Here, at the end of all things…

I am finally at the end of my great adventure. I am flying home from LA with my mom and sister beside me and my dad in front. The plane ride is fine (not the top notch service like I received on Air New Zealand, but I’ll take what I can get) and my grandma (knowing my heart’s desire) packed us some bagels and peanut butter and honey – I was starting to have withdrawal symptoms!

Looking back on the past 3 months, I am rather impressed with all that my friends and I packed into our time abroad! My favorite weekend was the South Island Adventure (last wknd in New Zealand) and the biggest thrill was probably bungee jumping. I’ve made so many wonderful friends, Drew and Katherine and Aerin and Tiffany and Tomas and Charity and Sheri and … (the list goes on). We already have one trip somewhat planned. Sometime soon, a whole group of us are going to Chattanooga! It’ll be a lot of fun – I can’t wait! I’m looking forward to the drive in movie theatre.

This study abroad was the most fantastic semester of college yet, and I will remember it a lifetime. Thank you to my new (it seems like I’ve known you forever) friends who journeyed with me across the world, and thank you to my family and friends back home who so lovingly awaited my return.

Now it’s time for a new adventure – one which is just beginning, and only God knows which direction it will take me. God bless!

Vacation Away from Vacation…

As it turns out, I really felt like it was time for a vacation after stepping off the plane in LA. So, thankfully my family came to meet me at the airport in LA with 5 days of vacation planned! I’m spending my time chilling with my family and it is wonderful! We went to the top of San Jacinto via a rotating gondola and hiked around the top of the mountain at 8000 feet elevation. Today we went to Joshua Tree, a desert valley with huge mounds of boulders and rock-climbable rocks! It was pretty sweet! I took along my rock climbing shoes, but decided to just climb the rocks with my hiking boots. There were lots of people rock climbing with ropes and everything. One day I’ll go back with my full equipment and enjoy some tremendous climbs. I definitely recommend Joshua Tree to any avid climbers out there! Tomorrow, the plan is to go to fellowship (YES! It’s been so long since I’ve been to fellowship!) at Terry Sweigart’s home. After that there is no plan, so we’ll figure it out tomorrow. For all those in Georgia, I will be home soon. But for now, rest assured, I’m safe and sound on American soil. God bless!

Jump into the ocean...

My last thorough blog entry left off with me having gone to Moreton Island on March 20 (see blog from Mar 22). Since then, I’ve done a lot. My test went well, even though I didn’t study on Sunday due to my island adventures – (well worth it!). The week went by quicker than usual. The following weekend was the long-awaited Scuba trip, so I had to pack in a little more school work in order to compensate for missing class the following Monday. But I got done with all the things I needed to, thankfully, and was packed and ready to go Thursday evening. In case you don’t remember, we had paid for a 3-day, 2-night live aboard scuba diving boat trip in the Great Barrier Reef, and it was about to begin! We (a lot of us – Drew, Joey, Alan, Allison, Charity, Aerin, Tiffany, Hannah, and me) all crammed into a maxi-taxi bound for the airport, super excited to begin our weekend adventure. The flight went really well, but we landed at midnight in a downpour. We grabbed a taxi to our hostel, and arrived shortly thereafter, found the keys to our rooms, woke up a stranger whose stuff was in one of our beds, and then crashed. The hostel was pretty hot and muggy, but I slept through the night. That was Thursday night.

Friday morning, I awoke and got dressed in my bathing suit. The diving boat company said they would pick us up at 8:30. Having a little extra time, I explored Cairns, even though it was raining. Rain? No problem – I was in my bathing suit already! To say the least, I came back to the hostel soaked and had barely pulled out my towel when the pick-up bus arrived. Off to the boat! We took a boat to the boat, because the live-aboard was already anchored at the reef, the Great Barrier Reef. The boat ride was pretty choppy, but that just made it more fun. I’m always game for a rollercoaster! Once on board the liveaboard, we got the low-down on sleeping arrangement and rules/regs, and then ate lunch – yum! (As a note, the food they fed us on board the boat was AMAZING! Especially Saturday night – which was steak and mashed potatoes, and garlic bread, and freshly cooked veges, and memories of home-cooking.) But to get back to the story…

