This past weekend, Emily, Steph and I took a trip to Sydney. We left on the first flight out extremely early in the morning on Friday, so when we got to Base Backpackers Friday morning, we still had the entire day to roam about the city. We dropped our stuff off at Base and then immediately took off for Paddy's Market, making a quick stop at Starkbucks to energize. We spent the entire morning wandering around the markets, looking at all the Australian souveniers you could imagine from jewelery to boomarangs to Australian road signs, etc, and bought some things for our friends and family. For lunch we just grabbed some sandwiches at the market. After we finished shopping we walked through China town and walked around the city and explored a little more before checking back in at Base. We relaxed for a little while there, and then got ready to head out for dinner at Darling Harbour. Darling Harbour is an absolutely beautiful place with tons of little shops and restaurants lining the water. We ate at a place called Ice Box, and I got a sushi/sashimi platter for dinner which was absolutely delicious, and then we all grabben gelato for dessert. Then we headed over to the Sydney Aquarium at Darling Harbour, where we saw all sorts of tropical fish, turtles, sharks, crocodiles, penguins, nemos, doris, stingrays, platypus, etc. It was absolutey amazing! After a very long day, the three of us decided just to head back to the backpackers and call it an early night, so that we could wake up early Saturday morning to start another long day!
Saturday morning we got up early for our day in the Blue Mountains. We met up with our tour group just a few blocks from our backpackers, and then our tour guide, Disco, loaded us on the bus and began driving off to the mountains. We stopped in a little town on the way for breakfast and walked around a little market, and then headed out the first stop on our tour. The Blue Mountains were absolutey beautiful, and we got to see lots of them by hiking through several paths. This week there were horrible forest fires in the mountains, so many of the paths were closed, but we still managed to see everything. In the mountains there is also some cool temperate rainforests, which were absolutely beautiful and I commented that I thought the Rainforest Cafe must have gotten their inspiration from there. We saw some beautiful waterfalls, we saw the three sisters, tested out the "world's oldest phone booth" (a highly acoustic cave that sent our shouting messages into the mountains where people on the other side could hear), rode the Katoomba Scenic Railway, the world's steepest incline railway, etc. We were hiking and climbing steps all day and it was definitely a great workout a tons of fun. When we got back into Sydney after our long day in the mountains, we relaxed for awhile before heading back out to Darling Harbour for our second night's dinner. At dinner, we were lucky enough to see them shoot some fantastic fireworks off above Darling harbour. After dinner, we stopped over at the Scary Canary, the bar attached to our Backpackers, and had a few drinks and danced, before going to back to our room for another relatively early night in order to start the day earlier on Sunday.
On Sunday we set out first thing in the morning for Sydney Harbour. Here we saw the Opera House and the bridge, both of which were absolutely breathtaking and so exciting to see. Next we walked over to the Rocks, shopped about the markets for a bit, and then stopped for lunch at a delicious little place at the Rocks. After lunch we walked over to the Opera House and went inside for a few minutes to look around and checked out a photography exhibit at the Opera House. After the Opera House, we wandered over to the botanical gardens which were absolutely beautiful. We stopped at the Government House and took a tour of the house which ended being really interesting, and then walked around the gardens a bit more afterward. When we looked up into the trees we noticed that they were absolutely covered in enormous bats who were hanging upside down fanning themselves, attempting to keep cool (it was almost 100 degrees farenheit in Sydney on Sunday!). From the botanical gardens we just leisurely walked back to the backpackers and hung out there for a little while and relaxed before being picked up at 7:00 pm to go to the airport for our flight back to the Gold Coast. Sydney was such a great city and this weekend with Emily and Steph was SO much fun.
