Ok, here it is, finally the second installment of the New Zealand blog. So, where did I leave off?? We had just picked up the van (late, but none the less) and were finally on the road. It was great, we had some groovy driving tunes on, compliments of Snowy's wonderful roadtrip mixes, a delicious bag of homemade trail mix, and our map to get us to the first campsite. There were hardly any other cars on the road, once we finally got out of Christchurch ( a little confusing), and we were making great time. The only problem was we were making great time in the wrong direction, New Zealand doesn't have particularly clearly labeled road signs. By the time we realized our error it was about 7:30 pm, which gave us about an hour and a half to get to our campsite if we wanted to arrive with any natural light to guide us. We rolled into our campsite around ten in complete darkness. We had a book of conservation campsites, so they were all pretty cheap about $5 or $10 a night, but ours was free the first night because we were so late there was no one to pay. We turned off the "highway", which is really just two lanes, onto a long narrow road which seemed to be taking us to the middle of nowhere, and it was. We camped the first night in "the middle of nowhere" and we discovered in the morning however, that it was actually quite beautiful. After parking our van and strategically changing into pjs, we settled into our bed. We were very careful to make sure all the lights were turned off, because we didn't want to drain our battery. Snowy and I were both concerned about what we were going to do in our van with no computer or flashlights to read by (we weren't very prepared for camping), but as it turns out best friends can find lots of meaningless things to talk about. Oh, also part of not being prepared for camping meant we didn't have sleeping bags (someone, Con, was supposed to give us one but he forgot), sleeping the first night, well every night after that was the coldest I have ever been in my entire life. You might be asking why didn't they just buy a blanket the next day, many people did ask this and I told them "oh, there wasn't really anywhere to buy one, where we were was very rural", but the truth is we are just very cheap. So, anyways as I was shivering away that first night, constantly waking up, I heard at one point a very fast clicking noise that annoyed but then just stopped. I didn't think much of it until... we woke up around 10:30 about two hours later than we planned, panicked and hopped into the front seat to drive off, after turning the key in the ignition and nothing happening, I knew exactly what that annoying clicking was the night before, it was the sound of our car batteries' last effort before completely dying. My initial reaction was , "S**t, F***k," and any other profanity imaginable, but then we hoped someone there could jump us, but then we realized that most campers leave before 10:30 so there wasn't really anyone around so my reaction to that was "S**t, F***k,". We did finally find two people to jump start us, we had to literally run after them because they were on their way to go on a hike, but the jump was successful. To show our appreciation we offered them delicious homemade carrot muffins, but they were uninterested. We starting to understand why American travelers get a bad reputation.
Ok, i'm bored of writing this, I will write more tomorrow. Hopefully, you are waiting anxiously, here is a bit of a preview of what's to come tomorrow...sheep herding in a Popeye van.
Cheers,
Laura
Saturday, February 27, 2010
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Oz Open and the Begining of an Open Road Adventure
Snowy and I got back from NZ a little over a week ago and I have been meaning to update my blog and I have no excuse why it has taken so long, I just didn't do it. Anyways, I will first briefly give an account of working at the OZ Open. It was pretty full on for the two weeks I was working there, I worked about 60 hrs a week and did pretty much nothing outside of work. My job wasn't exactly exciting, I worked in Corporate Hospitality; this basically meant I prepared one of the dining rooms before each meal and showed the corporate guests to their seats then gave them water when they were leaving. Other people working in Corporate Hospitality actually got to work in Rod Laver Arena so they got to watch pretty much every match. So despite my job being less than thrilling, it was still an amazing experience and just being at the Open was exciting and there was a great positive energy. I also got to catch a couple of matches after work. Another bonus was that the dining room I was working in was adjacent to the practice court so I got to see some pretty impressive athletes training. The main lesson I took away from the Oz open was that Australians don't appreciate my chanting "USA USA" when Americans are victorious.What I think is even more exciting then working at the Open, is my recent trip to NZ. The morning after the Oz Open ended Snowy and I boarded an early flight to Christchurch. We had scheduled to pick up a wicked camper, but the only catch was we had to pick it up by 4 pm NZ time (2 hrs later then Oz time). For those of you that aren't familiar with Wicked Vans, they are probably the most "basic" (and that's putting it kindly) camper van accommodation you can get. They target backpackers and I think most of their clients are 20 something boys, just guessing by the crude pictures that are painted on the sides of most vans. Anyways, our flight got in around 3 pm NZ time, and unfortunately it took about 45 mins longer to get out of the airport, with customs and such, than we had planned. We called Wicked Campers as soon as we realized we were going to be late and there was no answer, which was not a good sign; we decided the best thing we could do would be to just go to the garage and hope there was someone there late to give us our van. In the taxi on the way there we considered the very likely possibility that we may be spending the night in Christchurch, which would be very bad for a couple of reasons: 1, we are cheap and wouldn't pay for accommodation, sleeping in parks isn't that dangerous right? 2, Not getting our van would put us a whole day behind our planned driving route and 3, We had already payed for the day's rental. Luckily, to our relief their was someone at the garage when we got there, but she was not very happy to see us. When we told her we were sorry we were late and that we were there to pick up a van her exact words were " Are you F***ing kidding me", no we were not kidding. We feared that she might out of spite give us this van that had paintings of people doing some rude things to subs on the side, but we fortunately got a van with the unoffensive popeye painted on the side. We got a very quick run down of the van, like how to convert our table into a bed, where the kitchen was (our trunk), and how to change a flat tire. It was about 6 minute tutorial and we were off on the open road, well a quick stop at the grocery store and the gas station and then we were on the open road. Snowy took the first shift of driving, and the only real confusion with driving on the opposite side of the car and the opposite side of the road was that when we tried to use our turn signal the windshield wipers went on instead.
This is just the first installment of hat will prove to be a very long blog about our NZ road trip.Cheers,
Laura
Friday, January 22, 2010
I Like to Ride my Bicycle
After living in Melbourne for about a month, Snowy and I began to realize what a bike friendly (well kind of) City Melbourne is. At the very least a lot of people here get around by bike, plus we were finding we were spending at least $100 a week on taxis, so we set out on the task of finding two bicycles. Normally this wouldn't be a very difficult task, but we had some very specific criteria for our bikes; we wanted vintage bikes, that had to meet a certain degree of cuteness, and they also had to have a low price tag. What we discovered is cute, vintage bikes are very expensive and can sell for over $1,000. We were also bidding on e-bay so had to deal with the frustrations of constantly being out bid, by 50 cents. Finally, after about a month and half of searching we bought two bikes on e-bay with the buy it now function, both of which are adequately cute.
It was my job to pick up the first bicycle while Snowy was at work one day. I took a taxi to pick up the bike from the sellers house in North Carlton, a suburb that is about a ten minute drive from our house. The woman assured me over the phone that the bike was in great condition, except for a "little" squeaking and completely rideable, so I thought it would be no problem to ride the bike home. In hindsight I now see that it was pretty dumb to plan to ride the bike home, at noon when its 90 degrees outside and I know none of the road rules, but this was exactly what I had arranged to do. After paying the lady began my ride home, it wasn't but 45 seconds that I realized the tyres were completely flat and that I was basically riding home on metal rims. Also, the "little" squeaking was so loud and annoying that I could hear it while listening to my ipod with the volume turned all the way up. It wasn't a very pleasant ride, and it took about 20 minutes longer than it should have because I had to keep getting off my bike to walk since I didn't know the road rules and cars were honking at me, oh and I got lost. Now we just had to find another bike so Snowy and I could ride together.
We found another bike on ebay that was less than half the price and as it turns out was way nicer and didn't need any work, the only catch was that it had to be picked up in Noble Park. We knew that the train went there and that you can take bikes on the train, so Snowy went to pick it up while I was at work. She called me about an hour late telling me that she was lost in Noble Park, when I told some people they freaked out, telling me how dangerous Noble Park was ( apparently it's the ghetto of Melbourne), but Australian's have a bit of a jaded view of what a dangerous neighborhood is, and Noble Park is probably a safer neighborhood than where I lived last year in CT. The point is Snowy got the bike no problem, and now we ride everywhere and save hundreds on taxis. There have also only been minor mishaps while riding. Snowy almost crashed once when her tyres got stuck in the tram track, and my chain fell of once on the side of the road (I just threw a hissy fit until some man came and fixed it). The bike did cost a bit of a fortune to get it fixed and riding smoothly and I did hate it for that reason for a couple of days, but now all is good and I'm happily cruising around town.
It was my job to pick up the first bicycle while Snowy was at work one day. I took a taxi to pick up the bike from the sellers house in North Carlton, a suburb that is about a ten minute drive from our house. The woman assured me over the phone that the bike was in great condition, except for a "little" squeaking and completely rideable, so I thought it would be no problem to ride the bike home. In hindsight I now see that it was pretty dumb to plan to ride the bike home, at noon when its 90 degrees outside and I know none of the road rules, but this was exactly what I had arranged to do. After paying the lady began my ride home, it wasn't but 45 seconds that I realized the tyres were completely flat and that I was basically riding home on metal rims. Also, the "little" squeaking was so loud and annoying that I could hear it while listening to my ipod with the volume turned all the way up. It wasn't a very pleasant ride, and it took about 20 minutes longer than it should have because I had to keep getting off my bike to walk since I didn't know the road rules and cars were honking at me, oh and I got lost. Now we just had to find another bike so Snowy and I could ride together.
We found another bike on ebay that was less than half the price and as it turns out was way nicer and didn't need any work, the only catch was that it had to be picked up in Noble Park. We knew that the train went there and that you can take bikes on the train, so Snowy went to pick it up while I was at work. She called me about an hour late telling me that she was lost in Noble Park, when I told some people they freaked out, telling me how dangerous Noble Park was ( apparently it's the ghetto of Melbourne), but Australian's have a bit of a jaded view of what a dangerous neighborhood is, and Noble Park is probably a safer neighborhood than where I lived last year in CT. The point is Snowy got the bike no problem, and now we ride everywhere and save hundreds on taxis. There have also only been minor mishaps while riding. Snowy almost crashed once when her tyres got stuck in the tram track, and my chain fell of once on the side of the road (I just threw a hissy fit until some man came and fixed it). The bike did cost a bit of a fortune to get it fixed and riding smoothly and I did hate it for that reason for a couple of days, but now all is good and I'm happily cruising around town.
Thursday, January 7, 2010
A New Year, a New Blog...well not really a new blog I'm just going to actually update it regularly
It has been over two months since I last wrote in my blog, and despite pleas from my parents to continue writing I didn't actually believe anyone was following it, but enough people have appealed to me to continue chronicling my adventure down under, so here goes.
As I have wrote in previous blogs I am living in a suburb of Melbourne called Richmond. Laura and I are so lucky to live here because we had no idea Richmond was the best suburb (not that I'm bias now) when we first moved here. It's very close to the city, about a ten minute tram ride, and convenient to get to all of the other Melbourne suburbs. Richmond doesn't really have a stereotype as much as some of the other suburbs, for example we aren't all hipsters here, and there is a great neighborhood feel. We are living in a great little town house with a beautiful back garden where on nice days we enjoy a late breakfast or afternoon tea. I will put up pictures soon. We also just got tv in the house last week, so Laura and I camped out on the futon for a couple of days. I know its a little sick, and we really aren't that addicted to tv we had just been deprived for months.
As for work, we are both working as waitresses at a Greek restaurant in Richmond called Salona. It's the best Greek food in Melbourne so if you ever find yourself in Melbourne be sure to drop in for a leisurely dinner. We have come in for dinner and found ourselves still there sipping on wine 3 or 4 hours later. We love working at the restaurant, and have been so fortunate that the big Greek family that makes up the restaurant have welcomed us so warmly into their families, and now call us their American cousins and they swear we were Greek in a past life. Having them throughout the Holidays made it much easier when we were missing our friends and families from back home. I am also still working at the clothing shop, but only have two days left because I will be working at the Australian Open. I will be working as a Corporate Hospitality specialist, but still am not entirely sure what that entails, I just know it will be very long days for two weeks straight.
So much has also been going on in the past month or maybe even two since I last made an entry, but a lot of these things deserve their own post. For example, Laura and I both bought bikes to cruise around Melbourne this summer and that has been an adventure in itself. We also recently went on a wine tasting in the Yarra Valley ( a Christmas present from Mommy and Daddy, thanks). I will write about these in more detail another time. Again, sorry for the delay, but check more regularly for updates I will be better about it in the New Year.
