Australia Update 1: Distracted by kookaburras

#139. How's our big trip going so far? This is where you find out.

Welcome to The Silent Why - usually a podcast on a mission to open up honest conversations around grief and explore whether hope can be found in 101 different types of permanent loss - but right now, things are a little different!

If you've heard the previous episode, you'll have a good idea what this one is going to be all about. 

We (Chris & Claire, your hosts) are on an adventure halfway around the world, spending some time down under. In this episode, we update you on our trip so far via Singapore to Western Australia.

And since recording (just a few hours ago), we've already remembered plenty of things we forgot to mention; like how warm the sea was in Singapore, the unexpectedly delicious ice cream sandwiches (thanks Mel!), the luge rides, the different Maltesers, and the glorious abundance of Earl Grey tea over here. 

No doubt those stories, and many more, will make their way into a future episode. 

So far we've seen and experienced some amazing things, but we've also had some disappointments, and you know us - we love to share it all with you, so tune in, and join us.

Plus, for videos of the kookaburra and bobtail lizard we mention, find us on social media.

Transcript

Copy

Field Recording In Quarry Park

Claire 0:02

Hello, welcome to The Silent Why podcast, but also welcome to Quarry Park in Mandurah, Western Australia.

Chris 0:09

Whoop whoop. Under a big sky that's blue in colour, no clouds, surrounded by trees and grass and rock and crickets making noises. Something's making noises.

Claire 0:22

Butterflies. Last time we were here, there was a bobtailed lizard running around, so we're hoping to see another one of those. If you haven't seen one, Google it, they're funny little things.

Chris 0:30

It wasn't just one.

Claire 0:31

That's true. We just see four.

Chris 0:33

Did we see three or four?

Claire 0:35

And a couple of adults.

Chris 0:36

Bobtails.

Claire 0:37

I'm just gonna take my hat off. I left it on. We've we just took some photos for the artwork.

Chris 0:41

With our Aussie hats.

Claire 0:42

And uh I've left my hat on. Hang on. Okay, hats off.

Chris 0:45

When we arrived, our hosts have generously gifted us some headwear, which includes the hat that I'm wearing. Yeah. Which is uh or it has uh we're unaware of the Australian joke, but it's it's quite notorious, would you say, this brand? Seems to be, yeah. Bushchuck.

Claire 1:01

Yeah.

Chris 1:01

So that's based on a beer, is it called Emu Export?

Claire 1:04

Yes. I think emus? Do you call Emu's bushchucks?

Chris 1:07

Something like that. You're gonna see me wafting lots of flies around.

Claire 1:10

There's lots of flies, yeah, because you might go everywhere.

Chris 1:12

Okay, you're gonna see me wafting flies. I'm covered in insect propellant.

Claire 1:16

Because isn't one for the bites, he's had quite a few bites, so he's uh he's extra sensitive at the moment to flying things.

Chris 1:22

So I'm covered in repellent, but I'm wearing my bushchuck hat, which is very funny. It's reversible, so the side there's there's a black side with just a little bit of branding, or there's a very colourful bushchuck. So yeah, bush chicken, bushchuck.

Claire 1:36

Bushchuck, yeah. So yeah, check out the photo to see that. And I've got on not the hat I was gifted when I arrived. I had a blue uh cap which I've been wearing with a bin chicken on the front, and you might have heard us in the last episode talking about bin chickens. Um, they're actually Ibis. Is that a bird? Yeah, white birds with this big long black beak. Apparently they're known for going round bins. We haven't seen one anywhere near a bin yet, but we have seen quite a lot of them. Um so that was my hat. But then we also purchased a bigger, proper Australian hat where you get lots of shade all the way around, and I'm wearing that one today.

Chris 2:06

And that thing underneath the chin like a chin scrap.

Claire 2:09

That holds it on, which we've worked out as very useful, yeah, because when it's windy, you just lose those things instantly. So I can see why they've got those um very handy. Yeah, so we thought today we would come along um to one of the local parks near where we're staying and record some stuff for you because it's probably been the first opportunity we've really had or felt we could record

Singapore Flight And Meeting Mel

Claire 2:30

some stuff. And when we asked in the last episode for feedback on whether you'd want to hear from us, um we had some lovely responses from people saying yes. Basically, everyone's very kind saying if you can we'd love to hear it, but don't worry about it. But people wanted to hear about the travel tips and not travel tips, or you know, the travel stuff that we've been doing and experiencing. We don't have any travel tips. Um so yeah, here we are. We thought we'd come and we'd feedback on how things have gone so far. So we we flew to Singapore on the 15th of October. We had a week there, uh a few couple of nights in a hotel, and then we say we quit his brother and his wife and our two nieces, um, and we experienced Singapore for the first time. What's your takeaway from Singapore?

Chris 3:09

Well, before we get to Singapore, uh how nice the flight was with Mel, with our lovely flight to Singapore, that's true.

Claire 3:17

We had um, although some of you know that you know we're Christians, um, we pray about stuff, and one of the things that I've been praying about was the person that I'd end up sitting next to um on the plane, because it's a 14-hour flight, and you know, there's some people you do and don't want to be sat next to, and I was like, please let it be somebody really lovely that we can bless on the way and that maybe they can bless us, it'll just be a nice interaction. And she was the nicest person we could have got. In fact, if you're listening to this Mel, because she said she might listen, um, then yeah, thank you so much. We've exchanged messages on Instagram and it was a lovely flight, it was lovely to chat to her. She's got parents in Singapore, so she gave us some tips on things to do. We were able to chat about life in the UK. It was yeah, it was really lovely, so that was really cool.

Chris 3:59

She gave us some great tips about Singapore. In fact, in 13 hours and a flight with Mel, we had more travel tips than the two of us could piece together for all the online research.

Claire 4:09

Definitely, yeah.

Chris 4:10

So, Singapore, yeah. Well, no doubt. I guess those that live there or have been there lots are probably sick of this being a talking point. But no doubt the standout for me was just the sweatiness.

Claire 4:21

The heat, oh my word.

Chris 4:22

The humidity, just the hot sweat, the desire to get into air conditioning. Um, I can tolerate it, I don't get too distressed with physical discomfort too much. So I can tolerate it to a point. But there were times where I was like, well, I can really do with just getting away from this sticky sweatiness now.

