Category Archives: Travel

Liz lives amongst these absolutely amazing mountains (The Glasshouse Mountains). Eleven hills that rise abruptly from the coastal plain on the Sunshine Coast.

This lookout is literally up the road from her place.

So beautiful, and surreal.

Liz’s place. Her awesome retreat and practise on the right, and her house down below.

Some of Liz’s EMBODY products.

Inside her practise.

Her dog Onyx gave us a warm welcome!

He’s so awesome!

I spotted this lovely old scooter in her garage.

The view of Mount Beerwah from Liz’s massive balcony.

Lovely old piano. That night we just chilled out, ate a lovely dinner and enjoyed my fave bottle of red.

Furnace in the lounge room.

Lovely old bath tub.

Party decorations.

Caryn’s baby Honey, her eyes are amazing! Like a porcelain doll.

Nibbles.

The party kicked on into the wee hours.

The morning after; a shot of dreams which everyone at the party the night before had written down, ready to be burnt on Chinese New Years eve.

Caryn’s beautiful present to Liz, a framed drawing of Onyx.

I just got back from a great weekend up north in Sunny QLD where we celebrated my great friend Liz’s B’day, as well as the Chinese and Buddhist New Year. Was so great to catch up with some loved ones and meet lots of great new friends too. Was way too short a trip, feeling a bit bummed being back, especially as I have jury duty tomorrow!!!

Since 1974, nuts right? It’s almost 30 years since Transformers were created.

All generations of toys were on display.

Generation 1 toys… not quite as complete as I was hoping for.

Dinobots!

Masterpiece display.

Unicron! My fave toy of the day by far.

Original artwork (this one ended up being used on the back of the G1 boxes I’m pretty sure).

Comic book original artwork.

OG Movie poster on the left, would love to have this for home, or the garage.

Yonas controlling a fighting robot.

Full size Bumblebee.

Mastergrade toys in the gift store on exit (I had no room left!).

The expo was held at the National Science Education Center, like our own Powerhouse Museum it had fun stuff for kids to play with, like this bicycle in the sky race on ropes.

We then checked out the National Palace Museum.

Chinese tourists by the bus load.

We ate an amazing meal (also our most expensive meal all trip at $33/head). This was the Tai Chi double-flavoured Champion Beef Noodle Soup presented in a huge yin yang like bowl, one side was clear broth, the other marinated. SO GOOD!

Tea set, kinda felt like an Asian version of high tea (we had all sorts of teas to drink, all fantastic).

Day #6 was our last day in Taipei. We went out hard the night before and there was no way all of us were going to check out at noon so Charlie and I opted to pay up for another night to have a late checkout (our flights were at 11pm). Despite being hung over I still managed to check out the Transformers Expo, so glad I did as I geeked out hard once I was inside.

We checked out the National Palace Museum afterwards too, but I was way too wasted at that time to take in all the artifacts, and by the time we got the the airport I was running on reserve. I pretty much crashed once we boarded the plane, and woke up in Sydney! So sweet :)

We hit the Taipei Motor Show.

Merry Christmas!

So hot.

Oh noes.

German Fusion Restaurant!

Charlie loves chilli.

Night markets were amazing (especially if you’re adventurous with your food!). Sorry for the crappy iPhone (3gs) pics, time to get a new iPhone me thinks!

Spotted an aquarium too.

A live nautilus!!!

For realz, a blue ring octopus.

My Humps.

Mos Burger, best thing ever at 5AM in the morning.

Charlie posing with a passed out local.

And David too.

Outside our hotel.

Ximending, a cool young people’s hangout. Heaps of fashion shopping (heaps of fakes…), reminded me a little of Shinjuku.

Nicely modified Taxi.

Slammed Merc.

Crazy Engrish everywhere.

Spotted this beasty scooter at a vinyl wrap and airbrush shop.

And this storm trooper SL.

A rip of a rip of a rip. Quick too as Comme have only just released this red T.

Super detailed figurines.

WALD makes it right.

At this stage, with all the food and alcohol consumption, the days just rolled into one another and to me felt like The Hangover Part III. Crazy fun!!!

$3AUD/dish!

Might as well order everything then!

It’s pretty much a haze from here on.

Love my J Press tie (thanks for the heads up Kanye).

Steve and Zi.

Souvenir take-away photos.

Willy and Charlie scrubbed up nice!

Big Chinese banquet.

Zi and Gloria doing the rounds.

Saying goodbyes on the way out.

The reason why we were in Taiwan was to celebrate Zi and Gloria’s wedding. As it was a lunch time wedding I ended up feeling glad I didn’t go out hard the night before. The wedding lasted just 2 hours before they turned all the house lights on and kicked everyone out! Crazy! I’ve been to a fair few weddings now, none have been anything remotely alike (of-course all of them have been lovely experiences) and Zi and Gloria’s wedding was no exception… but it was the shortest wedding I’ve been to!

