Last week was EXTREME!!

EXTREME!! That was the theme for our trip to Byron, Surfers, and Brisbane. We headed north looking for warmth and sunshine and instead got wind and rain. We had transportation issues. But I was with a pretty great group of people (trip planned by Jeremy for his birthday. Me, Josh, Alex, Juan, Madeleine & Steph were the others), and somehow all the setbacks didn't matter. We had a great week, and it was once again very difficult to return to Canberra.

Day 1: McDonald's breakfast. Sleep on bus to Sydney. 1 hour flight on Jetstar (budget airline) from Sydney to Ballina. It had just rained for the first time in 3 months. Supposed to have a free shuttle to our hostel in Byron Bay. The number we called claimed they didn't do that. The guy who ended up driving us told us the train hasn't run out of Byron for 3 years. Hmm, never trust countrylink.com.au.

We drove through the little town on our way to the hostel. We loved Byron instantly. The hostel let us all together in one room. It was just a hop skip and a jump from the beach. By that I mean, through some bushes, over the train tracks, through some more bushes, and VOILA! The beach! Of course I raced for the water - I expected it to be freezing but it was actually pretty warm!

We took it easy that first night. Wandered around the town a little, even though most things were closed. It's a little hippie place. Just a few blocks make up the main part of the town. Lots of people with dreadlocks. Lots of shops with hippie clothes. It's about 40 minutes from a place called Nimbin, the "Amsterdam of Australia." It really only took us about 10 minutes to decide we love the place.

We ate dinner at the "universally famous" Earth'n'Sea pizza. $35 dollar for a large pizza but delicious. Lots of weird topping combinations. Josh and Juan got their beer - called B.K. I think - and deemed it the best beer in the world. They were being serious. Tasted pretty good from the sip I had. They were pretty upset to find out there's nowhere else to get it. If you're ever in Byron, make sure you eat there!

(click on pictures for bigger image)


There was a fire twirling show by a hippie couple with dreadlocks at the hostel that night. It was cool, but they performed to their own bad music. They also own a shop called Fairy Floss in town. It sells fairy and hippie clothes and fire twirling gear.

We went out to the beach aftewards and had the whole thing to ourselves, lit only by the lighthouse on the hill. We stopped at a bar in town, but headed home pretty early.


Day 2: Woke to sunshine, but clouds rolled in. We were supposed to do sea kayaking but they cancelled on us because of the wind. We got breakfast at a bakery and decided to do the hike to the lighthouse. Over beach, over rocks, through "rainforest", it took us a few hours. Absoutely gorgeous views. The sun came out for a lot of our walk.





That afternoon, the guys decided to do kite boarding to make up for no kayaking. I wanted to dry it, but opted for swimming instead. The water was warmer than the air (and was much more pleasant than getting covered by wind blown sand on the beach) and there was a sandbar that broke up the waves and created a nice shallow pool. I just wished I had a boogie board! The kite boarding guy was originally from Spain. His name was Crazy Alex. And his wife was originally from New Zealand. And they were a crazy little "EXTREME!!" family. After the kiteboarding (only Jeremy and Alex actually got to do it on the water - they learned on the sand), Alex took us to his van to show us his other toys. Free line... like skateboarding, except that each of your feet is on a pair of wheels that isn't connected to the other pair. Snake board... a 2 wheeled skateboard with a joint in the middle. Stilts on springs. He made us all try something, and then his extreme wife, 3 year old daughter and 8 year old son all showed us up. Alex told Jeremy that what he does for a living is "teach people how to have fun." Now that's the life!



This night we got cheap food at a place called Cheeky Monkeys... fun for one night, but a total tourist bar. We did end up back there to celebrate Jeremy's birthday. The girl who drove us over was from Canada. She was supposed to stay in Byron for 2 days, but has now been there 2 months. It's just that kind of place.


Day 3: The guys wanted to do more kiteboarding and I had wanted to try surfing lessons, but it was a cloudy day, we were tired, and the wind was worse. We bumped up our shuttle time to leave Byron by a few hours. We had Mexican food for brunch and everyone else got gelato (we ate a lot of gelato on this trip) while Madeleine and I explored the shops. Popped into a few hippie stores, some aboriginal stores, and we all took one last stroll on the beach.

Next stop: Surfers Paradise. Queensland! The Sunshine State! The woman who drove us there (about an hour's drive) asked us, "Is Canberra really the most boring place in the universe?" She knew someone who had lived there and had to move away because they didn't like it. We told her uni life is great.

