Warning: The following blog contains numerous solo shots

Well, night one in our hostel was my far the worst night's sleep I have ever gotten. I do not know how anyone can be as loud as the people in here! Also, I know I am really tall and all but I think these beds are made for midgets. When I lay down I can't even stretch out the whole way because my head and feet hit the headboard and footboard. But enough about the complaining. Yesterday was our first road trip driving on the wrong side of the road. We awoke at about 8 in the morning, packed our picnic lunches, and headed out. We were in full force tourist mode. The car was way better than I had expected. Our only request was that it was an automatic... I decided I would not try to learn how to drive a stick and on the other side of the street. Off we went with our google directions. I will say I think I am a better Aussie driver than American. First stop was an old Fig Tree--- called the Cathedral Fig Tree. It is pretty much in the middle of a rain forrest at the top of a mountain. I kept pulling off every 10 minutes to let people behind me pass. The speed limit was like 100 km an hour on a windy road-- we were going about 30. We decided we would rather make it there in one piece. After taking our pics we headed back on the road south. Next stop was Babinda Boulders. Very pretty-- the pictures of all of these things do not do it justice. The legend behind this place is a aboriginal girl fell in love with a guy in the wrong tribe and they ended up killing him. Everyday she would come out to the boulders and cry. There have been many deaths here and they say whenever someone swims there her spirits cling onto the people hoping it is her love coming back. When it is not, she releases the person and they die. Personally, I think the deaths probably have a little more to do with high currents and slippery rocks but I suppose the first makes a better story. The boulders did however almost claim the life of my nice sunglasses. As we were hiking to the lookout points Anne looks at me and says "so stay calm and don't freak out but on your neck is..." I'm sorry there are little creatures all around me so what do, FREAK OUT. End up scratching my neck really bad trying to get whatever this is off of me and my sunglasses fall to the very edge almost overboard. Thank goodness they survived the spill! Turns out it was like a small worm on me. I was picturing one of the massive spiders crawling on me. She seemed to get a good laugh; I was not as thrilled. Next we loaded back up in the car and head to our next destination. This was the only minor detour we had in the day. We went to a walkway in a national park however when we got there is was $20 entry fee so we decided not worth it and headed to our last destination. Last place we went was Paronella Park. It is a place where a Spaniard man handmade castles for his wife. We went on an actual tour at this place. I have come to the conclusion I would rather just roam around on my own. We didn't get to see one of the castles because there was a wedding going on. Ended up hanging back from the tour a bit-- tour guide just wasn't that good and instead of getting to hear the history behind "lovers lane" Anne and I opted to look at bats in a cave. Yes, we are cool. We made it back to Cairns safely and went to the downstairs bar for a while to get out of our pretty room. It was going to be a beach day; however, it is not pretty so I guess we are just going to hang around here!

(Also in above pics-- 1. Cathedral large fig tree 2. Me standing by in the large fig tree 3. Babinda Boulders 4. Anne and I standing in stream leading up to boulders 5. Large trees at Paronella Park-- can't really see me but I am at the far end 6. Waterfall at Paronella Park-- I am standing on the bridge over the waterfall 7. Waterfall Paronella Park 8. Stream at Babinda Boulders 9. Boulders)

5 Star Accommodations

Today was a good day. We finally got out of Tyler and Sams way, gave them their apartment back and headed to our luxurious new home. It is in a great location and Anne and I decided to spring for the private room in this hostel. The good news is this place makes me want to behave and never go to jail because I assume the accommodations are similar to these. In actuality it has everything we need-- 2 beds, air conditioning and a sink all for $18 a night with dinner at the restaurant around the corner. No worries though, they are not loosing too much $ on this deal because Anne and I rushed down at 5 to get our dinner vouchers and cash them in. You get to choose between 4 pre made meals. I got the spaghetti while she got the curry-- I kid you not when I say there were 8 noodles on the plate. Needless to say we had to go to the grocery store immediately! Next, we unpacked our stuff. Seeing as there are no shelves or storage at all we have used newpapers to line the room for cleanliness and organized our clothes that way. Today we walked around town for a while. We are in a different location of Cairns then we have been therefore there was more stuff to see. There is a festival going on here so live music is being played surrounding the lagoon. We sat out on the grass for a while listening to it. We have now been planning our latest trip for tomorrow and decided to stay in tonight and get a good nights sleep. Anne started laundry and we have been waiting for 45 minutes for a dryer to free up. We just went downstairs to move the clothes and apparently it gets locked up at 10. Guess thats one way to lighten the backpack load just get mildewed clothes you can't bring with you! Well I suppose that is all for now. Nothing too exciting-- hopefully after tomorrows trip there will be more going on!

