The Great Ocean Road

In May this year, we went to see stay at Cobden Crest Cottage, near The Great Ocean Road.

It was a great place to stay, but unfortunately, the locals didn't understand any english. They kept repeating the same word over and over, I think it sounded like "MOOOoooooo."

The Cobden Creat Cottage came complete with Kitchen, Bedrooms and Games rooms.

We saw the road to nowhere. This road use to be the main road, and was to close to the cliff, and as such the road was relocated.

We saw history behind General Motors Holden.

... as well as some incredible views of the coast.

Some of the tourist attractions had lots of steps to climb up and down.

Some of the waves were very big, and had a dramatic effect as they came in. It is hard to capture on camera.

We also visited the nearby chocolate factory and the cheese factory. We saw the Lochness Cow outside the cheese factory. Unfortunately Dad was too slow, and didn't see it. The photo is not a fake.

More photos

Paynesville

Earlier May this year, we went to Paynesville to fix up Grandma's old house.

We made a complete mess of the house. This is because we had to remove everything, in order to allow us to rent the property.

We took a lot of things to the tip, as we didn't have anywhere else to put them. One car trip was very loaded, as we had two chairs, one sofa, and two beds. As well as some other bits and pieces, like an old low quality record player.

This was kind of sad, because the chairs and sofa have been in the family for a long time, however we don't have the time to restore them to good health or any where to but them if we did restore them.

On the last day, we took Tyla, our dog to the beach.

Initially, Tyla was very jealous when another dog was allowed to fetch a stick in the water, but then when Tyla had a turn, the other dog became very jealous, and jumped off the jetty and into the water.

Tyla was happy because we throw the stick into the water lots of times so she could fetch it.

After Tyla went swimming she was a very messy with lots of sand.

More photos

Storms

2009-04-15

There were no trains from Belgrave to Bayswater (all day), so my trip into the city was slower then usual:

Service times

Time	Scheduled	Stop	A/D?	Service
07:32	07:25	Clarkmont Road	Depart	638 Bus
07:41		UFTG	Arrive	698 Bus
07:45	07:51	UFTG	Depart	732 Bus
08:08	08:13	Knox City	Arrive	732 Bus
08:15	08:15	Knox City	Depart	664 Bus
08:27	08:30	Bayswater	Arrive	664 Bus
08:56	08:47	Bayswater	Depart	Train
09:02:35	08:54	Ringwood	Depart	Train
09:16:55	09:09	Box Hill	Depart	Train
09:23:30	09:15	Camberwell	Depart	Train
09:32:30	09:24	Richmond	Depart	Train
09:37:30		Melbourne Central	Arrive	Train
09:38:00	09:29	Melbourne Central	Depart	Train

At Knox City I just missed the 901 bus to Ringwood, and decided to catch the 664 to Bayswater. In hindsight I would have been better if if I caught the next 901 to Ringwood, because of the long wait for the first train at Bayswater. There would have been more trains at Ringwood.

Train terminated without notice

Today my train arrived at Box Hill station, as usual. The only warning sign something was wrong was we stopped at platform 4, not platform 3, and there wasn't a Blackburn train terminating on platform 3. We waited.

When the Ringwood train passed us on Platform 3, I started getting worried.

The next train, a Blackburn train passed us on Platform 3, and we were given an automatic message the train might be delayed by 10 minutes, so I got off and caught the next Lilydale train from Platform 3 (fortunately my gamble paid off and it left first...).

At Ringwood I changed to the Belgrave train, which still wasn't the train stranded at Box Hill, but the next one. I didn't notice any people from my Belgrave train on this one, and it looked relatively quiet, so I guess they were still waiting on the train at Box Hill.

I have no idea what the problem was, because they didn't say.

(it goes without saying I missed my bus connection).

Communications

Date: 2008-12-04 16:00:00

At around 7:47am, when the train was arriving at Upper Ferntree Gully station, we assumed it was the 7:47 train. Express Box Hill to Richmond, stops all stations on the city loop.

The station announced that it was stopping all stations to Flinders Street station. Had the station staff made a mistake[1]? The signs in the train had indicated it was a City Loop train, but now said Connex.

After a number of stops, the signs in the train changed to "stopping all stations direct to Flinders Street station." Ok, not a good sign.

The driver made an announcement before Ringwood saying that the train was now a stopping all stations Flinders Street direct train. He didn't say why or what city loop passengers should be doing. My first thought was maybe the city loop was closed for some reason. So I stayed on the train.

Before Box Hill station the driver finally told us what I would have liked to have known much earlier:

• point failure at Belgrave
• this train was an additional service

If I known this earlier I could have waited for the next train at Upper Ferntree Gully station and got a seat for the full duration of the trip.

