Sydney, oh Sydney

I have started school, and work. Oh bummer. The age of no responsibilities has past. Here are some of the other photos from our trip to leave you with.

ps. I wrecked my camera so there won't be any pics for awhile

This is Airlie Beach Lagoon. You can't swim in the ocean around Airlie Beach because of the tide and the stingers, so they built this crazy lagoon/chlorine pool. Pretty. However, while admiring this place we got hit by a very intense rain storm. All in good fun...

We do wish you were here. Thank you Pink Floyd

Noosa Heads: very pretty little resorty type town. Biggest houses we've seen yet. Lots of surfing too!

Crikey! Had to visit one of the most widely known Aussie icon, the Australian Zoo, Steve Irwin's project.

So I promise I will post photos of the house soon as per request. Thanks for reading and much will come later. Cheers all!

The Whitsundays

I think I have found my heaven.
I think I have seen my future.

I'm going to go out, make a whole lot of money and then buy a sailboat and sail around the world.

Sounds fanciful? Well thats what I spent the last four days of my Queensland journey doing. We started out towards the Whitsunday Islands from Airlie Beach and were greeted at our resting spot by a very friendly dolphin! He continually swam around our boat making us oohhh and ahhhh. Amazing (Warning: I will use that word alot). Then in the morning the crew got up ridiculously early (4:30am) and began to sail. When we surfaced around 3hr later we were in the middle of the ocean with only tiny specs of islands in the vast distance. We found ourselves 40miles off the coast and this is where we were diving. Now I'm not afraid of much, but the things that make my heart race all reside in the dark abyss of water. And however calm it was still rather dark water. Then the tide began to go down, my hear rate with it. The bottom of the blue-green water began to appear, and we dove 24m down. This brought us face to face with unbelievable corral, fish you think only exist in aquariums, and caverns, which our resident diver Shawn took us manouvering through - intimidating when you have an extra 8inches of height strapped to your back.
I should mention now that to save considerable confusion later that our boat was lovingly named "Spank Me"
So the scuba diving was one of the coolest things I've every done, and after half an hour of turtles, wobbigongs (which measured in at 2.5m and Shawn called "a small shark") and every colour under the sun we made our way back up to the boat, where we took a little rest and then went snorkeling. By lunch time, the tide was down and you could see the corral from the top of the water - it was like land was slowly surfacing while we were still in the middle of nowhere. After we headed back intowards the islands, found our place to stop right near Whitehaven Beach, and had supper and some delicious hard lemonade. There were 22 people on the boat, not including the crew of 4, and they were all fantastic - we had a lot of fun having a few drinks and watching the sun go down!!
The second day, we went hiking over to Whitehaven Beach which is very beautiful and will be on any postcard or picture of the Whitsundays. And the water was unbelievably warm! Then we made our way to a different island where we got back in the water for another, longer dive. Again, saw some amazing things that words would not even be close to describing. Then, because the weather was riculously beautiful and windless and being on a sailboat, that means no sailing, our skipper Gary took us to Long Beach Island Resort. The whole ship went to the bar, had way too many drinks and then went back to the boat, where we started a fabulous dance party and drank the night away!
The next day there were some rather green faces....
but nothing another snorkelling trip wouldnt fix. By 11am we were heading back to land, where we hopped in our gas-guzzling tiny red hyundai and drove the 11hr to Hervey Bay, then another 4hr to Brisbane, caught the 2pm bus to Casino than the 7pm train to Sydney, which got us home around 7am yesterday.
Phew.
So ya, found my heaven aboard a sailboat with amazing people, great food and a whole "ship"load of fun. It is definately going on my recomendation list for anyone coming this way (the list is getting rather long by now, but very very stellar stuff)

umm, so ya, now I'm back in the city and starting school tomorrow. enough said on that subject. moving on...

I have a job. Both Kristine and I. We're working at a little Organic Cafe called Size Matters. Between the both of us we have full time hours so its working out perfectly!

Hope you all are doing great and I would love love love to hear from you. So drop me a quick line just so I feel connected and not completely oblivious to all the fabulous things you all are doing. So please, WRITE ME! I thought everyone liked to talk about themselves. haha

Cheers all and will chat soon!

Brisbane - Hervey Bay - Fraser Island - Rockhampton - Airlie Beach

This is the Fraser Island Highway. Pretty wicked if you ask me. In this particular picture we are racing the tide and trying to stay out of the waves.
Our Campground. Hard life. HAHAHA

Gorgeously warm freshwater lake located in the middle of ridiculously big sand dunes.

The Maheno Shipwreck.

Our transportation of choice for the two days. This bus believe it on not made it through extremely narrow sand roads and even through rouge creek beds.

The Flora and Fauna

Hey all,

Thanks for reading this and please leave messages on what you are up to!

We took the overnight train from Sydney to Brisbane. It was occupied by five rather shady, obnoxious and drunk passengers, so the sleep was minimal on the overnight train. When we got to Brisbane we had planned on staying 2 nights, but ended up booking the plans for the next week and a half, renting a car and immediately taking off to Hervey Bay. That was on Tuesday. We stopped in Maroochydore, the home of Steve Irwin and took some pictures of the Australia Zoo. Then headed to Noosa Heads which is the coolest resort town we've come across (only later to be challenged by Airlie Beach). Then we made our way to Hervey Bay where we checked in and packed our bags to head to Fraser Island the next morning.

