G'day from Down Under

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I've finally made my first trip to Australia. I first flew to Sydney, visiting my friend Soputtra. We then traveled together to a few places in the country such as Melbourne, Alice Springs, Uluru National Park and Adelaide. Now I'm back to Sydney and will fly back to Seattle on the 13th which I'm not looking forward to it at all :). It's been a fun learning traveling experience - different culture, different landscape and different perspective.

More pictures to follow.

Glacier Basin, Mt. Rainier

Last weekend my buddy and I went hiking at the Glacier Basin at Mount Rainer, one of the active volcanoes in Washington. The hike was about 5 hours round trip. With such a sunny day and temperature around 55 F, we can comfortably pace though the landscape and enjoy breathtaking views of the cascades, diverse plants, wild flowers and little animals.

Beauty can be deceitful! Inside Mt. Rainier's glacier peak are melting hot lavas waiting to burst out. Hopefully it won't happen for a long long time.

My neighbor

This raccoon is looking for food at the backyard. So I just had to snap a picture of it through my window. It really reminds me of the movie "Over the Hedge".

Can I borrow some sugar?

Barcelona FC Vs. Seattle Sounders FC

One of the best soccer teams in the world, the 09 Champions Barcelona FC came to play friendly game with Seattle Sounders yesterday. It was a great chance for me to see Barcelona play at Qwest stadium in Seattle without having to go to Spain :). Messi, Henry, Xavi were among the line up stars for the first half. Too bad they didn't let me bring my DSLR camera and lens inside :( so I had to borrow a Lumix from my friend.

As expected, the game was one-sided, dominated the entired 90 minutes by Barcelona. We ended up losing 0-4 to Barca lol. But it was a good experience for the Sounders to play against probably the best team in the world.



Messi's second goal in the first half.

Rattlesnake ridge

Another hiking weekend to Rattlesnake ridge, 1750 ft. (533 m) gain, with the view of Rattlesnake lake and the east cascades. The hike is not that rough. I would say easy to medium, even little kids can do it :).

Tiger Mountain, Issaquah

It was a hot and dry day. Hiking from Chirico trail to the Poo Poo Point at 1650 ft (511.50 m) elevation where para-gliders jump off from the lookout. It was really cool to see the para-gliders in action: waiting for the right wind, taking off and off they floated in the air.