In September 2000, just after I returned from my trip to Borneo, I had to buy this new car because my girlfriend had written off my car whilst I was away! *smile*

I did not look forward to hunting around for a new car, but I found a good buy locally. This car is a 1997 Ford Futura, with 4.0 litre, 6-cylinder, 220-horsepower, power-steering, central locking and electronic windows (I think I am starting to sound like a car advertisement...)





It is pretty much the same colour as my old car, and it feels so nice to drive!

As you can see, pretty similar, but I also really miss my old car! It had a lot of computerised features - from a digital odometer, to adjusting the internal temperature of the car. It was a pretty cool car and wished I could have kept it for another few more years.







A huge contrast to my first car!

It is a red hatchback that I bought early 1998, a few months after I arrived in Australia. But someone wrote it off a few months after I bought it. It was a pretty bad accident, but luckily I was alright. I was only covered by Third Party insurance, and to go through a lot of paperwork just to get reimbursement for the car!

Ecochallenge ( Sabah 2000 )

Arrival	Silam / Jungle Ops	Repeater Stations	The Competitors	Helicopter	Jungle Around Us	The Village

Away from Headquarters . . .

I managed to explore the villages at Silam.

The people here wore this white stuff on their faces - I guess their form of sunscreen.

These people were refugees from the Philippines.



The kids were fighting to fit into the photo!





The kids here were really cute.

These kids here, had caught a monkey and was trying to sell it at the camp for 5 ringgit (AUD$2.50).

No-one wanted to buy it because they knew if they bought it, and set it loose, the kids would just catch it again, and try to sell it.

In general, there were lots of great photos at Silam village.





One of the helicopter pilots was driving through the jungle roads, took a corner too fast, and had a minor mishap.



We headed into Lahad Datu to get some seafood!

An escape from camp food. Camp food was disgusting. There were live worms in the vegetables (yes, after cooked). Most of the food was not fresh, and was pretty boring. The seafood was fantastic here. Whenever we had the chance, we ate lots of seafood.

Yum... Paul did not get to eat all of the crabs - all of us had a portion of it.



Yummm... they were huge, but we did not eat them. They were too big for us to eat, pretty impressive though. They were the biggest lobsters I have seen in my life. We saw these at the same place we ate our seafood and frogs (below).




We had this frog for dinner about 2 min after I took the photo.

This was actually when I went out with Glen in Kota Kinabalu - he asked me to pick some food and to surprise him.

I did not tell him till a year later that he ate frog meat. He asked me what it was, because he reckoned it tasted funny, but I did not tell him at the time.

I think he will only eat it again. Only if he really had to.





Petronis Towers - the tallest twin towers in the world.

Actually, they are the tallest buildings in the world, followed by the Sears Towers in Chicago.

The towers are joined by some sort pedestrian platform.

These towers are located in Kuala Lumpur.

I went to Kuala Lumpur to pick up my Permanent Residency for Australia.

Woohoo!!! After 2 years of lots of paperwork, and correspondence back and forth with Berlin, I finally managed to get it!

The inconvenience of it all, was that I actually had to leave Australia ie collect my PR before re-entering Australia.









Below, is the only photo I have of the Lateral Linking Team that I worked with during the race.



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Created: 7 Dec 2001

Ecochallenge ( Sabah 2000 )

Arrival	Silam / Jungle Ops	Repeater Stations	The Competitors	Helicopter	Jungle Around Us	The Village

Helicopters . . .
The radio communications team had to arrive a few days before that because we had to hand out over 2,000 pieces of radio equipment. We had problems getting the necessary approvals for helicopters so they were grounded! I ended having to hand out most of the equipment as Glen and Paul had to sort out our use of the helicopters.

We had to fly all the equipment to Silam before the start of the race, and our team managed to fly to Silam the day before the race started.

Do you believe that Paul managed to take a photo of me whilst I was flying the chopper? He was standing to the side of me, and took the photo at night time, with the door open ...



Just kidding.

A couple of days before the race started, I was at the airport most of the day. We had some problems with the radios in the helicopters... I must have been in and out of those helicopters at least 200 times.

I did manage to get someone to take some photos of me in a helicopter, looking very much like the pilot!

I had hoped that I had the time to explore Kota Kinabalue, but we were so busy, it had to wait.



Here is the 212 or "Huey" - a twin-turbine Vietnam helicopter taking off. It is a hell a lot more powerful than some of the other helicopters we were using, which were 206s.


Here are the medical guys practising abseiling out of the helicopters (Aussie style)!

At the start of the race, I was sitting there listening to the first rescue on the radio.

3 hours after the start, four boats had capsized... helicopters and boats were very busy!

The competitors were due to arrive at Silam (another checkpoint) the next day (21st Aug).

For the first few days after the race started, I had to help organise to get the fuel to the top of the mountain.

After that the helicopter came in useful. It brought up 100 litres of fuel on the 4th day so I did not have to ferry fuel anymore!



