Category Archives: Travel

Melb2016: Transport Related Observations & Signs (Part 7)

Posted on June 13, 2016 by lui_gough

I’ve always been a fan of public transport, no matter where I go. It’s an economical way of travelling, although it’s not always convenient. I don’t mind though – I’m patient and tolerant enough. It’s always interesting to note the … Continue reading →

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Melb2016: Self-Guided Night Photography (Part 6)

Posted on June 12, 2016 by lui_gough

If the recent postings are anything to go by, people might be mistaken that this is a photography blog. I suppose it is, and it isn’t. Given that one of my interests is photography, and I rarely have good excuses … Continue reading →

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Melb2016: Daytime Walkabouts 2 (Part 5)

Posted on June 6, 2016 by lui_gough

My daylight adventures in Melbourne continue with the afternoon adventure. But first, a little bit of food. I decided to stop off at Rocket Burgers and Fries for a meal, mainly because it was a convenient “on the way” stop, … Continue reading →

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Melb2016: Daytime Walkabouts 1 (Part 4)

Posted on June 6, 2016 by lui_gough

After going on the free walking tours, I still had a bit of time left in the day and some energy to spare, so I began my roaming almost immediately. As it was already mid-afternoon, I realized I wouldn’t quite … Continue reading →

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Melb2016: Free Guided Walking Tour – Afternoon Part (Part 3)

Posted on June 5, 2016 by lui_gough

The I’m Free walking tour continues on into the afternoon, with the second half of the tour with the more tasty bits. We get stuck right into the street-art scene, a prominent feature of Melbourne culture. Apparently, such places are … Continue reading →

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Melb2016: Free Guided Walking Tour – Morning Part (Part 2)

Posted on June 5, 2016 by lui_gough

After the conference was officially over, I had free time to explore Melbourne. Before I left Sydney, I spent some time searching online for various places and attractions worth seeing in Melbourne. Since I had a lot already planned even … Continue reading →

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Melb2016: Going to the OzWater’16 Conference (Part 1)

Posted on June 4, 2016 by lui_gough

It’s been almost a month since my trip down to Melbourne for the OzWater’16 conference, and it’s taken me this long to get all my data together and partially processed so that I could start blogging about it. I suppose … Continue reading →

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Big-Random: Public Transport, UNSW Electrical Upgrades & Vending Machines

Posted on April 3, 2016 by lui_gough

It’s been ages since I put out one of these random posts filled with random observations. That hasn’t stopped me collecting random observations, although the pace of collection had slowed down as I wasn’t sure if I would ever get … Continue reading →

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Opal’s New Top-Up Machines and Single-Trip Tickets

Posted on April 1, 2016 by lui_gough

Sydney’s long march to a paper-ticket-less transport network just got one step closer with the announcement on 23rd March 2016 that they are trialing new top-up machines with single-trip tickets. While this was always considered as the next step, it’s … Continue reading →

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Random: Opal Card Stories, Tips & Central Station Upgrades

Posted on August 13, 2015 by lui_gough

The Opal Card is an automatic fare collection system based around NXP MiFare DESFire EV1 NFC cards and readers supplied by Cubic Transportation Systems (based on readers on the Oyster card network). It has been in use since December 2012 … Continue reading →

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Trip to HK & CN 2014 – Part 11: Last Two Full Days in HK, Odds & Ends

Posted on July 26, 2015 by lui_gough

At long last, we’ve reached what will probably be the final article in the series about my trip to Hong Kong and China. By this stage, I have achieved my primary objective of attending the conference and presenting some secondary … Continue reading →

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Trip to HK & CN 2014 – Part 10: Conference at Kylin Villa, Shenzhen

Posted on July 20, 2015 by lui_gough

This part continues on my series of postings about my overseas trip taken at the end of 2014 to Hong Kong and China. Because of time constraints and other interesting posts to put up, I haven’t been able to blog … Continue reading →

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Trip to HK & CN 2014 – Part 9: The Tram Catalogue

Posted on June 30, 2015 by lui_gough

As promised from the last posting about the trams in Hong Kong, here is the “tram catalogue”. This is basically a collection of mostly front-shots of the numbered trams as seen in Hong Kong on my tram day, 8th January … Continue reading →

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Trip to HK & CN 2014 – Part 8: Riding the Ding Ding Tram

Posted on June 29, 2015 by lui_gough

[This is a posting about a trip I took to Hong Kong and China as part of a conference trip at around the beginning of the year, but as I’ve not had the time to “digest” and write posts about … Continue reading →

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Obituary: mX Newspaper (Sydney Printed Edition 4 July 2005 – 12 June 2015)

Posted on June 21, 2015 by lui_gough

The mX was a free afternoon newspaper targeted at commuters, originating in Melbourne on 6th Feburary 2001 and spreading into Sydney on 4th July 2005 and Brisbane on 5th March 2007. Due to falling circulation, it put out its last … Continue reading →

