Zip Line Tour

I have been lazy about doing our other vacation posts. But I did manage to upload the video of Kyle on the zip line tour. It is pretty funny.

O'Reillys Rainforest Retreat

After a tense drive up the steep mountain with switch back after switch back we arrived at O'Reillys Rainforest Retreat. We checked in and headed to our mountain villa. As you can see in the picture it was a house on stilts nestled in the woods. What a peaceful place. Our condo was amazing with balcony that overlooked the lush surroundings.

The first night we ate dinner at the restaurant which was good and then retired early for a much needed full night of sleep. In the morning we woke up late and headed out to explore the trails. We borrowed a back pack and loaded Emily up for the ride. We started on their famous tree top walk which is a series of suspension bridges more than 20 meters up in the rain forest. Surprisingly it is very safe for the kids so Samantha could walk on her own with out me having a heart attack. About half way around the trail they have a tree where you can climb up a series of "ladders" and they have two look out decks. I normally shy away from the heights but even I couldn't resist the experience. Wendell and Sharon stayed down with the girls and Kyle and made the climb. The picture of me with scenery behind is from the top deck. We climbed back down and then headed off on to another botanical trail that had some amazing orchids and other natural foliage. You can see the Fig tree behind Wendell and Sharon that has some crazy roots and trunk.

That afternoon Kyle and I went on a zip line expedition. I was expecting some really high platform that ran across a deep valley in the mountains with an unbelievable view. Well sort of what we had. It was perch up a small mountain (of which you had to climb) and then cascaded down over a clear field to the landing. Kyle took a funny video of him going down. I will post separately. That night we wanted to take Samantha on a glow worm tour but it was pouring rain so we decided it was not a good idea. Instead we took her to the bar, where we had drinks and she had hot chocolate.

The next morning the whole family boarded a four wheel drive van and headed out on an expedition to a scenic look out point. We were the only ones on the tour so it was like having our own personal tour guide. We started off down the mountain and into the forest. Kyle got some neat pictures of special fungus that almost glows orange. But while doing so he wandered off the path and also got a few leeches. I told him it just made his experience all the more authentic. See the photo of his foot from hours later. We ended up at a beautiful look out area where our guide made a camp fire to brew tea and warm up "damper" which is like a big Australian biscuit. All very good. On the drive back to the retreat we actually saw a Wallaby (little kangaroo) jumping in the wild. Samantha saw it first and it was near our van and then jumped across the road right in front of us. What a cool thing to see.

After our tour we had some lunch and the were off to the Gold Coast. There were so many more trails we wished we could have explored. If anyone has the chance this was a great place to visit. You can see more about the resort at oreillys.com.au.

Australia 2010

Well after the complete cluster on Friday we were not taking any chances. The guy that dropped us off on Friday night came back to get us the next day at 5PM. We were at the airport at 6pm for our 9:40pm flight. Needless to say I think we went a little too early but we were first in line to check our bags. The flight itself was okay. We flew Air Asia which is the Asia version of Southwest. It gets you to where you are going but they charge extra for everything. Since it was a night flight the girls did sleep but Kyle and I did not get much quality sleep. Probably had something to do with a family of four crammed into three tiny airplane seats with little to no leg room.

We get to Australia about 7:30am and go to get the rental car. We check in and the lady says "you reservation is at the Brisbane Airport". I look at her and say "where are we?" She says "you are at the gold coast airport". Shit. This vacation is full of surprises. Luckily she is able to set us up with a great van that will hold all of us and our luggage. Bad news is I had planned the itinerary around starting and ending in Brisbane. Oh well, go with the flow. We drive up the coast and stop at a surf club right on the water for brekkie (Aussie term for breakfast). The scenery was amazing and somewhat compensated for the fact that they ran out of pancakes and the food took forever.

After breakfast we headed to Lamington National Forest. What an amazing area of the country. (see O'Reilly's post to come). We then headed back to the gold coast area for a few days (see Gold Coast post to come). Then the day before we left, we drove up to Brisbane for the day. We walked along the Southbank area and it was beautiful. We dropped Wendell and Sharon off at a Best Western so they could catch their EARLY morning flight to New Zealand and we headed back to the Gold Coast so we could also catch our morning flight home.

All in all, hiccups and everything, we had an amazing time. I told Kyle on the flight home that our perspective on vacations must have changed because it was an 8+ hour flight each way which is about like going from Texas to Europe but in my mind it didn't feel like the same.

You can see all our pictures on picasa, see address below. I will also update the album once I get Sharon's photos - http://picasaweb.google.com/heather.liskow/Australia2010?feat=directlink

Cluster

How exciting we are off to Australia! I called and booked two van taxis to pick us up at 7pm for our 10pm flights. We would then catch the 7:30 train and get to the airport at 8pm. A short shuttle ride to the other terminal on the bus and we are off. Yeah!

