Travel - Australia.Sydney.NSW.VIC.Melbourne Aug 30 - Sep 8 2013 - Part 2

Long overdue post. I have been procrastinated week after weeks. Blame it on the ever busy schedule for weekends, tiring weekdays. Oh well, life goes on, that's for sure. 

Highlight of my trip to the South island been the 4D3N road trips. Stayed over 3 small towns - Batesman Bay, Merimbula and Lake Entrance, all along the coastal beach. 

(Click to enlarge) Coastal road trip guide between Sydney-Melbourne

Day 1 - Towards Batemans Bay

• We picked up our RAV4 from Budget Car Rental. The selection of car rental service between various international company wasn't too easy. Pricing varies a lot and pre-work vs. walk-in pricing do varies. Glad that we stayed nearby KingsCross in Sydney, that helped me in surveying some companies, i.e. Avis, etc. The deal was good from Budget, with $500+ over 4Ds journey with waived one-way charge, as we will be dropping the car in Melbourne. Excess (insurance) deal was rather confusing for a first timer like me, glad Budget staff was real good in explaining the differences to me. 
• Journey begun right after we loaded out luggage from SpringLodge hotel, we headed to Wollongong. Stopped by a town for quick bruch, plus shopping.
• Bald Hill - One of my favorite scenic spot, where I spotted the Google earth car. I thought our appearance will be captured.. 

Bald Hill Scenic stop

• Kiama - Accompanied with blue skies made the combination well. The lookout tower was lovely. But it wasn't the good timing to witness its famous blow hole, as tide was low.

Kiama

Blow Hole - where strong tide could blast from here

• Kiama's Amaki Cafe - Absolutely best cafe and coffee we every visited throughout the journey. This cafe was highly recommended. Nice ambience especially dining outside its spring weather. I love the lemon meringue & scones accompanied with fresh strawberries jam and whipped butter.

Amaki Cafe 

Tea time

• Our journey continued after coffee break. Honestly, driving 200+KM a day can be hectic, while driving with its road condition in the evening will not be easy, it's because of the Kangaroos! They may jump out to the road when it turn dark.
• Jervis Bay - Before heading to our destination of the day. We stopped for a quick beach walk at Jervis Bay. Supposed the whitest sand beach. Sunset was stunning, though there was no great objects to fulfill the angle of picture.

Sunset @ Jervis Bay

• Batemans Bay - Arrived close to 8PM. We checked ourselves in Bay Waters Holiday Resort. With a quick recommendation from the front desk, we rushed ourselves to dinner, after dropping our  luggage in the room. It was supposed to be a 2 bedroom apartment, weirdly, it was another king-sized bed which is placed in the hall. Thank god we only stay over for a quick night.

Batemans Bay - Bay Waters Holiday Resort

• Starfish Deli - As we requested for oysters, this place was recommended. We left not many choice that night, while most shops are closed by 8pm. We settled with a house red wine, branded with fish bone. It was not bad. Accompanied with some fresh oysters, salad and pizza for the night. We were all tired for the 1st day road journey.

 Day 2 - Towards Merimbula

• Main highlight of the day, is island trip with Dolphin & Whale watching. We hit to Narooma's i- center right after our breakfast at the hotel. Unfortunately, i-center was not open until 9am. We waited and enquire for the boat trip to Montigue island. Price AUD$110/pax. While the boat will not be ready until 1PM, we have to tweak our plan slightly.. made a de-tour
• Tilba - A place famous of its Cheese factory ABC Cheese. Yum...

ABC Tilba Cheese

Selection of Cheese

• Montague Island - Absolutely scenic small island, which is worth visiting if you like nature, especially sea and its cold water sea creatures. Dolphins were everywhere greeting us, while we were on the boat trip to the island. Seals were dancing and sun bathing along the island. I almost missed the Whale! Dear, we knew it was Whale season and I managed to catch only the tail... Chilling spring weather on the boat was superb, I love those temperature.