Once again, our YHA hostel was nearly a stone's throw from the beach. Ok, so across the street and around the back of the fancy hotel. Man, Jeremy knows how to pick the prime accomodation! Another night of relaxing. We had a $5 bbq at the hostel. Sausage AND steak, salad, potato salad... ohh it was good.

Everyone else relaxed at the hostel, but we were right on Mariner's Cove, which had a little pier with bars and restaurants. The band playing at Fisho's sounded great so I went down to listen. The band was called Grassroots Street Band. When their set was over, the guy next to me asked me how I liked them. He knew the lead singer and was there with a few other friends (all locals). His name was Sonny. I knew he was a little... off when in response to finding out I was a psyc major he said, "Oh, I just saw a psychologist today." (Which is perfectly fine, but normally that's not the information you share in the first 5 minutes of conversation!) The girl he was with was really cool, and his other friends asked me how I was liking Australia, but Sonny decided that we should talk about... hippie things. He told me he has a condition related to methylation(??) where too many neurotransmitters fire - but he's on a vitamin treatment instead of drugs. And medication is bad and evil (ok, he didn't actually use the word "evil" but I know he was thinking it!). And since he was so glad to be talking to someone "who's studying at uni and going to be a professional," he decided to give me his thoughts on fluoride in water: it's evil. "They don't put fluoride in the water in Queensland. You can see the difference in the people - they have wider heads, they're more happy and free. It's the holiday spots that don't have fluoride in their water. Like California. California doesn't." I didn't question the wide head comment or bother point out to him that maybe people are happier in those places because of the climate or lifestyle. When he told me that there's 4 times the lethal limit in a liter of DC's water, I asked him why people aren't dying from it. I don't know what his answer was. You know, I had hoped I might meet some locals down at the bar, but this wasn't what I was going for...

Day 4: Farmers market for breakfast and a day on the beach! Surfers is really the opposite of Byron. I know Byron is probably hectic when it's not winter, but Surfers has to be worse. It has high rises. It has Sea World, Movie World, and other theme parks. Frommers calls it the vacation spot for the "rich and tasteless."

It was cloudy. Josh asked me if I wanted to build a sandcastle. Heck, yes! He, Juan, Alex, and I got to work, and Jeremy joined in when he thought we weren't thinking "big enough." The result: the most EXTREME sand castle ever! Built totally by hand. No shovels or buckets for us! It took about 2 hours. We had people stopping to take pictures with it.

And of course we destroyed it by doing flips into it.


(Yes, I know I'm short.)

We played EXTREME frisbee (our modified version of ultimate) then went for a swim. This time we remembered to grab some boogie boards! Water temp was once again good, but man those were some rough waves! Why going to the beach in winter is good: Summer in Australia is stinger (jellyfish) season - NO THANK YOU.

Night of seafood dinner and then to downtown Surfers (not that they say "downtown" here. Sam laughed at me the other day when I said it in reference to Sydney) to check out the nightlife - definitely a high point of Surfers. We were dropped off at Cavill Ave - it was only 10:00 and the place was swarming with people! We ended up at the Beer Garden (my kind of place with a diverse crowd and a live cover band), a dance club called Drink, and a New York syle pizza shop.




Day 4: Everyone else went jet skiing while I sat on the shore and talked to the woman who ran it (we had an odd number and wanted someone to sit out). She and her husband do the jet skiing and own some machine that cools soup quickly. Or something. They wanted to retire and drive around the country in an RV for a few years, but they only made it 3 months, got a job offer, and decided they weren't old enough yet. I was glad I didn't jet ski. Everyone else came back with chattering teeth and purple bodies. We had lunch, watched some dude feed the pelicans, and headed out to Brisbane.

Once again, don't trust the Country Link website. It told us there's one train a day our of Surfers. Liars. There's one every half hour. Although the train station was closed on this particular day, so we had to take a bus to another station. Never trust public transporation.

It was raining. It was still raining when we got to Brisbane. Showered and crashed in at City Backpackers. This was our first real "backpacker hostel" experience. We were split up into three different rooms, and we all shared rooms with strangers, male and female. I could see how this would be cool if the people in your room are talkative, like the one Canadian chick in our room. Or in Juan's room where so many languages were known that the group of them had a crazy English-Spanish-Italian-etc conversation. But I didn't like worrying about my possessions or wondering why the guy in the corner always seems to stare and never sleep...


Day 5: Awake before 6am for our tour to the sand island of Moreton Island (http://www.qldtravel.com.au/brisbane/sunrover-moreton-island-1-day-tour.html). Our guide, Brandon, picked us up at the train station and drove us to the ferry, where we had a 2 hour ride to the 20-sq-km island. Brendon had dreadlocks and is a Byron Bay native (which means he has a 2 hour commute to work in Brisbane). He told us about how he and his friends like to harass tourists who have just returned stoned on their "Alternative Bus Tours" from Nimbin. He said he'd been driving on Moreton since he was 12 and doing tours for 4 years. There was only one other person on the tour, besides our group: Duncan, originally from England but traveling the world spending inheritance money/teaching English for the past 7 years.