At the end of the race, we had to sling-load the repeaters, to get them off the mountain. That means we had to strap them onto the helicopters, and pull them off the mountains that way - quite effective really.






Repeater station finally airborne!


You can see a pole in the right photo.
My girlfriend asked me what it was for - it helps balance the load so that it does not keep swinging whilst airborne.


Below, you will see some pretty good photos from the chopper.



Towards the end of the race, we had to scan the rivers for the last competitors coming in - to make sure they had completed this section of the race course. It was low-altitude flying of the river-bed.

The photo on the left shows the chopper approaching Silam Village. This village was located just outside of Silam HQ.



Glen liked wanted to have a photo of the back of my head - and I ruined the photo by turning my head as he took it...

Here's a sunset shot of the helicopters flying around.

I had to put in this fantastic photo - the lighting gives a really nice feel to the photo.



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Created: 7 Dec 2001

Ecochallenge ( Sabah 2000 )

Arrival	Silam / Jungle Ops	Repeater Stations	The Competitors	Helicopter	Jungle Around Us	The Village

The Wildlife in Borneo . . .

The jungles in Borneo are really dense, dark and humid.

You will find that some of the photos look as though they have been over-exposed, but in reality, it is just the humidity in the air.






I have a photo of this at home - Glen enlarged it for me, and framed it!

Don't ask me why - I think I look rather wasted there.

Glen and I tried to race through the jungle.

The climb to the top of the mountain is rated as a 1.5 hour climb... Glen and I have done it in 26 minutes... actually I was confident that I could do it in less than 20 and so I did!

I held the record of taking 17 minutes to race to the top of Mt Silam, covering a distance of approx 4 kilometres through the jungle, up a mountain.

I was getting really fit (My girlfriend was proud of me).



This photo shows how dense and dark the jungle can be. It was so humid there... no, not because I hadn't cleaned my lenses.



You can see how muddy it is in the jungle - I became quite dirty after many trips into the jungle.



I think these trees are just as big as the Californian Redwoods. They might not be as old, but definitely just as big.



This was taken with a 300mm lens, from 1.5 metres.

The most amazing thing about them, is when they are scared, the curl up into little "marbles".

It looks like a small bug, but it is actually at least 7cm long, which is actually quite big.




I noticed in Borneo, most of the insects there were huge.

The wingspan of the brown moth was about 15cm wide - huge!

They are mostly active at night, which is quite common for creatures in the jungle.

A couple of the girls stationed in the jungles, was stationed here. Not a wise decision, considering these girls were paranoid about the insects.

(Note: in the photo below, I still had conjunctivitis) I had the red eyes for most of the trip.


Big and beautiful, don't you think? You can see how big the black moth is compared to the size of the telephone.





These plants were kind of special because each branch split into two, so by the end of it, they formed a hexagonal pattern.

Below, are plants known as the "pitcher" plant.

The pitcher plants are meat-eating plants - you have watch out not to fall into them because they will swallow you whole.



If you just believed that, you are very gullible! *laugh*

The pitcher plant, like other carnivorous plants, feed on insects.

They have sweet-smelling nectar that attract the unsuspecting insect to it.

When the insect lands, it finds the surface slippery and fall straight into the “pitcher”, where the plants juices drowns it and is digested by the plant.

You may have heard of other type of carnivorous plants such as the Venus Fly Trap, and the Sundew plants.



Yes, you see me holding the snake with a leaf.

It was a poisonous snake, and I was worried about it's venom getting on my skin.

For example a puff adder, contact with the venom numbs the skin.

I was not familiar with the snakes in Borneo, and was not about to risk it.


The tarantella was sitting inside the catering tent hunting.

Everyone was looking at it and admiring it, which was pretty amazing, considering I know many people who would willingly kill a spider in sight.

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Created: 7 Dec 2001

Ecochallenge ( Sabah 2000 )

Arrival	Silam / Jungle Ops	Repeater Stations	The Competitors	Helicopter	Jungle Around Us	The Village

Repeater Stations . . .



Here, you see Paul and I transporting some of the repeater stations by air.

From Silam, we flew down to DFVC. We stayed there for three days before going back to Silam.



I am at one of the repeater sites. Here, the top of one of the mountains was cleared, so we could safely land a helicopter there.

Oh... did I forget to mention that I almost chopped one of my fingers in half at the repeater site?

On top of my infected eye, I had another thing for the medical team to look at. The fingernail had been chopped in half and there was not much I could do about it except clean it up and try to avoid infections. The medical team was great there... they were extremely good.




We had a few problems with some of the communications gear.

Paul and Glen were handling it, and at times I tried to assist.

The first few days had been really tough.


The top of Silam is covered in clouds for most of the afternoons, so the solar panels are quite useless. A survey of the conditions made prior to the race was useless.

If you ask any of the locals, they would have told us that the peak is always covered in clouds... but apparently no-one asked them!!!