View from top of lighthouse @ Montague Island    

Approaching Montague Island 

Seal @ Montague

• Wallaga Lake - We were pleased with the amount of facilities and public toilets made available, and most importantly well maintained in NSW. This lake is rather huge, with Princess Highway cutting  through its way. 

Wallaga Lake

• Tathra Wharf - Along the way towards our final destination of the day, we stopped by this wharf for sunset watch and bite on our cheese packed from Tilba. Missing the sips of red wine, else its gonna be a perfect evening sunset watch.

Tathra Wharf

• Merimbula - We settled down with a very nice 2 rooms apartment. Living hall was well equipped, it was when I started on with my laundry over the few days trip. Seashells Aparment, thumbs up! I enjoyed preparing breakfast on my own. Grocery shopping at WoolWorths has always been exciting. Milk was fresh, butter was cheap, hotdogs were heaps!  Our dinner that night wasn't pleased, the fish and chips were not impressive and rather expansive. Nothing to shout. Thank god we ordered 3 similar dishes to share. 

Fish n Chips @ Merimbula

Seashells Apartment @ Merimbula

Simple Breakie

Lovely Apartment

Day 3 - Towards Lake Entrance

• After checking out from my favorite apartment, we get ourselves prepared for a longer journey towards Lake Entrance. The morning was rather easy, since we had a home cooked breakie prepared. *love it*
• Whale hunting was the 1st morning activity. We went along the coastal way, toward Eden. i-counter told us one of their staff just saw the whales earlier in the morning. We then quickly head ourselves to that direction described. Unfortunately, no luck.

Whale Hunting

• Well, no whale means we would need to visit the Whale Museum instead. Sigh. Such a disappointment. But the little tourist spot was super clean and beautiful. NSW has been so much organize in their tourism industry.

Eden Whale Museum

• Late along the way, our journey went a little boring. Where we had to cut into some forest area, no more coastal sea view. The symmetric of trees along the forest made us feel tired.
• 90 Miles Beach,  Lake Entrance - We entered into Gippsland, in the state of Victoria by the evening. Beautiful sunset along the beach. Water was cold, but some girls still get wet with their wet suits, super gals!

90 Miles Beach, Lake Entrance

• The Esplanade Resort & Spa - Excellent 2 bedroom resort apartment. Absolutely love it. Facilities are well occupied, nice kitchen as well as dining area. We got bored with eating out, in another way there was not much choice left in a small town like this. Restaurants are mainly the same and pricy. 
• Again, we hit to Woolsworth for shopping. We had 3 pizzas with special price, wines, cheese, pie, strawberries plus some other foods. Heated the pizzas with oven, dinner made perfect with sparkling wines! Awesome... well worth for the equipped kitchen.



Dinner @ Esplanade Resort Apartment

Day 4 - Towards Melbourne

• Final leg! We were then heading to the cold cold southern land of Victoria. I had the chance to drive for 200+km. Love it and enjoyed it very much. Driving in OZ has been just so easy. 
• Traralgon - Our stop of the day where we had our brunch. The Three Little Birds cafe is a local famous cafe. Fell in love with the egg benedict, made me feel like learning poached egg (in fact I succeeded!!). Besides meal, we had a quick shopping at Targets store around. 

Three little birds cafe @ Traralgon

Egg Benedict

• Walhalla - Uphill place, too bad snow has gone. Weather was rather cooling, as compared to the coastal sunny side. Perhaps mr weather brought us rain when we were heading to Melbourne.

Unique i-Center & souvenir shop @ Walhalla

• Wait a minute... How can we miss a winery visit during a OZ tour? I demanded at least one. (honestly, we have a few to hit in the plan.. but, we don't have enough time). 
• Narkojee Winery - Was the one and only winery we visited. It's a boutique winery with home grown grapes. Fell in love with its sparking red wine. Bought one home :)

Narkojee Winery @ Gippsland

• Drive to the city of Melbourne was a little havoc, as we almost miss out 6pm car drop time. Traffic was bad during rush hour, plus an accident over the highway. Thank god with Google map and gps. We avoided the freeway reported with an accident over the radio that evening. Instead, we paid a few tolls. It was open-ended toll, and be mindful, we passed through at least 6! Guess what was the total bill (auto charged to my credit card registered with my car rental), barely AUD$15. Besides, we'd need to fill full tank of petrol before returning the car, else I will get charged with higher price petrol (into my credit card)