It was a 4 wheel drive tour of the island. 7 people bouncing around in the back of a jeep = fun! There are no real roads on the island... it's all sand. There are 300 residents, but that includes people who have vacation homes there. We saw dolphins when we got off the ferry and I saw a sea turtle from a lookout. We saw a dead turtle on the beach - they die from eating plastic bags they mistake for jellyfish. We swam in a cold freshwater lagoon. We had a delicious lunch under a tarp while it rained. Luckily the weather cleared up after that. We drove down the beach. Brandon told us there was a freshwater spring and that it was the water source for the aborigines that used to live here. A pile of shells that they kept was dated to be over 5000 years old, which is relatively young in the history of aborigines. He said supposedly they worked with the dolphins to catch fish - the dolphins would chase the fish towards the shore and the people would reward the dolphins by throwing back the leftover fish parts.

We stopped at the lighthouse, at some sections of beach, at some places where we could hike around. We were supposed to do sandboarding, but weren't able to because the sand was too wet. Before we left the island, we stopped in "town" to buy snacks and check out the photo board - pictures of people with huge fish and giant sharks caught on the island. Brandon told us that just that week he had been surfing and when he got back on shore a guy told him that two sharks had swam just underneath his board, chasing a school of fish; fins at least a foot out of the water and Brandon hadn't even seen them.

Overall, a really fun tour! Everyone else slept on the 2 hour ferry ride back. I read Life of Pi, which if you don't know, is about a boy who was on a boat that sank. How appropriate.

That night, back in Brisbane (capital city of Queensland), we got dinner on Queen St - a line of shops and restaurants. Brisbane seems like a nice city - clean, full of cool bridges, buildings, and artwork, like most places in Australia I've been so far. After dinner I suggested we head to the Botanic Gardens, which are open 24 hours. We walked through there and along the river. Climbed some trees and scared some possums. Took rediculous pictures. Crossed a bridge to stroll on the other side of the river. Walked by Griffith University and the Maritime Museum. Found a cool walkway with fancy arches which led to their manmade beach - pools filled with sand and animal fountains and it was all lit up at night. Seemed like a fun place. Would have loved to spend a whole day in the city. We walked by a theatre, library, and museum, and crossed another bridge to take us back to the hostel.




Day 6: Of course, it was clear blue skies on the day we left. And it was amazing we all left, because only 5 of the 7 of us made it to the train on time that morning. Alex, who had been sleeping, magically showed up on our next train, and Juan, who had been missing, somehow made it to the airport (we fly Virgin Blue, another budget airline). Let's just say that morning was... EXTREME!

Did anyone really want to be back in Canberra? No. But we assured ourselves we'd be fine. Afterall, it was 10 days till our next vacation!

Wanna see more pictures? I have lots...

Byron Bay: http://gmu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2093360&l=d9c9d&id=15600311

Surfers, Moreton, & Brisbane: http://gmu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2093368&l=137c0&id=15600311

And these aren't from this trip, but I updated the 3rd page of my Canberra album:
http://gmu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2084725&l=abbea&id=15600311

a note on classes

Funny how I'm here for school and I've hardly mentioned it, right?

Well, there's good reason for that. I'm only taking 3 classes while I'm here and I only have class 2 days a week. I'm not quite sure how that happened, but it's pretty amazing.

Each class is about three hours a week, split into 2 parts: a lecture and a tutorial. The lecture is your usual lecturer blabbing on and showing slides. The tutorial, led by either your lecturer or possibly a grad student, puts you into a smaller group for discussion and interactive activities. For most (but not all) classes, tutorials take attendance and you can't miss more than two. Attendance is generally not taken in lectures. Really I don't find classes too different from at home other than the designated times for lecture and discussion. One pretty significant difference is that most degrees are only 3 years. Sure some people take longer, but I tend to get a surprised look each time someone asks me what year I am and I say "4th." Here 4th year psychology students are Honors students conducting their own research. (Mason has a similar program but it happens during spring of junior year and fall of senior - which is why I'm not doing it.)

