A few of the girls

This is what the bus looked like on the inside...

Dinner time!

The whole group and Nathan (our driver/guide)

I just wanted to share a few more pictures from my Exmouth trip since I didn't get any group shots with my own camera, but now I have access to them through facebook!

Well this week has been pretty uneventful for the most part. The first week back at Uni after a long break is always a little rough. I received a few of the assignments I turned in before break back. It was really quite a shock to get my grades back here because the grading is so different. Receiving above an 80% on an assignment is very good and it doesn’t occur very often. One of my lecturers told us that in her 10 years of teaching she has given a student above 90% only a few times. So when I got a 64% on one paper and a 70% on another I was disappointed at first; however I found out that both of these grades transfer back to Elon as a B. We were told that the grading was a lot different before we came, but I really didn’t think anything of it until now.

I had a math assignment due on Friday, so most of my free time this week was spent working on that. It amazes me how long it can take to complete 5 math problems. This math class is by far the most difficult class I have taken, mostly because I don’t have the same background as most of the other students in my class. The lecturer has been very willing to help me; however, every time I go to his office for help, he always ends up trying to tell me about some other math related problem or phenomenon. So, it takes a while to actually get him to focus on my questions.

Drea, my roommate from Elon, finally booked her tickets to come visit me in Australia!!! I am so excited. She is coming at the end of May, and she will be here for about 2 weeks. I am really excited that we will be able to share experiences together in Australia. My classes here end May 29th, and I only have one exam, which is on June 15th. After my exam I will only have 6 days left in Australia before heading home. It is hard to believe I have already been here for over 2 ½ months!

Yesterday (Friday) I went to my usual Bible study, but I didn't stay for dinner because it was Livia’s birthday. We planned to have a party at our friend’s house and then go clubbing in the city. We were all excited until we found out we had to cancel the party. The housing assistants and managers found out about the party and told our friends were hosting the party that their housing agreement would be terminated if they had the party. We were pretty surprised because people have parties and gatherings all the time in the student housing. A few hours later we found out that we couldn’t go to the clubs either because they all closed at midnight because the next day was ANZAC day (a public holiday). We all felt really bad for Livia and we still wanted to celebrate her birthday. So, we went to dinner and then went and hung out at a different location on campus…Dave’s flat. Dave ended up walking Komal home soon after we arrived, and he didn’t come back because he fell asleep at Komal’s flat. So there were about 15 of us hanging out at his house without him. It was pretty funny because his roommates kept walking in and they probably were wondering what in the world we were doing in their flat!

Albany Adventures

Me, Nathan, Jenn, Jamie at Whale World

Overlooking a beach in Albany

Whale world!

Jenn, Rhys, Nathan, and I at the gap and bridge rock formations

Jenn, Jamie and I all geared up for Paintball (aside from our helmets of course)

I can’t believe my two week break is practically over already! I just returned to Perth yesterday afternoon after spending 5 nights in Albany. Our week was full of adventures.
Saturday morning Jenn and I woke up early so we could catch a bus and a train to get to the Station where our bus would leave for Albany. We bought our tickets as soon as we got to the station but all the tickets were sold out for the bus route that takes six hours, so we were stuck with the one that takes a different and longer route (about 7 hours). It was a coach bus and quite comfortable so we were able to catch up on much needed sleep from the previous week. Of course, somehow, even though the bus wasn’t very crowded, we ended up with three loud little kids near us. When we arrived in Albany, Rhys and Nathan were waiting for us at the bus station. We headed back to Rhys’s house to meet his family. Rhys is originally from England but his family moved to Albany four years ago. Nathan is one of Rhys’s roommates from Curtin, and he didn’t go home to Canberra (the capital of Australia) because it is so far away and quite expensive to travel. Rhys’s mom and dad were so wonderful to us all week. His mom was an amazing cook. I haven’t eaten so well in a long time! After dinner, the four of us headed over to hang out with a few of Rhys’s friends from Albany. Later we walked to the “downtown” area to go to the Albany night club. However, we decided to head home because it was so crowded the line was so long.

The next morning we slept in…finally. Rhys took us to some of the tourist places around Albany. We went to see really cool rock formations known as the Gap and the Bridge. Then, we went to Hungry Jacks for lunch (which is just like Burger King), mostly because I really wanted French fries because I gave them up for Lent. We thought it would be fun to take our food and eat down at the beach; however, after two minutes we were surrounded by seagulls. That night, some of Rhys’s and Nathans friends from Curtin were stopping by Albany for the night, and they were planning to camp out in the backyard. However, they arrived around 8:30 expecting dinner and without camping gear. Things got a little out of hand because the Tilbury’s weren’t exactly prepared for four others to spend the night in their house. And some of them weren’t very willing to sleep on the floor, so they ended up leaving around midnight to find other accommodation. To make a long story short, they probably won’t ever be invited back to the Tilbury’s house.

