Dave and Issy Sheehan

DaveandIssy

Dave and Issy Sheehan

Former TravelPod Member: the.sheehan
Joined: June 22nd, 2015

We live in Melbourne, Australia, with our three offspring Scott, Emma and Troy, Coco the dog, and cats Sidney and Chilli. As at 2015 our offspring have all left school and should, in theory at least, be capable of fending for themselves, so as long as they don't kill each other or burn the house down, we can now happily trip off into the sunset.

Issy was born in Malta. She came to Australia with her family when she was four, and as at early 2015 she's never been back.

I was born in London to Australian parents who met on a cruise ship, got married in England, had me, and then turned around and came home. I come from a long line of enthusiastic travellers, and was fortunate to have travelled a lot when I was growing up. My maternal great grandfather was a published travel writer, and even managed to die on a ship cruising to Noumea way back in 1933.

Speared for Taking Happy Snaps?

Oceania » Australia » Northern Territory » East McDonnell Ranges May 3rd 2024

Trephina Gorge

DaveandIssy

Issy opts for a rest day, so I bravely set off alone along the Ross Highway to explore the wonders of the East MacDonnell Ranges. First stop is Emily Gap where a sandy dry river bed has created a deep sheer sided gap through the range … well it’s not actually dry, there’s a swimming hole here complete with jumping rope. There’s a sign to the effect that taking photos in the bit of the gap beyond the swimming hole is not allowed for cultural reasons … which is probably a bit superfluous … the water completely fills the gap, so you’d a need submersible camera, or ropes and crampons to climb around the water on the rocks … well actually no, it’s just the submersible camera option … you’re not allowed to climb the rocks. ... read more

The Distinctive Tones of the Red Centre

Oceania » Australia » Northern Territory » Alice Springs May 2nd 2024

Sunset, Anzac Hill

DaveandIssy

We’re a bit slow off the mark after our nearly 700 kms of driving yesterday, like nearly lunchtime type slow when we finally make our way out the door. I guess we must have needed the rest. We plan to spend what’s left of the day exploring the town. First cab off the rank is Anzac Hill, where we get excellent panoramic views over the town and back towards the MacDonnell Ranges and Heavitree Gap. No surprise it’s called the Red Centre, the colours of the soil and rocks are an unmistakably distinctive dark reddish orange. Next up is the Olive Pink Botanic Garden. I ask Issy what colour olive pink is, and she rolls her eyes. It seems I should have known better; Ms Olive Pink founded the garden back in 1956. We take a ... read more

Culture Shock

Oceania » Australia » Northern Territory » Alice Springs May 1st 2024

Kulgera Pub

DaveandIssy

Today we’ll be slogging an arduous nearly 700 kms north into the Northern Territory and onto Alice Springs. We stop to get a caffeine fix and stretch our legs at the thriving metropolis of Marla, population 38. It might be small, but the roadhouse supermarket wouldn’t look out of place in a Melbourne suburb. There’s not much you can’t get here - food for both pets and humans, toiletries, clothes, and even tools to fix your caravan. There’s no mobile reception, but they’ve got that covered too - three phone boxes lined up next to each other out the front. I wonder if many of the younger generation would even know what one of these things was. I get chatting to the two young service staff, she’s from Spain and he’s from Ireland. There do seem ... read more

Subterranean Living

Oceania » Australia » South Australia » Coober Pedy April 30th 2024

The Breakaways

DaveandIssy

I get chatting to the motel manager over breakfast. She says that her occupancy rate’s currently well down, which she attributes almost entirely to the well publicised recent civil unrest in Alice Springs. She tells me that lots of bus tours through here have been cancelled, and even some of the scheduled Ghan services haven’t run due to lack of passengers. She says that the situation in The Alice is deplorable; gangs roaming the streets armed with guns and machetes, smashing cars and property, and injuring people. She says that the curfew has helped, as have additional police services, but it’s far from a complete solution. Hmmm. Alice Springs is our next stop, and I’m suddenly feeling relieved that we’ve opted for accommodation a few kilometres outside town. This is all incredibly sad. It seems to ... read more