• Trust me, all of us were panic.. what if we couldn't get to the car rental shop on time. None of us are familiar with the streets, with the guide of gps, we saw our hotel and was glad it is just behind the car rental shop along Franklin Street. Let's drop our luggage instead of dragging it back from the shop... and I drove the car to Budget rental at around 550PM! Phew... we made it on time

Alright mate! That's all for the coastal drive trip report. Stay on for Part 3, for my brief stay in Melbourne. Good nite :)

Travel - Australia.Sydney.NSW.VIC.Melbourne Aug 30 - Sep 8 2013 - Part 1

A long procrastinated blog. Guess I soon acted like a moody writer. I have this long procrastinated posts (to be exact, it will be in series), yet I am aways waiting for my *mood* to appear. Soon when I am about to take on my 1st sentence, get to know I am about to leave the house for another function in 1 hour time.... it has been a hot Sunday afternoon, which I had been lazying around.

Back to my travel diary. First, I would thank Air Asia for their affordable air fare made all to the South island. It captured many of my 1st timer's venture along the trip. My very 1st visit to Sydney (I have done several business visits to Melbourne), this complete my ever curiosity on the never ending Sydney-Melbourne likings and debate, always reminded me of the Penang-KL's version debate over food rating. I will summarize my own opinion on the very last episode of this travel diary.

We traveled in a group of 4, 2 couples to be exact. That made some company to chit chat with throughout the journey. We get to try more varieties of foods too. Our flight made it just nice, reaching out destination around 7AM local time. Sorry to those who didn't had good sleep over the flight, as our itinerary will be packed over the days, but we still get to sleep late in the morning, because it was a free & easy DIY trip!

As much as we been greeted by the airport custom, I was almost caught red-handed when I realized I had some small packets of instant coffee in my luggage. [it is most important to not bringing any food items, be it processed or not into the land of Australia, else better to declare than found] But I was being lucky that morning, when the officer first asked am I traveling alone... I answered no, and showed him my partner. Officer said "OK, go lane 8". We were nervous! And the long trail of lane 8 was totally empty, which later led us out to the main door. Oh goodness, thank god there were no detention happened. At the airport, we then grab ourselves 2 prepaid SIM card with data plan, approached by an Chinese for Lebara Mobile. Plan was alright, but I find it too little for a 200Mb data especially when I need to teetered from partner's tab. It can be difficult to get its value top-up, because its not the common telco. Anyway, paying just $10 for the entire trip wasn't too bad.

DAY1 - Upon checking in at Springfield Lodge, our 3D2N lodging place. Immediately we started a over 10KM journey. Touring some tourist spots with just "bus no.11". I love their park, with just 16 degree Celsius made perfect weather to walk around. Unfortunately, I was not on a right attire (more like suitable for Melbourne, sigh).

Lovely weather

Sydney CBD

Other than walking, we took the boat (another common form of public transport) from Circular Quay to Manly beach. Unfortunately, time weren't enough for us, late evening on a winter is rather not colorful. It's a place full of water sports activity, pretty like to shop for some beach attire, too bad... Upon returning to CBD, when it was almost 7pm. I remember I grabbed a pork gourmet burger and it was superbly good!

Manly Wharf

Manly Beach

DAY 2 - Day tour with Anderson Tour to Blue Mountain. A great family business tour agency, worth every penny for their excellent service. Lovely tour guide, cum bus driver, cum food arranger made us feel comfortable. Time management is the key in respect to everyone's time.

Blue Mountain with 3 sisters. The main attractions. The trip includes visit to aboriginal cultural place. I recalled most was a place called Leura town with the famous Josophan Fine Chocolate. It was my 1st time buying fine chocolate from the boutique! lovely fine little choco, I recalled the mango chili favor! One thing that, it's ever affordable to pay for such fresh and fine choco there.

Blue Mountains

Aboriginal Cultural Center

Leura Town

I recalled our comfortable lunch with fish & chips, fresh broccoli, apple crumble and coffee... yummms! We then had a walk at the cliff tops and valley. Wind was cold, we had a few great shots at the cliff and rocks! Heard there was a missing man who didn't made his way back couple of weeks ago... 

Guide cliff top walk

Last excitement was at the Featherdale Wildlife park. I saw the Kaola and Kangaroos! To some extend, there are other interesting creatures, like the naughty Tasmania, bats, etc. Lastly, we were dropped at Sydney Olympic Park to catch a boat back to Circular Quay. 

Kangaroo

Featherdale Wildlife Park

Oww! Kaola!

Sydney Olympic Park

DAY 3 - Another free & easy walking day. I need to get my rented car sorted out. Great thing is almost all the car rental shops are just along the same street behind our lodge, the Kings Cross Road (Hmm... you will wonder if you know this place well) Something like our Jalan Alor :).

Other than that, our morning was spend walking towards another section of CBD. More towards the Chinatown area. 1st stop was St. Mary's Cathedral. Took some lovely shots there too, it was sunny that morning. Lunch at Chinatown was not bad, we hit to the food court instead. All sorts of Chinese cuisine, from HK roast pork to all kinds of noodle. It was not real great, but I would call it soothing.

St. Mary's Cathedral

Queen Victoria Building (QVB), a very old and classical building. Been refurbished a few times and maintained well, especially the washroom. It looks as if I have turned the clock to 18th century. An uncle who brief us on the building on our 1st day when we were looked lost, told us that some brief history about this building. Apparently, it was refurbished and owned by a Malaysian, to be exact Ipoh sometime ago. That brought me into curiosity to check out its Wiki. I managed to spot the huge classical clock in the building (its a high end shopping mall today), it stated the word Ipoh Ltd. in there. Impressed!

QVB's clock, by Ipoh Ltd

The rest of the day was to meet up a friend at The Rock area. In order to waste some time, and to save some energy, we waiting for a free public bus somewhere near Chinatown. It was a great experience waiting, observing the locals as well as its impressive and hostile bus service, they are such immobility friendly. Saw bus driver will walk down a bus, pull out the steps from the bus, and finally pushed a wheeled chair uncle up into the bus.

The Rock, a place with many bar & dining place. I was impressed by the Jack Mundey place. A person who was such into environmentalist. Today, they planted pots with green vegetables and kumquats to remember him.

Kumquat plant with vegetables 

Jack Mundey Place

 We waited and waited... for the night that comes!

Evening @ The Rock

Our dinner cum meeting up a friend, who brought us to this German bierhaus with pork knuckle and German beer. Awesome dinner made us extremely full. This made us had a walk to Darling harbor, which we need to give a miss, for other visit...

Beer with Pork Knuckle

Life in OZ can't complete without the shopping for wine. We bumped into liquor shop at least once a day. I was always busy checking their price, versus what we have back home. I'm always attracted by the pricing, unfortunately I am not a good drinker.

All kinds of Sparkling Wines

Good nite peep! Time for me to rest my arms... till the next part of my travel diary. :)

Love my Life - The Power of Hugs

* Opss... this had been a prolonged blog hidden under my other drafts. Until recently a visiting friend from abroad mentioned about hugs! *

Come the end of 2013, its another reflection moment. Everyone has gone through a lot over the year, but not everyone is able to stop, think, observe and reflect on own self. Setting a clear goal to move forward for a better 2014. Love my Life - It's going to be my goal for a better tomorrow, spiritually all through my inner soul.

I kept observing others over the years, telling myself perhaps its a good step to document down my own thoughts. It may help others to "think" the same way, even if it's not a perfect way.

