Hey homeboys and gals!

It's been quite a while since my last post, I'm sorry for that. I actually created a photobucket account, but I still haven't uploaded photos.
Actually I'm wastin' my time with travelling around and having fun rather that uploading photos twice (facebook should do for the moment). However, I'm sorry for those of you who aren't on facebook and thus can't see the photos, I'll fix that (someday).
During the last few weeks I had some time for day-trips, first there was easter break and secondly I skipped some of my lectures, coz I had company of probably the 2 hippest austrians.

On Maundy Thursday together with Markus and Thijs, I headed of to the Tasman Peninsula, first to throw a glance on Tasman Arch and the devil's kitchen, then doing the Cape Hauy walk to the candlestick and the totem pole, to really impressive rocks.
The easter weekend was really relaxing then, and I got back to activity on monday, when I did a daytrip to Mt. Field national park, where one can visit some nice waterfalls. Unfortunately I didn't take money with my, so I couldn't stay for the night. For some reason they want $10 for the campsite. By that time most of my friends left for New Zealand or some nice place on the mainland. Those who stayed in Hobart had plenty of uni-work to do, so I had to use the self-timer of my camera during this trip.


Skipping some days of my life, we'll focus on the following weekend, when I was on geophysics excursion in the Upper Esk valley, about 3 hours drive from Hobart, in the north east of Tassie. We were acquiring some magnetic data and doing some seismic measurements. It's probably some basalt that's causing a big magnetic anomaly there. However, the weather was nice, we had fun and we were sleeping in a Shearers quarter. Really cool.

While I was driving home from Fingal on sunday, the two hip austrian dudes Clemens and Sam were arriving at Hobart at making their way to my home. The following week I skipped some lectures to show them Tassie.
On Monday I had prac though, so I sent them off to Wineglass bay. I reckon it was a nice trip for them.
The pharmacology prac instead revealed my shocking blood-pressure, but I'm sure you don't wanna go into detail on that.
From tuesday to wednesday I had some time for a trip with my friends, so, well, we headed up the east coast for maria island. Unfortunately there was no ferry on that day, so we changed our plans. We drove further on up the road (now it's time to get the eric clapton song for the right feeling) to taste some wine, eat some pancake and camp in a national park. Yes we had a great time.

But now I've gotta do some uni work, write a report which is due on monday, I have to finish that, so I can go rafting on sunday. We're leaving tomorrow, camp at the river and go down the river on sunday. I reckon it's gonna be a great trip. The forecast says rain and snow in the mountain, so there's gonna be a good water-level, and probably a nice snowy surrounding.

catch you later!

Good evening!

Now I'm back for another post. Call it appendix to my last one, since it includes the last weekend, again.
So let's focus on friday night, when I played my first game in Tasmanien Soccer Premier League. That day was really weird, since I didn't expect to get the clearance in time. However, After a big lunch I was sleeping, when suddenly my phone rang and someone from the soccer club told me, that I can play!!!
Since this wasn't clear until a couple of hours before the game, I was substitute, and played only the last 30mins. Unfortunately I wasn't able to turn the game, so we lost 3:0.
The rest of the weekend you already know from my last post.
Now there's nothing more to say, I reckon. This week was again a week of uni-life. Well, on monday I tried some eyedrops in the pharmacology practical, phenylephrine. I was lucky, of the 4 "human subjects" I was the one who got the drug, not affecting the vision, but only the constriction of the pupil. I must've been looking like a maniac, one pupil 0.8mm in diameter, the other one 0.4mm. Unfortunately I don't have a photo.
This weekend I'm planning to fill the photobucket with a whole lotta photos, that I wanna share with you. I hope I can add some slideshows to my blog!

have a nice day!

Good Morning!

I just had a wonderful weekend at Bruny Island, we were a group of 12, very mixed group, you couldn't find a trend of who we were and we drove to Bruny Island for a nice camping adventure.
Again we were so lucky with the weather. On saturday it got up to 26°C and it was a starlit night. Camping in Tassie is awesome! There are many campsites around and you don't have to pay anything. Just put up your tent, a couple of meters away from the beach.
When swimming you can see some nice animals. This weekend I saw an octopus, some starfishes and a stingray. The stingray made us a little bit nervous though.
However the night was great, because we had a campfire, a guitar, 5.8kg meat and 120 bottles of beer.
I think you can imagine, that it's been a great weekend.
Monday, which was the day before yesterday, obvisously, was also great. I was at uni, when I got informed that Jeff plans a trip to clifton beach for surfing. Well nothing better than that, after finishing uni, I had 3 hours time to waste, before the pharmacology practical. So I drove out to clifton beach for some surfing experience. It was my first time, so I didn't have a lot of time standing on the board. Furthermore one of the three fins of the board was broken, not the best for stability.
After some time 2 dolphins showed up, how exciting.

And there is one thing you might not want to hear, but I simply can't always talk about the good things in life: Well, I've got a terrible pain in my back. It's because of the matress, I reckon. The next days I'll try sleeping on the floor and let you know, how this worked out.

Hey Yo!

