12 September 2007

aussie aussie aussie!!!

oi oi oi!!

let's be honest, faithful readers..i have been waiting to use that blog title for quite some time. and now's the perfect time to use it, i reckon, after coming home from the australia v argentina football game. unfortunately the soccaroos lost to the locos argentinos, 0-1. it was still a great game in front a sold out (cough 70k cough) MCG crowd. soccer fans are CRAZY, louder than footy fans but i dont know if they're more intense. apparently this was more of a 'friendly' match so maybe the noise levels were toned down a bit. either way, good times. and just being in the G made me excited for finishing the marathon - you do your final lap inside the MCG - how awesome is that?? for one thing, i'll be fall on my face dead by then, but it'll be cool to see how much footy players actually do have to run. and, more motivation to finish, right?

so less than a month till the marathon. BUT less than 5 days till tasmania! and 12 days till brisbane/goldcoast/reef/sunshine coast!! also, alycia, less than 3 days till your 2500 word as-of-yet-nothing-written essay is due. get on that, aright? then we can celebrate spring break.

but less back track out of the future, shall we? heck, less bypass the present too. let's talk a journey back to a little place i like to call saturday morning...

so this past weekend was the great ocean road trip with isop. 23 people ended up going on the trip - 11 of them were us. so right of the getgo, good odds for having a good time. the great ocean road was one of my australia must-dos. i don't know if most of you know what it is (helllloooo wikipedia!) but i'm sure you've seen pictures of the twelve apostles and such. so i've been excited about this for a while now, and this weekend had much expectation for it.

so we left saturday morning, 8am style, and hit the road through geelong and into torquay where we stopped for SURFING! i've never surfed before in my life, i can barely handle a boogie board. so i had no idea what to expect. i thought coming into australia that i'd never surf, not because it looked hard in itself, but because i was terrified of the water; i won't even swim in oceans back home because of sharks and stuff that'll eat me. and australia is known for having 205802852 of the world's deadliest animals, and about 3/4 of those are species of jellyfish. but yeah, that barely crossed my mind at the time, if at all. someone in the group asked about sharks and the guides told us it was a rare occasion, if any at all. so we climbed into our wetsuits (complete with booties!) and grabbed a board, then were given a 5 minute lesson on how to surf. a basic runthrough:
- see the wave in the distance
- get on your board facing the beach
- start paddling
- when the wave hits your feet, paddle 4 big strokes
- surf!
the first time we did it we just caught the wave, then kind of just leaned back and let it take us as we were still lying on the boards. we did that for about 10 minutes, then hit the beach for a lesson on how to stand, then hit the waves again. standing was kind of tricky, i got to my knees a lot, and was able to stand once or twice. the waves kept getting bigger as the lesson went on, and the water was FREEZING.. so by the time i was finally getting the hang of it, my toes were numb, and i had to pack it in. imagine what it would've been like without the wetsuit, because the wetsuit defintely was clutch. the problem was, near the end i was like "okay. freezing. one more wave, then i'm riding it in." so, the wave would come, and i would ride it in. then: "okay. freezing. one more wave, then i'm riding it in." this happened 3 or 4 times, then finally the guides were like "ride this last one in!" so of course i listened to them and hopped out. i can easily see how people turn into surfies. it's so addicting, and so much fun. such an adrenaline rush. you just want to keep catching the next wave, especially if they look good. and as long as the water temp is alright and your wetsuit doesn't have a jellyfish inside of it, i'd say you're golden to stay out on the waves as long as you'll let yourself. i'm so glad we did that during the GOR trip because now i know what i am spending my time during the brisbane trip doing. and the water will be warm there. niiiice.

so after surfing we stopped at lorne for lunch by the beach, which team ies divided up as a picnic kinda thang and it was delish, or as delish as pb&j sandwiches get. after lorne we headed to...uh...what did we do after lorne? oh, we saw a waterfall, pretty cool, 307 steps or something like that to walk back up. then we did teddy's lookout.

