Some of the adventures Jen and i go on are nice and pure and rough. Climbing mountains at 3am to see the sunrise, getting lost hiking around waterfalls or just driving… somewhere… distant. Those are great trips. This trip however presented us with the challenge of fulfilling certain obligations with sponsors, articles commissioned and the like, along with another layer to the need for certain imagery. We had our own needs, giving the mix of holiday, adventure, charity and education within the experience. This factor of ingredients made the experience more a project than a holiday. Which is why we departed with three digital camerasand a digital video camera stowed safely in our Crumpler bags. The cameras consisted of:

• Canon Ixus 55 
• Canon Powershot A700
• Panasonic DMC-FZ5 Lumix
• Sony DCR HC32E

These are relatively older bits of gear from our collection, and all relatively cheap. The Ixus is a very small camera for quick snaps and video whilst riding, and inconspicous when amongst crowds. The A700 is a worthy general travel camera and offers enough manual control for good pics, and escapes the marketing insanity of artificially high megapixels. The Lumix is basically a step under a DSLR with 35mm equivalent lens, good rapid fire mode, manual controls and is capable of good seperation and sweet bokeh. The video camera is a vertern of my band and alas still uses DV tapes. All light, easily stowed and kept safe, as i said above. But not safe enough. With Jen’s riding accident we have basically written off the Ixus and the video camera. Thankfully no data was lost and this re-enforces the importance of travel insurance.

Since getting back to the studio in Brisbane, i have been eagerly dreading the task of sorting through all the images. Whilst travelling, i made good use of Adobe Lightroom on the Acer Aspire One to attend to some of this on the road. The plan was to import all the daily photos into Lightroom, quickly tag them for the day and region, and utilise its backup function onto the tiny Lacie drive. This worked well for a few days but we soon fell in to the far easier habit of nightly dumps of files into daily folders for each camera. Its important to keep the different camera’s files apart, and a lot of other small issues i could relate and bore with at great length. The truth is the system as above works exceedingly well, but the trip quite quickly become bigger than the technology. There was just so much to see, experience and do, and appending files for the sake of saving time back at home? A quick decision to make. 

So now however i have the task of getting all these files imported into Lightoom, renamed and sorted. After that comes tagging them (where taken, what of, etc) and then rating. After that we’ll export a heap up to Flickr and post the gallery here. Only after that will we consider the exhibition content. If anyone is interested in the workflow of this let me know, as its rather interesting how best to accomodate three cameras, five SD cards, twenty-three days of travel and a very dusty and unreliable environment. For now though, there is work to do.

Until then hang in and check the twitter updates on the side. In short, we are having even more fun than we thought we would, and today alone has felt like two seperate days in one. Amazing. From very tourist things like shooting an AK47 rifle, to the simple amazement of little kids running out of their modest huts to shout “hellloooo” at us, and giggling at our attempts of “Xin chào” in return. For now, its bed time. Dave out!

At this stage we aren’t yet aware of the final total of funds raised for Oxfam Australia and can only shake our heads and laugh as some of our sponsors and plenty of our friends take their time to meet the first deadline. Which is, well, today. We won’t stop fundraising for Oxfam while the opportunity still exists however, and are certainly encouraging everyone to consider supporting if they havent already. Like you! Apart from that we have a busy weekend of running around for (I kid you not) pairs of socks, a visit to Crumpler to check out their new hydration bags and a replacement recharger for my favourite point and shoot camera. Somehow the transformer in my Canon A700‘s rechargabe battery pack has passed away (not with a band, but a whimper) in the last week, adding a new entry to the shopping list.

Shopping aside (as much because its a boring topic as for the glint in Jen’s eye), there isn’t agreat deal of excitement bubbling just at this moment. News of the troubles in Mumbai, our own concerns of family members in Thailand and being exhausted from our final days of work have left us in a mood of mild amusement if anything else. Somehow over the next two days I have to finish some audio projects in the studio before throwing a dust sheet over the computers and music gear that occupies a lot of my spare time. Jen has had the fun of saying goodbye to her cat for a while and with that, we’re nearly there. Thanks again to everyone who has supported us so far! And with that, it’s time for bed.

Last week went by quickly enough with virtually every hour of the day outside of work full of trip considerations. That’s not to say we haven’t had our fair share of relaxing, and I’ve certainly put a few hours into playing Fallout 3 in the evening last week, but there is just so much to do. We won’t stop fundraising for Oxfam Australia until the minute we get in the car and head to the airport, and we were very excited to have such great sponsors as In2Cycles and Crumpler onboard. The crew at ZeroGen have been amazing also and I would sound like an infomercial trying to fit in everyone that has donated and supported what we are doing. There is still so much to do, and we near the last yards of our target with this final week and are still encouraging everyone to get involved.

