faith . . . down under: February 2007

So, I am home, and have been home, from my beautiful backpacking trip down the coast. Sorry it has taken me waaaaaayyyyy too long to update here but there's just sooo much I wanted to say. The trip didn't at all turn out as planned but that wasn't a bad thing at all. We (when I say we, I am myself and the other girl here from UNBSJ, Sarah) flew from Townsville down to Brisbane and had book 6 nights at a Hostel just outside the city in a place called Manly. The hostel - Moreton Bay Backpackers - was aboslutly wodnerful as far as hostels go. The staff were abosolutley wonderful and there was a nice little pub attached with great cheap food.
The day after we arrived in Manly it just so happened that the marina (2nd biggest in Australia apparently) has Wednesday rigattas in which many boats need extra people to add weight for the race so we got to go sailing for free. The boat we were on was absolutely beatiful, the big 55 foot sail boat and the people were sooo nice. So we spent the day jsut moving from side to side, eating crakers and cheese on the water. We ended up getting put on the same boat as two girls from Vancouver who were really really nice. They had been in Oz for a month and were just spending their last few days in Bris befor ethey headed to Thailand (ps: when they left, they gave Sarah adn I their VIP backpacker's card which equals more discounts, oh yea!!)
So, the next day, Sarah and I went into the city with another lady from our hostel, Emel. She was an older German engineer living in New Zealand who had taken a diving trip to Cairns but go trained out and came to Brisbane. So, when we got to the city, we asked where the best shopping area woudl be and they directed us to Queen St. Well, Queen St. defiantely did haev shopping, it was like one street closed off in the middle of hte business district of Brisbane with shops all down it and a mall on the sides. But by shops I mean New York style, Dolche&Gabana, 300$ pencil cases shoping. Yeah. So, needles to say, we window shopped plenty btu decided to look arpund further. We headed to the old botanical gardens and got a pivate 1.5 hr tour that was simply amazing. The gardens had some really neat African tree like sausage tree, and Bunya Pines, and lotus gardens. We saw a possum quite close in a little eye-level hollow in a eucalyptus (apparently, some eucalyptus are called widdow makers because the tend to just randomly drop a huge brank without warning or due cause, thus you don't ever really want to just sit under the big braches). So after that we headed to Southbank and hit up the streets beach (a beach-like pool along the river in the middle of the city) and then took the train back to Moreton Bay.
Next day, Sarah, Pete (a old guy from England who was finally takign a trip after his kids grew up) Emel and I took the fairy over to Moreton Island for the day. Soooooo beautiful. There is a nice wreck you could snorkel off and see lots of fish but it was windy and decided against swiming near sharp metal and walked a ways down the beach and just spent the day on the most beautiful white sand beach with no stingers and tourqoise waters just playign around. I took my snorkel out and saw soem big white fish and tons of smaller ones right in by shore. Oh yea, as we were walking down the beach to swim, we saw what looked like a shark in the shallows and as we took a closer look, we realized it was a ~3 foot skate that had just died recently. The park people drove up as we were investigating and pulled it out and saw that it had defiantely been speared in the head. Sucky, beacause someone was probably out spear fishing and thought it was a shark, not a harmless skate, and killed it, or just shot it for fun. Pointless. So, after a long day of sun. we headed back and hung out it the hostel for the evening.
The nect day we opted for just hanging around the hostel and check out the Manly pool. We headed down to the outside pool (verrrryy clean and nice) with Allison and Christine (girls form BC) adn just layed there for a while. After that we watched some movies with the other backpackers all evening. Oh yea, Allison and Christine had just come back form Fraser Island and Allison had been layign the sand one evening there and got ALOT of sandflea bites that just kept popping up but then one day she started getting really sick from it and had to go the chemist and they told her there was too much poison in her system and she went on medicene and got cream and such for the itch so their last few days in Oz were not the best. Right.

So, on Sunday, we had been planning on going to Australia Zoo (my life's dream) but we had a conversation and it turned out that we didn't go...yea. So then we opted to head to the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary. We took the hostel shuttle into the city adn asked how to best get to the sanctuary but then we heard someone say that the citycat (ferry that goes up and down the river) went all the wayt to lone pine adn that we could buy a general transport ticket that wuold cover all the buses we needed for 3.90 for the day. so, we walked to south bank and found the ferry terminal and then found out that the ferry didn't g to lone pine. soooo needless to say we were there, hot and tired, me dissapointed i wasn't at australia zoo and sarah sad not to be diving and we had a momentarty laspe where we almost decided to call it quits and go hoem to townsville. but on the way back to teh hostel, we by chance spotted teh city bus that DID go to lone pine and hopped on. The sancuary has hundred of koalas and many other beautiul aussie species and was a wonderful time. I got ot hold a koala, pet some kangoroos, see freshwater crocs, and cassowarys and - get this - a taipan (fierce snake!!!!)!!!! yup jus inches away from the worlds most venomous snake! sarah wasn't all that thrilled but it made my day. anyhow, it was great adn we ended up finding out that our day passes didn't actually cover that far a trip but they let it slide AND the train people upgraded it for us so we didnt haev to pay for the train either, so we eneded up getting a shuttle to the city, a ferry ride, 2 bus rides out of the city and the train ride home for $3.90.

