Teddywombat's obsession with bushwalks

Living in Sydney has been such a merit that without going far from home, you can enjoy the beauty of the wilderness. There are no less than 600 walking tracks (according to wildwalks.com) meandering across pristine national parks, reserves and bushlands around Sydney. After a week of busy work, you can easily clear your mind and lungs by diving into a walking track or two during the weekends - keeping away from the crowds, leaving your cares at home and getting closer with Mother Nature.

In Australia, we don't normally call it "hiking" mostly due to the fact that we don't have many high mountains to climb. Plus, Australian native plants have a rather "bushy" feeling, though we do have big trees. With this in mind, hikers tend to call their hobby "bushwalking" rather than "hiking".

I've been addicted to bushwalking since 2006. My initiation was Bill Bryson's best seller "Walk into the Woods." Hence, after completing the book, every weekend the beautiful sunshine would tempt my wild heart to take a walk into the Aussie bushland.

At the beginning, I was studying the street directories to search for the closest tracks. It was exciting to find those green tentacles of Mother Nature stretching among building blocks, roads and railways. Following the traces of dotted brown lines (indicate walking lines) to see where they were heading was just as much fun.

After accumulating more experiences, I started exploring tracks with mid- to high-level difficulties. Finishing all the tracks around my area, I searched for those within moderate driving distances. But the first thing to consider was if the track could be finished within a day. Here is a short list of what I've prepared for a day hike, just for your reference.

• Bring a map with the track you are going to walk through (or a hand-held GPS). Do a bit of research before you set off--otherwise you'll waste some time in doing so along the way.
  
• Wear sturdy hiking shoes - remember, don't wear sneakers on rugged tracks, or your feet will complain!
  
• Drink plenty of water in any weather condition, no joking.
  
• Use sunscreen and sunglasses if you walk under the blazing Aussie sunshine.
  
• Bring a torch in case you miss your turn and schedule - blundering in the dark night forest is one of the most miserable experiences (it hasn't happened to me yet, but you can imagine how it would be).
  
• Other beneficial add-ons include a cap, camera, walking stick, a bag and some snacks. If you feel bored, an iPod may help you kill the silence.
  
• Wear fast-dry hiking pants rather than jeans. This is what I learned from Bill Bryson's experience--it's a very practical suggestion.
  

To list a few of my most favorite walking areas which I've been waded through:

1. Garigal National Park and Middle Harbor area: Located in the Lower North Shore area of Sydney Metro, Middle Harbor area provides probably the most delicate views, with lush native plants and expansive harbor inlets. Most tracks are well maintained in this area. One of my favorite is Two Creek Track. There are swift drops, leafy glade territories, wooden bridges hanging over babbling brooks, small waterfalls bumbling over black rocks and marshy mangrove banks--and the views across upper reaches of Middle Harbor are just sensational. Located right between residential blocks, Garigal National Park has no shortage of wild animals. There are flocks of cockatoo and rainbow parrots; mysterious water dragons (a kind of lizard) taking sun baths on boulders along the bank; wild cockerels wandering across the bushes. I once saw a mother fox playing with cubs along a secluded creek.

2. Berowra Valley and Hornsby area: There are plenty of picturesque tracks here, and they are far more difficult and wilder. A long section of the Great North Walk (Sydney to New Castle) runs through the whole region along the deep valley and Berawra Waters. But I rather prefer another thread of tracks from Gibbergong, passing Bobbin Head to Berowra Track before reaching Brooklyn Station. The view is just spectacular - very dynamic terrain alongside the tracks and very expansive valley water view. It's said that once a humpback whale entered the Mooney Mookey Valley in 1950s. It's a pity I missed the whale, but I did bump into a huge goanna of 1.5 meter long. Without any preparation, I was scared out of my wits at the first sight--but he was rather calm in seeing me.

3. Central Coast: This is a bit far from the Sydney Metro area, probably a 2-hour drive to the north, so I could go all day and hardly meet a soul. One highlight is the Bouddi Coast Walk stretching along the coast line of Bouddi National Park. Any angle of the ocean view on the track is just immense. Besides the cliff top walk, the track also strings up a couple of small beaches. Just imagine that a full kilometer-long, sandy beach is totally yours. Every time while passing an empty beach, I would be totally immersed in the beauty and calmness of Mother Nature. Not long ago, I met a big snake along the Bouddi Coastal Walk. That was another calm animal of decent size that I met alone in the wild. He even posed for me to take a couple of photos, and his cool, brown gaze was quite unforgettable.

