A girl, a dog and a Bush Turkey.

3 days until I fly to Cairns and begin my ozzy adventure! It seems so close but I've still got so much to do. I have to work today and the next 2 days -I'm doing 7 hour shifts which I think are going to be hellish! But at least I will have that little bit extra to do things. I still need to clean my room and pack the last of my things up. It's going to be so strange not having a home for 3 months, every day is going to be different and exciting. I don't have much of a plan so it's exciting not to know where we're going to end up. So far the plan is:

26th November fly to Cairns

• Buy a Campervan
• Do a Dive Course
• Travel up to the Daintree Rainforest -go Jungle Surfing (zipwireing through the rainforest, it looks amazing!)
• Travel along the Coast

25th December

• Christmas on a beach somewhere! Possibly Byron Bay?

31st December

• Sydney for New Year's Eve
• Then travel along the coast to Melbourne (See the Little Penguins!) and do the Great Ocean Road

19th January

• Ryan's birthday
• Go to the Melbourne Tennis Open
• Then drive back to Brisbane, perhaps go to Canberra en route

25th/26th January ??

• Fly to New Zealand??

8th February

• Fly back??

10th February JAMIE arrive

• Brisbane
• Gold Coast
• Whitsundays
• Sydney -Jamie's BIRTHDAY

24th February Jamie go home

• Find somewhere to live

28th February

• Back to uni.

This plan seems very vague, but really I think that's what's good about it! Having a campervan will give us the freedom to go wherever we fancy and see more of Australia than if we travelled hostel to hostel via public transport. And I think it will end up saving us money (unless something goes drastically wrong) as we'll be able to sell it at the end. I really need to sort out booking flights though, especially to NZ as if I don't do it now I probably won't end up going :s. But it's on my lidt of things to do!

The only concerns I have at the moment are if we can't find a campervan and if it might be difficult to find a nice place to live right at the beginning of term - but it worked out alright this time...

Since exams I've been working and trying to sort everything out. I have managed to do some fun things though! On saturday me, Ryan, Guy and Rich went to movieworld and wet and wild again. I got to go on the Scooby Doo ride again and there was a new 4d film in movieworld. It was Journey to the Centre of the Earth. It wasn't quite as good as Shrek but I did think it looked like a film that I actually might like to watch. In Wet and Wild Guy and Rich went on the loop the loop ride 3 times! After very little consideration I decided that I definately did not want to put myself through that again! I did get to go on the surfer ride (which Ryan previously found horrific) and thoroughly enjoyed it. It reminded me of being at the fair. We went on a few of the other rides I went on the really tall one thats up about a million steps that I didn't go down before. It was not as scary as it looks but does hurt your back a little. Guy and Rich were very funny on the blackhole ride as earlier in the day Ryan had found some balloons in his pocket, the guys took them and were challenged to blow them up during the ride. Which they did! The lifeguards were so confused, it was many lols!

Me, Ryan and Guy also went to the Fox on sunday for $3 steak, chips and salad which was rather nice seeing as I have realised that I now like steak. We then went to the Science Centre which is like Brisbane's version of Techniquest or @ Bristol. This was a lot of fun, although I did get beaten by a child for the speed I can throw. Most dissapointing. We built a bridge, made a tunnel maze on 3 sides of a stand, lifted each other and a fridge, froze our shadows and had our severed heads displayed on a fruit platter.

Another thing that some of you may already have heard about is the story of Jack the dog and the Bush Turkey. Personally I didn't find it all that amusing but everyone else seems to do so. I was walking Jack the collie dog in the field at the back of the RSPCA and had let him off his lead to have a run around. He disappeared into one of the hedges, then all of a sudden a Bush Turkey came running out chased by a rather speedy Jack. I panicked and was running around after them shouting at Jack which did NOTHING. He caught the turkey by the tail and managed to rip all his tail feathers out before the turkey managed to get away. And then the chase began again. It only ended when Jack slowed down because the turkey was IN HIS MOUTH and I was able to make him let it go. The poor turkey was a bit worse for wear though with his poor naked tail, and there were feathers everywhere!

With that I must go as it is nearly time for work.

