Straddie

Hello hello :)


As of this afternoon, Emily and I came back from a overnight adventure to a beautiful off-the map place called North Stradbroke Island. Due to the "off season", there were not a lot of people around which meant a quite and relaxing holiday in celebration of the end of uni classes!

We left for the island a little before 10am. After a series of almost mishaps/unfortunate events, we made it to the island a little after 1:30 I believe? It seems like we had been one step behind the whole way. After almost missing our morning train, we made it to the town with the ferry only to find out that the next one didn't leave for another hour and a half. We decided a nice picnic lunch on the harbor was a wonderful idea. Then, after catching the bus we had to pay for as the free one pulls right pass us, we made it to the ferry and island without much trouble. :)



The afternoon we spent exploring the area around our hostel. The look out point was about a 40 min walk away so we trekked up and hiked on a trail around the point. It was beautiful!! Miles and miles of ocean out in front of us, not a cloud in the sky and the sun beating down made for a very pleasant walk. June and July is whale season, so we kept our eyes pealed for them, but to no avail. We did see a few turtles though! That was pretty exciting.



That night we called it early. After eating a personal trainer's favorite meal of soda, cheesecake and chips with dip, we retired early to play some cards and read a bit. Oh how I have missed playing cards...



Saturday morning proved very successful! After a failed attempt for yoga on the beach at 8:30, we found a cute little cafe for breakfast. We went back to our hostel to prepare for a day on the water then went to a hire place and got a kayak for half a day (this only after realizing that the waves were not epic enough for our skill...) Man alive, my shoulders and arms are going to be so sore. It was pretty exciting. I just want you to imagine two girls trying to get this two person kayak out to the ocean when waves are crashing to the shore with all of our valuables were IN the kayak. Like I said... very exciting. I must say, we were pretty good at it until we tried getting back in to shore...we may or may not have flipped over. Laying on the beach for a while after our adventure was just the right way to finish off our island holiday.



I also forgot to post about one of my favorite things I have done in Brisbane this semester... going to the races!! Emily, Chris and I got all dolled up (not really... but we would like to think we put an effort in..) and headed out to the raceway to see some horse races. People actually were wearing all kinds of fancy hats and feathers with dresses and heels like they do in the movies! Oh the fashion was fantastic! The horse races themselves were pretty awesome as well. The sheer power of those creatures are quite extraordinary.

To top off the awesome day was (for Chris, free beer taste testing and..) meeting some Australian celebrities from a show called "Packed to the Rafters"!! They thought it was pretty funny that we did not know who they were, but they still gave us their autographs. Pretty awesome.

Overall, it was a fantastic way to spend an afternoon because it was so relaxing and entertaining all at the same time. I wish we had these at home...

3.5 weeks left.
Cheers :)