I'm taking 2 psyc classes: Motivation & Emotion and Personality & Individual Differences. Motivation I didn't really want to take but since I've taken most of my required psyc courses and not many psyc electives are offered here, I didn't have much choice. Unfortunately, it's as uninteresting as I thought it might be. The lecturer (no one seems to say "professor" here) makes his slides directly from the text and his lecture directly from his slides, adding and deleting nothing. In the tutorial, we fill out so many questionnaires that we feel more like test subjects than students. The tutor is a woman who's been teaching the class for years but is not interesting or necessarily accurate in her explanation of concepts. The subject matter is a weird combination of stuff I've already learned in other classes. Luckily, I miss half of every lecture because it overlaps with another tutorial (which everyone assured me wouldn't be a problem - and it isn't. All his notes are online. Oh wait, or I could just read the book.) Also, tutorials are 2 hours but only every other week.

Personality is much better. The lecturer is in her 40s or 50s and is pretty upbeat and spunky - she almost yelled the f-word into the microphone on the first day when she found out the textbook wasn't in the store. She starts each class by recognizing the Ngunnawal people, the aboriginal people who's land we're on (but where are they now? Even though a center on campus is named after them and people keep acknowledging them, it doesn't seem like any of them are here or that the land is being shared with them. Hmm). She is also the tutor and so far we've just done puzzles and taken intelligence tests and talked about them. Not too much new info in this class either, but I'm expecting it to get better.

My third class is Indigenous Politics and the State -- politics. What was I thinking?! But it was the only Australia-themed class that was offered this semester. It's a little confusing since I know nothing about politics and little about Australian history, but Terry (who is aboriginal) gives us such an insane amount of reading that I'm picking up things. That doesn't mean my essay is any good... but I mostly get it. But all this talk about self-determination, sovereignty, autonomy, self-government - all very related terms but with different meanings depending on who's saying it. It's also crazy how abused or excluded aborigines have really been in Australia's history. And how discriminatory a constitution and legislation can be. Maybe I'll get into that sometime, but it also makes me realize how little we're taught about Native Americans. The papers we read keep making comparisons: "The US and Canada did this with the natives, the US constitution did this..." and I'm thinking "Really?!"

I know in some places your grade consists of just a final, or a midterm and a final. Here there isn't any standard like that. I find it like home - it varies from class to class. Mine are 2 or 3 major grades - exams or essays, plus participation. One thing I do have here that Mason fails to ask of me (which is pretty sad) are major psychology essays. The most writing I've had to do for psyc at home, other than research proposals, is critiquing journal aritcles. I've never been asked to write a 2000 or 3000 word essay answering a question. Which is rediculous. So I think it's good that I'm here. One essay is on aggression and the other on - how appropriate - procrastination.

As for grades themselves, 50% is passing. They don't grade A, B, C, D, F. Instead you get a pass, and I know you can earn a distinction and high distinction (above 90%) as well. I tried to ask Angelo to explain the grading system, but he seemed pretty unsure of it and only concerned about getting his 50%. Guess I'll ask someone else. Doesn't really matter for me though because my grades don't transfer back, just my credits. Yeee haw.

Oh, also, they say "mark" instead of "grade." And the term homework is used but more often people will tell me they have "uni work" to do. And the library is a busy place. And the psyc text books are American and the motivation guy is always clarifying that the text says this or that because it's American (miles, fahrenheit, sept 11 research).

Another interesting thing is how they get into college. It seems that there are pretty strict requirements that determine whether or not you get in (the motivation guy clarified to everyone that you have more options in America - that it's not like Australia where you know for sure if university isn't an option for you). By the way, university is definitely NOT "college" here. In some of the states, your 11th and 12th years are called "college." Even the German girl (who said their admissions process is also strictly based on your scores and predetermined career choice) asked some of us Americans why we kept saying "college." In New South Wales (but not in ACT, as I learned in psyc today as the lecturer expressed her distaste for basing university admission on one score), you take subject tests in your 12th year that pretty much determine your entrance to university. Angelo explained to me that his overall score was something like 65 and the cut off for his program this year was something like 62, so he was one of the last people accepted. He thought our system of cumulative high school GPA, essays, extracurriculars, and recommendations sounded weird. He also told me that if you wait till you're 21, you get to bypass the qualifications and just pay to take classes. I also know that Canberra offers a program for people who don't qualify for university to take classes so they can improve their marks and eventually qualify to start a degree program.

I've actually gotten a lot of work done in the past week or so. It hasn't been all fun and games. ;) Although I did go to an amazing concert on campus. An Australian band called Beautiful Girls... you might like them if you like Jack Johnson, or maybe even the Wailers! Friday 2 of the girls and I went to the Canberra observatory. We almost fell asleep during the too relaxing 1989 planetarium show, but we saw Jupiter and some groups of stars through a big telescope. A fun night, but just an ok place.