At Box Hill I caught the real 7:47 service (the one I thought I had caught). Predictably it was running late. It train ended up arriving at Melbourne Central at 8:46, 10 minutes late.

Connex needs to provide better information to passengers when things don't go to plan. This would enable passengers to use Connex services more efficiently.

I submitted feedback to Connex via their website (case number 2008/011568).

Notes:

[1] recently a train stopped at Blackburn, and station staff announced it was a changing to become a stopping all stations train. Apparently nobody told the driver. The train used the track normally used for express trains too.

City link road works

Date: 2008-10-29 19:00:00

My bus to Fishermen's bend arrived at 9:28am instead of 9:06am, because of delays, due to road works.

First problems occured on Queensberry Bridge Road, as it was closed off past Whiteman st. Cars were expected to turn left or right, and the right hand turn traffic light cycle at this intersection is very small. Trams could get through, and busses could also get through to (via the left hand turn lane). It didn't affect traffic travelling north down the road.

Second, there were extensive delays on Montague Street, possibly because the left hand lane was closed. I could not see any reason for this lane to be closed, except for the fact there were vehicles parked in it to warn motorists that the lane was closed.

Unruly Passenger

Date: 2008-10-01 07:40:00

He didn't seem that bad. At least compared with some passengers I have seen...

When I arrived at Upper Ferntree Gully station I hadn't been able to hear the station announcements. The first one was happened when I was in the underpass, the next one while a other train at the adjacent platform departed. So I didn't know what the problem was (assuming the said). As it happened, I boarded the train on the closest door to the problem teenager. Oops. As I got on he asked me if I know what the delay was, and I said no. He then asked me if the train was delayed, and I said yes, while still walking to a vacant seat.

He was ranting and raving, and threatened to repeatedly push the emergency button, claiming it was an emergency. Apparently he also made threats to the driver, although I can't have been on the train at the time.

After the police arrived, removed the passenger, the train departed when the train driver made an announcement and said he couldn't say anything earlier. He also complained that the police took 35 minutes to respond. At this time I realized the teenager was the primary cause of the delay, and maybe entering from that particular door wasn't the best of strategies. Previously I had assumed there was signal failure or something, and that the problem passenger couldn't cope with the delay.

The 7:39am train left at 8:01am.

Townsville holiday

Date: 2008-09-29 20:00:00

Photos

Day 1 (2008-09-13) Flight to Cairns

Today we travelled by aircraft from Melbourne to Cairns, via Brisbane airport. We did this in an aircraft. The aircraft flew in the air and did not crash until we landed.

At Cairns the Hotel got our booking wrong. The process is that we booked via an online booking agency, and they write the details into a fax, send it to the hotel, where the hotel types it into their computer. Unfortunately they mistyped the date, and the booking was made for the wrong day. The hotel was fully booked out. Fortunately we were transferred to another hotel of the same owner and stayed there the night.

In the night Dad took some night time photos with long exposure times (15 to 30 seconds).

Day 2 (2008-09-14) Cairns to Cape Tribulation

We drove. In a car. A rental car. A rental car that was black, to be precise. At one stage we had to cross a river in a car ferry. The ferry cost as $19 for a return trip. We stayed the night at Heritage Lodge.

Day 3 (2008-09-15) Cape Tribulation

Today we walked up Mount Sorrow. You have to be careful to stay in sight of the orange arrows (or orange ribbons or blue ribbons) otherwise you can easily end up walking in the wrong direction (because it looks like that is the direction the path takes). We did so on several occasions and had to back track our steps and find out where the path disappeared to.

At one point we thought we were almost at the top. Wrong. We had only started the steep stretch. The path just kept going up as far as you could see. Eventually we got to the top of a steep stretch of path, but before we could get any relief, the path turned 90 degrees and we were at the bottom of the next ever lasting steep stretch of path. At the top of the mountain we got a good view, from a metal cage. Some people criticised the cage as being ugly, but it provided a place to wait without fear of leaches. Unfortunately no seats were provided.

We started the walk at 10:55, arrived at the top at 13:32, started the descent at 14:51, and got back to the bottom at 16:22.

Day 4 (2008-09-16) Cape Tribulation to Undara

On the way to Undara, we saw the Millstream falls, and made some friends with some Kookaburras.

There are a large number of road trains using this stretch of road. Each vehicle can be anything up to 5 units long (1 engine + 4 trailers).

Throughout the entire area there is a lot of sugar cane farms. All of these farms are linked by the narrow gauge sugar cane railway. The carriages look top heavy, but somehow they manage to stay on the tracks. There are numerous level crossings, with some of them being rather complicated because there has been no attempt to relocate the train track away from intersections. Instead, a placing give way signs at appropriate points is considered satisfactory.