Being brought up in a conservative Chinese family made me feel odd in giving hug to any one else, except own partner and family members. With the effect of close buddies leaving from my routine life, gatherings with a few long time neighborhood friends, made our bonding gone closer, thus it is very unusual for us to not having warm arm hugs each time we meet and apart. My observation went on with my recent overseas business trip to the West. A face to face meet with those we have been working for the past 1 year, it was such an auto move for us to hug when we meet, and we had a stronger hug when we are about to be parted. The feeling was warm, some with the pad at the back of our shoulder. It was funny, there was a public character I have been following through FB, asked this before "why would someone pad your back in a hard way when they hug?". Haa... it sounded funny, but there might be a reason. Same goes when someone shakes your hand, he/she would have done it  stronger than others. I didn't follow the answer though, but obviously the meaning of body language could trace its meaning somewhere.

Read this from another article of mind body green - Top 10 Reasons to give more hugs. From emotional to bio-chemistry and phycology, obviously the effect is great in bonding. It reduces one's stress, by padding one shoulder could give more strength to one another. Don't you think so?

There was another article I stumbled upon couple of days ago, it was about close mind & body controls. It mentioned how our mind could control upon our painful body section. Article was about - Emotion Pain Chart. Check out the chart and more write up from the article. How I could relate this all together with hugs, certainly it made some sense out of it. An arm hug gives us joyous experience in life, and of course with full of moral and emotional support, feeling loved too.

Long story short, my take out from this chart, it's useful to remind my own self to have a positive mindset in order to look forward for a painless body. Our mind could control every part of our body, and of course regular exercise with determination helps.

Excerpt from http://fractalenlightenment.com

Love your body, love your mind, love your soul. Have a healthy year 2014 ahead. Cheers and have a big hugs to all my lovely friends and readers out there. Love ya all! :)

Weekend Trip - Sitiawan & Sekinchan, Nov 9-10 2013

This wasn't a plan trip. Was rather a "family matters" trip. Journey was fruitful, except was a little tired in completing the ~500KM journey over 2 days. 

Our Journey

What's there in Sitiawan? The Tua Pek Kong temple at Pasir Panjang can consider as a tourist spot. Goggle map coordinate: 4.165637,100.690384. I have been to this place 3 times. One could set prayers outdoor, which parents and I do prefer than those saturated fumed indoor types. 

Tua Pek Kong temple

Set Prayers for well being

In fact, the real discover of the trip was some local made vermicelli a.k.a meehun, made out from our home grown Sekinchan paddy. It was the same Paddy processing factory - PLS in which I posted here last time. In fact, we got this vermicelli from another stall just outside the factory.

Getting into the paddy village

Cloudy sky

Paddy field

Rice vermicelli

End result - vermicelli in Chic soup

Enjoy every single weekend, be it out of town or self at home :)
Guess its time for me to prepare for the long winded write for my major trip report for 2013... I have been procrastinating.

Weekend Trip - Sungai Lembing, Oct 11-12, 2013

Click to enlarge

My weekends had been almost fully occupied over ever since my business trip last August. It was tiring and yet fulfilled with expedition moments. Sungai Lembing, a location 45min drive off Kuantan, isn't a place I am not familiar. I have been there 2 times just this year. My 1st successful hike was 15 years ago, while my 2nd attempt couple of years back was a failure.

The place is best for dawn, hike up when it is still dark around 4:30am. By 6:00am, you may find the 1st sunlight of the day. Indeed to be a fulfilling moment if you like nature. The hillview surrounded by thick evaporated midst, as if you are on top of the cloud. Very peaceful moment up hill... if and only if its quiet. In most case, it's usually packed with human being :)

Our trip started from Kota Kemuning - Karak (breakfast) - Cherating (Turtle Sanctuary & Lunch) - Kemaman (Satar) - Sg Lembing (Stay, Dinner, Hike, Breakfast) - Bukit Tinggi (Lunch) - Home.

1) Cherating Turtle Sanctuary - visit their website for detail information. It was free admission at that time, but we could contribute to its center. I place worth for children education, while they could learn and love nature.

Cherating Turtle Sanctuary

2) Lunch @ Restaurant Duyong - GPS- 4°7'35"N 103°23'50"E. Less than 5 min drive from turtle sanctuary. In fact I had visited this place last July, on my way to my Redang dive trip. I won't expect much from the restaurant, as it is very angmo friendly, in a way pricey. Dishes mainly Thai-styled.

Restaurant Duyong facing the sea

The menu

3) Snacks @ Warung Aziz Satar, Kemaman - Our initial plan was to stop for famous Hai Peng Kopi. Unfortunately, it was closed that Saturday. We brought the other friends to try out the local street foods of east coast - Satar, Otak-otak, Keropok Lekor, etc.. in fact, this was my first time here. I prefer small hut sized eating place, but only this can fit 15 of us.

East Coast's otak-otak

Satar - Baked fish paste

Fried Keropok lekor

4) Stay @ Sg Lembing Hillview Cottage (林明山頂小息館) - Newly opened cottage stay, they ran with promotion price earlier. Check out their FB website for more information and booking details. We had a room for 10pax (each with proper bed) and another room of 5pax. Bed was comfortable for the stay, except we need to queue up for the rest room, especially for the large room.

The surrounding environment was great, very nature like, except for the milky river. Believe the surrounding place is undergoing some development, or other bed & breakfast could be mushrooming the pathetically small town. Hope its not.

In fact, this house was built for bird nest raring business (top most floor). The ground and 1st floor are occupied with rooms. Ground floor with ample open aired space is meant for tenant activities, gathering. Occupied with board games, darts, ping pong table, etc.. and free flow of coffee/tea with plain bread too. My only dissatisfaction behind was on their loud music played over the evening (perhaps its activity/bonding time) and its disorganize of foods area. If only they can keep their stuff in a more organized manner, it will perfectly well enough for a 4 star B&B.

Google GPS coordinate - 3.922362,103.028119. The coordinate given at the FB page was incorrect at that time, hope they have had it corrected by now.

River view

Activity area

1st floor activity area

Ample hall for gathering

5) Dinner @ Restaurant Hoover - It's located at the town center, walking distance from the market and hike start point. Not much choice for a typical Chinese home cooked meal like this. Though, it was a great meal, served with ginger wine chicken, accompanied with the rainy night. Even though we had booked our tables for 7:00pm, heavy downpour caused the previous customer didn't want to leave the restaurant and table. We were forced to wait at the corridor.. poor me had my whole back all wet, though I had an umbrella with me. Was glad we had 4KG of roasted pork a.k.a. siew york packed, in which the auntie brought over to the restaurant, just before the heavy downpour. We managed to snack on it... yum!! super fresh, you may ask the homestay owner to order if you wish.

Siew York!

Dinner

Rice wine ginger chicken

6) The morning hike @ Sg Lembing Hilltop - In fact, I have nothing much to describe for the place. I don't mind the hike this time round as it was all dark. I couldn't give myself any excuse that I cannot make it, no other choice except to keep climbing the stairs and follow others who're in front of me, cause the queue behind me was long. Yes, the trail up usually pack, as everyone wish to take the picture of the 1st sun rise, with its heavenly view.

The hike ain't difficult,  yet it should be easy with a distance of just 1KM up the hill. Not too sure about the elevation, as some steps are steep, especially the early ones.

Sunrise

Love the sun & nature

Mushrooming up there!

7) Breakfast @ Sg Lembing market - Its famous for their homemade noodle, its special and all these while I have been liking this type of homemade noodle. Not the dry type, but its rather fresh from the factory. Their specialities - tomato sauce noodle, in fact its a made up from spaghetti bolognese.

Other must eat breakfast would be Yong Tau Foo + clear soup or curry Sg Lembing noodle. My favourite too!

Tomato sauce noodle

There's another Malay stall selling Nasi Dagang and perhaps Nasi Lemak just next to the market. It seems nice too. I have yet to try. Save it for the next visit, I am considering in visiting the rainbow waterwall, which is another must-visit place for Sg Lembing. That journey will be a little more challenging, with an early ride with open air 4WD towards the waterfall. Till then.

8) On our journey back, we stopped by Bukit Tinggi for lunch. At that moment, everyone was stunned and blank, as the journey has been really tiring, especially for the drivers. Hope all did enjoy the short trip.