New Zealand; Day 9

Today was science education day: we learned lots about geology, particularly vulcanology, and Eleanor learned about the geometry of trying to get a picnic table and two chairs into a cubby house.

We started at the Volcanic Activity Centre, which had some really great displays on, well, volcanoes, but also tectonic plates, the various types of volcanic rocks and earthquakes. A lot of it was text-heavy and Daddy-perfect, but the little room that demonstrates what a 6.3 earthquake feels like was Eleanor's favourite thing since the Hagglund/Ninky Nonk back in Christchurch. As soon as she found the 'Start' button we had little chance of getting her out of there.

Next it was a half hour stroll through the fragrant sulphur fumes at Wairakei Thermal Valley, where steam just comes up out of the ground in all sorts of little patches. Forty minutes later we were in Rotorua, where the main down town park is full of fenced off patches and the eggy smell is really strong. Although that might be mostly because our accommodation here, just a standard little motel, has its own geyser and thermal pool. Happily for Eleanor it also has the above mentioned playground, which she had to be dragged out of kicking and screaming.

Our final activity was an evening at the Mitai Maori Village, where we got to see a traditional war canoe paddled up stream, followed by a great demonstration of the haka and dinner cooked in a hangi pit. As part of the same tour we went next door to the Rainbow Springs Kiwi Wildlife Park. By this stage it was 9.30pm and their four little kiwis were out of bed and wandering around their enclosure, where the fence is only knee high. Eleanor, who has a collection of toy kiwis and a new favourite book about a kiwi who is afraid of the dark, was delighted when one ran right past her.

By the time we got home it was late and Eleanor was exhausted, but she's had yet another fantastic day. We all have.

New Zealand; Day 8

To sum up today, I went fly fishing and caught a 4lb brown trout, and Bevan went bungy jumping. Needless to say we're both now exhausted (although Bevan did get his second wind when he discovered the insinkerator in our hotel room, to the extent of encouraging me not to eat all of my pasta so that he had something to destroy).





My guide for the day, Craig, collected me from our hotel at 8.30am for a helicopter trip up the Mohaka River near Lake Taupo in the middle of the North Island. The chopper was a little white bubble model, just like the one on the cover of ABBA's Arrival album. Well just like, except that ABBA weren't wearing waders and I doubt either Frida or Agnetha needed a step ladder to get into the chopper, or made anywhere near as an undignified, uncontrolled exit at the other end.

After a quick refresher on my fly casting technique we started wading up river. All day we were casting into a head wind, and at times the wind made the river surface rippled and harder to see the fish, so Craig set some very low expectations on our chances of even spotting one let alone catching any.

However, about 10 minutes later I managed to hook a nice big brown trout. Sadly I misheard Craig's instructions as "hold the line" when he actually said "I'll hold the line", so me grabbing the reel just as the fish pulled meant that it skipped free of the net and disappeared down river with the fly. At this point I was happy simply to have a fishing story about "the one that got away". (Actually I was just happy that Craig had waders to fit me, so anything else for the day was a bonus.)

About half an hour later I got another nibble, and this time managed to reel it in. Apparently brown trout are quite lazy and rainbow trout are the ones that put up a fight, but as you can see this one really made me work for the trophy photos. It wasn't until after I'd released him back into the water that the adrenalin hit and I could really enjoy the moment. Craig's net has built-in scales, which is how I can accurately say it weighed 4 pounds.

For the rest of the day the wind was right up, and while we saw plenty of fish we didn't even get a nibble. Then it was a high-speed hike cross-country back to the chopper meeting point, another terribly undignified moment fighting the waders and my stumpy little legs to get up into cabin, and a bumpy ride home.

Meanwhile, Bevan and Eleanor had discovered a ride-on train near yesterday's playground, and visited the Craters of Moon which is one of the local thermal mud pools. Eleanor, observant as ever, saw all the mud and announced sadly that she'd left her gumboots at home.

By the time we got back to Taupo and I thanked Craig for one of the best days of my life, it was time for Bevan's bungy jump. Back when we first decided to visit NZ he announced that he wanted to see if he could actually throw himself off the ledge, especially without the sort of peer pressure that had pushed him to do abseiling and other action sports as part of group activities in the past. While the jump in Taupo isn't as high as Queenstown it is the world's highest water-touch bungy. Eleanor and I watched from the vantage point as he stood there for what seemed like ages - and he later confessed that he really did come close to backing away - before he lifted his hands above his head and went over. I was so very, very proud of him, and I suspect he's a bit proud of himself too.

New Zealand; Day 7

One week down, one to go. It's hard to believe we're half way through already, but if the weather keeps up like this we'll be very lucky and very grateful.

No Night Garden on Saturdays, but we still weren't checked out and off on our walk until 10am. At 10.05am Eleanor declared that there was a big poo in her nappy, which was correct, so she had to suffer the indignity of a nappy change in the middle of the park.

Spent a lovely relaxing morning just wandering around Napier and admiring the architecture and retail therapy in almost equal proportions. We ended up down at the seaside, which as you can see wasn't quite what we're used to at home. "All Black" is both the name for a member of NZ's national rugby team and an entirely apt description of the beach. In this photo you can see Eleanor and Daddy making a pebble castle.

Next we went to see Train World, which is a very large upstairs room completely taken up with a number of model train sets, one of which was lovingly constructed in a middle-aged man's bedroom at his mum's place and donated when he suddenly "passed on". More cheerily there was a little ride-on train for the kids, which Eleanor went on twice.

Lunch was sushi and another nappy change back in the same park, before an eventful drive to Taupo that Eleanor slept through. At about the half way mark Bevan commented, "We probably should have filled up with petrol before we left." With 36km still to go the low fuel warning light came on, and it was a nervous wait to see whether the rest of the trip would be as hilly - and fuel chewing - as the first part had been.

Our accommodation here is another Quest apartment, again with a washing machine that's running as I type this. For the next two nights we have two bedrooms upstairs (ours with a view of the lake peeping between two other motels), meaning Bevan and I could actually watch some TV tonight; everywhere else Eleanor's bed has been either a sofa bed or wheel-away right in front of the telly.

We had about a 20 minute walk into town for dinner at an Italian restaurant where the chef can't tell the difference between rigatoni and macaroni, which wouldn't matter except that Eleanor would have eaten mac and cheese with a fork or spoon but decided that fingers were better for a larger pasta. Thank goodness for baby wipes!

We finished up the night with a visit to yet another fantastic kids' playground (in the shadow of a big trout to add to our visit to the big salmon) and promises from Daddy to take Eleanor back there while Mummy is off on her guided heli fly fishing expedition tomorrow. I'm really, really excited about it.

New Zealand; Day 6

Today was our biggest single day of driving for the trip, all the way from Wellington to Napier. But, of course, it didn't start until after Night Garden was finished at 9.30am.

We started with a pilgrimage to Weta Cave, which is the museum/gift shop of Peter Jackson's Weta studios. Lots of LOTR memorabilia along with King Kong and other films they have worked on. Bevan bought lots of books, while Eleanor dressed up in the little kids play area. By the time we left she had it pretty much sorted out into Night Garden merchandise in the tub, books in one corner and puzzles in another. Throughout the suburb of Miramar are buildings that are obviously part of the empire, and it's all just starting to ramp back up again for pre-production on The Hobbit.

From there it was a slight downtown detour to see the Beehive and the Houses of Parliament on our way to Upper Hutt and a fantastic kids playground in some gardens that were included in Bevan's LOTR tour yesterday because part of Rivendell was filmed there. As he commented, life has changed when keeping an eye out for good playgrounds is an essential part of the day. Eleanor, as usual, had a great time and especially loved the ride-on bee. It's great watching how much more adventurous she gets every day.

