[Cans]

Great Barrier Reef, check! Yay! Tyler and I just got back from an amazing weekend up in Cairns - pronounced "Cans" in Australian. I can't even begin to figure out where to start! It was such an exciting and amazing trip!
We left for Cairns which is in the northeast corner of Australia on Thursday afternoon, arriving there late Thursday night. Tyler's coworker Claudio and Claudio's girlfriend Sandra came with us too. We stayed that first night at a hostel in Cairns and wandered around the city a bit.
The next day we got on the ProDive live aboard boat for our scuba diving and snorkeling adventure in the Great Barrier Reef. We spent 3 days and 2 nights snorkeling and scuba diving with a group of about 30 other people on the boat. There were 3 other snorkelers besides me and 2 were a couple that was pretty seasick so they didn't snorkel every time. (I definitely understand the seasickness cuz I was a little queasy most of the time that we were on the boat - and I was even taking constant motion sickness medicine - Eek). I mostly snorkeled with a girl from Germany named Sandra who was super nice. We snorkeled about 3 times each day for about an hour each time and I took tons and tons of pictures. We saw with very colorful fish, huge turtles, and even saw the Nemo fish. I hadn't done too much snorkeling before so it took a little getting used to but by the end I was pretty comfortable. I took tons and tons of pictures because I didn't know how many would actually turn out. The reefs that we were swimming in were super shallow - we could go right and touch them if we really wanted to. On our very last snorkel, we saw 3 sharks! They swam near us and circled a group of fish that seemed pretty unphased by the sharks being right by them. I was a bit more freaked out and tried to get a video but ended up swimming away too fast to catch much of them. I'll post the video online.
Besides just snorkeling, after much deliberation, I decided to do the scuba dive trial on board. Tyler and all the other people on the boat had been doing scuba dives instead of snorkeling and it seemed like we were seeing pretty similar things (although he did see a few more unique fish and eels than I did). I was super scared to do it - especially with the sky diving pressure change experience. Before going down - I had to watch a 30 min video and then Tanner suited me up with a tank and all that stuff. We went down only about 2 meters and I had to be able to perform 2 skills at that depth before we could go any deeper. The 2 skills were to fill my mask with water and then empty it while underwater and then to pull my regulator out of my mouth, drop it, and then retrieve it calmly. It definitely took quite a few panic-ed tries and swims back to the top before I could do these. Eventually though I was "good enough" to go. Tanner controlled my bouyancy so I didn't really have to think about too much - except clearing my ears - which was super stressful. I was probably being over sensitive to clearing my ears and was doing it constantly - maybe even too hard than I was supposed to. I couldn't tell if my ears were pulled or if there was just water in my ears. We ended up going down to about 7.5 meters and swam with a turtle and stuff like that so it was pretty neat. I think it would take quite a few more times though before I am anywhere near comfortable scuba diving.... I am still deliberating about doing the open water training... It really only takes one bad pressure change to possibly mess up my other ear. Eek. I would also want to be super careful about getting a super strict dive instructor cuz mine seemed a bit more careless and carefree than I would have liked...
It's hard to figure out how to summarize all the events from the weekend. It was so exciting and so fun - I can't describe it all without writing a long blog. After returning back to Cairns and readjusting to the stability of land, we continued our adventures. We met up with a bunch of the people on the boat for a fun night. We ended up dancing at a bar called the Woolshed (should have been called the Toolshed)- haha! Sunday we took a train to the city of Kanunda where I held a koala! It clung to my shoulder so tightly - it was adorable! I want a pet koala! We also got to feed kangaroos and wallabyes. Then we took ATV 4-wheelers through the jungle. We got to do jumps and were on a pretty narrow track most of the time. We went through some huge puddles and Tyler COVERED himself with mud! We were all pretty muddy by the end though. We ended by doing loops around a motorcross track. We then took a skyrail (like a gondola) over the jungle - back to Cairns.
Monday we whitewater rafted down a class 3/4 river called Russell River. It was my first time in just a 2 person raft. The person in the back controls the steering so Tyler drove the first 2/3 of the trip and I got to navigate down the last few rapids. It was pretty exciting. We didn't tip over - although we were probably close for a bit - haha! The water was a bit more shallow than it is sometimes though so we had to do a good bit of scooting over rocks when we would get stuck. We had to do a hike through the jungle for about an hour to get to the put-in for the rafts. Along the way - the guides picked up a toad that secreted toxins out of its back. I guess they're as prevelant as rats down there and its actually a law in Queensland (the state we were in) that if you pick one up - it is illegal to put it back down alive - so they had to kill it. I guess only one animal has figured out how to kill it and that's the kukkaburra - it kills it by picking it up and dropping it consistently on rocks until it dies.
Besides all these adventures - we did spend a few evenings and then the morning on Tuesday in the city of Cairns. Its a very international touristy type city that was really fun. We heard so many different languages. It seems to cater to the adventure types too - with the diving, ATVs, white water rafting, skydiving, bungee jumping, hot air balloons, etc - all readily available. There was a night market that sold very cheap massages - like $20 for 45 minutes total for both Tyler and me. There was a huge lagoon pool right next to the ocean that was really pretty. We had beautiful weather the entire time - like 70s and 80s degrees - and it was winter there! It was hard to leave our weekend vacation for sure!