Aside from that, we are faced with an interesting time of year. We won’t get a chance to settle back into Brisbane until 2009, which is a macroscopic “wow” in terms of everything we need to finish this year. Everything we need to finish in one week. I have four items of music production to hand over in the next week, a bunch of things to finish writing for work and the various final touches on ensuring the gadgetry that we will be travelling with is minimal, secure and robust. Jen has a heap of work deadlines and the eternal quest for reducing the amount of Things in her luggage. We are both very good at packing our luggage for travel but this trip adds extra weight and volume in our bike seats, helmets and other riding gear. I’m sitting even now with the excellent Shimano SH-MT41G SPD (how is that for a product name?) shoes supplied by In2Cycles that wrap around my feet in a continued quest to break them in. I’d ideally love to use them as my only enclosed shoes for both riding and walking for the times I won’t be wearing Havianas, though they do have the slightest of a forward roll. See the dull things we are considering? Shoes. Not the amazing food, incredible people or adventures ahead, but shoes. Jen asks “what’s wrong with shoes”, but I won’t bite, having dashed with full force of my wit against Jen’s Impenetrable Fortress of Shoebox Keep in recent months.

Back to the week at hand, and it can really boil down to a mix of our own readiness to jump on that plane and the major focus of every last bit of fundraising for Oxfam Australia that we can fit. It doesn’t stop even after we get home of course, with the photo exhibition and the fact that we are quite into the work Oxfam Australia does in general. In this final week itself we work through the last parts of the overall plan and head towards the silly questions like “what book are you taking with you?”. I’ve been thinking about grabbing some Buddhist books given the area we will be going to, though as much for context as anything else. I have enjoyed some podcasts on the topic as I ride and occasionally whilst working lately, which has been a nice break from the regional history we have been reading lately.

So from Shoes to Buddhist MP3’s and books, it’s obvious that we are now happily wedging petty distractions and small excitements into the daily routine. Jen even danced with excitement today, which was something between a jig and an episode of The Wiggles. I would have joined her but I’ve long since been banned from doing The Robot. I’m sure you understand. I’m also sure you understand that I’m going to insert the pre-requisite link to donate and support our fundraising for Oxfam Australia! And with that, there’s things to do and worlds to save.

For the sake of our legs however, I joined Jen on another training ride on Sunday. With the fine weather continuing overhead, and not a frozen pellet of hail to bounce off of our helmets this time, we hit the familiar setting of the Powerhouse for a warm up ride across to the Brisbane River Walk. Unsurprisingly the streets are busy with people making the most of the weather and we don’t feel too uncomfortable trying out our new In2Cycles riding jerseys as other cyclists in equally bright and tight gear zoom around like us. Whilst breaking my new Shimano shoes in I risk breaking my brains out, slipping somewhat on the new tread. The shoes offer the ability to screw in cleats but I figure this is perhaps not the best time to make such a sudden change to my riding style, given the good natured advice that I’m bound to “fall off a few times at first”.

With that enjoyable prospect buried, we race across the River Walk with a few bursts of camera and filming, and shake our heads in silent understanding as we near the historic wharves. Public outcry and political caution is thankfully mounting over new plans to develop the Howard Smith Wharves under the Storey Bridge. It really shouldn’t surprise the Council and developers that Brisbane city residents want this historic stretch left alone, and certainly not spoilt by a “boutique hotel”. We like this stretch of the river and the history of the World War II air raid shelters, and truly fail to imagine a nine-storey hotel marching up the cliffs. Thankfully the cliffs of Kangaroo Point on the far side of the river remain free of the meddling of developers and council for the time being and we ride over the Goodwill Bridge and dodge pedestrians who seem to alternate between Space Invaders formations and a real life game of Frogger.

We keep an eye on the cliffs as we ride past, being a popular climbing spot for a number of our friends, and head downriver until we are spat out onto the road near the iconic Brisbane Jazz Club. We ride past to the sounds of a some tired jazz standard being sung very politely, and despite my preference for Minton’s era jazz played by those who put a difficult life into joyous notes, I’m happy this old building has escaped the developers that are eyeing off the wharves on the opposite banks for the time being.