Beyond Sydney bushwalks, I would target New Zealand for world-famous tracks such as Milford and Routeburn Track. I once hiked Kepler Track alone last September when I traveled to New Zealand South Island. With the enormous alpine view, none of the Aussie tracks could compare. The best thing about walking New Zealand tracks is that every different piece of scenery is vividly spread in front of your eyes - cold, white alpine mountains; far and expansive pastures dotted with pearl-like sheep; the huge mirror of a glacial lake; colorful layers of mountain vegetation ... Without the thrusting mountains, the meandering green land would be too sweet; however, without the prosperous colors of vegetation, the mountain themselves would feel too cold. Does Mother Nature teach us a vivid lesson on how to treat our own life?

中共的民族政策是新疆局势的罪魁祸首

近几天新疆局势颇为紧张，汉族与维吾尔族成势不两立，水火不相容之势。官方统计死亡已达158人。这真是让人痛心的结果，也让人感到了像乌干达种族仇杀的那种恐惧。这是哪一方的错吗？笔者作为汉人的一员，从小受到的也是大汉族主义的灌输，对回教，维吾尔，藏族等也曾抱有一定的成见。然而近两年来阅读的一些有识之士的著作让我逐渐认识到自己的狭隘，改变了原来的看法。
对于近两天发生的事，作家王力雄在其两年前著作《我的西域，你的东土》中一针见血地指出了新疆问题症结所在，以下摘录一段再明白不过的分析。
”当局目前实行的民族政策，是政治上管的很紧，严厉镇压，而为了体现对少数民族的照顾，平衡政治上的强力镇压，在民事方面管得松，甚至采取姑息态度。这种大处镇压、小处放纵的民族政策，其实会导致最不好的结果。政治镇压造成的民族对立，不会因为民事上的照顾减小，反而使得少数民族被政治镇压形成的挫折和怨气，正好借小处发泄。譬如小杜说的维吾尔人不上卫生间而要在楼道撒尿，是因为「素质低下」，还是因为要表达不满呢？当这种发泄因为有少数民族身份被纵容，则会模糊社会的法治概念，似乎对少数民族有另一套法律标准。反过来使汉族反感，又会进一步加剧民族对立。最后没有一方满意，少数民族认为自己的权利不如汉人，汉人则认为少数民族有更多特权，受更多放纵。“
反观政府对这次暴动的镇压，与八九民运时隔二十年，中共在哪里又有一点进步呢？只有更加肆无忌惮的贪污腐化和对人民更加高压的精神控制而已。

Walking the Wentworth Tracks

I have been to Wentworth Falls in the Blue Mountains for no less than 5 times. However each time was a short lingering without hitting the bottom of the Fall.
Last weekend I finally made up my time to walk a full circle from so called “Valley of Waters” to Wentworth Falls.

The planning was a bit painful because there are so many side paths on map. To decide which track to take needed a bit study. A website called “Wild Walks” became a great help. It maps out some most popular tracks as well as very specific track notes.

So my trail was something like this: started from the end of Fletcher Street, followed the track along the side of Conservation Hut descent all the way to the Valley of Waters, then trudging through the long Wentworth Pass to hit the bottom of magnificent Wentworth Falls. Then climbing up the Slack Stairs to the top of the Fall (rising up around 900m), then follow the Undercliff Walk and Overcliff Walk until hitting back to Conservation Path.

I drove off from home at 6am when stars were blinking. Though the traffic was dead thin, it still took me around 1.5 hours to reach Wentworth Falls. The sun rose from the back while I was about to arrive, tinted everything with a golden fringe, looked like a promising day.

The track starts off with no drama at all – well paved and maintained. However covered by foliage there were no much breath-taking scenes until Queen Victoria Lookout and Empress Lookout. Sounds Aussies are quite reminiscent about their Anglo-Saxon roots. Though the scene is nothing like England.

A few more minutes later I arrived at Valley Of Waters. It was a series of small waterfalls, nothing gigantic but very delicate. Since it’s hiding deep in the valley, I could even feel the waves upon waves of moisture rushing through the atmosphere. And of course no short of vegetations, no naked rocks can be seen – they are all covered by thick moss.

Passing the Valley of Waters was the joint of National Pass and Wentworth Pass. National Pass is said to be a “easier” walk. Of course I would choose the more difficult one, which is marked as for “experienced walkers only”.

Since the sun was blocked by the cliff, it was rather chill and gloomy along the whole track. Though I didn’t find it’s very difficult comparing with tracks I walked before. I didn’t make any mistake at all in finding the track. A couple of spots need a bit climbing but nothing major. Oh well, I think I must be in the “experienced walkers” group now. I was longing to meet a wild animal along the way – a stout wombat would be ideal, but to my disappointment no ground animals appear at this season except ants. The relief was that there were never short of birds chirping, all song birds, no coarse songs of cockatoos or magpies.

