Cyclone Hamish
So, we get all of these warnings about this intense cat. 5 cyclone (hurricane for my American audience). It ended up not hitting land, but went down through the Whitsundays. The damage was nowhere near predicted, but it just goes to show how storms are intensifying these last few years. If it would have hit land, it would have been devastating!
Airlie Beach Young Adults Camp
The weekend of March 13-15, I got to go on the young adults camp with my church. I could have sworn I'd already posted about it, but it just shows how long it has been since my last post. The weekend was pretty much amazing, and it gave me a nice boost my worshiping and reading the Bible. I've already gotten 4 books read...1 Samuel through 2 Kings, now I'm going back to Genesis and reading through the whole thing. I think it will be a fun thing to do, because I don't have any books here and I've always wanted to read through the entire Bible. I'm even taking notes and stuff. I'm studying the Bible more than my classwork sometimes! lol
But back to the camp. It was down at Airlie Beach at the Whitsundays. We stayed in a hostel there, and Saturday we went out to the Whitsundays and Whitehaven Beach on Whitsunday Island. Now, this beach is said to be one of the most beautiful in the world, and it definitely lives up to the title. It was soooooo beautiful! No one lives on that island, so it's pristine, and the sand is snow white and the ocean is so blue! I just want a chance to go back! We took these crazy ocean-raft-boat-things so the ride was intense, but well worth it. We also went snorkling, but due to my camera MIA, I don't have any pics. The visibility was pretty bad due to Cyclone Hamish though, so you're not missing much. I also discovered that I'm not a huge fan of snorkling (in low vis at least). I kept diving down to look at stuff and chase fish, then I would forget that I wasn't scuba diving and think that my snorkle was my regulator. That made for a lot of breathing ocean water. Delicious! Not.
Here are some pics from the trip:
Ocean rafting...so much fun!
Group shot at the overlook and Our snorkeling site
Beautiful Whitehaven Beach and Lunch on Whitehaven Beach
Me at the sign and Keeping up the Clemson/Carolina rivalry...even in Oz!
Billabong Sanctuary
I volunteered the next weekend (March 21) at Billabong. It was really fun, but I had to get up at 5:30am on a Saturday. Now, if you know me, I love animals, but I also love sleeping in on Saturdays. So, I haven't been back the last two weekends, but I may. It's just sooooo early!
Here's what I got to do: I cleaned out animal enclosures (best part! Not), helped prepare the food for the day, helped clean out croc and blue-tongue lizard pens (which was actually kind of cool, because I got to pick up the blue-tongues), learned how to handle koalas (you can't pick them up around the waist because their ribs are delicate and will snap, so you pick them up by their super strong arms) and got to watch croc feedings. Also, the woman who picked us up was playing foster mom to a baby wallaby named Arnie and I got to hold him on the car ride. He's adorable!!! It was a pretty intense 8 hours, and if it started just a bit later, I'd be okay to give my Saturdays. We'll see how it goes.
Here are some pics I stole from Bobbi from Billabong (I'm not in any, because Bobbi went on a different day than me):
I volunteered the next weekend (March 21) at Billabong. It was really fun, but I had to get up at 5:30am on a Saturday. Now, if you know me, I love animals, but I also love sleeping in on Saturdays. So, I haven't been back the last two weekends, but I may. It's just sooooo early!
Here's what I got to do: I cleaned out animal enclosures (best part! Not), helped prepare the food for the day, helped clean out croc and blue-tongue lizard pens (which was actually kind of cool, because I got to pick up the blue-tongues), learned how to handle koalas (you can't pick them up around the waist because their ribs are delicate and will snap, so you pick them up by their super strong arms) and got to watch croc feedings. Also, the woman who picked us up was playing foster mom to a baby wallaby named Arnie and I got to hold him on the car ride. He's adorable!!! It was a pretty intense 8 hours, and if it started just a bit later, I'd be okay to give my Saturdays. We'll see how it goes.
Here are some pics I stole from Bobbi from Billabong (I'm not in any, because Bobbi went on a different day than me):
Baby Arnie in his pouch and one of the koalas
Where we make the food and Heaps of baby crocs!
Blue-tongue that I got to hold
Photography Class
So...I like taking pictures. I do NOT like taking pictures for a grade. I tried to get out of photography and into a fun bio class when I got here, but no. I have learned a few fun things, like the fact that I love slow shutter speeds and selective focus. Here are a couple of my fav shots:
So...I like taking pictures. I do NOT like taking pictures for a grade. I tried to get out of photography and into a fun bio class when I got here, but no. I have learned a few fun things, like the fact that I love slow shutter speeds and selective focus. Here are a couple of my fav shots:
Rugby
One of the strangest things for me is not knowing the rules of the popular games here. So a bunch of us girls decided to take in a North Queensland Cowboys rugby game. Unlike football games back home, there is no time between plays for an announcer to tell you what the heck is going on...so we watched and just smiled. It was oddly quiet, until a team got a try (like a touchdown, but 4 points) or a goal (2 points). We ended up losing the game to Melbourne Storm pretty badly, but we had fun watching and being in the sporting atmosphere.
Waiting on the bus...an hour late!
Watching the game
Basically the same picture twice...lol
Clubbin'
I don't even know if the on campus bar/dance club counts, but it's the place to be on Thursday nights. It's a fun way for all of the girls to get together and dance. For the record, I am being a good little sober girl!
Random Other Things:
I also joined the RAW (aka Rotary and Western Courts) women's rugby team. At first it looked like we wouldn't have enough girls to play, and we practiced with the boys at first. At the last minute, we got a bunch of girls, so we had to forfeit our first game last week and we'll start this Wednesday. We've had a few training sessions and I've already got a few random bruises from tackling people. I was so sore after Fridays practice that I did nothing but watch movies (Animal House and Some Like It Hot...nothing like a late night black and white movie!) and sit in my room on Saturday. But it's fun being active again. Except for today. We had a straight up fitness training session. It was pretty intense and reminded me why I'm so out of shape. Serious exercise is no fun at all! But hopefully it'll make me get off my butt and start running/jogging or something!
But that's it for now...hopefully the super long post will hold you until the next one, which will hopefully be next weekend, because I'm travelling to Cairns! I've got a lot of work to do (namely an 8 page Vertebrate Fauna paper, a 4 page field write-up for Functional Bio of Marine Org. and a psych midterm). Lots of work, and I've been lazy this weekend. I'll be working a lot this week so that my travels will be stress free.
Trips for this month:
- April 10-12: Cairns for Easter Weekend...I got roundtrip flights for $44 Australian dollars (aka $30 USD)!
- April 18-22: Not sure yet...it's mid-semester break, but I decided to go to Sydney and Melbourne later...
- April 23-26: Spending my 21st birthday in the middle of the outback on my Vert. Fauna field trip. Camping out and mozzies...great. Though we do set up traps for all kinds of animals, like snakes, lizards, rodents, etc...should be interesting.
Well, time for some studying...I'll post again soon (hopefully!)
-Jess
PS- Special thanks to Amber who reminded me that I've been super lazy with my posting and needed to update.
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