Making a stop for water, a check of the distance ridden on the cycle computer and some photos, we spin around and tackle the South Bank stretch. By the time we break through the humans and their happily random sidewalk footwork, I’m giving in to the reality that I might have picked up a cold from the previous day’s music festivities. We pause outside the lovely facade of the Gallery of Modern Art and check the cycle computer again. Chatting briefly we decide it’s better to appease the cold then to push on and start to head home. As we tick over the relatively embarrassingly short 30 kilometre mark we slow down and appreciate a gently setting sun and the disappearance of the buffeting headwind which has added some extra effort to stretches of the ride.

The ride was perhaps well short of the 100k’s we had planned earlier, but another day in the saddle all the same. I have gotten so comfortable with the Crumpler SoupandSalad bag now that I doubt I will want to ride with a traditional backpack again. It is something of a messenger bag in the way it hangs over one shoulder, but the cross strap I struggled with on the first day in Byron Bay now sits perfectly across to the side, holding the bag to curve of my back and side. The benefits are clearly airflow over my back and the ease by which to unclip one strap and have the full bag swing round to dig out cameras, squishy and Carman’s muesli bars as needed. It may seem a small thing to note, but the right gear does seem to remove the need to think about such matters and lets us focus on such important topics as how bad they are going to remake The Day The Earth Stood Still, how cool Gort was, or the relative merits of Open Source versus Third Party software. Obviously I was doing much of the talking by this stage. And much of the typing now.

With the ride retired and the sun past set, we swap bikes for cups of green tea, orange juice and rest. Thoughts turn to the hope for the disappearance of any suggestion of a cold and of the week ahead. One last week to rally support for our fundraising for Oxfam Australia before we fly out to Vietnam to swap our well laid Brisbane city roads for… for what? We know an idea of what to expect, we have seen the small snippets of video and the photos besides, but in just over seven days we will know for ourselves. And possibly curse every training session we cut short, regardless of something as genuinely lame as a cold. In my defense… well… no. There isn’t any. Time to rest up though.

Check our FlickR Gallery for Brisbane Riverside Ride Photos.

Aside from that, and our best wishes of course those affected, our attention has largely been on the last leg of the fundraising for Oxfam Australia. We are so close to our target now and feeling the urgency of the last two weeks closing in somewhat. As I’ve said before it is indeed an exciting trip as far as seeing the work of Oxfam Australia on site and “that little mountain bike ride” from Vietnam to Cambodia, but our thoughts and energies have been entirely on the fundraising. Once we hit the plane, I think the other elements of the trip will finally come to mind. Not that we aren’t genuinely excited, but it’s hard to dance around singing “holidaaaay” when the major purpose of it is to do what we can to better the lives of communities in regions like Cambodia, where AUD$25 can make such a difference. We usually end these countdown posts with some form of a reminder link where you can donate, but I’m going to pepper this post with reminders such as this link. Or you can go directly to the Oxfam Australia site and sponsor us there, and enjoy knowing that your money goes directly to the work of Oxfam Australia and you will be in many ways joining us on our trip. You will won’t you, reading this blog and checking the FlickR photo galleries, Twitter posts and your choice of either the excellent Vimeo or passable YouTube for videos? Of course you will!

So the fundraising and geeking aspects are covered, which brings us to thoughts of starting to get together the list of what we will be packing. We will be leaving our Mongoose Tyax Super and Giant Yukon’s in Australia and will be supplied with some model of Trek’s, though all the accessories come with us. Later this week I will fill out the Gear section of this site but needless to say we will be taking seats, gloves, knicks, jerseys, helmets, riding glasses and water bottles. In2Cycles have covered us nicely for that aspect and Crumpler have been fantastic with the bags and hydration solutions. The travel computer supplied by In2Cycles will let us track the distance and time we ride each day and Jen’s roaming smart phone (which really doesn’t deserve a plug here does it?) means we can tether our micro-laptop and have no excuse to miss our daily updates. Depending on how tired I get this will be either simply Twitter, some pics and a post or some video editing and typical verbosity. Maybe some hyperbole, Bryson-esque attempts at wit and general travel writing cliché. You can count on me for that.

So this week ahead is going to fly by, and so much so that I’m going to avoid any attempts at an analogy or metaphor and simply recognise that it’s going to, well, fly by. There’s really not that much more to say at this stage besides the reminder to help us reach the last part of our target, to remember that you can read older posts on the site by clicking on the categories or the “Older Posts” button at the bottom and another reminder to help us support Oxfam Australia! Lastly, thanks for everyone that has helped support us so far and for all the great emails and comments!

