#10

#10: Jump off a waterfall 
#10: Jump off a bridge


Its like a waterfall. But different.


So myself, Sebastian and Ange (my travel buddies from France and Germany, respectively) are walking along a gorge in Launceston (Tas) and this kid climbs up on the railing on this bridge. At first I thought he was going to kill himself. Then I sort of thought about it, and figured although it was pretty fucking high, it probably wasn't high enough to die from. Probably. So I figured he was just trying to do himself serious injury.


Turns out Sajeed is a 19 year old mad dog from Hobart who just decides to jump off stuff when he's got a few things on his mind. And he's jumped off this particular bridge 'probably 10 times', but other than his friends, no one else in Tassie is dumb enough to do it. But he doesn't know why, coz 'someone told me its pretty deep'. 


He said I should jump too. I said no. He shrugged and jumped. It was a long way down. Then I figured that I didn't come all the way to Tasmania to not jump off a bridge. So I did.

it may not look it, but it was a long way down. a long way.

recipe for good times

Golden Plains Festival

(aka the best fun known to man)

Ingredients:

1 Supernatural Amphitheatre

1 relaxed camping policy

17 camp flags/markers

67 couches

6+ bands with 6 or more members

As much alcohol as desired

8 animal costumes, 5 body painted tuxedos, 7 wedding dresses, token morph suit, range of other novelty clothing

1 novelty clean up song

Minimal security

3000 pairs of shoes

Selection of novelty snacks

1 Cask red wine, selection spices, fruit

4000 glow sticks

Method:

1) Arrive at Supernatural amphitheatre Saturday morning. Due to relaxed camping policy, park wherever and camp in/next to your vehicle. Because everyone knows that making people park their cars and then carry all their gear so they can camp somewhere else is a dumbshit idea.

2) Erect camp flag/marker. Dress in novelty clothes. Wear for remainder of weekend, even if you're the guy who gets his one piece banana suit costume ripped and covered in mud within the first hour.

3) Carry couch(es) to top of amphitheatre. If possible, under one huge canopy set up 3 couches, 2 rugs, and a coffee table (and fruit bowl). Place esky with BYO-ed booze (no glass please) next to couch and enjoy for remainder of weekend.

4) MC will play 4 songs. Choose your favourite. Each time this song is played, all people must simultaneously dance and pick up rubbish. DMX's Party Up (Up in Here) is an excellent choice.

5) Set up one stage only, with as eclectic a range of bands as possible. And remember the old rule: chances are if you have more members, you'll be more awesome.

6) When band plays what you think is the set of the festival, wave shoes in air in show of appreciation. See video for details.

7) If hungry, cook up random selection of gourmet goods to ensure the greatest festival snacks ever.

8) If hungover, mix red wine, random spices and novelty fruits in a bucket to create refreshing, life-giving sangria.

9) When last recognised band of the weekend plays, have an all out massive glowstick war,  whilst ensuring that everyone remains as relaxed, friendly and chilled out as they have been all weekend. (a good guide is to see if people are starting a 5am ping pong tournament, rather than wanting to punch on and be jerks).

10) Leave to sit for one amazing weekend.

Tips:

Provide extras such as free breath testing for drivers leaving the festival. Also ensure that security are relaxed and friendly, and don't have any deep down uges to 'smash some cunts'. Nice touches such as this will ensure that your guests will be sure to come back for second helpings.



arrow marker, daytime



arrow marker, night time




same sex marriage / limbo comp





shoes in the air (apologies for sound quality. makes pulled apart by horses sound like a bogan metal band. which they aren't.)

true love

It's nice to know that at least one person misses me

generic update

Last post was on Jan 24. Poor form. I really didn't want to be that guy. 
But I am, so you will just have to deal with it. Sorry.


I like to write in dot points for a number of reasons. Some of these are:
- Saves on doing grammar good and structure of sentences and stuff. 
- Looks efficient and professional
- Makes it seem like you've said more than you have
- Lets me ramble and jump from topic to topic without having to come up with any sweet segues


Hence, I am going to write this post in dot point form


- Bailed on Adelaide the day after Australia Day. My head hurt. Moreso from seeing 2 songs performed by Jessica Mauboy, than the all day drinking, throwing up in a random public toilet on the tram line between Glenelg and Adelaide CBD thing.


- Lots of sweet towns between Adelaide and the start of the Great Ocean Road. Too sweet to bother remembering, coz I'm drawing a blank right now


- Great Ocean Road is good. Once you've seen one massive limestone monolith, you've seen them all. But seeing the first one is pretty cool. Also met some cool poms and random travellers as I got closer to Melbs


- Mat and Cassi (his housemate) are cool for letting me live in their driveway (but mainly their house) for wayyy too long. Also cheers to Collette for giving up her carpark for a few nights, and Marky for a spot on the street outside his apartment


- Melbourne is good. The weather isn't



- Tasmania is really good. The weather really isn't


- Highlights from Tassie: (yeah, I'm doing dot points within dot points. Deal with it)
   ~ seeing snow. SNOW! on Mt Wellington (overlooks Hobart) in Summer, in Australia. I only saw 2 really small patches. If I'd seen 3 it would've given me inspiration to write a sweet song. Ross, you should look into that.
   ~ travelling with a cool french chick and rad german guy for the first week, and another super chilled german girl for the second
   ~ super cool beaches. East coast of Tas has awesome nice white beaches. It was balls cold tho, so I was usually the only one in the water
   ~ heaps of wildlife. Unfortunately its usually dead, on the side of the road. But some of it isn't, which is nice. 
   ~ amazing landscapes. Just like New Zealand*
   ~ mainly friendly caravan park patrons. We had a couple of sessions of 'quiet' drinks in the van over a few nights. We were asked not to return to one of the parks, apparently. (I walked away whenever there was a chance we could get in trouble, hoping that thick German and French accents would help us escape unpunished. Plus I'm a non confrontational pansy)
   ~ MONA. The Museum of Old and New Art. Some super rich guy decides to buy a sweet island/peninsula thing and dig a 5 storey art gallery into the ground and display his millions and millions of dollars worth of (mainly crazy contemporary) art for free. And of course he chooses Hobart to do it? Either way, its pretty awesome, even if i didn't understand half of the whacky shit that was going on in there. Exhibit A:

Car between two walls

They drove a car between two walls and left it there. Apparently it wasn't cool enough to make it into the collection though, coz this was just outside somewhere. Other highlights include a full size Mack Truck parked/built into a hallway so you couldn't walk by, and could only see the front and the back. And the Damien Hirst piece that kinda looked like a 3D painting. Made entirely
of tens of thousands of flies glued together. If it sounds like its a bit too cool for school, it sort of is. But its also sort of amazing. I couldn't recommend it enough.
   ~ So yeah, Tassie rocks. I spent 2 weeks there and it wasn't enough. Could've done a month easy. So if anyone's thinking about it, do it.


- Heading to Golden Plains festival a few hours West of Melbs this weekend. Camping in van, BYO booze. Should be fairly incredible. Then hitting the east coast, Canberra and Sydney by early April


- The List is still happening. Just sort of slowly. Still eating random foods (curried scallop pies anyone?) and doing all that other stuff. I did complete a new one that I need to post about, but have to get the photos together first. Coz as Dooly used to say in his Jackass phase; if there's no footage, it didn't happen. 


- That is all




*I've never been to New Zealand. Neither had my travel partners. But we want to. And we kept saying "I bet New Zealand is just like this", so it totally counts.