I'm Dreaming Of A White Christmas

How I was going to survive Christmas away from the folks and friends was always a major concern when I was planning my trip. The idea of not returning to Gympie, not having a big breakfast with my family, opening presents, stuffing our faces and drinking a lot of white wine made me slightly fearful of the holiday season. Would Santa find me in Banff, Alberta?

Santa may not have found me (let's be honest, I haven't been a very good girl this year..) and I may not have been in the company of my blood relatives, but I still celebrated Christmas with my family - my Banff family, that is.

Sitting in the living room of my house, surrounded by snow and the people I have come to love and rely on, I could not have felt more blessed. It made me so aware of just how lucky I have been on my journey so far - to constantly be provided with health, safety and good company, no matter where I have found myself. Here I was, a million kilometres away from home, surrounded by twelve people who had all managed to meet each other in the same place, at the same time, for whatever reason and I never felt quite so at home.

In honour of the festive season, we cooked our friends an epic Christmas feast complete with cranberry sauce, baked potatoes, vegetables, gravy and a turkey - stuffed, basted and cooked by yours truly. That's right, not only did I put my hand up a raw turkey but I managed to cook the damn thing with out giving anyone food poisoning. This goes down as one of my greatest travel achievements thus far.

So, much to my relief, I didn't spend Christmas curled up in my bed, crying over my absence from my family and lamenting the delicious meal I know my mother would have cooked. I thought of them fondly, missed them as much as I could allow myself to and carried on celebrating my first white Christmas alongside our cardboard cut-out tree (we're travel junkies on a budget, after all).

Ciao for now.

Happy Half Anniversary, Kristen Hyde

I know it's been awhile since I posted last. I've been a tardy blogger which means I've been a tardy traveller too. After all the excitement of the USA - moving to a new city every few days and finding new adventures to write about - my life in Canada has fallen into a routine. Work, boarding, work, boardring, partying, boarding, work. And sometimes I sleep. But mostly I board.

But I couldn't let today go past without posting, as today is my six month overseas anniversary. Correct-o, I've been an ex-pat for six months. I can't believe that half a year has gone by since I was hugging my parents farewell at Brisbane airport. I've been lugging the same backpack around for the last six months, wearing the same clothes and thinking the same thought that there really is no better way to live. Seeing new things and meeting new people and being so far outside of your comfort zone you don't even recognise yourself. The only buzz-kill is the thought of one day going home. But after six months of travelling and everything that goes with it - the occassional homesickness for your own bed, your own cupboard, breakfast at Le Monde and Tamarama Beach - even home has its merits.

But for now, I'm in Banff and (I'm sorry, family and friends) I'm not going anywhere too soon. Especially now that I have my brand new snowboard in my posession. With all the fresh snow dumping out of the sky and tired of having a debt to my name, I decided to just buy my board and deal with the after-effects of being poor and not being able to drink or eat. Moving from my neighbour's beat up Capita to my untouched Arbor was like driving a rusty old pick-up truck and then upgrading to a Mercedes Benz. The new board not only looks like a dream but turns like she's on rails, which is a vast improvement on the Capita which was like trying to steer a cruise ship on ice. Needless to say, the amount of time I spend boarding verses the amount of time I spend falling on my ass is now greatly outweighed thanks to Betsy.

Yes, I named the board.

Other interesting things that have happened in Banff include the Muskrat Street House losing one housemate and acquiring two new ones, acquiring enough movie files to start our own illegal movie store (including The Neverending Story which just isn't the same when you're 23), taking up yoga and not knowing how I've lived my entire life without it and implementing the tradition of $8 Steak Night every Tuesday at the Elk and Horseman.

And then there's wanting to get my ear pierced again, but that's another story for another time.

Ciao for now. xo

Bless Me Father, For I Am Travelling

I spent the better part of yesterday morning reading back over my blogs from camp and the earlier posts of my travels around America. I do this every now and again, as narcisistic as that might seem. Sometimes it's to torture myself at how much I still miss Appel Farm and the friends I made there. Sometimes it's to comfort myself. Sometimes it's to gain a little perspective.

I've been in Canada for two months now and consider myself fairly settled.  I have friends who are more like family, a job that drags my butt out of bed each day and a local pub where the bouncer no longer bothers to check my ID. I don't have to plan how or where I'm going to get my dinner each night or fight for a position in front of the stove in a hostel kitchen. I have my own kitchen cupboard and a shelf in the fridge and cooking a healthy dinner for myself remains a blessing I can count. In all respects, I feel like I've established a life in Banff.

Which is why I return to my blog posts every now and again - to remind myself that as settled as I might be, I am still a traveller. My feet might be grounded for six months, my backpack empty and stored in the cupboard beneath the stairs, its contents easily accesible in my bedroom closet. But just like when I was jumping buses every other day, bound for a new city with temporary friends and uncomfortable hostel beds, I should still be waking up each morning with that zeal for travelling, that appreciation for everything around me and everything I am experiencing, no matter how settled I might feel.

I remembered this yesterday when I was boarding at Sunshine. I was walking to the gondola with a snowboard under one arm and the snow beneath my feet and I remembered how removed I am from the life I was living in Sydney. Once upon a time I was sitting at my kitchen table struggling to believe I would ever be able to tell travel stories like my family and now travel stories are my reality. Tomorrow, I will go to work on a snow-capped mountain in a country on the other side of the world to my own.

Tomorrow is another day of travelling.

Ciao for now. xo

Birthdays and Boarding

So things are really heating up (or perhaps that should be cooling down...) in Canada, which is good for a variety of reasons, the most important being I finally have some news worth blogging about. After all, nobody likes a rambaling blogger, much like nobody likes a musician at an open mic night who is smitten with the sound of their own voice.