Well it is now 6 am and I am sitting at the airport gate, great start to any morning. Sunday was a relaxing day. For the most part we hung around the house until mid to late afternoon then headed to the Gold Coast to look around. Cameron’s family ended up coming over for a couple hours which caused our trip to get a later start than anticipated. Very similar to Miami—there is actually even a little town around there called Miami. We did not dress warmly enough and Anne wasn’t feeling well so we ended up calling the day early and heading back home for a night of hanging out and poker…. I have yet to learn how to play poker and didn’t have much interest in learning now therefore I just watched. Yesterday was a relaxing day at “work.” It was cloudy and misting nearly all the day so Anne and I stayed in the house for most of the day and cleaned and cooked pumpkin soup and attempted a pie. They have an EXCESSIVE amount of pumpkins. It took probably 2 hours to cut this dang pumpkin up—was by far one of the toughest things ever! Monday night at 10:30 p.m. we got a ride from Manny to the train station to head to the airport. We buy our tickets and get on the train only to find out that the train table online lists the wrong train times and the last one servicing the airport is at 7:45 at night. We end up riding the train in as far as it will go and having to take a taxi the rest of the way. About $100 later we made it. Then to sleep we go in the airport… yay. It was our only option because the airport is so far out of town and the trains did not start running early enough. Finally, after a longgggg day and night we made it to Cairns at about 9:30 am. We are currently staying at two guys from St. Louis’ apartment until we can find a place. They are here playing on an amateur soccer team. Town is a bit like Panama City; however, it is a central location to most of the things in Queensland we want to do so we are going to stick around here for a while—and it is WARM! We lucked out and the guys we are staying with our super nice and spent all day yesterday showing us around town. Well, I am off to go do a bit of exploring.

Brisbane

Friday-- the last work day of the week and it rains! Lucky us. We ended up having to go around town to Andrews rental properties for a couple hours more less running erands and washing a few windows. They took us to a rain forest area and to the Koala conservation center to look at the Koalas before work though! Anne and I were introduced into an English sitcom called Coupling that they have nearly all seasons on DVDs. We watched about 8 episodes into the night then headed to sleep. This morning was a beautiful day and we didn't have to work which made it that much better. Cameron took us into the Beenleigh train station then off we went to to Brisbane for the day. Today was by far one of my favorite days-- we sat all afternoon at an area at the Performing Arts Center, drank wine, and watched several hours of songwriters-- ages 14-18 play their guitars and sing. This culture reminds me a bit of Italy whereas it is perfectly normal mid morning/afternoon to see everyone just sitting back relaxing in the sun and enjoying a bottle of wine. We realized long about 4 that we still had not eaten lunch so off we went to find a bite to eat. After walking everywhere and realizing we didn't want to wait or pay $30 for a salad we ended up at Hungry Jacks (Australia's Burger King). Once again, whoever said Australians and us speak the same language-- not correct. I order a cheese burger and substitute an ice cream cone for the fries. Somehow or another I get my order which is an ice cream cone, burger, fries, sundae, and a regular coke because "this is what I ordered". Who knows! Before heading back we walked around town a bit more stopping to use the bathroom and this pretty building. Turns out it is the casino. We get carded which makes me pretty excited because the legal age here is 18. I don't know what it is about this place but so far prettiest buildings I have seen is the hospital and casinos. The guys all went out tonight but Anne and I stayed in and watched more of Coupling-- for us normally being the two people up for anything we sure have been lazy! Off to get a good nights sleep though, the beach awaits us in the morning!