And now, I realllllly have to go to bed. We're heading up north where it should be in the 70s all week! Byron Bay, Sufers Paradise, Brisbane, Moreton Island - here I come! You'll hear all about it when I get back. :-D

Aussie Rules!

So that cricket night was rather good because now I'm becoming friends with a bunch of people on that floor (p-middle). Wednesday night was Angelo's birthday, and before everyone headed to the Lighty, p-middle hosted him a party, which meant blindfolding him, taping him to a chair, and carrying him to McDonald's ("Mackers"). They even reserved the party room and bought ice cream cakes, the leftovers of which went to two teenagers dressed in black with crazy haircuts and spiked jewelry, who joined our party successfully because no one realized that no one else knew them.

Friday night a bunch of us went ice skating. I DIDN'T FALL! I DIDN'T FALL!!!

Today there was an AFL game in Canberra - Australian Rules Football, that is. Vic, one of the P-middle guys, took Madeleine and I to the game. Canberra doesn't have an AFL team, but, as Vic explained, some of the clubs in Victoria are having financial trouble, so they sell some of the games to third party locations. Today's game was the Sydney Swans against the Melbourne Demons. It was definitely a Swans crowd. We got there early, found a place on the grass about 5 feet from the edge of the field. Had lunch - a steak and onion sanger (sanger=sandwich. And I was being adventurous in choosing the steak and onion over my usual sausage and onion, haha) and then Vic explained the game to us. I had seen it twice on TV before (while that guy who cheers for the Kangaroos freaked out at the screen), and I discovered it was much easier to understand than I thought it would be.

Aussie rules is played on an oval instead of a rectangular field. There are 4 goal posts at either end. The ball is like a rugby ball. If you kick the ball between the 2 center posts, it's worth 6 points. If you run it through the center, kick it between the outter posts, kick it off one of the center posts, or back up into the opposing team's goal, it's worth 1 point. "Kickoff" in the beginning of the game isn't a kick - the ref bounces it off the ground and high into the air. The ball is moved by kicking it or hitting it off your fist (handballing, I think is what it's called), so the ball is never really thrown. When tackled, they try to get the ball off to a teammate because there is penalty for holding on too long. The game is played in 20-minute quarters. No time outs or commercial breaks, whoo!! Swans demolished Melbourne, 112-68. Vic said it could be worse - his favorite team lost by 157 points one time.

Lachlan from my floor rode with us as well. He was working at the game, doing computer support for a sports statistics company. Vic actually does a similar thing, doing computer support for the graphics systems for Fox Sports and ABC, and he actually helps design graphics for them as well.

And get this - they told me there's an AFL league in the US! Lachlan showed me the website. There are teams in Philadelphia, Lehigh Valley, and Baltimore-DC! WHO KNEW! They also said the NFL is really interested in AFL players because they're such good punters. Apparently a big kicker from the Jets was previously in the AFL.

And a year ago, I didn't even know this sport existed.

Cricket

So I still don't really know anything about the sport, but some of the guys did try to teach to us to bat and bowl in the common room last night. No TVs or skulls were broken. Good times.

And once again.... SYDNEY!!

A free weekend, a bunch of people going to Sydney... you know I couldn't say no.

So here are the weekend's highlights (in usual lengthy Lindsey style):

I was totally spoiled by last weekend's hostel. This one was in Kings Cross and more of what I expected from a hostel (less hotel-ish and more old house-ish). In an area with several adult shops. Bathrooms that smelled like a public pool. Weird drain noise outside the window. $7 less a night really makes a difference. It wasn't bad; the difference was just stunning.

The first night there was a free BBQ. Which, consistent with every other (like 4 or 5) free BBQs I've been to, means sausage (which I like! Gasp!) on a slice of bread, and (if salad is provided, which it was) no plates or utensils. WHY NEVER ANY PLATES OR UTENSILS FOR SALAD? Last time this happened I opted for eating salad by hand out of a napkin folded into a cone. This time I went for the good ol'e salad sandwich. And because I was starving, it pretty much tasted like the best meal I ever had.

Luckily everyone agreed to hit up the aquarium, which was my #1. It had some cool parts, like tunnels going through the tanks of sharks and things, and was clearly a good aquarium, but like any aquarium, I left feeling like "that was it?"

We took a harbour cruise. I learned there are advantages to traveling in a group of 8 females, especially if your group contains one hot Swedish chick, because the captain invited us into the cabin and let us steer the boat.

By the way, the captains name? Honestly... Captain Studly.