First and foremost, it was my birthday last week and I turned 23. Yet another milestone celebrated on the other side of the world. (For reference, other milestones have included eating gator sausage, watching Steph Holt get her first tattoo and being photographed unawares in a Steakouts advertisement. I am easily satisfied.) The benefit of being from Australia and celebrating your birthday in a different country is that you essentially get an additional 17 hours of celebration time. I saw in my Canadian birthday over pool and (a few too many) shots at The Gap and had Mexican that following evening with my roommates and neighbours, my now Canadian family, who were a fine replacement from the people who would have taken me out in Australia to get me drunk on my birthday. This fine replacement also sat me down to watch the movie, The Number 23, and now I am positive something bad is going to happen to me this year courtesy of the 23 enigma.

After a disappointingly warm introduction to winter, it has FINALLY started snowing! It started dumping last weekend and now everything looks like its coated in a thick layer of icing sugar. Unfortunately, snow doesn't taste anything like icing sugar but it looks pretty none the less. So, with snow to cap its peaks, Sunshine Mountain finally opened its doors to the public and I officially started waitressing at Trappers. My first day on the job was much like being thrown into the sea and told to either sink or swim, but I came out the other side with a better appreciation for northern service expectations and $120 in tips. God bless gratuities.

Like the weather hasn't been bipolar enough over the last month, the temperature plumeted to a very uncomfortable -38 degrees this week, forcing the mountain to close and everyone to seek refuge indoors. Despite it being cold enough to freeze your eyelashes together, Sunshine re-opened for part of the day so that only those crazy skiers and snowboarders who are addicted to the snow like Cher is addicted to the knife, could go up and get frostbite.

With all this snow falling out of the sky, I decided it was time to get my boarding butt on some slopes. I went and bought my snowboarding boots - a pair of peppermint-coloured Thirty Two's which are, in my opinion, the snowboarding equivalent of a pair of Jimmy Choo's but make my feet feel like they're being pushed through a meat mincer. Apparently fashion, and snowboarding, is pain. So with new boots in tow and my neighbour's old snowboard under one arm, I went up the mountain yesterday for my first ride of the season. Having been six years since I was last on the slopes, I greatly underestimated how much I remembered of how to snowboard. I spent most of my first run down the hill on my ass and at one point, jarred my thumb so that it bruised up to the size of a small sausage. By my third run, I had re-mastered the act of balancing but I've got a long way to go before I'll be boarding alongside Shawn White.

But the most exciting news is that, after getting the go-ahead from BUNAC, I should be making my way back across the border for Appel Farm 2011.

I've got my apple, you've got your apple...

Ciao for now. xo

No News, No Snow, No Sanity

I wish this post was bursting with news from abroad. I wish I could say that I've been run off my feet at work, hitting the slopes every other second I get, making enough money to cover my coffee addiction and the layby debt I've established at almost every ski and snowboarding store in Banff.

But unfortunately, none of this is true.

I am still waiting to start work.

I have not hit the slopes.

This is because there is about as much snow up on the mountain as I have things to fill my day with.

And I don't have any of my snowboarding gear as it's all still sitting on layby and can't be paid off until I start work. The only piece of snow gear I have acquired is my WestBeach jacket, which is as warm as it is smashingly attractive. Let's just say that if I get trapped in an avalanche, my jacket will save me. It's a beacon of colour. It's the Skittles of snowboarding jackets.

Unfortantely, all this spare time means I have acquired some seriously bad habits. I now sleep in until at least 10:30am. This is partly because it's too cold in the morning, partly because I know I have nothing better to do than stay in bed and usually because I'm sleeping off a night of 'playing pool' at the Devil's Gap Bar. I skip breakfast and move straight on to lunch, followed by a mid-afternoon nap which gives me enough energy to return to the Devil's Gap at 9pm for more pool. I realise this is far from a healthy lifestyle.

But this week, apart from sitting around watching reruns of How I Met Your Mother, praying for snow and pining for Appel Farm, my small achievement was playing my first gig at Bruno's Bar and Grill. My housemates, assorted neighbours and spattering of friends from around town all turned up to watch my first show and made for an appreciative audience. I play again next week and am hoping I can find a cheap used guitar before then so I can play more songs than just those I learnt in 10th grade music.

I hope my participation in Banff's cultural community might appease the snow gods and in return they will award me with snow.

I never thought I would be so impatient for a dump.

(Okay, that was cheap and nasty - my apologies).

Ciao for now. xo

Halloweening (Off-a the Candy)

It's been an eventful week in Banff, Alberta as me and my new housemates settled into our new home and tried to establish some sort of normalcy in our lives.  But it's hard to feel normal when every day seems to offer up some new Canadian experience.

This week, it was Halloween.

The costumes were outrageous, the candy consumed phenomenal and I'm not even talking about the kids. Trick-or-Treat is a child's game. Trick-or-Try-and-get-as-drunk-as-possible-while-dressed-up-in-a-skantily-clad-costume is the adult interpretation.

Halloween at the Muskrat St house didn't get off to a stereotypical start. We left it until the day of Halloween to buy our pumpkin to carve, only to find out that Banff, and probably the entirity of Alberta, was completely sold out of pumpkins. We didn't bother to buy any candy to hand out and none of our costumes were inspired by porn stars or showed a jaw-dropping amount of flesh (it's just too damn cold for that sort of thing).

But dress up we did - a pirate, an 80s skier, an All Black and a rastifarian - and when we woke the next morning, the demolished pumpkin heads lining the streets weren't the only heads that felt like they'd been kicked in.

This week also marked my first day of work and my first visit to the top of Sunshine Mountain (I was, quite literally, walking on Sunshine). I met the team I'll be working with over the next eight months, started the mass preparation that is setting up Trappers and got a feel for what life is going to be like working up on the mountain. As Sunshine isn't officially open yet (and won't open for at least another week), a lot of the runs remain untouched. That's right, smooth, white untouched powder - like icing on a cake - just begging to be carved across.