Cheers,
Laura
As I have wrote in previous blogs I am living in a suburb of Melbourne called Richmond. Laura and I are so lucky to live here because we had no idea Richmond was the best suburb (not that I'm bias now) when we first moved here. It's very close to the city, about a ten minute tram ride, and convenient to get to all of the other Melbourne suburbs. Richmond doesn't really have a stereotype as much as some of the other suburbs, for example we aren't all hipsters here, and there is a great neighborhood feel. We are living in a great little town house with a beautiful back garden where on nice days we enjoy a late breakfast or afternoon tea. I will put up pictures soon. We also just got tv in the house last week, so Laura and I camped out on the futon for a couple of days. I know its a little sick, and we really aren't that addicted to tv we had just been deprived for months.
As for work, we are both working as waitresses at a Greek restaurant in Richmond called Salona. It's the best Greek food in Melbourne so if you ever find yourself in Melbourne be sure to drop in for a leisurely dinner. We have come in for dinner and found ourselves still there sipping on wine 3 or 4 hours later. We love working at the restaurant, and have been so fortunate that the big Greek family that makes up the restaurant have welcomed us so warmly into their families, and now call us their American cousins and they swear we were Greek in a past life. Having them throughout the Holidays made it much easier when we were missing our friends and families from back home. I am also still working at the clothing shop, but only have two days left because I will be working at the Australian Open. I will be working as a Corporate Hospitality specialist, but still am not entirely sure what that entails, I just know it will be very long days for two weeks straight.
So much has also been going on in the past month or maybe even two since I last made an entry, but a lot of these things deserve their own post. For example, Laura and I both bought bikes to cruise around Melbourne this summer and that has been an adventure in itself. We also recently went on a wine tasting in the Yarra Valley ( a Christmas present from Mommy and Daddy, thanks). I will write about these in more detail another time. Again, sorry for the delay, but check more regularly for updates I will be better about it in the New Year.
Cheers,
Laura
Thursday, October 1, 2009
A New Home in Melbourne
So things in Melbourne are going FANTASTIC!!! We have moved into a new apartment,its actually a two storey town house. We lucked out because the rent is less than we were paying before, it's one thousand times nicer than our old place, our roommate had a bed for us to use, and our roommate a (33 yr old guy) leaves every week for work and is only here on the weekends. Work has also been going really well and I'm starting to pick up more hours. I also found out I got the job with the Australian Open; I will be working in Corporate Hospitality in January during the two weeks of the Open.
In other news, we have been going to some free shows that are part of the Fringe Festival. It's a three week festival of emerging artists, and there are all different kinds of performances from comedy, to music, to dance etc. Today October first marks the beginning of my being a vegetarian, Laura is doing it as well, but Lindsay had no interest. We will see how long it lasts, we are shooting for at least a month. Also as we become more settled Laura and I are trying to take more dance classes and hopefully soon we will have set schedule.
Now that I have Internet access in my house I will try to update my blog weekly and possibly bi-weekly.
Cheers,
Laura
In other news, we have been going to some free shows that are part of the Fringe Festival. It's a three week festival of emerging artists, and there are all different kinds of performances from comedy, to music, to dance etc. Today October first marks the beginning of my being a vegetarian, Laura is doing it as well, but Lindsay had no interest. We will see how long it lasts, we are shooting for at least a month. Also as we become more settled Laura and I are trying to take more dance classes and hopefully soon we will have set schedule.
Now that I have Internet access in my house I will try to update my blog weekly and possibly bi-weekly.
Cheers,
Laura
Monday, September 21, 2009
One Month in Melbourne
It's been quite a long time since I last updated my blog so I will try to catch everyone up with a recap of what I have been up to over the last month.
Lindsay and arrived in Melbourne in early August where we proceeded to spend the first two weeks here sleeping on the floor of a friends apartment and searching daily, with no luck, for an apartment. Right when things were really looking grim we found a fully furnished two bedroom apartment for a good price in a great neighborhood. We met the "landlord" Kevin or perhaps his name is David as that was who the e-mail I received was from. He was a pretty odd guy and it was a bit unsettling that there were large knives in the back courtyard when we came to look at the property, but at this point we really couldn't be choosey. We arranged to meet him the next day to give him, in cash, the first 4 weeks rent. We arrived with $1,300 cash and a lease that I wrote earlier that morning; the whole transaction seemed pretty sketchy and we became especially nervous when he took our money and told us he was going to make copies of the keys for us. Lindsay was especially having a heart attack during the fifteen minutes in the kitchen considering all the possibilities of how we were just scammed, and this man whose name might have been David or Kevin had walked out with 1/2 of all the money we had left in our accounts. Luckily, DavidKevin came back and we were handed the keys to our cottage.
The apartment did come fully furnished, but there were still a few items we needed to pick up to make it a little more liveable. We were told there was an Ikea in Richmond (the suburb we live in) and considering Richmond isn't all that large it seemed realistic to walk there. It would have been very reasonable to walk there had two different sets of people not given us directions in the opposite direction of Ikea, so it ended up taking us over an hour to walk there. Our new additions to our cottage helped a bit but there is really only so much that can be done to improve a cottage that has had no updates in the past 30 years without a full renovation. The first week in the cottage we were a little scared when nightime fell, but more than scared we were just freezing because there is no heat in our apartment. There is also a long hallway that reminds me of the scene in the Shining when the twins are all chopped into little pieces. Our lease is only for six weeks so we figure in that time we can find something more suitable for long term.
Now that the apartment problem was solved I had the task of finding a job so that I could actually pay my rent. I handed my resume out anywhere in Richmond that said they were hiring and the next day a retail store called Boo Radley called me back for an interview. I later found out from some Australian girls that I was very lucky to get a retail job with no experience. I have only worked two days so far but in October I will start working more regularly, and I think the main reason they hired me was because they need someone to cover every shift over the Christmas holiday and I told them I have no friends or family here so it wouldn't be a problem for me at all.
Lindsay and I have also been having fun as well since we arrived in Melbourne. We have seen 3 good movies: Coraline in 3-D, Inglorious Basterds, and the September Issue, but we can only go to the movies on discount days because regular priced movies are $20!! We went to an Australian Football game and saw the first ranked team play the last ranked team so it wasn't the most thrilling game but still really fun. AFL is similar to rugby and American football but the players don't wear any padding, play never really stops, and they object seems to be to just cream the guy with the ball. The finals are just starting now and Victorians are really into their footy so it will be fun to follow the games. Lindsay and I also went to the Taste of Melbourne and got to eat some of the best food we have had since being in Australia. At the food show we also got to go to a free wine tasting and a free Scotch master class. I found that I love wine, which I already knew, and I really don't like scotch, especially not drinking 6 glasses full of it.
Other good things that have happened are...Laura Snow (my best friend from College) came and she is living with us too. She already has a job working as a bartender and she has an interview for a retail job on the same street I work. I also really want to find a job for the evenings to have a little extra money, but also because right now Laura and I have opposite work schedules.Another thing Laura and I have been up to is looking for a rehearsal space so we can start dancing and choreographing again.
We have been up to lots of other things as well, but if I wrote them all this would be a ridiculously long post. I will try to update more frequently.
Cheers,
Laura
Lindsay and arrived in Melbourne in early August where we proceeded to spend the first two weeks here sleeping on the floor of a friends apartment and searching daily, with no luck, for an apartment. Right when things were really looking grim we found a fully furnished two bedroom apartment for a good price in a great neighborhood. We met the "landlord" Kevin or perhaps his name is David as that was who the e-mail I received was from. He was a pretty odd guy and it was a bit unsettling that there were large knives in the back courtyard when we came to look at the property, but at this point we really couldn't be choosey. We arranged to meet him the next day to give him, in cash, the first 4 weeks rent. We arrived with $1,300 cash and a lease that I wrote earlier that morning; the whole transaction seemed pretty sketchy and we became especially nervous when he took our money and told us he was going to make copies of the keys for us. Lindsay was especially having a heart attack during the fifteen minutes in the kitchen considering all the possibilities of how we were just scammed, and this man whose name might have been David or Kevin had walked out with 1/2 of all the money we had left in our accounts. Luckily, DavidKevin came back and we were handed the keys to our cottage.
The apartment did come fully furnished, but there were still a few items we needed to pick up to make it a little more liveable. We were told there was an Ikea in Richmond (the suburb we live in) and considering Richmond isn't all that large it seemed realistic to walk there. It would have been very reasonable to walk there had two different sets of people not given us directions in the opposite direction of Ikea, so it ended up taking us over an hour to walk there. Our new additions to our cottage helped a bit but there is really only so much that can be done to improve a cottage that has had no updates in the past 30 years without a full renovation. The first week in the cottage we were a little scared when nightime fell, but more than scared we were just freezing because there is no heat in our apartment. There is also a long hallway that reminds me of the scene in the Shining when the twins are all chopped into little pieces. Our lease is only for six weeks so we figure in that time we can find something more suitable for long term.
Now that the apartment problem was solved I had the task of finding a job so that I could actually pay my rent. I handed my resume out anywhere in Richmond that said they were hiring and the next day a retail store called Boo Radley called me back for an interview. I later found out from some Australian girls that I was very lucky to get a retail job with no experience. I have only worked two days so far but in October I will start working more regularly, and I think the main reason they hired me was because they need someone to cover every shift over the Christmas holiday and I told them I have no friends or family here so it wouldn't be a problem for me at all.
Lindsay and I have also been having fun as well since we arrived in Melbourne. We have seen 3 good movies: Coraline in 3-D, Inglorious Basterds, and the September Issue, but we can only go to the movies on discount days because regular priced movies are $20!! We went to an Australian Football game and saw the first ranked team play the last ranked team so it wasn't the most thrilling game but still really fun. AFL is similar to rugby and American football but the players don't wear any padding, play never really stops, and they object seems to be to just cream the guy with the ball. The finals are just starting now and Victorians are really into their footy so it will be fun to follow the games. Lindsay and I also went to the Taste of Melbourne and got to eat some of the best food we have had since being in Australia. At the food show we also got to go to a free wine tasting and a free Scotch master class. I found that I love wine, which I already knew, and I really don't like scotch, especially not drinking 6 glasses full of it.
Other good things that have happened are...Laura Snow (my best friend from College) came and she is living with us too. She already has a job working as a bartender and she has an interview for a retail job on the same street I work. I also really want to find a job for the evenings to have a little extra money, but also because right now Laura and I have opposite work schedules.Another thing Laura and I have been up to is looking for a rehearsal space so we can start dancing and choreographing again.
We have been up to lots of other things as well, but if I wrote them all this would be a ridiculously long post. I will try to update more frequently.
Cheers,
Laura
Monday, August 31, 2009
Home Sweet Home
So I know in my last post I said we were homeless, well technically we weren't homeless we were staying with Adriane and Jenny (two girls from Conn studying here) and their apt was right in the middle of the City so that was very convenient. Furthermore, we really aren't homeless in any capacity anymore because we found an apartment!!! Right when things were looking pretty grim for us we found not just an apartment, but a fully furnished cottage in Richmond. Richmond wasn't our first choice of suburbs, but it is ideally located one train stop from the CBD and it's in walking distance to Melbourne Park and all the stadiums, which will be very convenient for me if I get the job with the Australian Open I applied for. Another added bonus is that our landlord let us sign a 6 week lease, so if we find something better we are free to move. The only major downside to our apartment is that there is no heat and it is always ten degrees colder inside than it is outside and considering it's the middle of winter here so that means it's freezing inside. We took a trip to Ikea and spruced it up a bit and we have actually really been enjoying our little cottage. We have been keeping ourselves pretty busy in Melbourne and I will soon update the blog with all of the fun things we have been doing. I just wanted for now to make sure everyone knows we have a home and not to worry.