At 7:05 our vans are not here, so I call and he tells me that he would be here in 10 minutes. At 7:15 still no vans, he calls and asks if he can bring cars instead. That won't work because we have 6 people and a ton of luggage so I tell him to forget it. Luckily we can catch cabs right by our house so Kyle heads down the street to hail 3 small cabs to haul to the train station. Not an easy task but he does it. After much debate among the drivers on where to put all the stuff, we load up and are on our way. I am in the first cab and he is turning the wrong way and I say "not left, we need to go right". He says "one of the guys needs petrol". I then firmly say "we have NO time for petrol". So he gets out and yells at the other guy and then we turn and are going the right direction.

At the train station we are stalled because they have problems processing Kyle's credit card. Three tries later we just pay cash and get on the train. Upon arrival at the main airport we have two porter guys that are helping with our stuff. I tell them we need to go to the other terminal with Air Asia. I then ask if we should take the bus or a taxi? They asked what time is our flight and when I told them 10pm they both said bus because we have enough time. So we all follow them to the bus area. You would think walking to the bus area is easy but the airport is crowded and we have a stroller, five people, two carts of luggage and two porter dudes. So we have to wait and wait to get on elevator after elevator. Finally we get down to the bus area. We are ready to board and the driver tells our porter this is the wrong bus. Crap. The other, correct, bus pulls up but there are SO many people getting on and off I can tell it will be a while. At this point time is flying by and we are getting testy. So I tell the porters we will just take a taxi, please show us the way. He assures me they are right upstairs. Well back upstairs with all the elevators and across the terminal takes probably 20 minutes. We finally get two van taxis.

Now we are in the van taxis to go to the other terminal. At this point it is 9pm and the driver asks "what time is your flight?" I answer "10pm" he sighs and steps on the gas. Well this short shuttle to the other terminal is a 20 MINUTE car ride. It is a whole other airport in my opinion. At this point I have not completely given up.

We pull up to the new terminal at 9:25 and run to the ticket counter. All the desks are reading for a flight to Melbourne, not Brisbane where we are headed. We ask the first guy we see and he says "oh sir that flight has already left". We say "it was at 10pm" he says "no mam it left at 9:40pm". Shit, it is official we missed the flight. So he refers us to another manager guy. He says the policies of Air Asia are that you will need to book another flight altogether. At this point we have all been in okay spirits but when we heard that I think we all melted. Then he says "let me see what I can do". Thank God he rebooks us on the flight for the following day and we only pay the difference in fares. Once it is all taken care of we now have to get another two van taxis to go all the way back home-over an hour drive. We made it home at 11:30pm.

3 tiny taxis x $18 = $54

5 tickets on the train = $155

2 van taxis to shuttle to the other airport = $100

Change fee on airline ticket = $332

2 van taxis for the long ride home = $334

Quest for a family vacation...PRICELESS. Yeah right! It was a complete CLUSTER F**K!

PS - at least the prices above are ringgit so it was only $278 US dollars. I guess it could have been much worse.

Addendum to Driving Part III

So yesterday the girl I hit contacted Kyle with an estimate to fix her bumper. Any guesses?? I was thinking a few thousand ringgit ($400-$600) but no. Only 600RM which is $181. I told Kyle we need to give her a little more for a rental car or taxi's while her car is in the shop. So less than $250 for 5 collisions. Let's just say Kyle is not nearly as annoyed now that the incident doesn't have a fat price tag.

Driving Part III

Well Sharon and Wendell arrived in KL last Thursday so we rented a van to haul us all around. I have been driving our Honda Civic which is easy to handle in the traffic and tight parking area. The same can not be said for the Naza Ria van. Yes, this is the same car in which I experienced my other "fender benders". You can see where this is going. Yesterday the entire family went on a shopping expedition to the IKEA shopping center. I was in the parking garage and everyone was telling me where to park. I had just passed an aisle and someone saw a spot down there. So I checked my mirrors and put it in reverse. CRUNCH! I backed right into a Myvi which is a very small Asian car. I swear I could not see it in my mirrors, it was smaller width than the van.

Kyle just looked at me like "why the hell are you backing up in the busiest garage in KL?" Which in retrospect is a very good question. Not a smart move. Anyway the collision did nothing to the robust van but the poor Myvi had a nice dent in the front fender. I felt really bad for the girl because she had just been in another accident a month ago. Kyle kept telling her we would pay but she kept going on and on about why did I back up and how come I couldn't see her. What can you do at that point? We gave her Kyle's business card and took a photo with our phone. Wait and see how much that costs us.

Once Kyle had cooled off a bit I did remind him of the other 4 (combined from the two us) fender benders we had already been in and how we had not paid a cent for any of those. 1 out of 5 is not too bad.