We spent the rest of the afternoon on the road, with about a 45 minute stop in Woodville for afternoon tea at Yummy Mummy Cheesecakes and yet another playground. Fortunately Eleanor fell asleep after that for the last two hours up to the beautiful town Napier, which is the Art Deco capital of NZ. It was pretty much flattened by an earthquake in 1931 and completely rebuilt in that style. We're staying at serviced apartments that are very modern inside but behind the original art deco facade.

Tonight's dinner was Turkish: nowhere near as good as Sydney Rd, but very filling. Ordering was a challenge. I wanted a mixed grill, a mixed iskander and a mixed meze platter. You try saying "mixed grill" with an Australian accent and making yourself understood in NZ. I tried saying "muxed grull" and even "mexed grell", before giving up and just pointing to what we wanted on the register.

Finally it was bath night for Eleanor, who only agreed to let Daddy wash her hair if she could then wash his. This set a precedent where Mummy could only brush and dry Eleanor's hair if she could brush and dry Daddy's.

New Zealand; Day 5

Today we followed a much gentler pace, starting with a bit of a sleep in and a leisurely breakfast. Oh, and the first of four loads of washing that I managed to get done in the combined washer/dryer. At least now we have some clean clothes for the next few days.

We wandered through the streets and squares of Wellington down to the waterfront and the incredible Te Papa museum. There were heaps of activities for kids all the way through. The first was an enormous granite orb floating on a layer of running water, which was so perfectly balanced you could spin it any any direction. I'm not sure if Bevan or Eleanor enjoyed that more.

Inside were fantastic displays of New Zealand's birds, animals, marine life (including a giant squid in formaldehyde and video footage of it being caught), rocks and social life. One of the kids' areas had lots of small things in resin for them to touch and play with, such as a drawer containing the life cycle of the Very Hungry Caterpillar from a tiny egg on a leaf right through to cocoon and butterfly. There was even a life size model of a blue whale's heart with a note encouraging kids to climb through the chambers. As you can see, Eleanor was happy to oblige.

There was also a large display on the changes between when the first humans landed about 800 years ago and today, both for those species that the Maori hunted to extinction before white settlement, and the species that have subsequently been endangered by the introduction of flora and fauna to make the place more English and the extensive land clearing for the timber and to create grazing land. There was one entire room showing what it would have been like before humans, with lots of the large flightless birds that were first to be hunted out. Eleanor really doesn't like birds and seems to be especially wary of pigeons and peacocks, and she'd been remarkably brave in front of a cabinet that had stuffed examples of both. However, the "this is how it used to be" room with recreated Moa and other really large flightless birds was just too much for her.

Equally educational, and more to Eleanor's liking, was the menu board in the cafe confirming that there's no such thing as a babycino in NZ, but one can order a "fluffy". That rather explains the funny looks I've been getting all week.

After Te Papa it was back to our hotel for Eleanor and Mummy to have a nap while Daddy went on his half day Lord of the Rings filming locations tour. He hasn't admitted whether or not he chose to wear the elf ears that are apparently available on the minibus for the more hard core fans, and it sounds like he had to bite his tongue during various comments about the books/films that didn't agree with his interpretations. He now has a better appreciation of how much CGI was involved and how much the government indulged every one of Peter Jackson's wishes. Need to dig up a national park? Sure. Just put the native plants in storage and plant them back in when you're finished. You want the army to build a road to give you access for eight days filming? Not a problem, Bro! Do you want a strictly-enforced no-fly zone with that? You're employing 25,000 people; do whatever you want. Apparently for one scene they cut down a pine tree, moved it to a new location, stripped it of its own leaves and then stapled on 250,000 new ones at a cost of $35,000 to help create the right look for just a few moments of film.

Honestly, I did spend less than $35,000 at the yarn shop Eleanor and I hunted out while Bevan was unable to stop me. They had a fantastic range of possum/merino blend yarns, which is a NZ specialty. Australian possums are an introduced species in plague proportions, and for the last ten years they've been part of a combination culling / recycling program. Possum fur is hollow, which makes it incredibly warm and it's very soft. It's also fairly labour-intensive to produce, and therefore not cheap. I'm trying to pretend that buying lots of the yarn is my contribution to the environment, and somehow offsets the carbon emitted flying us over here and back.

We had dinner tonight at a Korean BBQ restaurant. The place had a BBQ set into the middle of each table, and the smell coming from the other diners cooking their own dinner was incredible. Given Eleanor's seemingly unlimited arm length lately we forwent the pleasure and stuck with pre-cooked dishes from the menu. And yes, that is our two year old eating with chopsticks and making less mess of it than we generally do.

New Zealand; Day 4

Up at 5am for the free local 6am shuttle to catch the 7am train. Ugghhh! However, the effort was totally worth it.

The Tranz Coastal train runs from Christchurch to Picton, up the east coast and along the north. Our ticket included the Interisland ferry to Wellington, which made the day incredibly picturesque and relaxing. We saw lots of cows and sheep, areas just north of Christchurch where the ground had cracked open during the earthquake, seals asleep on rocks in the water, vineyards, a salt processing facility, snow-capped mountains and a border collie chasing the train like his life depended on it.

Our seats were in the middle carriage, and we had four seats with a table in the middle all to ourselves. There was also an open-to-the-air viewing carriage near the front, which Eleanor loved. Despite the early start it's a trip well worth taking, and we commented several times how much easier and more relaxing it was than trying to drive.

The ferry was probably just as scenic, but Eleanor found the family area full of toys, TVs and other distractions and couldn't be budged. It was right in the middle of the boat, so while we could sort of see out the windows it wasn't that much of a view. Having got to bed late and up so early she was showing definite signs of a meltdown. A deck of playing cards bought us some peace for a little while.

Fortunately I found the nursery area, which was some of the original cabins converted to include a cot and two tub chairs. We put her in the cot and she cried and cried that she didn't want a nap, but by the end of the story her eyes were closing and she was struggling to remain sitting upright. After toppling over a few times and righting herself again Bevan made her lay down, and it only took 90 seconds of half-hearted sooking before she was out cold. Half her luck; I really wanted a nap, too.

Our car for the North Island is, once again, a Subaru Outback. However the Ferry Terminal car hire where we picked it up from didn't have any GPS units and the car didn't have a street directory, so we were on our own in down-town, peak-hour Wellington with only basic tourist promotional maps and waaaaay too many one way streets. It didn't help that most of them are only one way for part of their length, and that the two maps we had showed the arrows going in different directions on a key thoroughfare.

Fortunately we found our hotel, which is right next to a decent Chinese restaurant so we didn't have to think too hard about what to get for dinner. Frankly we were all just too tired to think too hard. Once Eleanor was in bed I headed out to the airport to pick up the GPS they'd put aside for us at the Europecar desk out there. And on the way back it was a quick stop at a supermarket to pick up some laundry detergent, ready to give our apartment's washing machine a thorough work out tomorrow.

New Zealand; Day 3

Yet another great day in gorgeous, sunny Christchurch, or CH.CH. as the locals refer to it. They have such difficulty with vowels here that I really don't blame them.

Up earlier than expected at 6:50am when the fire alarm went off for a second time (turns out it was another room burning toast, again!) but it gave Eleanor the chance to have a bath and wash two days worth of chuppa chups out of her hair and watch Night Garden before we headed off to the International Antarctic Centre.

