Binna Burra

Rainforest hike: check.
Seeing Australian animals in the wild: check.
Not being bit by snakes in Australia: check.
Seeing a snake: check.
Still not being bit: check.

How did you spend your weekend?  Did you get to see an Antarctic Beech tree?  I didn't think so.  Eat your heart out, Rich...  While not a Jeffrey, Ponderosa, or elusive Foxtail Pine of the Sierra, just the name alone to me says that this tree would have been rare.  Unfortunately not.  It was everywhere.  The rainforest was FULL of them.  Its ancient heritage is from Antarctica apparently.
So, yes, my first day off in this beautiful country I went 110km from Brisbane to the Lamington National Park into the Binna Burra rainforest.  One item off my bucket list: walk in a rainforest.  A couple of minutes into the hike there is a small little station that you can sanitize your shoes.  That is a clever little idea not to bring nasty pathogens into the ecosystem.
     After duly sanitizing my shoes, I head up the trail.  We don't have a ton of time for the trails and can't make it to a waterfall that is 11km away, but that would be a great destination.  It would be a negative hike too and not having my boots for the hike would have made it a bit uncomfortable. FYI: negative hikes mean your destination is lower than your start so going back to your car is all uphill.
     All told, we walked a nice loop with a side trail to an interesting rock formation and then went to look at some what they called "caves" which are really just rock outcroppings that made my hands itch to climb.  The views were nothing short of stunning.  To borrow words from another author: "There are moments that will live with a person for ever."  I have pictures, but as most who have been to majestic places have been, they really pale in comparison to being there.
     Certainly one of the highlights will be seeing a pademelon.  Unfortunately, the lighting and the timing of the shot I was able to get only afforded me a blurry shot of vegetation.  Still a cool experience.  The other wildlife experience was marginally benign.  The snake was merely sunning itself and slither away harmlessly.  I did see about half a myriad of butterflies and many, many very small lizards.  It seems they either don't grow very big in the rainforest there or get eaten once they are a bit bigger.
     Lunch at a bunch of rock formations they named caves was a very cool way to end my outing in the rainforest.  The view out over the valley was incredible and quite worth my first day off in this country.  My loose plan for my weekend next week is to have Friday off for a Football (Rugby) game (Broncos versus Cowboys) which should be a good rivalry game I'm told.
     I got home in time to catch the last vestiges of the setting sun.  This is my view for the next few weeks at night:

Nearby is a very cool pedestrian bridge to south bank that I decided to see if I could meander and find.  No worries about finding it at all.  The views are spectacular, but better pictures will be posted when I have them.  Apparently there was a smudge on the lens for all those shots.
 

A Quick Way Down

So, a typical Monday: dealing with secure data issues, high profile problems and then the email pops in the inbox with a simple subject "Australia" and an almost even equally brief body: "Call me when you get a chance."  Hmmm.  Intrigued to say the least, I sign out of the secure area I'm in as I get no phone communication capabilities when working what I was doing at the time and extricate myself from the NORAD-esque concrete structure and go see if there's daylight still in the real world and get cell coverage again outside.

My cell phone call was, to say the least, very informative.  "They" (I will use "they" to protect the innocent or whomever I deem I want thank you very much).  Anyway, this pronoun of "they" want me in Australia and apparently want me on that plane now, now, now.  Why am I still here?  Umm... Can... can I do laundry first before I go please?  Yes, apparently I can.  So with a little conversation I'm given some details I've asked politely for.  "Where in Australia?" being one of them as I believe it is a large CONTINENT with most of it being classified as outback.

A day later I have all I need, the exactly where (sort of), the exactly when (sort of), and how long (sort of).  I book flights, apply for visas (oh right, Kari's joining me down under at some point), and a service apartment for the month-ish that I should be there.  Apparently last minute flights half-way around the world book up quickly and I wasn't able to get anything until Sunday afternoon.  Actually there were flights earlier, but since they'll let me fly business and the only thing available was economy, I put my foot down and said "there wasn't anything reasonable available flying out on Friday or Saturday."  They said, "OK, come out Sunday and we'll see you on the ground here on Tuesday morning."  Crikey.  So, while you all get to enjoy gaining your hour of Daylight Saving Time, I get to enjoy my losing a day of sitting in an airplane.  Well, it will be in business class, paid by work so I probably will garner no sympathy from anyone here.

As for how long I will be gone and where?  That's the real question. You see, I *should* be in Brisbane until April 10, but that all depends on how things go over the next few weeks there and what the team sees when part of it goes to Canberra on Tuesday.  I could be going down there for some time.  In short, I could be in one place for a month or in several over several weeks.

I do plan to update this space with my sojourns but I have been told that what I am going into is a veritable maelstrom of crap meeting a deadline of monumental stature so my free time may be very limited resource.  However, I have told them that I am flying my wife down to meet me when the work is finalized to enjoy a vacation and they're all fine with that.  I just need to find out when "work is finalized" and where I will be so I can fly and meet Kari somewhere down under.

An edit from the airport:
Just a word of caution to my friends and family who may be reading this: if you'd like to avoid any issues checking in for an international flight to Australia, a) make sure you have completed the visa process online like I did and b) however, not like I did, make sure that the line for your "given name" on the form is indeed your first AND  middle names. This way your granted visa matches your passport and your check-in process will be more of a breeze.  It was not a huge deal here at the commuter terminal at 3:15pm on a Sunday and a matter of a simple code a supervisor needed to supply ("SXA", consider yourselves empowered) and I was on to TSA check. No Pre-check for me this time (why did I get Global Entry anyway?).  No matter, I was the only one in line and they were all joking with me and each other. Very lax.  Much better start than my September 18 trip to Japan if you all may recall started with it being canceled as I was 20 minutes from the airport.

Well, thus starts my meteoric wait for a commuter plane to LAX kicking off a stellar layover until my 10:30pm flight to Sydney. At least I will be able to get into the United Club and be a bit more comfortable there.