Cheers,
Laura
Cheers,
Laura
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Unemployed and Homeless
The task of finding an apartment has proven to be utterly impossible and extremely discouraging. We have run into an endless list of obstacles, so I will explain some of the main ones. The first problem we have is no one wants to lease and apartment to two unemployed American girls with very little money in their bank accounts, an obvious solution to this problem would be for us to get jobs before getting an apartment, but not surprisingly no one wants to hire a homeless person. In Australia the way apartments are rented is you find a property you like on a real estate web site, then there will be an open inspection time listed for you to come look at the property. The inspections only last for 15 - 20 mins, which is a problem when there are multiple inspections at the same time, or one right after the w other. What this all means is that Lindsay and I are literally running from one inspection to another in a city we don't know our way around at all. The next problem we have run into is that there are usually at least 15 other people at any given inspection. We figure any of these people with jobs are more likely to have an apartment rented to them than us. In Australia to actually get an apartment leased to you you have to put in an application. The application asks things like "where do you work", "what's your address", "how long did you rent at your previous property", Our applications look very weak when all of these sections are left blank. Also Laura Snow, who is moving here in a couple of weeks, isn't physically here to fill out an application, so we are trying to get all of her information from her, but it's difficult with the 14 hr time difference. The last obstacle we have run into is trying to find a furnished place, in Australia un-furnished apartments don't come with any appliances which means no refrigerators etc. We could deal with sleeping on mats if there are no beds, but we can't go buy all our kitchen appliances.
I have also ventured out beyond the traditional real estate websites to find an apartment and have been looking on gumtree (the Australian equivalent of craigslist). I found a couple of apartments that sounded too good to be true; fully furnished, 2 bedroom, in the CBD, with Internet included. Sadly they were too good to be true; I received basically the same email from all of them. They were renting their apartments because they were going to West Africa to do Missionary work, I couldn't look at the apartment because they were already out of the country, but if I sent them the money they would then send me the Key. I may be young and inexperienced, but I am definitely not that naive.
We are trying to remain optimistic, but it is honestly a pretty stressful situation. We haven't even had time to explore the city because we have spent every single day going to inspections.Hopefully our luck will change soon.
Cheers,
Laura
I have also ventured out beyond the traditional real estate websites to find an apartment and have been looking on gumtree (the Australian equivalent of craigslist). I found a couple of apartments that sounded too good to be true; fully furnished, 2 bedroom, in the CBD, with Internet included. Sadly they were too good to be true; I received basically the same email from all of them. They were renting their apartments because they were going to West Africa to do Missionary work, I couldn't look at the apartment because they were already out of the country, but if I sent them the money they would then send me the Key. I may be young and inexperienced, but I am definitely not that naive.
We are trying to remain optimistic, but it is honestly a pretty stressful situation. We haven't even had time to explore the city because we have spent every single day going to inspections.Hopefully our luck will change soon.
Cheers,
Laura
Seeing Sydney, Well Kind of
Lindsay and I have spent the past two weeks in Sydney and have been having a fantastic time and much of that is due to the fact we have had very gracious hosts. We have been staying with my friend Khadija, from Connecticut College who is studying abroad, and her three roommates. I think they were all under the impression we would be staying for a few days, as we were, but two weeks later we are just now getting ready to leave.
The apartment we are staying in is in Coogee so its actually like a 30 min bus ride (sometimes longer) to do see the touristy sights. The frist week we were here we didn't do that many touristy things, we did a little shopping, joined a gym for a week trial, and ate a lot, and we saw a pretty funny improv comedy show.
The second week we were in Sydney we went to the Sydney Opera house and saw a musical theater production called Poppea. It was an adaptation of the Opera the Coronation of Poppea. It combined the original songs of the opera translated into to German with songs by Cole Porter. It was interesting to say the least and gave us a lot to talk about after the show.
We also stayed to celebrate Khadija's 21st B-day which was a lot of fun. Lindsay and I were in charge of decorating the cupcakes and everyone was so impressed they thought they were store bought. Lots of Khadija's friends came over for cake and ice cream. We ended up staying in the whole night, a decision everyone was happy with.
The next day was our last day in Sydney and we were actually leaving at 9 pm for a 12 hr bus ride to Melbourne. I would not recommend a 12 hr bus ride to anyone especially since it's cheaper to fly, but we had bus passes we needed to use up, but if you do for some reason have to take a 12 hr bus ride absolutely do an overnight. It is certainly not the best conditions for sleeping, but we both slept most of the way and it made the time pass much quicker. Granted we woke up with immense neck pain and freezing cold (the bus driver had the AC blasting). It was 8 am on Saturday when we arrived in Melbourne and had the task of finding Adriane's (a friend from school who offered to let us sleep on her floor) apartment in a city we have never been to and with hundreds of pounds of luggage.
Cheers,
Laura
The apartment we are staying in is in Coogee so its actually like a 30 min bus ride (sometimes longer) to do see the touristy sights. The frist week we were here we didn't do that many touristy things, we did a little shopping, joined a gym for a week trial, and ate a lot, and we saw a pretty funny improv comedy show.
The second week we were in Sydney we went to the Sydney Opera house and saw a musical theater production called Poppea. It was an adaptation of the Opera the Coronation of Poppea. It combined the original songs of the opera translated into to German with songs by Cole Porter. It was interesting to say the least and gave us a lot to talk about after the show.
We also stayed to celebrate Khadija's 21st B-day which was a lot of fun. Lindsay and I were in charge of decorating the cupcakes and everyone was so impressed they thought they were store bought. Lots of Khadija's friends came over for cake and ice cream. We ended up staying in the whole night, a decision everyone was happy with.
The next day was our last day in Sydney and we were actually leaving at 9 pm for a 12 hr bus ride to Melbourne. I would not recommend a 12 hr bus ride to anyone especially since it's cheaper to fly, but we had bus passes we needed to use up, but if you do for some reason have to take a 12 hr bus ride absolutely do an overnight. It is certainly not the best conditions for sleeping, but we both slept most of the way and it made the time pass much quicker. Granted we woke up with immense neck pain and freezing cold (the bus driver had the AC blasting). It was 8 am on Saturday when we arrived in Melbourne and had the task of finding Adriane's (a friend from school who offered to let us sleep on her floor) apartment in a city we have never been to and with hundreds of pounds of luggage.
Cheers,
Laura
Sunday, August 9, 2009
Working? on a Farm
The bus ride to Mt. Molloy (where we are wwoofing) was miserable! The bus left at 7 am, it was hot (no ac or open windows), a lot of the people on the bus smelled BAD, the little girl sitting behind me had snot running down her face and she kept coughing and it was the windiest roads we have been on yet. I spent the two hour bus ride trying not to vomit. Thankfully we made it there throw up free and were greeted by Will (our new wwoof host) in his Yute. This property was completely different than the last place we wwoofed at. Where were this time was in a place called Maryfarms and it is was extremely rural, no internet and no cell phone reception. Maryfarms is also west of the great dividing range so they don't really get any rain in winter so it was extremely dry and extremely hot. They said in the summer it can get up to 120 degrees F. The property we were on is very flat and very brown but it surrounded by mountains and extremely beautiful. Our Wwoof hosts were a couple, Will and Jo who are in their late 30s/early40s and they have a 4 1/2 year old son named Sam and a dog named Chucko who is blind in one eye. They live on 250 acres and just opened a camp ground and a B&B. They expect to get mostly bird watchers staying because there are these huge Bustards that are everywhere on their property. Our accommodation here was really nice. We stayed in the B&B which is separated from the main house, but not very far, and we had our own very nice bedroom.
The first night we were there they had some of the neighbors come over for a sausage sizzle over at the campgrounds. They also had their first guests ever stay in the B&B so that was exciting. The B&B guests were a father and daughter from New Zealand, the 9 year old daughter Teal was very talkative and I think glad to have two girls in their early twenties to hang around with. The sausage sizzle was really delicious and it was great to meet the neighbors and some other wwoofers that they had with them.
The next day, our first full day wwoofing, Lindsay and I were eager to get to work and see what they would have us doing, but we soon learned that they were more interested in having us as babysitters for Sam than actually putting us to work. It was fine but we kind of felt uncomfortable that we weren't actually doing any farm work. We spent the morning playing with Sam, he is really into carpentry and has his own giant tool box. I was shocked that a 4 year old is allowed to use a real hammer and nails and a saw, Im pretty sure at times unsupervised. He was surpridingly very coordinated for a four year old and it was funny that he was teaching us how to hammer nails, he would say things like "ok ill just get this nail started for you". He was pretty cute he pronounced my name Waura and
Lindsay was "winsey", but he ran the house and controlled his parents. At times it was really uncomfortable when he was acting out and his parents were making excuses to us.
As far as the actual work goes we didn't do much as I said, we mostly babysat, one day we did some weeding, and we made dinner one night. While we were there we went on a hike with the neighbors and their Wwoofers. It could have been a really fantastic hike, the whole time we were in the rainforest we wanted to hike to a waterfall but the closest one was a day and half hike away, so this was finally our chance. Lindsay and I put on our jeans and sneakers for the hike but when we went to get in the car we told to put on shorts and flip flops. Lindsay and I assumed we must be driving to the waterfall because who hikes in flip flops, but oh no we hiked, not on a path, through long grass with stinging green ants, and over boulders. Neither of us were too thrilled about walking through long grass, especially after hearing snake stories for the past couple of days. We eventually got to the waterfall and it was really beautiful, I just wished I had been wearing sneakers the whole time. After the hike when we were all back in the car and driving through the woods (that had recently been burned) back to the farms, I noticed a large snake out the window. We pulled over and it was a ten foot black headed python, it was amazing, I had never seen a snake that big in the wild. Lindsay of course waited in the car, but was still brought to tears (she has been a very good sport about being in situations that make her very uncomfortable). The people that took us hiking who described themselves as "a bit alternative" (and they really were), told as that the black headed pythons are very aggressive so they thought it would be smart to throw rocks at it. Lindsay and I also encountered quite a few little creatures in our bedroom, such as the nightly huntsmen spiders (they are huge), and even a bat one night. We were supposed to leave on Friday but we found a cheap flight to Sydney on Thursday morning so we left a couple of days early (and we were glad to).
We left Wednesday evening on the same terrible shuttle we had taken a week earlier we got into Cairns around 7 pm and had 12 hrs to kill before our flight. We didn't want to spend the money on a hostel so we saw the Harry Potter movie then went to the airport around midnight. It was really creepy to spend the night in the airport because absolutely no one was there. We didn't get much sleep but we were excited to be going to Sydney!!
Cheers,
Laura
The first night we were there they had some of the neighbors come over for a sausage sizzle over at the campgrounds. They also had their first guests ever stay in the B&B so that was exciting. The B&B guests were a father and daughter from New Zealand, the 9 year old daughter Teal was very talkative and I think glad to have two girls in their early twenties to hang around with. The sausage sizzle was really delicious and it was great to meet the neighbors and some other wwoofers that they had with them.
The next day, our first full day wwoofing, Lindsay and I were eager to get to work and see what they would have us doing, but we soon learned that they were more interested in having us as babysitters for Sam than actually putting us to work. It was fine but we kind of felt uncomfortable that we weren't actually doing any farm work. We spent the morning playing with Sam, he is really into carpentry and has his own giant tool box. I was shocked that a 4 year old is allowed to use a real hammer and nails and a saw, Im pretty sure at times unsupervised. He was surpridingly very coordinated for a four year old and it was funny that he was teaching us how to hammer nails, he would say things like "ok ill just get this nail started for you". He was pretty cute he pronounced my name Waura and
Lindsay was "winsey", but he ran the house and controlled his parents. At times it was really uncomfortable when he was acting out and his parents were making excuses to us.
As far as the actual work goes we didn't do much as I said, we mostly babysat, one day we did some weeding, and we made dinner one night. While we were there we went on a hike with the neighbors and their Wwoofers. It could have been a really fantastic hike, the whole time we were in the rainforest we wanted to hike to a waterfall but the closest one was a day and half hike away, so this was finally our chance. Lindsay and I put on our jeans and sneakers for the hike but when we went to get in the car we told to put on shorts and flip flops. Lindsay and I assumed we must be driving to the waterfall because who hikes in flip flops, but oh no we hiked, not on a path, through long grass with stinging green ants, and over boulders. Neither of us were too thrilled about walking through long grass, especially after hearing snake stories for the past couple of days. We eventually got to the waterfall and it was really beautiful, I just wished I had been wearing sneakers the whole time. After the hike when we were all back in the car and driving through the woods (that had recently been burned) back to the farms, I noticed a large snake out the window. We pulled over and it was a ten foot black headed python, it was amazing, I had never seen a snake that big in the wild. Lindsay of course waited in the car, but was still brought to tears (she has been a very good sport about being in situations that make her very uncomfortable). The people that took us hiking who described themselves as "a bit alternative" (and they really were), told as that the black headed pythons are very aggressive so they thought it would be smart to throw rocks at it. Lindsay and I also encountered quite a few little creatures in our bedroom, such as the nightly huntsmen spiders (they are huge), and even a bat one night. We were supposed to leave on Friday but we found a cheap flight to Sydney on Thursday morning so we left a couple of days early (and we were glad to).
