"It rains in the rain forest"

It was my last (and very busy) week in Australia and I was spending it around the Far North Queensland. The week was only halfway and after the trips around the waterfalls close to Cairns I headed up the coast! The plan was to make a loop around the rainforest covered area north of Cairns and the town of Port Douglas.

It was a warm winter morning when I hopped on the bus in Cairns. First I would head to a river to cruise down along the mangrove shores and spot some saltwater crocodiles. I was curious whether we would actually see any but sure enough, as if they were planted there, we spotted a couple big ones. Surprisingly even some small saltwater crocks were swimming around and some more safely hanging around close to their mothers. The smallest I saw was 4 weeks old, about 15 cm long little creature, just swimming along the shore. The boat captain said everybody loves the small ones ... especially the big fish: they love to eat them! Snif.. cuties.

Cairns - from one cascade to the other!

It was the end of May and one of those mornings again: an unreasonably early wake-up and off to catch a morning flight from Darwin to Cairns. I felt I had barely fallen asleep the whole night, thanks to the Darwin party people keeping everybody awake (well it was Saturday night so what could I expect). I was counting the days 'til I would be home again, in my own bed, enjoying the peace & quiet…

From one small city to another, I was making my way through the northern parts of Australia. Cairns is the biggest city on the northeast coast, in the middle of tropical nature and the Great Barrier Reef. The city doesn't really have a beach (very strange) but a nice promenade by the sea. This is the centre of most of what's happening in Cairns with big lawn areas, spaces & equipment for the sports enthusiasts and BBQ spots as well as a 4800m2 saltwater swimming lagoon. And a lovely place to go see the sunset!

Lagoon at the Promenade

Darwin - the outback capital

When I was planning my RTW trip I had been very curious about the Northern Australia and the outback so I had decided to add Darwin to my Australian itenerary. I arrived there after very exciting 10 days of dancing in Brisbane and the Gold Coast ... feeling very tired. The hot & humid air of Darwin was a nice change after the chilly nights of Queensland - where I had actually managed to develop a cold. So the first couple days in Darwin I just kicked back, enjoyed the heat and did pretty much nothing. By the third day I was feeling better, happily doing some sightseeing and tanning by the pool. Not bad!

Darwin is quite a small city.. a town really. It's the smallest state capital in Australia though it is clearly the biggest in its territory (Northern Territory). There's basically two main streets that run parallel to the shoreline - and that's it. You'll find plenty of restaurants, bars and shops like in any city; actually there is some quite nice Aboriginal art in some galleries and markets but most shops sell the standard souvenirs. Darwin has in fact a large Aborigine population and you'll notice that pretty easily when you get there. 

Northern Territory coat of arms

Zouk in Brisbane! And the story about how I got doudouleyd...

If you want to dance zouk in Australia Brisbane is the place to go. During my week in Brisbane I had lots of time to go check out the latin dance scene - obviously I focused on the zouk socials and classes since this was the zouk capital of this side of the world! There's something going on every night, either classes or parties; or both. If you're more interested in parties it's best to be in town for the weekend. There's also great latin and zouk congresses in Brisbane and the area - scroll to the bottom of the post (after the full listing of the weekly zouk classes & socials) for more info on the events!


Party time! Let's burnnnn the floor!!

I arrived to Brisbane on a Friday afternoon, just in time for my first party at Rio Rhythmics. On Fridays they have zouk party or a mixed latin night with zouk, salsa, bachata and samba. The week I was there it was the latter but they were playing mainly zouk (definitely my kind of a mixed night!). The studio is quite big but it does fill up. It wasn’t hard to find good zouk dancers and I had a very busy night on the dance floor!

The weekends are packed with parties for zouk dancers, there are commonly several options. It does vary depending on what week you’re there since all parties do not run every week. I was lucky to be there on Brazilian Soul Dance’s monthly Saturday night Zouk Fever. It doesn’t go on very late (7-11pm) but there are heaps of great dancers – and if you want to check out another party in the same night the early finish makes that possible. The studio feels even bigger than the one at Rio Rhythmics. I was on fire that night and practically had to hide in the bathroom to have a little break :D I did enjoy it a lot and my feet were shattered by the end of it. There was also a show that night by the Raw Connection West Coast Swing group. The WCS dancers stayed to watch the zouk social after their performance and many of them got bitten by the zouk bug, I taught a couple of eager guys the basics!

Sundays there are a couple options as well: Casablanca for salsa & zouk and some weeks Rio Rhythmics hosts a Brazil Beatz night (every 2nd Sunday of the month). I rested my first Sunday in Brisbane and went to check out the Casablanca’s salsa & zouk night on my second Sunday there. They have two dance floors with salsa & bachata on the main floor downstairs and zouk on the smaller space upstairs. I was running between both floors as that week there were special salsa guests (Vito and Stefania from Italy) and I wanted to catch their show and a few dances with the top salseros and bachateros as well. There weren't that many zouk dancers actually that night but had great dances, at one point I even shared one dance with four different zoukeros. Thanks boys for that!