Claire 4:39

Yeah, I think we've when

First Impressions Of Singapore’s Heat

Claire 4:40

we first arrived in it, we'd heard some real like stories of people saying, Oh, it's unbearable. And we were like, what's it gonna be like? But when we got there, I thought I haven't like not experienced this before. It was like that when we were in Las Vegas, we've experienced it in Turkey, we have experienced that kind of heat, but what's so fascinating about it is it just seems to be relentless pretty much all year. And I think that's the thing that is just hard to believe and take on, and after a while you do get to a point of like, yeah, I'm I'm ready to be in a different country with some fresher air or some dry heat.

Chris 5:12

You get used to it, I'm sure those that live there are my brother John and his wife Sarah and their two girls have chosen to live there for two years uh for an experience which they're absolutely loving, and so we got to experience a bit of life with them while the girls were on their holidays from school, and so we did a little bit of sightseeing, didn't we, in the city? And also uh for us, I think we love wildlife in nature, and so going out to some of the parks and just enjoying the wildlife from macaque monkeys in the wild to lizards, those uh monitor what are they called? Water monitors? Water monitor lizards uh in various sizes, one huge one in that that park we went to uh on the water opposite Malaysia. The water I think was called the Doha Strait between Malaysia and Singapore. We went to a a park there which was fascinating and if the tide had been out you'd seen a lot more crocodiles. We did see a couple of crocodiles, uh, but you'd have seen far more if the tide was out. We were there and the tide was in. Uh, a very big fish eagle, was it, or sea eagle flying over. So yeah, we we loved the wildlife of Singapore.

Claire 6:26

Although interestingly, we were told that most of their birds are just kind of black. There's not a lot of colour in any of their birds there, which seems really strange to me. Um I don't know if that's actually true, but we didn't see any. Everything we saw, even if it was quite pretty, was quite dark in colour.

Chris 6:41

No, John and Sarah, who lived there, have had more uh more encounters with hornbills that are quite rare, I think so. Oh yeah, they were there, yeah. And cobras, oh nasty big snakes. So I think they've they've glimpsed a couple of cobras. So yeah, we didn't we didn't have that sort of running, thankfully. No. Uh but still, I think just yeah, it's just surreal. We spent a lot of time in wildlife parks in the UK in zoos where it's all managed environments and enclosures. But to be in the wild seeing monkeys, uh yeah, it takes took me a while to yeah, I just find it surreal.

Claire 7:20

It's like you're in a sort of a you're in some kind of zoo. It doesn't feel like this is the actual just natural world. And then on the other side of it, when we first got there, we did a lot of the Marina Bay Sands, Marina Sands Bay, that area, and we went around there. I think we did like, didn't you count like 22,000 steps or something just walking around and that was hot. Um but we wanted to see the there's a famous hotel in Singapore which um is called the Marina Bay Sands, and it's got three sort of pillars and then what looks like a ship on the top of it. Very odd sort of design, but really stands out. And a lot of people have given us tips on how to go to the top uh or part way up to see the view, and in the end, when we got there, we were just like, ah, suck it, we'll just go up and pay the money, go right to the top, pay for the viewing platform, and see it was a lovely day and see the view without any kind of glass in the way and everything. So we did that, uh, and that was pretty amazing because we got some lovely views over Singapore. We saw them packing away the F1 stuff because that had been the weekend before, uh the Grand Prix. Um yeah, and that was great, just a very different side from the wildlife, just how they build things and how clean everything is and well organised, and um yeah, that was really cool, just exploring, but again, just so difficult to do in the heat. You're kind of kind of when you've got periods of time where there's no shade, you're kind of rushing to the next bit of shade, and you're just yeah, constantly sweaty. Which, if like me, when you're not really good with physical discomfort, it's not the uh best environment. But I did kind of get used to it a bit. Um you just have to have the right clothes. It's about that with every bit of weather, isn't it? If you've got the right gear, it's not quite as bad. Oh kookaburra has just landed near us. That's so cool. I'm just gonna get my phone.

Chris 8:59

Wow, that's nice in the park where we are. So about 30, no, no, no, 20 metres away. A kookaburra's just landed on the grass and is plucking what looks like worms. Okay, Claire's put the mic down to become nature photographer. And it's now just flown into a tree. But they're large birds, aren't they? They're almost like the size of the British duck.

Wildlife Encounters In Singapore

Claire 9:21

These are one of my these are definitely my favourite birds so far, I think, because they're so friendly looking. They look like a stuffed toy. They're just like everything about them just says I would be great to cuddle.

Chris 9:32

Yeah. You don't get that with other birds. Aren't they? Very thick neck.

Claire 9:35

Yeah, the whole thing is just fluffy looking and friendly.

Chris 9:38

Big beak and they eat meat.

Claire 9:41

Yeah, that seems weird.

Chris 9:42

Oh, it's coming back towards us. Oh, it's even closer now.

Claire 9:50

I'll put this video on our social media.

Chris 9:52

And now it's gonna take off back into the tree. Yeah, definitely the size of a duck. And now it's back in the tree.

Claire 9:58

Oh, they are cool though.

Chris 10:00

Wow, great birds.

Claire 10:01

Ah dear. I'd love oh look, it's a bobtail lizard.

Chris 10:05

Oh yes.

Claire 10:08

This place is amazing.

Chris 10:09

There is a bobtail wandering around the grass.

Claire 10:11

Yeah, so the bobtails are about it can be about a foot long, maybe, quite fat, stocky, again, one of the more friendly looking lizards. Not much of a tail, hence the name.

Chris 10:20

You can need to you need to walk and talk and go and take a photo of it. Okay. Let's wander.

Claire 10:24

I'm gonna leave my handbag there while we're talking. I think Australia's safer enough to do that.

Chris 10:27

Because this is like an insight into because with these microphones we can walk and talk and we can walk and talk.

Claire 10:31

And I'll post these videos probably on the Instagram story. You'll have to catch them quite quickly because I they might vanish. I'm having to walk down a separate set of steps because my legs aren't as long. Now we did hear that someone got bitten by one of these. I really don't know what you'd have to do for this thing to bite you, it seems too friendly. And it well, it mainly runs away from you, but it doesn't look scary. Sunnyest tail. Oh kookaburra is back on the grass.

Chris 11:02

Yeah, there we go. We should do a nature podcast.

Claire 11:05

We should. Well, I'm sure this is really interesting to listen to when we're just walking around looking at it and everyone's just listening to audio.