This week is my last week of classes at Bond and my last full week of livin here on the Gold Coast. I leave on Friday for NEW ZEALAND (!!), and I'll be there for two weeks- Wellington to visit Di for a week (I'll also hopefully get to meet up with Adam's friend Jeremy from his study abroad in NZ), and then I'll be doing a tour of the south island for a week. I get back from NZ on a Saturday, and then following my return I have three finals, one on Monday, on Tuesday and on Wednesday, and then I fly home that Thursday! Its nuts how quickly time has flown. To celebrate my last week here, last night I went out to SinCity in Surfer's for a VIP Midori party with Lizzy, Brodie, Ashley, Steph, Hailey and her brothers, Lochey, etc. The party was so much fun and the Midori special drinks were delicious and inexpensive so it was a really good time. Steph and I crashed at Ashley's house in surfer's, which by the way was a beautiful 6 million dollar mansion right on the water, and then he drove us back to Uni in the morning. Today Steph and I laid out by the pool in University Place for a while and had such a nice, relaxing day out in the sun.
This weekend was a blast and this week so far has been fun as well. The rest of this week will be spent finishing the last bits of my schoolwork for the semester, laying out by the pool and soaking in as much sun as I can, before I depart on Friday for my two week trip to New Zealand!
Can't believe its just over three weeks until I'm back in the states!
Love and miss you all!
Arlyn
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Monday, November 16, 2009
A Weekend in Melbourne
Hello!
This weekend I went to Melbourne with Becky, Shannon and Steph. We left on an evening flight out of Coolangatta so it was relatively late when we got to our backpacker in Melbourne and since we wanted to wake up early Saturday morning in order to have the entire day to roam around the city, we more or less went straight to bed. All Nations Backpackers was quite an interesting place. The girls and I agreed it was more or less a bohemian/hippie infested cross between a frat house and a dorm. There were some extremely funny characters staying at there and there were some really neat murals painted on the walls. It was definitely not the cleanest place in the world, (and you all know how I feel about that) but overall it was a cool experience. We woke up Saturday morning at 8:00 a.m., got coffee at Gloria Jeans and breakfast at a delicious little place around the corner from our backpacker called 'Perk Up,' and then ventured off into the city. Our first stop was across town at Queen Victoria Market, which was an enormous indoor/outdoor market with tons of vendors selling everything from fresh produce to stereotypical Australia souveniers to Ugg Boots to lots of other little knick knacks. I bought a few souveniers for myself, including a ridiculous but awesome pair of new sunnies (sunglasses) and some opal stud earrings, and a few things for my family members. After the market, we walked up to the gardens, which were really pretty, and then walked over to the Gaol, which is a famous old prison in Melbourne in which Ned Kelly was imprisoned at one point. The prison was really cool and we had wanted to a spooky night tour of the inside of the prison, but that weekend they were doing a show rather than the tour, so we signed up for that instead. After the Gaol, we wandered around the streets for awhile, walked through China town, did a bit of browsing in the shops, etc. Becky and Shannon wanted to keep shopping, and Steph and I wanted to get lunch and explore some other parts of the city, so at this point we split for a few hours. Steph and I grabbed lunch at a little sandwich shop in the middle of Melbourne, and then wandered over to the harbor where we saw Flinders Street Station and took a ride on the Ferris Wheel, where we got some really great photos and views of the entire city. After the Ferris Wheel, Steph and I walked along the harbour back toward our backpacker. When we got back to the room we met Steve from Israel, one of our roommates for the weekend, who explained that he and his buddy were visiting Melbourne for the week. The other guy in our room was a slightly older guy who had so much stuff in the room it literally looked like he lived in the backpacker.. it was a little strange but he was very nice and it was certainly an interesting and fun experience. Steph and I relaxed in the room for awhile, and then Becky and Shannon joint us back in the room shortly after we got back. After re-energizing, Steph and I decided to go out for dinner (Becky and Shannon had snacked and decided to pass), so we found a cute little restaurant in the middle of the city called Max, where Steph got a steak and I got gnocchi (we both got our favorites!), and we each got a complimentary glass of wine with dinner. After dinner we met Becky and Shannon at the Gaol for the show. The show was unfortunately not exactly what any of us were expecting.. it was more or less an hour and a half monologue of a man telling the story of Ned Kelly's life from his perspective. The topic was interesting and I'm glad we went and got to see the inside of the prison, but we all agreed that we wished they had been running night tours instead. After the show we made our way over to Taco Bill's, where we ordered two gigantic Margharita's that came with complimentary sombreros that we split between the four of us. Taco Bill's was packed with lots of rowdy young adults and it was a really fun place to be and enjoy the famous Melbourne nightlife. After Taco Bill's we stopped back at the backpacker and changed and then headed out to the bar in the downstairs of our backpacker for a few more drinks (free drinks that came with the cost of our room!).