Wines Galore!

Tyler and I spent the weekend exploring the Barossa Valley - which is literally the Napa Valley of all of Australia. It is a good bit different from Napa though because all the wineries have FREE tastes of anywhere from 10-20 different wines. Crazy. We headed up on Saturday morning to the town of Tanunda which is kinda in the heart of the Barossa Valley. It's about 90 km from Adelaide. We checked into our little cabin and took out the bikes that they offered us. I had my first experience riding a tandum bike - it was super exciting! Unfortunately we weren't able to get the tires pumped up enough to spend the day riding those around. We biked with them to the first winery which was only like 1/4 mile away and then after doing the tastings there - we biked back to exchange the tandem bike for 2 individual bikes...sad.

We then went to 2 more wineries in the area of our cottage - basically next door to the first one we had gone to. After that - biking wasn't so easy so we walked the bikes back to the cottage before dinner. We headed out to downtown Tanunda (which is just a really tiny little town with probably about 5 restaurants in it) for dinner. It was delicious!
Sunday we continued our wine exploration - but this time I took over the driving - and Tyler handled most of the tasting. We went to 6 different wineries - and each had from 10-20 tastes. The tastes aren't really THAT small either - usually doing all the tastes would amount to 2-3 glasses of wine! Crazy! Some of the wineries were really cool. Rockford had a cool atmosphere being in old remodeled buildings like a stable and blacksmith shop. Charles Melton Winery had a neat atmosphere of sitting down at a long table for the tastes instead of the less personable standing at the bar idea that all other wineries do. We even had a cheese plate to go with our wine there! It was delicious! I think overall our top 3 wineries from the weekend were: Longmeil Winery, Rockford Winery, and Charles Melton Winery. All very tasty - especially the reds since its more the climate for those grapes around here.... Too bad I can only bring 2 bottles back in to the US - otherwise I could have a wine party :)

All the Small Things

So I was thinking - what do you all want to hear about? It's really hard to come up with what exactly are the important things that I should write about. Tyler read the blog the other day and was like "why didn't you tell them about this?" or "what about that" and I just don't want to bore you with all the little details of my life. But really - what do you want to read about? Do you want to read about the big events like our exploring of the outback and my driving of a car on the left side of the road? Or should I talk about the little things like how I hung out with Sandra all day today and she showed me some hidden secrets of Adelaide that I hadn't discovered before? And how we're going to a wine bar to watch a slide guitar show tonight? Or how I ran around the 4 terraces surrounding the perimeter of the city yesterday? Should I talk about the accomplishments I'm making with the Wii Fit game? haha! Or the book club book that I just started for the Borders book club down here? You tell me. What should I write about? :)