Our first dive was at 1 pm. I’m not going to go through each dive individually, just the especially special ones, because there were 9 total plus 3 snorkel sessions – and that’s a lot to right about! By the end of the trip, I counted somewhere close to 480 minutes in the water – that’s 8 hours of diving/snorkeling! So worth the money! So, the first dive was a little hazy. The cyclone had stirred up a bit of sediment and the waves were a little choppy, but it was the Great Barrier Reef, so regardless, it was amazing! After a few dives, Drew and I figured out that we use up our air at almost the same rate, so we were destined to be scuba buddies. That was fine with me because Drew is a great guy, and out of our group, he had the most experience – and knew how to navigate back to the boat! (very helpful) I always dove with Drew and we had a blast. The first night, we were supposed to have a night dive, but conditions were really bad, so we weren’t allowed to go. It was disappointing but we got over it. We were exhausted, so we slept like babies that night. (I actually felt like a baby getting rocked to sleep because of the gentle rocking of the boat.)


The next day was a little better weather – and we moved locations, and the second location was excellent! But before we moved I did another dive – (6am = early) – and went snorkeling (= AWESOME!). I saw a GIANT fish while snorkeling. It was blue and about the size of me – but with a small mouth so I was safe. I also saw a group of 6-inch squids moseying along, as well as TONS of other fish. When I went diving that afternoon (at the new place = better location, better visibility), it was the first time, I really felt like I was doing what I always pictured scuba diving to be like. While swimming along a reef wall behind Drew, I paused for a few minutes and looked up, down, left right, behind me, and everywhere I looked I saw fish. They we all around me! Corals, big fish, small fish, anemones… other sea things I don’t know the name of. It was breathtaking! I cannot describe. Luckily we took some pictures, so you can get a small taste for it. The colors we so vibrant though! yeah….it was really cool.

The first night, we were not allowed to dive, as they said we would be able to. A storm swept in just before we put our gear on and the conditions in the water were deemed “unsafe” for diving. What actually happened, is the boat was poorly anchored and the change in wind pattern caused the boat to ram into the reef! Yes, it actually hit the reef! So much for avoiding touching the reef or hitting it with our flippers. I didn’t see the damage to the coral but it was probably not pleasant. I am glad I wasn’t trying to scuba between the reef and the boat though! Fortunately, we did get to do the next night dive – and it was a blast! We saw long, narrow fish – arrow fish? – and crabs and squids and such.

The most memorable dive was the second to last, #8. Drew and I went diving on our own and Drew found a turtle! He was so cool! Finding Nemo does a really good impression of sea turtles – them being all lackadaisical and carefree. At one point, we petted his shell and even held his flipper while he was eating some coral and all he did was slooooowly turn his head to see what was going on behind him and then sloooowly turn it back. If I was a marine animal, I would be a seat turtle.

Our ocean adventure ended mid-afternoon on the 3rd day. I finished it off with a final snorkel, which was pretty awesome as well. We got back to Cairns and dropped our stuff off at the hostel and then meandered around the city looking for a good dinner. The next day we explored some more, and did some much needed homework. The local Mackers (McD’s) had free wifi, so that worked out really well.

For anyone going to Australia, I definitely recommend Cairns. Not so much for the city itself, but for all the trips/adventures you can take from that city. You can go scuba diving, snorkeling, rainforest hiking, bungee jumping, sky diving, and a whole lot more! Even though the visibility was a little low for scuba diving (meaning you couldn’t see as far as you typically can on the GBR), the scuba trip was AMAZING! On a clear weekend, I can’t imagine how brilliant everything would look. Maybe one day I’ll go back to Australia. If so, I’m definitely going back to the Great Barrier Reef!

If you don't let the outback bug you...