And carve across it I will on my beautiful new Arbor snowboard, which waits patiently for me at the ski and snow store in Banff. With my official start day at Trappers still a week away and pay day another fortnight after that, I haven't been able to formally purchase my snowboarding gear and have consequently, set up lay-by debts in multiple stores around Banff. It's either eat, or buy my board. Tricky... very tricky.

But the real blast out of the blue this week came in the form of an open mic night at Bruno's Bar and Grill. Still living a little off the high of performing at Appel Farm, I put myself back on stage and busted out a few original songs at the open mic night for a crowd of appreciative music fans. What resulted was the supervisor asking me to play a regular set at the bar every Thursday night, unpaid but compensated in drinks. It's going to be advertised in the local newspaper, my new friend Jay-the-bongo-player is going to back me up on percussion, they're going to provide me with a guitar to play on and I get to play whatever I want.

Missy Higgins, here I come.

Ciao for now. xo

You Are My Sunshine

Well, readers. It's official.

I am employed!

After a little over a week of nauseating impatience, Sunshine Mountain finally contacted me this morning to let me know the blessed news. I have been hired as a server by Mad Trappers, one of the top bar and restaurants on the mountain.

Hello, gratuities.

And if that's not enough good news, I have moved out of the Samesun Hostel and into my very own house. In a twist of absolute fate, myself and two New Zealand sisters I met at the Samesun managed to sweet-talk our way into a beautiful, two bedroom cabin/apartment a block away from Banff Ave, the main street of Banff. We are cramming five people into our little chalet - the two sisters and myself in one room and two male friends of the sisters in the other. Our landlord is providing us with five single beds, a couch and a coffee table and with the kitchen already decked out with a fridge, microwave, (self-cleaning) oven and dishwasher, not to mention a washer and dryer, all we are left to do is make a trip to the Calgary Walmart to collect kitchen equipment and bedding! I managed to pick up some sheets, blankets and a TV in Banff so we're half way there already.

We officially moved in this morning and had a joint welcome/21st Birthday celebration for Ciahn, which involved pancakes, berries, icecream and champagne. I spilt the champagne on the floor so the apartment is offically christened.

So after a few worrying weeks spent not knowing if everything was going to work out, if I was going to get a job, if I was going to find somewhere to live, if I was going to have to leave Banff, if I was going to have to go home to Australia with my tail between my legs, everything has worked out (like everyone I complained to promised me it would.)

But everyone who knew me before I started this journey also knew how much this all meant to me. How long I had waited to be here and how much frustration and disappointment after disappointment I had gone through before I finally boarded that plane bound for the USA. I spent a long time building this experience up in my head, hearing other people's stories and developing my own preconceptions for what living and working at the snow was going to be like. Sometimes this has been to my detriment, as when things haven't turned out the way I expected, I've discounted them. But I'm fast learning (and being reminded) that this is my time and it's not necessarily going to be like everybody else's experiences. That doesn't make it better or worse, just mine. I expected to be living in staff accommodation on the hill. Now, I'm living in a wicked house with two sisters whom I love and a kitchen which allows me to cook whatever and whenever I want.

And not only did I move in and get offered a job today, but it has started snowing.

And they say, it isn't going to stop.

Ciao for now. xo

(Not Quite) Walking on Sunshine

My apologies for the lack of blogging. It's been a tough ol' week and with all the stress of trying to find work, blogging about it has been the last thing I've felt like doing.

After travelling four hours to Banff and spending five days there, I did not return to Cranbrook a very happy camper. I attended the Sunshine Mountain job fair and interviewed for two positions - one as a liftie and one in hospitality. I felt pretty confident about how the interviews went and was told that I would hear back about the liftie position on Friday and the hospitality position on the 25th. After almost dying of anticipation, Friday came and went and I didn't recieve any exciting email in my inbox. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday - still nothing. Needless to say, I was pretty disappointed and kicking myself that I had put all my eggs in the one Sunshine Mountain basket. I now have one shot left to work on the mountain or start looking for a job in Banff itself and believe me, there are plenty of other people in that particular search party.

The real highlight of Banff - other than the breathe-taking views and the cool people I met - was for the first time in my life, I saw snow. Snow, actually coming out of the sky like confetti. Some girlfriends and myself had planned on doing a hike but on our way through town, the street suddenly clouded over and from out of nowhere, white fluffy flakes started falling from the sky. They danced their way down and dissolved as soon as they hit the pavement. It was pretty cool and I'm assured there is plenty more where they came from.

On a more upbeat note, it has been nice to return to Cranbrook for a few days. The hostel room I was staying in at the Samesun Hostel in Banff was a mixed-dorm in which I was the only girl and the snoring that issued from the other five beds could have moved mountains. Back at Steph's, I have the comfort of my own smooshy double bed, my own bathroom and the first two seasons of Laguna Beach.

Steph and her family and friends have been very attentive in ensuring I am having the ultimate Canadian experience. Steph's dad took me to an ice hockey game last night between the Kootenay Ice and the Edmonton Oil Kings, the junior league which is one level below professional. Thankfully, I had watched The Mighty Ducks (1, 2 and 3) enough times to understand most of what was going on and any of my questions were answered in detail by Steph's dad. The whole experience was very exciting, especially the parts where the 20 year-old boys smashed each other into the glass panels surrounding the rink and then got sin-binned for brawling. It's like rugby league but on ice with sticks and pucks and padding.

Okay, so nothing like rugby league but a good night out none the less.

I'm hanging out in Cranbrook for two more nights and then heading back to Banff on Friday with my can-do attitude a-blazing. There's a job out there in the snow with my name on it.

Ciao for now. xo

If You Love Canada, Put Your Hands Up!

USA. Shmoo-SA.

Canada is where it's at.

I hate to play favourites, especially given all the amazing and diverse places I've been in the last four months, but I'm sorry US of A, if you and Canada where in a beauty pagent, Canada would win the crown.