Hot Arse

Yesterday I continued to try to find a volunteer organization I could work with while I'm down here. I'm not allowed to work while I'm on a leave from Boeing but I am able to do unpaid volunteer work. I've contacted quite a few organizations but many of them have application processes and minimum assignment lengths and things like that. I'm really only here a month yet so I was hoping someone could give me something to do during that time.... BUT I did successfully get an interview with the SA Volunteers organization so that's something.... We'll see what comes of that next week.
Besides that - I took on attending a Bikram (Hot Yoga) class yesterday. I thought it would be interesting to go to one where they speak in Aussie slang - haha! She did mention our "arses" a few times - haha!
Then last night Tyler and I went to see the movie, Samson and Delilah. The lady at the winery in Adelaide Hills recommended it as a sort of documentary and not very happy film that is really good. It's an Australian film and I guess its kinda a big deal for those to be good so we went to see it. We just went to a normal theater but they were selling bottles of wine (and glasses and beer, etc) to bring in to the theater. All that stuff about the Aussies knowing how to drink is definitely true! haha! Anyways the film was definitely a bit harsh to watch. It was about 2 Aborigine teenagers who were basically living in poverty and became homeless and all this stuff. So yeah - pretty depressing. It was practically a silent film though - there were hardly any lines of dialouge - definitely no conversations! But yeah - pretty interesting.
To end this on a happy note - Tyler and I are heading to the Barossa Valley this weekend and doing some biking around there. Barossa Valley is basically the Napa Valley of Australia - haha! Yay - wining and hot tubbing! :)

Roos and Emus

We survived the outback! I took the train over to Elizabeth to meet Tyler after work on Friday and we headed out to Mount Remarkable. He was pretty tired after waking up at like 530 AM for work so he let me drive - my first time on the other side of the road! Eek! It was definitely interesting. The turnabouts were a bit tricky going around counterclockwise and the passing on the right was certainly something different. My placement on the road was also like relearning all over again. I was always veering too far to the left since I was used to being more on the left side of the road.

Eventually we made it to the group campground we were staying at in Mount Remarkable National Park. We camped underneath red gum trees where kukaburras above us laughed - literally - at like 5 am in the morning! Then as Tyler was making breakfast, an emu circled us at about a 5 meter radius. Crazy! I attached a pic.

From there, we drove to the parking lot where we started our trek around the Flinders Ranges. It was a total of 18km and we did about 11 km the first day, camped overnight, and then did the last of the 7km the next day. We hiked along a ridge for about a 1/3 of the hike and then among the rocky cliffs below for another 1/3 and then along a creek for another 1/3. Emus hiked along with us too!

After several nights on the edge of the outback, we felt like pros at "bushwalking" (aka backpacking in the "bush" - aka outback) so we headed further deep into the outback. Along the way, we stopped for lunch at the Old Willows Brewery in Quorn. It was a cute little old homestead that even had lambs brains on the menu. Unfortunately neither Tyler or I wanted a full order of the mind of a sheep so neither of us were even able to try a bite. :( After lunch, we continued on down the road to Wilpena Pound in the Flinders Ranges. A "pound" is a formation of a mountain range in the form of the circle or oval. Wilpena Pound specifically surrounds about a 20 square mile area. We camped in a campground right outside the pound and did a hike in to the pound on Monday (the Queen's birthday so Tyler had the day off). We were hoping to go up St. Mary's Peak which is the highest point in the Flinders Ranges but unfortunately the lady at the ranger center advised us to take a shorter path to a lookout instead - saying that we were too late for St. Mary's Peak and that it was too cloudy anyways and wasn't going to clear up all day. We did the little 7 mile hike she suggested instead but as we did it, the clouds blew out and it eventually became a super clear day. We were bummed that we listened to this older ranger who didn't even know how fast of hikers we were. BUT we did get to see lots of roos throughout our hike so that was pretty exciting! They were all over - just munching on the grass, kinda looking up when we passed but that's about all. We think we even saw a rock wallabye - which looks mostly like a roo but a little different. I was happy that we saw all these guys while hiking instead of while we were driving - that wouldn't have been fun for sure. After the 3 days of hiking, it was a 5 hour drive to get back to Adelaide for the 'fun' post-camping clean-up. (Again for all the pics - check out my picasa sight: http://picasaweb.google.com.au/annielb2000/20096FlindersRangesInSouthAustralia#)

