Mad rush through the US

Brisbane -Los Angeles - Santa Rosa - San Fransisco - Washington - Bowie - Philadelphia - New York. Yep another mad rush through the United states. The flights are getting easier as I am now able to sleep before the plane even takes off.

Have a look at Washington and New York. I got lucky with the weather. Washington is underestimated. A really great city, and all the Smithsonian museums are free. New York is a mad town, everyone is in a hurry, you can really feel the emphasis the Americans put on security these days. 

The Philippines

With Robin gone I had to make my way to the Philippines. Following good practice 2 colleagues and myself paid for a 2 day trip to a resort for 11 other colleagues. Transfers, food, lots and lots of drinkies and even a jet ski cost us each 300 dollar. That is 900 dollar for a weekend away for 14 people. Beautiful country, nice people. I wanna go back.

Flying a plane

Today we are going to fly a plane. Emmanuelle, again with a big smirk tells me that yet another adventure is about to happen. I'm going to pilot a plane. The thing about flying is that it's super simple. Flaps out, steer, add power, wait till 65mph, pull up, flaps in. 
That's it. 
It's when things go wrong that it gets complicated.

Paddle boarding

Paddle boarding, the art of standing on a board and paddle. It's great on the sea to catch a wave. Well, we're doing it on the Brisbane river with torrential rains. Even our guide has never been on the river with this much rain. It adds to the adventure.

We push each other in the water which is fun. There are big bull sharks in the Brisbane river so once in the water you better get out as soon as possible. Rob's mind is definitely concentrated on absolutely minimizing "water time". Before his body is submerged, his is already climbing back on his board.

Beautiful day on the water

Today we're diving with a charter 1770 undersea adventures, all organised by Emma. Their ship the Narcosis hasn't been out for quite a while as tourism in Australia has taken a hit. Our friend Don is working in Gladstone and only very intermediately goes out the reef. Emmanuelle has been nagging and pleading Don to go out and he agreed. The incredible thing is that the Day is superb. Don tells me that I have a great wife being able to pick such a great day 3 months out.

But our luck doesn't end there. The mantas are here and they are hungry. The full moon was just 3 days ago, so there is a lot of coral spawn in the water... Something that the Mantas eat. They come really close. Not only that, but we see a lot of pelagic fish, big sharks, large schools of fish, Eagle rays, sting rays everything. After the first dive Emmanuelle and I decide not to dive a second time as the snorkelling is as good as it gets.

Sky diving!

"Okay boys, we're here". Says Emmanuelle with a malicious smile. "You will be skydiving today." she says with an evil grin. These few words are enough to send shivers down my and Robin's spine.
The funny thing about skydiving is that you have to put all of your trust in guys who do everything not to be trustworthy. (They say they are hung-over and folded their chutes while drunk.)
In the plane Robin and I crack jokes, more to hide our nerves than anything else when suddenly. WHHHSSSHH... the door opens. I can see Rob's face turn blank and I'd bet a million that he can't remember what we were talking about. As Rob exits the plane I can see his slight worry turn to terror as he realises he was just hurled out of a perfectly good plane.


My turn.


As I fall down I am very much aware of everything around me. It is fantastic, what a rush! When the parachute opens I expect a jerk... which doesn't happen... Instead we are violently turning and still falling... another twist, this time clockwise. Bang! another twist and still falling. It feels like minutes and when I hear the dive master yell "WHOA!" I know something is wrong.
After a quick: "are we cool?" - "yeah Bro" - "Are you sure mate?" - "All good bro" we fly the chute left and right, couple of twists aaandd. Land! Whoa! I can see this addictive.
It turns out there was a twist in the parachute and in the Lines.

The amazing Birthday (3)

Under false pretexts I was lured into a pub. When all of a sudden. "SURPRIIISE". After recovering from skipping a few beats, I see so many friends. It was truly great to see how many friends Emmanuelle and I had made in just 4 short years. Emmanuelle, the mastermind of it all, filmed yet another of my reactions. After drinking 5 litres of beer and toasting with everyone (yep 5 full litres) the adrenaline was still pumping and I had a hard time getting to sleep.

The amazing Birthday (2)

When we were much younger blokes, Robin and I fantasised that it would be very cool to go on a big-game fishing trip. Well, this is my birthday and there is nothing that I can't have - yay - and so Emmanuelle organised not one, but two fishing trips to the marlin banks. We caught plenty of fish and even a large Wahoo. It were 2 stunning days with good friends, lots of beer and even dolphins visiting us.

The amazing Birthday.(1)

Despite my sincerest efforts, including pleading the powers that be, my thirty-something is turning into the big four-Oh! My wife had made it clear that the birthday week would be unsurpassable. She had been organising for weeks, and I was starting to wonder what the hell was going to happen.
Well: here's surprise one!
My best mate Robin, whom I hadn't seen in quite a while was invited by my wife, without my knowledge to Australia.
She took a sizable risk having a bloke emerge from my bathroom on a day where she was at home. (a jealous and near-sighted man might have shot first and ask questions later.
Watch my reaction as I see my best mate for the first time in over 4 years.