I am not even going to attempt to describe how beautiful this country is. I feel like no cliches or original lines of immaculate verse could do justice to the picturesque views that reveal themselves around every bend in the road. Since I arrived in Cranbrook, British Columbia on Saturday, I've been literally dragging my jaw behind me like a stubborn puppy. Every window I look out of, every hill I reach the top of, every valley which appears before me leaves me speechless. There is nothing in Australia and nothing I have seen in the last four months which compares to the towering mountains and kilometre after kilometre of green and gold pine trees which cover the country side. It's so beautiful, it feels like I've fallen into a postcard.

The mind-numbing, 14-hour trip to get across the American border to Canada was all worth it when I touched down in Cranbrook and was met by the happy face of Stephanie Murray, long-time friend who I met in high school while she was on exchange. As always, it felt nice to be back in the company of someone I'd known for more than a few days and even nicer when she took me back to her house and welcomed me into my own room, with a private bathroom. Is this resort living, or what?

In a wicked twist of fate, I managed to time my arrival in Canada on the weekend of Thanksgiving so Saturday and Sunday nights were spent in the company of Steph's family who introduced me to the festive holiday that celebrates the harvest. In a few words, Thanksgiving is like Christmas, but without the presents. All you do is eat. Turkey, lamb, ham, potatoes, yams, cranberries, vegetable casserole, gravy and of course, pumpkin pie. All this goes down with a few glasses of red wine and a much needed nap after the feasting is done.

While I'm calling Cranbrook home-base for now, I left today to pursue the reason I came to Canada in the first place. Work. After a four hour bus drive to Alberta which wound through even more mind-bogglingly beautiful countryside - I'm talking streams so icy blue they could be made of glass and mountains covered in the skeletons of wind-burnt pine trees - I arrived in Banff. Tomorrow, I head to my interview at the Banff Job Fair, where fingers, toes and fallopian tubes crossed, I secure myself a job and accommodation at Sunshine Mountain, where the next snowy part of my journey begins.

Everytime I arrive in a new place, I think my travels can not get any better, that my current experience can not be trumped. After arriving in Banff, anything more and I think I might die of aesthetic happiness.

PS. Except that it is FREAKING COLD!

Ciao for now. xo

Land of the Free

It has been three months and 21 days since I left the golden shores of Australia, bound for the land of the free. Since then, I have been the counselor for 27 beautiful and boistrous teenage girls, had a shaving cream fight in my bikini, swam in the Atlantic Ocean, stood at the top of the Empire State Building, eaten alligator sausage, drunk bourbon on Bourbon St, stood in Elvis Presley's living room, painted the town red in Nashville, surfed on a complete stranger's couch, eaten deep-dish pizza, gained a few too many kilos, seen the trees change in Ohio, spent a lot of time driving a lot of highways with a lot of life-changing people and stood on Carrie Bradshaw's stoop. And after three months and 21 days, my time in the United States of America has officially ended. .

My last post from the US of A is being written from the Philadelphia Airport where I arrived after a two hour bus ride from NYC at midnight. Here, sister dearest and I bid our farewells after spending the week in New York City together. I don't think there could have been a more perfect way for me to spend my last week in America. Each day I was treated to a different side of NYC's mixed personality as I trotted between the east, the west, the shabby and the chic. I bought used books from chatty roadside vendors in Greenwich only to purchase over-priced Christmas decorations from Saks Fifth Ave. I drank cocktails and coffee and marvelled at the strange creatures which inhabit this city. And the cream on top of the New York cupcake - I stood on Carrie Bradshaw's stoop. Even if I never marry or have children or publish a book, this small achievement allows me to die a happy and hopeless woman.   

Having just spent three very uncomfortable hours of the early morning sleeping on a line of chairs in the completely empty ticketing foyer, it's no suprise the Do Not Disturb-look has gone up on my face. And at 5:35 in the morning, this is only the beginning. To reach a town in the country right next door to the USA, I must survive three flights, two stop-overs and a lot of bad airplane coffee. But what, and who, wait for me on the other side are all worth it.

And with that, as my flight is called on the over-head, I must say my final farewell to the USA. Part of me feels a pang to be leaving the country that introduced me to so many 'firsts' - my first independent travel, my first camp, my first pumpkin pie. But another part of me rests assured that it won't be too long before I feast my eyes on her stars and stripes once again.

Ciao for now. xo

I'm In A Carrie Bradshaw State of Mind

It feels like I haven't been a city girl in a while. For three months, I've been living in over-sized t-shirts, denim cut-offs, canvas shoes and wearing little to no make-up. Using a hair straightner feels like a foreign concept, not to mention actually going somewhere which would require I straighten my hair. Let's just say two months of camp and one month of backpacking hasn't given me much opportunity to dress and behave like the city girl I am when at home in Sydney.

Needless to say, I felt a little rusty upon my arrival back in New York. Here I was in one of the fashion capitals of the world where I may bump into Anna Wintour at any moment, get caught in the background of a fashion shoot or get hit by a speeding cab and all my savviest, fashion-forward outfits are at home in Australia, packed in suitcases under my bed! I'm still fine-tuning how to style my new haircut and having come straight out of summer, I don't have any shoes which are suitable for the cold and rainy weather which greeted me upon arrival.

Then a man on a train, in offering me his seat, asked me if I was pregnant.

So now, not only am I unfashionable, but I am also fat.

Not quite the Carrie Bradshaw-inspired arrival I imagined for myself.

But as Alicia Keys crooned - These streets will make you feel brand new, these lights will inspire you -and within a day or two of being back in the world of high heels and candy-like cocktails, I got my groove back. I cut out bagels as one of my primary food groups, hit the gym and bought a pair of boots. With what few fashionable items I unearthed from the depths of my backpack, I threw together some savvy outfits and realised that straightening one's hair is indeed like riding a bike. Then with my credit card in one hand and my integrity in the other, I took to the NYC streets channeling the attitude of my New York oracle, Carrie Bradshaw.