We were in time for the penguin feeding before taking a ride on the Ninky Nonk. Well it's really called a Hagglund, and there's warnings everywhere that it's not suitable for people with heart conditions, bad backs, broken bones or pregnancy. Basically it's a cross between a car/caravan, a snow mobile and a tank with windows. They take you for a drive on an obstacle course to show what it's capable of, which is rather a lot of very steep hills at high speed with no suspension. Eleanor was borderline old enough for it, but the driver assured us that if she freaked out he'd stop so we could walk back. No need! We convinced her that it would be just like the Ninky Nonk on Night Garden, and it was and she loved it.

We also did the six minute storm room, where you rug up in coats and experience -18 degrees plus windchill. Eleanor lasted pretty much to the end of that in reasonable humour, before finding a room full of stuffed toy penguins and a babychino in the cafe, both of which were more her thing.

While Eleanor had her afternoon nap, I read our car rental contract from cover to cover and put in a call to a windscreen repair service for an estimate. It paid off, because eventually the hire company just took my word for it on the repair costs and abandoned their original idea of wanting to get a quote and then stuff around with how to settle the bill in the tiny window between right then and their closing time of 5.30 - during which I'd be out of contact anyway - with the added complication of us leaving on the 7am train tomorrow before they reopen.

In the end the bill was only NZ$134 and everyone was happy, except the manager who managed to get a splinter of the broken glass in his finger when he rubbed the damaged spot. During the slight negotiations on how best to resolve the insurance claim situation he commented that the repair cost would depend on how much glass was still there, and he shut up when I pointed at his finger and noted that it's a bit less now...

We spent the last part of the afternoon on various Edwardian forms of transport. There's a city circle tram using antique rolling stock, and our driver looked so much like Eleanor's grandfather that she promptly informed him, "Bo, I've got a poo!" She was right with only one part of that statement.

We also went punting on the Avon river in gorgeous style. Our punter was named Godot and he was great. He stopped so we could watch two little ducklings that were diving under the water and popping back up again right near us, which delighted Eleanor almost as much as trailing her hands in the water over the side and catching floating leaves.

Dinner was some of the best Mexican we've ever had, at The Flying Burrito Brothers. I had a half litre apple and mango margarita, which counts as my two serves of fruit for the day. Eleanor ate her own body weight in corn chips and cheese, plus half my churros for dessert. As tired as she definitely was by the time we put her to bed, Daddy still fell asleep first.

New Zealand; Day 2

Today we put some more miles on the hire car and, unfortunately, a stone chip in the windscreen. Need to check the paperwork to see if that's going to incur an excess (probably yes, but our travel insurance should cover most of that. Yay for travel insurance!)

The day started with Eleanor waking up at about 9.20am and resuming the previous evening's persistent requests to watch In The Night Garden... Bevan told her that it's not on in New Zealand (which he genuinely meant because we hadn't found it in the TV guide the previous day), and of course as he uttered these words he turned on the telly, just in time for the closing credits. D'oh!

Requests from the back seat for a playground were eventually silenced when we snuck into one at a small rugby club just south of Christchurch. She got to have a good run around, and she and Daddy had races down the big slides. I'm not sure who enjoyed that more.

Our next stop was Salmon World, home of the big salmon (yes, we're terrible parents forcing her to visit "The Big..." attractions at such an impressionable age) and a rather nifty aquarium full of Atlantic salmon, eels and both brown and rainbow trout of various ages in different ponds. Eleanor got to feed the medium sized ones, which she loved.

Then it was on to Ashburton, home of Ashford spinning wheels and knitting yarns. I got a little bit excited, bought even more sock yarn for my stash and some merino possum yarn for a practise project at knitting on double pointed needles, which is going well so far.

After lunch we headed off to the Banks Peninsula, which is an extinct volcano with a beautiful harbour right up into the middle of the crater. French explorers bought it from the Maori, but by the time they got back from France with a boat full of settlers the Treaty with England had been signed for all of NZ and they were too late. Akaroa is a gorgeous little town with a very strong French flavour; so strong they don't have a police station but a Gendarmerie.

From there it was back towards Christchurch and a trip up the gondola to the peak of Mt Cavendish. Amazing views all around, but the wind was icy cold. Eleanor loved the trips up and back, and we saw lots of rabbits and one poor, lost sheep, but the history cave was a bit too much for her. It was like a cross between the Ghost Train and a really bad wax works, all hosted by a Nicky Webster wannabe who kept popping up on video screens. I'm sure they meant well.

P.S. As I am typing this the evacuation alert just went off in our room. Luckily it seems to have been a false alarm, and better still Eleanor slept through it.

New Zealand; Day 1

We're off on our NZ holiday, and so far have survived day 1. Hey, it involved a three hour flight with a toddler, so don't knock our efforts.

Up at dark o'clock and at the airport by just after 7am. Our Pacific Blue flight was remarkably comfortable, and Eleanor did better with her ears on take off and landing than I did with mine. By the time we commenced descent into Christchurch she was past nap time and getting ratty, but a Chuppa Chup from the bottom of my handbag solved everything. A big hello to Ashleigh the flight attendant, who spent about 10 minutes playing "tickle-me-Eleanor" with a very receptive participant.

Our hire car is a Subaru Outback, and nice to drive (although the Japanese-side indicators are a constant battle against our European habits). Installing the child seat turned out to be both faster and easier than getting back to where I'd agreed to pick up Bevan and Eleanor. As tempting as it was, sanity prevailed and I obeyed the "Authorised Vehicles Only" signs that prevented me from going where I really wanted to. Airports stopped being the sort of place where one could risk such a stunt a bit over nine years ago. In the end it was free to stop for 15 minutes in the short term parking, so it all ended well. And I don't know what it cost us, but with all the one way streets around where we're staying adding GPS to our car hire was money VERY well spent.

Our motel is just north of the city centre in Richmond, walking distance from Christchurch's equivalent of Lygon Street Carlton, which is just around the corner from Christchurch's equivalent of Grey St, St Kilda (that's just a guess, but we passed three girls just standing around on street corners for no discernible purpose wearing heels that were almost as high as their hemlines).

Eleanor claimed the couch as her bed straight away,which was lucky because it's a sofa bed and that's exactly where we had planned for her to sleep. She was out like a light within a couple of minutes, but all things considered she has put in an exceptionally cooperative day.

Our first impression of Christchurch is that the earthquake was very lucrative for both the scaffolding and temporary fencing industries. There's a lot of visible damage around; brick fences propped up with concrete blocks, restaurants that are closed and buildings with large sections covered in tarpaulins. It's actually worse that we expected.

We had a fantastic dinner at The Bodhi Tree, which is a Lonely Planet recommended Burmese restaurant. The tea and lentil salad had great flavours and an unexpected but delightful crunchy texture. The menu style is a bit like tapas; you order 2-3 small dishes per person and lots of steamed rice. We had tempura style vegetables, garlic prawns, pork dumplings and a mild chicken curry, which was a wonderfully broad range of flavours and textures. A really memorable dinner.

We wandered home along the banks of the Avon river, which is so shallow and clear that you can see the ducks rummaging for nibbles among the pebbles at the bottom, and huge black fish chasing them. Took lots of photos with the new camera, which I'm happier with by the minute.

Today's photos

First, the laundry project from hell which is kind of getting there.

Next, proof that the dogs love their new bed, and the cat doesn't mind it either.

Survivor Palm Cove

More reality than reality TV, this is a recap of our recent four-day trip back to lovely Palm Cove, 5km north of Cairns in FNQ, and reviews of the businesses which vied for our custom.

Why the holiday now? Well I'm six months pregnant, and it seemed like a good idea to take one last romantic, luxury holiday before even leaving the house involves a pram, nappy bags, kilos of paraphernalia and, of course, a screaming baby. It's such a good idea that the evil Marketing geniuses have given it a name; the "Babymoon". I refuse to call it that.

