A note

I've just today noticed that the photo's I've been putting up from work don't upload with a link to the actual shot - just a thumbnail.

So, for those with some sort of Google reader action which gave you a post which doesn't exist, I've deleted the post until I can put it up properly. Wouldn't want to deny youse all the glory of the full size photos, hey ;)?

In the meantime, why I still like the man, even if some of the tosspots at the pink blog find him too spicy (I read one comment at LP that Beazley was better, FFS!)

Chao, por hoy.

Like he's riding on a motorbike...

...in the strongest winds.

So, I'm back from a pretty awesome weekend at the motogp on Phillip Island, during which I took almost a thousand photos, some of them even have bikes in them! I might post a few of them if we ever get the internet back at home, but for now, back to the trek.

The first one is the porters running past us with their 25 kilo packs.

The first camp site, Klaire looking for the dunnies. The porters would carry all the tents and stuff and have them set up by the time we got there. As well as the yellow bucket with beer and soft drink. No fridge – luckily it was so bloody cold the beer didn’t need one.

A shot of a mountain which loomed over us all day as we climbed “Dead Woman’s Pass. On the third day we started at an altitude of about 3000m. Over the next six hours we climbed up to 4200m. Tougher than I expected. Coca leaves worked a treat.

Looking back as we ascended. I can’t remember the name of the mountain.

Note Klaire, sans pack and bedroll, and sans sunny disposition, and lucky that was too. Not much oxygen, and it was cold so our heads were freezing making us dizzy.


Somewhere up there is the top.

And, just because I like mountains, a gratuitous photo of the mountain behind us again.

And we’re there. This was our group. We went with a company that is pretty small (Peru Treks) and they pay more/ treat their porters better. Our group had 16 people – some of the others had up to 40. Most were English (3 Londoners – all law students so they had a lot to chat to Klaire about – 2 from York, and 2 blokes from Northern England who talked like the Pikies from Snatch – when they’d had a few drinks I could understand less than I could Spanish). No Americans, which was good. There were other groups around, handing out little ribbons to the first one up, and woohooing like morons. One of the nicer Yanks I met turned out to be Canadian.


This was the highest point on the trek at 4,215m, and the wind came through the pass like freight train – actually, that’s a stupid analogy, freight trains are slow – more like a shinkansen. There was some scrambling of taking packs off and digging around for some warm clothes – it hadn’t felt that cold on the way up because we were stuffed – I think my sweaty shirt froze. We didn’t hang around that long as it was ridiculously cold.

That’s it, I had better do some work now.

More to come.

Chao.

Kick....

Push.

Nice one. The evil photo blocking server seems to be having a day off, and seeing how Optus still sucks (3 weeks now) I thought I might put some more shots up.

I did promise it would be Cusco, and I’ll get to that. First a couple of quickies:

A couple of locals kicking the footy on the reed islands. I did wonder who has to get the ball when it goes out of bounds, maybe they’re that good that it doesn’t?

Us on a wall on Taquile.

Finally we got to Cusco. Just in time to make the trek deadline after a slightly hellish 8 hour van ride. We did have a couple of days to look around. This was the courtyard of the little hotel we stayed at – Los Niños Dos. All the rooms are named after the orphans the profits go to – ours was Gladys.


A view of Cusco over the Plaza de Armas. Cusco was the first place we really started to encounter big tour groups, lots of Americans and Europeans. The square reflected that a bit, having heaps of people hassling you to buy various stuff.

An example of an Inca wall in Cusco using the ashlar technique. Apparently this meant it was a significant place – I assume this means a pub, or perhaps some sort of concert venue. This wall is almost a thousand years old – the Spanish, when they took over, tended to just build on top of the Inca foundations.

Then we got up and some ridiculous hour, got on a bus, and ended up at Kilometre 82 – the start of the Camino del Inca (Inca Trail) – 49 kms. At this point we were pretty chirpy and excited. Note K with her pack and bedroll, smiling and ready to go.

And note K, still with pack and bedroll, smile a little smaller, at one of the rest points on the first day. We had gone maybe 6 k’s at that point, and climbed a few hundred metres, I guess.