Sunday we woke up at 8:00 again, but this time got ready for our wine tour! We got breakfast again at Perk Up, and then met up with our tour guide/van and took off out of the city to the beautiful country wineries. The first winery that we stopped at, Chandon, was the largest winery. It was really beautiful and here we learned a lot about the process of making wine which was really interesting, and then tasted a few delicious different kinds of wines. The next winery was another relatively large winery, where we tried some more wines, learned how to sniff, taste and spit, and then went into the dining room for a great lunch. After lunch they had a little fudge tasting station (yum!) so we sampled a bit of fudge and then headed off to the third winery, which was a smaller but gorgeous winery with really great wines, particularly an amazing dessert wine. The fourth was another small, beautiful little intimate winery, called KellyBrook Winery, where we sampled our last bits of wine and then took a walk through their incredibly pretty gardens. When we arrived back in Melbourne at around 5:00 we were absolutely shot from the long wine-filled day, so we took a few hours back in the backpacker to rest, and then headed out for dinner at Taco Bill's. After dinner we made our way back to our room and spent the night in dancing to Girl Talk, doing the Hoedown Throwdown, doing some cheerleading dances (ha!), etc. We called it an early night because we had to wake up at 4:00 am the next day for our 6:00 am flight.
Monday morning was a bit dramatic because we went to board the flight and the flight attendants informed us that our tickets were for the 6:00 am flight the day before, meaning Student Flights (the travel agency on campus that we booked our trip through) messed up our bookings and put us on the Sunday morning flight by accident instead of the Monday morning flight. We all freaked out a little bit but eventually got it all straightened out and made it onto a 10 am flight back to the Gold Coast, and in the end we were laughing about how ridiculous the morning had been and how exhausted and hilarious we all looked in our sweatpants and sweatshirts and dirty, messy hair and tons of bags and souveniers, not to mention the sombreros we were carrying. Overall it was an amazing weekend with lots of fun stories and great experiences. I can't wait to have another exciting weekend in a city next weekend in Sydney!
Can't believe I will be back in the states a month from tomorrow! The traveling every weekend is making the time travel so incredibly fast! I'm having so much fun in Australia and on all my travels but I can't help but be excited for the holidays and to see my family and friends with all the Christmas decorations that now line the streets here (although I must admit as it gets hotter and hotter here, I begin to fear the shock of the cold at home more and more). I am also sad to realize I'm missing the greatest feast of the year (Thanksgiving), but Deb has promised to make me her famous stuffing on Christmas.
This week is my second to last week of regular classes.. I can't believe it. The week should fly by. I'm seeing the midnight showing of NEW MOON (!!!!!!) on Wednesday night, and then I leave early Friday morning for Syndey!
That's all for now! Miss you all lots.