We left Wednesday evening on the same terrible shuttle we had taken a week earlier we got into Cairns around 7 pm and had 12 hrs to kill before our flight. We didn't want to spend the money on a hostel so we saw the Harry Potter movie then went to the airport around midnight. It was really creepy to spend the night in the airport because absolutely no one was there. We didn't get much sleep but we were excited to be going to Sydney!!
Cheers,
Laura
Where the Rainforest Meets the Reef
We were up bright and early, which is starting to be a trend for us, to catch our shuttle to Cape Tribulation. We unfortunately were the last three people to get picked up by the shuttle so we weren't sitting together and Lindsay and I were in the last two rows of the bus. We both get motion sickness and the road up to Cape Trib is extremely windy and through the mountains, but we took bronine which has saved the day numerous times so far on the trip. We had booked this package on the first day we arrived in Australia so we knew that the trip up included a crocodile cruise, but other than that I thought it would just be transportation, but the shuttle was actually more of a tour. The bus driver was extremely informative about the area and we even pulled over for a rain forest walk. On the way back the tour included a brief stop at Mossman Gorge to go for a swim and a stop in the town of Port Douglas.
The crocodile cruise was interesting for the first 10 minutes and the first couple of crocs we saw were exciting, but being from Florida and having seeing countless numbers of alligators it wasn't really that thrilling. After the cruise we were back on the bus and headed up to the rainforest, weed stopped for about a twenty minute walk where we were looking for the endangered Cassowary (a giant flightless bird), we didn't find one but the walk was still beautiful. We arrived at our hostel around 1 pm, it was also called the Beach House but was much nicer than where we stayed in Cairns. We stayed in little cabins, our room was a six person share, it was pretty rustic but still nice. We headed over to the restaurant for some lunch and were a little disappointed because everything was really expensive and we didn't bring any of our own food and there wasn't really anywhere nearby to buy groceries. We would only be there for a couple of days so we figured it wouldn't be too damaging to splurge on food a bit. After lunch we walked down to the beach which was literally a 30 sec walk. The beach was absolutely beautiful, it is one of the only places in the world where World Heritage rainforest meets the Great Barrier reef. The beach was almost completely deserted, and to make it even better its surrounded by cloudy rainforest mountains. I was happy to sit in the sun and read my book for hours. We didn't go in the water because there were warning signs about crocs. They said we could go in the water as long as you can see in the water so you know if something is coming for you, but I decided I wouldn't take my chances. Lindsay and I went on a very long walk down the beach and on the way we found (or rather she found us) the most lovely dog. She was an extremely friend and huge Great Dane that we named pony. Lauren was taking a nap when Linds and I left for the walk, she woke up looking for us and saw two people that looked like us down the beach but these people had a giant dog so she figured it couldn't be us, but it was and Lauren was happy to meet our new friend Pony.
After meeting up with Lauren we decided we might as well walk down the beach in the other direction towards a small convenient store at another hostel that we had seen when we dropped people off the bus earlier that day. It turned out to be a pretty long walk, probably about 5 miles to get there. Five miles isn't really that far but we also had to walk back and it was starting to get late in the afternoon. The little grocery store was also WAY over price, but I suppose supply is extremely low in the rainforest so they can get away which charging exorbant prices. We just bought food for breakfast basically and then headed on back to our hostel. We decided to walk down the road instead of along the beach because it would be more direct and quicker, the walk was still pretty though because it is in the rainforest. After about 20 mins of walking back my feet were starting to kill me because I was wearing flip flops, but then we saw a sign that said "Beach House Keep Out", we figured this must be the Beach House we are staying in, how many beach houses can there be in a 5 km stretch, we also figured it said keep out because it was prob the service entrance. We walked down this really long road and as we got down it we started to notice it looked more like a junk yard than our accommodation, then we saw a really ramshackled looking house, then we saw and heard the three very angry looking guard dogs running out of the house at us not on chains. Our first instinct was to run, so that made there instinct be to chase us. We turned to face them and slowly walked backwards and they backed off, but it was terrifying and we thought we would be attacked by dogs on this really scary property that looked like it could be in a horror movie. After we got back on the road it was only another ten minutes back to the "real" Beach House. By the time we got back it was already evening so we showered and ate at the restaurant which turned out to be one of the best places we have eaten the entire time we have been in Australia. Lauren finally got to have Kangaroo and it was delicious, it pretty much tastes like steak. We again were in bed an asleep by 9 pm.
The next day we went on an exotic fruit tasting at a farm a couple of minutes from our hostel. This was so much fun and we of course loved it because we all love food. We tried ten different fruits and they were all delicious. One of my favorites was the custard apple, and I also really liked the sapotes. Unfortunately a lot of the fruits we tried aren't sold commercially, because either they are really ugly, they don't ship well, or they are ugly AND don't ship well. After we got back to our hostel we spent the rest of the afternoon sharing a beer and playing boggle, it was a great way to end a very relaxing day, and again we were in bed nice and early, but this night we had a surprise visitor in the middle of night. Around 1 am we are all awaken by Lindsay standing on the opposite side of the room to her bed freaking out about the GIANT rat that is by her bed. We turn on the light and sure enough sitting on her purse is a rodent, but it's just a mouse although I give it to her it was large. At first we are all staring at it quite confused because we can't figure out why the mouse is eating her purse, but then we realize he isn't eating her purse he is eating the banana she accidentally left in her purse. He chewed a pretty decent size hole in her bag which will probably serve as a nice reminder to her the next time she is in the wilderness to not bring in any food. Lauren was the lucky one who got to share her twin size bed with Lindsay because she had the top bunk which was furthest from the mouse.
The next day we left Cape Tribulation, I had a great relaxing time but I think Lindsay especially was eager to get back to civilization where there aren't mice etc. Our shuttle on the way back only had 12 people so we had plenty of room and our bus driver was really nice. We stopped at Mossman Gorge to go for a swim but the water was freezing so I actually didn't go in and then we stopped in Port Douglas which is a really pretty and quite fancy resort town. We arrived back at our hostel around 6:30 and were extremely rushed because we had to take a 7:00 bus into Cairns for our "Ultimate Party" pub crawl. We probably wouldn't have sought this out on our own but it was included in our package and dinner was included. We also had the best free dinner we have had so far, and it turned out to be a really fun night. There were also two Danish boys that Lindsay and I had met in Noosa that were on the pub crawl with us, so it was really fun to randomly run into friends we thought we would never see again.
We finally let ourselves sleep in, and then walked over to the lagoon to spend the afternoon. It was Lauren's "last night" in Australia so we decided we should go out for a nice dinner and have a fun night out together. We ate a Thai restaurant on the pier which I thought was delicious, I had a spicy green curry (which was really spicy) Lauren was supposed to have the mild green curry, but it was pretty much as spicy as mine and she didn't really enjoy eating it. We had another very fun night out in Cairns and then headed back because Lauren had to catch a very early bus to the airport for her 6:20 am flight. Unfortunately she woke up at 6:30 and realized her "flight" had already left. She packed up everything an headed over to the airport anyways to see if there were any other flights she could get on that day, but when she got to the airport she learned her flight wasn't even that day, it was the next day. She was so lucky!!! and we got to spend another day with Lauren. For our last night we checked out of the beach house and stayed at a really nice hostel called Gilligans which was pretty fancy as far as hostels go. This time Lauren didn't over sleep and got on her real flight no problem. .Lindsay and I had a great time with Lauren and were sad to see her leave, at one point I think we came close to convincing her to postpone med school and stay in OZ for a year. Linds and I were also gone by 6 am because we had to catch a bus to Mt. Molloy where we would be wwoofing for the next week. Hopefully we will have a similar experience to the last time we wwoofed.
Cheers,
Laura
The crocodile cruise was interesting for the first 10 minutes and the first couple of crocs we saw were exciting, but being from Florida and having seeing countless numbers of alligators it wasn't really that thrilling. After the cruise we were back on the bus and headed up to the rainforest, weed stopped for about a twenty minute walk where we were looking for the endangered Cassowary (a giant flightless bird), we didn't find one but the walk was still beautiful. We arrived at our hostel around 1 pm, it was also called the Beach House but was much nicer than where we stayed in Cairns. We stayed in little cabins, our room was a six person share, it was pretty rustic but still nice. We headed over to the restaurant for some lunch and were a little disappointed because everything was really expensive and we didn't bring any of our own food and there wasn't really anywhere nearby to buy groceries. We would only be there for a couple of days so we figured it wouldn't be too damaging to splurge on food a bit. After lunch we walked down to the beach which was literally a 30 sec walk. The beach was absolutely beautiful, it is one of the only places in the world where World Heritage rainforest meets the Great Barrier reef. The beach was almost completely deserted, and to make it even better its surrounded by cloudy rainforest mountains. I was happy to sit in the sun and read my book for hours. We didn't go in the water because there were warning signs about crocs. They said we could go in the water as long as you can see in the water so you know if something is coming for you, but I decided I wouldn't take my chances. Lindsay and I went on a very long walk down the beach and on the way we found (or rather she found us) the most lovely dog. She was an extremely friend and huge Great Dane that we named pony. Lauren was taking a nap when Linds and I left for the walk, she woke up looking for us and saw two people that looked like us down the beach but these people had a giant dog so she figured it couldn't be us, but it was and Lauren was happy to meet our new friend Pony.
After meeting up with Lauren we decided we might as well walk down the beach in the other direction towards a small convenient store at another hostel that we had seen when we dropped people off the bus earlier that day. It turned out to be a pretty long walk, probably about 5 miles to get there. Five miles isn't really that far but we also had to walk back and it was starting to get late in the afternoon. The little grocery store was also WAY over price, but I suppose supply is extremely low in the rainforest so they can get away which charging exorbant prices. We just bought food for breakfast basically and then headed on back to our hostel. We decided to walk down the road instead of along the beach because it would be more direct and quicker, the walk was still pretty though because it is in the rainforest. After about 20 mins of walking back my feet were starting to kill me because I was wearing flip flops, but then we saw a sign that said "Beach House Keep Out", we figured this must be the Beach House we are staying in, how many beach houses can there be in a 5 km stretch, we also figured it said keep out because it was prob the service entrance. We walked down this really long road and as we got down it we started to notice it looked more like a junk yard than our accommodation, then we saw a really ramshackled looking house, then we saw and heard the three very angry looking guard dogs running out of the house at us not on chains. Our first instinct was to run, so that made there instinct be to chase us. We turned to face them and slowly walked backwards and they backed off, but it was terrifying and we thought we would be attacked by dogs on this really scary property that looked like it could be in a horror movie. After we got back on the road it was only another ten minutes back to the "real" Beach House. By the time we got back it was already evening so we showered and ate at the restaurant which turned out to be one of the best places we have eaten the entire time we have been in Australia. Lauren finally got to have Kangaroo and it was delicious, it pretty much tastes like steak. We again were in bed an asleep by 9 pm.
The next day we went on an exotic fruit tasting at a farm a couple of minutes from our hostel. This was so much fun and we of course loved it because we all love food. We tried ten different fruits and they were all delicious. One of my favorites was the custard apple, and I also really liked the sapotes. Unfortunately a lot of the fruits we tried aren't sold commercially, because either they are really ugly, they don't ship well, or they are ugly AND don't ship well. After we got back to our hostel we spent the rest of the afternoon sharing a beer and playing boggle, it was a great way to end a very relaxing day, and again we were in bed nice and early, but this night we had a surprise visitor in the middle of night. Around 1 am we are all awaken by Lindsay standing on the opposite side of the room to her bed freaking out about the GIANT rat that is by her bed. We turn on the light and sure enough sitting on her purse is a rodent, but it's just a mouse although I give it to her it was large. At first we are all staring at it quite confused because we can't figure out why the mouse is eating her purse, but then we realize he isn't eating her purse he is eating the banana she accidentally left in her purse. He chewed a pretty decent size hole in her bag which will probably serve as a nice reminder to her the next time she is in the wilderness to not bring in any food. Lauren was the lucky one who got to share her twin size bed with Lindsay because she had the top bunk which was furthest from the mouse.
