The Final Week

This past week or so has been so full of extremes- no matter if it was studying, or out having a good time, everything has been really full of emotion/ purposeful. I survived my last three finals, and still managed to have a great time this week. Sydney was my last trip, so I've just been revisiting some of my favorite parts around Townsville, and beginning to say our goodbyes.

I revisited the beach on The Strand- this is the first time I've been down there since they put the stinger nets in the water. On another interesting note, they found a salt water crocodile hanging out in the water at this beach on Halloween. Maybe those nets are a good idea.

We went back to the Ross River to swim and do rope swings again- I've finally come to terms that I had terrible kness, and I decided climbing the tree wasn't going to happen. It's still beautiful, even if I didn't get to swing from the trees.

On Sunday we went back to the town markets. We had some great times browsing the vendors and watching the crafts men. This guy was making didgeridoos by hand which is impressive to watch. A didgeridoo is an iconic Aboriginal instrument, made from wood that's been hollowed out by termites. Not sure about these particular ones though...

After my last final, my two good girl Australia friends and I went back to the free pools to relax and enjoy the rest of the day. It was so hot that day, but still really beautiful. Cip and Ellie made for great company in class, and in my lab. I'll miss them!

Today was another great day. We set off early for the beach, and spent the day on the hot sand, and walking around town and playing in the free water park they have set up on the beach. It's really great for kids (especially during the hot summer months when jellyfish have everyone scared!). But whose to say a bunch of college kids can't have a blast there too? Today was a celebration of water.

We had our farewell dinner with the Arcadia staff representative, Cat, and we've started to say goodbye to people as they trickle out. A lot of people are headed off for some more traveling, mostly to New Zealand it seems. Even if I had more money to continue traveling, I'm pretty excited that I'll be back for Thanksgiving. But it really is crazy how the time has flown. Tomorrow (Friday) is my last real day in Australia, and I leave at 6am on Saturday. November 21st will legitimately be the longest day of my life, seeing as I'll also be arrive in Los Angeles at 7am of the same day. It doesn't take an hour to get there, its just flying back in time. Weird.

I'll save the reflection for the next post, but I just want to allude to how much I'm going to miss this place. Apart from missing some of the great friends I made, and the endless beaches and perfect weather, I think I'll miss the flora and fauna most. Maybe it's lame to admit, but I'm going to miss the tropical birds, and the wallabies and everything that just roam all over campus. I guess I didn't realize that I won't get to see tons of cockatoos all over the place anymore, or randomly find feathers from parrots. It'll definitely take some getting used to once I get back. Anyway, I'm planning on spending my last day back at the beach for the last time, and then the school is having a giant party to celebrate post finals. We don't plan on sleeping until we get on the plane.

Thanks for reading about my adventures, and I'll catch up with everyone in the states! I'll be writing about the experience as a whole, and just get a chance to really think about what I've learned and how I've grown as a person. This has been an amazing adventure.

Adventures in Sydney

I'm pretty sure that a visit to Australia would not be complete without seeing Sydney. Australia's largest city provides some of the most iconic images this country has to offer, alongside eternal fame from Finding Nemo. I spent 4 nights getting to explore and experience the city life and have many pictures to go alongside it all. We spent most our time there just walking around. Our hostel was on Pitt St and the city is gorgeous by night.

We visited the Chinese Friendship Gardens



We went to the Sydney Aquarium! They had dugongs and amazing sea turtles. I loved being there so much, and I actually think I could have spent a few days there alone. Legend has it that dugongs are responsible for all the reports of mermaids, and that sailors would drown trying to follow them as they swam to the depths.

That night we had tickets to see a show at the Sydney Opera House (Ahh) to see God of a play called God of Carnage. We figured we should dress for the occassion, and we treated ourselves to a nice dinner in Darling Harbor ahead of time. The show turned out to be pretty funny, and we had a really good time.

But what's dinner without dessert? We hit up a Belgium chocolate bar for that one, and my fruit and chocolate dip was totally worth it.

The next we walked around a lot more- mostly just taking pictures of the Sydney Harbor bridge, the Opera house. We visited the Royal Botanical Gardens and The Rocks, Sydney's historical district. It was fun, but very tiring!

Later that night, we entered a drawing to win cheap tickets to see Wicked. Lucky for us, we scooped up front row seats for $30! It was SUCH an amazing show, and may have been my favorite thing in Sydney overall. I left the theater singing.

