Townsville 2018

August 03
August 04
August 05
August 06
August 07

Townsville 2018, August 07 (Let's Rock)

Last day. Started with a tough hike up the 'goat track' to the top of Castle Hill which overlooks Townsville. Tough on the legs with all of the wide steps. Good views from a few different ledges.

Castle Hill.

Not one goat on the goat track.

The walk back down was easier, stopped at Queens Gardens for lunch. Would have been a good spot for running. Back to the city again to buy a magnet, only a couple of shops with limited options, but picked the best option.

Downtown.

Revisited Jezzine Barracks, near where the race was held on the weekend. Had some World War 2 stuff around, and various public art. There's a big public rock pool right on the beach, but was a bit to cold.

Drove down the long cape road to Cape Pallerenda. Looked like another good running track with some hills on Strava, but so rocky you'd twist an ankle for sure.

Just driving around a bit more before having to head to the airport, went past The Strand again and some botanical gardens. Got some dinner then drove to the airport. Best airport drive ever, just driving down a road with houses on it...and there's the airport car park!

Steps: 26,500
Drive: 350km approx

• Townsville
• 7 out of 10
• Good
• Better place to be during winter
• Having a car
• Running and walking tracks
• Townsville airport
• Traffic
• Bad
• City centre size
• Jellyfish in the water
• Limited entertainment options
• Melbourne airport
• Missed Out
• The Big Brolga - if it still exists

Townsville 2018, August 06 (Death Magnetic)

Bit of a rush start:

• Drive to city
• Find somewhere to park - the one 'main' street gets busy on a week day
• Stop at the supermarket
• Run to the ferry before departure

The boat only took about 20 minutes to get to Magnetic Island, not much to see.

I'm on a boat.

Got off the boat and walked to Arcadia and Alma Bay along the road. Surprised by how the amount of housing development on the island.

Not one arcade machine in Arcadia.

There were no footpaths going up the big hill to the other side of the island, so a good time for lunch.

Hiked through the bush instead towards The Forts track, hard work climbing up all the steps, only passed a couple of people. More walking around The Forts track to reach some old fort lookout towers, very dusty. This was supposed to be the best place to see koalas, but did not see any!

Bush walking.

The fort from the other fort.

Walk through the bush and along the street to Horseshoe Bay at the other end of the island. Probably ended up with about three hours of walking on the island.

Wasn't too much to see at Horseshoe Bay so got a bus back to the ferry, since the next run wasn't for more than an hour.

Steps: 26,000

Townsville 2018, August 05 (Road Rules)

The 10km race start was only at 7:45am, probably could have been a bit earlier. Drove from the hotel to the race, I thought roads might be crowded, but plenty of street parking everywhere!

Did a quick 2 kilometre warm up around the streets, while the marathon and half marathon was already out on the roads. Sweating from the warm up wasn't a good indication, walked over to the start and got in the front row.

Started a bit slow off the start, having gone too quick in the heat in Singapore earlier this year. Skipped the 2.5km drink station which was a mistake, struggling by the next drink station which wasn't until 5.5km. Need more drinks!

Not a huge field of fast runners, I probably made my way up into the top 25 quickly but was mostly running by myself afterwards. There was a couple of hills later in the race which were a bit difficult, not having a great time trying to stay under 4:00/km.

Grabbed another couple of spots late in the race, gave me something to focus on. The distance was 10.13km which didn't help my finish time, just came in under 40 minutes but not close to any personal beats. Lately my races haven't even been as good as my training runs, need to make some improvements to race preparation, especially hydration.

Drive back to the city to the farmers market on Flinders Street, not much for sale except cronuts! Got some food for lunch at stopped at the Palmetum - a place will palms. Good place with a little rainforest.

Palmetum.

Started a long drive north to Paluma, but took a detour first to the Frosty Mango. Basically it's just a larger version of a milk bar on the highway, selling lots of ice cream flavours and a few other mango specific products.

The Big Frosty.

Took the road inland to Paluma, one of those annoying roads with bends every few seconds and narrow roads, 40km/h max speed. Stopped at Little Crystal Creek for a break, had a river and some rock pools.

Little Crystal Creek.

More slow driving to get to Paluma, nothing at all in the town, almost drove past the other end without realising. Got out of the car at last, walked around for a while, had some nice tracks though the forest. Otherwise very quiet and deserted.

Somewhere in Paluma.