We had problems keeping the generators running - they were using more power than predicted and there was no sun on the top of Silam to recharge the batteries.

The generator itself was a re-built petrol engine with a car alternator on it.

We basically tried to use a system where we used a jerry can, cut holes into it, and relied on the force of gravity to transport the fuel to the generator.

This design ended up working best for us.


Our helicopter pilot sitting on the side there, just grinning...

On the third day of the race, I hiked up the mountain three times. I was really tired and all I could think of was getting a bit of a rest and some food. I managed to get a bit once I got to Danum. In Danum I managed to get 6 hours sleep before someone woke me up and told me that the repeater had died in Silam... again all the cars had to leave in a convoy... so rush, rush to find my driver and managed (just) to get into the convoy!

The road to Danum closes at 6.30pm and all the cars had to go in the convoy.


The helicopter flew all of us to the top of the mountain, and waited there for us till we were finished. Glen quite often told the pilot, "You don't have to shut down, because we'll only be here for 5 minutes." Well... quite often, we were there for as long as an hour and half! (Don't worry, the pilot was sensible enough to shut down immediately... he got to know Glen very well.)

I went up there often make sure that it was still running. It is much better getting a helicopter to fly me up there so that I can bring some fuel with me !



Glen has mostly been on top of the mountain getting the generator back online.
We have to keep the generator running 24 hours per day until the end of the race.




On the third night after the race started, one of the repeaters went dead.

I had to hike up the mountain on the previous day as the generator had died.

I did not leave the mountain until it was dark, so I had to climb down through the jungle in the dark!

Fortunately I had my torch with me!




Paul later gave me strict instructions to make sure that I leave the mountain so that I could be back at HQ while there was still light!

I found out that I did not have any problems navigating at night... I even offered Paul to go back up when the repeater died!

Anyhow, we ended up having to send the airborne repeater up!





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Created: 7 Dec 2001

Ecochallenge ( Sabah 2000 )

Arrival	Silam / Jungle Ops	Repeater Stations	The Competitors	Helicopter	Jungle Around Us	The Village

The Competitors . . .

The competitors did not rest... three of the teams were half way through the 600 kilometre course after only three days... pretty amazing!

Two of the teams were Australian. 18 teams were out of the race. At least 10 of these were due to medical problems.

Hardly any people around here get enough sleep... the place is active 24 hours per day because there are always competitors coming in!

I was keen to find out how the Danish team would turn out. At the beginning of the race, they were not very sociable. But by the end of the race, I think the tension of the race had gone, and I managed to have a chat with them. By the third day, the Danes are doing pretty well... they had a 22nd place!



This was the mountain-bike leg of the race.

The guy you see being transported to hospital in the helicopter (photos below), was doing this part of the race. He was rounding a corner on his bike and rode straight into a large branch.



We had a lot of medical urgencies... we almost lost a guy with a punctured lung !
I got some great photos and helped getting the guy into the mobile hospital. There was a lot publicity on the website and through the media about it.

Fortunately, he was only 15 minutes away from HQ, so it was possible for us to get him to the helicopter very quickly, and to the nearest hospital.



Another leg of the race involved rowing in these “sampans”, a Malay term for “boat”. At some point, the teams in the race had to also split up - some of them swimming, some of them rowing, to complete the water leg of the race.

Below, the competitors had to use a flying fox to cross the canyons. I managed to have a go at it - compared to rock-climbing... well, I found it pretty boring *smile*. I imagine most people would find it quite fun though.



There are no places to climb here.

I had hoped to take one of the helicopters to Madai Caves to check out the 200 metre abseil. The road to the Madai Caves lead directly through the tiny village of Gua Madai - a small cluster of homes, their wood bleached grey.

The town’s main sources of income are tourism and birds’ nests. The nests are found high up the walls of the cave, tucked away in cracks and crevasses, and can command thousands of dollars. They are harvested about three times a year.

My girlfriend mentioned trying "bird's nest soup" whilst I was there. She said normally the bird's nest they use belong to the swallow. It is a delicacy to many Asians, and similar to shark's fin soup - that is if you have tried it. Normally the nests are made out of the birds' saliva.



There was so much rain at Silam that HQ was often flooded.

Many of the competitors took the opportunity to get some sleep and the slept on whatever they could find.


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Created: 7 Dec 2001

Ecochallenge ( Sabah 2000 )

Arrival	Silam / Jungle Ops	Repeater Stations	The Competitors	Helicopter	Jungle Around Us	The Village

Silam and Jungle Ops . . .
It is so bloody hot in Silam! It must have been at least 40 degrees and 100% humidity!

Silam was the overall headquarters, and Danum Valley Field Centre (DVFC) was referred to as Jungle Ops. Jungle Ops controlled all radio communications and conducted the race through the the jungle.

