Lyn and sister Margaret there as well as son Jeremy and close friends from Colombia, Deanna, Hugo and Valentina. I think she is going to marry my son Jeremy even though she is only 5 years old!
Thanks Deb and Bren for having us and Deb for picking us up from the airport. That was great.
Our tennants did a great job of keeping the house ship shape. Thanks Brad and Marli. You're wonderful. They moved out about a month ago.
And now... to bed. Thanks for the blog again Al. Seeya soon.

Sunday, December 03, 2006

SOME PHOTOS FOR YOU










Couldn't quite get the order right could I? Can you see which one is David from Florence and which one is Coult from Beijing? There's a couple of the Great Wall at Beijing, the colosseum in Rome and Fay and I with Coult and Meiling in front of the Great Palace in Beijing. You might be able to tell that it was damn cold in Beijing.
Now off to Hong Kong. Home in Sydney Thursday 7 December. Don't forget to pick us up.... somebody!

PS Arrived in Hong Kong midday Monday 4 Dec. Boy, and we thought China was different! Hey, they drive on the CORRECT side of the road round here! Staying at a Youth Hostel WITH A VIEW!
Thanks Coult for everything including making sure we left the premises! Luvya!