Downtown Paluma.

Drove back to city, lots of dead kangaroos on the highway, no near misses this time.

Steps: 13,000 + 14.5 km

Townsville 2018, August 04 (Stranded)

Because of the climate the parkrun starts at 7:00am instead of 8:00am. There's three parkruns around Townsville, the closest was about 15 minutes away. Bit of a weird drive to get there, seems to be a separation between where the city ends and the suburbs start.

Got to the parkrun at Aplins Weir just in time, a good spot along the river. The course wasn't so special, just a cement footpath along the river, but good scenery at least.

I was just going for an easy run, started about 4:00/km but dropped it down to 4:30/km soon.
My only goal was to finish in the top ten, made it without too much effort.

Aplins Weir.

Drove back to the hotel then found somewhere to park in North Ward - north of the river where almost everything else. Walked down The Strand, a beachfront road almost identical to Cairns.

The Strand.

Walked down Flinders Street! in the city centre, a bit smaller version though. Spotted a couple of souvenir shops, some street art, but otherwise it was fairly quiet, maybe because it was the weekend.

The other Flinders Street.

Some street art around town.

Some other street art.

Victoria Bridge.

Got back to the car and drove up to the top end of the city to Jezzine Barracks. Picked up a race pack from the Townsville Running Festival expo. Free singlet! although I don't wear singlets, and a free 15 cents Coles bag! which had the race bib and not much else.

Drove to Hermit Park, ordered some pizza, drove to some park to have lunch. The park had some kids miniature train going around it, also happened to be near part of the V8 Supercars street circuit. After lunch walked around a bit of the circuit, some of it is just normal road so couldn't determine the full track layout.

Possibly part of a V8 track.

Didn't want to walk too much with a race the next morning, so went back to the hotel a bit early.

Steps: 17,500 + 5.5km

Townsville 2018, August 03 (The Town)

So this is what my winter holidays have come down to, a weekend interstate.

Started with a three hour flight from Melbourne after work, left late afternoon and arrived in the evening. Made a good decision to hire a car for the duration, cost about $220 which was easily worth the convenience. Got a free upgrade - aka we don't have your car - to a Toyota Camry, I would have preferred to have the compact Yaris or similar I booked, since it's easier to park.

The car was alright, it had a foot parking brake but would still roll after being engaged. The drive from the airport to the hotel was easy, since I brought along my own GPS unit instead of paying like $20 a day to hire one!

The hotel reception had already closed for the night, but they had a phone to use to get a room key from the safe. The people in the next room were the worst, they went out for the night at like 9:00pm but left the TV going at full volume. Then they finally got back after 1:00am and started making a ridiculous amount of noise. Lucky they were gone the next day.

Steps: 5,000

Singapore and Malaysia 2018

May 03
May 04
May 05
May 06
May 07
May 08
May 09
May 10
May 11
May 12
May 13

Singapore and Malaysia 2018, May 13 (Epilogue)

Travel summary:

• 10:00am flight
• Got hotel reception to book a taxi to come in 20 minutes, to save time waiting after finishing breakfast
• I asked about going to the airport instead of the central train station
• He said they don't do it, you have to use 'a website' yourself
• I asked what website, he seemed confused so I had to rephrase it - Grab or Uber apparently
• That seemed weird, so I just asked for a taxi to the train station and he wrote down my room number
• Finished breakfast and ready to leave!
• Checked on the taxi progress, he asked if I wanted to book it now!
• So...this made the whole previous conversation pointless
• The 'taxi' arrived, it was actually just a Grab driver, just managed to fit a suitcase in the back
• A bit too stressful, but got to the train and the airport with no more issues
• So many different queues to get to the departure gate, but moved fast
• Went with Air Asia instead on the way back, since it was direct from KL
• No screens in the head rests, really boring listening to podcasts and staring at nothing
• It was weird that I had booked a meal as part of the baggage allowance, they had two meal services but you only get one meal!
• Melbourne luggage carousel must be the slowest in the world, always takes at least 20 minutes
• The car battery started in the long term car park!

Next time...not sure yet.

Magnet updates.

Singapore and Malaysia 2018, May 12 (All These Things That I've Done)

Last day. Saturday morning is parkrun day! There's exactly one event in Malaysia, so I chose a hotel that was close enough to run there. The park was quite small so it was a strange course, run a small loop once then a large loop three more times. Even with an early 7:30am start it was very tough conditions in the heat, finished in just over 20 minutes for the 5 kilometres.

