I have found my new love.

Sailing.

Last week Dan and I spent 3 days and 3 nights on a boat sailing the Whitsunday Islands.  It was actually the most amazing few days ever.  We were on this boat with 14 other passengers and 4 crew.  We all slept in bunks below the deck, but our bunk was just under a large hatch in the deck.  The hatch was maybe 3 feet by 4 feet and we left it open at night so it was basically like sleeping on the boat deck under the stars.  It was so amazing.  The whole 3 days were spent snorkeling, sailing and wandering around on whichever island the skipper decided to go to. 

The snorkeling was so amazing.  I was a bit of a baby because the water was cold so I whinged a bit about it, but I always got in.  We saw tons of fish, a sea turtle, some jelly fish.  Dan even saw a sting ray.  We saw these blue crabs that seemed to be trapped in small pools when the tides went out.  There were so many of them that when they all moved together it actually looked like the ground was moving. We saw some snakes as well when we were walking on one of the islands.  Luckily Dan spotted them because I definitely wouldn’t have seen them.  That island that we were on had beaches that were made of silicon.  It had something to do with the ocean being really deep there and the silicon comes out of the ground.  It was really great for exfoliating!  It also made the sea water taste weird. 

The trip was a bit gross though because we were on a boat and there aren’t showers, we went from Friday morning until Monday night when we got back to Adelaide.  By that point Dan and I had salt permanently imbedded in our skin.  Dan’s hair could basically be molded into any shape and mine only moved in sheets!  Needless to say, showering was the first thing we did when we got back. 

 

When Dan first got here we stayed in Adelaide for a few days.  I tried to take him up to the Conservation Park that’s near Adelaide.  Somehow our timing was message up and we couldn’t catch a connecting bus and ended up walking for ages down a road and when we finally got there we only had barely an hour before the bus home left and we had to catch it because there was no way we were walking the whole back again. 

That night I took Dan out and I made him try a food that’s famous here in Adelaide.  We had whats called an AB.  Its just chips with gyro meat, tomato sauce, that white sauce that goes on gyros, and some other sauces on top.  It’s something that most people tend to only eat in the middle of the night on the way home from the pubs.  At that point it tastes really good, but most people don’t eat it any other time. 

We also went on a wine tour that weekend, which was fun.  There were a bunch of young people on the tour which was good.  There was a group of Canadians though that were so obnoxious that I couldn’t stand them and by the end of the day I’m fairly sure they knew I didn’t like them. 

 Before we went out to the Whitsundays, we spent a few days in the Gold Coast staying in Surfers Paradise.  We were meant to go surfing while we were there, but there had been some really bad storms the week before which had torn up the beaches and left heaps of debris in the water.  The storms had only been a few days before us so it was still pretty windy which made it hard to lay at the beach because we froze. 

The one day we decided to rent a car and just drive the entire Gold Coast.  We went Zorbing.  It is definitely the most random thing I have ever done in my life.  We got put inside this giant hamster ball thing, but there was one inside another.  There was a smaller one suspended inside a larger one, but the small one was big enough to fit Dan and I when we were sitting down.  After Dan and I climbed in, they fill the small ball up with a few inches of water and pushed us down a hill.  We basically just tumbled and rolled around uncontrollably for the minute or so that it took us to get down the hill.  It was so much fun!  A bit crazy, a bit of a waste of money for the 1 minute it took to get down the hill, but it was really funny! 

We then drove down to these rock pools where we had lunch.  It was just a river that because of the placement of the rocks created natural pools with a little waterfall.  We stayed there for a while even though the water was icy cold.  Dan got in a few times, but I couldn’t.  I jumped in a few times off the rocks, but it was so cold I couldn’t stand it!

After a while we drove back up and went to a beach for a while.  It was a beach for surfing so there was just heaps of surfers everywhere and we were a little bit jealous, but we did some swimming in one of the channels and tried building a sand castle!  We also discovered the sand crabs that were really tiny and white.  They would dig little holes in the sand and the sand that come out of the holes was in perfect little balls.  It was really weird, but not as weird as the ones we saw in the Whitsundays.

The whole trip was so amazing.  We probably could have planned things a bit better.  We ran into a few problems, had a some close calls at missing flights or trains.  Amazingly, it all worked somehow.  

Adelaide wins as some of the strangest weather I have ever experienced.  It is getting into the fall here, which means cold and rain.  Luck for me though, it doesnt get really cold here.  I havent seen a real winter jacket being sold anywhere and the buildings dont even have heating because it doesnt get cold enough to use it.  My room gets really cold at night though, so I wish they did have heat.  Adelaide gets a bit colder than some places though because we get the Artic winds.  This just means that I have to have layers because as I'm walking to Uni in the sun I get so warm and then all of a sudden a freezing cold gust of wind will come along and I have to put on 2 jackets.

Last week we had tons of rain.  There were some pretty bad storms because a lot of the beaches were really torn up, but it wasn't like storms at home.   There was no thunder and lightning and the sky never even got really dark.   