Love,
Arlyn
This weekend I went to Melbourne with Becky, Shannon and Steph. We left on an evening flight out of Coolangatta so it was relatively late when we got to our backpacker in Melbourne and since we wanted to wake up early Saturday morning in order to have the entire day to roam around the city, we more or less went straight to bed. All Nations Backpackers was quite an interesting place. The girls and I agreed it was more or less a bohemian/hippie infested cross between a frat house and a dorm. There were some extremely funny characters staying at there and there were some really neat murals painted on the walls. It was definitely not the cleanest place in the world, (and you all know how I feel about that) but overall it was a cool experience. We woke up Saturday morning at 8:00 a.m., got coffee at Gloria Jeans and breakfast at a delicious little place around the corner from our backpacker called 'Perk Up,' and then ventured off into the city. Our first stop was across town at Queen Victoria Market, which was an enormous indoor/outdoor market with tons of vendors selling everything from fresh produce to stereotypical Australia souveniers to Ugg Boots to lots of other little knick knacks. I bought a few souveniers for myself, including a ridiculous but awesome pair of new sunnies (sunglasses) and some opal stud earrings, and a few things for my family members. After the market, we walked up to the gardens, which were really pretty, and then walked over to the Gaol, which is a famous old prison in Melbourne in which Ned Kelly was imprisoned at one point. The prison was really cool and we had wanted to a spooky night tour of the inside of the prison, but that weekend they were doing a show rather than the tour, so we signed up for that instead. After the Gaol, we wandered around the streets for awhile, walked through China town, did a bit of browsing in the shops, etc. Becky and Shannon wanted to keep shopping, and Steph and I wanted to get lunch and explore some other parts of the city, so at this point we split for a few hours. Steph and I grabbed lunch at a little sandwich shop in the middle of Melbourne, and then wandered over to the harbor where we saw Flinders Street Station and took a ride on the Ferris Wheel, where we got some really great photos and views of the entire city. After the Ferris Wheel, Steph and I walked along the harbour back toward our backpacker. When we got back to the room we met Steve from Israel, one of our roommates for the weekend, who explained that he and his buddy were visiting Melbourne for the week. The other guy in our room was a slightly older guy who had so much stuff in the room it literally looked like he lived in the backpacker.. it was a little strange but he was very nice and it was certainly an interesting and fun experience. Steph and I relaxed in the room for awhile, and then Becky and Shannon joint us back in the room shortly after we got back. After re-energizing, Steph and I decided to go out for dinner (Becky and Shannon had snacked and decided to pass), so we found a cute little restaurant in the middle of the city called Max, where Steph got a steak and I got gnocchi (we both got our favorites!), and we each got a complimentary glass of wine with dinner. After dinner we met Becky and Shannon at the Gaol for the show. The show was unfortunately not exactly what any of us were expecting.. it was more or less an hour and a half monologue of a man telling the story of Ned Kelly's life from his perspective. The topic was interesting and I'm glad we went and got to see the inside of the prison, but we all agreed that we wished they had been running night tours instead. After the show we made our way over to Taco Bill's, where we ordered two gigantic Margharita's that came with complimentary sombreros that we split between the four of us. Taco Bill's was packed with lots of rowdy young adults and it was a really fun place to be and enjoy the famous Melbourne nightlife. After Taco Bill's we stopped back at the backpacker and changed and then headed out to the bar in the downstairs of our backpacker for a few more drinks (free drinks that came with the cost of our room!).
Sunday we woke up at 8:00 again, but this time got ready for our wine tour! We got breakfast again at Perk Up, and then met up with our tour guide/van and took off out of the city to the beautiful country wineries. The first winery that we stopped at, Chandon, was the largest winery. It was really beautiful and here we learned a lot about the process of making wine which was really interesting, and then tasted a few delicious different kinds of wines. The next winery was another relatively large winery, where we tried some more wines, learned how to sniff, taste and spit, and then went into the dining room for a great lunch. After lunch they had a little fudge tasting station (yum!) so we sampled a bit of fudge and then headed off to the third winery, which was a smaller but gorgeous winery with really great wines, particularly an amazing dessert wine. The fourth was another small, beautiful little intimate winery, called KellyBrook Winery, where we sampled our last bits of wine and then took a walk through their incredibly pretty gardens. When we arrived back in Melbourne at around 5:00 we were absolutely shot from the long wine-filled day, so we took a few hours back in the backpacker to rest, and then headed out for dinner at Taco Bill's. After dinner we made our way back to our room and spent the night in dancing to Girl Talk, doing the Hoedown Throwdown, doing some cheerleading dances (ha!), etc. We called it an early night because we had to wake up at 4:00 am the next day for our 6:00 am flight.