Back to the hotel and breakfast, this time got a bus ticket booked online for Genting Highlands to avoid any confusion. Only booked for about a half day, since I was not expecting too find much there since the previous indoor and outdoor theme parks have been closed down and the new 20th Century Fox theme park is well behind schedule. What a surprise...

Most buses take you to the bottom of the hill, which has the outlet mall and the cable car station up to the top. The line seemed to be moving deceivingly fast but it was just so long it took nearly 30 minutes to reach the front - it's going to be a total disaster once the theme park opens. I couldn't understand why so many people would bother going there when there isn't all that much to do, much better off just doing the equivalent activities in KL.

There's some temple at the middle station you can get out at, but given how long it took to get into a car, you wouldn't risk getting out and having to wait for another empty one again. So finally reached the top, a bit like the Crown complex I suppose, and likewise including a hotel and casino. There was a few smaller attractions that seemed to be more suited to children, video game arcade, restaurants, shopping, cinemas and bowling.

Probably not a good sign when the light show is one of your main attractions.

Given the amount of time available, just decided on some bowling after having looked at all of the options. The bowling was really cheap like the cinemas, paid for two games and did well considering having not played in a few years.

Could have gone close to 200 with a bit of luck.

The trip back down was great by comparison, 15 minutes or less.

Just had time to visit the Nike store at the outdoor outlet mall at the bottom, seemed like a good place and had lots of shops, but didn't have time to look anywhere else. Maybe saw a couple of size 13 shoes but none worth getting, instead got a couple of pairs of large shorts instead of medium this time, but they still weren't much longer! So need extra large in Asia.

More waiting in line.

Legs feeling really sore just sitting on a bus for an hour, not looking forward to an eight hour flight tomorrow. Back at the hotel I had to find an ATM at the shopping mall, given the preference for cash you'd think these things would be everywhere, but there was like one every second floor and took forever to find it, makes no sense.

Steps: 14,000 (2.5 hours)

• KL
• 7 out of 10
• Good
• Cheap also
• Park Run
• Bad
• Few signs for streets and train stations
• Less frequent trains
• No theme park at Genting Highlands
• Vegetarian options
• Missed Out
• Some of KL Forest Eco Park
• Malacca

Singapore and Malaysia 2018, May 11 (The Backup Backup Plan)

Had a two hour bus trip booked to go to Malacca at 8:30am, I was ready to leave a 7:30am but Jason wasn't even done with breakfast until 7:45am, so wasn't going to be on time for that - it only cost a few dollars at least. Took a train to the main bus terminal anyway, next available buses weren't until 10:00am so didn't really want to wait around in a bus terminal for that, it's only slightly better than an airport terminal.

Went back to KL Sentral instead, had a look at the bus situation to Genting Highlands, didn't look good so got out of the station. This was probably my least favourite experience, the streets around KL Sentral are just not pedestrian friendly at all, it's all highways and exit ramps and no way to get around on foot, just kept going around in circles reaching dead ends.

Eventually got to the museum / planetarium / gardens / bird park / butterfly park etc. Lots of things around, too bad it's almost impossible to get to. Found fake Stonehenge and a deer park walking through the gardens, only all the deer were just hiding in the shade, providing no entertainment. Tried out the KL Bird Park of all the available choices, described as the world's largest walk-in aviary. It was better than I expected, there is a big net over the whole park so the birds can't escape, and you can just walk around with most of the birds, somehow they don't have an issue with all the people being around them. A few had to be in cages for various reasons - their safety or yours.

White flamingo?

Some kind of parrot.

Favourites:

• Emu and Ostrich
• Flamingo
• Parrots

Walked to the closest train station, forgot it was another one of those KTM stations that was closed! so had to find the next station instead. Still dealing with sore legs so during the afternoon went back to the hotel, got a ticket for the cinema at the shopping centre. Bargain prices for movies, $4 for regular seats and the front few rows are only $3. The best option seemed to be this horror movie Truth or Dare, in English but with subtitles, no problem. There was a problem though, due to the Malaysia culture or whatever, they were cutting out bad words but also some themes must be inappropriate so suddenly the movie would just skip forward as they'd cut entire parts out of it. Really weird and confusing to watch. The movie would have been terrible even without the edits, like those Final Destination movies.

Steps: 21,500 (3.5 hours)