Has anyone else ever taken a holiday from their holiday?  Momma and I got breakfast delivered to our room while laying in bed at the hotel and laid by the pool everyday in Cairns.  The week before however, was a different story.  My mom got here last Sunday and she was pretty jetlagged so we just hung around in Adelaide, shopping and going to the beach on Sunday and Monday.  Tuesday morning we had an early start for our adventure to Kangaroo Island. 

            We had to get a cab at 6am to the bus station, where we got picked up by our tour guide for the trip, in a cramped little van.  We then drove for an hour and a half through the Adelaide Hills to get to ferry that we took for 45 minutes to Kangaroo Island.  We then packed ourselves back up into the little van and headed off on our two day adventure. 

            After some stops at different look out points, we headed to Seal Bay, which is exactly how it sounds.  The whole beach is covered with seals.  A tour guide took us down onto the beach where we came really close to some and we even got to watch a momma seal teaching the baby seal how to swim!  Afterwards, we headed to the Little Sahara for sand boarding.  I climbed straight up one of the sand dunes and it is way harder than it looks.  I will never again complain about walking up a hill because for every step up these dunes, I slid back down half way.  The slide back down wasn’t nearly as exciting as I thought it would be either.  Basically, it was like sledding down a hill, but if you fall off you roll around in sand until there isn’t an inch of you not covered in sand. 

            When we made it to the cottage we were staying in , we were a bit surprised.  From the outside it was really cute.  It was in a really remote area and had a campfire out front, but the inside was so gross!  The place smelled so bad and it was so dirty.  Im pretty sure it hasn’t been cleaned since it was built.  The beds were pretty gross too.  Mom and I washed all of our clothes as soon as we got back cause we definitely thought we were going to get bed bugs.  Luckily this was only for one night and we didn’t spend too much time inside.  After dark we got to go out looking for penguins.  Luckily we got to see a few hiding in the bushes, but the best thing was definitely the stars.  There were more stars than I have ever seen in my life.  They continued all the way down to the horizons on all sides making it look like we were in a dome.  We could see the Milky Way too which was so amazing! 

            The next day we went to go see some of the other sites on KI like the Remarkable Rocks and stuff.  We got to stop at  a koala park too and momma and I found a koala in a tree.  It was really low to the ground and it was awake, which is awesome.  Koalas are only awake for 4 hours everyday, the rest of the day is spent sleeping.  Also there are hundreds of types of eucalyptus tree and koalas only like to eat 20 or so.  The ones they eat are drugs so the koalas get really high from eating and then sleep even more.  I think that’s so funny!!

            A few days after this we went on our holiday to Cairns.  We stayed in the Novotel Cairns Oasis Resort.  It was so great to stay in a hotel since I have become very used to hostels.  The bed was definitely the most comfortable bed I have slept in, in a long time.  One of the first things we noticed were the huge bats that hung in trees near our hotel.  They were the biggest bats I’ve ever seen and a little bit creepy.  Our first day there Mom found a house boat for sale.  I think she should have gotten it.  I mean living on a house boat in Cairns, Australia sounds pretty great to me.  We also went to the botanical gardens because I had read about a rainforest walk that I wanted to do.  As it turned out, it was boardwalk a few feet wide and only a few inches above a swamp.  The boards were kind of squeaky and there were no handrails to hold on to.Mom was convinced that a crocodile was going to come out.

 Cairns is one of the main cities to get to the Great Barrier Reef, so the second day we did a tour out to the outer reef.  Mom made me wear a lycra suit in the water that made me look like an alien.  It was bright blue with a hood and mittens.  That paired with the goggles, snorkel and fins, we all looked really weird.  Snorkeling was so amazing though.  Heaps of fish were swimming around the platform where you get into the water off the pontoon.  The fish were crazy, from tiny orange and yellow ones to a blue and green one that was almost the size of me.  I saw tons within the coral everywhere.  I got really upset though because I kept running into these two other people who kept touching the coral.  They would break off pieces and touch them.  It made me really angry because the Great Barrier Reef is a World Heritage area and coral is living thing. 

            Mom and I didn’t do much else while in Cairns.  We mostly went shopping and laid around by the pool.  One morning we even got breakfast delivered to the room!  The one night while we were out shopping, we watched as these crazy birds flew in flocks and dive bombed in front of cars as they were driving by.  It was so crazy , like suicidal birds!  While we were in one of the shops, one of the birds flew in through the door and smashed into the window behind the girl working there.  The bird got stuck between the window and a picture frame.  The girl working there ran out and got a random guy off the street to help get the bird unstuck.  Between the crazy birds, the bats and the threat of crocodiles, we had quite the adventurous week. 

             I was really glad to have Momma here for a while.  It was funny though.  She let me take care of all the travel arrangements and planning.  When we would go somewhere, like the hotel, the people working there would look to her for confirmation, but I was the one who knew what was going on an what we were doing.  I was really sad when Momma went home, but the rest of the time will go by so fast.

For the last week I have been really hung up on the fact that here instead of gummi bears, they have jelly babies.  The little jellies are shaped like babies and I think it is the weirdest thing.  Who would want to eat babies?

