If there's a beginning, there's an end.

The time has come to say goodbye to Australia. I had the time of my life and met some pretty wonderful people that I hope to keep in touch with and see again. Thank you to everyone that has read my blog - here are a few parting pictures from my last two weeks while Ember was traveling around with me.

We spent 4 days in Cairns, which is the main 'Great Barrier Reef' city. We went snorkeling for a full day, relaxed on the beach, and kayaked at Palm Beach.

Lookout over Brisbane

There's nothing quite like Australian coffee at the beach.

View from our hotel/apartment in Miami Beach (Gold Coast). You can see Surfer's Paradise in the background.

Sydney!

Darling Harbour in Sydney

We went to a Wildlife Park in Sydney and saw all the cool native animals (and played with butterflies, mostly).

There was an event called 'Vivid' going on in Sydney while we were there. Artwork was displayed all around Sydney Harbour and the Opera House had animations on it at night.

Wombats, Koalas and Dingos - Oh My!

I never posted my pics from the Featherdale Wildlife Park, so here they are! This was somewhere we visited on the Blue Mountains Trip last month.

(Angry?) Wallaby

Wombats- They are mean!

The chickens were psychotic. 

The Dingo that ate that baby

Welcome to Australia

Daily dose of comics:

And the winner is...

A couple weekends ago I went on a trip to the Blue Mountains near Sydney with all the other exchange students. We went on 2 long hikes in the mountains and you can see how beautiful it was from my pictures below. The coordinator/adviser of the trip held a photo and video competition to keep it lively, and our video entry won! The photo competition still isn't over, but I'm one of a few finalists in the running. The video we made was at the bottom of the Three Sisters hike where there is a railway to the top. There was an old railway car on display that we decided to turn into a roller coaster scene. Enjoy!

This is what we got for winning. It's a season pass to the Brumbies games (rugby team sponsored by my school)

The 'Three Sisters' Lookout. We hiked around to the left of them, all the way down to the bottom down SUPER steep stairs, crossed in front of them at the bottom, and then quite a ways to the railway. There is a picture below that shows the view from the end of the hike and you can see the Three Sisters off in the distance.

Faaaaall!

While the rest of you are starting to warm up, it's getting cold here. I'll be traveling up the coast in northern Australia in 6 weeks and it will be warmer there, but for now I'm revving up my heater! On my way home from the mall with a friend I snapped some photos of the beautiful leaves to share.

ANZAC Day

Have you ever tried an Anzac cookie? If not, do it. They are SO GOOD.


Today was ANZAC Day (Australia and New Zealand Army Corps). It's a public holiday, which means I don't have a single class this week :)


Anzac Day marks the anniversary of the first major military action fought by Australian and New Zealand forces during the First World War. When war broke out in 1914, Australia had been a federal commonwealth for only 13 years and was eager to establish its reputation among the nations of the world. Australian and New Zealand forces allied and landed on Gallipoli on 25 April, meeting fierce resistance from the Ottoman Turkish defenders. What had been planned as a bold stroke to knock Turkey out of the war quickly became a stalemate, and the campaign dragged on for eight months. At the end of 1915 the allied forces were evacuated, after both sides had suffered heavy casualties and endured great hardships. Over 8,000 Australian soldiers had been killed.


Originally, I was planning on going to the Dawn Service at the War Memorial at 5:30 am, which meant I would have to catch a bus at 4:30 am. Since I'm practically nocturnal anyway, I decided to stay up and do homework until it was time to head out. During that time, I heard it raining pretty hard off and on and decided that it was a bad idea to go since the temperature outside was a measly 8 Degrees (46 F) outside. I was able to make it to the 10:15 service, though. The agenda was different, but I'm glad I at least went to something. 

I survived (an earthquake)

I woke up this morning around 5 am to an earthquake! I was too tired to care or get up.. so it's a good thing it wasn't anything major. It measured 3.7 mag and was about 30 miles away from me. One of my roommates posted this picture and I couldn't help but laugh: