Giovanni Has Been Replaced

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Trip Start Jun 24, 2008 Previous
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  Coffs Harbour, New South Wales, Australia
Monday, July 14, 2008

Those of you who know me well enough to have been subjected to my travel war stories know the story of Giovanni.  Those of you who know me well also know that my relationship with children is complicated.  It's not that I don't like children--in fact, there are quite a few children that I adore.  However, I have very little patience for ill-mannered children.  Particularly when I am stuck with them on a 9-hour flight from Spain to Chicago, as I was with the aforementioned Giovanni.  Giovanni was an evil child who ran up and down the aisle way of the plane crying, screaming, sitting in the aisle way as flight attendants and passengers climbed over him (that fact alone should tell you that it was not an American airline) and kicking in the bathroom door (which I was unfortunate enough to be sitting next to at the time--bathrooms get very ripe on international flights), while I kept closing it.  Anyway, the reason I got to know young Giovanni's name is because his mom spent the whole trip running up and down the aisle screaming "Giovanni

Warm Weather at Last!

!   Why can't you behave?  Giovanni, why can't you sit down?  Giovanni, why can't you sit quietly like these other children?"  It was a long flight.  The point of this introduction is this:  Giovanni has been replaced. 

As Paul and I were heading north from wine country to Brisbane, we decided to break up the trip by stopping in a cute little town called Coffs Harbour.  Oddly, the train was packed.  After we kicked a teenage girl out of our seats we sat down across from a mother and her screaming child.  Paul and I looked at each other, put on our Ipods and gritted our teeth for our 6 hour train ride.  Turns out the child was 5, and he spent the entire train ride screaming, crying, running up and down the aisle-ways of the train, sitting in the aisle ways immobile as grandmothers, train staff and others crawled over him, and swinging on the arms of chairs (including Paul's, who was on the aisle--for once in my life, I was glad to be sitting in the cramped window seat).  And what was his mother doing you ask?  Why, reading her novel and playing Suduko.  She was not watching him at all--unless it was to shove food down his throat when she got annoyed with him. 

Undoubtedly, the worst part of the trip was that the child's mother actually took offense when someone clearly complained to the train staff, leading to an anonymous announcement from the train staff that parents should keep an eye on their children

Coffs Harbour

.  Moreover, when the teenage girl behind us (who was annoying in her own right) made some comment about his behavior, mom's response was "who are you to judge?  you just don't remember being 5 years old?"  I had to physically bite my lip to keep from saying "I may not remember being 5, but I know for a fact my mother would not have let me behave like that in public."  At any rate, we turned up our ipods even more and cheered when they left, only to find him replaced with an obnoxious, foul-mouthed adolescent boy and a very odd conductor.  But, after I swore to Paul that we were never having children, the interminable train ride finally came to an end and we arrived in Coffs Harbour late in the evening.

The next morning, we were pleasantly surprised.  Coffs Harbour was a beautiful and picturesque beach-front town.  Since it was Sunday, it was pretty quiet, but we stumbled into a harbor-side market on the beach that included music, food and arts and crafts.   Since it was a beautiful day (one of the few Australian days that allowed us to wander around without sweatshirts and jackets), we strolled along the beach.   The water was a bit chilly, but that didn't prevent some people from swimming.  We also took a walk to an island right off of the town (there was a foot-path), and there we actually saw humpback whales breaching off of the shore.  Although we were too far away to see fins or tails, and the whales did not jump, we could tell they were whales.  We overheard some of the locals saying that they remembered when only 1 or 2 would make it by any given year, but we saw about 10 while we were there.  It looks like the population, which had previously been near extinction, has rebounded nicely.  It was an awesome experience, and it made us even more anxious to make it to the area of Cairns for some whale-watching and nice weather.  Next stop:  Byron Bay...

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Coffs Harbour	Coffs Harbour from the Island	Paul Whale Watching	Water where Whale Breached
Me with a Yummy Snow Cone

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