 In Australia, Tasmania is the butt of most jokes.  Since it is isolated from the rest of the country, people say that everyone there is related.  Most of the jokes have to do with people having two heads, one tooth or just being bogan (hillbilly).  The first person I met there was the shuttle driver from the airport to the hostel and he was definitely bogan.  When he smiled and only had one tooth I wanted to laugh so hard because it was exactly what everyone had told me.  Luckily, every other person I met there was normal.  

I flew in to Hobart on Friday and immediately made my way over to the Cadbury chocolate factory to meet up with Allie and two of her friends.  I hadn't eaten all day, so I proceeded to eat my weight in free chocolate and then felt incredibly sick afterwards, but it was really fun.  They have a store in the factory where you can buy all the Cadbury chocolates for really cheap.  Of course I bought a ton and have eaten half of it already.  I also decided to buy this giant box of Cadbury Raisin Brunch Bars for $12, thinking that the box was filled with individual boxes of the bars.  When we got outside and opened it, it was just a giant bag filled with unwrapped bars.  All four of us ate these bars all weekend and somehow I still ended up bringing home like 100!

I also got to drive on the wrong side of the road in Tassie.  Saturday morning we rented a car to drive to Cradle Mountain.  I was the first one to drive and ended up driving the whole 5 hours to Cradle Mountain.  The roads were crazy small and curvy.  It was a little bit scary, but we made it and driving on the wrong side of the road is much easier than I thought it would be.  My biggest problem was that everything in the car is flipped, so I kept hitting the windshield wipers when I was trying to use my turn signal.  We also saw some sort of road kill, about every 10 minutes.  It was pretty gross.  We were also really sad because we wanted to see a Tasmanian devil, but we didnt see any live ones.  We also thought it was so funny that all of the big towns marked on the map were not big towns at all.  We would think, okay we are coming up on a big place and there would be a few restaurants and buildings and then thats it.  Even Hobart, as one of their biggest cities, was not a real city.

By the time we got to Cradle Mountain, it was around 2 pm.  It was really cold and we didnt have time to do a really long hike, so we just did a 2 hour hike around one of the lakes.  It was one of the most beautiful places I have ever been.  I actually texted one of my friends from Tassie and told her that I was going to move in with her because I loved it so much.  We were driving back to Hobart when it got dark and the stars were so amazing.  Earlier last week I had gone to the beach with a few people at 6am to swim and look at the stars.  It is weird that theres different stars in the sky.  I kept looking for the big dipper.  Not being near a big city though, the stars were absolutely amazing.  

Sunday we drove down to Bruny Island just off the South East corner of Tassie.  Again, we kept laughing at how small everything was.  One of the big places to see on the island was Blighs Museum.  The whole museum was about the size of our living room at home.  We did get to see a penguin though.  We mostly just drove around the island since it was raining and really cold out.  Back in Hobart, we went on this ghost tour of one of the old penitentiaries.  It was pretty dumb, but the scariest part was the fact that the guy giving the tour looked EXACTLY like one of the photos of a prisoner names Isaac Daly.  He might have been the only ghost there.

To start, I ate kangaroo.  Last week we had it in the dining hall for dinner one night.  It was just a kangaroo steak and it tasted a lot like regular steak, but we had it with a berry glaze sauce.  It was surprisingly good!  In the last week, I have also tried sticky date pudding, which is a very common Australian dessert and Tim Tams, which are cookies that are more addicting that Oreo’s. 

 This last weekend got off to a very eventful start.  Wednesday nights are pub nights at college, so pretty much everyone goes out.  I made the mistake of staying out until 3:30 am when I had to get up at 5 am to catch a flight to Sydney.  Needless to say, I over slept and missed my flight.  A few hours of crying to the lady that works at the front desk and a lot of money later, I was on a flight to Sydney. 

Since Allie goes to University of Wollongong, which is about an hour or so from Sydney, I had to then take a train all the way out there.  This meant taking a short train from the airport to Wolli Creek and then an hour long train from Wolli Creek to Fairy Meadow.  By the time I finally got there, I was so excited to Allie and Craig at the train station.  It was like the next best thing to being home.  Sadly, I didn’t get to see much of Fairy Meadow since Thursday night we just went out to dinner and hung out in Allie’s apartment with some friends and Friday we caught the train back into the city. 

In Sydney we checked into our hostel and then went to go see some of the big sites.  We walked to the harbour to see the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Opera House.  We then went into China Town to have dinner, but it was crazy cause all through China Town were people selling things.  This was at night, when it was dark, there were tables of clothes, jewelry, watches, all right down the center between restaurants. 