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Visited: Transport Heritage Expo (6 – 8 June 2015)

Posted on June 7, 2015 by lui_gough

Thanks to the Queen’s Birthday long weekend, I’ve managed to scrape up some time to blog about things, and make the time to visit some interesting events around Sydney, one of which is the Transport Heritage Expo. The Transport Heritage … Continue reading →

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Trip to HK & CN 2014 – Part 7: Being a Tourist – Big Bus Tour (Part 2)

Posted on May 31, 2015 by lui_gough

Yikes! Time flies, but time for blogging? Well that sometimes happens, but it’s no guarantee. Always good to get things down before the memories fade too much, so I’ll try to turn back the clock to the 6th January, in … Continue reading →

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The tarnished Opal continues to darken …

Posted on May 21, 2015 by lui_gough

Suffice it to say, followers would have realized the difficulties I have had in getting satisfactory responses from Opal for anything less than a trivial enquiry. While the last post has seen update upon update, it’s probably time to start … Continue reading →

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Visited: The South-West Rail Link (Liverpool to Leppington)

Posted on May 5, 2015 by lui_gough

Having spent a decent chunk of my life on public transport, whenever anything happens, it immediately captures my interest. The rail network had suffered through many years of neglect, and has only been undergoing “slow” evolution – I’ve only really … Continue reading →

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Nothin’ but a tarnished Opal: Problems continue …

Posted on April 29, 2015 by lui_gough

My quest towards getting my Opal concession card working has been thwarted again. As of the last posting, I was assured by Opal Customer Care that my card had indeed been activated and was ready for travel – both over … Continue reading →

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Oh No! Another Opal Card, but Opal Activation is Broken!

Posted on April 27, 2015 by lui_gough

The Concession Opal card saga continues. In the last chapter, my card was blocked from use and a new card was to be dispatched to me, by express post. This card would have to be activated and the credit from … Continue reading →

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Problem: Opal Top-Up Pending Collection – RIP, my Opal Card

Posted on April 24, 2015 by lui_gough

It’s probably self-evident by now, as a regular user of public transport (and an observant one at that), that I’ve been looking forward to receiving and getting onto the Opal system. While concession holders, including tertiary students, were left to … Continue reading →

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Trip to HK & CN 2014 – Part 6: Being a Tourist – Big Bus Tour (Part 1)

Posted on April 7, 2015 by lui_gough

So far, my holiday has involved much time staying inside the hotel, resting my temperamental ankles and looking at various transmissions on the air. Time was running out, and I really had to make the most of my time in … Continue reading →

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Trip to HK & CN 2014 – Part 5: RTL-SDR, More Radio, AIS & Night Photos

Posted on March 28, 2015 by lui_gough

It’s been a while since the trip, but I’ve been just way too busy lately to post anything more about the experiments and photos I’ve taken during my trip. The trip continues, with this part focusing mostly on more radio … Continue reading →

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Trip to HK & CN 2014 – Part 4: Hong Kong Park & Edward Youde Aviary

Posted on March 7, 2015 by lui_gough

After the marathon post in the last part about analyzing Hong Kong’s free-to-air TV signals, this part won’t be from inside the hotel. Instead, it’s 2nd January and I’m on an outing to Hong Kong Park. This post will be … Continue reading →

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Trip to HK & CN 2014 – Part 3: Hong Kong Free-to-Air DTMB Analysis

Posted on February 23, 2015 by lui_gough

What does somebody do when they’re in a room and want to relax for a bit? They watch television, of course! Having lived the majority of my life in Australia, it also provides the double-benefit of allowing me to soak … Continue reading →

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Random: Concession Opal, Storage Fails, element14 Blogs, etc.

Posted on February 16, 2015 by lui_gough

It’s been an age since I last had the time to write up a random post. Normally, if I’m feeling well, I’d be happy to churn one out every fortnight or thereabouts, but lately, I just didn’t quite have the … Continue reading →

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Trip to HK & CN 2014 – Part 2: Around the Hotel & Ferry to Tsim Sha Tsui

Posted on February 13, 2015 by lui_gough

It might seem a little bit strange that the story of my trip is being told in a (slightly) non-chronological order. Initially I would have loved for it to be in order, but then I decided that it would be … Continue reading →

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Trip to HK & CN 2014 – Part 1: A View from the Room

Posted on February 11, 2015 by lui_gough

For business or for pleasure? Both. Or maybe none. We’ll see. I don’t generally go on many overseas holidays, but starting off with what is (I’m led to believe) probably one of the most cliché phrases to do with holidays … Continue reading →

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Review, Teardown: Apotop Wi-Copy (DW21) 5200mAh Power Bank

Posted on January 29, 2015 by lui_gough

Towards the end of 2014, I entered a competition held by Scorptec for a chance to win an Apotop Wi-Copy power bank. Guess what? I won! Thanks Scorptec! As a bit of a hobbyist photographer, backing up photos and keeping … Continue reading →

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