adventures in newcastle
from a letter
at 12:30 yesterday, my friend's friend drove up to the hostel and picked me up. after a brief tour of the town -- most of which I'd already seen -- and an extended lesson on the mysterious sport of cricket (australia beat england) we were off to Jarod's parents' house, which is on lake macquarie, the largest saltwater lake in australia. and what did we do on this fine lake? we went scurfing. or was it skurfing? not so sure how it's spelled because i was DOING it, but the concept is fairly simple: you hold on for dear life whilst being dragged behind a motorboat, riding either a surfboard or boogie board. i managed to ride the boogie board -- on my knees -- before insecurity settled in. i realized i was giving the guys quite a show with my bathing suit hanging down, and just being with guys, and outweighing any two of the three combined.

after the skurfing we played on a power plant. no, really. there are a couple of power plants around the lake and the one we played near uses the lake as a heating/cooling source. cool water from one side of the lake enters the plant and warms up and goes into the other. well, jared, who grew up on the lake, at some point in his youth discovered that you could jump into the warm water racing down this aquaduct type thing through a hole in the fence. it's about a 15-20 foot drop, then you careen down the aquaduct, avoid one boom in the water, quickly dive under another -- towards the right bank b/c on the left is some weird gadge/sieve thing that probably chops you into bits, and then you're dumped safely into the lake. out of the three tries, i managed one, not bad for an insecure girl afraid of heights.

after i was dropped off back at the hostel and i showered, i went across the street to treat myself to a nice dinner at the bogie hole cafe. salad. pasta. nice glass of shiraz. of course, i didn't finish, and when i asked for a box, the kind waitress said, "sorry love, we don't do that anymore. too many lawsuits." apparently, the cafe had a problem with its patrons bringing leftovers home and not heating them properly, getting sick, and suing the restaurant. the server tried to tell me it was a city law that's spreading, but one of the hostel workers said it's that cafe with the problem. nice. and i had seafood pasta. the last time i had food poisoning, it was from seafood, and i ended up in the hospital. but let's not forget the pot (that shit will kill you) i had too.

speaking of altered states, today was the first time i've consumed significant alcohol since new year's. and i was drunk by noon. i went on a wine tasting tour of the hunter valley region, the oldest winemaking region in australia. picked up at 9am, i had my first taste at 10:30. i was quite ready for food when we stopped for lunch at 1pm, but after ordering, we had MORE tasting, including some chili infused wine. the wine was very sweet and thick -- like a dessert wine -- and the chilis were very hot. Why, God, would you want all those tastes together? it was like sweet and sour pork gone bad. very bad.

tomorrow afternoon i take a 7 hour train ride further north to coffs harbour. the big banana, here i come.

love ya.