8 Days in New Zealand

What an incredible 8 days they were! I’m going to try to type out a long post with pictures soon, sorry I have neglected the poor blog since moving to Sydney. Things have been so busy here, and the internet connection where I live is basically crap.

Excuses excuses I know, :p

 

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I’m a little behind on last week’s post, but i’ve been busy having fun in Sydney!

Tuesdays and Thursdays are starting to be as fun as weekend days for me. Those are the days I drop my little monkey girl off to kindy and the older girls to school and I have the rest of the day to myself. This past Tuesday I went to the Harry Potter Exhibition at the Powerhouse Museum. It’s the perfect exhibit for the Harry Potter nerd in us all and features tons of props and pieces from the movie sets. I’ll be honest and admit that I was thrilled to see all the horcruxes displayed in a case ( and if you don’t know what that means.. go read the amazing books). Unfortunately taking pictures were not allowed inside the display but I did buy a book that has pictures of some things that were featured.





Thursday I met my American friend Anna at Bondi Beach for an afternoon of sun, sand, and smoothies. We braved the strong waves when it got too hot and almost got run over by surfers a few times! We both agree we need to make learning to surf a priority while we are in Australia. Now we just need to make some surfer friends to teach us.. :)

That night we went to a place called Scubar for a silent disco night. It was heaps of fun and something I recommend to everyone who loves to dance! $5 at the door gets you a pair of wireless headphones and a drink to start your evening. There are two stations linked to the headphones ( red light, green light!) that are tied to two different dj’s. No music plays in the bar itself, only through the earphones. It was so much fun to be dancing with Anna and my friend Theo and later realize we had been listening to completely different tunes!

This weekend was a bit more relaxed, which was fine with me! Saturday I went by the Sydney Wine Festival in Hyde Park with my friend Heather. There were so many tents showcasing wines from all over the country. We parked ourselves in front of the main stage and heard some great music!







This band was called The Myall High Club and their lead singer was rocking out on the harp ( of all the instruments??) They played a cover of MGMT’s Electric Feel that was pretty amazing.
 
Saturday evening we went to dinner at Jacksons on George. A cool little bar with a great drink selection and delicious pizza. After dinner we strolled up through The Rocks and walked down to the path that winds all the way around the opera house. That was the closest I’ve been to the house since I moved to Sydney. It was spectacular to see close up and completely covered in 1000s of small white tiles.

 

So I don’t actually have a picture of the opera house from that night.. but here’s the harbour bridge instead? My picture taking has been pretty lax lately, I’m going to work on that! :p

I hope everyone is having a wonderful week! xx 

I’m not sure when these things got so popular, but I had to put the au pair one up just for laughs :p

(Source: youwonderfulhuman)

It has been a busy 2nd week in Sydney! 

I think I have finally memorized all the girl’s after school activities, dance classes, swim lessons, art clubs, and everything else in between. This family keeps busy thats for sure! And carting a 3 year old along for the rides everywhere can be a bit repetitive. Get her in the car seat, and out, back in, and out ( repeat this at least 10 times a day!). I feel very lucky that my little monkey is pretty chill for a 3 year old and is usually agreeable to the busy schedule.



Coogee Beach





My little Mini Mouse!

Even though I am loving the job, I still look forward to adventures on the weekends. This past Saturday a few girls and myself caught the ferry to Manly to check out the Australian Open of Surfing competition. The beach was packed with tanned, beautiful people ( and surfers!) We relaxed on the sand, battled the waves ( the waves won), got to see some live music, skateboarding and surfing.



Ferry ride to Manly









Watching the concerts on the big screen ( the stage is literally right behind the screen though haha)


That evening we went to St Matthews Church up the road to see a screening of the movie Soul Surfer. The movie is based on the true story of pro surfer Bethany Hamilton who was attacked by a shark while she was surfing in her hometown in Hawaii. Though she tragically lost her entire left arm in the attack she was able to regain her surfing abilities and still competes in competitions around the world. After the movie Bethany herself came onto the stage and gave her testimony of her story. Incredible! 