Monday morning was a bit dramatic because we went to board the flight and the flight attendants informed us that our tickets were for the 6:00 am flight the day before, meaning Student Flights (the travel agency on campus that we booked our trip through) messed up our bookings and put us on the Sunday morning flight by accident instead of the Monday morning flight. We all freaked out a little bit but eventually got it all straightened out and made it onto a 10 am flight back to the Gold Coast, and in the end we were laughing about how ridiculous the morning had been and how exhausted and hilarious we all looked in our sweatpants and sweatshirts and dirty, messy hair and tons of bags and souveniers, not to mention the sombreros we were carrying. Overall it was an amazing weekend with lots of fun stories and great experiences. I can't wait to have another exciting weekend in a city next weekend in Sydney!
Can't believe I will be back in the states a month from tomorrow! The traveling every weekend is making the time travel so incredibly fast! I'm having so much fun in Australia and on all my travels but I can't help but be excited for the holidays and to see my family and friends with all the Christmas decorations that now line the streets here (although I must admit as it gets hotter and hotter here, I begin to fear the shock of the cold at home more and more). I am also sad to realize I'm missing the greatest feast of the year (Thanksgiving), but Deb has promised to make me her famous stuffing on Christmas.
This week is my second to last week of regular classes.. I can't believe it. The week should fly by. I'm seeing the midnight showing of NEW MOON (!!!!!!) on Wednesday night, and then I leave early Friday morning for Syndey!
That's all for now! Miss you all lots.
Love,
Arlyn
Monday, November 9, 2009
The Outback!
Wow! So much to update on. This past weekend I went to the Outback which was absolutely incredible, but before I begin with all that, let me just back track a little bit and do some pre-outback updates.
Halloween weekend was a lot of fun. Friday during the day Lizzy, Steph, Brodie, Ashley and I went out shopping for costumes. The costumes in Australia are literally about $150, so we quickly dropped the costume idea and settled for some funny Halloween accessories. I got a ridiculously awesome Halloween hat with a bat on it and a pump attached so that when you squeeze the pump the bat's wings fly. Its great. After that, we went over to Robina Town Centre where I tried my first Australian kebab. The kebabs here are different than at home.. they're not meat on a stick. Rather, they're sort of like if a wrap and a gyro mated, you would get a kebab. It was really delicious. After that, we went over to the pet store to play with the puppies and kitties (Lizzy and Brodie are going to get a dog) and it made me miss all of my animals, and then we headed home. Later that night we headed over to Ashley's sister Steph's boyfriend's house (confusing yes) for some pre-gaming, before heading out to SinCity- a bar down in Surfer's, for a continuation of Steph's 21st birthday. Steph's boyfriend apparently has a lot of money and rented a limo for everyone and then rented out the VIP section of SinCity for the night. It was tons of fun and we got unlimited drinks and danced and had a good time. Saturday was Halloween, and we went over to Mik and Nik's for a Halloween barbeque. I tried kangaroo for the first time, and we hung out and just had a relatively relaxed night and ate, drank and watched the soccer game. Sunday was just a catch up on school work day, and then the rest of the week was pretty normal with classes and papers and whatnot.