The flight there
Ah, Qant-arse. They now offer on-line check-in, allowing you to choose your seat the night before you jet out. Oooh, gadgets! Except there's a bug in the system, which they know about but haven't fixed yet, resulting in the hubby and I not being allocated seats together because mine was a FF rewards booking and his was a regular purchase. Never mind that I rang their reservations department and had our bookings linked two months ago to prevent this. Never mind that when I called Reservations 12 hours before departure it was apparently "too late" to do anything about it (other than arrive early and plead with the check-in desk) because I'd already progressed too far in the on-line process. Never mind that I specifically pointed out that I hadn't printed our boarding passes and asked if it was therefore too late to use the "Change Seat Allocation" function and was told "Yes".

Ignoring their advice I found that on-line persistence paid off, and I was able to change Bevan's seat to the one next to mine. I thought about trying to scab an upgrade out of it, and did point out on the phone that "I'm six months pregnant " but no luck. Apparently that only works on trains.

However, I will grant that flying Qantas does have some all-included benefits in the price. The headphones are free. The crappy movie was free. The non-alcoholic drinks are free. The hot chicken and rice "lunch" - served at 10.15am (which was actually 9.15am according to my watch, which I'd already turned back to Qld time) - was free, as was the complimentary "Splice" icypole for dessert to put one in a tropical mood.

Accommodation
The Sebel Reef House is a glorious place to stay. Our Brigadier Beachfront Spa Room was exactly that: a colonial, plantation-shutters-aplenty beachfront location, with a spa of such dimensions that one felt nervous about swimming in it less than an hour after eating. And NO WATER RESTRICTIONS! We cranked it up three out of the four nights we stayed there, and quickly learned not to add the complimentary bubble bath and run the spa jets. Of course, that was only when I could lever Bevan out of the two-seater wicker couch suspended from the balcony roof as a swing, or myself from the arm-chair and matching ottoman which elevated my pregnant ankles to swelling-proof height.

The staff are friendly, relaxed, professional and completely unobtrusive. We had a choice of sun lounges by either the fresh or salt-water pool (the fresh-water featuring a waterfall), although delivering a bowl of hot chips pool-side proved more difficult than imagined. The Reef House restaurant isn't the sort of place that does chips. It does a smoked-cheddar souffle, or a perfectly cooked minute steak, but not a bowl of chips. Never fear, Brigadier Bar to the rescue! The area between pool and lobby is a help-yourself, honour system bar with a range of chips, cashews, imported beers and lime wedges to satisfy mid-afternoon hunger pangs brought on by three lazy laps of the salt-water pool.

The Brigadier Bar also includes a range of magazines, newspapers, books in several languages that you can swap with whatever you brought with you and have finished, and a chess set which shall not be discussed ever again.

If lunch the first day was good, dinner the last night was fantastic. Local buffalo feta souffle this time for me, the saltiness of the cheese perfectly off-set by a scattering of sweet caramelised onion (which looked exactly like the chicken jerky we bribe our cat with, but presumably tastes a lot better). Turkey spring-rolls with cranberry and hazelnut salad had been an impressive entree, and the creme brulee for dessert was perfect. Bevan started with a magnificent duck salad before raving about the snow peas and mash accompanying his steak with pepper sauce. He can't remember what dessert was, other than that "it was beautiful!" (A check of the pdf menu on-line jogged the memory back to a pecan nut pudding with maple syrup anglaise.)

Breakfast the next morning was just as good, with Eggs Benedict for me (one of the best Bearnaise sauces I've ever had - just the right amount of cracked pepper) and roasted banana pancakes for Bevan, both of which efficiently replaced conversation with happy grunting.

But I just want a normal pedicure...
My toes were still wearing the scraps of polish from my last pedicure a couple of months before, along with the accumulated dead skin of that interval. I was too ashamed to turn up at the day spa for a full-body massage in that condition and decided to get a quick pedicure and new polish. Hey, Palm Cove is the self-proclaimed "Spa Capital of Australia" so how hard could it be? Hmmm. A quick look at the Sebel's in-house spa menu showed that they could do a Miji Jina Foot Treatment to "soak and sooth away tensions" for a mere $98, but I just wanted a normal pedicure with nail polish and sand blasting.

The main shopping strip had a hairdresser/beauty parlour, but their beauty therapist was in - of all places - Melbourne. A plea of desperation at one of the tour booking agencies revealed a dearth of common garden-variety beauty treatments. Fortunately someone knew that the Sea Temple spa does regular pedicures, but only because she'd had a visiting friend make the same plea and had done the research.

The Sea Temple is another Mirvac property, further off the main strip. I really wish I could remember my therapist's name - believe me, I've tried - because she deserves all the public recognition this humble blog can give her. Later it emerged that she'd delayed her lunch break to fit in the non-guest who wandered off the street without bothering to book, and she did a fantastic job. My toe nails are now a lovely shade of red and my heels bear a closer resemblance to skin than course-grit sandpaper. Hopefully she earned a nice fat commission on the ridiculously expensive - but utterly fabulous - bottle of Elemis Milk Bath I bought at her recommendation. This worked much better in the spa than bubble bath, and meant that Bevan got a little bit of spa treatment during the holiday, too.

Bevan was the hero of the day, and not just for remembering the Sea Temple's location. I got a bit hot and flustered on the way there, so he walked all the way back to our room to fetch my hat, and then waited patiently in the resort bar for me to finish. I'm proud to say that the bar's plasma set tuned to the Foxtel music video channel was the only television we saw during our entire time in Palm Cove.

Passions of Paradise
One cannot stay on the edge of the Great Barrier Reef without indulging in a boat trip. Last time we did the uber-touristy Quicksilver cattle muster out to Agincourt Reef. This time we looked for something a little more intimate.

We still don't know whether Passions of Paradise is the name of the tour company or their boat. I just know that it's not actually a brothel, because clearly none of our back-packer companions had any intention of paying to get lucky. On the other hand, the guy whose heart we watched stop beating as he was informed his 'extras' bill by the end of the cruise was $248 may well be selling his body by now.

Our catamaran joined the 8am peak hour rush of tour boats departing Cairns harbour, with a warning from the crew that it would be a rough trip out and sea-sick pills were available from the bar (at a modest extra cost). Being pregnant I decided to rough it out rather than risk a thalidomide-type catastrophe, and instead got a close-up view of the vessel's porcelain for several dignity-wracking minutes.

We had a very educational glass-bottom boat tour of the soft corals surrounding Michaelmas Cay on our arrival there ($18 extra per passenger) before donning our ultra-sexy stinger suits ($6 extra per passenger) and snorkeling gear for some up-close exploration. We knew the chance of stingers that far out was low, but since it's still officially stinger season through to May and I was snorkeling for two (and they provide better UV protection than any sunscreen was likely to) they seemed like a good idea. Besides, all the back-packers were wearing them so it was positive peer pressure for once. And a big howdie to the English back-packer wearing full-thickness makeup for her introductory scuba diving lesson.

Lunch was free, but if you wanted a drink it was $2.50 extra. And the on-board photographer took our photo underwater for free but charged $10 extra per photo for copies. As you can see, we coughed up for it. And no, that's not a basketball stuffed down the front of my stinger suit.

After lunch it was a short trip to another reef for more snorkling over harder corals. The fish life was amazing: we found Nemo, followed an Angel fish on a tour of the reef edge, were fascinated by a school of live cuttlefish and smiled back at the toothy Parrotfish which nibble the coral (ever wondered where reef sand comes from? It's fish poo.)