Chris 11:10

101 different types of wildlife found in Western Australia.

Claire 11:14

Okay, back to our bit in the shade. We found a step in the park that is nicely shaded.

Chris 11:20

Kookaburra's uh quite content in the tree.

Claire 11:23

Yeah, he's happily.

Chris 11:24

Must have good eyesight to be bobbing down like that onto the grass to find worms and then back into the tree.

Claire 11:30

Anyway.

Chris 11:31

Nice little interlude.

Claire 11:32

Yeah, back to Singapore. So yeah, we saw a lot of um Singapore from the city side of things, right through to the wildlife.

Chris 11:43

Definitely big highlight was the food.

Claire 11:45

Food, we did love the food. It was the first time we'd been in the country. Where the food was majority sort of East Asian, which is you know, noodles and rice and chicken and soy sauce, all the good stuff, and definitely enjoying that. I think I could be very healthy on a diet of what they eat.

Chris 12:02

For the first time, I think, ever you you had a few breakfasts that consisted of noodles and rice.

Claire 12:06

Yeah.

Chris 12:06

That you were really quite happy with.

Claire 12:07

Yeah, definitely.

Chris 12:08

A lot more so than the sweet stuff.

Claire 12:10

Savory goes down a lot better for me than the sweet. I mean I love the idea of pancakes and waffles and all that, but actually the noodles are good.

Chris 12:16

If you've heard anything about Singapore or um uh enjoyed uh spending time there yourself, you might be aware of the hawker centres that are quite a big deal with eating um quite rough round the edges, would you say? Um off the tourist, off the beaten track in a sense, but really local and great value for food and really good food as well. And uh there's certainly some popular hawker centres where tourists will go to, but yeah, the locals will enjoy eating there uh more than the sort of the Westerners.

Claire 12:49

Yeah, and it's pretty reasonably priced. I mean Singapore as a whole is known as being quite expensive, but actually eating those sorts of meals I thought they were quite reasonable, very, very healthy, very what you know, fresh, hot, well cooked.

Chris 13:01

Um, I found Australia to be more expensive than Singapore in in parts, but I guess we'll come on to that.

Claire 13:07

Yeah.

Chris 13:07

Uh so yeah, any other highlights from Singapore? I think just experiencing it really. We've got another couple of nights there on the way home in four weeks' time. Yeah.

Claire 13:17

It's interesting to be in a country with so many rules. That's the other thing I'd say. They've got a lot of they're very strict on um so it's very it's known as a very safe country. You can just leave stuff anywhere and it won't get nicked. And the reason is because their

Marina Bay Views And City Highlights

Claire 13:30

penalties are so harsh. So fines of thousands of dollars or time in prison just for doing things like walking across the road at the wrong place, like jaywalking. Or um one of the weirdest ones was being naked. Like if you're caught, even in your own home, but if someone sees you from outside, if you're seen by sort of the public as it were, you can be fined for that. Chewing gum, not allowed to have chewing gum, not allowed to chew gum. Um, yeah, all these different kinds of things, it's quite a strict country in reality.

Chris 13:58

Yeah, I carry chewing gum with me uh quite often, certainly on trips and holidays days out, that sort of stuff. Uh and you were treating my little can of chewing gum while we were there, my little plastic tub. You were treating it like it was some sort of class A drug. Like, don't put it away, don't take it out, don't take it out.

Claire 14:13

Mel told us that was one of the tips from Mel, wasn't it? No, don't chew gum.

Chris 14:17

Okay, still it's not a class A drug. No, it's just I wasn't chewing it, it was just carrying it on the side.

Claire 14:22

Um so yeah, quite uh but and because of that, it seems to be quite well run. Like the public transport is amazing, very clean, very quick, very efficient, very cheap. Um so yeah, it just interesting to be a country that's run very differently from ours. So yeah, that's good.

Chris 14:39

Score score out of ten top chunks rating for Singapore.

Claire 14:44

Oh that's difficult. All c every country's so different. I don't know how you how you would what would you say?

Chris 14:50

Oh I'd give it a I'd give it a seven.

Claire 14:54

Seven, okay. Yeah, that's probably fair. I was thinking eight, but I thought that does seem very high and the weather does knock it down a bit for me. One of the things I would say is it's not somewhere I would I went and thought I want to live here. Some countries I've come away thinking I could live there. It wasn't one of those. Was that mostly because of the other thing? Largely because of the weather. Would have loved to for the food. Um but yeah, the weather I just think for me is a little intense. I'd need need that to cool off every now and then. So yeah, okay. Seven out of ten for Singapore.

Chris 15:22

Then back on a plane for a five-hour flight to Perth.

Claire 15:26

Yeah.

Chris 15:26

From Chang'e. Oh, Chang'e Airport, that was impressive, wasn't it?

Claire 15:29

Yes, before we've got a butterfly garden in our terminal that was just free to go in and wander around. And when we went in, it was really warm. Like, you know, when you walk into butterfly tropical houses at the zoos and stuff, they're really warm. So we walked in, we're like, oh, it's one of those warm places again. We like you know, a bit fed up being warm, but anyway, all these amazing butterflies, and then we realised it wasn't a warm. There's a smell of jet fuel, wasn't there? It was just outdoors. They'd encased in like a sort of a netting cage, this area for the butterflies, but it was just the outdoor air that we were stood in, it wasn't heated at all. So that gave you an idea of the kind of temperature you're you're kind of walking around in.

Chris 16:02

But very nice airport. We'd heard very good things about the airport, and we haven't seen it yet, but apparently the waterfall there's a waterfall, water feature that's the highest indoor waterfall in the world. Something like that. In the arrivals or departures, or one of the terminals. So we've not seen that as yet, but we'll make a thing of that and spend a bit of time. Some people were saying it's like a destination to go even just to do shopping or for a trip out, you'd go to the airport.

Claire 16:27

Their airport, from what I can make out, is kind of open, so you don't go through security until you get to your gate. So in our country, you go through security first, pretty much, and then you're stuck in this big departures lounge where you can't get out of again until you go to your gate, and then you just get on the plane. Whereas in Singapore you go into the airport and you don't do security until you actually get to the gate to get on the plane. So people can wander in and out, so it is a place you can just go to and look around. You don't have to be flying anywhere. So I think that's why it's it they've made it into such a kind of destination.

