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You sort of summarized my experience with Australia as an European - beautiful to stunning places all around the coast, and every single one with massive sign o

by jajko 2y ago

You sort of summarized my experience with Australia as an European - beautiful to stunning places all around the coast, and every single one with massive sign of all the deadly creatures and other dangers that can kill ya in a minute (ie Irukandji). Didn't even take a proper swim there in the ocean, just waist deep on more remote beaches. Then I saw on Fraser island on some lookout above the shore sea literally swarming with sharks. From time to time some giant stingray swam through them, but mostly sharks. Like some caricature movie with Bond and piranhas. Oh boy do I enjoy swimming in Mediterranean and just not giving a fuck about anything, anytime, day or night, any season, even butt naked. In decades of going there I got 1 sting from small jellyfish on the shoulder, that's it.

rstuart4133 2y ago
I've been taking an annual fishing pilgrimage to Fraser Island for over a decade, maybe two now. Took my skin diving gear to catch some lobster one year, but it was too rough to see much. Just before we went the next year a skin diver got eaten by a shark off Indian head. Skin diving gear has remained home ever since. A few years later I spent a couple of weeks camping and fishing at Teewah Beach. Loverly spot, not too difficult to get to. A stag party group moved in beside us on the beach, which I wasn't too happy about. That night there was a bit of loud fun emanating from them, but not as bad as I thought it might be. Driving back the next day, we saw the group sitting on a log. No yahoo'ing now, they looked morose. Turned out a couple of them how drowned a few hours earlier trying to rescue a boy in the surf. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-12-06/teewah-two-men-drowned-trying-to-save-boy/12954856 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-12-06/teewah-two-men-drowne... Personally I don't regard Australia as particularly dangerous. I've been more scared in Switzerland climbing an ice pathway to a pub just meters are a 100m cliff, slipping and the only thing preventing me from certain death was a rope I was holding onto with all my might. I thought the setup was nuts, but the locals didn't seem is the slightest bit fazed by it. But I guess it's what your familiar with. My mother ensured I was swimming in the surf not long after I could walk, and the Swiss haven been climbing icy paths not log after they got out of nappies. Australia is a safe place if you are Australian, and Switzerland is safe if you are Swiss.
- MomsAVoxell 2y ago
  I wouldn’t be comfortable with the dangerous delights of Australia if I hadn’t grown up there, learned to spot the dugites and the tigers, been swarmed by ants while having a piss in the spinifex, gotten the odd toe stuck in a blue tongue, had jars of Christmas spiders for pets, acquired the requisite taste for a widgidi grub, discovered the reason you never kill the huntsmen, found much delight and mirth in tempting the rock pool blue rings out of their holes with a coin or two, swam beyond the reef only to be stalked back to shore by a tiger, survived the odd bushfire, beating back the flames with a damp potato bag… if my old Poppa hadn’t taught me how to deploy the hairspray and cigarette lighter installed permanently in the dunny, against the ever-present red back.. all before my teenage years brought me to the safety of the upper hemisphere. Living in the vicinity of the Austrian alps now, in my older age, like you I’m also a lot more terrified of those slippery mountain paths, but more so of the complacency and dullness that a Swiss life can bring ..
MomsAVoxell 2y ago
I too enjoy the Med, or more particularly parts of the Adriatic, but I can’t swim there much without getting the shark senses tweaked, no matter how hard some local tells me there aren’t sharks worthy of my worries to be found. It’s a bit like the difference between a good solid few weeks out bush, and a walk in the tempered gardens of some monarch. Sure, it’s safe .. but .. just, why?
- jajko 2y ago
  Well, now I have kids so that's good enough reason for me :) Its true that on my past travels to south east asia I couldn't care less about any of this. But still Australia felt more dangerous than say Borneo or Palawan on Philippines, I've only saw (small) sharks when diving enough, basically 0 jellyfish.
  - MomsAVoxell 2y ago
    Ah yes, the kids dilemma. To be honest I might’ve wished for a few sharks to show up during my kids swims on our Croatia trips, or at least something with a bit of bite… only to give them the spark that their Australian genes hadn’t quite ignited, to be sure. Indonesia and the western pacific in general doesn’t get enough fear, imho. Those sea snakes man…

by jajko 2y ago

rstuart4133 2y ago

I've been taking an annual fishing pilgrimage to Fraser Island for over a decade, maybe two now. Took my skin diving gear to catch some lobster one year, but it was too rough to see much. Just before we went the next year a skin diver got eaten by a shark off Indian head. Skin diving gear has remained home ever since. A few years later I spent a couple of weeks camping and fishing at Teewah Beach. Loverly spot, not too difficult to get to. A stag party group moved in beside us on the beach, which I wasn't too happy about. That night there was a bit of loud fun emanating from them, but not as bad as I thought it might be. Driving back the next day, we saw the group sitting on a log. No yahoo'ing now, they looked morose. Turned out a couple of them how drowned a few hours earlier trying to rescue a boy in the surf. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-12-06/teewah-two-men-drowned-trying-to-save-boy/12954856 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-12-06/teewah-two-men-drowne... Personally I don't regard Australia as particularly dangerous. I've been more scared in Switzerland climbing an ice pathway to a pub just meters are a 100m cliff, slipping and the only thing preventing me from certain death was a rope I was holding onto with all my might. I thought the setup was nuts, but the locals didn't seem is the slightest bit fazed by it. But I guess it's what your familiar with. My mother ensured I was swimming in the surf not long after I could walk, and the Swiss haven been climbing icy paths not log after they got out of nappies. Australia is a safe place if you are Australian, and Switzerland is safe if you are Swiss.

MomsAVoxell 2y ago
I wouldn’t be comfortable with the dangerous delights of Australia if I hadn’t grown up there, learned to spot the dugites and the tigers, been swarmed by ants while having a piss in the spinifex, gotten the odd toe stuck in a blue tongue, had jars of Christmas spiders for pets, acquired the requisite taste for a widgidi grub, discovered the reason you never kill the huntsmen, found much delight and mirth in tempting the rock pool blue rings out of their holes with a coin or two, swam beyond the reef only to be stalked back to shore by a tiger, survived the odd bushfire, beating back the flames with a damp potato bag… if my old Poppa hadn’t taught me how to deploy the hairspray and cigarette lighter installed permanently in the dunny, against the ever-present red back.. all before my teenage years brought me to the safety of the upper hemisphere. Living in the vicinity of the Austrian alps now, in my older age, like you I’m also a lot more terrified of those slippery mountain paths, but more so of the complacency and dullness that a Swiss life can bring ..

MomsAVoxell 2y ago

I too enjoy the Med, or more particularly parts of the Adriatic, but I can’t swim there much without getting the shark senses tweaked, no matter how hard some local tells me there aren’t sharks worthy of my worries to be found. It’s a bit like the difference between a good solid few weeks out bush, and a walk in the tempered gardens of some monarch. Sure, it’s safe .. but .. just, why?

jajko 2y ago
Well, now I have kids so that's good enough reason for me :) Its true that on my past travels to south east asia I couldn't care less about any of this. But still Australia felt more dangerous than say Borneo or Palawan on Philippines, I've only saw (small) sharks when diving enough, basically 0 jellyfish.
- MomsAVoxell 2y ago
  Ah yes, the kids dilemma. To be honest I might’ve wished for a few sharks to show up during my kids swims on our Croatia trips, or at least something with a bit of bite… only to give them the spark that their Australian genes hadn’t quite ignited, to be sure. Indonesia and the western pacific in general doesn’t get enough fear, imho. Those sea snakes man…