Back from Surfers Paradise.  It was a lot of fun, albeit very kitschy -- it reminded me in a lot of ways of the wayward love child of Niagara Falls and Waikiki.  Still, the ocean was great and the waves were choice.

    

I'm still mulling over my travel plans, but right now I'm leaning towards New Zealand.  I'll let you know.

That's what they call Queensland, and it's well deserved.  I spent the last few days up the coast in Rockhampton and they were every bit as tropical and relaxing as anywhere in the world I've been (which, as you know Dear Reader, is all over the world).  Watching the sun rise over the Pacific:



Of course, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to go diving off the Great Barrier Reef.  I've been certified for awhile and dived off 3 different coasts, but none of it could compare.

  

One interesting thing I just happened to see on my travels was the original Qantas "complex."  How times change...



This morning I arrived in Brisbane, which I'll be calling home for the next few weeks at least. I've arranged to stay at TGH, which seems pretty cool thus far and just happens to host some of my Sydney friends as well!  After that I might return to Sydney, or perhaps I'll hop across the Tasman to New Zealand.  We'll see.

I just spent the better part of a week touring through the alien landscapes of the central Australian deserts.  There are really no words to describe just how beautiful or surreal the experience was.

    

    

After a quick flight from Alice Springs to Rockhampton (thank you, Qantas Boomerang Pass!) I'm back on the east coast of Australia.  I'll be spending some time on the beach and joining a scuba trip out to the Great Barrier Reef, and then heading south to Brisbane.  More later.

... and Australia has a wealth of unique and beautiful wildlife.  Tonight I'm lucky enough to be "camped" out at a nature preserve north of Adelaide, where I've been just admiring all the cute marsupials.  Yes, a preserve with broadband internet access isn't exactly roughing it.

  

  

Helene is doing a Master's degree in Botany here in Adelaide (what a setting!) and I got to spend some time with her both on the lovely campus



and at one of the places she does research, the Adelaide Botanical Gardens.

  

Right now I'm heading north en route to the "Red Center" of Australia, the heart of the Outback.  Next stop, Uluru!

I've spent the last 2 days finding my way around my new home (for the next couple of weeks, at least), and there is certainly a lot to see and do.  The scenery is perhaps not as jaw-dropping as Sydney but the city has a certain refined charm I really enjoy.  Every day I travel downtown via this quaint little streetcar, which runs right outside my hostel.



This is the Royal Exhibition Building, where the first Australian parliament opened in 1901.  Melbourne was the national capital for 26 years.



This is Flinders Street Station, a major rail terminal in downtown Melbourne on the banks of the Yarra River.  The clocks on the facade of the building are emblematic of the rendevous point for Melburnians.



And here is a view of the Yarra from Princes Bridge, just behind the Station (you can see it on the right).

I made it into Melbourne after a fun weekend travelling.  Canberra was really neat, I've never seen a city so perfectly planned and laid out.  It was almost a little bit eerie.



I got to tour both the Old Parliament House and New Parliament House -- they are a lot different from Canada's gothic Parliament buildings.  They built the new building in a straight line with the old one and the Anzac Memorial (which I also visited), so close that in my pic of the Old Parliament House you can see the top of the new building directly behind it.

    

  

We also visited the Snowy Mountains.  It's hard to believe that a country so hot and arid as Australia could actually have respectable ski facilities, but from June to October this place is apparently hopping!  I would have liked a chance to hit the slopes here, but my timing is just a little off -- oh well, maybe in June.  Even without the skiing, I've always wanted to see this land every since I watched The Man From Snowy River as a little girl, and I wasn't disappointed.



So now I'm in Melbourne.  I'll be staying at a hostel called The Nunnery... yeah yeah yeah, laugh it up.  ;)  I'm sure this will be just as much of an adventure as Sydney was.  I'll let you know, but for now lunch calls...

Today we (that is, some friends from the hostel and I) travelled west of Sydney to see the Blue Mountains.  It's unbelievable to see this kind of vast natural wilderness so close to a metropolis like Sydney.



We took a cable car across the gorge, which was a little scary but a lot of fun.



You can't beat views like these!

It has been an incredibly hectic, incredibly fun first week in Sydney.  I actually got a job through the hostel folks -- I'm tending bar again, just like back in university.  See, education does pay off! :)  I've seen and done a lot of really cool stuff already, and here's the photographic evidence.

Like any tourist worth her salt, I took the twilight cruise of Sydney Harbour

    

and climbed the Harbour Bridge Pylon (lookout).  Fantastic vistas, truly breathtaking.

    

Not all of the good ocean views were found in the Harbour, either.  This is from Manly Beach.



And most of you are probably well aware that I can't resist the opportunity to do a little shopping.  The Queen Victoria Building is this incredibly posh shopping centre in downtown Sydney that has the nicest shops and is worth seeing just for the architecture.

  

Today is the Anzac Day holiday, the Australian equivalent of our Remembrance Day, so it's pretty low-key for the moment.  Of course, that affords me the opportunity to do some posting.  Now that I'm a little more settled into things, I'll try posting a little bit of information a little more often instead of infrequently dumping lots and lots of stuff online (like this post).  Until next time!