The next day we left Cape Tribulation, I had a great relaxing time but I think Lindsay especially was eager to get back to civilization where there aren't mice etc. Our shuttle on the way back only had 12 people so we had plenty of room and our bus driver was really nice. We stopped at Mossman Gorge to go for a swim but the water was freezing so I actually didn't go in and then we stopped in Port Douglas which is a really pretty and quite fancy resort town. We arrived back at our hostel around 6:30 and were extremely rushed because we had to take a 7:00 bus into Cairns for our "Ultimate Party" pub crawl. We probably wouldn't have sought this out on our own but it was included in our package and dinner was included. We also had the best free dinner we have had so far, and it turned out to be a really fun night. There were also two Danish boys that Lindsay and I had met in Noosa that were on the pub crawl with us, so it was really fun to randomly run into friends we thought we would never see again.
We finally let ourselves sleep in, and then walked over to the lagoon to spend the afternoon. It was Lauren's "last night" in Australia so we decided we should go out for a nice dinner and have a fun night out together. We ate a Thai restaurant on the pier which I thought was delicious, I had a spicy green curry (which was really spicy) Lauren was supposed to have the mild green curry, but it was pretty much as spicy as mine and she didn't really enjoy eating it. We had another very fun night out in Cairns and then headed back because Lauren had to catch a very early bus to the airport for her 6:20 am flight. Unfortunately she woke up at 6:30 and realized her "flight" had already left. She packed up everything an headed over to the airport anyways to see if there were any other flights she could get on that day, but when she got to the airport she learned her flight wasn't even that day, it was the next day. She was so lucky!!! and we got to spend another day with Lauren. For our last night we checked out of the beach house and stayed at a really nice hostel called Gilligans which was pretty fancy as far as hostels go. This time Lauren didn't over sleep and got on her real flight no problem. .Lindsay and I had a great time with Lauren and were sad to see her leave, at one point I think we came close to convincing her to postpone med school and stay in OZ for a year. Linds and I were also gone by 6 am because we had to catch a bus to Mt. Molloy where we would be wwoofing for the next week. Hopefully we will have a similar experience to the last time we wwoofed.
Cheers,
Laura
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Finding Nemo
We arrived in Cairns about 10 am after a bit of drama in the Gold Coast airport which ended in Lauren having to pay an additional $80 for her bag, but that was behind us and we were looking forward to an eventful week in Cairns. We arrived at the Beach House (the hostel we were staying at) and were greeted by the worst receptionists I have ever encounter, not only was the service bad at this hostel but it was also a 20 minute walk to the town center, if you ever in cairns DO NOT stay here. We dropped off our bags and went to grab a bite for lunch as our room was not ready yet. We had a delicious cheap lunch of fresh fish and chips. Around one pm we got to check into our room, which wasn't very nice and extremely hot, but we were grateful to have a four share all to ourselves. Needless to say we didn't spend long in our room and headed off to the lagoon, which we had heard from other travelers was where everyone hung out during the day. We were a bit confused how people could swim in the lagoon because you can't go in the beaches there because there are crocodiles. We soon (after a 20 min walk) learned that people can swim in the lagoon because it is not a lagoon at all but rather a chlorinated pool surrounded by grass. Regardless we still had an enjoyable afternoon lounging by the "lagoon" and reading. We headed back to our hostel to get changed for dinner, which was included in our travel package while in Cairns. You would think that by now after constantly being disspaointed by things that are free I would have lower expectations, but once again I was dissapointed by the gelatin consistency of my free curry. That was the first and last time we took advantage of our free meal. Cairns is notorious for being a party spot for backpackers, but we had a low key evening and were in bed early because the next day we were going out to the Great Barrier Reef to dive.
For our dive we had to be at the pier at 7 am so we were up bright and early, but we were all pretty excited. We went out to the reef with the company Passions of Paradise and I strongly reccommend this company to anyone looking to spend the day on the reef. There were only about 50 passangers on board (some boats take 200) and the day included a great lunch buffet. Lindsay and Lauren aren't dive certified but Passions offers an introductory dive to non divers so they had the opportunity to have the dive experience on the reef. I actually can't believe they can legally do this. I was shocked that on the entire boat only three of the passangers including myself were dive certified, but I was actually really glad because there were only four people total (including the dive master) that went out with my group. We had brand new equipment that was only a week old and they gave us wet suilts, unfortunately only shorty suits and I ofcourse got stung on my arms and legs where I had exposed skin. We got to do to different dives at tw o different sights and both were breathtaking and unbelievable. My group of the certified divers got taken from the large boat where everyone was diving and snorkeling to a separate location in a little motor boat, and the entire time we were under the water we didn't see another person. What I found to be the most spectacular part of diving on the GB reef were the huge coral shelfs, I just haven't seen this diving in Florida. On the first dive we swam through cave like crevases in the coral and saw a sea turtle, the first dive was about 40 mins then it was back on the boat for lunch and to travel to our next dive location. I was happy to reunite with Lindsay and Lauren and so happy they had a good experience diving, even so much that I think they are considering getting certified. Lauren decided that she would do a second dive but Lindsay was happy snorkel the reef and take some photos. The part of the reef we were on was shallow enough that Lindsay could pretty much see everything without having to swim deep at all. The second location we went to was pretty cool because the boat we were on has special liscence to dive there so there was not a single other boat in sight. On the second dive I got to see a sting ray which was one of the things I was hoping to see. I didn't see a shark and believe it or not I was kind of hoping I would. Back on the boat on the way back to Cairns we saw another sea turtle and a dolphin.
I don't remember what we did for dinner that night, but we did get dressed to go out for the night but all ended up falling asleep by 10 pm which honestly was for the better since we had to catch a shuttle to Cape Tribulation (the rainforest) at 7:30 am. Cairns was surprisingly a much nicer city than I had anticipated and I am actually looking forward to the two nights we will spending there when we get back from the Cape.
Cheers,
Laura
For our dive we had to be at the pier at 7 am so we were up bright and early, but we were all pretty excited. We went out to the reef with the company Passions of Paradise and I strongly reccommend this company to anyone looking to spend the day on the reef. There were only about 50 passangers on board (some boats take 200) and the day included a great lunch buffet. Lindsay and Lauren aren't dive certified but Passions offers an introductory dive to non divers so they had the opportunity to have the dive experience on the reef. I actually can't believe they can legally do this. I was shocked that on the entire boat only three of the passangers including myself were dive certified, but I was actually really glad because there were only four people total (including the dive master) that went out with my group. We had brand new equipment that was only a week old and they gave us wet suilts, unfortunately only shorty suits and I ofcourse got stung on my arms and legs where I had exposed skin. We got to do to different dives at tw o different sights and both were breathtaking and unbelievable. My group of the certified divers got taken from the large boat where everyone was diving and snorkeling to a separate location in a little motor boat, and the entire time we were under the water we didn't see another person. What I found to be the most spectacular part of diving on the GB reef were the huge coral shelfs, I just haven't seen this diving in Florida. On the first dive we swam through cave like crevases in the coral and saw a sea turtle, the first dive was about 40 mins then it was back on the boat for lunch and to travel to our next dive location. I was happy to reunite with Lindsay and Lauren and so happy they had a good experience diving, even so much that I think they are considering getting certified. Lauren decided that she would do a second dive but Lindsay was happy snorkel the reef and take some photos. The part of the reef we were on was shallow enough that Lindsay could pretty much see everything without having to swim deep at all. The second location we went to was pretty cool because the boat we were on has special liscence to dive there so there was not a single other boat in sight. On the second dive I got to see a sting ray which was one of the things I was hoping to see. I didn't see a shark and believe it or not I was kind of hoping I would. Back on the boat on the way back to Cairns we saw another sea turtle and a dolphin.
I don't remember what we did for dinner that night, but we did get dressed to go out for the night but all ended up falling asleep by 10 pm which honestly was for the better since we had to catch a shuttle to Cape Tribulation (the rainforest) at 7:30 am. Cairns was surprisingly a much nicer city than I had anticipated and I am actually looking forward to the two nights we will spending there when we get back from the Cape.
Cheers,
Laura
Friday, July 31, 2009
The Lazy Blogger?
Well "lazy" may not actually be an appropriate description of myself over the past 2 weeks since I last blogged. Perhaps stuck in the Australian bush with no Internet or phone reception would be more apt. If you can't tell from the last sentence Lindsay and I were wwoofing again. It was still a great experience, but I suppose when your first taste of something is paradise the bar is set a little high. I will definitely get into more detail about our new wwoof place, but we did heaps more in the weeks leading up to it.
After departing Sandra's (where we were wwoofing) we headed off to the Gold Coast to meet Lauren (our friend from Florida who was traveling in Thailand). We met up with her in Surfers Paradise, to sum up Surfers Paradise lonely planet describes it as..."If Surfers Paradise were a celebrity it would be Paris Hilton" basically pretty flashy and trashy, but we still had a great time. We stayed in a hostel there but we booked into a two bedroom self contained apartment so we were pretty separate from the rest of the hostel. It was nice to be able to spread out and especially nice to cook some of our won meals. While in Surfers Lauren and I took a day trip to a koala sanctuary; Lindsay didn't join us because she was feeling a bit under the weather and Im sorry to say she really missed out. Lauren was dead set on holding a koala and having her picture taken with it so that was the first thing we did. The koalas were ADORABLE and I found them to be surprisingly soft. I didn't get to hold one because as a budget backpacker I just didn't feel the need to pay to cuddle a koala but I was happy just to give it a pat. The wildlife sanctuary also had a lot more than just koalas they had pretty much all your staple Australian wildlife. After the koalas we went on to feed the kangaroos. It was so much fun to get to walk around and pet the kangaroos and feed them, but these were the laziest animals you could possibly imagine. Most of them were just lounging in the sun and would barely lift their heads to eat out of your hand. While at the sanctuary we also saw an aboriginal dance show, honestly I was not impressed, but Lauren was quite amazed and I did enjoy the didgeridoo part of the performance. We also made it to the 5 pm lorikeet feeding. We weren't sure what this was and for a bit were considering not even going, but I am so glad we did and would say it was the highlight of the day. At the lorikeet feeding everyone got a metal plate that was basically filled with sugar water plus some minerals, and the birds love it, there were literally hundreds of lorikeets that flew in for the feeding. I think at one point I probably had 10 birds on me at one point. It was so cool, but there claws actually really hurt and Im sure you can imagine the amount of waste produced by that many birds so inevitably some of it ended up on my clothes and in my hair, but it was still worth it. That was pretty much the highlight of Surfers Paradise and after a week in the Gold Coast we were on our way up to Cairns to dive the Great Barrier Reef and go to the rainforest.
As a side note, we also so Bruno while in the Gold Coast, it was hilarious but very crude so be warned if you plan on seeing it.
Cheers and sorry for the delay,
Laura
After departing Sandra's (where we were wwoofing) we headed off to the Gold Coast to meet Lauren (our friend from Florida who was traveling in Thailand). We met up with her in Surfers Paradise, to sum up Surfers Paradise lonely planet describes it as..."If Surfers Paradise were a celebrity it would be Paris Hilton" basically pretty flashy and trashy, but we still had a great time. We stayed in a hostel there but we booked into a two bedroom self contained apartment so we were pretty separate from the rest of the hostel. It was nice to be able to spread out and especially nice to cook some of our won meals. While in Surfers Lauren and I took a day trip to a koala sanctuary; Lindsay didn't join us because she was feeling a bit under the weather and Im sorry to say she really missed out. Lauren was dead set on holding a koala and having her picture taken with it so that was the first thing we did. The koalas were ADORABLE and I found them to be surprisingly soft. I didn't get to hold one because as a budget backpacker I just didn't feel the need to pay to cuddle a koala but I was happy just to give it a pat. The wildlife sanctuary also had a lot more than just koalas they had pretty much all your staple Australian wildlife. After the koalas we went on to feed the kangaroos. It was so much fun to get to walk around and pet the kangaroos and feed them, but these were the laziest animals you could possibly imagine. Most of them were just lounging in the sun and would barely lift their heads to eat out of your hand. While at the sanctuary we also saw an aboriginal dance show, honestly I was not impressed, but Lauren was quite amazed and I did enjoy the didgeridoo part of the performance. We also made it to the 5 pm lorikeet feeding. We weren't sure what this was and for a bit were considering not even going, but I am so glad we did and would say it was the highlight of the day. At the lorikeet feeding everyone got a metal plate that was basically filled with sugar water plus some minerals, and the birds love it, there were literally hundreds of lorikeets that flew in for the feeding. I think at one point I probably had 10 birds on me at one point. It was so cool, but there claws actually really hurt and Im sure you can imagine the amount of waste produced by that many birds so inevitably some of it ended up on my clothes and in my hair, but it was still worth it. That was pretty much the highlight of Surfers Paradise and after a week in the Gold Coast we were on our way up to Cairns to dive the Great Barrier Reef and go to the rainforest.