We went out the first night and had fun, but we had a little trouble finding places to go since we 1. didn't want techno (damn Australians and their techno beats) and 2. we didn't want to pay a $20 cover charge 3. Amanda was wearing flip flops. Problem 1 we ran into at a very crowded but nice place. Problem 2 at the hip hop club. Problem 3 at the gay club that was playing great music that taunted us from the street. What a night!

The walk through Botanical Gardens was nice because we didn't go down any paths that I had been down before. We climbed a lot of old, big trees.

Some of us quickly did the Museum of Contemporary Art, which like any art museum had some really cool stuff and some really weird stuff.

Dinner in Chinatown! We picked the nice looking place on the corner and it was DELICIOUS. Fried rice, veggie dumplings, beef, chicken. And Spicy & Sour soup. Which contained an ingredient that I assumed to be sprouts until Brankica pointed out that they had eyeballs. She refused to eat it, but I persevered.

After eyeball soup, we went to the bakery and had amazing, warm, tasty, 5 for $1 cream puffs.

That night, while some of the girls went to a Croatian party followed by the house of a guy from Canberra and didn't return til 7:15am, the rest of us planned to go but instead hung out in the hostel all night. It was actually a really great time, definitely enhanced by the fact that Stephanie is German and this English guy Greg came by. It kept the conversation (about everything, including universities, work vacation, Iraq, restaurants, transportation) really interesting.

I LOVE THE ROCKS. We had breakfast at this highly recommended place called Pancakes on the Rocks. Mine were chocolate pancakes with chocolate ice cream and cherries. DELISH. And then we went shopping in the weekend market there. So much cool stuff on sale - bags, jewelry, trinkets, artwork, most things imaginable - plus it was the first place in Australia I've seen real lemonade (instead of lemon-lime soda) being sold. And there was a jazz band playing outside one of the restaurants which totally made the atmosphere. After the market, we looked in some of the other shops in the area, found more cool stuff, tasted kangaroo jerky (yum. croc jerky is next on my list). Really, I want to go back to Sydney just for the market. Plus, it looks like there are lots of cool restaurants and bars in the Rocks too (this is where I had pizza last week). So yeah, definitely hitting all that up next time!

We took the ferry to Manly beach and could only stay for 40 minutes, but we wanted to see what it was like. Definitely a place that will be fun when it's warmer! We ran into the water and took some adorable pictures and just scoped out some of the shops (but didn't go in, since we spent it all at the market...)

So sad to leave Sydney again! We met up with the 7:15am girls (who attempted to sleep in the gardens all day) and got on the bus, while it was 14 degrees celcius. When we arrived in Canberra it was 1 degree. :( No wonder I'm sick...


(me, Brankica, Amanda, Nell, Jessica, Madeleine, Meghan, Stephanie)

Here are addresses to my facebook photo albums for those of you NOT on facebook:

http://gmu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2084725&l=abbea&id=15600311

http://gmu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2087852&l=26c59&id=15600311

SYDNEY!!!

If you're going to do Sydney, you've gotta go do it big. So that's what Dan and I did this past weekend.

[Pictures can be made a little larger by clicking on them.]

We arrived on our bus from Canberra midday. (What's between Canberra and Sydney? Sheep. And some olives.) Our hostel was around the corner from the bus/train station, so we dropped some stuff off there and caught the train to Circular Quay, and when we pulled up I let out two “Holy shit”s: the first for the Opera House and the second for the bridge. It’s the reaction I wanted to have but wasn’t sure I would have – but I found myself genuinely excited and amazed to have Sydney’s icons in my view. When we got off the train, we walked up to the Rocks area and found an Italian place where we were immediately seated and ordered pizza. It wasn't bad. I liked the atmosphere better than the food though. The waiter harassed me for not finishing the last few bites of my pizza. We then weaved our way through the streets and up some stairs to find the place for the Bridge Climb.

Dan’s afraid of heights, so he kept mentioning that we didn’t have to go - riiiiight. We found the place and inside he kept commenting on how no one looked happy – everyone who was about to climb and everyone who came down had sour expressions, according to him. I told him he was just seeing it that way to match his own schema of fear. We looked around the gift shop – and the thing that made me most nervous were the stuffed animal bears wearing the climb suits! How ridiculous…

When we went to sign release forms and get strapped up, it really became fun. The people who work there make jokes, about drinking on the bridge, about needing parachutes, about all sorts of dangerous and ridiculous things – I thought it was funny; Dan thought maybe the forced humor was more nerve-wracking. We were suited with a jump suit, wind pants, and attached a hat, handkerchief, fleece and rain jacket to our belts. We did a practice walk over some ladders and walkway inside, while our guide, Dean, learned all our names. There was a guy from Austria in our group of 12, but other than that, I think everyone was Australian, which semi-surprised me. We strapped on our radios (so we could could hear Dean) and headed out.