I know, I should study, in 3 hours I'm gonna write my second test overseas. Pharmacology. I wonder how this will be. Astronomy on friday was really easy. On thursday I was really stressed and started to study and read the textbook. On friday morning I realized that half of the questions were Multiple-choice. However, Pharmacology shouldn't be that easy.
Some of you might have seen it on facebook and have enjoyed the fotos, some of you didn't. I've made a trip to wineglass-bay on saturday. That's almost 200km in the north-east of Hobart and when I heard the forecast for Saturday I decided to do something.
But well, owning a car is prerequisite for this and so do I. Last Wednesday, when I received my driving licence from home, I went and bought a car. A nice one:
Mitsubishi Sigma, 1986, 200,000km, 113PS, Automatic.
And when I bought a device to connect my MP3-Player to the cassette-player of the car I definitely had to drive 400km and so I got to that beautiful bay.
So we, Rune, Thijs and Me had a finde day, hot, sunny, swimming in the sea. Well, you can imagine, a beautiful day in autumn.
Sunday was supposed to be my study-day (for pharmacology) but well, I was on this keg-party on Saturday evening, hence a bit tired on sunday and not able to do anything else than watching Steven Seagal in "The Patriot". At least he's playing an immunologist and doing some research, trying to find a new drug... This convinced me that I've done at least something for my pharmacology test. Even though the reference might not have the highest impact-factor, and additionally I'm not really sure about the H-factor of Steven Seagal.
But now I go back to my book. See you!

Gidday mates!

After this awesome weekend it's time for another post, I really was looking forward to writing it. However, the University Soccer team lost the game versus South Hobart 0:3. Without me, I'm still not allowed to play.
However, I was on a rafting-trip for the weekend. We left Hobart on Friday, 6pm and arrived at a small camping site at the Mersey river 6 hours later, after having dinner in a pizzeria, half the way up there.
Then there was the first challenge waitin', putting up a tent in the darkness, well not complete darkness since there was full moon. But for me it was a new tent, I bought in the morning, so I've never put it up before. I did a good job, and the tent was standin' upright, when I crawled in for sleep.
The next morning it was quite cold and rainy, but who cares? You'll get wet anyways when you wanna raft down a river. So at 10am we went off for our first trip, we did the same 6km a couple of times.
After two times and an upcoming thunderstorm, we were all feeling cold, so we stopped and had BBQ at the camping site, after that, what do you do when there's nothing else to do? Yap, get in the cars, drive upstream and raft downstream.
The sunday was even better, some of us had quite a hangover from the goon (australian slang word for cheap box wine) and the river was filled up with water (you remember, it was raining the day before). However, the sun was shining, and the water was wilder than the day before, still grade 3 but better. Rune and I, we had two great trips down the river in a small rafts, no one wanted to guide us, so we had to do it on our own and we were awesome ;)
Today the rain came back and I didn't check the forecast so far... But you can't trust the forecast any further than 2 minutes, the weather changes rapidly.
And the foto I'm providing shows a nice little rapid on the Picton river from last weeks raft (Grade 2)
Now I'm off and stuff myself with some chicken breast.
see ya!

Good day!

Today's "eight hours day", public holiday in Australia, actually I think it's in all britain and it's (former) colonies. I'm not explaining what they're celebrating, you can check that out on wikipedia, and I'm not writin' this blog to educate you.
However, I've had a great weekend, with a whole lotta sports going on. Starting with soccer training on thursday, on friday a workout in the uni-gym, in the evening Rune's birthday party. The next day I was hiking the Mt. Wellington. Was a nice hike, although the weather wasn't as good as we were hoping.
The morning was awesome, a few clouds, but mainly fine. During our "climb", the weather changed. And when we were at the summit, it was all in a cloud, raining, very windy and about 3-5°C.
So I've got to go again, the mountain is famous for it's views and I didn't see anything.
Sunday was fine again, and I was gettin' up in the morning early again to get ready for another rafting tour. Hopefully I'll get some pictures soon, coz I didn't bring my camera... Electronic devices and water - bad combination...
They have dry boxes for cameras, but mine is a little to big...
For today I've decided to go running, which I'm gonna do after finishing this post, and in the afternoon... Well finally I should start doing something for uni. I think there's a pharmacology assessment coming up in 2 weeks (or so), and a little bit of astronomy homework to do.
So then, one of my malaysian friends (I still have troubles remembering their names) just finished his shower, so I've got to take that chance and brush my teeth.

see you!

Hey there!

Well, now that it's march I think it's up to another post. Uni is quite nice, nothing has changed a lot since the first week.
In Pharmacology class I had a short discussion with the teacher, coz I didn't like his definition of non-competitive antagonists. He finally admitted that pharamacologists use quite an old definition.

At home I'm still living on toast. It's quite okay, makin' a sandwich every evening, but you have to make some variations. Sometimes you skip out tomatoes, sometimes have it with an egg. Well, next week I think I'm gonna check out that german bakery for some real bread. In the supermarkets they only sell toast, in different variations though.

Have I actually told you about beer in Tasmania? Or alcohol in general? I don't think so, hence I better do so now.
It's not possible to buy beer (or any other kind of alcohol) in a supermarket. You have to go to a bottleshop, mostly at the backside of some restaurants or other shop, marked with a sign saying "Bottleshop - Drive In". I've got to get you a picture of this...
However, beer is sold in 375ml, whereas a six pack is about $16 dollas, which may be about €8. So yes, it is really expensive.
When you're going out you usually drink a pint which is 570ml for about $6-8. Of course you can order a jug, which is 1140ml and sometimes a good opportunity. Usually you'll get a jug for $11, but there are days you can have a jug for $5 from 5-6pm, $6 from 6-7pm and so on. And then they wonder, why young Australians get drunk so fast.

However, I'm not gonna tell you all the secrets about life in Australia now, so I'll keep you reading.

keep on keepin' on and have a nice day!
luke