Monthly Archive for March, 2007

Man Caught Intentionally Spreading HIV in Melbourne

Published on March 29, 2007 in Australia in the News and Victoria. 0 Comments

This has got to be one of the most twisted stories I have read in some time:

A MAN charged with deliberately spreading HIV allegedly tricked his lover – who had registered himself with the local council as a dog – into having unsafe sex on the basis he could not transmit the disease.

Melbourne Magistrates Court heard yesterday that Michael Neal, 48, accepted a dog tag from his lover as a "sign of commitment" in their master-slave relationship.

Mr Neal, who is said to have set up a webcam to broadcast his sexual activities live on the internet, allegedly "deliberately contracted" HIV by having sex on the altar of a Catholic Church with two men he knew were HIV-positive.

The divorced father of three is charged with setting out to spread the virus.

Mr Neal faces 121 charges, including intentionally spreading HIV, attempting to cause serious injury, rape and possessing child pornography.

WTF?

World Swimming Championships Held in Melbourne

Published on March 29, 2007 in Sports and Victoria. 0 Comments

Melbourne has been on the world’s sports map these past couple of weeks due to the city hosting the 2007 World Swimming Championships.  Unfortunately the story of these championships has had nothing to do with swimming, but the assault between the Ukrianian swim team coach and his daughter that was caught on TV cameras:

WORLD swimming body FINA has withdrawn the accreditation of a Ukrainian coach captured by a television camera abusing and assaulting his daughter, a competitor at the Melbourne world titles.

Late last night, Victorian police were still questioning the 38-year-old man and his daughter after being called around 6pm to view disturbing footage filmed by a Nine Network camera in a marshalling room at the Rod Laver Arena where the world championships are being staged.

Inspector Rick Nugent told a media conference that police had not determined whether any charges would be laid against the man, who was seen pushing and kicking his swimsuited daughter, who vainly attempted to defend herself.

Later, the man was seen attempting to reconcile with her, as she slumped to the floor and tried to wriggle out of his embrace.

The shocking footage, aired around the world, blighted the Melbourne championships on a night when all attention should have focused on some spectacular swimming that saw four world records fall and Australia’s Leisel Jones defend her 100m breaststroke world record, just missing her own world mark.

It looks like nothing will happen to him because his daughter will not press charges, but it is unfortunate that so much attention has been paid to this incident. 

On Walkabout On: The Bushfire Recovery of Mt. Buller

Published on March 20, 2007 in Victoria. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , .

This past summer while the Victorian bush fires were raging I took a drive up to Mansfield to see the fires first hand. Well over the past Labor Day holiday here in Australia, I used the extra time off to take another drive up to the high country to see what the impact of the bush fires has had on the high country’s environment. I always enjoy going to Mansfield and once again it was nice to visit the city. It was very busy in Mansfield that weekend due to lots of people from Melbourne heading up to Mansfield for the long weekend.

After checking out Mansfield I headed towards Mt. Buller which is about 30 minutes east of town. Judging by this below picture, you would never know Mt. Buller was the sight of a massive bushfire just three months ago:

Mt. Buller, Victoria

My original destination on this trip was to complete The Bluff Trail which is a 13km hike up a steep alpine bluff to the south of Mt. Buller. To reach the hike I had to take the Howqua Track dirt road from the small village of Merrijig along the road to Mt. Buller. The Howqua Track travels for 16.5km to a large camping area called Sheepyard Flat. Once I entered the tree line, the damage from the bushfires became quite evident:

Bush Fire Recovery 4

Nearly all the trees were scorched black, however there was also plenty of signs of life returning to the forest:

Bush Fire Recovery 3

Much of the forest’s floor was covered in thick green vegetation. The amount of plant life that has already taken hold on the forest floor is really amazing when you consider the bush fires were only put out about two months ago.

Australian Bushfire Recovery

While driving down the road I had a wallaby jump out of the brush and hop along my Jeep while I was driving. As soon as I stopped to take a picture the wallaby looked at me, than hopped across the road and then hopped into the bush:

A Wallaby Runs Across the Road

The wallabies are rare to see compared to kangaroos because many of the different species of wallabies have been greatly reduced in population due to being hunted by foxes that were introduced into Australia by the early colonists. So it always good to see wallabies when you can.

