Australia!!!

Sooooooooo, Australia, theres been sooo much that has happened that I would be on here for days trying to put it all down, Ill put what i can and maybe add more later as after thoughts.

Start at the begining?
I came into Sydney Nov 2, walked around in the blazing hot sun and warm breezy nights for a couple of days checking out the amazing parks and wandering the city. The first day I went to a park near the harbor to see the iconic bay area and I found something more entertaining, huge bats! Huge red furried bats flying around in the bright sunlight, and it wasnt just a few, it was hundreds of these things hanging from trees. It was like i was in a zoo, and there are parrots flying around, as frequent as seagulls in MI, and some crazy long beaked bird walking around (check my pics). The park I was at was really great and all the different vegitation, it all had similarities to what Id seen before but it was just different in some way, like the huge rooted trees, all the diffrent palm trees, pine trees with vertical needle bunches instead of horizontal, trees with branches that had roots dangeling down and some that had gotten to the ground and looks like a seperate tree, trees with multiple trunksgoing down to the ground, on and on...

Some other diferent stuff in Australia:
-They have car/trucks!!! they sell them new, theres two of them: a ford falcon or a Holden/GM Commador Ute, sure wish they'd sell them in the US!
-A cool little van called a Suzuki Carry, google it...
-There are also ALOT of flat nosed smaller economical vans on the roads, lots for businesses and lots of travelers.
-Locals really dress up when they go out to eat and to the bar at night time
-There are drinking fountains @ cross walks in the city!!!
-There are Australian black crows that sound like that redrum kid from the movie The Shining
-The good surfing areas remind me of So Cal, vacation areas remind me of florida, and the cities kinda remind me of canadian cities turned tropical.

Court came in from Iraq after a couple of days and it was great to see her again althou she was dead tired after a long flight and crazy time travels. We hung out in Sydney for a few more days checking out the seafood market, flee markets, finding cheap eats, playing on monuments and hitting the Op-Shops harrrrrd (Op-shop = thrift/opportunity). Court actually had to get a 3 teir expandable suitcase to accomidate all the sweet finds.

We hit the road starting off visiting the Blue mountains (the color comes from the haze of eucaliptis), and back to the coast to visit cities like: Booti Booti, Gympie, Mooball, Coolingotta, Pimpama, Surfers paradise (that actually doesnt have very good surfing compared to near bye places), Tweed heads, and this is just the east coast...

We found some amazing beaches, picture perfect everytime and desolate as can be, partly because the whole coast is full of them so you just pull over and take your pick. One of the campsites we stayed at was a 20km drive down a bumpy backroad, something I vowed never to attemped again after Edweena's little "incedent", but it was well worth it. We where in the middle of nowhere with a beach to ourselves as far as my eyes could see. We played with the waves a while, played frizbee a while, and just enjoyed each others company and lack of company. The waves where amazing, we would be about 10 feet out from shore and a big one would hit us and knock us down. Some would swipe you off your feet and tumble you towards shore losing track of which way is up. The coolest one picked me off my feet and dragged me with my shoulder being the only thing suporting me, for about 10 feet! There where many times I would watch Court playing and a sec later Id see just her feet straight in the air! Its an amazing power with relatively limitless energy.

When we got further north, closer to the Queensland boarder, we finally saw some kangaroos! It was interesting actually see how when they are eating and want to just move forward a bit they use thier tails like a 3rd set of legs to move them forward. And to see them hop around, i cant even imagine how strong thier legs and tails are to be able to move that much mass as swiftly as they do. We stopped at a koala park later on the trip to try and find one but no such luck. And near a spot where a local said we just missed the whale watching by a week, it was a spot where the humpback whales pass by on there way south with thier new borns to go back to their feeding grounds. The southern ocean is where they feed and store up for the swim north during which they dont stop and eat. They then travel about 12000 km to get from the southern ocean to the tropical breeding grounds in the coldest months. They head back threw before the southern hemespheres summer time with their newborns with the peak time to see them being around Sept. So we missed the last few whales coming through but I did see what seemed to be a dolphin from the beach one early morning.

We got to the resort near Bundaberg (why yes they make a rum there, and why yes we had more then our share of sampling) after a few days of beach combing the coast and it was a nice relief to be able to get a good nights sleep, WITH AC!!! So we where livin the good life :) The area was one of the only spots to get to the Barrier Reef from the beach so we checked out snorkling for a couple of days and saw a sea eel and snake, a ray, a small shark!, many beautiful fish, coral, sharp barnacles, no sponge Bob to my multiple shagrins. Snorklin is fun and all but BEWARE! The most dangerous thing about it is not even in the water, its being in the water mid-day, getting lost in this other world while your backside is getting TOASTED! Well worth it though, FO SHO!!!

Near the resort in Bargara we found Mon Repos which is one of the two largest Loggerhead turtle rookeries in the South Pacific Ocean! So we were rockin on the turtle watching, very quitly mind you, so as to not disturb the moma poopin her eggs out. And boooyyy did she have a load, 100plus! cant member the exact # but it was alot, when I get the pics up you can countem yerself if ya like. After we watched moma crawl back to the ocean (which itself is an amazing thing, how she is able to move that huge mass) Me and Court got to help move the eggs to a safer location that is less likely to get washed into the tide. I squeezed one of the eggs, VERY gingerly, and it felt like a soggy pingpong. They mark, record and keep track of all the different locations of eggs to better understand the turtles. They did say that the lights kept on overnight in the nearby towns distract the young when they hatch and waddle back to the sea. They look for the light on the horizon to know which direction the water is and whith competing lights they get diverted which may result in more fatalities. All the more reason to shut your lights off when your not using them, AND another thing to keep in mind, balloons, cute little baby turtles love to try and eat those brightly colored death traps, so next time you think about getting a ballon as a gift, FORGET IT! Unless you want that out weighing your karma.