Sunday was a great day as well. A friend and I went down to The Domain in the Sydney Botanical Gardens to watch parts of the famous Tropfest Film Festival. I just recently learned that Tropfest is the world’s largest short film festival and draws incredible crowds every year for the premiere. The guest judges often include celebrities. This year’s stars included Nicole Kidman and Geoffrey Rush ( who was named Australian of the Year earlier this year). You can visit the website here to learn more and watch some of this year’s finalist films, including the winner - “Lemonade Stand” directed by Alethea Jones.



The giant screen in The Domain






You can’t tell with my horrible iphone picture but thats Nicole Kidman being interviewed!

As the night went on the weather in Sydney was not cooperating at all. The skyline was lit up with streaks of lightening before the rain started in. Anna and I were pretty set on waiting through the storm and fashioned makeshift ponchos out of empty garbage bags. After a few more films it was officially pouring so we decided to call it a night. Running barefoot through Hyde Park in the torrential downpour was so hilarious it almost made up for the soggy bus ride home. 



Me and Anna in our awesome ponchos.

How was everyone else’s experiences at these events? I would love to hear your stories! xx 

Hello! 

Being an au pair is a really great way to experience a new place, I would really recommend it if you love kids ( I mean reeeeally love them haha) and want to live somewhere new! The best resource I have found for meeting other au pairs and making friends has been Facebook! There are lots of Au Pair groups and usually ones for separate cities depending on where you are located. To give you an example there are over 1000 people in the Sydney group! Where are you looking at going? Let me know if you have anymore questions, I would love to help!

I just arrived in Sydney last week and have settled in with my new host family. The girls I will be watching are Gia (3), Milla (9) and Indie (10), and are all very sweet and polite. I was lucky to overlap with the last au pair, Lena for a few days. It gave me the chance to see the routine and ask questions. This family’s schedule is a lot different than the one in Melbourne. But I can see why they need an au pair. The parents go to work early and come home at strange times during the day. The girls each have various after school activities and sports that they need rides to and from and watching a 3 year old during the day is definitely a new experience for me!

I feel very lucky to have made some friends while I was here over New Years and traveling. I didn’t have to go through that initial lonely period that I had in Melbourne before I started meeting people. I just got to jump right into the swing of things here and that was so nice. Last weekend I went with some friends to Bondi for some sun and then into the city for some delicious pub food . Sunday we strolled Paddy’s Market and then walked to the Rocks for an afternoon drink.

The house I am living in is a 5 minute drive from the beach and a 20 minute bus ride to the city. I think i’m really going to love it here. :)

 

The house!

 
My new room! I have a big girl bed now! Yesssss

 

The view from the hill at the end of our road. Pretty awesome.

More pictures to come soon! :) 

Hello from Sydney!

I thought I would take some time and share some details of my 5 weeks as a backpacker with you. I will warn you it’s a pretty long recap so you might not want to read it all at one time! For starters I need to give you an idea of the distance my travels took me. Sydney to Cairns is roughly the same distance as Georgia is from New York in the USA, pretty dang far! The map below shows all the available stops you can make on a greyhound mini travelers pass from Sydney to Cairns. I didn’t stop at every place, but picked certain places and cities that interested me. 




I arrived in Sydney right before New Years. I was lucky enough to stay with another Au Pair and her host family for a few days. I was blown away by this family’s kindness and generosity. We had dinner together every night and the day before New Years they insisted that we join them on their family boat for the day. We cruised around the Sydney Harbor and stopped at the famous fish market, ending the afternoon with some fishing- unfortunately I didn’t catch anything! 


First views of Sydney!














The Opera house and Harbour Bridge view from the boat.




For New Years I went with my new au pair friend Heather to the Botanical Gardens to watch the fireworks. One little catch in our plan was having to get to the gardens at 9am to get a spot! It was a long day but a fun one spent in the gardens with a picnic, games, and 15,000 other people doing the same thing!








My new Sydney Au Pair friend, Kaylene from Canada :)

Bondi Beach on New Years Day.

My next stop up the coast was to the small beachside town of Byron Bay. This is a place known for it’s chill beach vibe and surfing. Before leaving on my trip I had asked other au pairs who were going to be traveling if any of our dates matched up and they did for Bryon, I met up with a nice German girl named Lisa. We went to the beach, to a pretty light house which is on the most eastern point of Australia, and cooked dinner together at our hostel. I only spent two days here but could have stayed a full week.