No Dramas

Life in Adelaide goes on. I've been busy exploring the city while Tyler is at work. Yesterday I took on finding us a team to join or group to participate in. I found information about the beach volleyball park and talked to someone on the phone about it. It's right next store to Tyler's place which is pretty convenient. Then I talked to a Running Company who organizes runs in Adelaide so I might join in one of those too. Then I talked to a Soccer Club that gave me a phone number to call to find out about local soccer teams in the area. When I said "Thank you" on my out, the kid there responded "No dramas" - which I found out after talking to Tyler is a pretty common phrase around here - basically meaning "no problem".
I finished captioning my Sydney pictures and Adelaide pictures from last weekend. You can check them out on: http://picasaweb.google.com.au/annielb2000
And in other news - it seems the Australians LOVE American Idol - its all over the news here!
And in other other news - they seem to have a lot of American type derivatives. They have a store similar to Forever 21 that is called Forever Young. And they have a store similar to Icing and Claire's called Frostings. Random.
Well I'm off to do more delving in to what it takes to go backpacking in the outback. Tyler and I are heading to Flinders Ranges this weekend and Mount Remarkable. I hope it loves up to its name! haha!

Tasty Cheese

So I've been busy exploring Adelaide and the surrounding areas - yesterday with Tyler and today so far on my own. Yesterday we had breakfast at a restaurant called "Scenic Restaurant" - creative obviously. It was pretty tasty and was up in the Adelaide Hills so had a pretty view of the city and stuff like that. Then we did some wine tasting. The state that Adelaide is in is South Australia (SA) (BTW - there are 7 states down here, not including Canberra - which is their capital - like DC isn't included as a state for us). SA has most of the wines that come from Australia - although there are a few from other regions as well - but SA definitely has the majority. Adelaide Hills is then one wine region around here. Barossa Valley is the most famous so we'll probably head there another day. Anyways - we popped over in to one winery not far from the restaurant. It was a tiny little place called Ashton Hills and only has 7 acres of vines. It's the oldest and highest winery in the region and the lady inside was super nice and super talkative. We were the only ones there the whole time and she gave us tastings of 12 different wines - no charge - so we ended up buying a bottle cuz it was tasty and she was so friendly and all. I guess most of the wineries in the region though don't charge a tasting fee so that was pretty nice. She recommended another one for us to go to where we also had a cheese plate and got to sit on a little patio area and stuff like that. It was pretty nice.
By the time we were done there - it was nearly 3 pm so we headed down the Hills and over to Ikea cuz Tyler only has one dresser in his entire place so I needed a place to put some of my stuff. We picked up a cheap hanging closet dealy.
Then we headed down to GlenElg which is a little beach community about 20 min from downtown. Tyler had considered living there but it would have made his commute a good bit more. We wandered around the little downtown area down there - and then found a cool place for dinner.
Today I've been busy exploring the city on my own. I did a 5 mile run so was able to see some of North Adelaide which was pretty cool. Then I grabbed some lunch downtown and hung out in a coffee shop for a bit before taking on the next adventure - grocery shopping. I needed to stock up because all Tyler has in his fridge is some moldy cheese, bacon, eggs, and beer. Literally. It was pretty interesting. They had some different food down here - or at least names for it. It seems their cheddar is called "tasty cheese". They make a special lettuce bag called "Aussie Salad" - "featuring beetroot shred for an Aussie influence". And my personal favorite which I definitely couldn't resist buying - "Rice Bubbles" - aka Rice Krispies - haha! The box is even exactly the same as home! Now I just have to figure out how to cook with grams and kilograms - etc....