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Published: February 8th 2009
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Kangaroos on the golf course
Don't worry, this photo is only for photo purposes. I am not actually shooting at this poor roo. Two days ago Dave and I arrived in Melbourne to meet up with two friends we made in Edmonton that are from this side of the globe. We hitch-hiked quite efficiently from Callala basically town hopping all day until we arrived in a city known as Narooma. We had rides from really nice people, an old lady gave us some peaches and an old man took us on a tour of a town and then on a tour of his dairy farm. We didn't make it as far as we'd hoped but Narooma turned out to be a great city. The YHA hostel there had the nicest people working it and I would recommend it to anyone.
We had some great fresh fish'n'chips at a byo (bring your own booze) restaurant (they are quite rampant around here) and went for a walk to the bay and a swim in the surfing beach. I saw my first seals swimming along the rocks and some of the greatest surf waves I have ever seen. We even found a beautiful secluded beach that apparently changes every time you visit and not many people know about. Unfortunately we didn't take the proper footwear to
actually get to the beach we were able to see it from a distance and we know better for the next time we visit it.
Later that day we went to the pub and hung out until our bus at 10pm came to take us to Melbourne, hitch hiking was becoming less reliable and the towns smaller so we just took a bus. We arrived at 9am the next morning and took a train far north of Melbourne to meet up with our friends. They picked us up and showed us around their neck of the woods which is essentially bush country with kangaroos and horses all over the place. We went into Melbourne that night to meet up with their friends atg a pub then headed home so we could catch the Australia vs. New Zealand cricket game the next day.
The cricket game lasted about 8 hours and was unarguably the most time I have ever sat in one place watching sports. It was a blast. I actually enjoyed the cricket match a fair bit and it is such an easy game to get a grasp of. The fans there were off the walls too. They
Huge stinray!
This was a huge stingray that we saw in Jarvis Bay! have drinking sections so they can keep an eye on people but it makes a great deal of trouble for security. People were getting kicked out every few minutes, huge trains of beer cups stretched across entire rows, fights, streakers ($6000 fine to run onto the field!!!) agreat deal of red-neck banter between everyone since there is a Calgary-Edmonton like rivalry between NZ and Australia. We took a night walk through the city to meet up with some more of our hosts Melbourne friends and then headed back home for the evening. We were greeted in our room by a giant huntsmen spider. It is scary because of its size though it is harmless to humans and will actually eat other spiders so I guess they are alright by me. This particular one is now camped behind a picture frame from its regular spot in the printer. I have heard numerous stories about this spider running out of the printer tray when printing starts or causing the printer to jam on occasion.
Today we went to yet another of our hosts friends houses, but this time for one who takes in animals who are injured or have had their
Seal on the rocks
We saw this seal in the Narooma Ocean. They were lazing around in the water doing the laziest poses for cameras ever! parents die to see a wombat and some young kangaroos. The wombat was nothing like I'd expected and acted like an affectionate dog from the numerous stories we heard. It was already about 37 degrees by 10am so the kangaroos were in hiding but we still managed to snag a few peeks at them, though we didn't get to cuddle the little guys =(.
Later this afternoon we were in the midst of making plans to attend a party however our plans changed ef so slightly.We started seeing some smoke from the brush fires which turned out to be closer than originally anticipated and changed our plans to staying where we were for the night. We helped our host and their parents to fill water buckets around the house and prepare for the bush fire spreading as it creeped towards the house and around us. Blackened leaves and bark began falling around the house, luckily not as embers because it is so dry here everything would have went up, that were convected from the fire over many km's away. The fires traveled greater than 60km towards us throughout the day and was just on the other side of the
hill from us when the wind turned suddenly and blew the fires in the opposite direction from us. We heard explosions as houses lit on fire and as the oil in the eukalyptis trees exploded in canopy fires, watching as helicopters and emergency vehicles tried to control the blaze. If the winds had changed 5-10min later we may have been battling some embers or the fires ourselves. The winds blew embers over us and eventually we had fires almost encircling us which made things pretty worrisome but luckily we were on top of a hill surrounded mostly by grass so the fire would have just burnt through rather quickly while we hid in the dam or indoors then we would have went about putting out fires around the house. The grass fires move extremely fast but don't last very long. The scariest thing was the fact that the fires roaring around us sounded like either train in the distance or a jet far away. The dull roar and the occasional explosions was a very humbling experience which made the gravity of the situation finally sink in.
I decided not to let anyone back home know about this until the
danger had passed because lets face it, I have a lot of motherly friends and family so I adopted the same view as I had taken with sky diving; it'd be better that they found out after it happened than before or during. Long story short, I am fine and everyone here is fine. Some people in the town weren't so luck which is rather sad because as the winds changed for us and we were quite thankful for that, we knew it would be terrible tidings for others.
Our plans have changed slightly and we are only doing the great ocean road for two night and three days (enough time to see the great sights and the twelve apocels), then heading up to Queensland to go to my hosts boyfriends farm for a real Australian outback cowboy experience amidst the flooding before heading to Sydney to head to school. I luckily received a spot in residence so my housing woes are taken care of meaning I can relx and have an even more exciting semester.
In closing, do not worry about me. I am safe and having very wonderful adventures!
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Dave
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So when are you going 'roo hunting? You know they are considered as pests? :D Snag a monitor for me! Or a carpet python... or one of those weird giant crayfish thingy.