More Pictures!

So i have all my pics from australia up now, below is the end of my trip in Oz, Sailing on the GBR and Cairns, Brisbane

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2197630&id=90401387&l=469d811974

and here is my first day in Delhi! Dont i look happy!
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2197632&id=90401387&l=ab419a579a

Jaipur

Hey! So i made it out of Delhi!!!!
it sucks that Sheila and Kathryn are gone, but now im traveling without a deadline, which is liberating almost! In Oz i new i had to be out by March 12th, so i had to rush through everything and keep on the move to see everything, adn travelling through northern india i had to do the same knowing i needed to be in delhi by march 23rd, but now! theres nothing constricting me! so ive spent a few days here in Jaipur now and im headed to Jailsimer tomorrow night where ill be able to do a camel ride and camping trip out to the desert, so that should be ballin.
Jaipur has been really good, the people here are nice to the point of guilty, so even being the dick i am, its still hard to say no! I got a tour of the city yesterday and saw the elephants all painted up and the camels all dressed up too, i saw the water palace (although the good one is in udipur, where im headed after Jailsimer). The guy showing me around even let me drive the rickshaw!! it was pretty cool and everyone was staring, its not everyday theres a white boy driving a cab hahaha
Last time, the guys who drove me from the train station to the hotel came and took me out for some drinks, which was nice, sketchy, but nice...i left my wallet and the majority of my money at the hotel just incase, same with my Trav Cheqs, but it was good, i tried the Indian whiskey, which is actually produced by Seagrams, so who knew!
While i was there though, his friend told me about how hes a jewellery dealer and that to import ot canada cost 250% tax, and that if i was willing to forge selling documents and have the parcels mailed to me in canada, only to give them to his cousin who would then write up papers claiming that my family didnt like them and i would hand them over to his cousin for about 5000pounds he said, so about 10,000$ canadian! it was a little too good to be true, and the lonely planet book warned me about it, and that i would end up paying massive taxes and all that stuff, so im gonna try to avoid the guy if i can, but if not im gonna have to let him down, its nuts either way, hahaha
im not sure if i mentioned it before, but sheila has been kinda enough to lend me her memory card converter, so im finally posting pictures!! i have the pics from byron bay and surfers finally up and im starting on my rainbow beach and fraier island pics, i think ill only get the 2 done today, ill have to wait on the others, otherwise the internet is gonna get a bit expensive today hahaha, so here are the links below!

Byron Bay and Surfers
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2197538&id=90401387&l=edacf5427c

Rainbow Beach and Fraiser Island (Part I)
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2197539&id=90401387&l=8f8b86a665

Rainbow Beach and Fraiser Island (Part II)
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2197540&id=90401387&l=7abdc9285f

The Del-hole

Were we left off...
I had just been to amritsar, which was 100% better then jammu, where i saw a whole bunch of muesums and then went to some funky temples and saw the silver temple and the golden temple, so tres cool. I took a "sleeper" bus to delhi from Amritsar, which was ballin! i had a cabin all to myself and could just lie down and stretch out, so it was really nice.
Arriving in Delhi was fine, the hotel the girls booked was really fancy, and expensive, but Kathryn talked the price down. We wondered around Connaught Palce, which was actually somewhat developed and seemed like somewhere i could coexist compared to other places in the city. So we went to some fancy resturants and bought a cake to celebrate my birthday for real! it was really good and i had a great day.
Today we went to the zoo and saw a bunch of places around town, i tryed to convince Sheila and Kathryn to go to the Canadian Embassy, but they werte a bunch of debbie downers. The zoo was good, but definitely not up to snuff with any other nice zoo in the world, but i saw a baby rhino!
Anyways, im headed to Jaipur tonight and then will be going around Rajistan until heading to Mumbai, then i want to spend a week or 2 in Goa and just relax and regroup on the beach, ive been going everywhere and i want a break (or to go home! im not sure which yet)
also...i forgot about st pattys day, i hope ya'll pounded a few extra green beers for me!!

My Birthday in Jammu

I left Manali thusday night at 5 in preparation for the 12hr bus ride that turned into 14hrs. Upon arriving into Jammu I was greeted with a bag search by the local police, obviously I didnt get into any trouble. When i finally got off the bus the autorickshaw tried charging me 50Rs for a 2min drive and then he couldnt find me a hotel and the one he did find was 500Rs a night and CRAP, and we had to walk there! I talked them down to 400/night and the thing was alot of hotels wouldnt take me because i was North American and Jammu is located in Kashmir which is still kinda hostile...which didnt result in a very good birthday, crappy room, dirty dirty city, although there were some good temples, the city was just too intense with all the military around and ppl acting shady. So i passed out at 4:30 and accidently slept til 11:30 so everything was closed when i woke up, then I watched some cricket and fell back asleep. Overall, crappy day, but the Birthday celebration will be in Delhi when I finally meet up with Sheila and Catherine.
In Amritsar now, home of the golden temple, so ill go see that and some of the other things in town then head to Delhi on the 23rd!
thanks for all the birthday wishes everyone!