Okay now on to the Outback! Thursday morning I woke up at 3:30 am to catch the airport transfer at 4:15 on campus. Our flight out of Brisbane was at 6:55 am. We flew from Brisbane to Cairns, then from Cairns to Ayers Rock (Uluru). Our tour guide for the weekend, Brad, was waiting by baggage claim at Ayers Rock airport, and once we were all gathered, he took us to our truck and brought us immediately to the Cultural Centre at Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park. There we walked through the centre and learned a little bit about Aboriginal law, religion and art, and I bought my first big souveniour for myself: an original Aboriginal painting! The Aboriginal art is so neat and I loved it and can't wait to get it framed and hang it in my room back in Columbus! After walking through the Cultural Centre, we had a quick lunch and then headed out for our Uluru Base Walk. The walk was about 9.6 km (approx. 6 miles) and took a few hours, but the views were absolutely spectacular. We filled our bottles of water up several times, and the immense dry heat kept us from sweating or having to pee too much! After we finished our base walk, Brad met back up with us and drove us out to our campsite for the night. We dropped our stuff down and headed straight for the pool at the main building at the campsite! It felt SO good to jump in the cold water and cool off. After cooling down in the pool, we headed back to the campsite where Brad gave us some sparkling wine and crackers and dip and pointed us up toward a path where we could see the sun setting over Uluru. The views were spectacular and it was such a nice way to relax as our first day was coming to an end. When the sun had set, we went back to our campsite where Brad had prepared our dinner. He made kangaroo bolognese- pasta with kangaroo meet and lots of vegetables-- it was absolutely delicious. After that, we all began getting ready for bed. We rolled out our swags (coolest things in the world: they're basically matresses that roll up like sleeping bags and they're SO comfortable) by the campfire, listened to dave matthews, and got ready to sleep under the stars. I have never seen so many stars in my entire life and it was so beautiful (even saw a shooting star!). I cannot even describe the feeling of lying out under and open sky so far away from all civilization. Its so unreal and so fantastically exciting and relaxing all at the same time.
Friday morning we were awoken at 4:00 am so that we could get to a lookout close to our campsite to watch the sunrise over Uluru and Kata Tjuta. The sunrise was SO beautiful. It reminded me of watching the sunrise at the top of Mount Haleakala. Once the sun was up, we drove over to Kata Tjuta for a 7 km hike through the "Valley of the Winds". On the drive over to start the hike we saw free roaming camels on the side of the road! So strange to see camels just walking along! The Kata Tjuta hike was by far the prettiest hike of the entire trip. The views were absolutely stunning. While on our hike we also saw a bunch of kangaroos bouncing around. After our hike we got back in the car and stopped on the way at the Resort, which was basically a little shopping center and resort in the middle of the desert, to walk around a bit and buy some more water bottles and fill up on fuel. We hit the road again and then stopped once more at another campsite for some lunch. Here we walked around a bit, saw some really beautiful flowers, saw an emu picking at some hung laundry, saw some beautiful Australian birds, and then all gathered up for a delicious barbeque of sausages and cheeseburgers. After we were all nice and full, we got back in the car and headed for our second night's campsite: Kings Creek Cattle Station, stopping once more on the way for a spectacular view of Mount Connor and a really neat looking salt pan. When we arrived at our campsite, we were pleased to find out that this site also had a pool, so we dipped in and cooled off once again. This campsite's main area was also amazingly clean, so a few of us decided to have our showers there, before heading out to our more remote camping location. When we got to our site, we were all exhausted and immediately rolled out our swags by the fire and relaxed for awhile while Brad cooked another delicious dinner. This night we had chicken and vegetables over rice and homemade garnished bread. After dinner we all basically immediately passed out and got ready for another early morning in the desert.