As an iPod and portable speakers attempt to drown out the rain to the sounds of The Doves, we pedal and run and lift bits of metal in eagerness for dusty trails in a country where we hope it won’t rain on our heads either. We quickly lose interest in the gym but persist, trapped with the notion that the enjoyment of our riding will be directly influenced by our preparation. The little laptop sits here as both the means to write this post between sets, and the gateway for journeys into FlickR to seek inspiring photographs of the regions we will be travelling. As you should know, nearly every photo on this site is a direct link back to that section of our collection of photos on our own FlickR account. I chose this route rather than FTP as a means to utilise some time saving WordPress publishing plugins (namely tan tan noodles gallery) and also to create a persistent gallery within FlickR itself. I can’t say enough about just how useful FlickR has been for us to scope out photos of places, and I’ve been a big fan of the popularisation of photo publishing services and the resulting communities as a historical social study.

Geek topics for another time, I did consider SmugMug and alternatives but nothing really beats FlickR for the community of great photographers, and a little trick the photographically inclined tourist might consider is the update of the old “postcard positioning” trick. The traditional wisdom was to purchase a few postcards from the inbound airport when you land, and use those as a rule for the best spots to get similar photos. As simple as it sounds, flicking through postcards is a nice way to get some ideas about advantageous framing and positioning for photographs of Big Obvious Tourists Things. Given we are going to a Big Obvious Tourist Thing called the Angkor Wat temples, I have been enjoying some of the overlapping perspectives of the people who have been there, taken photos, and uploaded to sites like FlickR. In the future we won’t have to wonder about “all the people that would have stood in this spot”. We can see most of them on FlickR.

As fun as this rant is, it’s my turn to hop on the treadmill and stare into either a beige wall or an imaginary distance. If this weather clears even to a light drizzle we will happily hit the roads again, but storm warnings and lightning suggests otherwise. As ever, insert reminder on how to support us on our ride with the Oxfam Cambodia Challenge for 2008. You know, that thing where we actually ride bikes on roads, rather than treadmills and machines in small rooms.

After a weekend training session in Byron Bay under cloudy skies and intermittent rain, we catch up on this day of a new countdown week for lunch and this post. Sitting at a cafe with our little computer at hand, we are slowly getting used to strange looks from passers-by as we excitedly chitter and chatter (Jen chitters, I chatter) about the trip ahead, the fundraising left to do, the training remaining and even how best to keep up with our travel diary of sorts. Yes, this blog. And yes, people do tend to give you funny looks as you push half eaten sandwiches and empty coffee mugs aside to fold back pages of a Lonely Planet and argue good naturedly about travel blogs, little computers and looking like a geek in public. Oh yes, and the small issue of crossing Jen’s current threshold of geek-comfort-in-public by way of a demonstrations of dumping photos from a digital camera to this small form factor laptop via Lightroom. They might have been timelapse photos from the morning ride to work. Very cool and will be up on the site by the end of the week. Some might find this a little too geeky (ahem, Jen) and some might think this is totally awesome (ahem, Me). The jury is still out on that one perhaps.

So as lunch ticks on and our thoughts turn back to projects and the daily grind, we pay our bill and make our way back into the sunshine with a discussion on take away coffee and our lunch bill. I’m now carrying this little laptop in one hand and poking away at the keys with the other. But yes, coffee and lunch bill. One we probably won’t be able to enjoy on most of the trip ahead, and the other will be a small fraction of what we might spend here in Brisbane. If our perception of the cost of lunch in Vietnam and Cambodia is insignificant, then we can only enjoy that the cost of making a difference for local communities in both Vietnam and Cambodia is also, by comparison and quite literally, insignificant. What isn’t insignificant is the increasing feeling of pride in getting closer to our fundraising target of $11,000 to support the work of Oxfam Australia each and every day. We couldn’t be doing this without your support and as ever, remind you that we need further support to reach out target. And with that, it’s time to shut down the laptop, throw it and the camera in our new Crumpler, and head back to work. For three more weeks.

Byron Bay is many things to many people. If you ask most people what the history of the township is, they would likely respond that it was a small hippy township in the 1960’s or 70’s. If you ask them what it has become now the answer would range from a hippy hang out, alternative lifestyle township, yuppie weekend getaway, stoned backpacker Summer destination or just a typical commercialised sea side city. In that regards, they are all correct. As for the history, well that’s a little surprising. There’s no denying the influx of what we can peacefully call hippies in the 1970’s was a major contributor to the perceived image of Byron Bay, but the regional history for diary, meat and whaling isn’t often as discussed. I can only assume the warehouse ruins I used to marvel at near Belongil a few years ago, which are now completely bulldozed and cleared, were some remains of the whaling sheds cited to be in that area. For those interested there are some notes on the history here and here. The reason I mention this in a training post is that Jen and I have had some adventures down this way that are completely different each time. From attending Splendour In The Grass festival to simply ending up on the beach at 4am talking to backpackers and swapping travel stories, it’s a unique place. It seemed a good idea to head down there and tackle the famous lighthouse as a training ride. We didn’t consult the weather channel.