The Himalayas

So after relazing for the past 2 days in Rishikesh, ive moves north to Manali!
Rishikesh was cool, did alot of sight seeing and saw a ceremony on the Ganges river, got some good pics too. Took an early morning yoga class, which wasnt bad, but ive had better...over all Rishikesh was really relaxiong and exactly what i needed after 2 days in delhi hahaha
The 16hr bus ride to Manali was something else tho, they crammed as many ppl into the bus as possible so all our luggage had to be put on the roof as we were driving along the cliffs at night. The bus was filled with ~90% buddhist monks who kept getting off and untieing the roof rack to get their stuff but then not tieing other ppls things back on! so the last leg of the trip i think my bag was a bit loose but it survived hahaha.
So I only got into Manali this morning and wanted to get on the internet because ive been computer free for 3 days now! (its a feat, believe me haha) So I probally wont be back online until I head back to Delhi, so ill aim for the 21st/22nd, just so I can hear all the birthday wishes from the otherside of the world. Its gonna be weird not being around anyone for my birthday this year, but Ive saved the cards my family gave me to open on my birthday, cuz i figured I wanted SOMETHING to do on it.
So the 23rd ill be back in Delhi (buh) to see Sheila and Catherine until they head back to Canada and I head south, which is the complete opposite of what I'm experiencing right now! (I can see snow! its on the top of the mountains, but it still counts)

My 1st thoughts in India... I WANT TO GO HOME

seriously, its a zoo here, it took 3hrs for me to get from the airport to the hotel (if you can call it that, its tres sketchy) but its not too bad...the noise doesnt stop so im glad i hvae earplugs, and the flight from brisbane to Kuala Lumpur was good, they had movies on demand, so i watched Twilight and fell asleep watching Dead Poets Society, but who knew it was possible for a 2yr old to cry for 6hrs straight! Already ive been brought to 2 scams, and ive also killed presents for my mum and sister (i hope you guys like them) now i just need to figure out what to get the rest of the family!
The hotel im at has internet, hense the blog, but i think im gonna go pass out cuz im friggin exhausted!
Headed to Rishikesh tomorrow night, its where the beatles visited when they came to india, and ill slowly be making my way north to Manali and Jammu which is suppose to have some wicked temples. I also bought myself a painting of the Rasa Lila (only Jen Marvin will understand, but i dont know if shes reading the blog or not...hmmm)
anyways, im safe, have a room, have a personal driver within the city named Sham, so Delhis just a bit much and im ready to leave and not come back until sheila gets here hahaha

The Animals I forgot about...

So i realized there was a bunch of stuff about all the cool animals i saw and forgot about so bare with me...
So in Sydney, I saw wild cockatoos, those giant bats (apparently theyre flying foxes, thank you vero) and Ibis' (weird looking birds, i think theyre like Oz's canadian goose, cuz theyre EVERYWHERE)
In Byron when i arrived i walked down to the beach and as I was reading I saw a pod of Pasific Bottlenosed Dolphins swimming along the shore, about 25 of them, it was really cool, but the surfers moved in not to distrub them...
On Fraiser Island I saw Dingos (i have pictures of that) and a bald eagle on the beach, it flew away before I could run over it hahaha, and TONS of Osprey
AND when i was on the bus going to Harveys Bay after fraiser island, i was looking out the window and saw a bunch of Kangaroo standing in a feild watching the bus go by!
And then I saw everyfish ever in the Whitsundays, clown fish, parrot fish, sunfish, angel fish, blowfish, and i think i already told you all about how i swam in the middle of a school of bait fish, and i saw a starfish and sea anemie and a sea turtle!
hopefully ill see a tiger and elephants in india!!

Off to India!

So I know I havent updated this in a while, I've been busy chillin out (mostly just reading eclipse and breaking dawn hahaha, but they were both sooo good!!) and its been raining all week here in brisbane so i havent been able to get into too much trouble...Laura and BJ have been awesome, I tried Kangaroo last night, it wasnt too bad it was just a tenderer beef really, i doubt i would have tasted the difference...
Im not sure if ill find anywhere in India to load my pictures, so there might be a mad rush of photos when i come back in may, so be prepared hahaha. I hvae Surfers Paradise, Byron Bay, Rainbow beach and fraisers island, Airlie Beach and Whitsundays, im not sure if i got any photos in Cairns (was a bit preoccupied with the whole lost my debit card thing) and i dont know if i got any here in Brisbane (ill see what i can do walking back to powells)
My flight leaves tonight for India...Brisbane to Kuala Lumpur at 11:25pm then Kuala Lumpur to Delhi at 8:05am arr. at 11:15am in Delhi (flying with Malaysia Airlines flights 140 and 184) Im staying in Delhi at the Swagat Palace (570247060) (all that was really more to ease my parents so they know what the deal is haha)
thats really about it, got my misquito net and malaria pills the other day, so really brisbane hasnt been too wild! got 2 more books after selling some back, so things are moving along, now to just get ready for india!!