From Kota Kinabalu, we flew to Lahad Datu and drove the rest of the way to Silam. Silam was the site of one of the repeater stations. We had to set up a HQ a few kilometres from this station... heaps of opportunities for a few walks in the jungle.

The operation at Silam was huge!... I had never seen such a busy place before. The place was crawling with energy. It was bigger than any military operation I had ever seen! You would be amazed to see the logistics involved in this project ! At the time I did not have the time to take a lot of photos.

We had many army trucks transporting the competitors' equipment - very good cooperation from the military. They helped out with the preparation and set-up of HQ, and with the transportation of fuel.





This is the headquarters on the left.

The whole Ecochallenge race is governed from this office.

The map in the background contains the position of all the checkpoints at which the competitors have to go through.




Both of the above photos are aerial shots of HQ and were taken from a helicopter.


I managed to get a nice aerial shot of Silam HQ. The big white patch in the middle is where the competitors stored all their equipment. Just to the left are the containers from where the race is controlled. The 4 'finger-like' white pads on the right are the heli-pads. The long rectangle to the left is the eating area, and just above it is the hospital.




Approaching DVFC in helicopter.

This is actually a research centre in the middle of the jungle - commonly known as DVFC (Danum Valley Field Centre).

DVFC is not normally accessible the tourists and the general public, only to researchers.

DVFC is concerned about contamination into the jungle.



Outside Jungle Ops HQ.

The green boxes contain bottled drinking water.

By the time the race was over, most of this had been consumed - quite amazing really, considering there were really only 10 people at Jungle Ops.

During the competitors were not allowed any help from us, and that included the provision of drinking water.




Paul with some of the radio equipment at Silam.

He is standing next to the HQ matrix, which contained all the communications equipment for headquarters.

Paul is also standing next to the only 2 beds in the HQ building. These were used by the radio operators to nap in between shifts.


Below, you see me sitting in the catering tent at Silam.

I think it must have been a good day, to have been sitting there, smiling... I am just guessing here, because obviously I did not take the photo, and I cannot remerber the place.





Bad hair day?

I did not have a shower for a very long time, and to hold my hair in place, I adopted various techniques, such as the sunglasses-hairband...

This place is a breathing ground for tropical diseases!

As you can see, my right eye is really red. I somehow managed to get conjunctivitis and did not know it was contagious. I did not want to trouble the medics as they were pretty tied up with the competitors. When my vision on the left eye was getting blurry and I had problems seeing what was in front of me, I was ordered to get it checked. Just as well I did!

In Kota Kinabalu, I had the same problem on the other eye... at one point both my eyes were infected. It started on my left eye on the way to Kota Kinabalu in the plane ! It then spread to my right eye. The nurse at Silam told me that I should be careful because it could re-infect to my left eye. It started to look and feel a lot better after using the eyedrops that they gave me.

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Created: 7 Dec 2001

Ecochallenge ( Sabah 2000 )

Arrival	Silam / Jungle Ops	Repeater Stations	The Competitors	Helicopter	Jungle Around Us	The Village

Preparations at the Magellan Hotel
( Kota Kinabalu ) . . .


All the Ecochallenge teams gathered together at the Magellan Hotel in anticipation of the race, which was due to start on 20th August.

During our stay at Kota Kinabalu, we were staying at the most extravagant hotel - as pictured on the right. It is huge! It has 3 swimming pools, and takes us an hour to walk around the perimeter.

The radio communications team had to arrive a few days before the start of the race because we had to hand out over 2,000 pieces of radio equipment. We had problems getting the necessary approvals for helicopters so I ended up having to hand out most of the equipment whilst Glen and Paul sorted out the issue of the helicopters. We had to get all the equipment and our team to Silam before the the race started.



Glen and Paul checking all the equipment and re-programming some of the radios.



Behind me are all the radio equipment, ready to be handed out. I am standing here waiting for the competitors to arrive as I have to sign out the equipment as I give them out.

We had to improvise a lot of the furniture, using old crates to set up tables.





After the race, Glen and I decided to make most of the luxury and just veg... aaahhh... bliss!














Created: 7 Dec 2001

Ecochallenge ( Sabah 2000 )

Arrival	Silam / Jungle Ops	Repeater Stations	The Competitors	Helicopter	Jungle Around Us	The Village

Ecochallenge in 2000 was held on the east coast of Borneo, in the jungles of Sabah. It was an extreme race where the competitors taking part have to endure 10 days of running through the jungles; kayaking and swimming many kilometres offshore; and mountain-biking for 150km on dirt roads. All in all, the fastest competitors travelled 600km in a space of just over 5 days!

I had the privilege of being there, being the developer of software that was used by the radio communications team. I also helped out with the setting up of all equipment and made many trips to the repeater stations.

Being in the jungles of Sabah, let alone part of the Ecochallenge preparations, has proved to be a challenge and an experience worth remembering, and hope to be part of any future Ecochallenge events.