The sails went up for the return journey, which was smoother and less violently vomitous than the trip out, and actually rather pleasant sitting in the shade outside and watching the on-coming waves.

Out comes our inner John Lethlean.
Palm Cove offers a number of dining options. Some offered fantastic food and service at exorbitant prices. Others offered average food and amateur service at exorbitant prices. While the former was ultimately more enjoyable, the latter provided the better entertainment for those of us who've watched too many episodes of Gordon Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares.

Bella Baci
To quote again from the Palm Cove Chamber of Commerce website, "The owners, Sam and Christine, will ensure that you and your guests are treated to a memorable evening in Palm Cove when dining at this lovely restaurant." Memorable is right, but perhaps not for the reasons they hope.

The decor and beach-front location were indeed lovely, but the staff were just that little bit too nervous and keen to impress. Bella Baci is the middle of three restaurants that essentially share the same open space, so we really can't blame them for the constant camera flashes from some idiot tourist at a table next door in Nu Nu. Why that man wanted seven near-identical photos of his partner sitting at their table is beyond me. I'd just like to be there when he gets the prints back from the chemist and sees the death stare I'm giving him in the background of the last six.

Perhaps I've been spoilt by the calamari rings available from the SouthEnd food court at Highpoint, but my entree was a little disappointing. Fortunately they came on a massive pile of salad mix, giving lots of options to hide all the bits that were too chewy to swallow.

Bevan's salad entree was spectacular only for its sheer size. For mains I had a second entree of goat's cheese and sun-dried tomato filo pastries sitting on yet more salad. The first mouthful was rich and magical, but by halfway through the third pastry it was all a bit too much. To be fair, eating some of the salad might have cut through the richness. Bevan's Osso Bucco was huge but good.

The whole thing would have been perfectly OK had they charged about 30% less. If you're in Palm Cove and want Italian, fork out the few extra dollars and go to Vivo instead (see below) because overall it's just better value for the money you're already spending.

Nu Nu
Despite waking up early Tuesday to the sound of tour buses grinding along the main street, getting out of bed and into the shower proved too much to manage before the Reef House brekkie menu stopped for the day, a la McDonald's. Nu Nu had been written off as a dinner destination the night before on a combination of their horrific prices and prominent bragging about winning Gourmet Traveller's 2008 Regional Restaurant of the Year award. However we had considered it as a lunch option, and were pleased to discover the breakfast menu still on offer.

Out of sheer perversity we sat at the same table as the previous night's Steve Parish and waited to be blown away, which really didn't take long. Our waitress knew that she worked at a good restaurant and didn't feel the need to keep asking if everything was OK. The fresh juices were great, and Bevan's lemon ricotta lacy pancakes disappeared very quickly.

My 'french toasted heidi raclette and gypsy ham sandwich' was terribly amusing to Bevan. Well, perhaps that was more the look on my face when it arrived. A small loaf of bread had been hollowed out, stuffed with filling, french toasted and wrapped in a large serviette. It measured approximately 15cm in each direction. It was huge. Somehow I ate most of it. I'm still wondering if they used a microwave to melt all that cheese properly before the french toasting.

For the record, neither of us approve of a restaurant with a page of closing credits thanking their interior designers and the people who supply them with "all things coconut". If the management is reading this, consider yourselves lucky that I didn't have a pen with me, let alone a red one, or you'd have been given a stern lesson in the difference between its and it's.

Vivo
Last time we were in Palm Cove this building was the sales office for one of the many new resorts that have sprung up. Now it's a very nice place for afternoon tapas while gazing out at the beach (which I'm slightly ashamed to admit we didn't set foot on once during the whole trip).

We still can't decide which was our favourite dish: the spiced baby calamari with lime aioli, the prawn (singular) which had been coated in flaked coconut, the crumbed and deep-fried olives stuffed with a veal/ pork mix or the super crispy smoked paprika fries. Maybe it was dessert: Bevan was very happy with the presentation and variety on his tropical fruit platter, and I somehow forgot to share any of my hazelnut and chocolate semi-freddo with berry compote.

Colonies
Apparently this was one of the first restaurants in Palm Cove. Allegedly in 2001 Jamie Oliver tried to claim royalty payments over their blatant use of one of his recipes and the owner sent him a stubby in response. Supposedly one of their goals is to provide 'affordable' dining. I can't personally vouch for the first two claims, but charging at all for bread and charging through the nose for everything else doesn't spell 'affordable' to either of us.

With fewer than 300 tables, Colonies is one of the smaller restaurants in Palm Cove. The staff consisted of two guys squeezed into a tiny galley kitchen, one girl manning the bar and a single waitress trying to do everything else front of house. As mentioned, not a crumb of bread was gratis, which they tried to justify by claiming that it was all 'home made'. One might point out that the garlic bread we had seemed 'home made' only in the same sense that the garlic bread I do can claim to be 'home made' because I slice the store-bought roll and apply garlic and butter that I've mixed together. And what happened to the promised mozzarella?

Following Gordon Ramsay's example, Bevan started with crab cakes that were OK (although neither of us could claim to be crab cake aficionados so we had nothing to compare to). His lamb main course was still a little too capable of saying "baaaa" for my liking, but he was happy with the amount it was cooked through, and it was his dish after all. My chicken scallopini had looked great on the menu, but in reality I was surprised to find that the prosciutto didn't go as well with the garlic cream sauce as I thought it would. The dill garnish was ho-hum, and the wedge of fresh cherry tomato on top was completely out of place for that dish.

White chocolate cheesecake was another option that sounded good on the menu but was actually a disappointment, being a little gritty in texture. My friend Erica's New York cheesecake is much smoother. Bevan's "mango three ways" had a very Top Chef title but unfortunately a somewhat RSL Club presentation: a cheek of mango balancing on a small scoop of mango gelati and a vague smear of mango coulis. The whole thing was jammed into an ice-cream sundae glass (which made the mango cheek hard to eat) and padded out with a heavy whipped cream. At $14.90 it should have been an anglaise at least.

With Bevan's two glasses of red (in awful old-fashioned crystal goblets) and my two LL&B, the bill was our second highest for the holiday and probably our least favourite meal.

Far Horizons
Thursday morning, and we still hadn't quite mastered the art of arriving at a resort restaurant in plenty of time to sample the breakfast menu. At least that's the impression I got from the sole waitress still on duty when we finally got to Angsana after running out of time on our last trip to Palm Cove. If I'd listened to what she said verbally instead of reading her body language I'd have realised that breakfast was still on for another half hour and we were welcome to sit at the ocean-view table of our choice.

The menu featured the near-ubiquitous range of exotically-named juice combinations, but also the more unusual option to create your own from a choice of any three fruits on a pretty long list. Fortunately our lovely waitress from PNG was paying more attention to what Bevan said to her than I paid when she spoke to me. She pointed out that the eggs-plus-extras plate he was designing was essentially the big breakfast less the sausage, which she was quite happy to do even though big breakfasts are usually pretty rigid and his original order cost more. Again, I wish I could remember her name to give her more credit.

My ham and cheese omelet was fine, and we got our first look at a newspaper in days. The good news was that the Reserve Bank hadn't raised interest rates. The bad news was that insurance premiums might go up instead after a massive wind and dust storm in Melbourne that brought down power lines, made people in tall city buildings sea sick and shut down most of the train network. Do we have to go home?

One of the top 10 spas in the world
With freshly-manicured feet I was brave enough to set foot in the Reef House's in-house spa. Their insistance on not performing any treatment on a women in her first trimester of pregnancy was a comforting sign that they know about certain risks, although it did get a little frustrating being repeatedly told "normally we'd do X but you're pregnant so you miss out".

