Gothenburg.. in typically Swedish weather…

Day 1 in Gothenburg is easy to summarize: WET!

I slept long – especially considering I slept in a tent – and just after I finally got around to leaving for the city, it started raining. I don’t think it stopped for one minute for the remainder of that day.. I had foreseen some rain – I was actually carrying a raincoat – but not like this.. The end result is that I’ve already wasted my favorite pair of summer shoes.. it will take them a few days to dry, that ‘s for sure. Not much else worth saying about that day.. just that I managed to setup the rain shelter on my own.. not an easy feat considering the thing has like 6 poles which tend to fall over if you have set up none yet or only a couple.

On the road again

This is it!ย I’m on the road again in Scandinavia. Same countries as last time, different places – at least some of them.. ๐Ÿ™‚

The idea is to head towards Trondheim in Norway and then slowly head back via ร–stersund and possibly good old Karlskrona.. I wonder if there’s anyone I know left, but I doubt it.. except maybe those working for the Uni itself, my mentor being the only one I still remember ๐Ÿ™‚ I think you’ve already guessed it by now.. I did the same amount of planning as last time: next to nothing! Sort of a guess about where I d like the trip to go and where to start it: Gothenburg. Next step were some randomly named cities on a map with some reserves nearby – Trondheim and ร–stersund – and finally “oh maybe I can go by Karlskrona”. There it is: the thought through plan of this years road trip… ๐Ÿ™‚

Back at home…

The title says it all… I am back in ordinary-boring-wet-cold little Belgium…

I boarded a plane Saturday evening to swap a warm, sunny and fun Melbourne with a cold, rainy and boring place in the middle of nowhere.. Now I understand why Australia needs tough immigration laws.. without those all the planes to Australia would be full and those leaving empty! ๐Ÿ™‚

Flying home.. to Melbourne!

Back in Melbourne.. I took a flight this afternoon.. and this may sound strange, but once I had dropped off all my luggage at the hotel and walked to South Bank I felt like I was back home.. I know I’ve only been here for a couple of weeks, yet it already feels a bit like home.. tomorrow I have to fly to my previous, more permanent, boring & cold home though.. pitty!! ๐Ÿ˜ฅ

What I left today – even after only a couple of days – already hurt, so I don’t want to think about what tomorrow will be like.. flying back to that gray boring country that isn’t really a country anymore..

Road through hell..

Today I moved from a room at a friend’s place outside Sydney to a room in a backpackers hotel in the city center.. There ‘s a tiny detail to it though that ended up being a little more serious then I had anticipated.. since my hosts had gone to work, my motorised transport to the railway station was also gone.. and since I couldn’t check in before noon I wanted to stay at their place for bit longer as well.. It was one of those days though.. not really very hot, but HUMID! And then around noon the sun broke through the cloudcover… So instead of a relaxed walk to the station I went through a 25 minute long torment. I was carrying 3 bags so could barely walk properly and on top of that, the second I got out the door I was bathing in sweat.. Normally when you sweat, you expell excess heat and you are supposed to cool a bit. But with this high humidity all it did was drip off of me and ruin another set of clothing.. I think during that 25 minute walk I must have lost 5 kilos worth of water.. ๐Ÿ˜

Sydney

So I managed to get here after all… Sydney!

Arriving here it felt like entering a Finnish sauna, only this one has no exit…
I’ve had some hot days in Melbourne – though not as many as I ‘d have liked – but not something like this.. I don’t mind the heat, but it s a moist sweaty heat.. guess by the time I get used to it, I will be on a plane back to sub-zero Belgium… and to be honest, even though I’m not yet dealing with the humidity too well, lying on a beach or in a park in the sun is preferable over freezing in Europe every time you go out the door.. Ideally I ‘d have a job where I’d have to work in Australia during (European) winter and in Europe during summer.. ๐Ÿ™„

The bank’s stranglehold on our lives..

Okay.. I had a bit of a scare yesterday… largely caused by the excess power banks have nowadays…

Yesterday morning, whenever I tried to get money from an ATM it showed a message stating the transaction was cancelled by my bank.. I thought maybe they were having issues, but a few hours later it still didn’t work, so I asked my parents to check it out.. Than, yesterday evening (local time) I got a message that my VISA had been blocked, yet the card I had been having issues with was my regular MAESTRO card (which they said should be working fine).. So here I was – on the other side of the planet – thinking I had no working card left.. and with only 20$ cash remaining.

The green side of Melbourne

This time no tourist loaded bus trip.. the sky is crystal clear so instead I walked through some of Melbourne’s parks looking for a good spot to do absolutely nothing ๐Ÿ˜€

There s a lot of small parks all over Melbourne, most of them just outside the business district and in the suburbs, but plenty are within walking distance of my hotel.. I ended up in the Fitzroy Gardens and though not big, it was the perfect place for a nap in the shade..
Not much else to say about yesterday.. I merely enjoyed doing as little as humanly possible ๐Ÿ˜‰

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