We bought souviner drinks called Ozmopolitans, and they were delicious. Our cups light up too, which made it even better

On our last full day we visited Paddy's markets, also known as a one stop shop for souvenirs and tourist goods. It was actually really overwhleming trying to fight the crowds of people. We didn't stay long, prefering to head off to the worlds largest Imax to catch a movie in 3-D. We saw A Christmas Carol, and it was pretty cool. The movie was just okay, but the 3-D effects were awesome. I enjoyed it a lot. I probably had too much fun.

I spent my last night in Sydney being kind of lame- I had my first final on Saturday, 2 hours after my plane landed. I stayed in a studied, which was actually a smart decision. Little did I know I was also at the beginning of catching a cold, which I still haven't been able to shake. Either way, I loved Sydney. It was a total different experience than everything else I had done. And who could resist such a sweet opera house?

The Daintree Rainforest

Last Thursday, I left for yet another trip with the Arcadia group. This trip was the one that I canceled (because of identity and lack of funds and whatnot) but I had a change of heart, and brought out the credit card. I'm sooo glad I did because it ended up being amazing.

Friday morning we set out for another day of scubaing and snorkeling out on the Great Barrier Reef. I was so excited for another trip back, especially since it was giving me a bit of a before and after kind of feeling. I saw the reef 2 weeks into the trip to Australia, and I returned 2 weeks before I leave. And after all my classes this semester, the reef really became that much better. Knowing more about the reef let me appreciate it even more.Although I still didn't see a sea turtle, a couple of sting rays and baby squids made it pretty exciting.

Our boat to the reef was also pretty sweet. It was bigger than the one last time (less sea sickness by all) and it came with a really nice lunch, and some complimentary sparkling wine. Very classy! This is one of the Arcadia leaders, Cam and I on the boat.


We also had some really fabulous sushi for dinner.

We got up early on Saturday and headed off for an animal sanctuary in the area. They ran a morning special called Breakfast with the Birds, and it was fabulous. The breakfast buffet was filled with so many different types of fresh fruit- all the usual grapes, strawberries, oranges and then some more aussie flavors like passion fruit, star fruit, jackfruit, blood oranges, kiwifruit, and so much more. It was delicious. And there were sooo many beautiful tropical birds flying around and hanging out trying to get some breakfast too. This little guy stole some cheese off my friends plate...

We walked around some more, fed some cute wallabies and saw a giant pelican and played with the ducks. I love the fauna here, and will probably miss it more than anything else. I've gotten so used to all the birds and marsupials that I sometime forget America lacks them. I really want to being home a wallaby.

We ventured further north into the Mossman Gorge area of the Daintree Rainforest. The Daintree itself is the worlds oldest rainforst, and it's really remarkable. We had another aboriginal cultural tour and it might just have been my favorite yet. Our guide is a healer for his family group, and was so incredibly wise about everything. I wish I could have spent more time there, especially since he offered to fix my knees. Ugh that would have been nice.

Anyway, saw some giant stranger fig trees

And some cave paintings


And the Gorge itself, among soo many other things. It's really just too much to try and even word. The shelters, and types of food, the cassowaries and the snakes. It was truly an amazing place. This place was right up my alley.

Oh, and of course the beautiful swimming it offered. The water was chilly, but really refreshing. If you climbed up river, you were able to slide down the currents pretty much the entire way. It was so much fun. Not a bad Halloween, if you ask me.


Sunday we woke up and went on a jungle surfing ziplining adventure. I loved it. We zipped right through the Daintree with an award winning eco-tourism organization. We all donned a new name, as chosen by the guides that we wore on our helmets. I was now Xena, the Warrior Princess. I was okay with that. We learned a lot about the area as we went from platform to platform, and heard some great birds. There was a bird of paradise that was calling for a while- I really wish we could have spotted him. Still fun though!

Later that day we headed off down the Daintree River, in search for some wild salt water Crocs. We got lucky, and spotted "Lizzy" sunning herself on the banks. Our guide was hoping to spot "Big Al", but something about seeing a 5 meter long wild male salt water crocodile kinda spooked me... Maybe Captain James Hook really was swallowed whole.

And then there was Cape Tribulation- where the rainforest comes right to the reef edge. The only spot where two World Heritage Areas meet each other. Quite beautiful, once you get over the thought that the wild crocs in the area can kill you, and the box jellyfish swarming in the water will also kill you.

Easily one of the best trips that I had here. This is the part of Australia that I absolutely love, and I know I'll miss it! I already took my first final, and I'll be home in just two weeks! Time has flown!

A breath of fresh air.

As you may have guessed from the last post, the whole identity theft really threw me for a loop last week. Most fortunately, things are mostly back to normal in that respective and are certainly looking up. I was pretty busy making phone calls and dealing with the issue for a few days, but since then, it's back to normal. yay!

This past weekend was a lot of fun. A bunch of us (mostly my American friend, and just a few Aussies) decided to go ice skating at the rink nearby. I actually laughed out loud when I saw it- it was so small, and the ice was really cut up. I couldn't believe that this could be considered normal, but it totally was! It was really great though, and I had so much fun. I had my fingers crossed for not falling though- I don't think my knee would have appreciated it. Sadly, two of the Australians came with us weren't quite so good on ice as we Americans, and before the night was over, ended up with a broken wrist and a broken collarbone. We felt bad for them. Everyone else managed to stay on their feet (mostly) had a good time though!

By a stroke of luck, my friend Kiara and I happened to be awake early on Sunday morning and went down for breakfast early. It just happened our one friend was there to pick up some people to head out jetskiing for the day. He asked if we wanted to come along, and we were right on it. Who could say no to a day full of free jetskiing and beautiful Australian beaches? Definitely not me. I had so much fun riding on the jetski and tubing along behind it. It turned my entire week right around into something that actually turned out to be good. I didn't see that coming anytime soon.

I'm also trying to get back on the trip I recently canceled up to Cairns. The more I thought about it, the more it makes sense to try and go. I really want to go SCUBA diving again, and now's my only chance. Keep your fingers crossed for me! And can I just say sorry in advance for the lack of Christmas gift buying this year? I'm going to be coming home from Australia really broke, and I wouldn't have it any other way :)

Identity Crisis

One of my goals for coming to Australia was to take time to "find myself" and to try and rediscover who I really am. Sadly, since I've been gone someone else seemed to find me before I did. While I was away in Byron Bay over the weekend, someone hacked into my bank accounts back in the states and withdrew all the cash I had left. It's great that despite telling my bank a million times that I'd be in Australia from July 14- Nov 21, that on October 15th I waltzed into a branch office in Philly and took out all my money. Nice move, PNC. Way to be on top of things.

So where does it leave me? With a crap ton of paper work to work through, calling loads and loads of people internationally, setting up new accounts and trying to get my money back. In the mean time, I'm hoping I don't have to cancel my MRI appointment for me knee on Friday. I already had to cancel one of my trips back to the reef: I had a nice long weekend scheduled to do some more diving and to explore the rainforest, but due to unforseen financial circumstances, that idea was nixed. I'd love for someone to try and tell me that bad luck is a mental thing, because anybody who knows me and can remember event from less than two years ago will agree that I've been having a rough time.

Well, I need to go file a police report with the Australian federal government. Despite this all occurring in the states, it seems that I need to file it in Australia. What a joke. I love how Australia cares more about me than the USA.

To Byron Bay and Beyond!

So it's been a while since the last post, and apart from this past weekend, not too much has been going on. I've been taking it pretty easy lately, getting some work done and resting my partially torn acl (what's with me and injuries?). Anyway, this past Thursday, I left Townsville and headed south to one of Australia's famous surfing areas, Byron Bay. We had a little scheduled trip with the Arcadia group, but my friend Kiara and I went a day early...

We got to Byron mid-day, and immediately began meeting really awesome people. Byron is absolutely gorgeous, and this is definitely a place worth revisiting, if I ever get the chance.

We had the night free to do whatever we wanted, so we ended up bar hopping all over the town. We decided to be really friendly and talkative to other travelers and we ended up meeting so many cool people, and seeing so many different live bands. The list of people from other countries included: Canada, Ireland, Scotland, England, Germany, Austria, Australia, Sweden, South Africa, and Holland. That's pretty crazy, especially since we actually held full conversations with all these people, and we even learned some different languages too.

We tried not to stay out too late, since we we're getting up early on Friday to go SKYDIVING! 14,000 ft above Byron Bay, free falling for over 70 seconds. It was amazing. I won't lie though; I was really scared on the plane ride, once everyone started jumping off. Another little aside to that, on the flight up, we spotted 6 Humpbacks whales from the plane! They swim all around this area on their migration from the southern cold waters of the Antartic, all the way up the coast of Australia. So awesome. This was our baby plane; I kind of wish I spent the extra money to get the video and pictures of the jump.

Saturday was a walk up to the Lighthouse, and around the most easterly point of mainland Australia. It was so beautiful.


Afterwards, we went for a surfing lesson. Byron Bay and the surrounding areas are famous for their fabulous surf, and bring in some big name surfers year round. We went to some smaller waves, and gave it a go. Despite having done some surfing before, and loving it, I couldn't do it without causing quite a bit of pain in my knee, so I had to give it up. I still took pictures though :)



We spent Friday and Saturday night at nearby Lennox head. We stayed at Lake Ainsworth, which is said to behold healing properties. The lake is surrounded by tea trees, and their tannis run into the water actually creating a lake that looks like a giant pot of tea. The water was actually red- orange, and tasted kind of like weak tea. Pretty neat to swim in though, and super unique!

Sunday was sea kayaking, and some snorkeling along the rock jetty. We moved further north, to Surfers Paradise. We embarked on an aboriginal culture kayaking tour, which was actually really cool. We learned a lot, listened to some stories of the native people and participated in some small ceremonies and tracked wallabies and snakes.



Surfer's paradise was another beautiful area. The city skyline came right up the the beaches, and it created a pretty cool backdrop to an awesome area. We spent Sunday night hanging out, before catching our flight back up on Monday.

All in all, it was another really good trip. I love traveling around Australia, and wish I had some more resources to continue doing it. For now, it's back to work for me. There are only two more weeks of classes left, then I have a week off for studying (i.e. traveling to Cairns and Sydney) and then it's two weeks of exams and I'm done. I leave in just one month! Time is flying by, and there's still so much to do and see!

The Outback: Nightlife

After a long day of hiking, we'd hit the road to our next campsite. We never stayed in the same place twice, which was great to experience new places, but meant always packing and unpacking our campsites. Again, our group worked so well together that doing work never mattered. Some people would start dinner, others would find wood for the fire, others unloaded all our sleeping gear, and some entertained.

We didn't sleep in tents; each night we unrolled our canvas swags (complete with a sleeping bag and thin foam pad) right underneath millions of stars. The strongest source of light pollution came from the moon- which eventually set in the middle of the night to yield the most amazing stars I've ever seen. After waking up to see them for the first time, I actually thought I dreamt them... until everyone else confirmed how amazing they were.

We spent majority of our nights around a campfire- talking about what we learned that day, or what we liked and didn't like. One kid, Ryan, brought his guitar and a few people played it all week. And everyone was always singing and playing along. It really created a soundtrack for the whole trip. It was great.

The Outback: Aborginal Culture

Apart from the amazing people we went on this journey with, there was another group of amazing people that made it all possible: the Anangu aboriginal people. We had so many amazing opportunities to learn about their culture and to visit ancient caves and spiritual sites, and got to meet a few locals.

We began our trip at the Alice Springs Desert Park and had our first introduction to aboriginal culture. It was a good introduction into what we'd be getting to experience first hand. We learned about techinques for survival, and methods of finding water and learned a few of the "stories" of the people.

At the end of our first day, we stayed in a small, modern aboriginal town and begin to experience the culture first-hand. We ate our first traditional meal (rabbit, wallaby and kangaroo over an open fire pit) and many people got to meet a group of aboriginal kids. They were playing near where we were staying, and we're so excited to show off their playground. They were so proud of it. The next morning, we met our guide Nigel, and went for a hike through Wallace. Along the way were ancient symbols for watering holes, and ancient cave paintings. Nigel pointed out all the plants and animals that they would use for food and medicine, and told of stories about the old culture.

Throughout the rest of the week, we'd be getting to learn and experience more and more. We saw, we learned and we talked. We visited Uluru, the iconic Australian Outback image, and we understood it's significance. We met local artists, and bought artwork off them in the streets. We got to try painting ourselves, and learned the symbolism in their work. They paint the stories of creation, and of daily life and it's amazing to get to see all their artwork, and to understand it.

We all learned so much, and gained so much respect for these amazing people. One of our leaders, Lyndon, tried to teach us about the distinctions of being a tourist versus a traveler. After all we learned about this place, and everything we got to experience, I am proud to say that I fit into the "travelers" category, along with the rest of our group. The Outback is the kind of place where you would hope to fit that category too.