My 2 hour session started with a traditional Aboriginal smoking ceremony performed without the slightest sense of incongruity by my lovely Japanese therapist. The promised 'special' pregnancy setup turned out to be just a regular body pillow covered in a towel, but it was still more comfortable - and physically possible - than laying on my stomach would have been. This massage was the first I've had in years that didn't leave me feeling bruised the next day, but was also the most expensive and least claimable on health insurance.

Baby put on a high-kicking performance to impress a line of Las Vegas showgirls when the therapist laid her hands on my stomach in a soothing and theraputic way. At least she calmed down so I could relax for the facial, which was one soothing potion after another. Unlike at Sea Temple there was no berry sorbet to finish up, but the cup of tea was nice even if I was limited to the normal range "because you're pregnant" instead of the exotics they apparently offer to the barren.

Phone us after you collect your bags
Finally a word in praise of JetPort Parking at Tullamarine. Not only was it less vast and cheaper than the airport's own long-term carpark - where you have to wait ages for the bus and then load your own bags - but it was under cover. Thanks to the RACV member's special we saved even more, and were very pleased with the door-to-door convenience and the speed with which they picked us up on the way home.

So, that's our travel diary. The camera didn't make it out of the suitcase but we don't care because it wasn't that sort of trip. We came home completely relaxed and wondering how much the place will have changed the next time we visit, although by then we'll be looking more for a two bedroom unit at a resort with a kid's club than a romantic ocean-view room for 2.5 people.

Survivor China: finale

Well the final episode was traditional if not entirely exciting. Put another way it was predictable if not entirely entertaining. The reunion, however, was excellent so all is forgiven. Oh Survivor, as if I could stay mad at you for long!

It started with a recap of key moments from the previous seven weeks, including Todd and Amanda sealing their alliance on day one, Denise puking up the balut at the gross food challenge and Jean-Robert’s steady descent into madness. We also got a reminder of what they all looked liked before the boys grew beards and Courtney grew strangely dark roots that suggest she’s not a natural platinum blonde. Who would have guessed it?

It might be an urban myth that the Great Wall of China itself is visible from space, but I suspect the Survivor version of the Great Wall can actually be seen from the moon. The producers had built a massive replica section of the Great Wall using besser bricks, which was the set for this week’s reward challenge. Survivors had to collect blocks and assemble them to finish a section at the top of the wall. The bigger puzzle is going to be for some archaeologist in the year 4267 who finds a section of the Great Wall, thousands of kilometres from the rest and in a different building material, and has to try and work out why it’s there.

Amanda won the reward of pizza, beer, soft drink and brownies. Jeff said that it was only a single serve but she could choose to share it with one or two others if she wanted. To me a family-size pizza, three beers, a jug of Coke and a plate full of chocolate brownies is way more than a single serve, but then I remembered that it was an American portion.

Amanda chose to share it with Todd, and used the time to accuse him of backstabbing and scheming to get rid of her, which is exactly what she was doing to him last week. Back at camp Denise had a cry about never getting picked for anything, which I’m sure PG loved to see. Todd tried to tell Denise how much he loves all the remaining girls, but considering he’s gay and a total schemer it was less than convincing. More convincing was his paranoia that he’s getting paranoid.

Tree mail brought an invitation to another key element of every final episode, the walk down memory lane. This one took place in the shadow of a massive concrete statue of Guan Yin, the Chinese goddess of compassion and mercy. If the producers had either compassion or mercy for their audience they’d drop this because it’s just such bad television. As usual, it consisted mostly of the four remaining members of Hidden Dragon trying to say something nice about the early victims from Crouching Tiger – none of whom they knew – and eventually deciding not to say anything at all.

The final immunity challenge involved balancing a pile of classic rice pattern china on the end of a stick. As usual, Todd failed early and was out. Courtney is a waitress at home, but that didn’t help her either. Denise tried to negotiate some kind of settlement with Amanda, who quite rudely refused but then was all hugs and "Did you really think I was going to let you quit on me?" as soon as she’d won and could afford to be gracious. That’s really only an appropriate thing to say if one is the hero in a Jerry Bruckheimer movie who’s held someone’s hand and kept them conscious and alive until the ambulance arrived and is now trying to be modest.

In the hours before Tribal Council, Denise tried to convince her saviour not to vote her out next, claiming that Survivor is all she’s got other than a crappy job as a lunch lady, and that she needs the money. It backfired badly, merely convincing Amanda – who in turn convinced Todd and Courtney - that Denise could easily soak up enough sympathy to win the million dollars. Sure enough, it was a unanimous vote that put Denise on the jury instead of in front of it.

OK, what’s next on the final episode checklist: luxury, boozy breakfast to reward the final three in the hope they might do something vaguely interesting while drunk to spice things up a little. The hamper must have included that kerosene-soaked rag on the end of a stick to make sure they got a really good bonfire going as they burned everything not nailed down before heading off to the final tribal council.

Even the jury grilling this year was a bit lame. Nobody had an axe to grind. Well, Jean-Robert seemed peeved that he had to vote for either Courtney – who he hated from day one – or Todd or Amanda, both of whom he promised not to vote for if they backstabbed him. Jaime tried to make them turn on each other, but kept doubling back on her own questions until nothing made any sense at all.

Todd and Amanda both claimed to be huge Survivor fans who came into the game with a specific strategy, and were forced to hurt people they really, truly cared deeply about in order to successfully implement that strategy. Courtney just pointed out that she’s never been a Survivor fan, had no strategy and was written off by everyone, but made it to the final three anyway and so they should give her some credit for that.

In a very tricky piece of editing, Jeff collected the bucket with the who-gets-the-million-dollars votes. The camera cut to the final three, and when it cut back to Jeff he was in the CBS studio at the live Survivor Reunion! Oh the miracles of television. Oh the miracles of professional hair and make-up. Courtney and Amanda both suddenly had fringes, and Todd had a weird hillbilly faux-hawk with a bit of mullet at the back. Trendy yes, flattering not necessarily.

With seven of the eight votes read out, Amanda’s sole vote put her in official third place. It created a nice little three-all cliff hanger between the others until Todd’s name appeared on the last vote and he got to look shocked and cry and hug the others and do his best beauty queen routine before running off to hug his family.

A lot of the reunion focussed on James and the way Todd and Amanda managed to vote out someone holding two immunity idols. Jean-Robert – who was inexplicably wearing a beanie – still believes he was voted off early because he was the biggest threat. He’s treating it as a compliment, which Jeff amusingly pointed out is only a compliment if it’s true.

The entire world now knows that Courntey weighed 42kg when the game started, 39kg by the time it finished, but is now something over 42kg. Yep, Jeff essentially called her fat on national television. Mind you, she was wearing horizontal stripes and everyone knows they’re not becoming.

Leslie yet again said the exact words "I’m not a religious person" (arrgghhhhh!!!), and Chicken said one of the most profound things ever at a reunion: "If I didn’t win the money I’d want to go first."

James has had a good time since the show, being voted People magazine’s sexiest man of the week and getting hit on by grieving wives and daughters at the sides of graves he’s waiting to fill back in. Denise hasn’t been so lucky, getting sacked from her job as a lunch lady and being forced to work instead as a janitor at the same school. Some might suggest cleaning toilets and serving school lunches is pretty much the same category of materials handling, but on the bright side she can get a decent haircut now. She explained that the mullet keeps her hair short at the front under the work hair nets but long at the back so she can be more feminine for her husband and keep him happy. I’m not even going to touch that one.