As shown in the map, the red trails are where most of the competitors either ran or walked. The purple trail was the kayaking/canoeing leg. The orange trail was the mountain-bike leg and the blue trail was where the competitors had to swim with all their equipment.

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Created: 7 Dec 2001

On this particular Saturday, I drove to Terrigal to see the Mexican Chilli Festival... it was excellent. I shot two rolls of film up there. Some of these pictures have turned out beautifully!

A couple of my Mexican friends were doing the entertainment there. Victor is very good at playing the mexican harp. His wife, Shiraz, is an excellent dancer.

I took a series of shots in colour and a series in black & white. I shall first show you the ones in colour and then in b&w, as the b&w ones are very artistic!







Victor plays the harp like a dream!

I was once at Lance's place - Lance was helping Victor record his music onto CD. The harp does not look like your ordinary orchestral harp. It was ornate and somehow different. It is was a very beautiful instrument.









As you can see, these women are gorgeous! Something about silk stockings, I think...

Shiraz is the photo in the middle. She did quite a few numbers, and this was one of them. All 3 girls danced in a colourful combination!









Here you see Shiraz dancing in a duet.

I have seen her do this dance at a similiar concert May last year, here in Lindfield. Victor and a couple of guitarists provided accompaniment to the dancing. Shiraz moved so fast that at times, all you could see was this colourful wave of skirts.

Her partner's costume reminded me of the costumes the Spanish toledos wore (except without the cape).









As you can see, Shiraz danced a number of dances that day.

It takes a lot of energy to do those dances!

Religion is an integral part of Laos society where the majority are Budhists.



The monks dressed in orange and red ropes are still visible everywhere and it is largely seen as becoming a novice (junior monk) is seen as an opportunity to get an education and support your family if you come from a poor rural area.


 


The high influx of tourists, especially to Luang Prabang is therefore a bit of a win-win situation for everyone. The tourists support the temples in the area by paying their admission fees to visit and on both my trips I have found that the monks are keen to have a conversation as it is a way of practicing their language skills.

In Luang Prabang the monks walk in procession every morning to collect rice from worshipper along the roads. Before sunrise there are hundreds of monks walking the streets in every direction. There is an equal horde of tourists trying to take photos of these monks and equally tourists handing out (sometimes dubious) rice to them.



There are posters around the city encouraging being there and seeing the monks as well as providing some guidelines such as keeping a certain distance, not using flash photography and if you hand out rice then where to get it from. Most of it common sense really, so it was sad to see how some would be blocking the paths and sticking their camera phones with flashes into the monks faces.





Sacha and I went there a couple of mornings, but because of the time of the year everything was dark and because the monks move quite fast through the streets it was a challenge getting good shots.



One afternoon we walked past a temple and a group of monks were in progress of cutting down a large tree and afterwards trimming off the branches. They were going to use some of the tree trunk for traditional drums and the rest for ornamental purposes inside the temple.







In the late afternoons you would hear them chanting in the small rooms of meditations, chanting and prayer. These are often smaller places of worship and not part of the main temples which are used for more ceremonial purposes.
One evening I heard such chanting and went to investigate and found these monks. Definitely one of my favourite moments in Luang Prabang.



A common assumption and misconception is that the monks live by an ancient code with a simple life, so it is quite interesting to see that even they have adopted modern technology with smart phones and cameras.

The locals are still relying on motorbikes to get around. They are far cheaper and more convenient in the towns. It is even possible to fit an entire family onto a single motorbike.







Younger kids and high schoolers ride their push bikes for transport.



Although Aiden and the other kids definitely preferred the motor bikes.



Nothing too flash for weddings - a normal new car will suffice. If you notice the sign on the door, then I am not sure if the bride was expecting to come home to 'Meat & Sausage'.



There are also some vintage cars around which have survived since colonial times - like this 1952 Citroen.

On the last day in Luang Prabang we went to the local ten pin bowling alley.

We had heard and read that this is the place where things are happening in Laos. When we got there the place was totally deserted apart from a few staff members.

We did play bowling and it is a bit surreal to play by ourselves in this fairly modern centre in Laos.



They didn't have any support rails for the kids, but Aiden especially did really well and the kids managed to beat Kim on points.

Just outside Luang Prabang there is this amazing waterfall cascading down a limestone creek.

We decided to get up early to go a take photos, so that we could be there early before all the crowds arrived.





















At the entrance to the park there is also a Bear rehabilitation centre. They rescue bears from captivity and keep them until it is safe to release them back into the wild (if ever). The bears have a big area and seem to love climbing and sleep in the hammocks provided.

What I especially remember from my last trip to Laos was the kids. One of my most cherished photos is one of two little girls holding a bouquet of flowers that I took 20 years ago (it is on this blog if you look for it through the search function).

The children are still there. They are still very shy, dirty and smiling.











They make up their own games such as these kids at a school playing marbles with tamarind seeds.







These kids were playing a game where the kid under the table had to poke the feet of the kids above the table.