After Bryon Bay I headed to Surfers Paradise on the Gold Coast. I think the flashy name has definitely had an effect on the amount of tourists that come here and how built up the area is. There are literally skyscrapers right next to the beach, kind of an eye sore compared to the natural beauty in Bryon. But it is still a fun place to try surfing or to meet other backpackers traveling up the coast. I met two lovely Swedish girls here and we spent hours at the beach and teaching one another card games from our countries. I also did a surf lesson and managed to stand up a few times so that was very exciting!






My certificate from Surf School!






Surfers to Brisbane was a big change as well. I had gotten used to seeing the ocean and missed it while I was in the 3rd largest city in Australia. Although I only had a day and the weather was a little gloomy I think I managed to see a lot just by walking around. There was a lovely lagoon on the southbank of the river that divides the city. Because it’s not the best idea to swim in the river they built the swimming area and made it free to the public. My favorite part of the day had to be going to the Gallery of Modern Art. There were some really cool instillation art exhibits, one by a Japanese artist named Yayoi Kusama that I remember studying in an art class at GCSU. Pretty cool!



















“The Obliteration Room” in the Art Gallery. Everything in the room is white and when you go in you are given a sheet of colored dot stickers that you can put anywhere! The aim of the piece is to try to cover the entire room in layers of dots!

Onward from Brisbane to Fraser Island! I’ll admit I was a little skeptical of spending three days camping on a sand island inhabited by wild dingos, in the blazing summer heat AND it being jellyfish season so you really shouldn’t be swimming in the ocean. But believe it or not this might have been my favorite part of the whole trip - it was that awesome.

We had special 4wd cars to navigate the sandy beaches and uneven paths through the forests. Sometimes it was so bumpy that it felt like you were on a safari ride at Disney land, I almost expected a T Rex or Elephant to come crashing through the trees chasing us. We spent the days riding around the island, swimming in the crystal clear rainwater lakes, and hiking along the beach paths. In the evenings we went to our campsite and had giant barbecue dinners of hamburgers, sausages, and salad. It was a tight squeeze to get everyone at the tables but we all sat together and it was very homey.




















The last morning a group woke up to see the sun come over the horizon, it was breathtakingly beautiful and well worth the 5am wake up call.




I was sad to leave Fraser but excited for my next destination: Airlie Beach and The Whitsunday Islands! I had booked a two day sailing tour that I expected to be the highlight of my trip. Unfortunately the wet season has just started in Queensland so it rained the whole time. Our group made the most of it though. We managed to get to Whitehaven beach in time for a few pictures and a quick swim and some snorkeling where we saw heaps of beautiful fish and corals. Whitehaven beach is ranked as one of the worlds most beautiful beaches, one reason being that the sand there is so fine and white. It’s actually illegal to take sand from the beach and if caught you can get a big fine. With all the rain we has lots of time to talk and get to know one another on the boat. There were groups from Ireland, Sweden, Israel, Belgium, England, and even another solo American traveler like myself! We are apparently a rarity, everyone I met guessed that I was Canadian before American. There are just not as many Americans traveling this way.


Our boat the Habibi.



The swirling sands of Whitehaven beach



Girls just love jumping pictures! This was the other American, Shir from LA. these were the stinger suits we had to wear every time we went into the water to avoid the jellyfish stings.



What else to do on a boat in the rain? Drink goon, play games and sing songs of course! A British lady named Belinda taught us a funny game called fluffy bunny, and the Irish men started singing all their drinking sounds at about 11 ( and didnt stop till 1!). They even got a little creative and made a funnel out of a snorkel, oh man.


My next stop was to a small island called Magnetic Island which is off the coast near Townsville. Before leaving Airlie Beach I ran into a friend named Mike ( from England) who I met on the Fraser trip. He was heading the same direction so we decided to travel together for a few days and had a great time hiking the trails on Magnetic Island before heading up to Cairns. 




 
This was our view from the hostel rooms we stayed in. They were more like beachside bungalows with balconies that overlooked the water. It was such a relaxing way to spend a few days in between busy cities.





