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Published: March 22nd 2012
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Call me sad, but I was kind of excited about coming to Wollongong. As it turns out, it’s not that flash! :-) It’s sprawling and industrial and there seems to be quite a lot of dodgyness. After looping through the town, we drove straight to City Beach where dozens of surfers were catching a wave after work. This area is also a serious boot camp location and there were people training and working out literally everywhere.It made me feel quite lazy for just walking around!
After strolling along Marine Drive and around the town centre, we drove out to the university to find a place to park our van and be ready for our morning swim at the campus aquatic centre (ie free sleep and shower). Wollongong’s students are truly spoilt with the awesome recreation facilities on site. We were very impressed!
Later on, we visited the Nan Tien Buddhist Temple, which is the largest temple in the southern hemisphere. It is just beautiful and I would have loved to stay and take some of their classes (they offer accredited courses on Buddhism as well as lifestyle modules, cultural activities and mediation). The whole temple complex has a wonderful
feel to it and you can’t help feeling instantly calmed and soothed. There are 10,000 buddhas to admire, including little cute ones that are dotted around the gardens.
We decided to stay for a truly delicious vegetarian lunch before visiting the pagoda and the ‘bell of gratitude’ (the custom is to ring it to send out good wishes to your family).
I am so interested in Buddhism and instantly get a “feels right” sensation whenever I visit a temple. I’m hoping there will be an opportunity along the way for me to learn more about it and perhaps go on a retreat.
Normal 0 false false false MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-languageƐ mso-fareast-languageƐ mso-bidi-languageƐ}On our way out of Wollongong, we passed an area which is very popular with hang-gliders and para-gliders. We saw quite a number of them swishing overhead. It looked like so much fun! I’m always amazing at how their canopies
enable them to rise as well as fall. As skydivers there’s only one way we’re going to go, and that’s down!
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