The first of the Inca sites – Llactapata . It was used mainly for agricultural production, apparently. The guide reckons the curves along the front deflect the flow of the river in flood so it didn’t wash the whole joint away. He also told us the Incas were Socialists. He was pretty cool.

Dammit, I had a whole lot more written, but the server's back to its tricks, so that’s it, I had better do some work now.

More to come.

Chao.

You say times are tough...

...we've got the best of both worlds here.

So, the question I had for today was – is Peter Garrett a sellout? I was beginning to agonise a bit over that, but I realise the simple answer is...no.

As much as a whole bunch of people are carping on at the moment about his acceptance of US bases, uranium mining, Gunns pulp mill acquiescence, etc, etc; at least he might shortly be in a position to actually do something about it.

Put your single issue ideology aside for a tic and think about it carefully – the ex-lead singer of the Oils as environment minister.

It gives me goosebumps.

I really believe that when Ruddy skips down the carpet at the victory speech Power and the Passion should be blaring out over the PA.

Or maybe “Been Away Too Long”

Have I been away too long
Have I been away too long
Have I been away too long
I just can't wait

I imagine completeness
No spin cycle deceit
Time and tide keep on rolling
Now the world’s at my feet

Of course King of the Mountain is the obvious choice – it reminds me of the rubbery figures ads on telly advertising an Oils tour when I was a kid – Hewson and Keating and I think Oaks – Keatings doll singing while Hewson’s looked sad and wobbly. Well, they were all wobbly I guess, but still.

Maybe not Mountains of Burma, though, given the lack of action on that one.

I was going to go from here to some more photos, but more often than not the work server blocks my ability to upload anything but text, so you might just have to wait until the net is back at home.

Hasta la semana proxima.

Chao.

Just a quick note...

October 4 headline roundup:


news.com.au:
CCTV pics of Lady Di.

Beer can bomb hoax.

Swim star’s daughter marries just before passing away.

Britney has visiting rights, and Dr Phil wants to help.

Ecstasy stash in potato head.

Home and Away breaches ‘G’ classification.


BBC News:
Australia bans African refugees


NY Times:
Australia bans African refugees.


Washington Post:
Australia bans African refugees.



I can’t decide if I’m happy or unhappy that most of the world won’t see news.com today.

Time for a beer.

There's klingons on the starboard bow..

..scrape them off, Jim.

Again, the internet is gone from our home. Never arrived actually. I’m on hold to Optus at the moment, trying to talk to that ridiculous voice system. So I’m scanning through some sites I look at occasionally.

Onlineopinion.com.au is an interesting case. Generally, for most of the political/ current issue type sites I read, the post serves mainly as a stimulus for robust discussion. As mentioned earlier, that normally doesn’t extend to news articles, but most blogs seem to attract enough reasonably intelligent commenters, whatever point they speak from, to get a good discussion going. That said, there are more than enough sycophantic love-in sites to go around, with hordes of regular commenters eager to jump to the defense of the poster should anyone new question their wisdom (I’m sure this isn’t unique to the more progressive side of politics – it’s just that the others seem to lack imagination and just end up at Ackerman or Bolt).

Back to OLO – it’s different. I find that I avoid reading the comments more and more on here. For every intelligent comment on OLO, there are five written by complete nutters WHO randomly CAPITALISE shit (incidentally, I think I might include that in my exploding cookie plan). I’ve thought about making comments in the past, but the nearest I got was a desire to pull someone up when they used the word “acronym” to describe an initialisation.

I really don’t have the energy. I recently heard it described as a blog by someone - it's not, but it does have some good articles.

And in a perverse reflection of Sherd’s weird fondness for science blogs, I have taken to reading a lot of economics blogs. There’s a few good Australian ones, like Quiggin and Club Troppo, and many more OS blogs. Because I am super intelligent I like to read them and then forget where they are because I assume I’ll remember the address.

Oh well. Here’s an example I was reading today. I’ve even added it to my bookmarks this time.

Now I have to write an essay. Photos later, perhaps.

Chao.