Being single and fabulous in New York City is made all the more easier by staying in a swanky hotel and courtesy of my sister, who's work happened to send her to New York the exact same week that I was planning to visit, I'm thankful for getting a bit of much-appreciated red-carpet treatment at the Andaz Hotel. Not only do I get to stay in a suite which boasts its own bathroom, supply of yummy treats which are restocked daily, a flat-screen TV with cable and a big plush queen bed, but I get to share it all in the company of my sister. Our return to Hyde-Sisterhood Status was celebrated by spending Sunday trundling around Brooklyn doing what we love most - eating and taking photographs of street art.

However, with Sister Dearest here for work, the daylight hours are mine and mine alone. With the weather throwing a wet blanket over my plans to wander around the city neighbourhoods on a whim, the rain drove me inside on Monday and Tuesday. I ticked a few more tourist landmarks off my list - the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MET), Grand Central Station and the New York Public Library. That's right ladies, I stood on the staircase where Carrie Bradshaw did not marry Big.

The sun decided to co-operate this morning and lavished me with some blue sky, so it was off to Greenwich Village - what was the haunt of the artists and bohemians of the 70s but is now the stomping ground of NYU students and beautiful, if not surprisingly, overpriced apartment blocks. I found the world's most satisfying thrift store - Munk Vintage Thrifts, 175 Macdougal Street - where I bought a giant Nordstrom scarf for a tidy $15. This was followed by a cupcake from Magnolia Bakery (Sex In The City reference) which I guzzled in the Washington Square Park while writing poetry and watching wayward bohemian-types busking Bob Marley tunes. I then walked back to the subway where I accidently came across another Sex In The City landmark, the Jefferson Market Garden, which was the locale of Miranda and Steve's wedding.

And to top it all off, I'm typing this post from the window seat of my hotel where below me, the streets are full of busy New York commuters hailing taxi cabs and scurrying towards subway stations. A pipe protruding from the sidewalk billows a steady stream of white cloud into the air, which dissolves into the twilight sky as street vendors shut up shop for the night. Before my eyes, the street lights are flickering on as the city shrugs out of its business suit and slips into its evening dress code. Just like Carrie Bradshaw, New York City itself has an outfit for everything.

And here I am, writing in the middle of it.

Ciao for now. xo

You, Me and E-Town

Elizabethtown may not have a Disney World, an Empire State Building, a major museum of any significance, a major bridge of any significance or really anything of any significance, BUT it did have Kate Leibrand and to me, she is considerably significant. After a one and a half hour train trip from Philadelphia to Elizabethtown, me and my bestie from Appel Farm were finally reunited.

There may not be any major over-priced tourist attractions to visit in Elizabethtown, but the town does play host to Elizabethtown College which is an attraction in itself, especially for a tourist. I've stayed in a few college towns so far on my journey (Durham, Florida and Nashville) and while I experienced a brief game of beer pong with some Vanderbilt boys in Nashville, Elizabethtown was my first introduction to the college life in America.

And I'm happy to say, college is one more stereotype flaunted by the movies and television shows which isn't so far from the actual truth - houses host keg parties, beer is served in large plastic red cups, the boys are jocks, the girls go to Homecoming and no one really cares about their actual education. And everyone on campus eats breakfast, lunch and dinner at the same gigantic cafeteria which has a smiliarly gigantic buffet of every possible food item you could ever want to eat.

I won't fill you in on the antics of my three days in Elizabethtown, except that I took part in a fair few of those large red cups and felt their effects. Thankfully, I was able to hold my own when it came to flip cup and beer pong.

Can definitely say I'll be leaving America with one or two new skills under my expanding belt.

Ciao for now.

Flip Flip Flipadelphia

Having been on the road for the last month, moving consistently from place to place every couple of days, it was a relief to get back to good ol’ comfortable Philly. Having seen most of the tourist sites when I visited the city during camp, I didn’t feel the accountability to get out and see as much as I could every day. Having come from Canton where it was a similar story, I felt like I had checked myself into roadtrip rehab. Rather than getting up at the crack of sparrows every day, armed with my Lonely Planet and a metro card, I slept in, watched cable and ventured outside only when the fancy (or my appetite) demanded so.


Continuing to tread on the kindness of the Carmeny family, Tim again welcomed me into his home in Philly, which he shares with another Appel Farm friend, Julie. Parked on the couch directly in front of the cable, it was hard to tear myself away from marathons of America’s Next Top Model, especially with the fall weather rearing its ugly head outside. I continue to be followed by a literal black cloud, unable to escape the rain no matter where I go.

But that didn’t stop me from grabbing my umbrella and going out looking for food, usually with Tim in tow. We did bagels on South Street, margaritas on Passyunk Ave, coffee on 4th and pizza on 2nd. Not to mention mid-night snacks as we stayed up watching the Top 100 Hits of the 90s on VH1. We burned off the carbohydrates by playing Frisbee in the park where we attempted to teach an uncoordinated five year old how to toss a Frisbee without decapitating our fellow park-goers.

I even managed to turn down a morning with the Gilmore Girls to go and get my haircut – an indulgent necessity I have been battling with for the last two months. My hairdresser – bless her – tried her best to recreate the brilliance of Sydney’s Neil Moody, but alas, cut my hair an inch too short. However, as annoying as this is for the time being, does mean I can tack another few weeks onto the time period before my Rapunzel-like hair once again grows out of shape.

As it turned out, I wasn’t the only one treading on Tim and Julie’s kindness. While I couch surfed, a mouse had also decided to make itself at home in the living room. Each evening as I tried to sleep, I would be awoken to what sounded like something the size of a gorilla building a nuclear warhead. Despite our joint attempts to catch the mouse by blocking its exits and buying sticky traps, the mouse continued to remain evasive - stealing both cereal and my precious sleeping hours.

But before I could say “Out damned mouse”, I was once again packing my bags and boarding a train, bound for Elizabethtown where another greatly-missed Appel Farm face awaited me.