Day #2 I woke up feeling pretty queasy and was super close to sleeping in, but ended up getting up. First stop was an electronics arcade as Stevey (James Bond) needed a portable external battery. The guys use whatsapp to keep in touch via phone, my phone was too old for the app unfortunately (time to upgrade my 3gs!).

Charging session, so geeky.

Next stop, 101. Spot the 2nd tallest building in the world in the background.

We were just amazed at how wild the locals drive, and praising them for not having accidents and knowing how to brake, but then we spotted this.

Taipei 101 from street level.

For lunch we smashed Din Tai Fung and ordered 60 dumplings + a billion other dishes, all of which only came to $20AUD each. Ridiculous!

We then went up to the top, was a really hazy day unfortunately.

Spot the kite, crazy right?!

Exit through the gift shop. The hand carved coral is nuts, this particular piece is over the top.

Detail.

Joe from AAI picked us up and drove us out to visit AAI HQ.

The car we were driven in.

Mugen CRZ in progress.

This MKII Golf staff car blew my socks off.

It’s even got Buddy club seats in it.

More AAI staff cars.

AAI.

The first thing that greets you, this amazing Le Mans racer.

So wide so low.

Tom’s Racing Corona (?) race car.

The boss’ new hobby to keep him fit.

Buell.

This chaser was awesome.

Inside.

Got intake?

Trophies EVERYWHERE.

A new project they’re working on. Automatic only though for Taiwan, if you want the manual you’ll have to buy the Subaru.

Some Buddy club Honda race cars.

Massive money spent on this FD.

One in you can’t get out. Nuts!

Race cars lying around everywhere you looked.

Even this now neglected EG up high on the mezzanine.

And this fantastic EK.

AII HQ even has it’s own bar.

Staff bike. Ti frame with old school Campy friction gear on it.

Their $20 simulator was crazy and makes our Forza simulator at Zen look piss weak.

Joe then took us out for some traditional Hakka food.

So so good. Hearty and earthy.

All traffic lights have hook turns for scooters (which dominate traffic) and a countdown to green too (wish we had that!).

Day #2 I got up feeling wasted and vomit sick. I skipped the hotel breakfast (a first for me as there’s nothing I love more than hotel buffet breakfasts!) but I still managed to get up and get on with the day. I was feeling much better by the time we got around to lunch time (where we smashed so much Din Tai Fung it was ridiculous), and visiting AAI was great (Zi, David, Charlie and I used to work for AAI/Buddy club Australia), but I didn’t have enough energy to do it all over and hit the clubs once more come night time (OLD MAN!) so I crashed, lame.

The little house we stayed at was just up the road from the boat ramp. FJ and Cube were definitely the most Asian cars within a 100km radius!

“So How” – the boat co-owned by Zi, Steve and William, all serious fishermen.

We used the FJ + boat a LOT. At least twice a day.

Zi’s FJ unloading So How at the local boat ramp.

Zi casting crab traps, despite a couple of attempts in different locations we didn’t have any luck.

It’s all about patience.

Mei had awesome luck with fishing, she might even have pulled in more legal sized fish than anyone else over the weekend.

Sun setting on day #1 of fishing.

The only fish we kept from day one was this Tailor, caught by yours truly, prepped and cooked by Zi (was so tasty!).

Cherry. Zi the mad man that he is brought his funny cats along. Yes they freaked out for a day or so, but almost got comfy by the time we had to leave!

Meatball, haha! He’s such a funny cat.

Day #2 the sun went away.

We had a morning session at this jetty and Zi pulled up a leather jacket and a large Brim.

I pulled up another Tailor and the guys on the boat pulled up more Brim which saw us eating fish for dinner!

All gone!

Overcast again on day #3. I was spewin as I really wanted to tan in the sun! The local birds put on a show for us though.

We took the boat right up to the beach and witnessed a pretty special sunset.

Amazing right?

Stevey not only drove the Fj to and from Lake Conjola, he also drove the boat most of the time.

Hell bent on catching a monster flathead, Mei refused to give up and so we fished into the dark.

Still no monster flathead, maybe next time!

This morning the sun was out, shame as we had to clean up the house and go home! We snuck in a drive to Mollymook Beach for Fish and Chips though, such a lovely beach.

Easter Traffic was hardcore, when we finally got back to Sydney we had a traditional Vietnamese feast at Hai Au Lang Nuong in Canley Vale.

Just got back from a 3 night Easter Fishing Break at Lake Conjola, about 3hrs south of Sydney. We had tons of crazy laughs and amazing feasts provided by Colin and Mei. So How, Chicken & Cheese, Finally! I’m way too buggered to try to recall everything right now, but I’ve uploaded some photos, you can view them in high res on my Flickr.