As a side note, we also so Bruno while in the Gold Coast, it was hilarious but very crude so be warned if you plan on seeing it.
Cheers and sorry for the delay,
Laura
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
A Weeks worth of WWOOFing
So Lindsay and I have been in Cooroy Woofing for just over a week now and we are having a fantastic time. If you have looked at Lindsay's latest facebook album than you know that in my previous blog when I said this place was paradise I wasn't kidding. We have done such an array of activities here so I will try to recap as many as I can, but I will most likely forget some.
A typical day for us here on the farm starts out around 8 am. Lindsay and I have the same breakfast in our cottage every morning and I am not complaining. We make a pot of chai tea, and have toast with peanut butter, honey from the bees here, and sliced banana, also from the farm. We usually start the morning with some weeding or the furniture refurbishment project we have been working. After about 2 hrs of work or 2.5 hrs we come in for morning tea. Morning tea is a great part of the day; we make fresh squeezed orange juice and enjoy an assortment of locally baked treats. After about a half hour break we get back to work until lunch. The next couple of hours of work can be anything from mulching to clearing or my favorite the poo run.
The day we went on a poo run was surprisingly one of the most fun. Sandra called us one morning while we were down at our cottage working on the furniture and said "girls we will pick you up in the truck shortly we are going on a poo run". Lindsay and I didn't really know what this entailed, but we could gather from the title that it would involve collecting manure somehow. Well, the truck pulled up, with a large trailer attached, and Lindsay and I hopped in the bed of the truck for this new adventure. Btw riding in the bakc of the truck was really fun. We drove to a large field on their property where cattle graze and from the looks of some of the poo we saw also horses. Once out in the field we hopped out with buckets and spades and started scooping up fresh looking paddies. We had a lot of fun thinking of all the different poo puns, and our host Sandra had some pretty good ones. I won't write them all here because Lindsay will definitely put them in a facebook album. It took about an hour with four of us working to fill the the trailer of the truck. One the way back to the house we also stopped to throw some fresh cut hay into the back of the trailer. By the time we got back to the house we had already worked about three hours between the work on the furniture and the poo. We had a delicious lunch as usual on the veranda and then it was back to work for us. We weeded for an hour and Lindsay and I were both starting to feel a little tired, we had already been here for about 4 days working, and picking poo is much more labour intensive than it sounds. We had hoped the weeding would be the end of our work for the day, but we were wrong we still had two hours of mulching ahead of us. This was probably the hardest day we had on the farm so far, but it was also a really fun day, and I think Rob (Sandra's son) told his dad how hard we working because he guilted Sandra into letting us sleep in the next day.
Lindsay and I have done some other really fun projects here; for example we planted an herb garden with lemon grass, coriander, parsley etc, we chopped down some yuka trees and dug out their roots, and we picked citrus. Oh and we also had the job of feeding the colt in the morning before Ken (Sandra's husband) came back from mustering cattle out west. We lost the responsibility when on the morning Ken and Rob came back Lindsay and I went out to feed the colt as usual, but everything did not go as usual. We didn't know that there would be two new horses down near where the colt is kept and they were not in a paddock. The horses saw us an immediately associated us with food. We out smarted them and went around the shed (where the hay is kept), but then I had to carry the bail of hay through horse territory over to the colt's paddock. I decided the best method would be to run for it, Lindsay I also thought this would be the best method but she was running in the opposite direction away from the horses. The only problem with this method for me is that horses can also run and a hell of a lot faster than me. Luckily, I made it to the colt's paddock and threw the hay over the fence without the other horses getting any. It was a pretty funny start to the morning.
We have also been doing a lot of cooking and baking for the family while we are here. We prepared appetizers one night when they had some company. We made guacamole with pita chips, baked brie with raspberry jam wrapped in pastry dough, and bruchetta. Everyone was very impressed with our culinary skills. We also made Lindsay's spinach pie, an apple pie, and oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. As you can probably tell we eat a lot here and really well. The 5 hrs of work definitely does not balance out the copious amount of food I consume.
Sandra's family is so kind and we really feel lucky for this to have been our first Wwoof experience. They also have three really nice dogs which are fun to have around. One dog Bill was kicked in the head by a horse as a puppy and is a bit retarded now, Charlie his brother is really friendly and wants everyone to love him because he doesn't have a family member to be attached to, and Zach was really not too friendly to Lindsay and I in the beginning but he has warmed up and now walks us down to our cottage every night. We love being around a family, but it makes us both really miss our own families.
We are here for 4 for more days, and then we meet Lauren Cooper (a friend from home) in the Gold Coast which will be a blast. I'm sure we will have more adventures to write about before we leave.
Cheers,
Laura
P.S The second morning we were here there was a kangaroo about ten feet from our cottage. It was an exciting way to start the day.
A typical day for us here on the farm starts out around 8 am. Lindsay and I have the same breakfast in our cottage every morning and I am not complaining. We make a pot of chai tea, and have toast with peanut butter, honey from the bees here, and sliced banana, also from the farm. We usually start the morning with some weeding or the furniture refurbishment project we have been working. After about 2 hrs of work or 2.5 hrs we come in for morning tea. Morning tea is a great part of the day; we make fresh squeezed orange juice and enjoy an assortment of locally baked treats. After about a half hour break we get back to work until lunch. The next couple of hours of work can be anything from mulching to clearing or my favorite the poo run.
The day we went on a poo run was surprisingly one of the most fun. Sandra called us one morning while we were down at our cottage working on the furniture and said "girls we will pick you up in the truck shortly we are going on a poo run". Lindsay and I didn't really know what this entailed, but we could gather from the title that it would involve collecting manure somehow. Well, the truck pulled up, with a large trailer attached, and Lindsay and I hopped in the bed of the truck for this new adventure. Btw riding in the bakc of the truck was really fun. We drove to a large field on their property where cattle graze and from the looks of some of the poo we saw also horses. Once out in the field we hopped out with buckets and spades and started scooping up fresh looking paddies. We had a lot of fun thinking of all the different poo puns, and our host Sandra had some pretty good ones. I won't write them all here because Lindsay will definitely put them in a facebook album. It took about an hour with four of us working to fill the the trailer of the truck. One the way back to the house we also stopped to throw some fresh cut hay into the back of the trailer. By the time we got back to the house we had already worked about three hours between the work on the furniture and the poo. We had a delicious lunch as usual on the veranda and then it was back to work for us. We weeded for an hour and Lindsay and I were both starting to feel a little tired, we had already been here for about 4 days working, and picking poo is much more labour intensive than it sounds. We had hoped the weeding would be the end of our work for the day, but we were wrong we still had two hours of mulching ahead of us. This was probably the hardest day we had on the farm so far, but it was also a really fun day, and I think Rob (Sandra's son) told his dad how hard we working because he guilted Sandra into letting us sleep in the next day.
Lindsay and I have done some other really fun projects here; for example we planted an herb garden with lemon grass, coriander, parsley etc, we chopped down some yuka trees and dug out their roots, and we picked citrus. Oh and we also had the job of feeding the colt in the morning before Ken (Sandra's husband) came back from mustering cattle out west. We lost the responsibility when on the morning Ken and Rob came back Lindsay and I went out to feed the colt as usual, but everything did not go as usual. We didn't know that there would be two new horses down near where the colt is kept and they were not in a paddock. The horses saw us an immediately associated us with food. We out smarted them and went around the shed (where the hay is kept), but then I had to carry the bail of hay through horse territory over to the colt's paddock. I decided the best method would be to run for it, Lindsay I also thought this would be the best method but she was running in the opposite direction away from the horses. The only problem with this method for me is that horses can also run and a hell of a lot faster than me. Luckily, I made it to the colt's paddock and threw the hay over the fence without the other horses getting any. It was a pretty funny start to the morning.
We have also been doing a lot of cooking and baking for the family while we are here. We prepared appetizers one night when they had some company. We made guacamole with pita chips, baked brie with raspberry jam wrapped in pastry dough, and bruchetta. Everyone was very impressed with our culinary skills. We also made Lindsay's spinach pie, an apple pie, and oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. As you can probably tell we eat a lot here and really well. The 5 hrs of work definitely does not balance out the copious amount of food I consume.
Sandra's family is so kind and we really feel lucky for this to have been our first Wwoof experience. They also have three really nice dogs which are fun to have around. One dog Bill was kicked in the head by a horse as a puppy and is a bit retarded now, Charlie his brother is really friendly and wants everyone to love him because he doesn't have a family member to be attached to, and Zach was really not too friendly to Lindsay and I in the beginning but he has warmed up and now walks us down to our cottage every night. We love being around a family, but it makes us both really miss our own families.
We are here for 4 for more days, and then we meet Lauren Cooper (a friend from home) in the Gold Coast which will be a blast. I'm sure we will have more adventures to write about before we leave.
Cheers,
Laura
P.S The second morning we were here there was a kangaroo about ten feet from our cottage. It was an exciting way to start the day.
Welcome to Paradise
For those of you who don't know WWOOF stands for Willing Workers On Organic Farms you work for 4-6 hrs a day in exchange for room and board, and this is one way Lindsay and I hope to travel around Australia and save some money, but also we hope to get away from the party scene of backpacking and hostels and meet some "real" Australians. We decided on the two weeks we first wanted to give WWOOFing a try, we emailed about 20 people and right away got an enthusiastic response from a woman named Sandra. The description of her property sounded wonderful, 157 acres with orchards and horses and landscaped gardens and the final line of her description read "come enjoy a little piece of our paradise". She also told me in the email that she has a swimming pool and that Lindsay and I would have our own "self contained cottage" which for all I know could have meant a shack, and her description sounded lovely but really anyone could write anything they wanted and a farm is still a farm right? WRONG a farm is not just a farm. The place we are having our first WWOOF experience actually is paradise!!
We arranged to meet Sandra (our WWOOF host) at the bus stop at 1:25 pm on June 30th. At 3 pm when she still wasn't there we began to fear that perhaps we had been stranded in the tiny town of Cooroy where we didn't know anyone and had nowhere to stay. A woman at the bus stop was really kind and after telling us WWOOF horror stories of people never getting picked up by their hosts she gave us her phone number and address and said we could stay with her if we needed to. Thankfully within 30 minutes Sandra arrived in a really nice SUV and she was also really nice which was quite a relief. It was about a ten minute drive from the bus stop to their property, we turned off the main road onto a long, steep, winding driveway. Along the driveway Sandra pointed out where they had done the rainforest reforestation, and where their horses graze. When we pulled up to the house I can honestly say I was completely blown away, their whole property is absolutely stunning!! Sandra drove Lindsay and I down to our cottage which certainly is not a shack. The cottage has a veranda that wraps around, a living room, bedroom, kitchen and bathroom. Once again Lindsay and I are sharing a double bed because Sandra thought Lindsay was a bloke and we were couple. To Lindsay's dismay we were also informed of the 10 ft python that lives at our cottage (for those of you that don't know Lindsay has a bit of a snake phobia).
After dropping our bags off at the cottage Lindsay and I had our first test as WWOOFers, carrying a large dining table from our cottage up to the main house. Our cottage is about 100 yards from the house and we had to carry it uphill mind you. We passed the test and got to enjoy fresh squeezed orange juice on the veranda that we actually squeezed from citrus that grows on the property. While sitting on the veranda drinking fresh squeezed orange juice and admiring the views of rolling hills, forests and a mountain I realized that I can probably never WWOOF again because it will never be this good.