On Saturday, Craig left to go home around 11 and Allie and I began our adventure.  She has this Lonely Planet travel guide called Walking in Australia with all kinds of hikes throughout Australia.  There is this one hike in Boudi National Park outside of Sydney, in Killcare, that we decided we wanted to do.  We had called to check out the bus times and they said there was only 2 buses heading out that way on Saturday and that there was only one back into the city, but that we could catch a cab or walk a ways to catch a different bus.  So Allie and I took a train to Woy Woy where we got on a bus heading to Killcare.  We asked the bus driver if he went near Putty Beach, where our hike started, and he said he could get us pretty close.  The driver went outside of his normal route to get us close to Putty Beach, but as we were getting off the bus he told us that there were no more buses heading back that day and that a cab would be around $50 and handed us a map of the area.  Allie and I are both thinking that we would get to the entrance to the national park and there would be some sort of information center that would help us figure out a way to get back.  After walking a ways down the beach, we realized that there was no information center and we didn’t have the number for a cab company or anything.  We wandered into a camp grounds and found a sign with some numbers on it and started calling some information numbers trying to find a way back.  At this point, we are both already a bit hungry because it was now 2 o’clock and we hadn’t eaten since 10 am.  We had also assumed there would be some shops or something near the entrance where we could get some food, but again, we were wrong.  After finally calling the non-emergency police number and asking them for the number for a cab, we scheduled a cab pick up at the entrance to the park at 7:30 pm, even though we didn’t exactly know where the entrance was. 

Already a bit hungry, we set out on this hike.  It was a really amazing hike, but it was basically an endless staircase.  There were areas where the stairs were so steep, it was like impossible to get up and some places where it was hard to even see the path.  In one place we lost the path for a little while.  The hike was called the Coastal Walk, which was completely appropriate since every little while the path would take us to the cliffs looking out over the water and then back in to the forest.  One of the places along the hike was called Maitland Bay.  It was one of the most beautiful beaches I have ever seen.  It was kind of hidden and seemed as though most of the people there had gotten there by boat. 

It took us 2.5 hours to get to the “end” of the hike.  However, this meant that we then had to walk back the way we came.  We were so hungry and tired that we basically sprinted back.  Somehow, we made it back to the start in 1.5 hours.  We were so hungry at this point and we had over an hour before the cab was coming that we just started walking out towards where we thought the town might be.  We wandered aimlessly through a neighborhood for a while until we ran into a few guys and asked them where the nearest place to eat was.  Luckily, it was just down the street.  At then end of the street was like 2 restaurants, a liquor store (bottle-o as its called here), and a post office.  Both of us ordered a Cajun-chicken burgers.  They were probably the best burgers I have ever had.  It was Cajun-chicken, tomato, lettuce, beets, pineapple, and a ranch type sauce.  I would never have normally tried all those things together, but it was so delicious.  When the cab came to where we were, we were so relieved to find it was only a $27 ride, not $50.  After another hour train ride from Woy Woy to Sydney, we were both so exhausted that showered and basically just went to bed. 

Sunday was beach day and I was so excited.  We went for a run and did a little bit of shopping before hand, so we didn’t get to Bondi Beach until after 1pm.  Bondi has to be one of the most crowded beaches I have ever seen, except maybe in Hawaii.  The waves were huge and there were people everywhere.  It looked so much like a movie to me.  There were the lifeguards everywhere and the surfers off on a separate part of the beach.  Allie and I were in the water for a while even though it was freezing cold.  By the end of the day, we were both super exhausted again. After Allie headed back to Fairy Meadow, I pretty much went straight to bed to make sure that I wouldn’t miss my flight in the morning…

I tried vegemite today.   I t was really disgusting.  I felt kind of like I was going to throw up.  My roommate and I made a deal that if I tried vegemite, she would try a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.   So this afternoon she spread some vegemite on a cracker and made me eat it.  It really was very disgusting.   I was told by a few other people that its not a good way to eat it so I reckon I might give it a second chance in the morning.  Tons of people eat a very, very thin spread of it on toast with butter, while other people eat it on toast with the soft boiled eggs they make here for breakfast.  Another girl told me the best way to eat it is with cheese and tomato on toast.  We'll see how many times I'll try it.  It was a pretty bad first experience.

At dinner, I made my roommate eat peanut butter and jelly.  She hated it.  She said it was way to sweet and went around telling other people to try it.  Most people wouldn't and said it was gross, but there were a few people who had tried it before and said they liked it.  It's weird to think that they dont eat pb & j here.  At home everyone has it.  It's like an American staple food as a kid.

I also tried a dim sim today.  They sell these in pretty much every take away restaurant around.  I dont really know what was in them because the girl who let me try hers didn't really know either.  It was similar to an egg roll with meat inside.  It wasn't all that good, but not as bad as vegemite.  I got to talking with some people and I now have a whole list of foods I have to try including:

sticky date pudding

lamington

tim tams 

mars red bar

some sort of noodle thing I can't remember the name of, but from what they said it sounds kind of like our ramen noodles only with sauce instead of broth

meat pie

chilli sauce

there was heaps more, but I can't remember it all right now.  Mostly what I want right now is some regular cheese.  At home, the most standard cheese is either American or cheddar, I think at least.  Here, the only sliced cheese I have seen for sandwiches is this white cheese that I have never had before and they use it for everything.  Its the same cheese that is in all the food, its in the sandwich bar, its used for nachos.  It's pretty good cheese, but I am just used to more variety I guess.  I have not seen any other kind of cheese here other than like more expensive cheese blocks.  I would really like a good grilled cheese sandwich made with American cheese.  The one day we were eating tomato soup with dinner and someone was saying that they liked bread and cheese with heir tomato soup.  Another girl then said that she loved to toast them together and everyone was like "wow, that sounds so good!"  I just laughed and told them that grilled cheese and tomato soup is another American favorite.  