And some things never change, kids teasing each other.





The girls in the school yard 'hang out'.



Visiting a local school was great for our kids to get a glimpse of how other kids live.







Along the road we stopped and a family was outside with the mother breastfeeding her son in their outdoor living room. This is where everything happened such as the cooking, washing, feeding etc.





The chicken were running around freely



Here is a rare shot that Kim took with my camera in it.



It is a very family oriented life they live

Our kids had a blast of a time in Laos. They loved each other company (for the most part) and sometime looked like real little travellers.








They were respectful at the temples and even offered a prayer.





At other times they behaved like animals and should be lock away in a cage.





But for the most part they liked exploring things that us adults wouldn't see such as this crater from a crash landed U.F.O.

For getting around the towns in Laos we mainly used Tuk-Tuks. These are small motorbike powered minibuses and the experience can be very mixed. Most of them are generally good, but some have bad brakes have a plume of smelly two stroke engine smoke trailing behind them. We could easily fit our two families into one and I'd joke that there would even be room for another couple of adults.



The kids loved the tuk-tuks and have the fresh air blowing in their hair while riding.



The only downside is that you'd never quite know what the fare would be until you started bargaining and from town to town the fares seemed to be very different. Even though I believe I am reasonable proficient at bargaining, I'm still confident that we paid more that the locals would be paying for the same trips.











For the longer trips we would catch either local buses (mini vans) or in some instances it was worthwhile us hiring a private bus as we were enough people to fill it.

From Vang Vieng to Luang Prabang we hired a private van taking us across the mountain pass at Kasi. Last time I went through here it was in an open bus and at the pass it was raining and really cold. This time round we had a beautiful clear day with a great view of the valley below from the top.





The week before they had a lot of rain and a landslide had taken out large parts of the last section of road (I read in the local newspaper a few days earlier that the road was closed). Our little van was struggling getting enough grip and our driver had to reverse to get enough of a run-up in the next attempt to make it through the steep and muddy section.

The larger trucks were really struggling getting through.

The morning markets are interesting. This is where the locals still go to buy their fresh produce and all kinds of specialties are being sold here. It would be easy to go here and get the ingredients for some really delicious food.

There are also some unusual things that we don't see in our western kitchens. such as:

Dried Squids:



Fresh fish - of cause, but this have sharp teeth.


A protein and herb table that would make most chefs (and diners) salivate:






The Chillies in Lao are more hot than in Thailand - We loved the heat.


A pig:


River crabs:


Beetles:


Dried rats:




Caterpillar - these are yummi when fried:


Frogs:

River snails:


Dried squid, shrimps and fish:

They still manufacture silk they way they used to. It was interesting for the kids to see the process from small caterpillar eggs that hatch to worms to the production of the silk itself.






I had always wondered where the colour blue (Indigo) came from. I knew it used to come from a seashell, but I was fairly certain that this wouldn't be the case here. It turns out that they use a special leaf from a plant that when mixed with water and left fermenting/oxidising turns into a blue dye.





They also use plants for most of the other colours.





After they spin the thread they use traditional weaves to make it into pieces of garment. These days the silk garments are fairly expensive - hundreds of dollars, but it used to be really cheap.

During the dry season the people of Luang Prabang builds traditional bamboo bridges across the smaller river. This saves them a lot of time (and cost) to cross directly into the centre of town rather than a long detour to the other larger bridges.

It also earns them a small income to charge foreigners a small fee to cross the bridges.

This year we celebrated Christmas eve with the boys.

5 days before Christmas I still hadn't taken our annual family photo even though I had the concepts loosely worked out in my head.

I knew that I wanted to do one in the kitchen and one evening when Kim decided she wanted to experiment with cooking brownies I decided to set it up and talked her through the concept and what I wanted her and the kids to do.
It worked out better than expected.



Kim also wanted one of us unpacking gifts.

This one was a lot harder to set up as the light was critical.




The last family photo we did was a simple one taken in the morning at Maroubra beach.

In one of the shops at Eastgardens I found a wall full of these inspirational notes for 2015.

A couple of days ago the kids were playing in the park at Kims dads place while a big storm was approaching.

The light was beautiful so I couldn't resist snapping a couple of photos with my phone.

Kim has never learned to ride a bike. One day at the park she borrowed Kaylas bike and gave it a try.

She did pretty good considering that she's never done it before.

Here is some quick snaps of some public artwork that I find really cool.

This artwork I found in the Macquarie centre.







It is thousands of plastic balls suspended from the ceiling.

And this grafitti is from Redfern...I wish all grafitti was this well done.

One day we went with the kids to the opera house to experience a play called "The tiger who came to tea" which is based on a childrens book of the same title.

We had borrowed the book week before and read it to the kids so they were very excited and the play was really good fun and well made.

One of the sad events of the year was the attack on the Lindt cafe in Sydney where a lone gunman took the patrons as hostages. He was eventually shot by the police after killing two patrons.