MISS YOU ALL and I hope you like your birthday present Melanie, it was so good to skype! xxxxx

RSPCA, Fraser Island and Whale Watching

I just got back from walking Hercules the husky. He is so, so nice! I don't understand why he would ever be at the RSPCA. Actually all of the dogs I've met there have been so lovely, it's hard to understand why anyone would give them away. I'm really enjoying my voluntary work but I keep finding dogs to take home. Hercules would be ideal for you Laurie! I ended up just walking him for about 45mins as he was so amazing. He was moulting ridiculously though, bits of fur were flying off as he ran along. I brushed him a bit and ended up with a huge ball of hair but he was still all tufty looking where he was losing his coat. I walked some some other lovely dogs as well but Hercules was definately my favourite.

So lately I havn't got up to that much as I've had loads of deadlines. But in midsemester break I did go to Fraser Island on a field trip. It is really, really beautiful there. The lakes are amazing and wierdly all have different coloured water -red, green and clear. My favourite part was definately sand dune jumping. We had been trekking for what seemed like hours and then we're told to climb up a huge sandy bank. When we got to the top you could see huge sand dunes it was so beautiful. We walked along to the edge of the dune, where it suddenly drops off steeply. The idea here is to just run and jump off the dune. Scary, huh. So I was feeling pretty nervous as it looked like it was gonna hurt when you thudded down on the sand. But me and Louisa conquered the fear and jumped together. I think I was the one of the only ones that screamed. Flying through the air is pretty scary to be fair though. It was so much fun though, and did not hurt at all. Everyone had a few more turns and then the whole class jumped together! I'm not sure if the photos are up yet but I'll try to put one in when I find it! From there we trekked on a couple of km to the first lake we went to. It was a huge red lake in the middle of a forest. The swimming was so good there because it was so humid and after trekking you just feel disgusting.

I really enjoyed Fraser Island. We spent the mornings doing field work but then in the afternoons we would go to a lake or creek for swimming. One morning I even got up at 5.45am to go tracking. This is where you look for, and try to identify animal tracks in the sand. We saw loads, including snake tracks, dingo tracks and even tiny millipede tracks.



There were so many dingoes there! One of them came right up to us on the beach and was only a couple of metres away! There pretty tame because tourists feed them. But this is bad because then if the dingoes attack people they get put down. When it is really the peoples fault for trying to play with wild animals! There were the cutest dingo pups on our campsite though. The campsite was fenced to stop the dingoes getting in but the puppies are small enough to fir through. They are so sweet! We also saw a couple of snakes, a huge spider, a little scorpion and many, many bugs.



Another really fun thing about Fraser Island is driving on the sand! I would love to drive there but I'm sure I would nearly definately get stuck. You get bounced around like crazy in the back of the 4WDs. It was v.v. funny.

Everyone was really nice on the trip, and we all ended up going to Down Under on the tuesday after we got back :).

So, the weekend before Fraser I went Whale Watching down at the Gold Coast. It was AMAZING, literally the best thing I've done here. The whales were actually really close and we saw loads of them, like maybe 20+!! And they were jumping out of the water, slapping their fins and blowing through their blow holes. It was amazing to see, and something I think everyone should do if they ever have the chance.



While we were at Surfer's Paradise I somehow managed to lose a shoe in the sea. I'm not really sure how this happened but it was nowhere to be found. So if you go to the beach, please look out for my shoe. It is a grey lace up dap in size 4.

I think that is all of my news....On Sunday I am going to Stradbroke island though, which should be exciting :D.

Lots of love xxx

This and that

So I haven't blogged for a while but I'm also not really sure what I've been doing. One thing that I am very excited about is that I'm going to start volunteering at the RSPCA. I'm going for training on saturday and then will start going every friday. I have to do a couple of hours of admin work, but then I got to do dog walking and animal enrichment activities. I really miss Lexie and Moss so it will be good to work with the dogs :D

Other than that I have been mostly working these last few weeks. My job is getting pretty tedious but at least I should be doing some fun things with the money over summer. I will hopefully be going whale watching in Surfer's Paradise this weekend. And then on monday I'll be going on my field trip to Fraser Island with my Australia's Terrestrial Environment course. It's crazy that it's midsemester already though! I don't feel like I've been here all that long, but at the same time when I think about arriving here that seems like a world away.

