Author archive
21 June 2013
Exploring Dili As I hadn’t really explored Dili yet, I started in the morning with a walk to the nearby sights. First up was the Cathedral officially opened by Pope John Paul. In Indonesian, “Pope” appears to be “Sri Paus” which in Malay kinda suggests a beautiful whale? Next up was the Presidential Palace, donated […]
20 June 2013
Backside of Jesus I had heard that diving in this new country was good because during the Indonesian occupation, people didn’t have access to explosives so they couldn’t fish with dynamite. So much of the coral is unspoilt. So I wasn’t disappointed with the coral on my first (and only) dive in Dili at the […]
20 June 2013
Today, I dived the Backside of Jesus (that’s the name of the divesite behind Cristo Rei). The coral was good supposedly due to restrictions on explosives during the Indonesian occupation, meaning that people couldn’t fish with dynamite. But there wasn’t much fish of interest. You can read about my dive here. I’ve been too spoilt […]
19 June 2013
Flying to Dili I had set the alarm for just before 0600 and I managed to down a muesli and coffee before the shuttle picked me up for the airport. I got there before check-in had opened and I waited for a while. The check-in process was slow as some people had lots of luggage. […]
18 June 2013
I took the bus to East Point Reserve this morning; it required a bit of a walk. The morning that started off cool was warming up. After a while, it was scorching in the sun. I decided that I didn’t need to walk around the reserve too much; it would have been better as a […]
17 June 2013
I was collected from the hostel around 0730 for my excursion to feed crocs and thereafter to Litchfield National Park. First stop was a petrol station where they collected the cashed and vouchers, or had the credit card slips signed. There was also enough time for some smokes (yes, at a petrol station). Crocs on […]
16 June 2013
Being Sunday, town was quiet. I decided to go to the Aviation Heritage Centre by bus. It was a nice surprise when I could take the free bus headed to the V8 races. The centre had one of two B52s on display outside of the USA. It was big and impressive. They tried to market […]
15 June 2013
Flying to Darwin I chose a good day to leave. The weather had dropped to 6 degC overnight and rain was forecast. I had been lucky with cool weather but scorching in the sun at times. I checked out from the hotel and waited for the complimentary airport shuttle. As it arrived, most people rushed […]
14 June 2013
My dilemma Today’s arrangements had been a toss-up between walking the Valley of the Winds or climbing Uluru. The English doctor I met yesterday had been convincing me to do the latter as she is a mountain junkie. I’m far from being a mountain junkie and I feel that Kinabalu at 4095m is a big-enough […]
13 June 2013
As I retired at 9pm last night, I woke naturally at 0300 (six hours usually does it for me). I dozed till 0540 when I started to get ready for my 0615 departure to Uluru.I had a nice brekkie of a cheap clearance croissant (heated in a pan), muesli and three-in-one coffee from the supermarket. […]