Ciao for now. xo

A Little WaWah

There was a serious pull on my heart-strings last night as Tim Carmeny and I drove the eight hours from Canton, Ohio back to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The tug came as we stopped to get gas (*cough*, sorry, petrol) at a Wawa.

Having not seen a Wawa in little over a month (being an eastern roadstop), I was overwhelmed with memories of camp and our miscellenous roadtrips to get slushies or hogies or just plane candy at the local Wawa. Being back on the eastern coast, so close to Philly and New Jersey and therefore camp,  I realised that essentially, I was home. Back to the old stomping ground that is the eastern seaboard.

When I rattle of the list of places I've been in the last month - from New York down to Miami, New Orleans, Memphis, Nashville, St Louis, Chicago and Ohio - it sounds like I've been on the road my entire life. But when I think about it, it feels like only yesterday that I was kicking back with the musos in Nashville, only the day before that Caitlin and I were cruising down the highway between North and South Carolina. So much has happened in the last month and it has rushed by just as quickly as the road beneath my bus's tyres. I've gone swimming on Miami's South Beach, drank bourbon on Bourbon Street, stood in the studio where Elvis Presley recorded his first song, played pool with future country music sensations and wandered the streets of Chicago with my jaw dragging along the pavement.

It's easy to look back and only remember the long slogs between cities on uncomfortable bus seats or packing then re-packing my backpack for the fiftieth time that week or lying on someone's couch missing my own bed and own bathroom and Sex in the City collection like crazy.

But walking through a new place (or even an old familiar place like Philadelphia) still gets me. It still instills in me the satisfaction and excitement of being in another country and of seeing different things and being foreign unto myself. Even when travelling gets fatiguing and the thought of climbing on another bus is enough to make me want to cash in my passport, just being here puts me back where I belong.

Ciao for now. xo

Can Do In Canton

After the hustle, bustle and business of Chicago, it was nice to board the bus and arrive in Ohio. Seven hours later, I'd gone from skyline city to farmland fabulous. Ohio is famous for producing corn, apples and pumpkins and with Halloween just around the corner, those beautiful orange orbs are just about everywhere.

Ohio also offers the Carmeny family and my accommodation for the six days I am here. Courtesy of Lydia and Tim Carmeny, who I met while at Appel Farm, I have been welcomed under the roof of their 'Gram' who is just about as cute as a button. Imagine the kind of grandma you'd want if you were featuring in a cartoon, turn her voice up a few pitches and put her in a chair playing Boggle. And where ever Gram goes, Buddy the rescue dog must also follow. Gram's house is a bit like a hostel in itself, people are always coming or going or staying. She keeps a guest book in the foyer for those who are visiting to sign and like any good host, is constantly checking in to see you're happy and satisfied (your stomach that is).

Not that I need to be satisfied. Ohio itself offers everything the weary traveller needs. Beautiful vistas of green trees, slowly starting to turn yellow and red with the change to fall. Once abundant crops of corn now singed to gold as they drop their leaves. Ohio is about as picturesque as a postcard and even more so now that fall is starting to poke its face around the corner. Even now, in the late September, I can see the slow change of seasons as the trees begin to morph their colours. The houses in Ohio are dressing their front porches with orange, yellow and red festivities with haunting jack-o-lanterns burning bright in the evening light.

It must be quite an experience to be here through October and November - the trees burning up in the frost and dropping their leaves until they're left naked and bare, the streets full of kids in their costumes as they call for trick or treats and everything covered in snow as warm bodies celebrate Christmas around stoked fires and plates of pumpkin pie (of which I just had my first taste).

The aesthetic of fall is just as romantic as all those movies depict.

Ciao for now. xo

Chicago in Three

I have much to rave in regards to how wonderful Chicago is, but so this post doesn't go on forever, I am going to limit myself to three main points of interest.

1. Food

After leaving Glenn in Logan Square, I moved to the AAE Panthenon Hostel, which left much to be desired, but was located in the heart and blessed soul of Greektown. Which meant, food food food. You couldn't swing an olive branch without hitting something delicious. Greek restaurants, Greek cafes, Greek bakeries, Greek butchers, even Greek take-out. I ate so much souvlaki and baklava, I now outweigh my backpack.

And if I wasn't eating Greek, I was eating pizza - famous deep dish pizza which is so deep you could practically swim in the cheese layering. So deep, so cheesy, but so good. The AAE Panthenon, while located in Greektown, was also conveniently located around the corner from Giordano's - a Chicago pizza institution. And as I couldn't find anyone to share a pizza with me because my hostel was a wasteland, I ate one all to myself. Now, my backpack is carrying me.

Along with these, there were also other delictable discoveries. Ear Wax - the vegetarian cafe on Milwaukee St, Wicker Park that makes wicked falafel and gives you a big dump of hummus as a side. And Nookies Tree in Belmont, where not only did I get the best vegetarian burger, complete with cucumber and mango salsa, but the gay waiter (this being Belmont) said that he liked my polkadot pants and that I was styling.

By the way - the vegetarian cafe, the vegetarian burger - I know it might sound like I'm turning vegetarian, but it's only because I am suffering from the sheer lack of vegetables in my life. I am still a meat-eater, I swear.

2. BeveragesAnd if I wasn't eating Greek or pizza or the occassional vegetable, I was drinking coffee. That's right, for the first time in the four months I have been in America, I FINALLY found first-class expresso coffee at the cafe group, Intellegentsia. Sweet, expresso relief. And while they may not make a flat white, or know what a piccolo is, one of their baristas was crowned the world champ at the 2010 Barista World Championships. Although, I would still argue that Le Monde is better. But then again, I am biased.

And there was also the occassional drinking of alcoholic beverages at assorted hole-in-the-wall bars throughout Wicker park.

 

3. The Art

Okay, so I know I've crooned this repetitively like a rooster but the art in Chicago really is unlike anything else. There is so much to look at, so much that isn't hidden behind a frame and a barrier in a gallery. It's all out there on the street and in the people you pass and the hopeful buskers playing blues ballads on the train platforms. The skyscrapers themselves personify Chicago - the way they reflect the sky's electric hue and force you to see the world from a new perspective.