Chris 16:56

Okay, so that's the airport. Then we arrived in Perth, and now we've had what two and a half weeks, three and a half weeks.

Claire 17:04

The 23rd we flew of October, so yeah, I don't know exactly.

Chris 17:08

In Western Australia,

Food, Hawker Centres, And Costs

Chris 17:10

uh mostly based. We've not been into Perth as yet in terms of the city. We've been south about an hour south of Perth in a city called Mandurah.

Claire 17:17

Two weeks, three days.

Chris 17:18

Two weeks, three days, and since then we've experienced British weather.

Claire 17:23

Yeah, we've had some proper rainy days, we've had some windy days, we've had some grey days, we've had some sunny days.

Chris 17:29

It's definitely hotting up now, so I think the forecast ahead in this part is up in the early 30s, uh heading that way this week. So it's hotting up, and we've spent a lot of time just chilling out and spending a lot of time with with our host with Dave and Trace. Big shout out to Dave and Trace for their generous hospitality, looking out for us and looking after us. So we spent a lot of time with them. We've had a few trips out, a few day trips, a few mornings or afternoons out. And then we're just back a few days ago from a bigger trip which was south into a famous part of Western Australia.

Claire 18:04

Called Margaret River. And there we were looking, well, we went and did quite a few things, didn't we? We started off by well we were we were staying in an area called Narrabuk Narrab. Yeah, spelt with a G Narab beach, spelt with a G, to Ganarab almost. I don't know what the sign and G thing is, a bit like Nat and that's true. I was gonna say Ganoo. Ganoo. You pronounce the G for Ganoo. Don't hear of Ganoose anymore, do you? It's not Nu, is it? It's Ganoo.

Chris 18:32

Is it Ganoo or Wilderbeast?

Claire 18:34

Yeah, I think so. Anyway, so Nat is my only example then. So um yeah, it's a bit like Nat, Ganarabub, but it's Narabub beach, and uh there's a lovely beach there, and then just down the down the coast from that is Surfers Point, which we were quite keen on. Anyone who's followed us for a while will know that we have been out to Nazare in Portugal a couple of times to go and try and see the uh the big waves and the big wave surfers out there. So we love watching people surf. We don't surf ourselves, we have no experience in surfing, but we do love other people doing it. So we went to Surfers Point, saw some people surfing out there. It was a very windy day, so that produced a few waves. Um and then we went to Hamlin Bay, which is famous for stingrays, coming up to the beach and feeding. We did not see any stingrays. The weather was again quite windy, everything was a bit churned up, so um we didn't see it, but we did for the first time go in the Australian Sea.

Chris 19:27

Yeah, the Indian Ocean.

Claire 19:29

We wore rash vests which we've bought since we got here. We were the only people wearing them, everyone else was in bikinis and swimwear, so uh I don't know if we look more like locals or tourists, but we had on our full, full long sleeve rash vests, and yeah, we went in the sea, and then uh we were just sort of enjoying that. It was not warm, we thought the sea might be warm, it wasn't, it was freezing. And as uh myself, Chris, and Dave were trying to work out how to take a photo of ourselves while we were waist deep in the water. Dave just happened to utter, watch out!

Chris 19:59

Um He didn't even get out.

Claire 20:00

I don't even think he got it out, no. And as we turned round, there was a wave just behind the three of us that was I mean, I couldn't see the top of it, I could just see I see it went up to the top of your head. Um, and it just wiped all three of us out. We just went, I felt like I was in a washing everything went a bit slowly in a washing machine. I remember thinking to myself, I don't know which way's up. Thank goodness it was shallow.

Chris 20:21

Um did your life flash before your eyes?

Claire 20:24

This is it. So uh yeah, that was fun, and nobody saw it and no one got a video of it, which is really disappointing because we'd love to have seen what it looked like, all three of us just getting completely bowled over.

Chris 20:34

I'd been using a new bit of technology to record video, and I'd been recording bits of video in the sea before then. I was so disappointed that I wasn't recording. Wasn't recording, yeah, that would have been pretty. It would have captured the drama of what felt like uh a close call with death. I can remember that I can still feel the slap on the back of my head from this wall of water.

Claire 20:55

Yeah, I think my head touched the floor. I can't remember. I did

Rules, Safety, And Changi Airport

Claire 21:00

bash my ankle on something, but yeah, I wasn't planning on going under, getting my hair wet or my face wet or any of that stuff, and that all went out the window. Had a full nasal rinse of seawater, so it was a yeah, it was an experience. That was our first experience in the Australian Sea.

Chris 21:13

There'll be some people that will be appalled with us for going to that area and having no interest in wine because it's a hugely popular area for uh wine lovers, of which we are not. So loads of vineyards, loads of big name wineries that I'm told export. So in the UK, Australian wine, much of it will have come from this Margaret River area. Uh so we saw we drove past lots of that. Um we did go to a cave, that was pretty incredible.

Claire 21:41

Oh yeah, Lake Cave.

Chris 21:42

There's there's five or six big caves you can visit on tours. Cave Road. And we went to one of them called Lake Cave. That was incredible.

Claire 21:51

Yeah, there's hundreds of caves in that well, over a hundred caves in that area, but about six or seven that are open to the public. And um we chose Lake Cave, which was pretty amazing, really well done. 300 plus steps to get down and back again, so it was a good day of walking.

Chris 22:06

Um I think that was a cricket that just landed on you that you brushed off. I think so. Well, something started making little ch chirp chirp noises on the grass. Type of cricket. Yeah, constantly beating flies off us and things.

Claire 22:18

Oh my goodness, so many flies. So you'll probably you might see photos if we post them of the beach. It was beautiful, like classic white stand, blue blue sea, absolutely stunning. But the flies, the minute you stop moving for about three seconds, they were on you, on your face, on your lips, on your nose. Oh, it's horrible. Wasn't expecting that.

Chris 22:37

I feel like with Dave and Trace, it's one of those things that they're just used to. They're probably sick of visitors that come and just constantly you know, when you're used to something in your country, when someone comes to visit, like in Britain, where all we talk about is the weather.

Claire 22:47

Yeah.

Chris 22:48

Uh so when other people come and just like, oh, it's so cold, isn't it? So it says, Yeah, just get on with it, deal with it, we're used to it. So others here were just like, oh the flies, how'd you do anything with the flies? They're just like, just deal with it, just accept it. It's like, I can't, I can't stand still because five flies land on my mouth and my eyes.