Driving along the dirt road there was some areas that some how escaped the fires:

Bush Fire Recovery 1

Yet other areas that were scorched were still quite beautiful:

Bush Fire Recovery 2

Eventually the road crossed over the Howqua Creek that was also some how able to escape the bush fires:

Howqua Creek

Across the Howqua Creek, the road runs through the large campground of Sheepyard Flat:

Sheepyard Flat

This is actually quite a nice campground that was slowly filling up with Melbournians camping here for the weekend. Unfortunately as I drove through the campground the road was eventually blocked preventing me from reaching the Bluff hiking trail. The road was closed because the park service hasn’t been able to clear it of fallen trees from the bushfire. So I had to unfortunately cancel my hiking plans.

With my plans canceled I decided to turn to Plan B and go explore the four wheel drive roads on the north side of Mt. Buller instead.

Next Posting: Mt. Stirling and the Bindaree Track

Rocky Scandal Down Under

Published on March 15, 2007 in Tabloid Crap. 0 Comments

This story continues to make headlines down here in Australia:

AFTER his tussle with Australian customs officers last month, Hollywood actor Sylvester Stallone insisted that the suspicious substance detected in a routine baggage search was not steroids.

Summoned to appear in a Sydney court yesterday on a charge of importing a prohibited import, court documents alleged that Stallone imported 48 vials of human growth hormone.

It was alleged that customs officers found five boxes of the growth hormone when Stallone alighted from Qantas flight QF8 from the United States on February 16. Stallone, 60, was visiting Australia to promote his latest film, Rocky Balboa.

The documents alleged that Stallone ticked the "no" box when asked to declare whether he was bringing in restricted or prohibited goods.

They alleged the active ingredient in the substance, going under the brand name Jintropin, is the human growth hormone Somatropin, which was not approved by the US Food and Drug Administration.

Stallone says that the vials were not growth hormones and that they were a legal substance that he has been taking for years.  However, is anyone really surprised he was taking a growth hormone?  I’m not surprised, look at him in the above picture, he is a 60 year old guy with that kind of body?  When he was younger he probably didn’t need to use a growth hormone but definitely at age 60 he probably needed a little help to keep that kind of body. 

I actually went and watch Stallone’s movie this past weekend.  Rocky Balboa was actually a decent movie and it is what Rocky 5 should have been.  In the movie Rocky is retired in Philadelphia and operating his own Italian restaurant.  Rocky has the urge to start fighting again so he applies for a boxing license to participate in some local fights.  However, a series of events happens that leads to him fighting in a charity match against the much younger, reigning heavyweight boxing champion.  The actor playing the reigning champion is really the weak part of the movie.  He does not look like a heavyweight boxer and really didn’t have a built body like Stallone had for the movie. 

Stallone should have given that guy some of whatever he has been taking because he needed it.  Mike Tyson actually made a cameo in the movie and I thought he would have made a better villain boxer than they guy they had.  Oh well, the movie was still above average and wraps up the various storylines in the Rocky series.  Was it worth the $14 bucks I paid to watch though?  Probably not unless you are a big Rocky fan, but I would definitely recommend renting it when it comes out on video though. 

Dave in Sydney

Published on March 7, 2007 in Humor. 0 Comments

Dave from Snake Gully was visiting Sydney. He walked into a bar in Oxford Street and sat next to a rather attractive woman.

"Hi," he said, "I’m new in town. Can I buy you a drink?"
"No," she remarked, "I am a Lesbian."
"Oh, really?" he asked, "How are things in Beirut?"

On Walkabout: The End of the Rails and the End of A Journey

Published on March 5, 2007 in Western Australia. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

The Nullarbor Crossing

As the trained pulled out of Cook the wife and I were treated to more of the “scenic” Nullarbor Plain:

DSCF4491

The terrain stayed like this for a couple more hours and then the train stopped and some Aborigines from this vehicle got out and boarded the train:

DSCF4497

We are in the absolute middle of no where but some where out here there must be an Aboriginal community and whoever these people were got on the train and just left their vehicle sitting there. The Aboriginal owners of the vehicle for whatever reason must make some good money because usually you don’t see Aborigines driving nice vehicles like this SUV.

