adventure Keyword
Greyhound
It is 2am. I’ve been on the Greyhound bus for 7 hours. The sound of the road peeling away under the wheels and the gentle rocking of a cabin should be lulling my senses into a blissful stupor but they bring no respite. I watch through my window into the clinging blackness and try to ignore the poster child schizophrenic that chose to sit next to me. He keeps yelling and yelping, one of three personalities at any time bursting forth onto the bus. Sometimes it’s the retarded boy, others the racist Southerner and when ever a sign came into resolve enough to be read: the educated Harvard scholar. If I am lucky I can catch them arguing between each other as their vessel jerked and roiled about in his seat. Their arguing continues through the night and punctuates the darkness. Around 5am he quietens a little, yet keeps snorting and fizzing and fidgeting. His odour has driven a few of my fellow passengers to move up into shared seats, foregoing their comfortable reclining positions for relief from the smell. I breathe through my teeth and count the hours, the minutes, the seconds until the next stop.
With the break of dawn comes an oasis of a gas station where we stop for food and drinks. My seat partner rises from his perch and lumbers down the isle, carrying with him his most valuable worldly possessions, 15 recycling containers. I stretch and am greeted by numerous faces that smile at me reassuringly and words of praise and amazement at my resolve. Only 13 more hours of travel face me but they lay stretched along the i5 through the new day. The terrain changes in hue and composition as we roll ceaselessly onwards into the morning. California opens before the bus welcoming me into it’s warm bosom. Mesas rise along the highway and farmland covered in dry grass surround the coach as we travel south in the morning sun.
While my strange friend has moved on he leaves a sinister stink he in his stead, standing sentry in the cabin like a ghost. I push my chin deeper into my chest and watch the white lines weave and duck back and forth along the asphalt. We’ll be coming up to San Francisco soon according to the woodsman that sits in the seat in front of me. I look out of my window and drink up the scenery. I gulp it up in an attempt to satisfy my excitement. A new city awaits just on the other side of the bay. A new city, with new sights, new people and hopefully new adventures.
Niagara Falls
Toronto has given me some fantastic weather, and the day that I jumped on the tour bus to Niagara Falls proved to be one of the best of the week. The blue skies, warm sun and cool breeze providing a backdrop to one of natures greatest attractions.
Waking early and scoffing down some pancakes I got amped for the trip. In the middle of a coffee I met Mark, the tour guide from Salty Bear Tours who rounded up 14 of us and piled us into a van.
It’s around a two hour drive around the lake to the Niagara region, during which Mark regaled us with stories of Canada, took questions and in general entertained us to our first stop : a winery.
As I had quite a big night just before the tour I wasn’t entirely keen on a wine tasting, but I did get the opportunity to try “Ice Wine” something we don’t get in Australia. It was extremely sweet, so not something I would normally enjoy, but a small taste was fine.
Moving on we headed into Niagara on the Lake for lunch and to stretch our legs. This town was pretty cool, nicely presented and utterly touristy. I grabbed some chicken tenders from the supermarket and sat in the park enjoying the sunshine.
At this point we were itching to see the falls, but Mark had a couple more spots to show us. First a lookout onto Niagara River, and then to the Whirlpool which was very impressive and BEGGED to be swum in.
Finally we hit Niagara Falls. I have to say I was amazed. While the falls themselves aren’t really that high only falling around 50 or so metres they throw around 168,000 cubic meters of water over their edge each every minute. The falls are actually made up of two separate major falls, the American Falls and the Horseshoe Falls but the majority of the water goes over the Horseshoe Falls. Probably the most striking thing for me though was the sound. It wasn’t nearly as loud as I thought, even when practically underneath the falls on the “Maid of the Mist”.
“Maid of the Mist” is a tour which travels up the river, past the American Falls and then right up under the Horseshoe Falls. Battling with our ponchos was fun enough but looking up and seeing yourself surrounded by the falls was too much for words. I managed to grab a couple of shots without my camera busting due to water damage. Best 14 bucks I have ever spent.
I could have spent all day at the falls, but the tour was coming to a close. With huge smiles on our faces we headed back to the hostel. I had a great time that day, made new friends and got some great photos. I also marked off another of my “tourist” jobs for my adventure. “Niagara Falls” has a massive tick in my book.
Oh, see if you can spot the “No Smoking” sign under the waterfall. Classic comedy.
Seilpark
While I didn’t have the money to indulge in any of the more EXTREME adventures on offer in Interlarken, I did sign up to the Seilpark. SeilPark is a high ropes course, set 20 to 30 meters in the trees of a swiss national park.
Being a fairly confident climber from doing heaps of indoor, I had no problems with the course, my rope handling and climbing skills coming back to me quickly. The equipment was top notch so I could put full faith into the harness, often leaning way out over drops that others found vertigo inducing. Probably the most enjoyable of the courses was the flying fox course which consisted almost entirely of zip lines, but the park offered paths of varying degrees of difficulty so everyone could get involved.
I went with Owen and Coops (a driver and guide from Busabout) and Renee one of my mates from the bus. Renee struggled through, but did a great job considering she was terrified of heights.
At one point in the day I was asked by the staff to pretend to have an accident on the highest course, let myself drop and they would send one of the new girls to save me as training. I accepted and then proceeded to hang suspended for around half an hour while the staff got her stuff together, hooked me up to a pulley and lowered me down. As I ran off as soon as I hit the bottom she wasn’t too impressed and when I went up to congratulate and thank her she ripped me to pieces saying that “some people just can’t make it and need help getting down, its nothing to be ashamed off”. I couldn’t explain to her so I let it slide. It wasn’t until later that she met up with her boss that she came over and apologised. All good fun!
A great, cheap day out in Interlarken, well worth checking out.
Arthur’s Seat
Yesterday, I climbed Arthur’s Seat. The Seat is a portion of an exinct volcano that rises above Edinburgh. Interestingly, as was pointed out multiple times during the walking, Arthur’s Seat has nothing to do with King Arthur, and the name is believed to be a bastardisation of Archer’s Seat, which seems much more logical. There is a heap of history associated with the Seat both geographically and socially, but I’ll let you find out more yourselves. While normally quite an easy climb especially when done in certain directions, I set myself the challenge of climbing the road less travelled. The climb took me from one side of the Seat, along a gentle slope onto the windward side, where I scaled the steepest part of the hill which didn’t require climbing equipment.
The view from Arthur’s Seat is amazing allowing you to see Edinburgh proper and the surrounding regions. It was quite beautiful. At the top I was able to drop my whole body weight against the wind that howled around me and remain standing. Rain was pelting in sideways, so hard that I felt that my face was being cut with glass with each drop. It was great. I spent about 3 hours casually strolling the Seat, taking in the sights and generally being proud of myself.
Soaking wet I sauntered back into the hostel at about 4pm. I got changed, hung up my gear and retired for a brief nanna’s. The Edinburgh night was calling me and I had to be ready.