 
Ciao for now. xo

Post A Comment...

Want to make the life of this lone traveller a little less lonely? POST A COMMENT! This blog is just as much my personal travel newspaper, as it is a forum for your own experiences or advice. Everyone's got their own travel tale or horror story or life-changing experience on the road to relive. I've told you mine, now I want to hear yours.

And it's super easy! Not being a rocket scientist is not a valid excuse! Simply click the comments link at the end of any post, write your desired message, select an existing ID or to remain anonymous and then click the big silver button that says Post Comment. And hey presto, you're done!

Happy commenting!

Ciao for now. xo

Travelling Alone - A Pro and Con List

Pro - You can crawl out of your miserable hostel bed at what ever time you please. You are your own alarm clock.

Pro - You can eat what you want, when you want, where you want and for how long it takes.

Con - Sometimes, sitting at the bar with nothing but a vodka and soda for company makes one feel kind of pathetic.

Pro - You can stop and shop in a store for as long as you like.

Con - But when you find that gorgeous dress that is about the same price as a few nights in a hostel, it would be nice to have a second opinion to make you PUT IT BACK ON THE RACK! YOU CAN'T AFFORD IT! HOW ARE YOU GOING TO EAT?!

Pro - Deciding what you're going to do, where to go to get there and how long you're going to be there before you move on to the next tourist attraction, doesn't take the entire day to organise. You're own itinerary is just that, you're own.

Con - When you're standing in front of the World's Biggest Blah Blah Blah, it would be nice to have someone to share it with.

Pro - You can take as many photos as you like without someone tapping you on the shoulder, telling you to hurry up because they need to pee/are hungry/are tired/will cut off your fingers if you take one more damn photo.

Con - You take so many carefully aimed selfies of you and said tourist attraction, even Facebook would be ashamed. Or, you have to do the awkward "Hi, can you please take a photo of me in front of Lake Who Really Cares?" and then try to smile while hiding the fear in your eyes that the good samaritan you just asked to be your paparazzi might suddenly make off with your camera.

Con - With no one to share the load, you constantly look like a pack horse.

Pro - With no one to share the load, you don't have to listen to people complain about how heavy your and their bags are.

Pro -  You can sleep on the bus/train/plane.

Con - It would be nice to have a friendly shoulder to sleep against on the bus/train/plane.

Con - When the old man who sat down next to you on the bus/train/plane starts telling you about his rheumetism, you'd sell your soul for a friend to turn to keep you conversationally unavailable.

Pro - When the cool cats you met at the hostel invite you to spend the day with their travel party at That Beach or That Park or That Neighborhood, or are also heading to That City on That Train and staying at That Hostel, it's nice to feel your little heart inflate. Ah, friends.

Pro - When people ask what you're doing and who you're doing it with and you say that you're travelling alone, the impressive look that crosses their face makes even your toes feel proud.

Con - Then the pride turns to fear as you worry that they might kidnap you or steal all your belongings, including your sacred collection of travel magnets.

Pro - When you're sitting alone in a cafe eating the most delicious breakfast you've ever wrapped your lips around, or on the train whizzing past burnt orange corn fields and electric blue skies, or standing in front of the most magnificent sculpture or building or creation, and you could share it with someone or you could just exist their quitely taking in the sheer awe of this inspiring world you're in, travelling alone totally trumps.  

Ciao for now. xo

Be'an in The Windy City

After spending the day in Chicago, I've definitely come to realise - summer is over.

The Windy City showed me just why she was christened with such a nickname as Glenn and I headed Down Town for the day. The wind whips through the city streets like a hot knife through butter and for the first time, I was confronted with the real cold of the north. Canada is certainly going to be an interesting experience...

But not even the cold could detract from the beautiful Chicago city. Beautiful doesn't even do it justice. When the clouds cleared long enough for the sun to pop its head out, you couldn't tell which was the city skyline and which was the sky. Every window in every skyscraper reflected the brilliant blue, creating a mozaic of sky and glass. 

Everything in Chicago - architecture, sculptures, gardens, pavements - is an opportunity to push the envelope in what is interesting and obscure. There's the art that hangs in meticulous position at the Chicago Institute of Art and then there's the gigantic eyeball that lies in the middle of the city for everyone to appreciate. Brick walls are covered in professional grafitti and gardens are filled with iron sculptures.

And then there's The Bean - a gigantic metal kidney bean which sits in the middle of Millenium Square. From every angle, the bent metal reflects obscure images of itself and the city, strange warped perspectives that make for the most interesting photographs. If my camera battery hadn't run out, I could have filled a few gigabytes worth just taking photos of every aspect of The Bean. It definitely lived up to the hype.

The more I see of Chicago, the more tempted I am to move here.

Ciao for now. xo

Welcome to Chicag-ie

Despite the six hour commute between St Louis and Chicago, I really had little to complain about. Taking the Amtrak train is like travelling first class compared to the flea-infested Greyhound. Rather than sitting next to an ex-felon or a woman who smells like bacon, I sat next to a lovely girl who did her trigonometry test and didn't say a peep. I stretched out in my luxuriously large train seat, ate a packet of MnMs and  took in the beautiful scenery flying by. Then I watched High Fidelity on my laptop, an ironic choice you could say, given that it was filmed in Chicago.

My intitial thoughts on Chicago are - New York? Shmoo-York. LA? Shmell-A. Chicago is the bitchingest city I've been in yet. It has all the city-cement you could hope for along with the arts culture I crave. Every corner boasts another vintage discovery, every street holds another fine dining experience and for the first time, actual acceptable coffee! But the best thing that Chicago has to offer is Glenn Hendrick.


