random stuff during study break

Last night, dinner with friends

war memorial

kings park

my friends and i rode around the river on our bikes- view of perth from across the river

holding a koala!

my friends and i went to an island off the coast for a couple of days

sunset at the island

the beach

quokka!

we took a speedboat to the island and back. i thought the huge waves were going to flip us over!

Tasmania!

I left for Tasmania on a Friday night, with three teammates, one girl also from california and a couple from Germany. We had a layover in Melbourne from 11:30 pm till 7 am the next morning, so we had to sleep in the airport. We found some benches to sleep on, only to realize that there was a continuous beeping sound nearby. So we moved downstairs to some other benches. Everyone had a sleeping bag, except me. One of the doors to outside was open, and the whole night I was freezing. I barely got any sleep. We "woke up" around 5 am and got on our short flight to Hobart, Tasmania (the capital). The men on our team had decided to grow out their facial hair and shave it into weird beards and mustaches to fit our costume, lumberjacks, for a party that weekend. So when one of out teammates came to pick us up from the airport, a lady tried to get in because she thought he was a taxi driver. It was pretty funny. All the guys who grew out their beards looked ridiculous. So we basically went straight to the fields. I met some of the teammates I hadn't met yet, and for the first time ever we all played together. Our team was called Happy Pigs and we got pretty sweet jerseys. We had two girls from california (myself included), one guy from canada, one guy from ireland, a dutch guy, the couple from Germany, and the rest were Australians. We played okay that day, all of our 3 games were close, but we lost them all. That night there was a showcase game between two of the top teams, so we got to eat Indian food (provided by the tournament) and watch them. That night we all hung out in our cabins, chatting and drinking beer. There were some pretty cool people on our team, and I especially liked the Irish guy, but, naturally, he had a girlfriend. Damn. But anyway, it was a pretty relaxing evening. The next day we had three more games, we lost the first two and finally won the last one. Then that night there was an Ultimate party at a club. The theme was Tasmanian idols, so our team dressed up as lumberjacks. One guy even bought a small christmas tree! It was a pretty fun night, we basically just danced the whole night. The next day we had two games, we lost the first and won the last. We were pretty excited about winning our last game because we had lost to the team on Saturday and also because we had no girl subs for that game. The whole tournament there was only one girl sub, and the last game we had none! I have never played so much. 3 day tournament, on almost the whole time. That evening they had a bbq for everyone while we watched the finals. The next day a group of us left for Cradle Mountain, a national park in central Tasmania. It was a long drive, but we got to see a lot of the landscape, mostly rolling green hills, farms, sheep, and cows. The group consisted of me, the other cali girl, the dutch guy, the two germans, and an australian couple. The dutch guy and the german guy were hilarious. They kept me laughing the whole week. For the next three days we hiked. We hiked to several lakes and hiked (almost) to the summit of Cradle Mountain. The landscape looked prehistoric to me and we saw all sorts of wild animals like wallabys, wombats, and quokkas. The three of us girls who had played in the tournament were exhausted. Every part of my legs hurt. Every night we drank warm drinks, watched a movie, and played games. We also cooked/ate really good meals. It was nice to cook meals and all eat together like a family. Our last day was spent driving/flying home. Everyone I met that week was so great, I didn't want to leave! One of the girls is planning a dinner for all of us to get together, so hopefully that will work out because I would love to see everyone again. I may also go play with them some nights, even though I technically am not a part of the league.

Australian Mixed Ultimate Championships 2009- Hobart, Tasmania

My team in pink

The guy on the right is doing a lay out

Cradle Mountain

The girls at cradle mountain (Katie- from Cali, Micha- from Germany, Me, Anne- from Aus)

Hike through the snow

To the Cradle Mountain Summit

A Wombat- we saw a bunch of them. they were so cute and they let us come right up to them!

A Wallaby- related to a kangaroo

A Quokka- they are rodents, but they jump and have pouches like kangaroos! I thought they were adorable.

Most of Tasmania looked like this

UWA

Here are some pictures of my campus!

The University of Western Australia

Guild Village- where the book store, stores, the tav, etc. are located.

Peacocks live in our Arts building!

Winthrop Hall

The underpass between Currie Hall (where i live) and UWA that I walk through everyday to get to class

Currie Hall!

My building. My room is the bottom right corner.

Right outside my room!