Dolphin swim (good weather)

Today we wake up to a perfect day, no wind, lots of sun. So, what do you do: you book a babysitter for Kieran and book another trip to go swim with the dolphins. This time we hit the Jackpot, yesterday was good today is off the scale!

The dolphins jump around us, over us, they stay with us for the whole time we're out there. The freezing water doesn't bother us any more and Emma and I love every moment. Check out the videos and pictures! Emma had three dolphins jumping around her and over her in synchronicity.

A little later we land in a soup of krill, There must be 10 in every litre of water around us. I can see why whales get so big. One gulp of this soup would yield many kilos of high protein krill.

Towards the end of the swim Emma gets approached by some sort of albatross, her intrepidity to try to touch the bird is harshly punished: the bird bites her pretty hard on the hand. Someone yells: Emma is probably the only person in the world who can piss off an albatross.

Fishing off the Gold Coast

As a farewell gift, my employer offered me a fishing trip. Since everyone who wanted to come is usually on a plane, we had to wait 2 months to find a spot in everyone's calendar. Turns out this day was probably the worst day to go after pelagic fish. Too much rain had cooled the water so the marlin stayed waaaay off shore and there was too much food in the water to get any fish really interested. I did catch a nice Dolphin fish though. 

Problem: I can't end the season like this so I have to go again. :)

Baby Seals

We drive up the coast from Kaikoura and find a small pool, about 10m by 10m full of... drum roll... baby seals. Their cuddliness is off the chart and they seem to be perpetually playing.

Emma, Kieran and myself jump back as one emerges from the water and comes running at us. Turns out all it wanted is to say "Hi, I'm a baby seal, whatchadoin?" After a quick look around we conclude mum is out fishing so: I take Kieran on my arm and get closer to the seals, one comes out of the water and I manage to touch it. Kieran loves it. Further up there is a waterfall with a good dozen of other baby seals. Very cool indeed. We can only hope not too many people will discover this place before the authorities have to close it down, or make it payable.

Awesome.

Merry Christmas

Yeah, that's a real Koala. 

Just check those claws, Emma is smiling but I could hear her say "iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii"

Merry Christmas everyone.

Dolphin swim (bad weather)

Emma booked our swim with dolphins months back and now, the day is here. Yay. Unfortunately there's a 35 knot wind that could blow off the hair of a man's head. So swimming is recommended only for 'very experienced swimmers'. Right, well we didn't come across the Tasman sea to miss an opportunity like this, but still that sea looks pretty angry.
After a rollercoaster ride on the boat to get to the dolphins we find ourselves in the water, a soothing 12C warm. It feels like a million needles are viciously being jabbed in my head. But that doesn't matter: there they are: the dolphins. We swim and play with them. They swim circles around us as we dive down. They jump out of the water they are beautiful.
We even see 2 mums bringing their babies to show the babies some very slow moving creatures.

Town of 1770

For Emma's birthday I had decided to take her to Town of 1770. And, as usual - as I organise the trip -  the 'bad-weather-bassie' curse strikes again. This time it even scares the captain of our boat that took us to the Great Barrier Reef.

Yep: Emma took the auxiliary to go fishing off the reef when black clouds rolled in from the coast. The Captain starts running - If there's one thing that gets me nervous it's running captains -  and we see all the birds fly back to the Island ready to hide for the storm that is about to be unleashed. Emma makes it back - barely -  with her soaked fishing party and crew scramble to tie down all the gear. It only lasts for about 45 minutes, but man, this was a vicious storm. We enjoy some Canoeing, the millions of soldier crabs and the good weather. 

Ekka Day

Scaring the living crap out of our son has become some sort of a sport. Nothing mean or bad, really, but taking him out of his comfort zone and having him experience as many things as possible is actually turning out to be fun. >:o)

So how about a ride where the minimum age is 5?

U.S. Trip

Well, it was time to fly across the ditch again to the U.S. This time it was a new record: Brisbane --> Los Angeles --> Santa Rosa --> Detroit --> Syracuse --> Washington Dulles --> Los Angeles --> Brisbane. All of that in 10 days. I guess my new boss wanted to kick the tires and see if I would fall apart when given a challenge.

Well, I almost did: on the Syracuse --> Dulles leg of the trip the plane's landing gear came down,

1. With a thud  -- No worries
2. Went up again! -- Slightly worried
3. About 50 meters above the landing strip the Pilot floored it -- Lightly nervous
4. And we found ourselves circling 5000 foot up wondering what was going on. -- Nervous
5. After 40 minutes of testing flaps, throttle, landing gear, control surfaces etc. -- Slightly scared
6. The pilot reminded us that if we needed to review any safety measures our safety card was in the pocket of the seat in front of us. -- Scared
7. He added: We expect an uneventful landing and the stewardess looked like she'd just soiled herself -- Really Scared.
8. As the plane came down for the second attempt, the last few meters -- Scared the shit outta me!
9. And the plane landed with no problems. -- Cool bananas + poker face.