Try Not to Step in the Nuclear Waste

Oceania » Australia » South Australia » Coober Pedy April 29th 2024

Island Lagoon

DaveandIssy

Today we head into the real outback, a five hundred and twenty kilometre slog north along the Stuart Highway to the famous opal mining town of Coober Pedy. But first up is a visit to the impressive Australian Arid Lands Botanic Garden on Port Augusta’s northern outskirts. We read that the concept of a garden here was first proposed in 1981 and it opened in 1996. It covers an area of some 250 hectares and includes species collected predominantly from arid areas of South and Western Australia. Next up’s a short drive east to the Matthew Flinders Red Cliff Lookout which, as the name suggests, sits on top of a cliff on the west side of the narrow headwaters of Spencer Gulf. We read that the great navigator came here during one of his many expeditions. ... read more

The Bodies in the Barrels

Oceania » Australia » South Australia » Port Augusta April 28th 2024

Quorn

DaveandIssy

Issy asks me how I slept. “OK I think“, I reply, “other than getting up in the pitch black in the middle of the night and spending ten minutes trying to find the door handle on what turned out to be a door size wall panel”. My beloved does eventually stop giggling. Such a sympathetic response …. not. And on the subject of the motel’s bathroom, the mirror above the sink‘s so far from the basin that I need a telescope to be able to see myself shaving. Fortunately I seem to survive the ordeal without too many deep wounds. On the upside, the mirror’s only so far back because the proprietors have seen fit to fill the space between the sink and the wall with a wide bench. They’ve thus managed to avoid one of ... read more

Sacrificial Pigeons

Oceania » Australia » South Australia » Clare April 27th 2024

Silo art, Eudunda

DaveandIssy

So today we’ll be heading west into South Australia and on to the wine valley town of Clare. Compared to yesterday it’s going to be a relatively relaxed drive of only a tad over four hundred kilometres. We stop to stretch our legs at the thriving South Australian Riverland town of Renmark, best known for its prolific production of irrigated oranges and grapes. The ANZAC Day memorials set up along the attractive riverfront include thousands of crocheted red and purple poppies. It seems the purple ones are intended to recognise the “sacrifices” made by the animals that got drawn into the various conflicts. We read that it’s estimated that eight million animals lost their lives in World War I alone - horses, donkeys, dogs ….. and pigeons. I’d always thought of a “sacrifice” as being voluntary; ... read more

The Prime Minister was a Local?

Oceania » Australia » Victoria » Mildura April 26th 2024

Murray River, Mildura

DaveandIssy

We seem to have spent a lot of time traversing the globe over the past few years, and we’ve often been quizzed on our impressions of the empty arid centre of our wide brown homeland. And our response? Um, ahh … well we’ve never actually been there, which has always felt just a tad embarrassing. So we’ve decided it’s time to put that little wrong right - a three week and six thousand odd kilometre road trip up into our Red Centre. That feels like it’s going to be an awful lot of driving, but if that’s what it takes …. And today’s first step to get us in the mood, well that would be a lazy five hundred and fifty kilometres from Melbourne up to Mildura in the far north west of Victoria on the ... read more

Dodgy Aussies?

Oceania » Australia » Victoria » Melbourne September 19th 2023

DaveandIssy

So it’s day 100 or thereabouts, and today we finally head home. We’re starting to suspect that some countries are perhaps just slightly over-suspicious of us Aussies. We go through all the usual electronic security screening at Denpasar Airport and take our seats in the gate lounge. We’re then told we need to leave, and we can only go back in again after our hand luggage has been re-inspected, this time by hand, by a security guard. Huh? So sure enough a long queue forms outside the lounge while a single guard goes through everyone’s bags one by one. The time we were supposed to takeoff has come and gone, and security guard guy’s only done half the queue. And the question on everyone’s lips is of course "why", and why seemingly only for flights to ... read more

The Bravery of the Men with the Red Flags

Asia » Indonesia » Bali » Seminyak September 18th 2023

Tanah Lot Temple

DaveandIssy

We’re both feeling a bit sad. Today’s the 99th and last full day of our sojourn, and whilst we are indeed feeling melancholy, this is the longest we’ve ever been away so it probably is time to go home. We have a very enjoyable beachside lunch with our friends Jane and Mark from Melbourne. They tell us that they come to Bali at least once a year. They’ve been over in Sanur on the slightly less frenetic east side of the island for a week and they’ve just arrived here in Seminyak where they’ll be spending another week before heading home. We’ve booked a car from the hotel for a late afternoon trip to the iconic Tanah Lot temple. Mr Google says it’s less than 20 kms away, but it’ll take an hour and a quarter ... read more

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