Table Of Contents
Once again getting a late start, but I posted the photos a few days two weeks ago. Am mostly
in Wellington for the next month, except for trips on most weekends. The trip report for Australia took a few more days.
COVID
There is definitely a big wave in North America right now, including Quebec. There was a small wave in NZ at the end of July, but it seems to have dropped right off. There is still the winter lurgy going around in NZ and I’ve had a cough for 3 weeks. (The doctor who I saw about it had COVID a few weeks ago). My cough is not COVID, though, if I’m to believe the RAT.
There were two research results that I found interesting:
- Antihistamines prevent covid infection in mice. Of course, we’re not mice, but still interesting.
- Long COVID rates: based on US Veterans Affairs data, 10.42% pre-vaccine pre-delta; 3.50% for vaccinated people in omicron era (still “substantial” per the study).
Professional
In July we submitted a paper to the HATRA workshop at SPLASH. Turns out I’ll be on the right continent, but the wrong end of it, to attend the workshop; I’ll be arriving in Pasadena the evening of the workshop after refereeing at the Ontario Open. It was good to get a first paper out with my new PhD student Alex though.
Worked on 19 days, a large chunk of which was HATRA, and a smaller chunk preparing my NSERC Discovery Grant resubmission (Common CV (ugh), new reviewers, lots of related work, some reworking of objectives).
Grad students/mentees/collaborators
Again, above-average collaboration count: I was talking to my students and collaborators on 15 days. HATRA was a lot of that.
Also chatted with SE15 grad Michael and some freelance SE student advising.
Collegiality
Just one review request for TOSEM. On the other hand, I asked 2 friends to read a paper that I have been trying to get into conferences; thanks Brian and James! I’m sure their advice will help.
As part of working on that paper, I also prepared a talk summarizing a previous version of the paper, so that we could consider it in a different form than written. As authors, we considered the talk and figured the way forward, and then I also presented it to my students.
Teaching
I also arranged my teaching schedule for Winter 2025; most weeks are 3 days a week, which should be OK, though 3 courses in 1 term sounds terrible (not by my choice!)
Trips
Two trips: Old Ghost Road (West Coast of NZ) and Melbourne/Cairns.
Old Ghost Road
Oops, I didn’t write a trip report. Oh well. I am still working on the Overland Track trip report, with waterfall day and the last day left. Perhaps I’ll write this trip up after that. But I also feel like I’m always doing writeups. Some writeups are more interesting than others.
I will note that the wild goat pie I had at the West Coast Pie Co in Westport was quite tasty. The meat is hunted. I believe you can’t sell hunted meat in Canada.
There seem to be a couple of attractions in Westport which may be worth going to sometime, like Kawatiri on the Pounamu Pathway. I’d also like to get to the Westland petrel place again.
In the July part of this trip I also visited the Centre of New Zealand in Nelson. It is not noteworthy enough to go on the NZ places page. I also went back to the library yet again.
Melbourne/Cairns
We had planned to be in Melbourne in March 2020, but for obvious reasons, that didn’t happen. Four years later we finally managed to get to Melbourne for a bit. I bought a ticket including 2 weekends, and then decided to go to Cairns and the Great Barrier Reef during the week from Melbourne. So, in the end, it was a Saturday/Sunday in Melbourne, then off to Cairns, back the next Saturday, and then back to Wellington on Sunday.
We were planning on going for a hike in the Cathedral Ranges, but the weather was actually uncomfortably chilly and windy. Pretty hostile overall, and not the weather that we’d brought clothes for.
Instead, we went to the Dingo Sanctuary near where we thought about hiking, and also Long Forest.
We got up early on Sunday to head to Sherbrooke Forest. After walking for a while we did manage to see a superb lyrebird—as Alex put it, when you give up hope, then the lyrebird appears. It wasn’t in full display, so I was like “is that really a lyrebird?”, but it definitely was. And then, except for the lyrebird and the galah, there were tons of birds just at the parking lot (where they used to feed birds).
Melbourne ↔ Cairns Travel
tl;dr: Thanks for nothing, Jetstar. So many delays and annoyingness.
Cairns
The main point of going to Cairns was to see the famous Great Barrier Reef. I booked one night on a liveaboard. But then I found several other things to do around Cairns, e.g. the Wet Tropics UNESCO site. I heard that Daintree was also great, but I thought it was too far for the time we had.
Great Barrier Reef
Here’s my hot takes on the Great Barrier Reef. I suspect it’s a place that is better for diving than snorkelling. The reef at Aitutaki was far more colourful (bleaching?) and calmer. Here, it was somewhat like a washing machine when we were out; so much so that MP skipped some of the snorkels. I did swallow rather more salt water than I would have liked, though maybe I got a bit better at snorkelling towards the end. Pictures edited for colour.