Soon I hit the bottom of Wentworth Falls, and it’s for sure much more majestic than those in the Valley of Waters. It is said the water to be falling from 800 meters above the top of the cliff. Standing at the bottom, I was not able to see the top, the fall has been segmented into 3 steps. Every time I came to see the Wentworth Fall, there were plenty of people up on the top, where you could drive to arrive. But now sitting on a big boulder at the bottom of the fall, I didn’t see a single soul for half hour. There are sure some steep climbing on the cliff.
And that was true, the beginning of the Slack Stairs was quite steep, 4-5 sections were almost vertical. At one spot there were no stairs, just a thick rope dangling from above. This part is definitely not for faint heart.

However after elevating from the Slack Stairs, there was no drama at all. When I was about to reach the top, a lady talked to me considerably “You still got long way to go, young man!” “Oh really? I think I’ll be fine” I said. And I was sure to be fine.

The Undercliff and Overcliff walks loop back to Conservation Hut were no challenge at all and I got back to top within half hour.

Looked at my watch, 3.5 hours I spent, including all the stops. Though no much excitement, I finally conquered one of the most famous Blue Mountains tracks. Now I miss New Zealand, the alpine view was just sensational.

An interesting debate between an environmentalist and a humanist

This is an interesting debate happened today. While a friend was raising fund to support patients with Multiple Sclerosis, I replied that I actually donate to Wombat Awareness Organisation. Next is the logged message, A is that friend, while B is myself.

A: I walked 9 kms on Sunday 14 Jun to help raise fund to support patients with Multiple Sclerosis.
If you like to sponsor this effort with some spare coins, please let me know. I will go to your desk.

B: Ah I donate to a wombat protection organisation. I seem more interested in protecting nature and wild animals than help human beings, haha

A: Faint ... No comment on your comparison.

B: Human being is so self-centric, this is where all the problem starts, being the supreme intelligent on earth, we should not only care ourselves, but the whole well being. While we are caring about the nature, we are caring ourselves.
You should understand it well from Buddhism philosophy.

I believe in what original Taoism (Lao Tsu and Chuang Tsu) noted, the most crucial relationship people need to deal with is the human relationship with mother nature, not the nasty relationship between human beings. The whole history went through a wrong way.

A: Animals are also self-centric. Wombat never care about human being.
The difference is they still don't have the power to make too much damage.
In a broader sense, saving nature is saving Man.
But it's long term effect; and it can't replace the immediate relief for people who are suffering from any kind of decease.
When you feel sick, you go to see doctor, not Wombat.

B: I would say all living creatures are selfish, they only take care of themselves - that's designed by nature, and it's running well in natural process to keep the balance.

However, there have been no such being as human, who put so many species into extinction - purely for their own well being or benefits. If we don't plan the long term solution, short term relief is meaningless - people soon put themselves into extinction, have you heard some NASA wants to bomb the moon to find water? - a bunch of lunatics.

Womat is sure no much help to human beings, but it's one tiny reflection of the natural protection efforts, we cannot save whales because Japanese keep on hunting no matter what, but we can help wombats if we can raise enough awareness and stop the government from legal mass slaughter - at least things need to done little by little.

Famine, wars, disease are means to balance the world population, and they are inevitable, the small adjustment efforts from within won't help much on the big picture, human world is always changed by lunatics, like Mao Ze Dong.

Optimising web page download time - tips and tools

Fast loading pages improve user experiences, it is widely accepted. But along with the proliferation of faster internet connections, web designers/developers put less attention on page file sizes. It presents a serious threat to user experiences and customer satisfaction. Fast page loading time is not only a crucial factor to keep users happy, but also a key factor to elevate your search engine rankings.

Here are a few tips to make your web sites/pages running quickly and smoothly.

1. Ensure there are no broken path and images on page - they would dramatically increase loading time.
2. Host files locally.
3. For images, always specify image dimensions - height and width, most browsers would recognise an image's dimension, leave it to be loaded last if it's heavy, and load the rest of page first.
4. Make Javascript and CSS external, because they are cached by the browser, but inline JS and CSS get downloaded every time the HTML page is requested.
5. Combine Javascript files - as a general rule, downloading a batch of JS files is slower than download one big JS file even though the combined file size of the batch equals to the big one or even smaller.
6. In the same principle, combine multiple images into a single one, the overall size is about the same but reduce the number of HTTP requests.
7. When designing Flash, rather than designing one big Flash (swf) file, make each flash scene as a separate swf file, and call respective file from the frame swf, depending on user action. In this way, those user uninterested content would not be loaded.
8. Try use vector graphic as much as possible, and reduce the usage of imported jpg, wmv and other raster graphics. Vector shapes are extremely light weight while raster graphics tend to cluster Flash movies in size.
9. Preload components. You can take advantage when browser is idle, a simple example, preload an image for a mouse over state. A more advanced usage could be, before you launch a new redesign, users browsers are stuck with caches from your old design. So before the redesign has been launched, some code can be written in your old page, when the browser is idle, the code can request images/scripts which will be used for new page. Otherwise when the new site is launched, all components would be loaded afresh.
10. Optimise images - use suitable image formats (jpg, png, gif) for different design elements, designers should be crystal clear on this.