As evening approached it became time to feed the colt (that's a baby horse for you city folk). As we were walking up to the paddock we actually saw two kangaroo grazing in a nearby field. This was our first kangaroo sighting in the wild and we were so excited, Sandra sent us to get our cameras and we were so worried they would be gone by the time we got back. We ran to get our cameras and when we were approaching again the kangaroos spotted us and froze, we were sure they were about to bolt, but they didn't hop away, they actually started boxing!!! I didn't know kangaroos really boxed, but I can assure they full on box and also kick a little.
It was such a perfect first impression of where we would be spending the next two weeks, and we finished the day off by helping Sandra make roast pumpkin soup for the next days lunch (with a pumpkin picked from the garden), we also incidentally got the reputation for burning onions, but we were able to redeem ourselves in the days to come. Dinner was a delicious spaghetti bologenese (sp) and we were in bed by ten pm because we had to be up and ready to work by 8 am. If it continues on like this I don't think I will ever want to leave.
Cheers,
Laura
We arranged to meet Sandra (our WWOOF host) at the bus stop at 1:25 pm on June 30th. At 3 pm when she still wasn't there we began to fear that perhaps we had been stranded in the tiny town of Cooroy where we didn't know anyone and had nowhere to stay. A woman at the bus stop was really kind and after telling us WWOOF horror stories of people never getting picked up by their hosts she gave us her phone number and address and said we could stay with her if we needed to. Thankfully within 30 minutes Sandra arrived in a really nice SUV and she was also really nice which was quite a relief. It was about a ten minute drive from the bus stop to their property, we turned off the main road onto a long, steep, winding driveway. Along the driveway Sandra pointed out where they had done the rainforest reforestation, and where their horses graze. When we pulled up to the house I can honestly say I was completely blown away, their whole property is absolutely stunning!! Sandra drove Lindsay and I down to our cottage which certainly is not a shack. The cottage has a veranda that wraps around, a living room, bedroom, kitchen and bathroom. Once again Lindsay and I are sharing a double bed because Sandra thought Lindsay was a bloke and we were couple. To Lindsay's dismay we were also informed of the 10 ft python that lives at our cottage (for those of you that don't know Lindsay has a bit of a snake phobia).
After dropping our bags off at the cottage Lindsay and I had our first test as WWOOFers, carrying a large dining table from our cottage up to the main house. Our cottage is about 100 yards from the house and we had to carry it uphill mind you. We passed the test and got to enjoy fresh squeezed orange juice on the veranda that we actually squeezed from citrus that grows on the property. While sitting on the veranda drinking fresh squeezed orange juice and admiring the views of rolling hills, forests and a mountain I realized that I can probably never WWOOF again because it will never be this good.
As evening approached it became time to feed the colt (that's a baby horse for you city folk). As we were walking up to the paddock we actually saw two kangaroo grazing in a nearby field. This was our first kangaroo sighting in the wild and we were so excited, Sandra sent us to get our cameras and we were so worried they would be gone by the time we got back. We ran to get our cameras and when we were approaching again the kangaroos spotted us and froze, we were sure they were about to bolt, but they didn't hop away, they actually started boxing!!! I didn't know kangaroos really boxed, but I can assure they full on box and also kick a little.
It was such a perfect first impression of where we would be spending the next two weeks, and we finished the day off by helping Sandra make roast pumpkin soup for the next days lunch (with a pumpkin picked from the garden), we also incidentally got the reputation for burning onions, but we were able to redeem ourselves in the days to come. Dinner was a delicious spaghetti bologenese (sp) and we were in bed by ten pm because we had to be up and ready to work by 8 am. If it continues on like this I don't think I will ever want to leave.
Cheers,
Laura
Monday, July 6, 2009
A Honeymoon in an Historic Queenslander
Noosa is only a short 25 minute bus ride from Mooloolaba, and it was great, we actually saw a giant bald eagle swoop right in front of the bus. We arrived in Noosa without any reservations for the week, as I mentioned in the last blog, so we stood at the bus station for about 5 minutes before I pulled out our ever so handy Lonely Planet guide (thanks Becky and Lisa). We had basically two options, we could try the cheaper traditional backpacker hostel we had been staying in or try for the "perpetually booked" (Lonely Planet's words) Halse Lodge, which is still technically a hostel. We went for the Halse Lodge and they convenientally had only one room open, which was a double room with one double bed. The women assured us that after two nights she could move us into a dorm where we wouldn't have to share a bed and I think she was a bit taken aback when we said we actually preferred to stay in a double. We were just looking forward to having our own room for a week. The Halse Lodge was beautiful, it's a huge old Queenslander house that has been converted into a hostel, set in two acres of rain forest, and a five minute walk from the beach, hence why we felt like we were on a honeymoon. Our room was on the second floor of the main house, and there were huge verandas with comfortable lounging chairs, and the halls and rooms all had hardwood. The only downside was no electrical outlets or bathrooms in the bedrooms, but what this hostel was lacking in conveniences it up for in charm, plus the bed was finally comfortable. The property was also filled with at least a dozen different species of birds ranging from mag-pies to parrots, this was great for the most part except that they seemed to live outside our window and woke up about three hours earlier than Lindsay and me.
On our second day in Noosa Lindsay and I decided to go for a walk in the National park just down the road. We had read that koalas can sometimes be spotted in the park, but we didn't expect to see one within the first minute of entering the park. Right at the entrance there was a koala sitting up in the tree. We were so excited it was our first koala spotting in the wild. We took tons of pictures and stood there staring at it for ten minutes even though it really didn't move at all. The walk through the park was beautiful, we walked up a ridge that overlooked the ocean the entire way.
While in Noosa Lindsay and I cooked almost all of our own meals despite the fact that the kitchen was disgusting. The kitchen was pretty small and with he entire hostel using it I suppose it was inevitable that it would be as such, I was mainly grossed out that people were walking around the kitchen barefoot.
We went to the beach pretty much every day in Noosa. We had the intention of surfing while there, but on the day we borrowed surfboards the water was literally as flat as a lake and freezing. We also kayaked along the Noosa river one afternoon, we got out of our kayak on a sandy little island and waded through the water, of course we later found out that the river is where bull sharks breed. I suppose considering bull sharks are extremely aggressive it was fortunate that Lindsay and I are both too big of wusses to have gone any deeper.
I am embarrassed to say that while in Noosa Lindsay and I also went to see the new Hannah Montana movie and I am more embarrassed to say that we LOVED it.
Noosa was so beautiful, the National Park was gorgeous, the beaches lovely (even though I hear they were destroyed in a cyclone), Hastings street was great for strolling and it looked like there were tons of fabulous restaurants (regrettably fabulous restaurants are definitely not in our budget).
On our second day in Noosa Lindsay and I decided to go for a walk in the National park just down the road. We had read that koalas can sometimes be spotted in the park, but we didn't expect to see one within the first minute of entering the park. Right at the entrance there was a koala sitting up in the tree. We were so excited it was our first koala spotting in the wild. We took tons of pictures and stood there staring at it for ten minutes even though it really didn't move at all. The walk through the park was beautiful, we walked up a ridge that overlooked the ocean the entire way.
While in Noosa Lindsay and I cooked almost all of our own meals despite the fact that the kitchen was disgusting. The kitchen was pretty small and with he entire hostel using it I suppose it was inevitable that it would be as such, I was mainly grossed out that people were walking around the kitchen barefoot.
We went to the beach pretty much every day in Noosa. We had the intention of surfing while there, but on the day we borrowed surfboards the water was literally as flat as a lake and freezing. We also kayaked along the Noosa river one afternoon, we got out of our kayak on a sandy little island and waded through the water, of course we later found out that the river is where bull sharks breed. I suppose considering bull sharks are extremely aggressive it was fortunate that Lindsay and I are both too big of wusses to have gone any deeper.
I am embarrassed to say that while in Noosa Lindsay and I also went to see the new Hannah Montana movie and I am more embarrassed to say that we LOVED it.
Noosa was so beautiful, the National Park was gorgeous, the beaches lovely (even though I hear they were destroyed in a cyclone), Hastings street was great for strolling and it looked like there were tons of fabulous restaurants (regrettably fabulous restaurants are definitely not in our budget).
There's a reason when you mention Mooloolaba most people havnen't heard of it
So we took about a 2 hr bus ride from Brisbane to get to Mooloolaba. The bus stop was literally across the street from our hostel which was convenient. This hostel was extremely different from our hostel in Brisbane. In Brisbane the staff all wore uniforms, there were security cameras everywhere, and the rules were posted everywhere. Here there was no way to tell the staff apart from the backpackers, and we later found most of the staff were backpackers staying in the hostel, most of them came for a weekend and ended up staying weeks. This hostel seemed to really cater to surfers who are drawn to the famous Maroochy beaches. There were wetsuits hanging from all the balconies and over tanned shirtless men everywhere. Our room was very small with two bunk beds and some of the most uncomfortable mattresses imaginable, it was freezing at night and we didn't have any blankets in addition I thought there was a faint smell of urine to the room, but Lindsay didn't notice.
Lindsay and I walked down to the beach as soon as we arrived. Mooloolaba is an extremely cute little beach town with tons of restaurants and cafes right along the beach. The beach was only about a ten minute walk from our hostel which was really nice. The beach was gorgeous with views of the mountains to the North and large rocks jutting into the water that we could walk on. There are also terrifying shells that are wedged under large rocks that look identical to coiled snakes (Lindsay has a picture in her facebook album). After getting back from the beach we picked up a $5 pizza from dominoes to split, while eating it we met a very odd Dutch boy who insisted we play ping pong, not with him but against each other (we did not). We were in bed and sound asleep by 9 pm, but freezing, while the party raged on outside.
The next morning we got up early because we were supposed to go on a tour of the glass house mountains, but we were the only two signed up so it didn't happen. We also got to try Vegemite on toast for breakfast; Vegemite is not at all what I had imagined, first we didn't know that it is supposed to spread VERY thinly on toast, so I was quite surprised when what I expected to taste like a peanut butter substitute actually tasted the way I would imagine congealed gasoline to taste. Anyways not the best start to the morning but the hostel "staff" was very nice and offered to take us surfing instead of the Glass House Mountains tour. A group of six of us went to a beach about a ten minute drive away. No one in the group was an experienced surfer, the water was freezing, we didn't have wetsuits, it was an unguarded beach, and there were 15 ft waves. Lindsay and I decided theses were not the ideal conditions for us to try our hands at surfing.
Lindsay and I actually had a great time in Mooloolaba; we discovered there was free wifi at McDonald's, enjoyed the beaches, and had some delicious meals (see Lindsy's album for a picture of Pumpkin Pizza). Well we are off to Noosa next which is a bit more of a resort town, we don't have anywhere to stay yet but I hear there are heaps of 5 star hotels if we can't get into a hostel. jk. But really we are hoping for hostel vacancies.
Cheers,
Laura
Lindsay and I walked down to the beach as soon as we arrived. Mooloolaba is an extremely cute little beach town with tons of restaurants and cafes right along the beach. The beach was only about a ten minute walk from our hostel which was really nice. The beach was gorgeous with views of the mountains to the North and large rocks jutting into the water that we could walk on. There are also terrifying shells that are wedged under large rocks that look identical to coiled snakes (Lindsay has a picture in her facebook album). After getting back from the beach we picked up a $5 pizza from dominoes to split, while eating it we met a very odd Dutch boy who insisted we play ping pong, not with him but against each other (we did not). We were in bed and sound asleep by 9 pm, but freezing, while the party raged on outside.
The next morning we got up early because we were supposed to go on a tour of the glass house mountains, but we were the only two signed up so it didn't happen. We also got to try Vegemite on toast for breakfast; Vegemite is not at all what I had imagined, first we didn't know that it is supposed to spread VERY thinly on toast, so I was quite surprised when what I expected to taste like a peanut butter substitute actually tasted the way I would imagine congealed gasoline to taste. Anyways not the best start to the morning but the hostel "staff" was very nice and offered to take us surfing instead of the Glass House Mountains tour. A group of six of us went to a beach about a ten minute drive away. No one in the group was an experienced surfer, the water was freezing, we didn't have wetsuits, it was an unguarded beach, and there were 15 ft waves. Lindsay and I decided theses were not the ideal conditions for us to try our hands at surfing.