Claire 23:02

And the weird thing was when we got changed to go in the sea, they got these toilets there, which are kind of like a little bit like old, neglected, outdoor sort of toilets. And in the toilet, which are quite big, big toilet, big, you know, rooms almost to get changed in as well as the toilet. In that room, there were no flies. It was the only respite I got from the flies. And in England, that would have been the only place the flies were congregated.

Chris 23:25

Yeah.

Claire 23:26

So I didn't understand that at all.

Chris 23:27

That blew your mind.

Claire 23:28

Yeah, I did.

Chris 23:28

No flies in the toilet. When you step out of the toilet, you get it covered in flies. So um yeah, Trace also bought us from her workplace some they were at clearance. She got four mosquito nets that you put over your head if you're wearing hats and then they drape down. And I thought it was a bit of a joke. I haven't said this to her. I mean, Dave's gonna be listening to this, we have to be careful what we say. Uh but yeah, I thought it was a bit of a joke. Just like, ha ha ha ha ha, Brits need mosquito. But then genuinely, we've now seen people walking around the beaches and those hiking, wearing these heavy.

Claire 23:58

If I went back to one of those beaches and we were gonna hang around for a while, I would definitely put it on. I'm not a fan of them landing on my face.

Chris 24:04

Well, I said they're not gonna they're not gonna bite you, but they're just irritating that you you just keep bashing them away from your face and then they land on you again, and you land your ear on the yeah, arms. Uh I thought I had one or two on me and you were walking behind, you said you've got like 15 on your back. That's all right.

Settling In Near Perth

Claire 24:20

It's all over people's clothes. So that wasn't fun.

Chris 24:22

So no, we're we're not a fan of the flies.

Claire 24:25

These are the things you don't see. You see these beautiful pictures on Instagram. Oh, lovely dragonfly gone past. You see these beautiful pictures on Instagram, all these lovely beaches and people doing stuff. If you feel bad about that way, you feel a bit jealous, or you feel like you know, just a bit crappy because you don't get to do stuff like that with nice beaches, just remember there's a high chance they're covered in flies. Just doesn't show on the photos.

Chris 24:46

For every stunning image of the Indian Ocean and a white sandy beach, there's a photographer covered in flies.

Claire 24:51

And I remember when we went to the Maldives, the white sand there, they didn't want you walking on it too much because of the sand flies, because they bite from the sand. So there's a lot of things about these beautiful beaches that they don't tell you. So just think about that.

Chris 25:02

So we've been south, we had four nights away, and now we're back in Mandurah for the weekend, catch up on some washing and some rest, and then we're heading north up the western coast of Australia. Tuesday. Our end destination is Exmouth, as they pronounce it, or Exmouth, like we have in England. Yeah. And we're heading up the coast past some places called like Coral Bay, Shark Bay, so lots of ocean life and shell beach flies, maybe.

Claire 25:30

Yeah, hopefully seeing dolphins, maybe some rays, stuff like that. It's yeah, but definitely getting hotter. I think it's about 35 up there now. And it's weird because I messaged a friend and I said to her going north, but it'll get hotter. And she's like, Oh, that's so weird, because in England you go south to get hotter, and of course, with the other side of the equator. So, whereas most people go south where we are to get hotter weather, because you're heading towards the equator, here you have to go north towards the equator to get hotter weather, so the further south you are, the cooler it is. So, um yeah, it's a weird kind of backwards sort of thing. But we're learning, I'm surprised with the language in Australia, how many things have been said that I haven't understood. Just little words they have. Like um Tracy's had talked about um I'm gonna get the ports down from upstairs. I had no idea what she was talking about, but that was suitcases. She asked me when I first arrived if I wanted to put the jug on. That was the kettle. And all these little expressions, I'm just like, I'm sorry, I've I have no idea what you mean. So there's lots of little things, just little words they use. I was like, gosh, no, I didn't know they used this. Um they have to pay extra for toilets in their house.

Chris 26:36

Toilet tanks.

Claire 26:37

Yeah. They like can have a toilet, but if you want another one, you've got to pay for it. In England we have more toilets than people in most houses.

Chris 26:42

So it's Well, I don't know about that, that's a stretch.

Claire 26:45

Well, what we're building now for people, if you look at the new buildings, most of them will have an ensuite, a main bathroom, possibly a second ensuite, and a downstairs toilet. A lot of houses, the newer ones we build now, have three to four minimum.

Chris 26:57

And no toilet tax in the Ukraine.

Claire 26:59

Yeah, the older houses would just have one outdoors.

Chris 27:00

But uh I've been surprised, I naively thought that Australia would be cheaper. And I naively thought because you can get about two, just over two Australian dollars to the British pound in currency, I thought we'd be like really rich. But actually I'm amazed how much how much more expensive

Margaret River Trip And Surf Tales

Chris 27:20

stuff is here. Um, everything from fresh fruit and veg, salads, through even local stuff, through to beer, bread. Uh, it's a lot more expensive. And we'd we'd said well we're planning for months that as part of this this time we'd we'd look to spend a week in Tasmania, but we quite quickly wrote that plan off when looking at the prices of the flights. That again I naively thought they'd be a few hundred pounds to get to Tasmania each return. Almost like an internal flight, but didn't realise it would be nearer like a thousand pounds for the travel. So we knocked that one on the head and thought said we'd spend a bit more time in Western Australia uh exploring. Fuel's definitely cheaper, so diesel I think here is cheaper than we're used to paying for diesel at home. Uh it's about £1.40, £1.30. Well about £1.30 at home a litre, and here it's about £80p a litre. That's in British obviously currency. Um but I'm surprised by how much more expensive. Like I bought six Royal Gala apples from the supermarket, and I think they cost about four pounds. Four British pounds, about eight Australian dollars. And at home that'd be about one pound fifty, about three Australian dollars. So uh yeah, some things are double the price, um, a lot more expensive. So that's that's yeah, that's that surprised me. Okay, just a break from interlude. We now have a kookaburra above us, almost directly overhead, about twenty feet up in the tree. So we've now got a different view of a kookaburra. Which is quite pleasant.

Claire 29:04

So cute. Yeah, we're trying to get him to laugh. There'll be a few people out there listening that would have also started singing kookaburra sits in the old gum tree, because that keeps going through my head every two, three days.