Having picked on Courtney’s weight and Denise’s hair, Jeff next turned the blowtorch on Jaime and Erik, forcing her to confess that they’re dating and him to confess that he’s still a virgin. He gave the rest their token last few seconds of fame, and then announced that Denise, James and PG – WHAT!! – were the three who received the most votes in an on-line poll as this season’s most popular Survivor. James won the official $100,000 but then Jeff announced that Mark Burnett – whose name Jeff carefully dropped a few times – had decided to give Denise fifty grand to make up for losing her dream job. They didn’t say whether that came out of Mark’s own pocket or the production budget, but it was a nice gesture.

Finally we got a preview of the next series, Fans v Favourites. Ten die-hard Survivor fans who think they can do better will be pitted against ten players from previous series in Survivor Micronesia. They didn’t name the old timers, but a quick peek on the website shows they include Amanda and James from this series, Yau-Man and Parvati from Fiji, and past horrors including Eliza from Vanuatu and Johnny Fairplay from Thailand. I look forward to a massive tribal council chambers, hurriedly assembled to thwart the writers’ strike, falling on his head.

Depending on when – if – Channel 9 decides to run the next series (and series 17 after that, for which casting has already closed) I might be on maternity leave from both paid employment and writing the weekly summaries. For this series at least it has been my great pleasure to inflict on you my passion for certain reality TV. Now grab your torches and head back to camp.

Survivor China: week 12

Well, next week is the grand final and the answer to who wins the big money, who wins the little money, and who (in your best Maxwell Smart) misses by that much.

After last week we know it won’t be Erik, although the unanimous decision back at camp was that he’s possibly the nicest person on the planet. Being ‘nice’ hasn’t helped him lose his virginity or improve his financial position, but it’s nice to be nice so that’s nice for him.

After the opening credits it was pretty much straight into this week’s crappy tree mail poem, which stressed the importance of being skilled and popular, or in other words ‘nice’. Each Survivor was given five arrows, and told to put them in vases belonging to the other people. The most popular person would have the greatest number of arrows to shoot using a replica 4th century Chinese repeating crossbow (available at all good weapons outlets).

The challenge worked on the basic premise that the person whose name on the target board got the most hits would win. Obviously having lots of arrows would assist in this endeavour: PG’s vase contained only one, confirming beyond doubt that she is not popular and giving her virtually zero chance of winning. It didn’t help that she entirely missed the board with that one arrow.

Courtney had twelve arrows but didn’t manage to hit her own name even once, which is presumably why the tree mail was so specific about the need for both popularity and skill. She's been told all series that she's hopeless at challenges, so perhaps people deliberately gave her arrows in the hope her failure would benefit their own cause. Sure enough, she managed to spray them evenly enough between Todd and Denise that it took until the final arrow for Denise to be crowned winner. It also made Courtney the easy choice for Denise to take with her on the reward of an overnight stay at the Great Wall of China. (Jeff tried to pump it up as a one of a kind experience, but I just did a Google search on "tour, great wall of china" and got 2 million hits.)

Anyway, Jeff then announced that Denise could take another person as well. PG laid it on thick that Denise should repay the favour of the Shoalin Temple visit. Instead, Denise repaid the favour of choosing the only two people to have given her arrows; Courtney and Todd. Denise knows that if PG doesn’t win immunity this week she’ll get voted out, and therefore has no strategic value. She’s been on a private jet with PG and knows how unpleasant it can be. She’s lived with PG for however many days now and probably relished the chance for a break.

Thanks very much for that, Denise. You might have had a 12 hour reprieve from PG’s whingeing, but we had to tolerate seemingly endless minutes of her complaining about not being taken on the reward and people implying that she’s unpopular. In fact PG probably would have complained about the arrow distribution even if Denise had taken her on the reward, which was yet another excellent reason for Denise to put as much distance between them as possible.

I’m almost glad this series is over, because there’s been some incredibly annoying moments. One of the worst was the way PG and Amanda, like, spent 12 hours alone at camp, like, trying to see who could, like, use the word ‘like’ the most often in a single sentence. I lost count because it was hard to focus and scream "SHUT UP!" at the TV at the same time.

The immunity challenge was a repeat of several past challenges, with one person being knocked out of contention each round. Todd couldn’t throw stars, Denise still couldn’t eat the balut, Courtney couldn’t bounce a tennis ball on a drum, and PG couldn’t chop through the ropes and solve the puzzle as fast as Amanda did.

Amanda’s immunity win put PG well and truly in the firing line at Tribal Council. Todd and Amanda had each been lobbying against the other while they were separated during the overnight reward, and with Amanda safe PG started a desperate effort to gang all the girls up against Todd. Unfortunately she forgot that she’s much less popular than Todd, and Denise especially was made so uncomfortable trying to give non-committal answers to PG’s grilling that she was quite happy to obey alliance orders.

The vote against PG might have been unanimous, but she’s convinced they voted her out because they were scared to death to go against her in the final three. No, PG, watch this episode again: they voted you out despite you being an easy beat in the final three. Like, that’s how, like, unbearable another couple of days with you would have been.

Survivor China: week 11

So how did the biggest, strongest and not necessarily stupidest guy this season manage to get voted out last week while holding two immunity idols? I don’t get it either, but those who did survive Tribal Council were all very relieved to have pulled off the blind-siding. Personally I was quite impressed by how calm and rational James’ farewell speech to the video camera was, and thought the others were very mean saying they feared for their life if the plan didn’t work. Later he turned up for jury duty and glared at them. And then I understood.

PG – bless her – has decided that voting out James was not a masterful strategy by highly skilled players to get rid of the strongest person, eliminate both immunity idols and improve their own chances of winning the million dollars ($640k after taxes). No, it was certain proof that the original Hidden Dragon alliance is collapsing. If she can get just two other people to swing over to her side, and if she can keep winning immunity, and if there’s a lightening strike that kills Amanda, Todd, Denise, Courtney and Eric, she’s in with a chance.

As suggested in the ads, this week the loved ones turned up to participate in the challenge. Among much hugging and crying were frequent apologies for the body odour. Denise’s first words to her husband were, "Can I have your socks?" "Please" might have been nice too, but she apparently smelled so bad he was happy to comply as long as she didn’t breath on him.

Loved ones and Survivors were blindfolded and sent into opposite ends of a maze, with instructions that the first pair to team up and reach the middle would win. PG is a chip off the old block, with her Dad pointing to where he thought the middle was and saying, "We need to go that way". I’d like to point out that pointing is not much help to a blindfolded person, although it is slightly amusing to us at home. Amanda and her sister used freaky and annoying bird calls to cut through the shouting and find each other. Denise’s husband Robert just followed the smell and they won.

Long before Corey Delaney / Worthington forced himself uninvited into our media consciousness with his yellow sunglasses and even more horribly yellow hair, another ghastly little twerp named "Johnny Fairplay" competed in Survivor Pearl Islands and pulled off one of the worst stunts in Survivor History. In both cases the act itself was abhorrent, but the chutzpah with which they pulled it off had to be at least acknowledged if not actually admired.

When Johnny's best friend turned up as a loved one Johnny asked, "Where’s Grandma?" and was sadly informed that she had died. Trouble was, Grandma was so alive she answered the phone when Jeff rang the family off-air to express the production team’s condolences. The whole thing was a total lie, pre-planned between the pair of them to ensure that the challenge winner would give up the luxury overnight reward so that Johnny could "get all of the news from home" and "come to terms with his grief".

Why bring up ancient history? Because this week every Survivor fan was dragged back to the memory of that series when Todd came face to face with his little sister at the reward challenge. He pointedly asked how his even younger sister is doing, only to be informed that she had miscarried her baby.