All of Sydney laid flowers in front of the cafe as Martins place.

A couple of weeks ago we went to Daydream island in the Whitsunday islands at great barrier reef.

This was a great opportunity to check out some of the natural beauties...





...such as Whitehaven beach.











We spent a lot of time playing at the pool and at the beach.





The resort has a massive inland lagoon with lots of stingrays and sharks that the kids loved.






Aiden and Lucas were allowed to touch some of them including this live shark.



and stingrays and star fish.










And on the island there were lots of kangaroos.



A beautiful place.





And I did have time to do a bit of creative shooting.





Eventually it was time to say goodbye to the island with a vulcan salute.

In early November I did another open studio day. This time a mini day with less models, hair and makeup and studio setups.

As usual it was good practice and fun to work with the various models. I think I did get some great photos and there were a lot of lessons learned that can be done better next time.


Model: Charlotte de Lucey


Model: Jessica Garcia


Model: Tanika de Alwis


Model: Britney Williams


Model: Tanika de Alwis

Compared to the other times I was doing a lot more natural light photography this time and some of it in nasty and not very flattering direct sunlight. I think I still managed to get some very usable results out of it.


Model: Nikki Doan


Model: Nikki Doan


Model: Amy Hill



The hardest thing for me is still the communication with the models and the creation of a vision that is different when you are on a fixed set.


Model: Jessica Garcia


Model: Jessica Garcia

This Sunday we took the ferry to Manly.



It is a beautiful trip past the opera house and the boys were very excited being on a boat.














At Manly we went down to the beach. It was a calm day so the boys had a lot of fun at the edge of the water.










After that Kim did some shopping, we had some fish'n'chips and we also had an ice cream.

Today the Rockstar (Andy) and the Prong went climbing at Berowra. The news media had gotten the hint of the occasion and the paparazzi were there in full force taking photos.



The bureau had told us that it was going to be a cool day, but it turned out to be rather hot for Berowra (29 degrees) and around lunch time the face was pretty much in the sun...so it was skin cancer territory.

We started out by me leading on an easy(iere) climb called "The Wall Thing 18" ...very pleasant climb with a fairly reachy finish. We then did (I led) the "Boundary Rider 19" which was equally pleasant with an extremely long reach to the anchor and the first time I went for it I missed the hold on top (I had no idea where to aim) and peeled off giving myself a rockstar manicure in the process (This is when you feel off all your skin on your hands to the point where it starts bleeding).

We then did "Mental Fatigue 18" and by this time the face was getting hit by the sun and warming up. The sun was in our eyes and it was hard to see where to go. Last time May did this climb she peeled off half way up. This time there was a significant amount of blood stains on one of the holds despite it being a fairly simple and straightforward climb with good protection.

We started getting hot now and the Paparazzi had left so we decided that we didn't have to show off any longer and decided to do a direct variant to "Mental Fatigue" (sopposedly grade 20) on Toprope...very pleasant but would not have been very good on lead as the first bolt was up very high.

The last climb of the day was "Palm Sunday 21" this was the highlight of the day even though we did it on top rope. Next time I go to Berowra and have a good day then I'll definitely come back to this one and try and lead it.


Editors note: It turns out that the paparazzi weren't taking photos of the Rockstar and Prong. The reason why they were there was because Paris Hilton was there showing off her latest outdoor collection...seriously...who gives a sh..!

Saturday morning we drove out to the Blue mountains to spend the day there climbing (Unfortunately Andy couldn't go on an overnight trip).

When we got up there it was cold, covered in clouds and drizzling. We decided to have a coffee and breakfast to check if it would clear up...and fortunately it did.

We were planning to go to Shipley, but after studying the guide we decided to go to Bardens Lookout instead.



It was completely dry and it turned out to be a day with a perfect temperature and we did some really nice and varied climbs (I would tell you the climbs but someone stole/took my guide book during the day). We started on a grade 16 (Karinya I think) for warmup, and then moved to a very pleasant grade 18 (Jolly Good Fellow). I then had a go at a grade 20 (Dr Do Little) with a very reachy and balancy move up the top which almost made me fall off (Andy had a hard time on this move).



We then did a grade 19 (Little Triggers) and by this time my strength was gone so I only just managed to lead it (almost came off clipping the top anchor as I was drained). The climbs are fairly long at Bardens Lookout and I don't have a lot of endurance because the climbs in the gyms are too short.

Phil had a go at a grade 21 (Hang on to Yourself) and was really struggling on it and came off 4-6 times one of which was captured on video and once he came off upside down. Eventually he got through it and I toptoped and cleaned it (With a lot of grunt and swearing).

Download video of Andy Climbing 1
Download video of Andy Climbing 2
Download video of Andy being Lowered
Download video of Phil Falling

As tradition dictates we played golf with Sasha on new years day. And he had booked a time at Brighton Golf Club (Moorebank) at a civilised hour (1.30pm).