The other thing I have been craving is bacon.  At home I love bacon, but here it is really gross.  It is really fatty and it is always really chewy.  I need mine to be super crispy.  Luckily, I said bacon was my favorite food during a get to know you game in one of my classes last week and some guy told me about this specific bacon that he buys.  He said after he visited the states, this is the only bacon he will eat.  I reckon tomorrow, I might go to the store and get it.

I am officially of legal drinking age in the US.  Not that it will matter much for a while, but it is still pretty cool.  I didn't have the normal 21st birthday either.  Thursday morning Aarika, Lisa, Dan, Jeff, and myself headed to Melbourne for the long weekend ( Monday was a public holiday in Adelaide for a horse race, the Adelaide Cup).  Luckily, its super short flight to Melbourne from Adelaide, only around an hour.  We got to our hostel super early though, so we had to wait around to check in.  It was pretty cold and rainy, so we headed to the Immigration Museum for a while.  The boys hated it, but I though it was pretty interesting.  After we all navigated our way back to the hostel, with only getting slightly lost, we went to this really cool bar to have dinner.  The inside of the bar was dark, but it was lit up by fixtures that had pictures and patterns all over them so they cast a strange glow and one section even had Christmas lights hanging from the ceiling.  Half of the bar was filled with couches and coffee tables and the other half had regular tables and chairs.  The decorations were so crazy.  One wall had doll heads lined up along the top and every wall had random picture frames, knick-knacks, and mirrors.  It was the craziest bar I have ever been to, but also the coolest.  Plus, they had $4 pizzas!

 Friday we booked a bus tour of The Great Ocean Road, which is a road that was carved into the sides of the cliffs along the coast east of Melbourne.  The road curves and bends with huge hills and drops while looking out over the ocean.  It was a gorgeous drive, but our bus driver was a little bit crazy.  He drove so fast that every car in front of us would pull over and let us pass by.  We stopped at an Aboriginal Cultural center where we got to listen a guy play the didgeridoo.  A didgeridoo is an Aboriginal instrument created by termites.  Making the instrument is just finding a tree limb that has been hollowed out naturally by termites, cutting the limb off as the desired length.  They’re so cool because each one is different and creates a different sound.  Most of the sound is actually created with the mouth by moving your tongue and having different pressures of air in your cheeks.  Apparently, these can only be played by men and Nicole Kidman recently got in trouble for playing one!  I took videos of the guy who played for us because it sounds so awesome.  It actually doesn’t sound like a wood instrument at all.  It sounded almost electronic.  I really enjoyed it. 

 We had a few other smaller stops along the road including a wildlife park to see koalas and for a rainforest walk.  We also stopped at Bells Beach, which is apparently one of the greatest surf spots in the world.  Too bad I haven’t learned yet…

 One of the main attractions of The Great Ocean Road is seeing the 12 Apostles.  These are limestone stacks that are naturally formed by the ocean.  The waves wear away at the base of the cliff creating a small inlet, until the cliff can’t be supported anymore and a sheet of rock falls.  The directions of the waves have left these stacks disconnected from the mainland.  Eventually, the stacks crumble away which is why there are actually only 9 of the 12 left.  We stopped at Loch Ard Gorge and London Bridge, two other natural tourist spots on the coast.  The Loch Ard Gorge is an inlet with caves that has a famous old story of a ship wreck to go along with it.  The London Bridge on the other hand has newer story of a couple getting stuck out on the limestone stack when the bridge collapsed. 

 

On the way back from the tour, we were passing through the city and saw the Crown Casino, which is the largest casino in the southern hemisphere.  We decided to give it a shot.  I have never been to a casino before, so at first I stuck to the slot machines with Lisa.  Unfortunately, I did not do very well on those.  A little while later, Dan decided to show me how to play the Big Wheel and after one bet, I was hooked.  I turned 21 sitting at a table, losing all my money over the next 3 hours.  Despite the fact that I lost, I had a really fun night.  I can honestly say I am much happier that we were there rather than out drinking!

 Aarika, Lisa, and I of course spent the next day shopping.  In the morning, we dragged the guys to Victoria Market, the largest market in Melbourne where I discovered my new favorite food.  Burek.  It’s a Bosnian food which is basically a fried dough filled with cheese or meat.  It reminded me a lot of a pierogi, except much thicker and it more of a pie form.  It is definitely the best thing I have eaten since being here!  Of course, we bought all kinds of other things at the market as well.  The boys decided they were sick of shopping and decided to go to the IMAX while us girls went to shop in Fitzroy, a more bohemian district.  It was a weird combination of expensive stores and thrift shops.  Some places were both in one.  

