Weather tours

The human body just isn't really adapted to experience, in the space of seven days or so:

1. A beautiful tropical island paradise on the Great Barrier Reef, where one spends an average of 4-5 hours a day actually under water, and much of the rest of it on a boat speeding over glassy calm seas (meep, I miss this so much already). However, said paradise is occasionally threatened by tropical cyclones, sometimes to the extent where we tie all the boats to the trees and hide in the library. A storm in January swept half our beach, the incinerator bins and the entire barbecue away; then three days later it was back to paradise.

2. High dry heat of close to 40 degrees in Melbourne's wide planned grid system. Gorgeous really although I think without a healthy Lizard tan walking around for a couple of days in this would have been quite dangerous! Shady laneways and big trees in the botanic gardens offered very welcome relief.

3. Endless drizzle for 36 hours in Townsville. I swear it must have rained for 90% of my time there. Sunny Townsville not really being built for this, I visited the museum of tropical queensland and the perc tucker art gallery, and in doing so I think exhausted Townsville's rainy day potential in about 3 hours flat.

4. Rather nice weather in Brisbane really!

5. I'm not sure what the weather was actually like in Singapore as it was evening, and I spent most of it in that amazing underground warren that is the junction of Orchard and Scotts Road linking the MRT station and three or four different shopping malls, so that you never really have to emerge into the 95% humidity... not a bad thing given the weather, but malls make me feel a bit claustrophobic sometimes -- one could be anywhere on the planet when in one, what is the point? More a lack of weather than extreme weather of any kind.

6. Freezing cold and snow back in Cambridge. I do sort of feel the snow makes up for it, we got a good 1-2 inches yesterday afternoon and it was lovely to see Great Court in the white. A bit bizarre as I still have a bikini tan and my body isn't used to the weight of all these clothes, but I'm enjoying having a bit of a winter for the first time since 2007.

Cold aside it is nice being back; I've conquered jetlag at last and am stuck into analysis at work, and it's lovely catching up with everybody over various dinners and happy hours and suchlike. Also getting back into the 'extracurricular' life with hot yoga yesterday and a documentary film screening on the evolution vs intelligent design debate tonight that is part of the Darwin celebrations. There's simply too much to do in this town -- if not for the film I could have gone to (1)more yoga (2)a contemporary dance class (3)BA dinner (4)Death of a Salesman at the ADC (would've if it hadn't sold out!) or (5)Iolanthe at the Arts, etc. etc. It's a far cry from research station life, I do love them both but at times the adjustment can be a bit of a shock to the system!