Ryan has moved into his own place and got a job where I'm working now. He's going training for it today so should be starting pretty soon. We've been vaguely starting to make travel plans. So far we are thinking that we will go straight to Ayre's rock when exams are over, then possibly visit Alice Springs as well. Then we're going to fly up to either Darwin or Cairns where Ryan will buy a campervan and then we're going to travel all the way down the East Coast. We've heard it may not be worth going to Darwin and I can't seem to find any flights to there from Ayre's rock either so it's looking like we might be starting in Cairns. Which is meant to be amazing for backpackers and it's right by the Great Barrier Reef -so I think I'm going to get my scuba diving certificate there. You can do courses where you live in on the boats which sounds like so much fun! I've always wanted to go on a boat holiday :).

Anyways, things that I have actually been doing...

At the beginning of September the Brisbane festival started. This is not at all like the Edinburgh festival. Everything is expensive so I haven't actually been to any of the events. The opening was pretty amazing though. It's called Riverfire and it starts with a fighter jet zooming between along the river with a glowing ball of fire shooting out the back of it. It was really cool -looked a bit like the sun. Then the river lit up with fire along it (this wasn't actually on the water, there were platforms along the river) and the fireworks started it. But they didn't just come off the river, they were coming off the tops of all the skyscrapers on the other side of the river (we were at South Bank). Then the bridge lit up with a waterfall of sparks. It was all really pretty. It finished with the jet coming back through. I am a big fan of fireworks so this was pretty amazing, especially with the jet. And it was free :).

So the next week I had my fieldtrip to Lamington Park. This involved a 12km trek in the rain. It wasn't a great day. It was pretty much the same as Brisbane Forest Park, except we got to see some heathland as well. There's supposed to be really good views from there but it was so misty that you couldn't actually see anything at all.

Me at Lamington with a big uprooted tree.

The next day I was going on a trip with QUEST to Springbrook -which is pretty much right by Lamington so I was feeling pretty concerned. This actually turned out to be really good though. The sun was out and everyone was much happier. We went to 'best of all lookout' where you can see all the way to Byron Bay. Then we headed to the 'Forest of dreams' where we saw glow worms and fed parrots.

Feeding a parrot!!

We then went to a waterfall where some crazy people went swimming. I was considering it until I heard the horrible screaming noises everyone was making when they got in.

Me from behind the waterfall -slightly damp!

After spending some time there we headed over to this place called Natural Bridge. It's hard to explain but is basically water going through a hole into a cave and somehow this is a bridge... It was pretty too and we even saw some glow worms in there natural habitat. After that we headed home.

Me and Louisa them met up with Guy and Ryan for dinner at a Turkish restaurant. I discovered that I do not like Turkish food. For some reason I thought it would taste like Moroccan food so was massively disappointed. There was a belly dancer though, although she did not roll her belly which we found odd.

Last week we went to QUEST's film night where we saw a pretty odd Australian film called Priscilla Queen of the Desert. It was about transvestites travelling to Alice Springs to put on some shows. Was surprisingly good. We then headed to RE which is a pretty cool bar in Toowong with live music. Was pretty dead by 11.30pm though -people seem to head out and go home earlier in Australia.

This weekend me and Ryan went to Wet and Wild -a water park at the Gold Coast. I bought my first rash vest for it! It's very nice -blue, stripey roxy tee :). However ended up not wearing it as wasn't allowed it on some of the ride. Ryan, Guy and Rich had been the week before but I had been working. But Ryan loved it so made me go even though it was cloudy. It was fun though although they have a ridiculously scary water slide. You go up to the top where the slide is unlocked for you to get in. You get in and are standing up with your back against the vertical slide. You are locked in and then there is a countdown before the floor drops out from beneath you and you fall down at ridiculous speeds. It was so scary that I couldn't even scream! Horrible ride. After falling down you do a loop the loop which you can't even notice due to going so fast. At least it was over quickly. The other rides were much nicer. I especially enjoyed the Kamikaze which involves a 2 seater rubber ring, which you sit in facing each other. It's a bit like a half tube or something. You drop off one side and then go up the other and then again until you slow to a stop. I got straight back on this one it was so good. The rest of the slides were all pretty mellow. It seemed that most of the rides there were either too scary or not scary enough.

So that's about all I've been up to -it seems that I may have done more than I thought.

Love you and miss you xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx