Brad's Random thoughts

The driver sits on the left side of the car and they drive on the other side of the road. Can get very confusing because I was always told as a child to look both ways, I look right and see nothing and start walking.....not a great idea!!

also.... driving on the other side of the road also means that when walking on the sidewalk you should keep to the left of the sidewalk or you will be walking into very angry looking aussies. I didn't quite understand why they were walking straight at me and giving me evil looks.

Its extremely difficult to find recycling here.... Whats the deal with that!! This can cause some problems when your dating a very recycling conscious person.

Customer service blows!! Not only does it suck getting supper at places and getting any kind of service checks, places like vodaphone lie to you about their services and tell you all these things about your phone to find out later that your phone is not compatible. Right now Jods is over there giving them shit. Hopefully it works out.

While camping in Byron I have never seen stars so bright. I have done some camping in Canada in fairly remote areas but I have never seen stars so friggen bright. It is also harder to find constellations in the southern hemisphere.

The animals and wildlife are awesome here. Its so funny how you look around and every single animal is so much different then Canada, except for the fucking seagulls and pigeons, of course those bastards have to be here too. We don't know the names of the birds so we created names for them. There's yellow face, mohawk, sex bird (makes a noise that kinda sounds like "oh yeah" and it makes the noise louder and louder and in a higher pitch until it, well you know.....makes a climax like sound). The June bugs are massive, the frogs are quite large, the lizards are awesome and we haven't seen any spiders or snakes worth talking about.

Byron Bay was having a drug crack down while we were there. This is because of the schoolies, the growing drug problem and the fact that Nimbin is so close. Nimbin is a wonderful little town full of dopers and crazy people, there are some hippies there too. Its a really neat town worth taking a look at. Expensive and crappy product though. With that being said we were in Byron at a bar and saw a puppy running around. We immediately try to get its attention and pet it (jods loves her puppies), apparently trying to get the attention of a police drug dog is not a smart idea. Once we realized it was a drug dog we decided thats not a dog we want to befriend. Luckily our Nimbin purchase was long gone by that point.

I LOVE BOOGIE BOARDING!!!

I can't wait to get on a surf board!! maybe tomorrow.

Oh yeah..... There is a bird here that sounds exactly like a bunch of laughing monkeys. No shit, it sounds hilarious. You wake up in the morning and it sounds like a whole bunch of monkeys are laughing at you.

Cats here are not friendly.

Thats all for now. Im sure I will have many more random thoughts for ya

Springbrook National Park - Natural Bridge- Best of All Lookout

Mon Nov 21

Our team spent the day basking under the sunny rays.  Brad showed me how to boogie board on 10 ft waves...so much fun!  The ocean floor is sandy and soft - however the waves were quite rough and the current pulls you quickly making it sometimes hard to stand up.

Tues Nov 22

This morning we woke up early and headed out to the rainforest nearby!  

We hit up the Natural Bridge Walk- which lead us to an amazing little waterfall.  

Trees in the National Park were very different than what we are used to back home, and walking through the park had a damp cool feeling that was refreshing.  

Along our walk through, we kept our eyes peeled for any wildlife that we might come across, needless to say, no spiders or snakes were spotted...but this black lizard caught Lindsay off guard as we walked down the walking path.  We snapped a few pictures of it before we slowly wandered off back into the rainforest.

Some of the lookouts that we saw along the way in Springbrook were amazing.  The falls shown below are a plunging 106 meters down- The view was spectacular from so high above and the tree canopy seemed to be never-ending! 

To the left - is the 106m waterfall (not so lush due to a lack of rainfall)

Looking out forward from the railing

Looking at the falls from another lookout point 

More trees :) 

Antarctic Beach Trees

 This tree was actually burnt down in 1911 - and at that point it was already 1,000 years old.  They had to cut and burn the top of it down, as it was too large and close to the school located in the left hand corner of the picture - as was considered to be a risk

 This was looking out from "Best of All" lookout point - the highest peak is Mt Warning which is an inactive volcano

 This was the valley & mountains to the left of Mt Warning

We ended the day with a local stop in a village along the way and chowed down on some delicious meat pies (tomato & onion, bacon & cheese, plain (minced meat) and a sausage roll.

We are taking off tomorrow for Byron Bay!

Hey Everyone!