let me tell you about teddy's lookout. it's right off of the road, just a built out stand overlooking the ocean. it. was. amazing. i've never seen anything that awe-inspiring or astonishing ever. the ocean was so blue, so endless, and the cliffs were rugged and intense and i don't know how to put into words how it made me feel. just happy. sickeningly, lovingly happy. like i could've wrote a million hallmark cards about that scene. anyways i could go on and on about it but i'm not going to, you'll never know what i mean until you are there for yourself. so put that on your australia must-do list, aright?

we got to hike down teddy's lookout mountain, which was cool, it consisted of team singalongs, always a good time. then some people ended up getting lost so our guide had to take the bus and try to find them, which was fine, it meant time for us on the beach to frolic and play like the sound of music characters that we are.

after teddy's lookout i reckon we got pretty tired, we went to some koalas in the wild place and saw koalas in the wild. koalas are pretty cool animals, and i'm sure i'll miss them once i'm gone, but golly gee wilikers, are they boring. all they do is sleep and canoodle with the trees. i sleep, too, and no one watches me. i'm a good canoodler, too, where's my paparazzi? still, one of the koalas had its baby on its back, which was cute, AND there was a wooden koala put-your-head-in-the-hole picture kind of thing, which warranted heaps and heaps of laughter. obviously.

so then we finally made it to apollo bay for the night, settled into our hostel accomodations (top notch) and our bed (4 to a bed and the little one said roll over..roll over). it was reminiscent of the shepparton days of long past. in order to conserve water, the 6 of us popped on our bathers and hit up the shower (it was very savannah07-esque, little snuggle bear, anyone?). then we hit up some take away joint for food and then got ice cream, then stopped at a local bar which apparently was townie boy night. we ended up back at the hostel by 10pm but it felt much later. we would've went to bed then but we ended up taking a midnight excursion to the beach.. or what we hoped would be the beach. (SIDE NOTE: I THINK MY ROOMATE JUST took her adderall...she'll be up for another 24 hours now) so apparently we have no idea how to get to the beach, and it being pitch black outside, the odds weren't in our favour. after narrowly avoiding death (and i mean it...we came to a point and used kristen's cellphone flashlight to read a sign that said "DANGEROUS DROPOFF AHEAD") we finally found a path down to the bay. the sky was pretty, very shiny and twinkly outside the lights of the city. it was so calm and serene and the best part was the stars reflected into the bay waters. i've never seen anything like it before. so in conclusion, the near death experience was well worth the risk of that view.

the next morning we packed it up, then left for the 12 apostles! we stopped at some forest walk place on the way there and siobhan warned us about killer leeches hiding in the trees. so the twelve apostles have now been turned into the seven apostles (or 8? maybe?) after one of them collapsed in 2005. really cool. i'd put up pictures here but i don't know how, the pictures speak better than i could describe it. it was just cool knowing that i was seeing something that people years from now won't be able to experience, because the waves keep hitting them and they keep eroding slowly but surely. after the apostles we stopped at loch ard gorge which was easily the best stop of the whole trip. saw some great views, then went down into the gorge and saw stalactites and huge rocks and did jumping picture! madi would be proud. after that we stopped for lunch at port campbell, then hit the road for the trek back to melbn.

all in all....great trip. made me realize just how lucky i am to be here right now, experiencing the things i am experiencing. i could be like my roommate and be taking adderall in order to stay up to do nothing but homework..and never leaving my room because i'm doing homework..but no. that's just not me. well, it will be the next few days as i need to write 2 2500 word essays. but that's only 3 days. i can dedicate 3 days to uni. i think.

in other news, guess who got the most AMAZING package the other day from the most AMAZING sister in the world! it was huge and contained all the classics, notably the butterscotch fiber haystacks (gone already) and banana reeses, and butterscotch chips and pudding and candies (YAY for amanda knowing that butterscotch does not exist here!) and an uncle bub's shirt (smelled like the grill!) and a halloween shirt (they dont celebrate it here!) and gum and lindt chocolate (between lindt and cadbury i think i know where those extra kgs are coming from) and yeah. just awesome. hint hint hint for those of you out there, feel free to compete with amanda. in fact, i insist it.

alright. it's late, and i'm not even connected to the internet anymore. my politics class is only a tutorial tomorrow, woot! so only one hour. of course that means more paper writing time, but it's probably better that way.

okay cub scout. peace. out.

love,
me

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