Chris 29:22

You'd have to work to stop singing that, didn't you? Yeah. Uh kangaroo kangaroos are a lot more cano.

Claire 29:30

Yes, I think on one of the last episodes, I don't know if I said it, but I had the impression that kangaroos weren't this side of Australia so much. I thought they were the other side. That was so wrong. They are everywhere. Even in like the little fields in between housing estates, we've seen a whole herd of kangaroos and they've got joeys with them and pouches.

Chris 29:48

Are they herds? Do they flock?

Claire 29:50

Yeah, apparently are herds. I don't know if that's the official name, but it's a herd. Maybe there's a like a a bounce of kangaroos or something. But um We've seen them in the as you're driving along in the car. In fact, they were the first thing we saw from the airport to our house where we're staying, we saw them in a field just hanging out. So yeah, kangaroos everywhere. And we saw an emu, we've seen a field of emus with six or seven in, and we saw one running down the road ahead of the room.

Chris 30:15

All in the while that was the most bizarre scene.

Claire 30:18

That was so funny.

Chris 30:19

And the as we were driving down this long straight road heading out to the coast, there was this mirage up ahead of this lumbering sort of mess. We're like, what's that? Ahead. Not the thinking, is it someone on a horse? Is it someone cycling? And then realizing it's just the whole sort of shape of it and the way it was flopping around was a bit weird. And as we then got closer to it, realised it was an emu running up the road being mobbed by other birds, it was a bit cruel. But then we got quite close to it and again got photos, but it's the strangest sight to see this giant bird lumbering up the road. And then, yeah, as you mentioned, the day before yesterday on the way back from Margaret River, we drove on the highway on the freeway past a field, and there were six of them all in this field. Just again, it's like what?

Claire 31:04

Yeah, how is that in the wild? So weird. One thing we have realised is that so a lot of people, I think, with Australia, especially in England, you have this impression of all the bad, dangerous stuff being in Australia, the spiders, the snakes. There's signs everywhere here on the floor, like snakes

Lake Cave And The Fly Onslaught

Claire 31:20

live here. We've not seen a single snake anywhere.

Chris 31:22

And we've been looking.

Claire 31:24

Yeah, and it was something singing above us. Kookaburra still sat there happily. Um we haven't seen any snakes. There are signs, and they are around, but I think they're quite rare by the sounds of it to see one. But everything that you fear in England, in Australia, seems to be in Queensland.

Chris 31:42

Yep.

Claire 31:43

Every time we look something up, because we hear about something new that's nasty, whether it's a shark or a jellyfish or a snake or a spider, what a scorpion, whatever it is, you look it up, it's in Queensland. So if you want to avoid all the bad stuff in Australia, don't visit Queensland.

Chris 31:56

Yeah, I can that seem to be the place where all the bad stuff happens in Australia.

Claire 32:01

There's not a lot here that's really they have got red-backed spiders which can bite you, but they're not like fatal or anything.

Chris 32:07

Um they could be to a like a baby.

Claire 32:10

Oh, kookaburra just land on the grass again. Good eyesight.

Chris 32:15

Straight down, grabs the worm, and then so pretty.

Claire 32:20

Got these lovely blue tint to their wings as well.

Chris 32:23

Kingfisher-esque. Are they part of the kingfisher family?

Claire 32:26

They should be. They look like the sort of fluffy bigger cousin.

Chris 32:30

Yeah, lovely.

Claire 32:32

Very sweet.

Chris 32:33

So, yeah, that's probably the the points of Australia.

Claire 32:37

Wildlife, food, temperatures, much much drier temperatures, even when it is hot, very bare, very bearable, and their houses are built for it. So that's the only thing that's interesting out here. Almost all the houses are like what we would call bungalows. Like one story, maybe they've got a room upstairs, but all very low, wide, kind of really weird compared to England where we just build upwards two, three stories all the time. So that's interesting to see.

Chris 33:01

Uh, in terms of how we're doing, what kind of update couldn't you give on us? Because I think we'll be honest, this hasn't hasn't been the we've not realised the dream as yet.

Claire 33:13

No.

Chris 33:14

That we had bold, unrealistic, now we realise expectations of what this time would be. Oh, there's another cocoa burro just flown behind us. We're surrounded by cocoa burrows.

Claire 33:24

It's a sign.

Chris 33:25

There was me thinking they were a rarity. I don't know what it's a sign of, but no, lunchtime probably. But yeah, I mean we we expected that we would use this time. I think we spoke about in the last episode that we did about how we love to go deep into our marriage stuff and spend time when we go on holiday focusing on our marriage and focusing on each other, and we've not had any opportunity really to do that. It's been it's been quite the opposite, really, if anything. I think you'd sort of joke that we'd just become friends rather than lovers while we've been here. So that's that's a bit difficult to navigate. Partly because of our own choosing, I think, having chosen to accept uh Dave's very generous offer of using their place, so living with them and it's their holiday as well, so Dave's on holiday and time off work. So yeah, we've not had the we've not had the time to drill into some of the stuff we wanted to focus on in childlessness. We've not done anything really around that. And as well as that, you've been unwell literally since we got to Australia. You've not had a healthy day yet in Australia, which has been really

Planning The Hotter Northbound Route

Chris 34:30

frustrating. Ah sweet.

Claire 34:34

Yeah, that is yeah, that's been probably my biggest frustration. I landed and within about 24 hours had a quite swollen feeling throat, you know, when your glands are up. And I was like, oh no, I'm fighting something. You had the same thing the same morning you woke up feeling the same, and within about 24-48 hours you were fine.

Chris 34:53

I'm still snotty.

Claire 34:54

Mine lasted for about a week, and then I was starting to feel better. I had a day when I felt better. Then last Sunday we went to a church in Australia to um check that out, see what that was like, and by that by that evening I felt bad again, but with a different symptom, like a sore throat inside and getting a bit snotty. And since then I just have not been able to shift this cold, just can't breathe properly from my nose without thank goodness I packed a VIX nose spray. Um, and yeah, we found a nasal rinse that I can do to try and help with that. And I was on paralysor for a long time. I'm off that now, but yeah, I just can't shift it, so it's been two weeks of trying to enjoy stuff, but at the same time just battling through symptoms and low energy, which is not welcome.