Kuranda Village
This village, not actually very far from Cairns (30km/40 minutes by car), is really popular with Japanese tourists, including groups of high school students. MP thinks it’s because it seems to be sort of a nature activity (but not really).
The train goes through rugged terrain. Building it was quite a feat for the 19th century, mostly by hand. Booking it still feels being in the 20th century: I had to call (OK, by cellphone from the Uber) to book, and then picked up and paid for the tickets at the station. The equipment is also retro. Gold Class (which we weren’t in) seems to basically have sofas as seats. The train also takes 90 minutes to cover the 30km, but it does a lot of switchbacks. Anyway, I like scenic railroads, and here we were, so I enjoyed it. It is a legit train that transports you between point A and point B, though of course tourist-focussed.
Atherton Highlands
There were a lot of stops here! The notes in my book are over half a page.
MP thought we should eat in downtown Cairns on a Friday night. Cairns is extremely car-choked and lacks good foodpaths. Boo! (Also, entering the mall which is right in the middle of the city is hard: there is really only one pedestrian entrance from the street, and there is no other street activation, just walls surrounding the garage. There’s also the entrance through the parking garage, but who wants that?)
Anyway, parking was stressful, since many people were downtown. Lots of restaurants were busy, but The MED was empty, and had, again, really good food. Melbourne is famous for food, but we did have many great meals in Cairns.
We stopped at the grocery store on our way out. There was a PA announcement repeated several times, with increasing desperation: “Could the owner of the dog in lane 3 please move your dog?'
Melbourne Round 2: abbreviated final day
Despite having less time in Melbourne than hoped, we did manage to meet up with Hanna from the Overland Track for some desserts at Bing Chillin (matcha crown croissant) and then some last-minute gear shopping at Bogong (MP got mountaineering boots and I got new climbing shoes, on sale!). There is more choice in gear in Melbourne for sure.
After being the last to leave Bogong, we walked over to Snow Monkey Ramen, which has a number of unique takes on ramen. I had the lobster bisque ramen, which definitely was a lot like a bisque. I’d have it again.
Then there was a walk through the lively streets of Melbourne back to our hotel, and out early the next morning. The SkyBus (somehow there is no train) was 20 minutes on Sunday morning and like 40 minutes on Saturday afternoon. We changed our AKL-WLG flight and got back to Wellington in the early afternoon.
Travel planning
I signed up for the IJF Academy practical session in Japan and started occasional nage-no-kata practice. I also got tickets for the trip to the Ontario Open/SPLASH/Manitoba Open (WLG-YVR, YVR-YYZ, YYZ-LAX, LAX-YWG, YWG-WLG). I should arrange accomodation for that and for the North Island Championships. I’m ditching the South Islands in Christchurch in favour of a mountaineering trip to Ruapehu.
Movement statistics
Includes the Australia trip, which is a lot of flying, relatively, for staying in this part of the world (but Cairns is really far north at 16°S).
- 🚶 Walking: 116km on 22 days (same as June, though only the last day of the Old Ghost Road)
- 🚲 Biking: 65km on 9 days
- 🚗 Driving: 535km on 8 days (almost all in Australia)
- 🚗 Taxi: 95km (off the Old Ghost Road; to WLG, MEL, around Cairns, and to CNS)
- 🚌 Bus: 277km on 7 days (mostly from the Old Ghost Road)
- ✈ Plane: 10941km (NSN-WLG, WLG-MEL, MEL-CNS, CNS-MEL, MEL-AKL-WLG)
- 🚣 Boat: 128km (Great Barrier Reef)
- 🚠 Gondola: 8.5km (Kurunda SkyRail)
- 🚆 Train: 69km (Upper Hutt and Australia)
Pretty average month apart from getting to Cairns. More time on boats this year than usual.
Walks
- Old Ghost Road: last day
- Melbourne: Happy Valley Track; a lyrebird walk, but not quite this one in Sherbrooke Forest
- Kurunda Village to Barron Falls round-trip 8.7km
- Atherton Highlands: Hypipamee Track and Wongabel State Forest
Australian walks are not as well documented as NZ walks on DOC land!
Pictures
This month I processed pictures just up to the end of the month. Marginally fewer pictures processed than in June, but I think I took the same number of pictures as I processed, so just treading water here. The number of sets doesn’t tell the whole story, since sets have different numbers of pictures. New sets is 11.
Picture logs again available. As always, pictures are clickable to go to the full gallery.