So, the next morning we headed to the transit center and hopped a bus to teh Gold Coast at Surfer's Paradise and stayed at Surfer's Paradise Backpackers. It was a nice enough place right near the beach and was a must bigger hostel than Moreton Bay. We headed to the major shopping which was outlet stores (mainly surfshops, ie Billabong, Rip Curl etc.) which was really neat to browse and then got caught in heavy rain (much colder than Townsville rain) on the way home. Sarah still couldn't find dive trips so we then decided to just spend one night in Surfer's and head to Byron Bay the next day. Now, you must understand that Byron Bay was the one place that EVERYONE who has gone to Australia and knows what kinda of person I am has told me I MUST seee, so I had a pretty high expectation of this place before I went. And it totally met my expectations. I reaaaaaly loved Byron Bay and really hope to go back after classes. The first night there, we booked a room at a little backpackers that truthfully wasn't the greatest. There were only three bathrooms for like 30 girls on one wing and it just wasn't very close to Johnson St (the main drag) and not really my style. So, Sarah was tring to book a liveaboard for a few days so i decided to book another hostel i had seen advestised that I reallly liked the look of - The Arts Factory. Sarah didn't end up finding any diving that wasn't horrendously expensive so we decided to book a shared (ie 6-8 girls) room at the arts factory. So went and got picked up at the bus stop and by the time we foundour shuttle, I know we had made the right choice - the artsfactoryworker's shirts had VW vans on them. The guy who was our driver was sooo much nicer and gave us a little tour of the city and i spotted a sign for free bushtucker walks at the hostel that night, which was great becasue I have been asking everyone to tell me alllll they know about the native plants, animals etc.
When we went to check in, it turns out that there had been a problem with the booking and it hadn't gone through though I had our booking number (??). So, we were both thinking that they'd just send us away becasue the place was full up (almost EVERYWHERE, hotels, motels, hostels etc. were full, peak season i guess) bub instead, the guy gave us a private 2 bed hut at the 6-share price, which was a MAJOR deal as the shared were only ~30$/night while the huts were worth like 80$.night! Anyhow, we had to wait a few minutes while the hut was cleaned and while I was sitting in the common room reading, they were playing Ben Harper, and all my favs at that! SO we got our hut which consitsted of a little wagon-type tent with two comfy beds, that you have to walk across a bridge and some walkways to get arcoss a little creek/lake that was stained brown from all the tea trees that were around.
Sarah decided not to go on the bushtucker walk but I couldn't miss it. The guy who gave it is defiantely the real Crocodile Dundee, well at least Cockatoo Dundee. Before we started our wlak we all had to deorate oursleves with ochre adn then we went around the property looking at the native healing, edible, and usefull plants and animals. We also breifly learned how to make/throw a spear and then he showed us how to make a nice braclet from fibres from the local plants that he used to make and sell to toursits. Oh yea, turns out, Cockatoo Paul is also a preformer and plays didjeridoo etc. adn makes the most amazing jewerly out of aussie opals and random teeth and kangaroo claws he gets from road kill. i widh i had bought his cd.
turns out that day was valentine's day as well so there were a bunch of things lined up that evening at the budda bar (venue attached to the hostel). Sarah and I had a wonderful dinner adn then saw the most AMAZING fire dancer ever. I mean, i've seen videos of guys doign this before but they got nothing on this guy. I mean, he burnt him self multiple times during the routine but he didn't care and did a set with 4 double ended sticks of fire AND chains with burning balls of gas (something very few poi dancers do beacsue the chance of tying yourself up is very high).
Anyhow, the next few days, Sarah and I spent either at the beach or in the pool and just kickign around Byron. i really really love that city. So after our there beautiful days at the Arts Factory, Sarah and I packed up adn hopped on the bus back to Brisbane. They played the same movie that was playing on the way down: Boytown. What a bad but hilarious beacsue it was sooooooo bad. Its an Aussie movie about a boyband that used to be huge in the 80s who decides to get back together and market towards middle-aged women. They even end it with a Boytown rendition of Terry Jacks' Season's in the Sun. Yeah.
So we went back to Moreton Bay Backpackers fo rour last two nights and were planning on going to Australia Zoo on the Sunday, but alas, again it did not happen. When we go there, a couple of the people who had been there before we left the week before were there, including Allie, a British guy who just finished hit carpentry training and could be here 4 years working. Anyhow, the bit was quiet but nice and the flight back was uneventful.
All in all, great trip, but I wish I had gotten to Australia Zoo, btu I guess it wasn't time yet. But I have contacted the zoo and revieced a volunteer pack and, if all goes well, I will spend a few weeks volunteering and teh Irwin's zoo!!! anyhow, I have plenty of pictures that need to go up here, but I am at uni and can't access them, it will have to wait.