Lindsay and I actually had a great time in Mooloolaba; we discovered there was free wifi at McDonald's, enjoyed the beaches, and had some delicious meals (see Lindsy's album for a picture of Pumpkin Pizza). Well we are off to Noosa next which is a bit more of a resort town, we don't have anywhere to stay yet but I hear there are heaps of 5 star hotels if we can't get into a hostel. jk. But really we are hoping for hostel vacancies.
Cheers,
Laura
Thursday, July 2, 2009
Bunking in Brissie
Lindsay and I arrived at our hostel in Brisbane around 7 am in the morning. Our room was obviously not ready at this hour but we enjoyed a dip in the spa and some complimentary Internet time while we waited. We met with Josh (the hostel's resident travel expert) around ten to provide us with some information about trips we may be interested in taking while visiting Australia. Little did we know we would be spending $800 and booking a months worth of travel, excursions and lodging. At the end of the hour with Josh we had booked ourselves a trip to Mooloolaba with accommodation, a trip to Hervey Bay and Fraser Island (the largest all sand Island in the world) which includes 4 nights accommodation, our trip to Cairns including our dive, hostel and some meals, our trip to Cape Tribulation (the rain forest), as well as 3,000 km worth of travel on the Grey Hound bus. After the shock of spending about 1/3 of all the money I have to travel for the next couple of months I was settled by two thoughts: first, these were the main excursions we had planned to take anyways and the price we got them at seemed like good deals, and second, we would be having to do a lot of Wwoofing.
We spent the rest of the day wondering around the city taking care of some business such as going to the bank and buying a cell phone. Our hostel was in the Valley which is right near China town where we enjoyed a light and cheap lunch by splitting pad Thai. We headed back to the hostel for an afternoon snooze, but had plans to "go out" that night as we were informed the best way to avoid jet lag is to drink the night you arrive in Australia.
After waking up from our naps we headed downstairs for $3 steaks, salad and chips. A word of advice, Never Eat a $3 steak (which is actually like $2.50 US), it was pretty bad, hard to cut, hard to chew, and hard to taste, but I don't know why we were expecting more of a $3 hostel steak. After dinner we went back upstairs and met our bunk mates for the night. They were three very friends English girls all about 22 or 23. They introduced us to Passion Pop, which again I wouldn't really recommend unless you find yourselves backpacking Australia, it's a $5 bottle of very sweet sparkling wine and tastes as such. We spent the evening in the bar called Birdie Num Num. Everyone in Australia is so nice and friendly, even though most people we have at our hostel are not Australian.
Day 2 Brisbane
The second day in Brisbane we had really nice weather, it was a bit cool but sunny. We walked down to South Bank which is a really pretty man made beach along the river with shops and restaurants. We split a burger and chips (fries) for lunch from a vendor along South Bank and the women working there was the first mean Australian we met. She yelled at us for taking ketchup packets, apparently they are 30 cents each, and then yelled at me when I tried to pay her for them and our burger tasted like meatloaf. We walked back along the pedestrian bridge that crosses the river and through the botanical garden. I love that Brisbane has a lot of parks and green space. We stopped in a supermarket to buy food for dinner and lunch the next day, no more meatloaf burgers for me.
Day 3, 4 and 5? (all kind of a blur it was two weeks ago)
Unfortunately, the next couple days we were in Brisbane it was both pretty cool and rainy, but we still managed to get out and do things and not sit in the hostel drinking from 5 pm onward, which seems to be a backpacker trend. On Sunday night we went to a venue called Powerhouse that has free music and comedy shows every Sunday. Powerhouse was a really amazing space; it's kind of like a huge remodeled warehouse on the inside, boasting tons of performance and rehearsal space. It's right on the river and has a delicious looking restaurant that was not in our backpacker's budget. To get there we took the City Cat, which is a pretty fast catamaran style motor boat (that might be a terribly false description), on the boat we had beautiful views of Brisbane and the Brisbane bridge all lit up. We just got to Powerhouse in time for the comedy portion of the event. One of the comedians was really funny, and we aren't sure if the other two were funny because we couldn't understand them. We came back to Powerhouse the next day to walk through the photography exhibit they had. I wish we had been in Brisbane longer because they had some really amazing dance shows coming. The only other noteworthy that happened in Brisbane was that two guys were placed in our all female dorm which I think was more awkward for them than it was for us. As last word of advice when Aussies (not from Brisbane) tell you "Brisbane is shit" don't believe them, from what I saw it's definitely worth a visit.
cheers,
Laura
We spent the rest of the day wondering around the city taking care of some business such as going to the bank and buying a cell phone. Our hostel was in the Valley which is right near China town where we enjoyed a light and cheap lunch by splitting pad Thai. We headed back to the hostel for an afternoon snooze, but had plans to "go out" that night as we were informed the best way to avoid jet lag is to drink the night you arrive in Australia.
After waking up from our naps we headed downstairs for $3 steaks, salad and chips. A word of advice, Never Eat a $3 steak (which is actually like $2.50 US), it was pretty bad, hard to cut, hard to chew, and hard to taste, but I don't know why we were expecting more of a $3 hostel steak. After dinner we went back upstairs and met our bunk mates for the night. They were three very friends English girls all about 22 or 23. They introduced us to Passion Pop, which again I wouldn't really recommend unless you find yourselves backpacking Australia, it's a $5 bottle of very sweet sparkling wine and tastes as such. We spent the evening in the bar called Birdie Num Num. Everyone in Australia is so nice and friendly, even though most people we have at our hostel are not Australian.
Day 2 Brisbane
The second day in Brisbane we had really nice weather, it was a bit cool but sunny. We walked down to South Bank which is a really pretty man made beach along the river with shops and restaurants. We split a burger and chips (fries) for lunch from a vendor along South Bank and the women working there was the first mean Australian we met. She yelled at us for taking ketchup packets, apparently they are 30 cents each, and then yelled at me when I tried to pay her for them and our burger tasted like meatloaf. We walked back along the pedestrian bridge that crosses the river and through the botanical garden. I love that Brisbane has a lot of parks and green space. We stopped in a supermarket to buy food for dinner and lunch the next day, no more meatloaf burgers for me.
Day 3, 4 and 5? (all kind of a blur it was two weeks ago)
Unfortunately, the next couple days we were in Brisbane it was both pretty cool and rainy, but we still managed to get out and do things and not sit in the hostel drinking from 5 pm onward, which seems to be a backpacker trend. On Sunday night we went to a venue called Powerhouse that has free music and comedy shows every Sunday. Powerhouse was a really amazing space; it's kind of like a huge remodeled warehouse on the inside, boasting tons of performance and rehearsal space. It's right on the river and has a delicious looking restaurant that was not in our backpacker's budget. To get there we took the City Cat, which is a pretty fast catamaran style motor boat (that might be a terribly false description), on the boat we had beautiful views of Brisbane and the Brisbane bridge all lit up. We just got to Powerhouse in time for the comedy portion of the event. One of the comedians was really funny, and we aren't sure if the other two were funny because we couldn't understand them. We came back to Powerhouse the next day to walk through the photography exhibit they had. I wish we had been in Brisbane longer because they had some really amazing dance shows coming. The only other noteworthy that happened in Brisbane was that two guys were placed in our all female dorm which I think was more awkward for them than it was for us. As last word of advice when Aussies (not from Brisbane) tell you "Brisbane is shit" don't believe them, from what I saw it's definitely worth a visit.
cheers,
Laura
And 35 hrs Later...
So I know Lindsay and I have been in Australia for over a week and haven't blogged yet, so I am going to try to recap the last week. Please bear with the numerous simultaneous posts.
We left Fort Lauderdale really early on the morning of June 17. It was actually quite fortunate for us that it departed so early because since neither of us got much sleep the night before, partly out of excitement for our trip and the fact that we woke up at 4 am to leave, we both slept most of the flight. We arrived in LA around 10 am and we were so grateful Becky came to pick us up since our layover was 13 hrs long. She took us to Santa Monica where we enjoyed a delicious lunch of burritos and diet coke. On the way to the restaurant we had briefly walked through a farmers market, but didn't take the time to look around because we were starving, so we took the walk back to the car to browse the booths sampling fruit wherever possible. We bought a bunch of fresh mint, and pre flight mojitos suddenly seemed like a really good idea.
After Santa Monica we stopped by Venice Beach on the way back to Pasadena. It was really fun to see the outside gyms, graffiti and odd street vendors. The one I felt most inclined to buy from was selling magical wands, or rather nobby sticks with marbles glued to the end. The drive back to Pasadena from Venice Beach was awful, the parade for the Lakers was going on in down town LA that day so we were literally just stopped still in traffic on the free way.
After over an hour of sitting in traffic it was great to get to Franklins apartment where we could enjoy hot showers and mojitos before having to head back to the airport. We stopped at
"In and Out" (a burger joint only on the West Coast) to fully get the California experience.
Becky an Franklin were both so hospitable and having the opportunity to put on fresh clothes made the next leg of the flight not only more enjoyable for me, but probably for the woman sitting next to me as well.
Upon getting back to the airport ( a little later than planned) Lindsay and I learned that we were two of the last ten people to check in and there was no way they could sit us next together. We were sad and didn't want to spend the next 13 hrs sitting and sleeping next to strangers. But to our pleasant surprise when we asked at the gate they were not only able to sit us next
to each other, we were also seated in the bulk head, which means about an extra 6 inches of leg room. We also couldn't have asked for a better flight. I was asleep before the plane took off, woke up 9 hrs later, brushed my teeth, watched a movie, had a surprisingly delicious breakfast, and then we landed in Brisbane about 45 mins early. It was really simple getting from the airport into Brisbane. we took a short train ride and then had about a 5 min walk to our hostel.
We stayed at BUNK Brisbane and it was really nice. It had a pool, a hot tub, a bar in the hostel, en suite bathrooms in the rooms and the kitchen was relatively clean (which I would later learn is a luxury for a hostel). Our room was an eight person all female share, or so we thought... I will explain that later.
This is all for now, expect more soon.
Cheers,
Laura
We left Fort Lauderdale really early on the morning of June 17. It was actually quite fortunate for us that it departed so early because since neither of us got much sleep the night before, partly out of excitement for our trip and the fact that we woke up at 4 am to leave, we both slept most of the flight. We arrived in LA around 10 am and we were so grateful Becky came to pick us up since our layover was 13 hrs long. She took us to Santa Monica where we enjoyed a delicious lunch of burritos and diet coke. On the way to the restaurant we had briefly walked through a farmers market, but didn't take the time to look around because we were starving, so we took the walk back to the car to browse the booths sampling fruit wherever possible. We bought a bunch of fresh mint, and pre flight mojitos suddenly seemed like a really good idea.
After Santa Monica we stopped by Venice Beach on the way back to Pasadena. It was really fun to see the outside gyms, graffiti and odd street vendors. The one I felt most inclined to buy from was selling magical wands, or rather nobby sticks with marbles glued to the end. The drive back to Pasadena from Venice Beach was awful, the parade for the Lakers was going on in down town LA that day so we were literally just stopped still in traffic on the free way.
After over an hour of sitting in traffic it was great to get to Franklins apartment where we could enjoy hot showers and mojitos before having to head back to the airport. We stopped at
"In and Out" (a burger joint only on the West Coast) to fully get the California experience.
Becky an Franklin were both so hospitable and having the opportunity to put on fresh clothes made the next leg of the flight not only more enjoyable for me, but probably for the woman sitting next to me as well.
Upon getting back to the airport ( a little later than planned) Lindsay and I learned that we were two of the last ten people to check in and there was no way they could sit us next together. We were sad and didn't want to spend the next 13 hrs sitting and sleeping next to strangers. But to our pleasant surprise when we asked at the gate they were not only able to sit us next
to each other, we were also seated in the bulk head, which means about an extra 6 inches of leg room. We also couldn't have asked for a better flight. I was asleep before the plane took off, woke up 9 hrs later, brushed my teeth, watched a movie, had a surprisingly delicious breakfast, and then we landed in Brisbane about 45 mins early. It was really simple getting from the airport into Brisbane. we took a short train ride and then had about a 5 min walk to our hostel.
We stayed at BUNK Brisbane and it was really nice. It had a pool, a hot tub, a bar in the hostel, en suite bathrooms in the rooms and the kitchen was relatively clean (which I would later learn is a luxury for a hostel). Our room was an eight person all female share, or so we thought... I will explain that later.
This is all for now, expect more soon.
Cheers,
Laura
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