 The Moomba Festival was going on the whole time we were there, so Saturday night we figured we would check it out.  Strangely, it was an alcohol free event, which just surprised us.  Festivals like that at home always have beer tents and Aussies love drinking a whole lot more.  It was not very exciting, but we did go back on Monday for the water shows, which were really cool.

 On Sunday evening, I saw one of the coolest things I have ever seen in my whole life.  On Phillip Island, near Melbourne, there is a penguin march every evening just after dark.  We got to sit on the beach and watch these mini penguins come in on the waves from the day of eating, to go burrow in the hills.  These tiny penguins would come, a few at a time, out onto the sand only to immediately head back into the water.  After a while, they started coming out and walking up the beach into the hills.  There were boardwalks built right along the paths the penguins take up the hills.  We stood along the boardwalk and watched group after group of tiny penguins waddle up the hill.  We were only a few feet from them which was so incredible.  Sadly, we weren’t allowed to take pictures since the flashing scared the penguins.  I tried to sneak a video of it, but it didn’t come out.  Watching these penguins come out of the ocean and being so close to them, I actually felt like I was in the Planet Earth movies. 

 Overall, Melbourne was great.  The hostel on the other hand, I can’t say the same.  Oh well, it was only for a few days and we didn’t spend much time there luckily.  After 5 days traveling, we were all very exhausted.  This morning I was so glad to be back in Adelaide.  Unfortunately, this means week 2 of classes…

Today was my first day at Uni... ughh!  I only had  one class, but after not being in school since early December my brain is not in school mode.  It is also a huge change for me from U of I.  My class today was lecture with maybe 20-25 students.  The only classes I have that are that small are my labs, lectures are usually over 100.  I am also really used to the huge U of I campus.  Here, University of Adelaide is only like 5 acres or something.  The buildings are all smashed together and you have to go through one building to get to another.  It was a good thing I left early because it took me a really long time to figure out where my only class of the day was.  On top of all that, I am used to engineering classes where we have weekly homework assignments and tests throughout the year.  This semester is going to be a lot more writing for me... I dont know how I feel about that.

It's orientation week this week or "O" Week as its called.  I have it for both Uni and St. Marks College.  College "O" week has been pretty crazy.  On Sunday all the freshers were made to do really stupid things on the lawn for all the committee members.  The made some kids chug milk, or follow someone while fanning them with a giant palm leaf.  The committee did a lot of yelling at everyone, but it is a little bit funnier since I am older than about half of them and have hung out with them for the last week.  For the rest of this week, they make the freshers get up around 6 and they yell and make us do weird games and run laps on the lawn.  It sounds pretty ridiculous, but you really get to know everyone pretty quickly.  At night everyone goes out.  Last night we had a pub crawl, which was heaps fun.  Tonight we have a toga party!  

One of the hardest things to get used to around here is the drinking age.  I am used to drinking, but since the drinking age is 18, it is much more acceptable to drink in the open.  Here at the college, everybody keeps beer in their rooms and people bring a bottle of beer to dinner.  Alcohol is bought by the college and the Master and the Dean are around when everyone is drinking.  Even for Uni "O" week theres beer.  The Uni "O" week is pretty cool.  It is kind of like a huge festival on campus.  There are tents with all of the clubs where you can sign up for them, but there is also free concerts, food, and beer.  Its really weird, but it's pretty cool.  

Sadly, I dont have an accent yet.  I have picked up on some words.  Everyone around here says heaps.  Heaps of fun, heaps of people, heaps of work.  Its a weird word to use so commonly.  I have noticed I've started to say it.  I also have just gotten used to called school Uni.  Here, when you say school people think you are referring to high school.  If you say college, that means the housing, like where I am staying.  So everyone says they have Uni in the morning or have to spend the day at Uni.  Its pretty weird.  They also say cheers to everything.  I have heard it used as a greeting, a thank you, a goodbye, pretty much anything.

Tonight the toga party was supposed to be on a boat that goes down the Torrens River, which runs through Adelaide.  However, about a week before I got here the river had to be drained because it was so polluted.  Its really a shame because my walk to Uni is right along the river.  The water level is so low and it smells a bit in spots, but supposedly it should fill back up in a few weeks.  I cant wait to see it when its full.  I really like Adelaide.  I think that if I could pick up my whole life from back home and put it here, I would be so happy.  Downtown Adelaide is busy all through the week with people shopping on Rundle Street and at the market.  I love being there, it's like being in a mini-city because it is nowhere near the size of Chicago, but still tons of people.  North Adelaide, the suburb where I am actually living, is only about a 20 minute walk from down town and its filled with parks, trees, and the river.  Its the perfect size place to live for one semester.  It is small enough to figure out and not feel like you are lost all the time, but big enough so you aren't bored all the time.  And its about 20 minutes to any of the beaches!!!