Well it has now been three days working out here—one more day till the weekend! Yesterday morning Anne and I got the duty of tidying up the kitchen. You know I was in seventh heaven! Anne and I took it a bit far and scrubbed down everything organized and actually made it look like a sanitary place to cook food! We ended up having to do more stuff in that dang shed all afternoon and then it was Anne and my turn to cook. Brian if you are reading this--- it turned out something like every time I attempted to cook for you. DISASTER. We are both normally pretty good cooks so we were going to make a casserole using the eggplant. Well, Andrew was hungry and wanted Kangaroo Curry so that is what we were assigned to make. l I don’t know what Curry is and sure haven’t cooked Kangaroo so it turned out SICK. The rice looked more like mashed potatoes…. We did decide one good thing from this we got out of cooking duties from here on out. Last night we decided to book our next destination. We got online and booked a one way flight to Cairns on Tuesday. Anne booked hers first. When I got to the booking part I looked and realized we had clicked a random date a couple weeks out for the flight, no wonder it was so cheap! Thank goodness I called the lady and may have fibbed a bit about an online booking glitch in the system and was able to get the flight changed and waivered the $80 flight change fee.

This morning woke up and I guess since he saw our enthusiasm for cleaning yesterday we got to clean inside today. Well…. I thought I knew some messy guys-- apparently not. Andrew is like uh check the down stairs bathtub and you can start there. OH. MY. GOSH. Anne was upstairs vacuuming and ran downstairs because she heard me gagging in the bathroom. There were old dirty dishes “soaking” in the bathtub and the drain was stopped up! I finally made it through.. barely. This afternoon was lots of fun though!! It was hot and a pretty day so I read on the porch and then we went fishing! Last time I went fishing was a good while back though—I think a couple years ago in Brooksville when I was casting the reel and pretty sure I hooked Brian (I was told I would never get to go back). Well my fishing skills didn’t improve. Anne caught a fish within 20 seconds, literally. I caught a stick in about 2 hours. I did put the worm on the hook by myself though. We just finished up dinner. It was MUCH better than ours last night. The guys cooked steak, kangaroo sausage, potatoes, pasta salad and chocolate crepes for dessert. I need to get out of this place ASAP. The laughter has still not stopped around here, Manny was laying on the porch and got a leg cramp so Anne asks “Do you have a Charlie horse?” He gets this horrified look on his face and is like I’m not Charlie… what horse? Funny how some things we say makes no sense. They also sat around asking tons of questions about all of the different states, geography populations etc. I think I need to go back to geography class. Gorgeous night here. We have been on the porch visiting listening to Manny play the guitar now I am heading to sleep!

Day One Working in the Shed

view from the porch of the house

Today was by far filled with more laughter than I have had in a while… and for those of you who know me well this is a lot because I laugh at just about anything. I woke up well rested at about 730 this morning! Best night's sleep I have had since I left, probably because Fanny was not coming in at all hours of the morning and I had a room to myself! Went downstairs and grabbed some breakfast and then Andrew (house owner) asked if we wanted to join for yoga. Well... I find out that when Anne told him when we were coming she expressed that we were really into yoga because according to the “WOOF” handbook people are more willing to take you if you share interests and since we were coming to a self sustaining yoga community she put this in here. So after awaking sore from by run yesterday in Sydney we went downstairs for yoga. I had to bite my tongue the whole time to keep from laughing or crying because 1. I haven’t tried yoga since I was like 15 because I was FAR to uncoordinated 2. We were in some random town in Australia on top of a mountain doing yoga and I was just trying to
take it all in. After yoga we sat out on the porch for a while relaxing before starting “work” at about 10. First Andrew gives us directions… don’t be fooled, even though Australians speak English still a serious language barrier. We finally got our directions and the 2 other guys that have been here for a while were just as confused as us. The organization in this place kills me! However, we are staying here for free and they are feeding us so I put a smile on my face and built shelves, movedd wood, unloaded trailers etc. It was fairly hard labor….. the shed we were organizing and cleaning reminds me of growing up what Grandfathers in Mathiston looked like… but there are about 6 of them and larger… so it's CHAOS. We found all types of stuff from about 7 weed eaters to a unicycle. Anne, Manni, and I worked together all day. How do I describe Manni…. he is from Canada, speaks French and some English and is a major hippie… so we just ended up laughing mostly at the miscommunication that occurred between all of us all day trying to communicate. After a couple hours of work we came up ate lunch on the porch and went for a couple more hours of work. The property is amazing! awork in the shed got to see all kinds of fun stuff, a drowned “cane toad” that had fallen in a water barrel, a mouse that had drown in the water pail, and the type of spider we saw in the ZOO! It was HUGE. No worries though I did not get this close to take the picture, Manni took the photo as I ran the opposite direction. After working all day—Cameron, Manni, Anne, and I went on a hike of the property. Andrew in all has 15 acres around where we
are. It is so pretty around here! We went out to a small landing area in the woods which is going to be turned into a camping/yoga area woods and sat out there for a while. I think one morning we are going to make it up there to watch the sunrise. Earlier in the day when I was working with Cameron on a project at the dam he asked me of the types of stuff I enjoy to do and I had listed most sports… on the hike however both of them kept laughing at us and were like you played sports?? You sure are uncoordinated! I managed to only fall once though! Allie, a friend of Andrews that lives nearby came over for dinner tonight—it was yummy! And Manni made us chocolate and banana crepes…. So much for the “healthy” yoga community! Just finished cleaning up the kitchen and am heading to sleep!!! Hard days work on the farm really takes it out of you. Oh and Sarah, your name came up a lot between us today. Every time we were hauling cinder blocks we just kept laughing at what you would do if you were here!