Kim and I hadn't played for about 10 months as we had been too busy with all the other things in 2008 (see the rest of the blog postings).



I think we played a fairly decent game considering the time since we'd last played but both Kim and I were fairly tired after the 18 holes. It was a hot day with temperatures in the mid thirties and the course was fairly hot...so we drank lots of water as we went.

Every year both Kim and I have been in the Sydney harbour area to watch the fireworks on New Years Eve.



But this year we decided to have a quiet new years eve just the two of us with a visit to the movies and then a nice dinner at home.



We did however watch the fireworks from our balcony at midnight and it looked just as spectacular as previous years (I borrowed the photo above from another site).

Between Christmas and New year we drove with Kims family up to Smiths Lake (300km North of Sydney). We rented a house on the lake up there.

We hired a tinny (small aluminium boat) a couple of days and went fishing and managed to catch a lot of breams (a lot too small to keep).





Kims dad loves fishing and he quickly found out that in the morning and evening the fish were at the shore just outside the house.

In the evening we cooked nice dinners and BBQ's and the cookaburras came to the balcony around dinner time to check if there were leftovers. We had a bit of fun with them as you can see.



In the evenings we played Blackjack (Kim and I cleaned up) and had nice food and wine.



Chong (The husband of Kims sister) showed his more feminine side.



The rest of the time we spent at the beach playing in the waves and playing with Kims sisters kids.

Christmas day was celebrated with Kims family at her sisters house.

A lot of people were there and everyone had been asked to bring some food. Kim had cooked Red Duck Curry the day before while I was preparing the Christmas Eve dinner.



Again...lots of food, playing table tennis, jumping the trampoline and all the kids got to open their presents.

Christmas even was celebrated in the traditional Danish way in the evening of the 24th December.

Kim and I had invited some friends over to out new house and prepared the traditional roast duck, ris-a-la-mande and large tiger prawns for entrees.



It was a nice evening and we didn't finish until well after midnight and all of us were really full by the time we finished dinner. There was a couple of kid and after dinner they got to open their Christmas presents.

Every year on Kims dads birthday we celebrate with the family. Every couple brings a couple of dishes of food and we all share it.

On our honeymoon in Bali I really wanted to do this scuba dive that was recommended to me by my friend Andy. It is this old wreck of a US cargo ship (USS liberty) that was torpedoed by the japanese in 1942 and then beached to save the men and the cargo.



The wreck has since slided back into deeper water (during a volcanic eruption in 1962) and it now in 5 to 27 meters of water just off the coast.



I did two dives on the wreck while Kim was snorkeling in the surface on top of the wreck and it is without a doubt the most amazing scuba diving experience I've had. The ship is huge and you can swim through the cargo hulls and there is an amazing variety of fish and corals on the wreck.

I saw a 1.5 meter barracuda, a 1cm tall seahorse, a garden of eels and a great variety of other fish including a large school of travelly.



I had my personal dive master for the day and I got him to take some photos and some video with his camera while we were diving. On the first dive we went all the way around the wreck (max depth 27 meters) and on the second we went through the wreck itself.



Kim had a really good experience as well and really enjoyed the 30 degree warm water and managed to get her bum burnt while snorkeling for several hours.

I think we'll both go back there if we get the chance.

Click here to download video of me feeding fish

Click here to download video of me diving

Our Honeymoon day after the wedding went to Bali in Indonesia. We did have some hesitation going there considering that the Bali Bombers had been executed the week before and that the Australian government discouraged all travel there.

The plane up there (and back) was only 25% full so plenty of space to get a good sleep.

We stayed in Nusa Dua Westin....a nice hotel although the rooms are a bit small.

On the first day we slept in and later in the day drove to Kuta to have a look around and do some shopping. Later in the evening we went to Jimbaran Bay for dinner. This is a whole beach where all the restaurants have put their tables and chairs out onto the beach itself...very romantic but quite expensive compared to local restaurants.





The second day we hired a car to drive us to Ubud in the hills, Monkey Forest and later in the day down to a small place called Tanah Lot. Especially the last one was very nice around sunset and we ended up not getting back to our hotel until 8.30 in the evening much to the dismay of our driver.





Dinner took place near the hotel and we found that the value of the food/prices was much better here.

A couple of days later we went for another drive (In between we went to Tulamben...see posting below) up to some beautiful lakes and temples up on the north of the island as well as rice paddies and we had a really nice trip despite driving with the most grumpy driver.







Time was running out and Kim felt that she hadn't spent enough time shopping so the last two days were spent shopping and sitting at the pool and on the beach.



One evening we booked a really nice restaurant called "The Living Room" in Seminyak and I booked the whole outdoor area (cost a fortune) just so that we could have a romantic evening in the garden just the two of us with personal waiting staff.





The week was way too short and we never got to do everything we wanted to do so I have a feel we will be coming back in the future.