Chris 35:39

Which is ridiculous. We said this morning, didn't we, after all the build-up, certainly with your hormone stuff and the last 12 months of preparing for this hormones and HRT, and really hoping and praying that we get to this place. Uh, it's unbelievable to think that we've now been in Australia for two and a half weeks, and the hormones have actually been eclipsed by feelings of cold and congestion. Yeah. And the hormones have been alright, and yet you've not actually been able to appreciate them being better because you've felt congested and not sleeping well.

Claire 36:13

Well, I thought I'm not sleeping too badly, but it's just that you know when you wake up and your mouth's really dry and your nose stops your breathing, it's that kind of stuff which gets in the way. It's um I'm doing everything, you know, I'm trying to get a bit of sunshine, I'm having veggie mite, that's got B vitamins in it apparently. Umanges for a bit of vitamin C. Doing all the right stuff, so I don't understand really why I can't seem to shift it. I'm really hoping I shift it before we head up on our north trip on Tuesday.

Chris 36:41

That's the plan we were going to go out today, but decided not to to try and have another opportunity for you just to chill out and try and let your body rest and fight this thing. Yeah, I think before we begin a another trip which is gonna be hot. Uh it's gonna be more uncomfortable physically because of the heat where we're going, that you really don't want to be taking a cold away with you.

Claire 37:01

I think the problem is even when you relax, you're not at home, are you? So I don't know how much your body ever fully relaxes when you've got like a what are you looking at?

Chris 37:09

Kookaburra.

Aussie Lingo, Prices, And Daily Life

Claire 37:11

You're so distracted, it's a deep, meaningful conversation. You're just staring around into space.

Chris 37:15

Well, there's kookaburra around.

Claire 37:16

Well, focus, you've seen kookaburras already. Um so yeah, it's been difficult.

Chris 37:21

So we continue to try and work out uh and manage our expectations, uh, which is constantly evolving because I mean you start a trip like this, obviously, with the whole trip planned out uh ahead of you, uh, and then you continue to manage expectations as as time marches on. That's probably more like the podcast meet, isn't it? For how do you, when you're journeying to use that word through something, continually reassess and change your expectations in order to try and live comfortably and try to try and reach contentment. Um, because we've over the last two or three weeks we've not been content with our lot, have we? So the more we manage our expectations of what we want to get out of this time, the more content we might feel.

Claire 38:07

Yeah.

Chris 38:08

I mean You look like you disagree.

Claire 38:10

Not necessarily. I think there's a lot to be I don't want it to sound like we're just you know ungrateful when we're here on this amazing holiday and we're just like don't feel good about our lot because it's an amazing opportunity to have But I think yeah, it's easy to put a lot of very high expectations on such an opportunity and think you know, we'll be able to do this, this and this, and sometimes that's just not possible. Plus the fact when we got here, I think, you know, like we said, we're kind of switching off. And when you switch off like properly for a good amount of time, y it's the last sort of place that you'd have a deep conversation. It just doesn't really happen, does it? So I think it's um yeah, it's difficult to be able to do all that stuff. And we didn't know what it was gonna look like. We didn't know if we were gonna get here and be on really good form and love it, or if we were gonna suddenly switch off and not be able to do much. So yeah, I don't know.

Chris 39:04

Good job we planned to keep things quite uh sedate then in a sense while we were here. We didn't have many trips in, did we?

Claire 39:12

No, we s we set the expectation low of just hanging out in Perth if that was the the thing that we were gonna do as as the a baseline, which would be something amazing. As it goes, we've planned quite a lot in. Um we did plan out our our first plan. We put loads of stuff in and then we sat and looked at it, and the next morning we woke up and like this is a massive mistake. We need some space to just to be able to do other things and enjoy being here. We can't just keep going from one thing to the next all day, every day. So we did change it from Margaret River. We stayed in one place and went there rather than moving around every day. The next one is different, we are moving around every day for about ten days, so that's gonna be busy. But after that, we've then got some got about two weeks of just downtime here locally to do local stuff. There's a lot of stuff we want to do around here that we haven't done, like Rotnest Island and Penguin Island, and the P West trees got the dolphin cruises, and so there's a lot of stuff locally that we might do. But uh yeah, we'll see. We'll see how it goes. But yeah, it's been different from what we expected. And I think when you think this might be like a once-in-a-lifetime type thing for the length of time that we're off, for the amount of time that we're here, yeah, it's easy to put very high expectations on on what you want out of it. And what do we want out of it? We wanted to see stuff, we wanted to have fun, we wanted to enjoy it, we wanted to have good conversations, we wanted to reassess life, we w we wanted everything really, didn't we? And I think we're realising that might have been a bit ambitious.

Chris 40:35

Uh yeah. Yeah, yeah, that's true. We wanted everything emotionally, more than physically, more than just like the excitement of a big trip. I think we want just to be in in an absolutely good place to reset. Uh, and that's that's not what we've done as yet. Um maybe that maybe that will come in the weeks ahead. Let's say we've got four more weeks in Australia, so that's loads of time. Um I d I uh yeah, I find what I do find hard, and I'm wrestling with myself, just to come back to some point you made, is that whole concept of looking on the bright side. I don't know how to

Kangaroos, Emus, And Missing Snakes

Chris 41:10

get that balance right, whether it's just internally or externally with other people. You know, I'm a grateful person, and there's so much that I'm thankful for. But also you need to talk about this stuff, I fell, and be realistic about this stuff. But whether it's between the two of you or with friends as well, if you want to be able to process this stuff with company, it does feel like you could be easily accused, whether you're accusing yourself or someone might be thinking about it, that you're just ungrateful. Yeah. Or you need to look on the bright side, you've got a glass half empty rather than a glass half full mentality. So I find that hard, you mentioned that. Yeah, just a few minutes ago. But knowing how to talk about this stuff, how do we talk about this stuff together and work this stuff out and help each other with our expectations without both of us thinking that the other one's just being a bit negative?

Claire 42:03

Yeah.

Chris 42:04

How do we do that? Oh, someone's distracted kookaburra, I think.

Claire 42:09

I'm about to come back and look at you and say, are you distracted? Two kookaburras just landed nearby. I was waiting for you to say something. Um, yeah, no, I think that is difficult, and I I do think being grateful is important. Okay, because it's so distracting because now there's a kookaburra right above our heads.

Chris 42:27

Literally ten feet away from our heads. If it pooed, it would hit me.