Thursday - we got on the tour bus at 8am. It was a big bus, like a Greyhound, which we thought would take us to the ferry. Wrong - it was our vehicle for the next two days. This machine and our tour guide Fritz (who was the most cheerful man and made the trip even better) boarded the ferry at a tiny little dock and then exited the ferry at the island. However the exit ramp was higher than the water so into the water and up the ramp and to the parking lot we went. Did not stop there however - we went on through to the "roads". They were barely as wide as the bus, but Fritz manouvered the four wheeler no problem. So we bounced through sand roads on a sand island, through a rainforest anchored in sand, so a little resort town and then the beach. Then we turned onto the Fraser Island highway where even more sights awaited. This highway runs around the island and slowly disappears during high tide - its simply the beach. We checked out the outline of the island, and then headed to Cathedral Beach, where we spent the night in great tents that I think we should install at the cabin. Also had an awesome dinner and even some kangaroo!

Friday - we woke up and continued our tour of the island - we climbed a sand dune to a fresh water lake that was 25 degrees and beautifully clear. No seaweed or anything! Just catfish about half a meter long. We made our way to another lake that was slightly acidic apparently - it has been filled over the years by rain water only. Crystal clear and a crazy teal colour - we weren't planning on going swimming but a rain storm hit and we were so wet that we thought may as well do it now! With the day nearly over, we left the island and made our way back to the hostel in Hervey Bay

Saturday - We drove to Rockhampton to break up the drive to Airlie Beach. We found ourselves in a "hole" (warned by one of the guys on our Fraser Island tour). "Rocky" is a cross between a small southern USA town and an Aussie middle-of-nowhere redneck hub. It is 100 Mile on Ozzie-steriods - 50,000 people live in this beef capitol of OZ. It is a place one should pass through on the way to more sun, but unfortunately it is the only and thus most popular stop between Hervey Bay and Airlie Beach. The hostel was iffy, the neighbourhood sketchy, the retail shops closed at 4pm on a Saturday. We ate at Sizzlers, which I would warn against - kind of like a glorified Perkins. Yet the locals apparently frequent the place for special occasions such as Valentines Day. Overall, it was a disappointement that only succeeded in one thing - reminding me of Prince George - Congratulations Rocky, you're the largest populated redneck town in the East, complete with drunks on the corner at 3pm.

Sunday - we left Rocky like a bat out of Hell, and headed for Airlie Beach - a cute little resorty town that was as picturesque as Noosa Heads with a completely different feeling. Thanks Whitsundays for showing us how gorgeous Queensland can be!

Next on the agenda - sailing the Whitsundays, diving, relaxing, eating and drinking while doing so.
Then back to the big city to start school and my newly acquired job!
Cheers all! "Hope yous going great"

Check that off the list!

So we have been in Sydney for a little over a week. We have found a place to live, moved in, checked out the neighbourhood, de-cockroached our new flat, gone to the beach, got
our diving liscences, toured the uni, the city and the harbours, gotten sunburned.....


A pretty succcessful I week I do believe.


A little more detail? Ok. Kristine and I found a completely furnished flat - completely furnished. I mean beds, couches, tv, plates, forks, hangers, everything. We bought the necessities and bug killer, as the roaches just loved a vacated place. They are mostly gone now. Don't be too grossed out, they are apparently very difficult to avoid here. It never gets cold enough to kill them off. But we are living on the second floor of a terrace house that is over 100 years old. It is in the oldest part of Sydney called the Rocks - its the first place settled here. Very cool. The Harbour Bridge runs nearly overhead, which is pretty neat. And we can see the Opera House in the distance. You can see water from the front window, as well as the back windows, as we are on Millers Point, the little jetty of land that seperates Darling Harbour from Circular Quay (the harbour the Opera House is in). We completely lucked out with this accomodation. Pretty much unheard of so we have not one single complaint. Even the obloxiously loud boat horns have found their place.

This is a view from the front windowThis is looking towards Darling Harbour at the side of our building (back is to the Opera House)Because we found ourselves in Sydney for a decent amount of time, we decided to take our PADI Open Water Divers Liscence! So now all three of us (and Anders from Denmark) are now certified Scuba Divers! Don't we look amazing in our gear. Its alot lighter once you're in the water! So now, when we head up to the Great Barrier reef we can independently dive up to 18m. Not that we will go by ourselves - definately will go with a guide. Lets just say we all have something underwater that we are not a fan of. Kristine doesn't like her sharks. Kev isn't a fan of sea urchins and I still hyperventilate a little around sea weed forests. The water up north will be a lot clearer than what we learned to dive in. We dove at Bare Island, where the visibility was only 2-3m. So basically you follow the flippers of the person infront of you. The vis up north will be about 10m which will be so amazing!This is where we dove at. Its called Bare Island, and was actually used in Mission Impossible 2. Its a navy base built into the rock of the island. Pretty cool looking. Our first to dives we did on the right side of the bridge, the second day we dove on the left side. The second day was definately better - we were able to swim with schools of fish, rock fish, nearly landed on a sting ray and saw some Rock Shark eggs. Very cool and slightly terrifying, but very very cool. So we've been in Sydney for just over a week, and as our Australian record shows, thats about as long as we stay anywhere for a continuous period. So we're heading north tomorrow, to the hot hot hot Great Barrier Reef (kind weird to be going north to the hotter weather!). We train it to Brisbane tomorrow, stay there for a few days, then hopefully make our way to Fraser Island, further north to Noosa and Rockhampton and Airlie Beach, followed by some sailing and diving around the Whitsundays! Then back down to Byron Bay before heading back to Sydney and started school....right school. That is why I'm here....

You can also now leave messages on my blog, I believe. Kev changed the settings. You can also check out his blog, he has some amazing pictures too! chubey.blogspot.com

Hope all is going great back at home! It was good to talk to the fam on Saturday - miss you all! And a big shout out to Uncle Gregg, who is now as healthy as every!!!! So happy for you!

Cheers all and can't wait to hear from you! Keep me posted!