hikari*: Lakes Entrance

This marked the begining of our journey to Lakes Entrance.

"An artistic picture" (according to Ray) of "Malaysian Chipsmore" (according to me).

I realised that will be what happens when I hand him my camera.

Because after 1030393439 years I finally had a chance to drive an AUTO car and really drive Ray somewhere in return.

You know how I complained last time that he never took decent pictures of me? Well, I think he decided to prove otherwise, or maybe rebel.

#1 Macro shot of my hair.

#2 Not enough? Macro shot of my goosebumps.

#3 Still not enough? Un-macro shot of my injection mark.

Have I justified my reason to complain, ladies and gentlemen?

And to think that I take absolutely amazing pictures of him! Like this one in the Fish and Chips store in Lakes Entrance. How did he repay me?

With this. Grrrrrrrr.

But nevermind. Seafood basket was grrrrreat. So everything was forgiven.

According to Ray, seafood in Lakes Entrance is super. So the plan was to start off casual with fish and chips, and end glamourously with a fancy seafood dinner. In between all the eating action would be fishing and paddle boating.

The sun was shining bright and warm despite it being a bit wet earlier.

It was even warm enough for us to share an ice-cream.

And bright enough for me to appear half a shade fairer under natural sunlight!

And then we stepped out of the car to see.

Gloominessssssssssssss.

It was quite a damper. In the end, we did not end up doing an fishing or paddle boating - no one was able to. Luckily, Lakes Entrance offers quite a beautiful and tranquil scene. We ended up just walking aroung and taking in the scenery.

There were really graceful swans along the shore. . .

. . . until the started scavenging for food in the sewage pipe.

The worst part was the patchy rains. We were walking whenever the sun shone and looking for shelter whenever the rain took over.

One of our shelters. Bridges like this remind me of Sandakan :)

Now for the big surprise!

Voila. Right after we stepped out of what must have been our 3rd shelter.

Different from the tranquility offered by the gloomy skies, Lakes Entrance was then looking serene. Really really beautiful.

Walking along the bridge, one can't help but be mesmerised by the instantaneous change of colour of the water - from grey to blue (reflecting the weather).

Just after the bridge, there is a beach. I love beaches over here.

The millions steps before us.

The sunset was gorgeous. See my orange face haha. It was not fake tan gone bad, I swear.

Ready for the gorgeousness of sunset at Lakes Entrance? Go!

I just love looking at the colourful reflections of the clouds on the water surface. Swwwooooooon.

The night was cold and windy so I was reaaaaaallllly looking forward to the glamorous fancy seafood dinner as aptly described by Ray way early before the trip.

BUT. Every single seafood restaurant was booked out. We were literally walking from door to door asking for a tiny table for two - but to no avail sniff sniff - sniff both as in sobbing and snivelling from the cold.

In the end we went to a random cafe and had erm, supposingly-cheap-but-not lousy cafe dinner. But it was a good laugh.

The next morning we went to this place called Buchan Caves. Located just a good 20 minutes drive away from Lakes Entrance, these are limestone caves filled with stalagtites and stalagmites and underground rivers carved by the nature through the flow of time.

Lemme tell you, it was amazing. Makes you really appreciate the creations of nature and the beauty of it.