Brisbane from bridge.
Sunset from Brisbane Go-Between Bridge.
Double rainbow!
Passionfruit? They stick this seedy yellow fruit on everything.
Tasted like sour cream and onion chips.
Apparently the Brisbane river is almost pure salt and changes direction 4 times per day; hence the discoloration you may have noticed in previous photos.
All the malls and shopping centers are outdoors. I guess the weather is dependable enough they can put permanent shops and cafes outside.
As we are encouraged to assimilate into Australian culture, the course's first off campus lesson was a surfing lesson. We went to Surfers Paradise on the Gold Coast. We had arranged for our group to break into two smaller groups for surfing lessons. The water was so agressive we kept having to get out and relocate to less agressive portions of the beach. A lifeguard even yelled at the instructor for letting us go out in the waves since we were so inexperienced. Also, there were these little quarter sized jellyfish with blue tentacles which stung a few students. The instructor kept telling us to tell him if we saw any wash up on the shore so he could move us. Overall, the instructors were really great and the lesson was fun. It would have been much better in more calm water where we wouldn't fight the waves and jellyfish wouldnt be thrown about.
Surfers Paradise is on the Gold Coast. The city is right on the beach.
That night we went to the Australian Outback Spectacular. It was a ton of fun! Think: musical Medieval Times, without swords or jousting. The whole story was the history of Australia. This included such Theatrical elements as an indoor helicopter, a cavalry charge, insalely well trained horses which would lay down sit and shake on command, and some adorable dogs with which we got to cuddle.
On Saturday we went to the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary. It was established in 1923 and is now one of the only places in the world it is legal to touch or cuddle with a koala. Also, fun fact: koala is aborigine for "does not drink."
Cool sign at the entrance to Lone Pine.
The non-cuddle-able koalas at the entrance.
At first we were afraid of all the kangaroos hopping around us. Finally we decided to see if we could touch them and they didn't seem to mind.
Some people fed them pellets and grass.
I found a baby joey :)
Same Joey from before.
Wellman cuddled with a koala named Serenity. Supposedly she thought he was a male koala.
Annie cuddled with koala Matthew.
Jimmy also cuddled with Matthew.
My koala was a female named Pepsi. Most of the koalas were male since it's mating season but she was soft and sweet.
It cost $16 to cuddle a koala and each of us got a picture with it. Some of us have been joking about how "fake" the koalas feel - their hair is so thick, coarse, and curly it feels like a toy.
Platypus! This animal is as crazy as it looks. It jumped in and out of the water, off the walls of the tank, and constantly spun in circles. Almost like an otter, but somehow more hyper? I wish we could sedate and cuddle with these too!
In the evening we attempted to bus to Hervey Bay. Supposedly, the flood waters could receed at any time, but it's still raining pretty heavily. We ended up stopping about 3 hours into the ride before we had to stop at a rest stop.
They eat babies?
Everyone who got fruit or salad returned their food. It was $3.50 for a Twix bar and $10.45 for this "caesar salad"...
(There is more lettuce in this salad than the one I bought the next night...)
After an hour or two we ended up turning around to go back to Brisbane. The only alternate road would involve a 12 hour detour.
Overnight the authorities unexpectedly reopened the road for people who needed to pass through. It would only be open for a few hours and new flood warnings were being issued for the region. So, the next morning we returned to the road.
"I dont think thats supposed to be a lake..."
Tops of trees
Bridge
Detour - they set up the road closed signs as we left one strees
Soccer/Track field
High ground
We drove all day so we could scuba dive at 7 the next morning. We toured using Lady Musgrave Cruises and the instructors were all experienced. Everyone had a great time: we saw sea turtles, sharks, starfish, coral, anemone, a 6ish foot manta ray, dolphins, and tons of awesome fish. A particularly agressive tomato clown decided I had gome to close to his anemone. Hopefully some of the underwater camera photos will convert to digital.
The island we dove by.
New Zealand
Sunset from Agnes Waters
As of Monday night the flood had covered the last remaining road was covered by 12 feet of flood.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone :)
a koala named matthew, hilarious.
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