So I can't figure out how to do captions on the pics but they are as follows--- 1. white house on the hill in which we are living 2. Anne working in the shed 3. me day one work 4. spider we actually found in the shed 5. Cameron showing us on the hike of the property 5. More on our hike

The Simple Life-- starring Anne and Jill

Today has been quite a day… Anne and I left Sydney about 1 and took about an hour flight to the Gold Coast (around Surfers Paradise). We arrived at the airport and it sure did resemble the size of Columbus GTR tiny airport. We realized when we arrived that we had checked the buses leaving Brisbane but when the cheaper flight came available into Gold Coast we jumped on it.. therefore after arriving here we SURE hoped that there was a bus to get us to where we needed to be! Thank goodness after about 20 minutes of waiting we hoped on a bus. The guy in front of us happened to also be going to Beenleigh a random small town here so Anne and I creepily just followed him. Thank goodness because we had to go to a random bus stop get on a train and ride it in the middle of nowhere. Sure enough we arrived and called our “WOOFing” home to tell them we were here. On the train ride over I got to see my first 3 wild kangaroos! I was very excited! We wait at the bus stop and our ride arrives to take us to our “working” location. We are now in a small suburb of Beenleigh on 15 acres overlooking the city, hills, and in the distance and beach (view outside my bedroom window in the picture and bedroom pictured). We sat out on the porch while another “WOOFer” here prepared our meal. It was very good! All organic stuff. Its definitely not five star accommodations but it will do! Anne and I each have our own room so that is a plus. The toilet however you have to fill up with water in order to flush it… we looked as if we were on the simple life trying to figure out that situation. We both rolled up here in our D & G and Marc Jacobs sunglasses, seven jeans, etc. into hippie world. Its definitely an experience to say the least. We will probably be here for about a week. After dinner we volunteered to clean the kitchen seeing as though I normally like to clean… well this is a bit different. Have to get buckets of water from the bathtub to rinse because of poor water pressure and everything is very eco friendly and so I was afraid to throw anything away! We are not quiet sure what we are going to do here all day, we get to “work” in the morning at like 9 or so mainly sorting through plumbing pieces--- they are in the process of redoing the plumbing and becoming a completely self sustainable property… I got a bit confused when they were talking about all of it! That is all for now! We did make it and for all of those people who laughed when Anne and I said we were going to work on a farm here—ha we proved ya’ll wrong.