- Sets of pictures posted: 20
- Total pictures posted: 648
- Total pictures in selection pool: 1828
- Accept rate: 35% (min 16%, max 68%)
As always, pictures here (and sometimes elsewhere) are clickable to go to the full gallery.
July posts
Overland Track parts 5 and 6 posted in July:
- Part 1: Australia versus New Zealand
- Part 2: Before the walk [Melbourne photos, Hobart, Launceston]
- Part 3: Overland Track day 1, Cradle Mountain [photos]
- Part 4: Overland Track day 2, Windermere [photos]
- Part 5: Overland Track day 3, Pelion [photos]
- Part 6: Overland Track day 4, Kia Ora [photos]
Two more days left for the Overland Track. No other posts this month. It feels like I’ve been putting more effort into editing photos than writing (non-summary posts and not research).
Miscellaneous
Another significant trip this month, but still decent routine.
Acquisitions
- La Sportiva Futuras: my Miura VSs have a hole in them, and these were on sale at Bogong. So were Miuras, but I figured these would be better.
I also had to warranty my headlamp charger. It supposedly is replaced now.
Sports
Judo practice 7x, missing a week due to Australia trip. Climbing 6× as well. Route difficulty at Faultline seems to fluctuate.
Restaurants
A few new places in Wellington, plus Australia and Nelson.
New Zealand
Nelson:
- Stefano’s (“Real Italian Pizza made by Real Italians”): right next to where the bus dropped us off, and reasonably good.
- Lambretta’s Cafe & Bar: would order the chowder again; different from a sandwich, which I didn’t feel like.
- Penguino Ice Cream Cafe: ice cream was good (well, duh); stroopwaffle was OK
Greater Wellington:
- Nora Kebab: I would go here more often if it wasn’t all the way at the end of the train line.
- KC Cafe: somewhat famous in Wellington, but the eggplant dish was actually kind of weird and maybe I’ll try something more usual next time.
- Cream Cake Studio: I had something small and tasty from there but I guess I didn’t take a photo and forgot what.
- Library: again, not the millefeuille I was expecting, though I’m always a fan of whipped cream.
- Volco Dough Club: a donut, again filled with cream, win
- Wraps and Rolls: filling was good, bread wasn’t my favourite, not crispy
Ohakune:
- Johnny Nation’s Chocolate Eclair Shop: famous eclairs deserve their fame (again, cream-filled).
- Mountain Kebabs: lunch stop on the way to Whakapapa, good option. They have kebabs and not much else.
Australia
Greater Melbourne:
- airport croissant: surprisingly not bad.
- Dumpling Lane (Melton): pretty good for a place inside a mall
- Mama Yama Sushi Express: tempura eggplant was light and crispy
- Meat And Dumpling: at first the heating wasn’t on yet and it was cold, so we went to Mama Yama; after lunch we went back and MP had the boba with soft serve, a revelation.
- Karachi Street Food: MP’s biryani was great. Beef Haleem kind of purée-like.
- Bing Chillin: Matcha crown croissant was a lot (of taste, sugar, fat, …).
- Snow Monkey Ramen: A bunch of creative takes on ramen. I’ve never had lobster bisque ramen, but it is bisque like and also ramen-like.
Cairns:
- Ozmosis: delicious burger; MP liked her salad too; generous serving size
- Viet Fresh noodles: pretty authentic Vietnamese place
- Sushi Train North Cairns: a chain; the things we ordered were OK, but there wasn’t a lot of choice. Still, not much chicken sushi.
- Yama Zuru Izakaya: a far better choice than Sushi Train even if sushi was unavailable.
Kurunda:
- Hayabusa of Kurunda: haven’t seen sesame miso soup like this before, but tasty; can also buy kimonos
Atherton:
- Lake Barrine Teahouse: the scone gets MP’s full stamp of approval
- Northern Star Thai Restaurant: amazing, kind of remotely located
Cairns again:
- The MED: worth the struggle to find parking on a Friday night, though somehow the place wasn’t busy— it should be!
SYD:
- Mad Mex: the best place I could eat at the airport?
Volunteering/Advocacy
The usual volunteering. I did write in to the NZ Government consultation on re-increasing the speed limits, which is a terrible idea. Also I volunteered to help organize MP’s Snowcraft course run through the Wellington Section of NZAC, i.e. making sure that meals happened ([pictures]; [day 0]; [day 1]).
Conclusion
Cairns was interesting, though somewhat annoying for reasons I didn’t go into much in the trip report. Plus the Old Ghost Road. Plus a workshop paper. Can’t complain.