Undara is a place of historic volcanic activity. It is now a national park. We went on the sunset tour, and saw kangaroos, wallabies, and bats flying out of the lava tube at night. We learnt that kangaroos have pointy ears and wallabies have rounded ears.

Day 5 (2008-09-17) Undara to Ingham

We went on the half day tour, and saw more wildlife. We also saw the insides of some of the lava tubes.

The mango tree on the side of the road is significant because it marks where the lava crossed this area.

Later on we saw a number of water falls and headed for Ingham. At Ingham we stayed at in old building, Hotel Noorla, with historic features. For example, the owner created all the tiles by hand, and they appeared to be of good quality.

We stay the night in a historic Hotel.

Day 6 (2008-09-18) Ingham to Townsville

We see more waterfalls (the Wallaman Falls). When driving we go around a corner and find a dead cow on the road in front of us. Only it isn't dead. There are two calves, back to back, sun baking on the road. We blast our horn at them as we pass them, but they don't seem to take any notice.

We walk to the bottom of the waterfalls and take lots of photos.

After the falls, we drive in our brown rental car to Townsville. By this stage, the car has been covered in layers of dirt and tar (from the many road works) and bullshit (from wondering live stock) that it is no longer black.

Day 7 (2008-09-19) to day 9 (2008-09-21) Townsville

My sister attended a wedding in Melbourne (the irony!), so we look after her dogs and try not to destroy her house too much in the process. On the first day we accidentally flood the house (the hose come out of the sink from the washing machine). On the second day the toilet flush mechanism breaks and is no longer functional. On the third day nothing breaks.

We take lots of photos of birds, lizards, snakes and dogs in the area.

Day 10 (2008-09-22) to day 16 (2008-09-28) Townsville

Fix stuff around my sisters house. Fix leaking toilet. Repeatedly. Fix TV, and allow it to receive ABC (perfectly) and other channels (not so good - Antenna is VHF only). Install blinds to protect dogs from insects in wet season.

Day 13 (2008-09-25) Townsville

Walk through Town Common taking photos of birds.

Day 14 (2008-09-26) Townsville

Walk through Town Common and take photos from the top of Mount Marlow.

Day 15 (2008-09-27) to day 16 (2008-09-28) Townsville

Continue fixing stuff. No photos. Wasted days.

Day 17 (2008-09-29) Townsville

Today we leave Townsville to go back home, in Melbourne. The aircraft flies through the sky. It is powered by our camera, with every photo we take we propels the aircraft forward and keep it in the air. Flying is perfectly safe, as long as we don't run out of batteries. When the camera fills up with photos it is time to land.

Latrobe Valley accident

Date: 2008-08-29 14:16:38

AO-2007-065: Cessna Aircraft Company 172M, VH-EUI and Amateur Built Avid Flyer, 28-0929, Latrobe Valley Aerodrome Vic.

Preliminary report now available.

From the report:

Sometime later, as the aircraft had progressed in the circuit, two aircraft attempted to make a radio broadcast together, and the instructor in the second Cessna 172 reported that he broadcast that there had been an over-transmission and that the transmission indicated that both aircraft had called on final approach. In response to that broadcast, it was reported that the pilot of the Avid broadcast that ‘he had the other aircraft in sight’. The instructor reported that he noticed that there appeared to be two aircraft in close proximity on final approach to runway 09. It was reported that shortly after that, the Cessna and the Avid collided while on final approach to runway 09.

We will have to wait until the final report.

Secure Gateways

Date: 2008-08-29 14:16:38

For any connection to the Internet, ideally you want to keep things as separate as possible. For example, web servers should not exist on your internal network, because this means anybody who breaks into the web server can access your internal network. You shouldn't put it on your firewall either, because not a potential attacker could get access to everything.

The solution is to put the web server on its own, physically separate network, that has its own network connection to the firewall. This way you can add rules to restrict connections from the web server to the internal network, so even if the web server is compromised, an attacker cannot get to your internal network. Obviously the firewall must be kept secure, this means it should not run anything except the bare essentials. This is also known as a DMZ.

Unfortunately, this approach, while secure, has traditionally been rather expensive, due to the large number of computers required. On my network I would have:

• Firewall
• Samba file server
• Asterisk server
• Web server
• Squid
• Mail server

All of these functions should be separate, in order to minimise damage if one part is compromised, but that is 6 computers, that must be purchased, located, and provided with power.

What if there was a cheaper and easier way to do this?

There is: Xen Virtual Hosts.

Conclusion

With virtualisation software, it is possible to produce a reasonable gateway with only one computer, and still have a firewall protecting the various applications from each other.