After two weeks on the road by my lonesom, it's nice to be back in the company of a friend. Glenn lives in Lincoln Square in Chicago, on the edge of the famous Wicker Square. Today we wondered around Wicker Square, which was a bad idea, as the streets offer one vintage store after another vintage store. Sister Dearest's advice to me before I left continues to ring in my ears - "If you see something you like, buy it. You're overseas." And so I continue to acquire an interesting collection of clothing and crafts. However, my favourite discovery today (other than the black pinafore dress I bought) was the community book exchange - what looked like a newspaper dispenser bin but where people could leave and exchange books with each other.

I'm bringing this concept home to Sydney, along with my black pinafore dress.

Ciao for now. xo

Meet Me in St Louis (A Couch Surfer's Experience)

I survived another thrilling six hour adventure on the Greyhound to make it to St. Louis, Missouri (this time, there was a baby that didn’t stop crying from the moment it boarded the bus. You know the type of crying I’m talking about, the one that sounds like a death metal fanatic at a Metallica concert).

St. Louis is a cute type of city, much like a teenager that missed that part of puberty when they were supposed to get a growth spurt. This is in fact the story of St. Louis. Once upon a time, it was a booming metropolis, also referred to as the Gateway to the West. In honour of this namesake, St Louis erected the first largest freestanding structure called The Arch – a large semi-circle of steel which is situated between the city and the banks of the Mississippi. Apart from its historical reference to the city, The Arch looks like just that, a giant arch.

Anyway, St Louis began to lose popularity to larger cities around it – Chicago, Philadelphia, New York – and soon the population dwindled considerably. This is partly due to the political and governmental organisation of the city wherein St Louis and St Louis County exist as two completely different entities, meaning that each smaller suburb is responsible for itself and are able to streamline the caste system with their own governments to control taxes.

All this I learnt from my hosts, Hannah and Tony, in my first ever couch surfing experience.

Definition of Couch Surfing: Where a poor backpacker takes advantage of the kindness of strangers and sleeps on the couch or spare bedroom of people he/she has never met before.

Couch Surfing is not such an uncommon way to travel anymore and while at first I had my reservations, friends who had surfed and survived with little to no horror stories, recommended it as a worthwhile experience. So I joined the online community Couch Surfing.com and found myself a cute couple, Hannah and Tony, who lived with their three cats on the outskirts of St Louis.

While most couch surfers do just that – surf/sleep on a couch – I was lucky enough to get my own room at Hannah and Tony’s. They were very welcoming and went to great lengths to make me feel as safe and at home as possible. While both studied (you guessed it, politics), I was left up to my own devices during the day.
As discussed, St Louis is a geographically divided city, with each of the suburbs almost like a different city unto itself. After visiting The Arch and taking a million shameless photos, I made my way to the City Museum, the main reason I had come to St Louis in the first place. The City Museum is a playground for children and adults alike, made completely out of recycled materials (tin cans, train carriages, yellow school buses etc). But I got there to find that, between Labour weekend and March, it’s shut Monday and Tuesday. And what two days was I in St Louis for? Yah – Monday and Tuesday.

So I put my disappointed butt back on the train and headed out to Maplewood and The Loop for a spot of retail therapy. The Loop is known as one of the 10 Most Famous Shopping Strips in America and is a retail playground of vintage thrift stores, boutiques and independent handy-crafts. And you know how I can’t deny a good handy-craft...

After breakfast with Hannah this morning where we talked more politics, I spent a few enjoyable hours lazing around the house watching cable and playing with the cats. Then, for what felt like the thirtieth time, I squeezed my belongings and fresh purchases into a bag that I swear has the magical powers of Mary Poppins – I continue to procure and it continues to somehow accommodate.

And I boarded the Amtrak train and was left wondering what I’d been missing out all of these weeks, schlepping it out on the dirty bus when such heaven existed on the railway tracks.

Ciao for now. xo

Music City

After spending four days in Nashville, I was generally disappointed to leave the place. I found things there that I never expected. For the first time since being on the road by myself, I didn't feel the pulsing pressure to go out and see as much as I possibly could. There was something about the daylight in Nashville - it just makes you want to be and appreciate, without a map or an itinerary or a camera. I found myself falling in to step with the world and finally finding my stride as a traveller.

Without a doubt, the best part about Nashville was the music. Every night offered a new buffet of talent. On my last night, I went and saw the Dirty Dozen Brass Band - a brass band from New Orleans who played southern jazz like you've never heard before. But it wasn't just about the bands in the bars. It was the people I was staying with at my hostel. Everyone harbored some secret talent for music and some of my favourite memories involve sitting around the hostel at 3 AM listening to these incredible musicians playing music just for the hell of it. I was exposed to some incredible people who have encouraged me and changed me and certainly left their treble cleff imprint on my travels, each in their own way.

Ciao for now. xo

Beneath the Brim

What is most interesting about Nashville is not the hat-wearing-boot-scooting cowboys or even the music they play. It's all the things that lie beneath the stereotype that make Nashville more than just a hicksville city.

Like the fact that in Centennial Park, there sits a giant replica of the Greek Parthenon. Giant. And it's surrounded by the lush green grounds of the park where ducks wonder between the fountains.

Or at The Frayed Knot - the local bar for the Vanderbilt collegiates - they actually play beer pong, on tables designed and designated strictly for beer pong. And dressed in their deck shoes with the sleeves rolled up on their salmon pink Ralph Lauren shirts, they get very drunk trying to prove their masculinity by bouncing a ping pong ball into a slightly-full cup of beer.

Or how the music is not strictly knee-slapping-swing-ya-girl-round country tunes. The live music (of which there is plenty to choose from) is a hybrid mix of country, pop, jazz, soul and even hip hop - a rapper beatboxing with a violin is quite a scene to behold. Even my hostel, AAE Music City, is overflowing with talent. A piano sits in the lounge room where people lay down honky tonk tunes when the feeling suits them, or each pick up a guitar to play the Dueling Banjos or their latest musical creation.

That's what makes this city Nashville.

Ciao for now. xo