The outback is really nice, if you don't let it bug you too much. This past weekend, I rented a car with Drew, Katherine, and Hannah and we drove to the outback, equipped with a couple of tents and the linens from our hotel rooms. We saw flocks of emus just chilling by the road. We saw mobs of kangaroos bouncing around in the fields. And we experienced a small taste of the bugs of the outback. We spent the second night at Lightning Ridge, and there were a LOT of mossies! Mosquitoes, loving termed 'mossies' by aussies, are in abundance in the outback. Luckily, my bites are just red dots at the moment, but Katherine and Hannah are suffering the most. Katherine counted two bites on her left foot this morning. However, the sunsets were gorgeous and the landscape is beautiful too. I had fun, but it's nice to be back in the comfy hotel again!

Aussie, Aussie, Aussie!

Life is REALLY busy! So...I'm not going to write much now. I'll come back later and update, but for now here's just the highlights:

Last Wednesday, I went to the Australia Zoo on a Bio3100 field trip. It was sweet! I petted a koala, laid on a kangaroo, fed an elephant, and touched wombat! busy day

This last weekend was the trip to Cairns to go diving - it was frickin sweet! I scuba dove 9 times, snorkeled for ~3 hours, and touched 2 (!) sea turtles!

I have less than 10 days till I'm back in the US, so it's most definitely crunch time. Tomorrow we have an all day field trip to Lamington Nat'l Park, a tropical rainforest preserve south of Brissie. It looks like it'll be a lot of fun, and best part: I don't have to take any notes! Whoohoo! I leave in 6.5 hours, so time for bed!

Oi, Oi, Oi!

Impromptu

Saturday night, Drew and I received a call from Charity asking us if we would like to go to Moreton Island the next day. Details: We would leave at 6:40am, get picked up from the hotel, take a ferry, go 4-wheel-driving, snorkeling around some wrecks, sand-boarding, and be back by 6:30pm. Total cost for the day: $140 - everything paid for with a lunch provided. Last thing, make the decision in the next ten minutes. ok. After quickly assessing my work-load (i.e. the fact that I had not even begun to study for a test on Tuesday, and that going to the island would completely book my weekend) I decided why the hell not! I mean cyclone Ului was supposed to hit land at 4am, but whatever! I felt like it was the right thing to do, so I said yes. Drew agreed. I learned later that we didn’t have to be ready until 7am – so that was good!

Then I had to make a decision because I already had some plans for Saturday night. I decided to go ahead with my plans and end up studying all day Monday (which by the way, I am not doing at this moment, b/c I'm writing this blog). So Saturday night, I watched Finding Nemo with my buddies while we ate dinner. We have been wanting to watch that movie the entire trip but no one brought it and it costs $22 to buy – ridiculous! However, at brekky we saw on the TV that it was going to play at 6:30pm! Whoohoo! It was great! Then we went pub-crawling, again, b/c it was so much fun the first time. It was a little less busy, but we had a blast anyway! I went to bed around 2:30am.

Woke up at 6:30am, from Drew’s alarm, b/c I set mine for pm. (As a note, I set my alarm before going pub-crawling, so don’t make assumptions ;) I hurried to get ready, woke up Drew, who didn’t wake up to his alarm, and then rushed downstairs. I ran to the ATM to grab some cash, and then caught some breakfast all before 7am! Then we waited, and waited, until finally the bus didn’t come. At 7:20 we called the company who then told us that the bus died, and the tour was therefore cancelled. Ok. SO we had to improvise. We decided we could possibly still make it to the ferry before its 8:30 departure, so we called a cab. We were determined. We figured if we didn’t make the ferry, we were only down about $15 each. The cab driver didn’t know where to go, but thankfully Charity knew the address, and the cab driver plugged it into his GPS. We made it – with God’s help. When we made it to the dock, we figured out we could sign up for a tour there! And they gave us a discount b/c they didn’t have to pick us up from the hotel. So we paid $140 and got on the ferry.