Claire 42:32

This is a good example, I think this is this is a good example. So you know, we've got some stuff going on. I'm not feeling brilliant right now. Which is a shame and disappointing, but I am really appreciative of the kookaburra being sat nine feet above our head. So I think that that's what for me that's what it is about finding things to be grateful for. So I'm very grateful for that. I'm not gonna write that experience off because I feel crappy with a cold. So I think it's that's the thing, but you're right, it is very easily turned into look on the bright side, and I do think if people are struggling in any situation, it's never massively helpful to tell them that unless they are people who do need to hear it because they're never grateful. If anyone knows us, I think they know that we will be grateful for experiences, we will be enjoying the wildlife, it's not something that is just um nothing to us.

Chris 43:23

And it reminds me of several podcast episodes that we've done in the past where people have spoken about, our guests have spoken about holding the tension or sitting in the tension of the two, the good and the bad, the grief and the joy. That it's you know you don't have to have one or the other at any one time, you can hold the two in tension. So I'm minded to think of that. That you know, it is okay to to be glass half full and glass half empty at the same time. Yeah. Is it okay? Does that make sense? I don't know. Uh I'm working on that myself. I said I'm I'm not I'm not at peace with my own self on this trip as yet. I'm fine, I'm trying to find that.

Claire 44:04

I also think it's because like I think getting away from me in holidays brings up things, it makes you think about life, and then normally we would talk about that and process it before we go back again. I think that we'll be having things coming up on this holiday already, but we haven't had time to talk or process them, so they're j we're just sitting with it. And that's not very comfortable. You know, things like not feeling well. I've had that so often on so many holidays, that's a massive disappointment for me. I feel like I'm gonna have to process that that it's happening once again. Things like childlessness, you know, we've been around in different touristy places and stuff, we've seen people teaching their kids to

Expectations Vs Reality Of The Trip

Claire 44:40

surf and you know, doing all these family things together, and you know, that makes me think about what I'm missing out on and what I haven't got, and I haven't had time to stop and process it. I think how do I think about that? There's stuff going on um you know, around us, Tracy's just about to retire from her job. That makes me think, I don't feel like I've even started in a job that I could retire from, and it that gets you you know thinking about where you are in life and what's happening, and there's a lot of stuff coming up because we've walked away from the routine. And if we don't at some point sort of process that before we go back, then I think that could be quite damaging because normally we would process it and go back having talked about it and feeling better about things. So yeah, I think that's another side of it. We're just having to sit with that for a while until we get the space and time to to talk properly and really think about stuff, and that's probably just a bit uncomfortable, but necessarily a bad thing because we just have to make sure it doesn't ruin the other good things that we're experiencing along the way, like the kookaburras, which have all gone now.

Chris 45:39

Yeah, one that's one in that over there. I can just see it. You can't. I can make it out. I've been following it, tracking it. What a joy. Uh yeah, but that was unexpected, wasn't it, that we'll be taking things back to or thinking that we're taking stuff back to the UK to process.

Claire 45:55

We're not planning to take it back, we've still got time, that's what I'm saying. We haven't discovered it now because we haven't done it yet. This is what happens when you're distracted by a cuckoo burrow.

Chris 46:02

That's not what happens when I'm distracted by a cuckoo burr. But I I understand that, and I think I'll join you in that. We're living with people, and so um we're spending a lot of time around each other, so it's not like the two of us are just able to I guess get bored together and then start talking about stuff.

Claire 46:24

It doesn't naturally come like it would if you were just doing a holiday with two of you.

Chris 46:27

Yeah, yeah, definitely. If there's the two of us in the hotel room, then there's a lot more space there to talk about all things.

Claire 46:36

So yeah, hopefully, it's interesting and not too depressing for people.

Chris 46:41

Well it's us, isn't it? It's probably us.

Claire 46:43

If you listen to this podcast, you're used to you're used to big topics that can be a bit down and sad, but also with hope, and there is always hope, and I'm definitely hopeful, it's not the end of our holiday yet. I'm hopeful to have time and space to do that stuff as well as all the other cool stuff. Yeah, looking forward to what's ahead, just hoping I can shift this cold in time to enjoy it fully. But um I don't know when we'll could because we're now going away for about 10 days on this next trip. Um there won't be opportunity necessarily to record stuff and post it. But uh maybe when we're back we'll see what we're doing then and if we can update on anything else. If we can, we will. If not, it will be our episode. So first episode we get back, we'll do our chatty Christmas catch-up. That's the other weird thing. People are messaging us like you know, Britain's starting to get ready for Christmas coming, and it's getting darker, and we're just here in the inner sunshine with no evidence of Christmas anywhere. So very strange that we will just roll straight back into Christmas, have to get all our stuff out and uh get the lights up and find a tree and everything, start planning Christmas, which will be like literally two to three weeks away when we get back. So I'm quite looking forward to that. Having something to focus on like that straight away will be quite cool. Um, and I think we've really made Christmas into something better for us over the years, something we can look forward to. So that's good. But that'll be yeah, if we don't do anything before, that'll be the next episode, but maybe we'll do something we'll get back from our trip, see how we're doing, update people.

Chris 48:03

Yeah.

Claire 48:03

And hopefully I will be a lot clearer in my voice and not quite so nasy.

Chris 48:09

Well, I'm surprised it's taken us this long to do this one. I think this is sort of four weeks in.

Claire 48:13

Yeah, we definitely thought we would be able to do something.

Chris 48:15

I thought we'd be I thought, again naively, that would be like maybe doing like weekly short updates on stuff, but again, it's just not just not being something we've been able to think about doing.

Claire 48:26

No, but we do feel the loyalty to our listeners and wanted to update you with something and thank you to anyone that's messaged or asked how we're getting on. Um that's much appreciated. And I will post some things on social media. I'll probably post some of the kookaburra and bobtail stuff I've just recorded so you can see what I'm talking about. Um so have a look at that on our social media. And yeah, apart from that, I think that's everything from Australia for now. Thank you for tuning in.

Chris 48:53

G'day We should have started that way.

Claire 48:57

We should have started with it, yeah. Anyway.

Chris 48:58

So more to come.

Illness, Energy, And Managing Disappointment

Chris 49:00

Find us on social media @The SilentWhy pod, yeah. On Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, X, threads. There we go.

Claire 49:13

There's the list.

Chris 49:14

And uh yeah, we'll be in touch.

Claire 49:17

Goodbye.

Chris 49:18

Goodbye.