On Monday, we woke up and we went to the set of the Australian T.V. show called Lockie Leonard. It was really neat, but it would have been even cooler if I had actually seen the show before. Afterwards we headed to the beach because it was such a nice day. We drove about 45 minutes to a really secluded beach. Along the way, Rhys asked who wanted to learn how to drive his manual truck. Jenn volunteered first. Aside from stalling about 5 times, she did well considering she had never driven a manual and it was her first time driving on the opposite side of the road. Once we arrived at the beach, we still walked another 15 minutes before we arrived at the perfect beach location. This walk involved climbing up and down slippery rocks. It was hard to keep up with the five guys but we managed. On the way home, Nathan tried driving a manual car for the second time, and he did pretty well. Later that night we hung out and watched a movie together.

Tuesday we hung out at Rhys’s house in the morning, and Jamie (one of our friends from Curtin University) was on her way back up to Perth, so she stopped by for a little while. The five of us went to Whale World in the afternoon. There we got to learn all about whaling, as it was a previous whaling station/port. Jamie and Nathan headed back up to Perth later that afternoon. I tried driving Manual that night, but only drove on the road near Rhys’s house. My Dad taught me how to drive manual a little a few years ago but I was really uncomfortable driving manual. This time, however, I didn’t even stall! It was really weird driving on the left side of the road though.

On our last full day in Albany, we went to a historic Fort in Albany. The lady let me in free because we think she thought I was a little kid in the backseat. We got a good laugh out of that. We were running a few errands and Jenn and I realized neither of us had appropriate clothing for paintball (we had a reservation to play on Friday morning back in Perth). So we went to Salvation Army (the Australians call it Salvos) to pick up some old t-shirts. Then, also went to well known squid shack restaurant for a snack. There, Jenn and I tried fried squid. It wasn’t too bad, but it wasn’t my favorite. Our last dinner was wonderful, as usual. I tried coronation chicken, which I had never tried before. We relaxed and watched a movie later that night. We went to bed at a decent hour because we were leaving the next morning at 7 am. The Tilbury’s drove back to Perth the next morning, and it only took about 4.5 hours, instead of the 7 hours it took on the bus.

We arrived back at Curtin around noon. It was Komal’s birthday, so we took her out for dinner later that night and a few of us hung out afterward. Today went to play paintball at a place that was about an hour away. I must admit I was quite nervous. I was with a lot of others who had also never been before so that made it a little less scary. The first game I got shot pretty bad because after I got hit I surrendered and someone still kept shooting me! It really stung the first time, but it wasn’t too bad. And then I got hit on the top of my head a little later and that hurt even more. I ended up having a lot of fun, but I definitely have proof that I played. .. I have about 6 bruises/welts on my body. We were so dirty after playing because we had all been crawling around in the dirt. We went home to take showers and then we planned to go see the new Fast and Furious Movie in the theatre. Once we arrived at the theatre, we found out that all of the tickets were sold out for each showing. So went to Blockbuster and rented a few movies. I have really been enjoying the break, but tomorrow I really need to focus on the one major assignment that I haven’t even looked at since the break started!

Kalabarri National Park

Sunset at Monkey Mia

Dolphin!

The Farm Stay

Break...Week One

The Bus/van

The Pinnacles

SOme of the girls at Ocean park

Me and Jenn...and our Margaritas

Sandboarding

The adventure began on last Saturday morning at 8:00 am, which was our scheduled departure time. We met our tour guide/driver ( Nathan) and we got to see the lovely blue bus that were traveling in. Our group consisted of 15 students, which was much smaller than we expected, but it turned out to be really fun with a small group because we got to know everyone really well. Our first stop was at the bizarre Pinnacles. We then had lunch, which involved making our own sandwiches and washing our dishes. . . which I wasn’t exactly expecting. After driving another few hours, we somehow managed to get two flat tires, which held us up for about two hours. The adventure was only beginning. After what seemed like ages, we got back on the road and ended up staying a Farm Stay accommodation rather than the beach house we were originally planning to stay. We were served dinner, which included a choice of kangaroo stew or old fashioned farm style tucker. I stayed in a room with 5 others because each room had 3 bunk beds. When we woke up the next morning we actually were able to see horses, lambs, and llamas…it was much more obvious that we were on a farm in the middle of nowhere.

Sunday, we had breakfast at 7am (breakfast every morning was cereal and toast) we headed off to Kalabarri National park where Nathan led us on a hour long hike. It was really beautiful, especially the areas overlooking the ocean. We also stopped at Shell beach, which is a beach made entirely of sea shells. Then, we were off to Monkey Mia Backpackers Resort. Monkey Mia is known for its world famous dolphins. Once we arrived we went down to the beach and saw the sunset and the dolphins. We enjoyed steak and hot dogs on the barbeque for dinner…I think this was the only night that Nathan did all the cooking by himself. After dinner we went star gazing on the beach.