Margaret River

Margaret River is sort of like a Napa Valley on the beach. It's a beautiful town down south and it's right on the ocean. My friend and I took a bus down (it was the easiest and cheapest way). It was about a 5 hour bus ride (with a 1/2 hour stop for dinner and a movie), but normally it only takes about 3 hours to get there. When we got off the bus our bus driver asked us if we knew where we were going and we admitted that we didn't. He tried to find our hostel on the map, but it wasn't there! We were a little nervous, but we figured we just needed a taxi. Of course we couldn't find the number for a taxi either, so the bus driver told us to walk into town and ask for help. We walked up to a restaurant/bar and asked the bouncers where we could find a taxi. Of course they were right in front of us haha The taxi driver knew where our hostel was and so at last, we arrived. Another girl was supposed to come with us, but she was on crutches so at the last minute she canceled. Luckily, we still had reservations for 3 so we got a room to ourselves :) The hostel was pretty nice (a couple of years ago it was voted the best hostel in australia). The next day we got picked up for our first ever wine tour! Before the tour started they took us to have a nice barbecued lunch on the Margaret River. It was absolutely beautiful and we even got to listen to a guy play the didgeridoo for us! The tour took us to three wineries (one big, one medium, and one small), a cheese factory, a venison farm, a chocolate factory, and a brewery. I liked it all! And it was nice to see some more beautiful Australian landscape. My friend and I hated to waste any alcohol (being the cheap college students that we are), but we quickly realized that we did in fact need to spit out some of the wine if we didn't want to make fools of ourselves as the young, drunk, american girls. We met some nice people (all couples... haha) and our guide was really nice. After the tour we got back to our hostel and watched a couple of episodes of england's version of the office with an american backpacker. Then we went to dinner at a nearby restaurant. We didn't realize that you needed reservations, so as we were deciding what to do a guy came up to us and said, "are you girls waiting for your boyfriends?" we said no. he said, "do you girls have boyfriends?" we said no. He said, "yes!" and then proceeded to tell us that his friends and him were waiting for a taxi and wanted to know if we were coming with them for a wedding party. hahaha we said no and told him we needed dinner. he directed us to the bar where we could also order food and said "just pretend like you're not with me!" I was thinking... but we're not with you... haha After dinner we went back to our hostel and played some cards for a while. This funny man from New Zealand talked with us for a while and we also met this guy from France. I think hostels are kind of fun places to meet people from other countries, especially youth hostels. The next day we went on a walk to and along the beach. It was absolutely gorgeous. We had a nice little picnic lunch on the beach (some crackers, canned salmon, and brie cheese from the cheese factory) but it got cut short after we got attacked by some hungry seagulls. After lunch we got a ride from the hostel manager into town and we walked around for a little while. I wanted to get a magazine for the bus ride back, but they were about $8! They had some books for sale for only $6 so I got one of those instead. Then we caught our bus back to Perth!

The beach had all sorts of cool rock formations like this

The wonderful beach

At the brewery. We shared a paddle of various beers.

Wine tasting!

Cute duck family on the Margaret River

Playing the didgeridoo for us at lunch

Margaret River

Monkey Mia Weekend!

Two weekends ago I went on a tour up north with some friends. It was definitely one of the best experiences of my trip thus far. The first day I left currie hall at 6 a.m. to go meet for the tour. I went with 4 girls I already knew (two who go to UCSB and the other two are from Holland), their friend from England, 1 Italian lady, and 4 Japanese people. Once we got out of Perth I learned what Australians mean when they say "the bush." The Bush is literally bushes on and on forever. Our first stop was the pinnacles. The pinnacles are these rock formations that the aboriginals believe are the people of an old aboriginal tribe who were turned into rocks after using up all the land resources. We got some really cool photos, but an old couple got mad at us for climbing on the pinnacles, oops! As we were leaving, our coach broke down! So we were stuck on the side of the road waiting for them to bring us another one. We were supposed to sandboard that day and there were some sand dunes nearby, so we started to sandboard there, only to find out that it was a national park so we weren't allowed to. So instead we had lunch and then napped/hung out in the bus for a couple of hours. rough start. But then, alas, the working bus came for us! We proceeded with our journey and ended at a hostel. It was my first hostel experience and I liked it! We all shared a room and there were a bunch of young people staying there that we hung out with. The next day we went to Kalbarri National Park, which reminds me of Utah/Arizona because it has vibrant red rock. We saw beautiful gorges and hiked down to the river that formed them. Then we went to see the Stramatalites, which were the first living organisms on Earth! They are these ocean rock things that produce oxygen. We stayed at another hostel that night and played cards with a bunch of funny Irish guys. The next morning we woke up early and walked to the beach where they let a few lucky people feed wild dolphins who swim right up close to shore. We then went to an aquarium with open pools and got to see all sorts of cool sea creatures like sea snakes and sharks! Then we went to shell beach, which is a beach that looks like it's all white sand, but really it's a bunch of tiny white shells. It's also really cool because you can walk really far into the water and only be up to your knees. Finally, we ended the day at a farm stay. We saw wild emus and kangaroos! We got to feed some emus, sheep, and kangaroos as well. Then we went and looked at the starts. It was amazing because there was absolutely no light pollution so we could see SO MANY stars. The farmer showed us a bunch of constellations and explained a lot about the stars to us. Afterwards we went and had dinner in the shearing shed. For dinner I abandoned my pescatarian ways and tried kangaroo in a shepherds pie. After dinner we had a bon fire and we tried to show everyone how to make smores, but it was rather difficult because we were lacking supplies (they don't have grahm crackers or hersheys chocolate here). The smores consisted of small chocolate chip cookies and flavored marshmallows. But they were okay, and the bon fire was fun! On our final day we left the farm stay and finally went sandboarding! It was so much fun, and the sand dunes were beautiful. After that we went to this small principality where a guy decided he didn't want to pay taxes so he found a way to secede from Australia. Now he is this old man with a church, post office, and souvenir shop. He even has his own currency (although I'm pretty sure it's not useable) and stamps. Our final adventure was at an animal park where we got to feed different farm animals and kangaroos. While I was posing for a picture of me feeding a horse the donkey bit me! It hurt so bad and that is when I decided there is a reason why donkeys are called ass's. I also saw dingos and crocodiles. Then I got to hold 3 pythons, a big lizard, and a baby kangaroo! It was so cool. An absolutely amazing weekend.