I am going to try to keep these a bit shorter considering Johnny said he needed cliff notes for my first post! Not too much has happend in the last couples days, just getting settled. We finally made it out for the first time… however didn’t make it too far. We went out with Kate, girl from England who is in our room and hung out with some people that work at the hostel (also traveling). Long about 11 o clock though we decided we were worn out and remembered we never ate dinner so went to a Kabob place next door. I got chicken on a stick and cheese fries (we decided we are going to be eating organic for about the next month might as well enjoy eating junk till then) although I will say not nearly as good as Chevrons! The guy in line next to me just looked at me and was like wow cheese fries—I guess if you are going to be unhealthy might as well go all out-- pretty sure I re assured the stereotype of unhealthy American on that one. When we came in there were some girls standing at the front desk—Sarah and Anna we thought the clothes in Miami were interesting you should see some here!! About 6 inch long pleather leopard print skirt. She was like why don’t you go shower and get ready and come out with us—I was like uh thanks we went out wearing this, did shower and am tired and going to sleep! I guess she didn’t get the memo it is 50 degrees and COLD. Yesterday we laid low. Went to a nearby café and ate lunch then Anne and I did our own thing. I went down to the Botanical Gardens and Hyde Park running. It is AMAZING down there—by far my favorite part of the city yet. The run turned into me stopping every couple of yards to take pics. On my walk there I saw the prettiest building ever so I wandered up through the gates to go exploring—turns out it is the hospital! If I get injured I am going to insist on coming here! Looks like a palace or cathedral. Anne and I met back up to repack our stuff and cook in the hostel kitchen our supper. Holly you were right I did not need NEARLY ½ of the stuff I packed. In the picture is the stuff I TOOK OUT of the backpack to leave in storage for a month. EKKK. And The bag is still pretty dang heavy! Dinner actually turned out really good we were proud (we took pics)! We are now awaiting our flight out of Sydney. We leave here about 1:00 then head to Brisbane, take a bus south and head out the “yoga community”. This should be interesting. Our duties mainly consist of household chores and gardening. That is all for now!

More of Sydney

Not too much exciting has occurred since I last wrote. Unfortunately after orientation we still remain friendless… well not really just not quite anyone that we would want to share an apartment with for 3 months. There were some 17 and 18 year old guys from New Hampshire, the friend Anne made at the Kanga BBQ and one other dude. We decided it is a bit cold around here too so we have derived another plan. During orientation the girl convinced us that we can work in boutiques and receptionists in the city when we get home so we might as well do something we would not ordinarily do so we were convinced. We have now joined the WWOOF organization.. some of you may be familiar with it (Willing workers on organic farms). When you join you get a large book of thousands of farms or small homes all over Australia that will accommodate and feed you in exchange for 4-5 hours of labor. The “labor” all is different depending on the farm that you go to. Some is fruit picking, assisting cooking, household chores, etc. We have sent an email to one dude that is hosting a yoga retreat and you get to set up for it and assist with things such as that. We are not positive where we are going to start first, but there are lots of fun options in the rain forest, mountains, and near the beach. We will see how this goes… most are on a week to week basis you just call ahead and see if there is room! Lets see… we have been doing TONS of walking it is ridiculous! We still are not right with our time zones! Yesterday we went to the Wildlife Park… the good thing about Anne and me traveling together is we are both on the same page about wanting to do everything touristy and not touristy. So off to see the Kangaroos and Koalas! So ironic that got to watch the little kangaroos eating dinner when last night we had kangaroo for dinner. After that we did our own walking tour of the town and we honestly were on our feet from 1230-715 when we came home. We stopped once briefly for lunch and dinner. We have decided if it’s a pretty day might as well go on foot instead of bus or subway! We had intentions of being social and going to a social with the hostel down the street from ours however we both fell asleep while on our computer by about 8! Today was similar to yesterday however we bummed around here until about noon… in the lobby because FANNY was still sleeping. All 5 of the other roomies were all in the bathroom talking this morning—we can’t figure out what this 40 year old lady does every night until like 5 in the morning! We went out to Bondi Beach—another 6 miles at least of walking! Another BEAUTIFUL day! We laid out on the grass hill and picnicked with about everyone else in the city watching the surfers. This is most likely going to be our home when we get back from the farm work. Now we have decided to take it easy for awhile and be social tonight for once. There is a new girl from England that has been in New Zealand that is here by herself in our room so I think we may end up going out tonight. That is all for now, nothing too exciting!