Saturday morning we were awoken at 4:00 am again, this time to get an early start on our hike at Kings Canyon. This 7 km hike was so incredible. The sights were once again breathtaking. It started with an extremely steep treck up to the top of the canyon, but then was pretty relaxing and relatively flat the rest of the way through. Brad stayed with us the entire hike this time which was really nice, because we got to learn a lot about Aboriginal culture and the geology of the canyon. About halfway through the hike we stopped at the "Garden of Eden," which was a beautiful little natural spring in the middle of the canyon. We also visited spots on the canyon known as the Amphitheatre and the Lost City, and Brad taught us a lot about all of the different plants and the medicinal purposes they served for Aboriginals. After our hike, we went back to the main station at our campsite for a quick lunch, and then piled back into the car for a long drive to Alice Springs. When we got to Alice Springs, we checked into our backpackers, which turned out to be really nice, with a bathroom in our room and everything, and then headed to Toddy's, the bar at the backpackers, for dinner and drinks. It was a very nice way to unwind from an amazing weekend in the Outback. The next morning we woke up at around 8:00 (which felt so late!), ate some breakfast, and caught our 9:30 am transfer to Alice Springs airport where we caught our plane back to Brisbane!
My trip to the Outback was so much more beautiful and exciting then I would have ever imagined and I'm so glad I decided to do a trip so different from everything else I've done so far in Australia. This week its back to schoolwork, but then next weekend its off to Melbourne! Can't wait to update on that trip!
Love and miss you all!
Arlyn
Halloween weekend was a lot of fun. Friday during the day Lizzy, Steph, Brodie, Ashley and I went out shopping for costumes. The costumes in Australia are literally about $150, so we quickly dropped the costume idea and settled for some funny Halloween accessories. I got a ridiculously awesome Halloween hat with a bat on it and a pump attached so that when you squeeze the pump the bat's wings fly. Its great. After that, we went over to Robina Town Centre where I tried my first Australian kebab. The kebabs here are different than at home.. they're not meat on a stick. Rather, they're sort of like if a wrap and a gyro mated, you would get a kebab. It was really delicious. After that, we went over to the pet store to play with the puppies and kitties (Lizzy and Brodie are going to get a dog) and it made me miss all of my animals, and then we headed home. Later that night we headed over to Ashley's sister Steph's boyfriend's house (confusing yes) for some pre-gaming, before heading out to SinCity- a bar down in Surfer's, for a continuation of Steph's 21st birthday. Steph's boyfriend apparently has a lot of money and rented a limo for everyone and then rented out the VIP section of SinCity for the night. It was tons of fun and we got unlimited drinks and danced and had a good time. Saturday was Halloween, and we went over to Mik and Nik's for a Halloween barbeque. I tried kangaroo for the first time, and we hung out and just had a relatively relaxed night and ate, drank and watched the soccer game. Sunday was just a catch up on school work day, and then the rest of the week was pretty normal with classes and papers and whatnot.
Okay now on to the Outback! Thursday morning I woke up at 3:30 am to catch the airport transfer at 4:15 on campus. Our flight out of Brisbane was at 6:55 am. We flew from Brisbane to Cairns, then from Cairns to Ayers Rock (Uluru). Our tour guide for the weekend, Brad, was waiting by baggage claim at Ayers Rock airport, and once we were all gathered, he took us to our truck and brought us immediately to the Cultural Centre at Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park. There we walked through the centre and learned a little bit about Aboriginal law, religion and art, and I bought my first big souveniour for myself: an original Aboriginal painting! The Aboriginal art is so neat and I loved it and can't wait to get it framed and hang it in my room back in Columbus! After walking through the Cultural Centre, we had a quick lunch and then headed out for our Uluru Base Walk. The walk was about 9.6 km (approx. 6 miles) and took a few hours, but the views were absolutely spectacular. We filled our bottles of water up several times, and the immense dry heat kept us from sweating or having to pee too much! After we finished our base walk, Brad met back up with us and drove us out to our campsite for the night. We dropped our stuff down and headed straight for the pool at the main building at the campsite! It felt SO good to jump in the cold water and cool off. After cooling down in the pool, we headed back to the campsite where Brad gave us some sparkling wine and crackers and dip and pointed us up toward a path where we could see the sun setting over Uluru. The views were spectacular and it was such a nice way to relax as our first day was coming to an end. When the sun had set, we went back to our campsite where Brad had prepared our dinner. He made kangaroo bolognese- pasta with kangaroo meet and lots of vegetables-- it was absolutely delicious. After that, we all began getting ready for bed. We rolled out our swags (coolest things in the world: they're basically matresses that roll up like sleeping bags and they're SO comfortable) by the campfire, listened to dave matthews, and got ready to sleep under the stars. I have never seen so many stars in my entire life and it was so beautiful (even saw a shooting star!). I cannot even describe the feeling of lying out under and open sky so far away from all civilization. Its so unreal and so fantastically exciting and relaxing all at the same time.