There are some really useful tools in optimising page download time. To list a few:

• Use a page analyser, for example http://www.websiteoptimization.com/services/analyze/
• Using Firebug as FireFox plugin, it will analyse all aspects of a given web page. http://getfirebug.com/releases/index.html
• Pingdom - Cool little tool to check loading time of all page components.
• CSS and Javascript file size shrinker - http://www.cleancss.com/ and http://dean.edwards.name/packer/, used to clean up CSS and JS.

Millimetrik, Cities EP & August Stars, Music For Twilight EP

Both Cities EP from Millimetrik and Music for Twilight EP from August Stars are very limited edition CDR of Make Mine Music release. “Cities” released 120 copies while “Music for Twilight” was only 100 copies, while no re-issues have ever been published or even considered from MMM. Hence to say, I’m a lucky dog to become 1/100 in the world.

Music wise, “Music for Twilight” is a sombre, dark type of meandering conscious flow. 8 pieces of unsettling drone are pretty consistent in terms of pace and mood. Boomkat called August Stars’ music as “dark ambient”, and compared the album with the mighty Deathprod and Lustmord’s music. I do agree August Stars lacks a bit airiness details of those artists. It doesn’t shine in terms of complicated arrangements, and the imaginary sound scape it creates, however the album is not short of sparkling moments. And it gives you an uncertain boundary of terrain you could feel – though it’s limited. The feeling is rather like walking on a large patch of pasture while the fog confines your vision. Although this is not my most favourite ambient release, I would definitely rank it higher than most Infraction releases I possess. This is a dark music scape that wouldn’t make you feel bored, and to my surprise it is a Make Mine Music release, which normally doesn’t touch this type of dense music range.

“Cities” from Millimetrik still sounds a bit glitchy and darker than typical MMM sound. There are pleasant drum beats mingled with thawed melody and random sampling of glitches. While the structure and melody leading a well planned direction, the music doesn’t give you a cheap dance beat feeling at all. Each piece is programmed with enough airiness and random glistering lo-fi bleeps. This is superb electronic beats comparable to Seefeel and Boards Of Canada – more listenable than Murcof. I wouldn’t surprise at all if this is a Merck release. Well done, Millimetrik!

YouTube 评盘古乐队“圣女林昭”未果

试图在YouTube, 盘古乐队的“圣女林昭”MV 下留言，几次未果，要不说超过500字限制，要不点了Submit button半天没反应。最后好歹上去两句。难道YouTube也被中共控制了么？我只想要说下面很短的几段话。

盘古的音乐中交织了他们的激情，理想与人文关怀。在共党的思想桎梏下听惯了酸歌蜜曲的人们，你们可曾真正用自己的心灵去与有思想的艺术，包括音乐，撞击出火花呢。盘古的朋克精神不是你们灯红酒绿，声色犬马的麻醉剂，它是让尚有良知的人深刻反省，挑战中共集权的文化梭镖。

像中共试图用金钱蒙蔽人民的眼睛一样，在文化上也试图用彭丽媛，解小东这类酸软的垃圾蒙蔽我们的耳朵与心灵 - 使文化丧失多元性，文化的主题完全趋于小我，那也正是极权政治更加方便愚弄掌控人民的一种手段。

撇开政治与理想不谈，就音乐而言，绵软的情歌让中国从六四后阳痿了这许多年，还不够么？经典恢宏大气如金武林"严肃音乐-失乐园"，几年内竟在诺大的中国连一千张手写编码CD都卖不出去？为何卡拉OK里吼的还是那些十几年前港台软骨情歌？像木推瓜，盘古这样真正有着反叛意识与社会良心的重磅音乐，权贵们也许还不屑封杀，因为还没被他们知道的时候，这些声音恐怕早已被麻木的民众漠视在无知的洪流中了。

在一个“理智”丧失殆尽的社会，当一些另类试图重拾人类的尊严与理想的时候，他们往往被骂做疯子，这和鲁迅笔下的“狂人日记”时代又有多少进步呢？