The last Greyhound bus trip was a straight shot from Townsville to Cairns. Cairns is the gateway to parts of the Great Barrier Reef with the closet sections of the reef about 2 hours offshore. My second day there I went on a day trip out there and went snorkeling. I wish I had pictures to share but didn’t have an underwater camera. The corals were all different colors and so were the fish. We say stingrays and a few sea turtles just cruising along the ocean floor. My favorite had to be the parrot fish, they were every color imaginable and you could hear them when they took small bites out of the coral.



the view of the reefs from the boat, some areas were so shallow you had to swim carefully to not damage the coral.



I stayed at one of the most well known hostels in Cairns, Gilligans. Mike and I each met up with groups of friends who happened to be in Cairns at the same time too. We all had some interesting adventures together, a “party pub crawl” hosted by the hostel, going to the movies, and even one sneaky prank that turned into an epic TP fight.









My last stop on my “Epic Australian East Coast Adventure” was to the Daintree Rainforest and Cape Tribulation. This section of the rainforest was made into a World Heritage Site in the 1980s. That means the area is closed to any more construction to preserve it’s natural state. There were already a few hostels built but they are more like jungle cabins so it was quite rustic. On the first afternoon I went to a swimming hole with some people from my hostel. The water was perfect and there was even a rope swing. The next morning I went sea kayaking around the Cape. I had planned to kayak somewhere along my trip and I’m glad I saved it till the last stop. Cape Tribulation’s tag line is “Where the Rainforest meets the Reef”, and thats pretty close to how it really is! In high tide the water is right up next to the trees, and you can see stingrays, lemon sharks, and fish right beneath the boat. The next day on our bus ride back to Cairns we stopped at a wildlife sanctuary and saw all kinds of animals. Crocodiles, cassowaries, kookaburras, emus, and kangaroos to name a few. 5 months in Australia and I finally got to feed a kangaroo! 





Sea Kayaking Cape Tribulation



Mason’s Swimming hole in the Daintree rainforest.



Feeding kangaroos!

And that brings me to the end of my trip up the east coast of Australia! I’m sorry for the lengthy recap I was just really excited to share everything with you guys. This trip taught me so much about traveling and so much about myself. New places, new people, new connections all rolled into one unforgettable adventure. 

Love,
Andrea

This might be the last weekly update for a few weeks because tomorrow I’m leaving for 3 weeks on the road up the east coast to Cairns :)

It’s 1:30am and my plane leaves at 9:15am. Lucky me is waking up at 4:30 to drive to the train station for a one hour train ride, and catch a bus to the airport that takes 50 minutes. Ouch. But if thats how I get there thats what I have to do!

But I couldn’t leave without telling you guys about Australian Christmas. So here goes..

In typical Melbourne weather fashion the day before Christmas was sunny, warm and spent outside by the pool catching rays, and Christmas day was an insane thunderstorm complete with power outages and hail in some parts of the city. Despite the weather we loaded up the car and went to my host Mum’s sister’s house for dinner. There were lots of little kids running around while the adults were getting dinner ready. One uncle even dressed up as santa and passed out the presents under the tree. He made every single person come and sit on his knee and give him a kiss on the cheek. Me included! haha

Dinner was turkey, ham, stuffing,  cranberrys, roast carrots and potatoes, rolls and really good champagne. Sounds like Thanksgiving food! Some Australian families grill out on the barbecue and have seafood, but they didn’t this year. My favorite part as always was dessert. We had pavlova and plum pudding and custard. I made banana pudding to help contribute and everyone who tried it really liked it. 



Oh yeah i got in the Santa photo :D



Opening presents on Christmas morning! I love my kangaroo stocking!


The living room post present opening :p



My little doll hanging out in the tree.


here comes santa! ( or Uncle Ashley.. either way)


Had to take a picture of the desserts. 


My munchkins with their gingerbread ( really shortbread ) masterpiece!



And to let you end with laugh, here’s me on Uncle Santa’s knee, face red with embarrassment as I accept my gift. :p 

conductorr:

Christmas Tree on the Beach [explored] by CarlosSilvestre62 on Flickr.

(Source: conduct0rr)