Australia, March 2003

It's been a while since the last time we wrote. We thought you might enjoy hearing more about Australia and our doings.
 
It has now been over four months since Jean started working at Toowoomba Hospital in Queensland, Australia. Although the work has had its stressful moments, it's been a good experience so far. From a doctor's perspective (and from a patient's) some aspects of the Australian medical system are better than the system in the U.S. Australia has universal health care and a good public health system. However, Australia also has malpractice lawsuit issues and lots of doctors leaving medical practice because they can no longer earn a living. In Toowoomba, Jean works with an enjoyable set of colleagues, residents and medical students that she'll miss when her assignment ends in early May.
 
While Jean's in Toowoomba, Bert has been shuttling between the US and Australia. With the help of the internet and low cost phone calls, he continued many of the projects he was working on since last summer. He also became adept at creating websites. There is now a website at www.corp21.com that explains more about his business activities. He also created a professional site for Jean at www.droffner.com.

Australians take more vacation than Americans. Jean's 6-month assignment included an opportunity to take two weeks off, which we've used for a 7000 km (4400 mile) road trip. From Toowoomba we headed southwest. After 1400 km (800 miles) we reached our first interesting town, Broken Hill. Up until about 50 years ago, Broken Hill had the largest silver mine in the world, but the ore is running out. While in the area we learned that minerals generate about 50% of Australia's export earnings. The photo to the left shows a typical example of the architecture in Broken Hill.

From Broken Hill we drove into South Australia to see another of Australia's exports -- wine. We managed to visit both the Barossa Valley and the Coonawarra area. Wine is a big export because Australia has alot of the right soils and climates, and few people. We managed to get in some tastings at various wineries. This picture shows one of these. While in South Australia, we also saw Adelaide, a very pleasant city.

Next, our travels took us to the coast of Victoria, west of Melbourne, where among other things, we saw these rock formations called the 12 Apostles. There were many others with names like "the arch", the "blowhole", etc.

This coastal route led us to Melbourne, which struck us as the "industrial city" of Australia with a population of almost 4 million people and lots of factories around its periphery. The heart of the city is quite beautiful, however, and the area around the wharves has been gentrified. It seems like quite a pleasant place to live. Melbourne was our embarcation point for the overnight ferry to Tasmania.

Tasmania is different from the rest of Australia. The people even had a noticeably different accent. Using analogies with the US, Queensland is like the Texas of Australia, South Australia is like the coast of California with no people, Melbourne is like Chicago, and Tasmania is like Maine, with wildlife even more exotic than the rest of Australia. The following are some of its interesting wildlife. Some of these are also found in the rest of Australia, but are much more common in Tasmania.

The duck-billed platypus is an egg-laying mammal that has a leather bill that looks like a large black duck's bill. When stuffed specimens were first taken to Europe, they thought it was a hoax. We're still trying to work out the origin of the name platypus. Because Tasmania was first discovered by a Dutchman, Abel Tasman, Bert's theory is that it means flat cat, which is kind of the way they look. The platypus lives in burrows next to streams and ponds and eats insect eggs. These animals are notoriously difficult to see in the wild because they are nocturnal and skittish, but we managed to see a couple at a distance. This photo is a stuffed one we saw at a nature center. The road sign is for platypus crossing and shows a top view.

The echidna, or spiny anteater, another egg-laying mammal is about the size of a large grapefruit and really cute. They look like a large scouring pad with a nose. This one was crossing the road as we were driving.

The wombat is a marsupial the size of a teddy bear that lives in a burrow. The picture on the left was taken in a zoo. We also saw a mother and child along a nature trail in one of the national parks, but it was at too great of a distance to take a good photo.

The Tasmanian devil, a feisty hyperactive marsupial with ferocious teeth, has a reputation for ruining camping trips by getting into the food. This picture was taken in a zoo. We also saw them in the wild at night, but couldn't get a photo.

We also saw wallabies (small kangaroos), opossums, and alot of different birds in the wild. We did not see any Tasmanian tigers. This carnivorous marsupial is the size of a dog. Unfortunately, they were hunted so vigorously (to keep them from eating sheep) that they've been extinct since 1936.

On the way back home, we stopped in Canberra and Sydney. Canberra is the national capital and is very laid back. It feels a bit like the Stanford University campus and Palo Alto. Sydney is a three-hour drive from Canberra and feels a bit like San Francisco.

We should also mention the dingo. These are the wild offspring of dogs that were brought to Australia by Asian traders about 3000 years ago. Because of the dingo, many native animals (including the Tasmanian devil and the Tasmanian tiger) became extinct on the Australian mainland and were only found in Tasmania when the British settlers arrived at the end of the 18th century. Here is a picture of a wild dingo that we saw while on Fraser Island, a 100 km (60 mile) long sand island north of Brisbane that we visited in February. It should be noted that dingos can be deadly. About 18 months ago, a dingo killed and ate an 8-year old boy on this island. Hence the signs being modeled here by our tour guide.

The final animal worth mentioning is Kermit. This frog sometimes swims up our toilet pipe and sleeps under the toilet rim. He's harmless and very cute, but we have learned to turn the light on before using the toilet at night.

In the mean time, we've both gotten older. We celebrated Bert's birthday in Toowoomba with cheesecake and Jean's birthday in Melbourne with sponge cake while waiting for the overnight ferry to take us to Tasmania.

We hope you've enjoyed our update.
Jean and Bert

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This page was last updated on 04/02/03.