I created this blog so that family & friends can follow us on our travels in and through Australia for the next year.  Ill try to come on and keep you guys updated as often as we can.  

Where to start...

We left Canada on Nov 16th, 2011 @ 7:30AM

We flew from Ottawa --> Vancouver --> Aukland --> Australia (on Nov 18th, 2011 10:30AM) 

Brad and I are living in Surfers Paradise currently with two of his friends from Bishops Uni.

CHAPTER 1

We have only been here for 3 days, and I'm still not sure yet if its hit me that we are here...the weather has been 28 degrees, bright clear blue skies, an amazing turquoise ocean and white sandy beaches.  Before moving to Aus we had already set up an Australian bank account, and on our second day of being here, we both purchased Android cells - which incase you didn't already know, are hooked up to Skype - so another great way we can text or talk and keep in touch :) 

Brads: Brad.Gorski

Jodys: jodsveauds

Our two lovely hosts have been taking good care of both of us, spoiling us with amazing dinners and great company.  We are both so lucky to have friends here to help us out in our first transition to moving to Australia and its been extremely helpful!

We have been discussing a bit more about what our next plan/step is going to be/take us...

We are hoping to both get low-key jobs for a month or two here in the city, possibly getting a hook up at either a cafe (coffee shop) or possibly working seasonal work... with that being said, were not committing to anything at the moment, and we are still applying for jobs online also. 

We are also looking to do harvesting jobs in the new year maybe - probably in Tasmania (south of Australia- island).  Lots of options such as cherry, mango, almonds and olive picking/harvesting - and theres a great webiste here that we can check to see what work is available at this time of year...so we are hoping that if all goes good, that we will spend 3 months doing that and at the same time, travelling around Tasmania.  There are about 10 National Parks on the island, wine country and lots of other amazing things to do on the  island, so we are thinking it might be a great way to see that part of Australia while working at the same time.

Theres lots to figure out in the next week..

Our hosts will be out travelling with their parents who are coming down to visit for 10 days - so we are thinking of taking the opportunity to check out Byron Bay while they are gone -and do some camping and exploring of our own!  We will be living in a hotel (lease) apartment until Jan...so we are thinking of spending Dec-Jan here in Surfer's...and then we can move to Tasmania  in the new year and start our harvesting, save $ and then possibly move to Melbourne /Victoria and set up shop either there...or Sydney...or..?? again, this will depend on where we find work..but those cities are interests for sure!  

Thats about it for now, just pretty much waking up every morn around 8am - having some brekky, doing some running around to set up cell phones, banking etc and then spending the rest of our afternoon chillin on the beach, relaxing and taking it all in!!

Random Thoughts:

*The next two weeks here in Surfers is "schoolies week" so there are 30,000 students that come here to party and celebrate graduating high school.......so, its been quite interesting as all these students are crowding the beaches, streets and of course are obnoxious drunkies for 2 weeks, not sure how many are staying in our hotel, but Matts sandals have already been stolen and we receive many anonymous knocks on the hotel door, yelling and heckling from balconies...our famous phrase for the next 2 weeks is "fucking schoolies!" as they are so annoying all the time lol..juicers!

*the 'in-style' fashion over here for girls apparently are those high-rise top jean shorts...half of them have their ass cheeks hanging out...others are battling frontal wedgies - its quite the look ..haha - i wouldn't be caught dead in this...its awful looking...especially when paired with a bikini top..talk about brutal tan lines.

*There is a pet store here on the main strip where you can go and actually 'rent'/ take care of puppies and take them home and look after them for the night - including food supplies - so that the puppies don't have to stay in the kennels over night..its free..and no, we have not done this.....yet. lol 

*Grapes cost $18.99 per kilo....!!???

Heres some pictures we have taken in the past few days:) 

Enjoy! 

This is the view from our hotel apartment looking over Surfers Paradise beach from the elevator, 10th floor - about a 5 minute walk to white sand, blue skies & the refreshing ocean!

This is further up the gold coast, about a 10-15 min drive from where we are staying - The Spit-  Lots of ppl fishing here on the side.  This side of the barrier is also been known for spotting sharks- so no swimming unless your crazy enough to hop on your surf board and make your way over to the island thats shown in the back.

This is the other side of the rock barrier at the Spit.  Great waves for surfing, lots of dogs running on the beach and safer for swimming.

Surfers Paradise - where we are staying currently :)