Here comes the story 'bout the Hurricane

So as I mentioned the other day I was headed into the Hurricane in Cairns, well the Hurricane missed us, but i ended up in a totally different type of Hurricane...
I got some books at the used book store (finally found a used copy of Breaking Dawn and To Kill a Mockingbird) and I ran out of cash, so I went to the Westpac ATM (so i dont get any service fees of anything like that) . As I finished withdrawling 150$AUS it tells me to remove my card to get the cash, and low and behold, it refused to spit out the card, so i never got the cash and it kept my card, so now im stuck in Cairns with now money, and no debit card... Westpac told me to call scotia or to wait until monday morning to go get my card from the Branch, but my flight leaves for Brisbane sunday morning at 6am.
So now i have a few options, im going to call my flight and see how much it will cost me to delay it until monday afternoon, or I can take my chances and try to get Scotia to fedex me a new card to Brisbane before I leave for India on thursday.
Quite the pickle, but ive left the panic behind me, i have options and now its just getting around them buh
other then that though I bought a wicked pair of Volcom shorts this morning for 35$ which is like 25-30$ canadian! wohoo!

Snokling the Great Barrier Reef and Sailing the Whitsundays

Hey everyone!
So tuesday night i left for the sailing trip with 27 others through the whitsundays and up to the great barrier reef. It was pretty awesome, i may have liked fraiser island a bit better, but thats more because of the people (although dont get me wrong, the ppl i actually hung out with on the boat with awesome and I had a great great time with them)
So we left late at night and arrived at Whitsunday island that night and got to spend some time on the beach (Whitehaven Beach) the next day...the sand was ERXACTLY like the sand in seista key, if not more white and lighter, it was pretty surreal. On the beach we had our introductory scuba dive lesson, which was pretty cool, the instructor was impressed with the 4 of us (myself, Tobias (Gerany) Mark (UK) and Andrew (also UK)). And obvously encouraged us to go diving with him at the other reefs.
So that afternoon we headed off to Hook Island, and I scuba dived in Luncheon bay...the catch was that if i wanted to scuba on the Great Barrier Reef (GBR) I had to go then as well, so it ended up costing me an extra $125 for 2 dives, but when the heck else am i going to have an oppourtunity to do something like this! (and think of how jealous elliot would be!! hahaha)
So I weent scuba diving at Hook Island and saw some pretty awesome coral and some really really cool fish
We sailed through the night and got to the GBR, bait reef to be exact, around midnightish and set up shop there. In the morning I went scuba diving again and it was BALLIN!! we went right down into these deep caverns and was just surrounded by coral and saw some clown fish and everything! (I saw so many fish that i have no idea the names of half of them)... so we kept scuba-ing around there then headed deeper into the GBR and went to Hardy Reef...so i had already spent 125 on 2 dives and a 3rd would have been 180, but it kept getting cheaper the more dives you do, so it was a slippery slope and i had to resist. So at Hardy Reef I snokled and saw just as much IF NOT MORE then i would have diving. When I was snokling around i was diving all over the place and saw some massssssiiivvve fish, like at least 4ft long, it was nuts, saw some blow fish and parrot fish and just some massive angel fish and some that were neon blue, and then i found a school of bait fish (you know the ones that make a big fish and an arrow in finding nemo, them) and swam right in the middle of them!! just i looked down, left right and in front and they were everywhere, it was really really cool. Saw a star fish too! BASICALLY, if it was in planet earth/blue planet I saw it...David Attenbourogh doesnt have shit on me hahaha...
So then this morning we left the GBR and went to Hayman Island and snorkled a bunch there and there were tons of fish there, but i had seen most of them and there was a ton of jellyfish there, so even in my stinger suit i think one still managed to sting my ankle.
Spent alot of time on the boat sailing from place to place, but I managed to finish The Colour Purple, which started slow, but i REALLY enjoied by the end of it, so now im on to memoirs of a geisha, which is shaping up to be really good, i didnt realize it was an actual memoir, i just thought that was the title, hahaha...
So im on the 8:15pm bus to Cairns tonight (where there apparently is going to be a cyclone hitting soon, so pray that it will hit after my flight to brisbane sunday morning!!), 24hrs in Cairns tomorrow and off to Brisbane at 6am sunday, then India on THURSDAY!!!! buh! where has the time gone!!
Also, life doesnt stop with me here hahaha, Jew (Zach haha) got TV on the Radio tickets for June 3rd for which I will have made my gloriouos return by then hahaha, so thats exciting! I already have plans in Canada!! hahaha