To get onto the bridge, you have to walk down the street to an unmarked door. The weirdest part was actually getting up onto the bridge because you have to squeeze through some small spaces and step in some places obviously not designed as walkways.

But once we got up on the actual bridge, everything was fine… we climb up to traffic level, which was quite a thrill, and then on top of the side of the bridge… but from there you can only look over the edge. It’s just metal straight below you, so you don’t feel in danger, not like you’re going to fall. You're holding onto railings and attached to a wire the whole time. We didn’t walk too fast, trying to take it all in. I was still amazed to look over and see the opera house, which Dean mentioned is NOT listed in the new 7 wonders of the world, much to Sydney's dismay.



Doing the sunset/twilight climb was the best idea ever… because you see something different every time your turn your head. And we LUCKED OUT with the weather. It had been cloudy until the end of lunch, and most of the clouds had passed by the time we were on the bridge. Just a few lined the sky for the sun to light them up. As we climbed up the bridge, the sun was lowering, shining it’s light on the city’s buildings and then on the opera house. It was gorgeous, gave me chills. The sun hit the horizon and turned the sky a brilliant orange and pink just as we hit the peak of the bridge. A group picture (the included, free one) was taken and then we had more pictures taken and each of us crossed the center of the bridge to the other side. That was the scariest part, because you could look down and see the traffic rushing beneath you, and the wind picked up a bit. We stared at the sunset from the other side then. As day turned to night, we walked down as slowly as possible to enjoy the view. Sydney stretches on as far as the eye can see, with the lights of the buildings lighting up the darkness as the sun sets behind the Blue Mountains. Dean told us about the bridge being built… with no scaffolding or support, something like 16 of 500-some men died building it. The two halves were built separately, held in place by cables until they were lowered together… I can’t imagine what kind of cables those were. He also told us about the only proposal rejection he’s seen on the bridge: the unmarried parents of a teenager, the mom said, “we’ll talk about it when we get off the bridge.”

Needless to say we didn’t want to get off the bridge. We climbed down, ducking below street level just as a railcar went by and shook everything. When we got down, I pointed out to Dan that everyone’s expressions were really due to the sadness of leaving the bridge… because it was sad to leave that beautiful view behind! I wanted to stay up there longer, even though we probably were up there around 2 hours. When we went inside, Dan made sure to smile at everyone getting ready to go, give them the thumbs up, or tell them it was great.



We didn't bother to look at our overpriced individual pictures because we changed and hurried over to the opera house. Here’s the thing about walking up to the opera house… I couldn't believe I was doing it. My breathing changed, and I was just in awe. I couldn’t believe I was there. I told Dan, looking at the bridge, “I was just climbing on the bridge and felt fine, now I walk up to this building, and I’m freaking out!” We got our tickets for Verdi’s “Il Trovatore.” Student tickets $50. The hall was one of the smaller ones, but our seats were amazing. Row P, but right in the center. And seats near us were empty so we were able to move so that no one was directly in front of us. I was a little scared, as the last opera I saw was Faust with Katie when we were in the back row and almost fell asleep. I thought I might be in trouble because the seats were comfortable too.

Luckily, the opera was amazing… the story was good, and I could actually follow it. The performances and the staging and even the set were great. And I really liked the music, quite powerful, and I knew some of it. During intermission, we went out on the back balcony for a minute, to stare over at the bridge.

The funny thing is, they don’t dim the lights to signal you to get to your seats… they have a very obnoxious dinging instead. It’s weird.

Also, the inside of the building is weird… where we bought the tickets reminded me of being in the metro because it’s all concrete… and inside the lobbies, you very distinctly make out the shape of the building. If it weren’t the Sydney Opera House, it would be too unusual, and not quite beautiful.



The night ended with ice cream and a walk around Circular Quay and totally crashing. In that state between wake and sleep, I actually started dreaming about what I could see from on top of the bridge.

The next morning we ended up literally running for the train to the Blue Mountains. We paid for a train + bus explorer pass to Katoomba (awesome name). It was a little over 2 hours there. The day was looking cloudy and making us a little nervous. I was amazed that civilization didn’t really stop at any point from Sydney to the mountains (unlike between Sydney and Canberra). When we arrived in Katoomba, a cute town, we decided to take the bus in an hour. We stopped in a gourmet cupcake shop, and then found a small café to eat in. It was so busy and so small that people would turn away because all the tables were full. Dan got a ‘big breakfast’ and I got a beef pie with mashed potatoes and mushy peas… quite Australian. And really really good.