On Mondays and Tuesdays there are no zouk socials at the moment but again on Wednesday there was another Casablanca party. That week it was held at Brazilian Touch in the Valley due to another booking at Casablanca. There were a little less people there than at the socials during the weekend - on Friday and Saturday I'd say there were up to 100 dancers or even more, Sunday around 60 and Wednesday around 40. But a good night nonetheless!

Thursdays you can take a little break from zouk: If you dance salsa the one place I would definitely recommend is Cloudland at 641 Ann Street in Fortitude Valley. Free entry and the night I was there even free mojitos (I'm not kidding!). The decor is very cool with a big dining area on two floors, a long bar, dance floor (with annoying surface unfortunately) - and live bands!

Cloudlands - coolest salsa club on my trip!

Bribane and the Sunshine Coast - beach and city life in Australia

I got to Brisbane after three chilled out days in Byron Bay. I had planned to stay a whole week in Brisbane to check out all the zouk dancing spots in town – it is the zouk capital of Australia after all! A dance friend of mine had offered me even a place to stay so I was all set for my dance week! But more about dancing in Brisbane in the next post :)

Brisbane is bit of less known big city in Australia – Sydney and Melbourne seem to get most tourists, as well as Perth on the west coast lately. But Brisbane is quite well located with lots of fast connections to the popular islands such as the Australian reef destinations Fraser Island and Whitsundays as well as Fiji, among others. It’s also in the pretty much half way on the travelers’ famous east coast route from Melbourne or Sydney to Cairns. I immediately liked the city when I strolled from the bus terminal to the river and boarded the City Cat ferry. The river snakes through the city, passing the skyscraper filled down town (Riverside terminal) and you get a good sense of how the place looks like.

Chilling out in Byron Bay

My plan after Sydney and Ayers Rock was to see some of the east coast of Australia between Sydney and Brisbane. But since I had spent some extra time dancing in Sydney and wanted spend some more time dancing in Brisbane as well there wasn’t a whole lot left. So it happened that Byron Bay was my one and only stop between the two big cities. I had asked around for the best places to visit on the coast and Byron kept coming up – frankly people had a hard time finding anything else to recommend which made my planning easier.

So I boarded my first Australian bus – and hopefully the last night bus. I can tell you it wasn’t like those first class buses I took in Central and South America. Luckily the bus wasn't full so I had a two seats to myself but still found it hard to come up with a position to sleep in. The 12 hours went quite fast anyway. It was nice to wake up after the uncomfortable sleep in the bus to see a stunning sunrise over one field in our stop-over. 

The big red rocks

Sorry my blog is ridiculously behind at the moment, I had major internet issues in the last month traveling in Northern Australia. Will try to get back on track this month!

The iconic image of Australia: Ayers Rock! I had booked flights to Ayers Rock already last November when I booked my RTW-ticket so I didn’t have to think about whether to include a visit to the rocks on my trip. It was one of the highlights of this trip that I had been waiting for. 

There’s a couple different sites there: firstly there's Uluru or Ayers Rock and secondly Kata Tjuta - they are two separate sites, two massive rock formations. They are both located in the same National Park area and they're both an easy 20-40 min drive from the small town of Yulara where most visitors are based (or I might say all since there are no other places to stay there). Both Uluru and Kata Tjuta were formed in the same time period and are the same colour but they have different geology - read more about that at the bottom of the post.

There’s also a third popular site there, Kings Canyon, but that’s a 3-hour drive from Yulara and I didn’t want to make my schedule too hectic so decided to skip that – at least there’s something more to see in case I come there again! 


Uluru

The main thing for me was the see Uluru. I really wanted to have enough time to see all of it so I didn’t join any of the day tours since primarily all of them would just drive around the rock for the most parts. I wanted to take my time so I just got a transfer there and back, leaving me however much time I wanted to walk around it. First I went to see the sunrise – there are separate sunrise and sunset viewing sites where hundreds (and probabaly thousands in high season) flock to see the rock change colours. It was very scenic and you could see the entire rock formation from there – which I would later see up close.

The different colors of Uluru at sunrise

Enjoying the Sydney latin scene

Sydney is quite a good spot for us latin dancers and I had 10 days to check it out. The city is not known for its zouk scene (Brisbane is the Australian zouk capital) though you’ll find zoukers and some socials & parties there. But for salseros and bachateros there’s a lot of things happening, something every day of the week.