I am officially in Australia.  Yesterday, we went on this bus trip to a place called Victor Harbour.  It was really boring, but I had delicious fish and chips.  After spending 2 boring hours there, we went to Umbirra Wildlife park and I got to see koalas and kangaroos!!!!  There were so many kangaroos, it was a little crazy.  They were everywhere and we bought food for them.  Since they are in this park, they are very docile and everyone just walks around with them and pet and feed them.  If you held your hand too high for them to reach the food, they would stand up and put their front arms onto your hand and hold on to you.  Their arms are so strong and their claws so big that it kind of hurt, but made for a really cool picture!  I even saw a joey in the pouch of a big kangaroo.  It was funny though because I always thought that joeys sat upwards with their heads sticking out of the pouch, but apparently that isnt true.  For most of the time just the long, back feet and the tail were sticking out of the pouch.  When the head would pop out it would be right between the feet which looked really funny!!  The koalas weren't as exciting.  They were very cute, but you couldn't feed them and they mostly just sat there while you pet them a few times.  We saw some other animals like crocodiles and wombats.  I dont think the crocodiles were real though because we stood there for like 15 minutes waiting for one of them to move and none of them did.  Well they moved their eye lids but still!!!  It was a really cool trip and I got lots of pictures.  I am having trouble getting my pictures to upload to shutterfly and then facebook wouldnt let me do it either.  Im going to try a few more times and I will let everyone know as soon as they are up!

We decided to try out a new beach yesterday.  Aarika and I took the bus, with her British roommate Harry, her neighbor Eli, and a few other people.  The bus here is cheap.  I bought a 10 trip interpeak pass which works between 9am and 3pm for around $7.50.  The new beach is called Henley.  Its only a few miles up from Glenelg beach, where we have been the last 2 times, but it is completely different.  The water was so incredibly clear and there were fairly big fish in the shallow water.  It was so calm, with hardly any people or waves.  I loved it.  We swam out pretty far to a sand bar.  The current out there was really strong.  We all ended up quite a ways from our stuff!  The guys were teaching me how to throw an Australian Rules Football ball.  They throw it from their side and kind of roll it.  They made fun of me a lot because I was TERRIBLE!

After the beach, I went out to dinner with people from St. Marks college.  Wednesday apparently are International Pub night at a bar near here.  We all dressed up in short shorts and tall socks and went to dinner at the Oxford.  The Oxford is St. Marks' "place".  The owner give the students good deals on drinks and food and has St. Marks shirts hanging out the walls.  They said they go there every Wednesday night.  The students were telling me about how the other colleges try to go into the Oxford and all the rivalries.  Apparently, there is this big sports competition and everyone gets really into it.  They said they need more swimmers, so I'm in.  I will probably try something else too.  Maybe cricket event though I have no idea how to play.  One girl said that if I have played softball I will probably be decent.  

So far, every single person has told me to be excited for what is called "O" week or orientation week.  Its next week.  Basically what it is, is games and fun things in the mornings and lots of partying at night.  Everyone has said it is the best week of college and you meet so many new people.  I think it will be really great.  The only problem is that I have "O" week for both my Uni (haha the schools are Uni and where I am living is called college) and college the same week.  So I will have to figure out how to do both of those.  Last night, they told me to rest today and tomorrow because next week will be very crazy and tiring.  I can't rest too much because I already signed up through Uni to do a tour of Victor Harbour tomorrow for the whole day and Sunday is a trip to Port Adelaide and a dolphin cruise.  Busy already!

I think I made a really good choice staying in St. Mark's college.  It is like a mix between the dorms and Greek life.  It has the living style and co-ed sense of the dorms, with older students living with the new ones, but it has the social aspect of a sorority or fraternity.  I suppose that dorms might be like this at smaller schools.  I just really like how involved everyone is with the new students.  I walk around and when I see someone I dont know, they usually know who I am.   If they dont know right away, they ask if I'm a new student and as soon as I say I am a study abroad student they know.  I dont know if I would have liked it at home, but here is makes me feel so much more comfortable.  I'm also happy because I have been told that sometimes international students tend to only hang out with other international students because those are the only people they really get to meet.  Here I know I will get to hang out with TONS of Australians, since there are only 3 or 4 international students.  

Anyways, so far so good!

I tried posting pictures, but I am having trouble.

There will be some really soon!

Also, the toilets dont flush the opposite way.

I havent seen a kangaroo or a koala yet.

I do however have a bunch of mosquito bites... I was hoping they didnt have those here.

Back at the beach today, I jumped off one of the jetties (piers) into the water.  It was pretty scary.  I almost didnt do it cause it was so high.  I'm really bad at judging heights so I wont try to guess, but it was high.  Aarika and I met 2 guys from Toronto at our study abroad/exchange thing this morning and we all decided to blow off all the things we planned on getting done today and go to the beach instead.  Being a Monday afternoon, there was nobody there, so we played frisbee with a cheap plastic frisbee the boys found in some shop.  As entertaining as it was to play frisbee in the wind down there, apparently it was dangerous because the frisbee cut up Aarika and Dan.   