The ferry ride was nice – I slept (except when drinking the free hot chocolate and Timtam they gave us). [Side note: Timtams are delicious. Anyone reading this should buy them at the nearest Target immediately, since they are only selling them in the US until the end of March. As far as I know, Target is the only store selling them. I suggest the original flavor. You’ll find them in the cookie aisle.] Anyway, Moreton Island was really pretty. Our first adventure was snorkeling, and it was excellent! We snorkeled over about 15 wrecks, and we saw a sea turtle! It was laying on the ocean floor as we passed over it and then came up to surface behind us. He was a young turtle, judging by its size (about 3ft length, head included). There were also sooo many fish! And they were beautifully colored! And we got to feed some of them. The guide gave each of us 2 balled up pieces of bread. When you held them underwater, the fish nibbled at your hand to get it. It was fun. We also tried holding the bread between our hands and then catching the fish as they tried to get the bread. I was not successful.

Then we went to a lake that had some therapeutic oil from the rain runoff – I forget what it was called. Regardless of what it was, it felt nice to lay in the lake. The guides said the oils make you younger. I don’t know if that’s true, but I felt younger when I got out! Then we went to a lighthouse and explored. There was a beautiful view of crashing waves, and ocean fading into a horizon mist of clouds! From there we went to “the Desert” which was really sandy. The desert has HUGE sand dunes! IT reminded me of the movie Sahara. We each got a 1x3ft plank of particle board that was finished on one side. This was our sand board. We hiked out to the highest dune – quite a hike uphill in all that sand! And then we got to go sandboarding! It had been sprinkling most of the day, so the sand was wet – not ideal for sand boarding. However, I think we did rather well! I went about 4 times. My last time, I didn’t quite reach the bottom, so I rolled the rest of the way with Aerin. I was pretty sandy by the end. (After each time, you have to hike back up the giant hill – it’s a little discouraging after a couple times.) After that I raced Drew up the hill one last time (he beat me) and then ran down it. It was terrifying! The hill was at about a 70 degree angle, so I felt like I would face-plant the entire way down. But it was fun! If I didn’t have to hike up the monstrous hill again, I would have run down it another time! At this point I was completely covered in sand, and there was no easy way to get it off.

We thankfully had one more stop: the ferry. We drove back to ferry and immediately jumped into the ocean. It felt so good! It was a lot of fun to run up to the water as fast as you could, sprint through the shallows and then dive into the ocean! Once I was de-sanded, I boarded the ferry for the trip back. On the ferry I saw some dolphins and enjoyed another cup of complimentary hot chocolate and timtam. Nom nom! We made it back to the hotel by 6:50, at which time I ate, relaxed, and then slept. Awesome day!

Fun in Brissie

Today was a lot of fun! Seeing as we're not in Heron Island, we have a bit more time to hang out in Brissie. However, we did have an extra day of class - but that wasn't a big deal. After class this morning, I took a nap - a long nap - and it was wonderful! Then I made plans with some friends and we went to dinner at a jazz performance. It turned out the food was gone by the time we got there but it was nice to relax, chat, and enjoy the music on the grass. The venue had set up lawn chairs and blankets with pillows for the viewers to lay on. Then, we went to a ferriswheel to ride, but it was a little too pricey so we got some good at a local chinese stand and watched a spray-painter. He was really talented! He used spray paint to paint a portrait of a lady standing nearby. Then, we went to this open area where they play salsa music every Friday night, and everyone dances in the street. It was a lot of fun - reminded me of Sydney. Then I tried my hand at the slots again, and went back to the hotel to watch a movie with some friends. We (Tiffany, Jourdan, Matt, and I) ended up watching I Love You Man. It was a wonderful night!


Since we now have a free weekend, we're going to spend it exploring Brisbane. Tomorrow, the plan is to go to a museum and then some festival. On sunday, we may go to the koala sanctuary, where they let you hold a koala!

Current news about Ului is that it will hardly affect our diving trip! Thank you God! The cyclone has dropped to a level 2, and will pass south of Cairns, which is good because the north side of a cyclone creates less waves.