I happened to be in town for the Sydney International Bachata Festival! I didn’t want to tie myself to the festival schedule so I just decided to join a couple of the parties. First it was the pre-party at the Mediterranean restaurant on Oxford Street - cool location. When I walked in a zouk song was playing but only a few couples were on the dance floor. No reason to worry though, soon the floor was packed! They played mostly bachata with a couple salsas and zouks in between. I was happy I found some really good zouk dancers later on in the evening. And obviously tons of amazing bachateros. I had never danced bachata on that level before or Dominican style bachata ever!

Cool days in Sydney - my first time in Australia

Australia! The country so big that it's also a continent - though it is the smallest continent. Australia was definitely at the top of my travel list, for one because of the excitement of being that far away from home but also for many of its natural wonders.

My journey in Australia would start in its biggest city, Sydney. I arrived to Sydney on a Monday afternoon, after my couple weeks of stay in New Zealand. I was a bit anxious to see how strict the local customs really were but really weren’t asked too many questions (the same set as in New Zealand - "where have you used those shoes", "are you carrying any fruits") and apparently my visa was in order too since they never asked to see any proof of it. Australia was only country I needed I pre-arranged visa on my entire trip! I took the train from the airport to the city which was really fast & convenient, considering I was staying close to the Central Station (and that was a good place to stay in my opinion). I had even managed to find a hostel with free wifi, amazing (first world problems...)! For the rest of my first day I did a bit of walking around, getting familiarized with my new surroundings and slowly started to feel at home again.

The next morning I had decided to join a free walking tour of the city. It was a similar concept as the tour I did in Valparaiso, Chile – the tour would cover most of downtown and you would tip the tour guide at the end of the walk. You end up getting to know more of the city than you would by walking around a day or two by yourself and they tend to include (or make up.. who knows) lots of small fun stories. The tour starts every day at 10.30 and 14.30 next to the Cathedral. There were around 20-30 people on the tour that day which is quite a lot. This tour guide wasn’t as good or as funny as the one in Valparaiso but I did like the tour and it really helps to get your bearings in the city. BTW, the same tour company offers also evening tours! The weather that was pretty crazy with a tropical storm that completed drenched everybody who was even 10 seconds without a shelter.. and then it was gone after 15 minutes with clear sky and sunshine. But that was the only bad weather I had, for the rest of the week it was mainly sunny - chilly at times but sunny.

Cathedral on George Street - the main avenue of Sydney

Last of New Zealand (this time..)

As a conclusion of my couple weeks in New Zealand I headed back to Auckland for two more - the two last - days. I had tons of planning and organizing to do… Or that was the idea at least. And to go dancing! I still wanted to see a bit more of Auckland so I went out to do some nice walks along Mission Bay and the harbor areas. It was warm and sunny so it was the best way to spend the day. Central Auckland is pretty easy to get by on foot and the circle line buses (1,80 NZ$) will get you anywhere you need. 

Windy Wellington

After a bit over a week on the New Zealand's gorgeous South Island I was moving back up to the North Island. I took a morning bus from Nelson to Picton, basically just over one big hill, straight to the Picton ferry terminal. I could already check my bag in the ferry that would leave in about two hours so I had some time to go explore Picton!

Picton is probably mostly known for the ferry connection but it was a nice little town. It had a bit more modern feel to it, compared to the other South Island towns that I visited. The harbor area is the prettiest part of town with manicured lawns and palm trees, the bay was full of sailboats, motorboats and yachts. There’s some pricey cafés with views to the bay or just can just take a seat in the park.

Resting in Nelson and tramping* around Abel Tasman

*) That obviously means trekking in the NZ lingo

After about a week in New Zealand I was making my way towards one of the most popular destinations in the country, the Abel Tasman National Park, located on the North East corner the South Island. To get there I would first go to the town of Nelson, taking another early morning bus from Christchurch. It was one of the most annoying bus rides but I won’t get into that – it might have felt more annoying since I was very very very tired. But it was fun to be a party girl for a change that night before in Christchurch!

I arrived to Nelson later that afternoon, checked into my hostel and went out have a stroll in the city. There are nice cafés, restaurants and shops in the tree lined streets, a cathedral up on top of the hill – it’s all very clean and quaint. You can make some walks in the city, one of the most well-known ones is to the “Centre of New Zealand”, that’s where I went the next day. I was feeling a bit flu-ish but it was a really sunny, beautiful autumn day so I thought a little walking around wouldn’t hurt me. The Centre of New Zealand is supposedly in some way the geographical centre of NZ, surprise surprise. I'm not sure in what way, it seems to be oddly conveniently located on the top of a hill. But it's a nice 20 minute walk up and you can see all around the city from there. You can also stroll in the botanical garden (there seems to be one in every single town) and a river that goes through Nelson has a scenic walkway along it.