It is awesome to go down to the beach because it is so inexpensive and quick.  We didnt bother to wait for our student IDs today, so the tram was $2.60 for both ways.  If we had our IDs it would only be $1.20!!!   It does get more expensive on the weekends, but still!  It only takes 20 minutes to get there AND the McDonalds sells soft serve cones for 70 cents!!  I suppose cheap ice cream makes up  for really expensive drinks... :(

I  think I'm starting to get used to the driving on the wrong side of the road thing.  I mean I still look the wrong way to start with, but it doesnt freak me out as much as it did at first.  When I first got here, I would get scared that the cars would crash or something cause it looked really weird.  Now, I dont even pay attention anymore.  I think that is part of how time right now is really warped.  I have a sense of short term time lengths, like half hour vs an hour, but the days seem to last forever and it seems like I have been here for much longer than 4 days.  I already know my way around the city pretty well.  However I dont have very good sense of timing as far as distance.  I keep telling everyone that everything is a 5-10 minute walk.  It isnt true at all.  We did discover though that every map we have seen so far of this city is scaled horribly.  There are streets that look the same length on the map, but one is a 5 minute walk and the other is a 20 minute walk!  My goal for tomorrow is to learn how to use the bus that comes right outside my college.

I got locked out of my room for the first time today.  Everywhere around here, they seem to have keycards instead of actual keys.  I left mine in my room and I need mine to get into St. Marks College, then to get into my building/apartment thing and then to get into my room.  I somehow found an open door to the college, but then had to knock on my roommates patio door to wake him up to let me in, where I had to find my other roommate to get the number to call the guy that has the master key.  It was a huge process, so I think I will try to not do that anymore.

Today was my first day without a whole ton of stuff to do.  I did some unpacking, got a little homesick, but I think thats normal.  I went with one of my roommates to go look for phones.  The phones here are crazy.  It costs like $60 for a phone then you have to buy the sim card and then instead of paying for minutes, you buy an amount of money per month.  It costs 76 cents per 30 seconds to call anywhere in Australia, but only 16 cents to call the US!!! How crazy is that!!!  Its also 25 cents to text anywhere, so I text people at home!!!

The phone places are on Rundle Street, about a 5-10 minute walk from where I am.    Rundle Street is like a 3 block long, walking shopping district.  Its awesome because there are tons of people out and the shops are very open.  Theres Woolworths where I finally got orange juice ( extra pulpy!!) .  Theres all kinds of people out entertaining.  Some were playing music, there was a clown on stilts, there was a magician climbing through a tennis racket, and everyone just stands around to watch.  I love the openness of everything.  We were actually there last night when we went to the bars, because most of the bars are on Rundle Street past the shopping district.  

Farther south of me, in downtown Adelaide (I'm in North Adelaide), there is a place called Central Market.  Three or four times a week it is open with all kinds of really fresh fruit and meats.  I dont have to shop for myself since I like in the college, but I just think it is so cool!  There is also a really large Asian population here and near the Central Market there are TONS of really authentic Asian restaurants.  I can't wait to try some of them.  I also can't wait to eat my first meal at the college tonight!  If it is anything like regular dorm food, I will be happy. 

The beginning of the adventures!

Finally, I'm in Australia!  The trip has been so crazy so far.  I thought I would be nervous flying myself , but it really wasnt scary at all.  Luckily I slept most the way to San Francisco where I met up with Aarika , the other girl from U of I.  The 14 hour plane ride from San Francisco to Sydney was TERRIBLE.  I could barely sleep at all, even though I drank some of the free wine!!!!  It makes me want to stay here just so that I don't have to fly back.  Dont worry I'll come back.  

Everyone around here is so friendly!  When Aarika and I were trying to get from her apartment to my college, we tried to take a free bus.  We asked directions from someone and they told us to take the free bus the was caterpillar colored.  We werent really sure what caterpillar color was but we did find the bus stop.  We waited 35 minutes because around here nobody seems to be really worried about being on time anywhere.  The bus driver would tell some people they just couldnt get on the bus because he'll be back in 20 minutes!! That would never happen at home!  The bus only held like 15 people and all of them were old people and we were the 2 crazy American girls!  All the old ladies were telling us different places to get off the bus and so finally with both of my HUGE luggages, we got off at some random stop and stood on the corner with our map trying to figure out where to go.  Luckily some lady walked by us and asked if we needed help and then offered to walk us all the way over to where we needed to go.  

After getting all my stuff into my room and meeting my roommates, they showed me the cellar thats in my room.  I can pull up a door in the floor and theres a whole room down this super steep lady.  It creeps me out pretty bad so I have been keeping my suitcases on top of it, but my roommates said they had parties all the time down there.  

Yesterday, Aarika and I went to the beach for the day.   We asked some people how to take the tram to the beach.  It should only cost $2 for students, but we dont have student cards yet.  When we got to the beach we stopped for food and I ordered what I thought was a normal tuna fish sandwich.  However, instead of tuna salad like I am used to, I got plain tuna.  It was so gross.  Aarika ordered fish and chips and had to pay extra for ketchup or "tomato sauce".   So while we were laying at the beach, the  people in front of us were from here and they starting talking to the guy next to them who happened to be from London, and then the girl next to him was from Canada and then Aarika and I were like oh hey well we are from the US.  The study abroad office at home kind of made us worried about how people would react when we would say we were American, but everyones thinks its great.  One of the first questions everyone asks about is Obama being in office.   Everyone around here is really excited about him.