Before we hit the highway however, we had a few chores to run. The first was a visit to Brisbane’s first Crumpler outlet, which is the very funky store with the very funky bags. Whilst I’m not too endeared with the word funky, it’s probably about as neat a summation of the quirky, bizarre, amazing and creative bag company as one might come up with. Crumpler are cited as stemming from bicycle messengers making their own bags, and have blossomed into a world famous company designing incredible backpacks, messenger bags, camera bags and all sorts of bag like goodies. We were very excited to talk with Crumpler about sponsoring us for the Oxfam Cambodia Challenge for 2008 and they were very excited to do so. About as excited as Jen and myself running into the store to hassle Shannon for some new bags to test out. Kids in a candy store. Dumping all my gadgets out on the counter we managed to squeeze into a Soupansalad with ease and I spent a few minutes getting my head around the clever fasteners. We’ll have some more exciting Crumpler news in a few weeks but we thanked the Crumplorz (my just-made-up-name for them) for their help and hit the highway in earnest.

The further south we got, the more the clouds crept into the frame. By the time we checked in to our accommodation, the first drops of rain were dropping down. By the time we got the bikes ready and hit the road, it was raining proper. We rode through the small township into the late afternoon and worked up a hunger, before reluctantly heading back to the room, stowing the bikes and strolling back into town for dinner. We settled in at Byron Orion Curry House with its very cosy interior of dark wood and padded red walls. Many reading this now would be thinking we were crazy to eat there, and the internet has a fair bit of condemnation and bad reviews for the restaurant. Despite this, we were in the mood for a curry and a curry we had. Admittedly a watered down Tiki Masala from a planet where chickens are close to extinction, but the organic lamb was nice. You can’t really get upset at a prime positions tourist trap restaurant in a hip township with its own identity issues that is staffed by bored backpackers. Well, you can, but you shouldn’t. Of course it’s overpriced and of course it’s not authentic, but it’s never going to be Brick Lane or even New Farm. Making the most of the mass of food in front of us, we ate and ate until Jen sat watching me eat and eat and eat and, basically eat. Normally we eat at Beach Hotel itself, which surprisingly has yielded some creative and delicious menus, but a curry must when a curry is want. Even a curry that is judged as wanting.

For those who don’t find lengthy essays on meals interesting I will leave the topic with a truly fascination parting comment that our Eggs Benedict in the morning were delicious, thank you very much. On the topic of riding (in a Training post?? No way!) we happily hit the bikes and pedalled across the railway tracks into the town again, riding down the beach to warm up. With legs ready to rock, we pulled out towards the lighthouse and discovered the ride there is a lot shorter than we actually thought. Soon enough we have pedalled with ease up the steep approach and ride right around the lighthouse itself. All too soon we tapped brakes to pull up and gaze out over the beautiful bay. We take photos, film some video and get ready to ride away, before noticing a pod of whales playing below. Whilst the whaling station is long gone and without a trace to my knowledge, the days of steeply declining whale numbers are gone with it. Even from our high and distant vantage we can’t help but smile at the ridiculously large and playful leaps and slaps on display. There is no clever explanation needed for the brilliance of such a sight, and we linger long enough to feel our legs go cold and nudge each other into action again.

Continuing the ride down and around, we head over to Belongil and find a deserted stretch of dead end road with the odd cement overhand to practice some technical riding. We spend some time between determined frowns and self effacing laughs as we practice monos, wheelies, bunny hops, jumps, braking, balance and technical pops. In short, we are terrible. At length, we must head to the car and depart, finding our way back north with Squishy acting as GPS. With the recent rains in a typically beautiful selection of rolling hills and sudden mountains comes a renewed intensity to the greenery and we don’t doubt for a second why hippies, movie stars, rock gods and organic producers wish to claim a corner of this playground for themselves. As for us, it’s the city we yearn for and all the hustle and bustle that Brisbane can offer. That’s not a lot of hustle. And not a lot of bustle. Certainly not much compared to Ho Chi Min, which we will be riding through in 3 weeks! Argh! Until then, please help us continue to progress towards our fundraising targets!

Check our FlickR Gallery for Byron Bay training photos.