Denise never explained whether it was sympathy or pure strategy, but she chose Todd and his sister (along with Amanda and her sister) to share the reward of a massive lunch on a boat. She also got handed a mobile phone to receive a call from home. The producers had chosen a phone from Sprint Communications because, just like Denise and Robert had to be to win the challenge, Sprint is known for speed and communication. It wasn’t subtle. Neither was the font size of Sprint Communication’s credit in the closing titles.

Oddly, Todd doesn’t appear to have mentioned his little sister's tragedy at all during the entire lunch. I suppose it’s hard to talk and cry and stuff your face with chocolate cake at the same time, so he focussed on doing that last one really well. In fact, poor Kimmy – whose unplanned teen pregnancy and subsequent miscarriage is now world-wide news – didn’t even get a mention until back at camp when Todd, Amanda and siblings went for a swim to gloat about how great the reward was.

For the record, Amanda’s sister’s butt had to be pixelated as she jumped in the lake. Either that family really likes skimpy swimwear or there’s a genetic birthmark that’s just too horrible for prime time. Eroc Giron and Brian Metz, who get closing title credits as ‘Digitizers’, deserve a bigger font even than Sprint Communications for their efforts. Possibly an Emmy, too.

Back at camp during the reward, PG was seriously peeved that Denise didn’t return the favour and invite her to share the reward, since she’d taken Denise to the Shaolin Temple a few days before. They all expressed total disbelief about Todd’s sister, and Courtney did a brilliant replay of Todd’s Oscar-worthy performance as a grieving brother, for which she definitely deserves an Emmy.

The immunity challenge involved wading back and forth through an obstacle course in a swamp, trying to decide which statements out of three pairs were true so that the right keys were picked to open a box and raise a flag. The questions this week were things like, "The Chinese invented barbed wire" and "The Chinese invented gunpowder". Once again there was a perfect opportunity to learn more about the reign of Emperor Nasi Goreng, and once again the producers passed it up.

As jokingly suggested last week, PG won immunity. Her family is Chinese so she kind of had just a little bit of an advantage getting the questions right. Erik knew he’d be targeted for elimination and did some nice work trying to convince the others that Todd was lying about his sister. He and PG both went to work on Denise, pointing out that the others will only take her to the final four. In fact at Tribal Council they both managed to talk generically about how there are ‘certain people’ at camp who can choose between being fourth in their current alliance or possibly winning the game. They may as well have said, "I’m not going to name names, but her initials might be Denise."

It didn’t work, so Erik got voted out in a four-two decision, and can now break up the jury box flirtation that seems to be happening between Frosti and his sweet little Southern Belle Jaime. Todd looked very happy and not at all grieving as he trotted out of the Tribal Council pagoda. Next week might be a different story though, because it looks like the girls plus Denise might gang up on him. With only five Survivors left now, and only a couple of episodes to go, it’s getting very exciting.

Survivor China: week 10

So after spending the last week on the edge of my seat waiting to find out what the big post-Tribal Council surprise is, we finally know. Was it worth the wait? Nuh.

The bad news from Jeff was that there was ‘unfinished business’ and they wouldn’t be going straight back to camp. PG, who only escaped elimination minutes early because she’d won individual immunity, looked like she was going to puke. The good news was that it was a reward challenge, not another vote. The bad news was that "this is no ordinary reward". Actually make that good news, because it was a really good reward.

The winner got an overnight stay at the 1,500-year-old Shaolin Temple, birthplace of Kung Fu. In talking the reward up, Jeff made it clear (including to everyone at home) that this truly is an opportunity that very few people in the world will ever experience because outsiders are not invited. It begs the question of what influence CBS has over a Chinese government desperate to look good in the lead up to the Beijing Olympics, and what influence that government in turn has over the Shaolin monks. Or maybe CBS just offered them their own kung fu reality show as a way of getting around the writer’s strike.

The challenge itself involved questions about Chinese culture, like "True or false: China is credited with inventing the abacus." Having known the answer to that since about grade four, it was disappointing to see so many people get it wrong. I was waiting for "True or false: the Emperor Nasi Goreng built the Great Wall of China to keep out the rabbits", but oddly it didn’t come up.

PG, who last week was sooking that she never wins anything, won her second challenge in a row and took Erik and Denise with her. On the private jet taking them to the reward, PG started lobbying her fellow outsiders to form a new alliance against the four back at camp the minute the ‘Fasten Seatbelts’ sign went out. They were not impressed by the intrusion: Erik just wanted to eat the free pistachios in peace, and Denise was probably wondering whether hers is the worst mullet to ever travel by private jet. I think Bon Jovi collectively won that honour a few decades ago, but she can dream.

She’s actually a bit of a dark horse, confessing during the flight that she’s been studying karate and kung fu for eight years and is not far off getting her black belt. Between Denise loving a visit to the birthplace of her chosen sport, and PG loving a chance to learn more about her Chinese heritage, Erik was the odd one out. Denise even did a demonstration of her own after the Shaolin monks had finished theirs and a bunch of little kids taught the outsiders a few moves. I’m really glad to see someone get to go on a reward that’s so relevant and meaningful, and which there is no doubt they are truly the person most capable of appreciating.

The kung fu theme didn’t end there because the immunity challenge involved throwing stars. I was kind of hoping to see Erik knock himself out with some nunchakus, but throwing stars it was. Tree mail came in the form of a typically bad poem attached to a large placard by said throwing stars, so there was no excuse not to practise and absolutely no excuse for PG not landing a single hit when the pressure was on, other than that she’s pathetic and doesn’t deserve to win.

One of the biggest – and, as it turns out, most erroneous - assumptions this season has been that James would be a major threat in the individual immunity challenges. The producers keep listing his profession as ‘grave digger’, and he’s certainly built like someone who spends a lot of time in heavy manual labour. However, I suspect that might be a slight exaggeration because as I understand it his family runs a funeral business, which isn’t quite the same thing. I suppose grave digger sounds more interesting, plus they already had an undertaker on the show a few years back and don’t like to repeat themselves. Except with the rope and puzzle piece challenges.

And yet while James is such an obvious physical threat, none of the individual immunity challenges have suited his strength. This seemed to perhaps be the one, but Courtney – tiny little Courtney with the skeletal arms and Vampire-pale skin (and, I might point out, dark roots growing nicely through the bleached blonde hair after a month in the jungle) - did just as well in this challenge as James.

Erik managed to win, and the alignment of the (throwing) stars [sorry] allowed Amanda to put in place her brilliant idea of getting rid of James the alleged threat, and knocking both immunity idols out of play. Never mind that Todd and Jean-Robert both had the same idea a couple of weeks ago. Since Erik had immunity it was very easy to convince James that they were all sticking to the original plan of voting out PG next. And she played along, after a chat with Amanda in a desperate attempt to survive meant she was let in on the secret that James had been targeted instead of her. It was an enviable no-lose situation for PG: if James didn’t play one of his immunity idols in the crucial moment at Tribal Council he’d be eliminated, and if he did then whomever PG and Erik voted for would be gone.

Oddly enough she managed to last the remaining few hours until Tribal Council without stuffing up. There was a fabulously tense moment after the votes had been cast but before they were read out when Jeff told the remaining seven that if someone was going to play an immunity idol they had to do it right then. James looked at his bag, then back at Jeff and ... said nothing. He did hold them both up eventually, but that was during his farewell piece to camera as the credits rolled and they weren’t much use to him by then.

The ad for next week shows lots of people crying, so presumably it's the loved ones' visit. Either that or PG wins immunity again.