Monday, we woke up early so we could be there for the feeding of the dolphins. We really got to see the dolphins up close! Some people in our group were randomly picked to feed the dolphins. By 10 am we were off again to Ocean Park to see tiger sharks. Again, we got to see tiger sharks up really close as well as a number of other interesting fish and sea creatures. Then we headed off to Warrorra Station where we spent the night. This accommodation was much more rustic than the previous two places we stayed. There were 2 people per room and we didn’t even have sheets on our bed. Plus, when we went in the kitchen to start cooking pasta for dinner, we encounter a number of spiders and even a few cockroaches. Surprisingly, the pasta was delicious and I ate every bit of mine. That night we also celebrated Lottie’s 18th birthday. We also enjoyed “Australian” style smores by a campfire.


The next morning breakfast was at 6:30. I got up for breakfast only to find that under my right eye was really swollen and I had no idea why. I figured the swelling would go down after an hour or so, but it didn’t. I ended up buying some allergy medicine later that day, and even that didn’t work very well. So, basically I had a swollen eye for a day and a half. Anyway, that day we only rode in the bus for an hour total (which was wonderful because the past three days had involved anywhere from 6 to 9 hours of riding on the bus). We arrived in Coral Bay around 9am and we had the whole day free. Most of us decided to enjoy the day on the beach. Jenn and I rented snorkel gear and we went out and snorkeled for a couple of hours. It was really cool because we saw so many colorful fish, stingrays, and even an octopus! That night we had stirfry for dinner, and then we went to the local bar as a group. Jenn and I each got a Margarita. That night we went to bed before 10 o’clock even though it felt so much later!

Wednesday, we had to leave coral bay and head to Exmouth (our final destination) at 5:45 am. My friend Matt and a few other were going scuba diving and they had to arrive at a certain time so we all had to get up early. It was only an hour and half drive to Exmouth, and again we had the rest of the day free. I ended up going to the beach and the pool. A few of us even went to the sand dunes later to try out sand boarding (I had never heard of it before, but basically it is like snowboarding on sand). We had chilli for dinner, and again we went out to the local bar to hang out. We ended up playing quite a few games of pool.

Thursday was the day we were all dreading because we had no fun stops other than fuel stops and bathroom breaks between exmouth and Northampton. So, we drove for about 9 hours and only stopped twice. We arrived at the same Farm stay we were at the first night. We actually arrived before dinner so we got to go for a dip in the pool, and we also played quite a bit of table tennis. Instead of Kangaroo stew for dinner we had a beef stew. We all enjoyed our last night hanging out together. We even got a present for Nathan.

Friday, we departed at 7 am, and we had about 6 hours of driving before arriving back in Perth. For some reason those six hours seemed the longest. Along the way we stopped at a gas station for lunch (which, of course was sandwiches). We got home around 2 pm, and ever since I have been busy getting ready for my next trip, which is to Albany. Jenn and I leave tomorrow morning bright and early! Tonight we celebrated Komal’s birthday because her birthday is in a few days and we won’t be around. We made a pasta dinner and cake for her tonight, and then watched the Lion King. Such a good night.

Midterm Week

(This map shows most of places I am going over the break. The first week we will be going to Northhampton, Kalbarri, Shark Bay, Coral Bay, and Exmouth. And, then the second week to Albany!)

As this week is midterm week, I have actually spent a lot of time working on papers and studying for my math midterm, which is tomorrow (friday) afternoon. I am the only student from our class who is taking the midterm before break; every one else is taking it two weeks from tomorrow, which is during our two week break. This week has been long and hard, but I know it is going to be worth it because I won't have to worry about studying over the break!

Now, as for the exciting part, I am going on two main trips over the break. The first week I am traveling up the west coast with a big tour group. Jenn, Matt, and I signed up for the trip together. We will be going to a lot of national parks and beaches. We also are going to the famous Monkey Mia, and there we will be able swim with Dolphins! The farthest north we go is Exmouth, and then we travel back down the coast and stop at a few other places. I am also excited because it will be warmer up north, and it actually is starting to cool down in Perth. Today the high was about 75 F I think, which is a big change from Febuary and most of March when the temperature was in the upper 80's and 90's.

Then, the second week of break, Jenn and I are going to Albany, which is about a 5 hours southeast of Perth. We will take the bus down, and it will probably be about a 6 hour bus ride. When we arrive, we will stay at our friend Rhys's house. We met him through Matt because Rhys is one of Matt's roomates. I am not exactly sure what will will be doing in Albany, but I know it will be fun :)