Silly Billies Return to Roam

The annual World Adventure Race Champs - this time in Western Tasmania - had come around again and always seems to excite and frustrate those of us who follow these mad races. Because I am writing this well after the event it is impossible for the outcome not to flavour my post - those of you who followed the race online will understand. We weren't really able to follow the race anyway, there was a strict "no spectators allowed" rule. So Viv, Karin and I decided to follow the general route of the course by car and enjoy some great camping and picnicking along the way, catching up with the race if and when possible. I would have liked to post during the race, but this part of Tasmania is very sparsely populated and so there was virtually no internet access. The race started in Burnie at 9am, as the teams paddled out into the sparkling sea on inflatable kayaks and round the beautiful coastline to Penguin. On Burnie beach minutes before the race start We saw the racers

We felt right at home flying into Tasmania, over green pastures and small sunny towns. After landing in Launceston airport we rented a hire car and made a beeline for the local bakery and a delicious vegie pie! Such a delicious pastry and so unattainable in the rest of the world (-: We took our car into the Walls of Jerusalem National Park, which backs on to the well known Cradle Mountain NP. We had two days to fill in before the rest of Chris's adventure racing team arrived - so we decided to head into the bush for an overnight tramp. The fog was hanging very low and it felt like rain was on its way as we wound up through the bush, passing through Eucalyptus forest filled with amazing tree ferns! Chris amongst the ferns We made our way up to Chapter lake on a very small and forgotten track. The lake is beautiful, densely crowded by thick bush with delicate falls cascading off a small rock outcrop. We had a little feast to cook up - including some good old corn-on-the-cob. A ve

Arriving in China We flew to Beijing Airport and then took a domestic flight with Air China to Kunming. On the flight we were served this very strange looking fruit – white with little black spots like a slice of dalmatian dog! We chuckled about the weird and wonderful things ahead of us (we later found out this peculiar and tasty thing was a dragon-fruit). After a long taxi ride in rush hour traffic through Kunming we caught a rumpty bus to take us a further 4.5 hours to Dali where Matt and Lara live. Due to a series of unfortunate events they were currently at the hospital in Hong Kong, but we knew our friend Joe would be at their place. Sunset from Dali Communicating with drivers was pretty challenging, but we did finally find ourselves in Dali old town around midnight. Lugging our gear up the hill we located Matt and Lara's on the university campus with the help of Joe's detailed instructions and it was a great thing to yell out “Joe” and see a familiar face pop out