Palm Cove

Finally a REAL beach. A real OCEAN beach. With real WAVES and DOLPHINS :) Yes, dolphins. As soon as we picked a spot to sit on the beach we saw a group of dolphins a little from the shore splashing around. It was wonderful. I've never been to the ocean before and I've never stood on ocean sand or swam in ocean water. Naturally, I had to make sure that ocean water is actually salty and so I tasted it. Yes, it is salty. Really salty.

Katie and I were pretty scared of getting skin cancer from the Australian sun, so every half hour or so we reapplied our sun lotion. She told me that parts of the ozone over Australia in the summer are completely gone. I don't really know if that's scientifically accurate, but at any rate, I wasn't about to wait around and see how intense the rays from the sun could really get.

I finally coaxed (although, more like forced) Katie to jump in the waves with me. But here's something you have to know: I am scared of water that you cannot see through. So pools are great, you know? You can see the bottom and you know what to expect. Lakes are fishy (in more ways than one) because you can barely ever see to the bottom and you could be swimming with snapping turtles or water snakes or some hungry monster. That always freaks me out. Usually, Alex is around when I want to go swimming in a lake and so I have him jump in first and swim around and if he doesn't die within a couple of minutes I jump in. Well, it's sort of the same story at the ocean. Except, there's the possibility of sharks, crocodiles, jellyfish, stingrays... do you get my point? I was able to splash around for about 6 seconds before I started to think about the things I couldn't see and then I would run back to the shore. Then I would see that people were actually swimming and I'd go back out for maybe 9 seconds. But then I would think about the things I couldn't see and run back to save my life. And, of course, this just kept repeating. I was really wishing that Alex was there to test the water for sharks and stuff, but I had to go it on my own.

After a day at the beach, Katie, Stephanie and I went to the Cairns Tropical Night Zoo. Sounds mysterious doesn't it? We had a steak dinner at the zoo followed by a photo session with koalas. Then we grabbed our torches (which weren't actually torches but lame flashlights-how misleading) and set off on a tour of the noctural zoo animals. We saw the koalas in action and all of the reptiles in the reptile house. We had a campfire with the kangaroos while we enjoyed billy tea and damper. We even got to see the crocs being hand fed (only lunatics would get that close to a crocodile). And we met a real life swaggie. It was a pretty fun experience. But, I wish I could've gone to the zoo during the day time to see all of the other animals too. Maybe next time.

There will be a next time in Cairns for me. For sure. Bank on it.

First day in Cairns

Like most cities in Australia, you don't actually say "Cairns" when referring to Cairns. You say "Cans." Just like you don't say "Melbourne" but instead "Melbin" and not Brisbane but "Brisbin."

So we got to our Hostel today only to find that Cairns really doesn't have any beaches, just a lagoon, which is actually a big swimming pool. So tomorrow I am planning on catching the bus to Palm Cove to be at a real beach.

The plane ride from Sydney to Cairns was brillant. We finally flew Qantas and I am so happy for it. They really treat their costumers well: breakfast, lunch and a movie.

Anyways, only adventures await me. I cannot wait.

With Love, from my Host Fam

I don't think I could've lucked out more. Staying with my host family has definitely been a very rewarding and full of fun experience. I don't really know how it happened, but one they drove me home from Macquarie and the next we were passing jokes at the dinner table. 

It's kind of hard to even explain. These people took me into their home and showered me with love like no one else ever has. They planned my wedding. And there was a running joke about all of the cultural immersion experiences I was getting by staying with them.

This is my little sister, Rosie. She's in Year 11. We had a great time together. She's pretty witty with the jokes and comments, you can't really get anything past her. She made me eat vegemite last night. It was actually good. I was astounded. Rosie is pretty serious about school. So much so that she goes to homework club! I told her we don't really have those in America, but if we did they would have shirts and officer positions. Her club doesn't have those. Rosie is pretty special because I let her see all of my big eyebrow pictures from when I was younger.

Here are my host parents, Kerrie and Keith. Keith is the head master of the junior college. They are truly wonderful people. Keith helped me with behaviour management tricks in the classroom and Kerrie made all my food! I would stay if I could. I really enjoyed getting to know Kerrie. I feel like I could talk to her about anything at all if I needed to. I just feel like I gelled in with the whole family so well. Keith would say something ridiculous and we'd all look at each other and start making jokes.

Isn't this adorable? These are the presents my host family gave to me this morning before I left for school. The card is very personalized with all of the jokes and memories we've had over the past 2.5 weeks. Like I said, I would definitely stay if I could.

Whales, Wine, and Dancing

Friday morning I was up by 5:30. I had to pack my bags for the weekend and catch a connecting ride into Sydney. We started Friday by having class. This is the first time I have seen any of my classmates since leaving for our host stays. I'm not going to lie-I think I lucked out! It has been such a pleasure to be living with my host family and not everyone's experience seems to be as positive as mine.

Some friends were planning on seeing Randy Newman at the Opera House Friday night. We have been allowed $50 to see a performance or use for some other cultural Australian event. I didn't want to spend Friday night by myself waiting for their performance to be over, so I went to the Opera House to see if there were any seats available for "Belong" which was a dance by an indigenous/aboriginal dance theater. The lady said there were 2 available seats, one in the back and one in the 2nd row center. So, of course, I took the seat up front.

I got to the theater, sat down, and waited. As everyone else filed into the theater every seat seemed to be filling except any around me. As a matter of fact, both of the front rows remained completely empty except for myself. Some friends from my class ended up with seats behind me. The show started and I felt like the dancers were going to pull me up on stage. I was like 4 feet from them. After intermission I made some of my friends move up a row so that I didn't have to sit awkwardly by myself anymore. Why in the world did the lady give me the closest and lonliest seat in the house?

Anyways, Saturday morning I had to be up early again so that I could hop on a bus and take a ride. Saturday was wine tasting day. Now, before this, I thought that I was a fan of red wine. I had some pretty good communion wine in my day. I got to the winery and realized wine is actually pretty disgusting! I should've bought the first wine that I tried. It was at First Creek winery and was called Semillon. It's a white wine and it was pretty good. Everything I tasted after that was terrible. And what is with dessert wines? They are disgusting! And sweet wines? Yuck! Why do people drink that?

It's a good thing I took it easy at the wineries. I only took a sip or two from each tasting and poured the rest out. By lunch time, all of the other wine tasters were tispy, loud, and obnoxious. We ended up eating at a pub for lunch, which didn't really help the situation, but at least the group of drunk Americans didn't stick out too sorely.

On Sunday we strolled down to Nelson's Bay at Port Stephens. I wish we could've spent more time there, I loved it. On our whale cruise we saw a couple humpbacks and even a baby or two. But, they didn't do anything spectacular. We also saw some dolphins and seals. I think I liked the seals best. It's so strange to think that they actually live in water and not just in captivity at the zoos.

Friday of this week I fly away north to Cairns. Oh, warm weather, how I miss you! We will scuba dive the Great Barrier Reef, spend a day in the Daintree Rainforest, sit on a real beach, and (hopefully) go horse back riding into the sunset! I'm sure by the end of all of that I will definitely be ready to come back home. I miss my siblings and friends and Alex and I just want to be back in Michigan where (how ironic) it's actually warm and summer time. And I want to see my brother get married and move out of the house ;) Emily and I have a lot of work to do. Home sweet home soon enough.

I don't think this post really makes a lot of sense. I know it's not a very exciting post. But, I'm at school, waiting on the headmaster to wrap up a meeting and drive me to my home. Oh yeah, I did end up  missing my host family this weekend. It was good to see Rosie in the car when I got picked up. I like them here.