Australia’s Nuclear Past

After a while the train slowed down and the intercom announced that the train was passing the Maralinga nuclear testing site in South Australia:

DSCF4495

The British with cooperation from the Australian government tested nuclear weapons here between 1956-1963. The nuclear tests remain highly controversial in Australia due to fears of radiation poisoning of local Aborigines and the fact that many Australians do not like nuclear technology. The picture from the train above is of the ruins of foundations of buildings you can see located on the north side of the train track in this Google Earth image:

On the south side of the track there was a large hole you can see in this Google Earth image. What the large hole was for no one knew, but I couldn’t get a good picture of the hole because it was on the opposite side of the train from where I was sitting and people were glued to the windows during this portion of the trip. This image kind of gives you an appreciation of how isolated this portion of Australia is:

Maralinga is located in the grew box you see to the right of the Maralinga, SA Australia sign. I continued to check out the area using Google Earth and by following the road north from where the area where the train runs through I was able to find this base:

You can see an airfield on the right and probably the main base on the left. I’m figuring the base near the train tracks to the south was probably their logistical base to unload supplies to put on trucks to move to the main base located probably about 20 kilometers to the north. I continued to follow the road north and it branches off into three holes:

I’m speculating here, but could it be that these three holes may be where the British tested their nuclear weapons? Here is a Google Earth image that gives you an overall perspective of the base:

You can see the main base that is labeled as Maralinga and the three holes located just to the north. To the south of the main base just over the ridge line is the train tracks on the sub-base where the train line runs through.

All in all it was an interesting history lesson because I had no idea the British even conducted nuclear testing in Australia. However, if I had to choose a place to conduct a nuclear test, this place would be it.

Late in the afternoon the train finally exited the Nullarbor Plain and entered the South Australian outback:

DSCF4498

Many people don’t realize how many trees the outback has, but for having so little water the vast majority of the Australian outback is filled with these small gum trees. Before long the sunset and the next morning we were due to arrive in Adelaide.

Last Stop Adelaide

The next morning this is the scene I woke up to:

DSCF4501

The sunrises over the Australian outback are always spectacular. The train ended up arriving at Keswick Terminal in Adelaide around 9AM. It took an hour before we got our bags back from the baggage car, exited the station, and got everything loaded into my Jeep that had been sitting at the station for over two weeks. Fortunately no one messed with it and everything was intact. It was about 10AM and we stopped to get breakfast and finally got on the highway and out of Adelaide around 11AM. It took us about 8.5 hours to get back to Melbourne and with the time change we were home around 9PM. It was a long day and was glad to be back after all the traveling we had done not only on that day, but for over the past two weeks as well.

Holiday Roundup

Here is a run down of the total distance covered during our entire Western Australia trip:

Air: 1700 KM

Ground: 4,400 KM

Rail: 2,400 KM

Total: 8,500 KM

Western Australia really is an amazing place with great diversity in landscapes depending if you go to the north or south of Perth. You have outback, canyons, spectacular beaches, and dolphins to the north and mountains, forests, caves, wineries, and stunning coastlines to the south. Just remember that the distances between locations is truly vast. So make sure you have a well planned out trip including knowing where you will be staying the night. Just about everyone we met in Western Australia were really friendly especially when they found out that we were Americans. Western Australia is a unique experience that many Australians have never been to and I highly recommend anyone with the time available to definitely do it.

Prior Posting: A Town Called Cook

Return to the Western Australia Holiday Journal Archive

Hollywood Takes on Aussie Wool Industry

Published on March 2, 2007 in Tabloid Crap. 0 Comments

No one has ever accused Pamela Anderson of being a rocket scientist and this just proves it:

Former Baywatch babe Pamela Anderson has taken the shears to her ugg boots.

The Hollywood pin-up credited with turning the Australian boots into a global fashion phenomenon denounced the footwear on her website.

In a truly blonde moment, the actress has suddenly realised that the boots are made from shaved sheepskin.

And mother-of-two Pammy, a staunch animal rights activist who has been a PETA member for a decade, says she is racked with guilt that women worldwide have followed in her footsteps.

"People like to tell me all the time that I started that trend – yikes!" Anderson wrote. "I used to wear them with my red swimsuit to keep warm, never realising they were skin.

"Well, let’s start a new trend. Do NOT buy uggs! Buy Stella McCartney or Juicy boots."

This comes on the heels of singer Pink’s attempt to boycott Australian wool:

The Australian government has challenged US pop star Pink’s campaign to boycott the country’s wool.

Pink said the practice of "mulesing", or cutting flesh from lambs’ rear ends without anaesthetic, was "sadistic".

But Australian Treasurer Peter Costello said the practice stopped sheep dying of maggot infestations and was humane.

He questioned Pink’s expertise, saying: "Pink is entitled to her views but at the end of the day would Australia’s farmers take advice from Pink?"

You got to like how Peter Costello is able keep a sense of humor in light of all this stupidity. 

You can read more here and here.