We went through several plans for the day: 2 hour hike into the valley. 1 hour hike across the cliff. Dan wanted to make it back to Sydney for Othello, so I thought we could at least try. We decided on the 1 hour walk from Scenic World to Echo Point, but when we got there, Dan decided we should do the valley first (or canyon. Blue Mountains are more a canyon than mountains). He was speeding down the paths and stairs and I yelled to ask him what he was running for. "I'm running to Othello!" Luckily, my stupid knee and its aching convinced him to slow down.



They call this area rainforest, but we couldn't figure out what exactly qualifies something as a rainforest. There's rainforest in northern Australia, but here? We saw parrots (or crimson rosellas rather) and a waterfall and lots of ferns and passed the "world's steepest railway." After about an hour, we realized we couldn't hike to Echo Point and still make it to Othello. We made a pointless dash for the bus, not realizing how far into the forest we were and how many steps we'd have to climb. Pointing out our energy levels and state of health (we, like everyone on campus, are suffering from winter colds), I convinced him that we would enjoy it more here taking it easy and missing Othello. He was a saddened Shakespeare fan, but agreed.

We hiked back up and took the next bus to the lookout at Echo Point. What a spectacular view. The Three Sisters rock formation was more impressive from up close. You could look off and see layers upon layers of blue mountains (I think all distant mountains look blue, but this is apparenlty due to sun shining on eucalyptus oil in the air). From one lookout, you were hanging over the edge. We walked to the bridge that leads to the first of the "sisters" but it wasn't too impressive. We did see some bigger, green parrots though.



We left from the town of Leura, which a lady in Katoomba said was very nice, but we couldn't tell from the one block of mostly closed shops (because almost everything in Australia closes around 5:00).

Back in Sydney, we walked through Chinatown to Darling Harbour and had a good dinner in a line of restaurants that all have tables on the sidewalk/patio area looking over the water. Don't worry - there were heat lamps! I tried octopus for the first time and it was AMAZING. We also got sticky date pudding to satisfy Dan's mom who had been harrassing him about not trying it since he'd been in Australia.

The next day was great as well. We walked through the city till we reached Hyde Park and saw the ANZAC War Memorial. Walking from the there leads into the Domain ("a place for people") and right into the Botanic Gardens. The gardens were pretty (obviously) but it was the wildlife that got me. All sorts of colorful birds, ones with long beaks (ibis?), and cockatoos - tons of cockatoos! (What I've realized that all birds in Australia make really obnoxious noises.) Some squawking led my eyes up to the trees… and there were several bats hanging from the tree above us. I looked around – ALL of the trees around me were filled with bats, and not little bats – BIG BATS. Maybe a 100 of them. (Note to Sugar Ray fans: "Can you eat the fruit bats?") We also discovered some huge spiders when a tour guide pointed them out to some other people. The best was when I went to look for a bathroom: I walked down the path, and all of a sudden a possum ran out in front of me! I didn’t realize what it was at first. It looked at me before scurrying past me and up the path. I took some pictures of it, and while I was distracted by a cockatoo it disappeared. I went into the bathroom, and when I was washing my hands, I turned to find out the possum had snuck up behind me! It had me cornered really and sat up to smell the air. Then it smelled my shoe while I whipped out my camera and then I followed it out of the bathroom.




Our walk continued around Mrs Macquaries Point and then over to the opera house again. I checked out the vendors' tables there and really enjoyed talking to a jewelry maker from London about how she makes her jewelry and the meanings behind all of it. I'm upset now however because it appears that the ring I bought is only sterling silver... with brass underneath. Gypped!



The afternoon ended walking around Circular Quay again. Some guys played didgeridoos as they tried to sell their CD. We had fish and chips on a bench overlooking the water while seagulls tried to steal our food.

Really, I loved Sydney and didn't want to leave.



And actually, the girls just called me and a whole bunch of us are going to Sydney THIS weekend!

PS- I've eaten half a jar of Nutella (that chocolate hazelnut spread that's popular everywhere but the US) in one day. This isn't good. Anyone want to pay for my gym membership? ;)

Sit tight...

Hello friends & family,

I'll be writing all about my (fantastic!!) weekend in Sydney in the next day or so. I just want to get my pictures onto the computer first.

I'm glad to hear you guys are enjoying the blog and that some of you are even checking daily.

The blog should be set up so that you don't need an account to leave comments. So if you've got anything to say (even 'hello!') you can leave one at the end of any entry - just click where it says how many comments have been left.

In response to some of the comments I've gotten so far: Yes, Suk, a kangaroo could beat you up, and the blog is all about me cause I'm in Australia and you're not - so ha! <3