Me with the "prince"

Holding a baby kangaroo!

Holding a python while having two around my neck- eek!

Sandboarding

Shells covering Shell Beach

Shell Beach- all shells, no sand!

One of the dolphins at Monkey Mia

Stramatolites

Gorge

Pinnacles

Bali- a little late

View of sunrise from top of voclano

Hike up Volcano

Gidgit Waterfall

One of the twin lakes

One of the temples

Kuta's main street during the day

Sunset

Finally, I am blogging about Bali. We left on a friday and were lucky enough to have a friend drive us so that we didn't have to pay for a taxi. We got there and the line was short, so things were good. We got up to the counter, gave the lady our passports. She looks through them and goes, "Where are your visas?" The visas in Australia are electronic, they need to be scanned. We tell her this and she says she needs visible documentation and sends us to the customs people. We go talk to the customs, get back in line (which is now very long) and wait. We think that they were having computer difficulties because the line was not moving (and they should have been able to scan our passports). Anyway, we basically ran to our flight, and alas, we got on. The flight was pretty good, but when we landed I freaked out. The airport is on the coast, but I didn't know that, so I thought we were landing on the water haha We were so close to the water! We got there pretty late and on the taxi ride to our hotel we drove through downtown Kuta (the main city in Bali). It was crazy! The traffic was terrible and there were people everywhere! In Bali people don't start going out until around midnight. We spent our first day at the beach, but quickly realized how hot it was. We were literally dripping with sweat. So we had lunch at this really nice restaurant on the beach. I paid $6.50 for a smoked salmon sandwich with a salad and fries. Crazy cheap, and as we found out later, this was one of the most expensive restaurants in Kuta. After lunch we went back to our hotel and spent the rest of the day at the pool where we could lounge in the cool water. That night for dinner the hotel recommended that we ate at this seafood restaurant on the beach. The restaurant picked us up and took us back for free. We literally ate on the beach, the tables were on the sand. It would have been a great place for a date because all the tables were lit by candlelight and you could easily have a walk on the beach after dinner. We got to pick our own fish, a first for me. It was a multi course meal and absolutely delicious. I paid $9. We spent the next day at the pool as well- it was cheap, relaxing, and we worked on our tans! haha On Monday we went on a tour up north. It was our own private tour and we saw temples, lakes, the tallest waterfall on the island, and hot springs. Outside the city the landscape is beautiful and green. The next two days we took surfing lessons in the morning and laid out in the afternoon. I was horrible at the surfing, but my instructor was really nice and funny. His name was adios and we got along really well. On Thursday morning we decided to hike up a volcano to watch the sunrise. A guy was supposed to pick us up at 2 am to drive us to the volcano, but we waited for a half an our and he didn't show. So we went back to bed and then at 3:15 am we got a call that our driver was here! So we had to get back up and get ready again. I was not happy with our driver, and I feel kind of bad because I wasn't very nice to him haha So we got to the Volcano and all the guys at the bottom of the Volcano were laughing at how late we were. We had to hike up the volcano in 40 minutes. It's supposed to be a 2 hour hike. I was dying. I felt so out of shape. The whole way up my friend kept saying, "Who's idea was this? I wanted to ride elephants!" haha But it was definitely worth it. At the top we had a beautiful view of the sunrise and there were cute monkeys! Plus we got to explore the volcano crater. there was a cave with bats that we went into. spooky! We hiked back down and then we were taken to have breakfast at this restaurant on a small mountain across from the Volcano. We had a beautiful view of the volcano and the lake below it. We spent the rest of that day and the next day... at the pool. haha Thursday night was our one night out. I wish we had gone out more because it was so much fun! We started a little earlier than we should have and there weren't many people at the first bar we went to. We danced there for a little and then took our friend back to the hotel (i forgot to mention that she sprained her ankle surfing and was on crutches). At the hotel bar we met this hilarious Irish guy. We sat with him for a while and then we decided to go out again (this was around 2 am). This time the clubs were packed. Luckily the Irish guy was with us because there were a lot of waisted creepers. One guy told my friend he really liked her and wanted to sleep with her! haha I couldn't believe it! We danced at a couple different clubs until about 5 am and then finally we went back to our hotel. What a night! The whole week was so funny because all the guys were obsessed with the fact that we were American. Everyone wanted pictures with us haha I felt like a celebrity. Our flight left late friday night and we got VIP service because our friend was on crutches. All in all the week was pretty perfect. I came back super relaxed.