Friday morning we were awoken at 4:00 am so that we could get to a lookout close to our campsite to watch the sunrise over Uluru and Kata Tjuta. The sunrise was SO beautiful. It reminded me of watching the sunrise at the top of Mount Haleakala. Once the sun was up, we drove over to Kata Tjuta for a 7 km hike through the "Valley of the Winds". On the drive over to start the hike we saw free roaming camels on the side of the road! So strange to see camels just walking along! The Kata Tjuta hike was by far the prettiest hike of the entire trip. The views were absolutely stunning. While on our hike we also saw a bunch of kangaroos bouncing around. After our hike we got back in the car and stopped on the way at the Resort, which was basically a little shopping center and resort in the middle of the desert, to walk around a bit and buy some more water bottles and fill up on fuel. We hit the road again and then stopped once more at another campsite for some lunch. Here we walked around a bit, saw some really beautiful flowers, saw an emu picking at some hung laundry, saw some beautiful Australian birds, and then all gathered up for a delicious barbeque of sausages and cheeseburgers. After we were all nice and full, we got back in the car and headed for our second night's campsite: Kings Creek Cattle Station, stopping once more on the way for a spectacular view of Mount Connor and a really neat looking salt pan. When we arrived at our campsite, we were pleased to find out that this site also had a pool, so we dipped in and cooled off once again. This campsite's main area was also amazingly clean, so a few of us decided to have our showers there, before heading out to our more remote camping location. When we got to our site, we were all exhausted and immediately rolled out our swags by the fire and relaxed for awhile while Brad cooked another delicious dinner. This night we had chicken and vegetables over rice and homemade garnished bread. After dinner we all basically immediately passed out and got ready for another early morning in the desert.
Saturday morning we were awoken at 4:00 am again, this time to get an early start on our hike at Kings Canyon. This 7 km hike was so incredible. The sights were once again breathtaking. It started with an extremely steep treck up to the top of the canyon, but then was pretty relaxing and relatively flat the rest of the way through. Brad stayed with us the entire hike this time which was really nice, because we got to learn a lot about Aboriginal culture and the geology of the canyon. About halfway through the hike we stopped at the "Garden of Eden," which was a beautiful little natural spring in the middle of the canyon. We also visited spots on the canyon known as the Amphitheatre and the Lost City, and Brad taught us a lot about all of the different plants and the medicinal purposes they served for Aboriginals. After our hike, we went back to the main station at our campsite for a quick lunch, and then piled back into the car for a long drive to Alice Springs. When we got to Alice Springs, we checked into our backpackers, which turned out to be really nice, with a bathroom in our room and everything, and then headed to Toddy's, the bar at the backpackers, for dinner and drinks. It was a very nice way to unwind from an amazing weekend in the Outback. The next morning we woke up at around 8:00 (which felt so late!), ate some breakfast, and caught our 9:30 am transfer to Alice Springs airport where we caught our plane back to Brisbane!
My trip to the Outback was so much more beautiful and exciting then I would have ever imagined and I'm so glad I decided to do a trip so different from everything else I've done so far in Australia. This week its back to schoolwork, but then next weekend its off to Melbourne! Can't wait to update on that trip!
Love and miss you all!
Arlyn
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