Rainforest Hiking

This weekend we rented a car (more on that in a sec) and drove down to the Gold Coast Hinterland (inland from its famous namesake) to do some hiking with Becca and Beth.  I wish this post were longer, but words can't do this experience justice like the pictures can.  You can see those here on Nicole's flickr.

The driving was quite an experience. I'm the only one over 21, so I was the only one who could drive.  Driving on the left really wasn't all that bad, nor was turning, I think in part because I had spend the previous couple days thinking really hard about how to execute such things.  The weird part, though, was being on the right hand side of the car.  Having the bulk of the car be to the left and the mirrors in all different places made merging and parking quite the experience. We did have a couple not-quite-that-harrowing moments after turning left and going about 100 yards before we all realized we needed to be on the LEFT side of the road- luckily in pretty isolated areas with no cars around.  It was good practice for NZ next week.

The rainforest we walked through in Springbrook National Park was breathtaking. Its a UN World Heritage site, and since its up on these ridges has huge gorges and lookout points, and the different altitudes mean that there's like 3 different kinds of rainforest that we actually hiked through.  We saw something like 7 waterfalls, including walking right under some of them.  My mother would have died at all of the "babbling brooks" (a reference to our trip to Northern California in during the spring melt in which each runoff creek on the side of the road was exhilarating).  It was straight out of a geography textbook- we even saw a lace monitor lizard that was probably 4 feet long.  

Once again, I wish I could say more, but you've really got to look at all of the pictures- I can't stress how awesome they are.  I really wasn't expecting what we got out of the day- it was amazing despite the sore ankles and shin splints.  And the driving turned out pretty well, thankfully.

Its been a looooong time since I've blogged.

I must admit, the realization that I'm likely going to be hounded with the same questions over and over even if I do blog has created some apathy.  So if you're going to read the blog, be kind and help reduce the number of times I get asked "So how was Australia?" or "What did you do?," since this blog is sort of aimed at reducing the redundancy of such questions and keeping those interested informed.

About a month ago Nicole and I went to Sydney (make sure to check out her blog, it has pictures and such).  It was a pretty busy hotel weekend, I guess there was a mini-marathon like thing the day we left, so we ended up staying in 3 hotels in 3 nights.  

Sydney felt a lot less Australian to me, it was almost like London's little sister, just on the other side of the world.  Everything moved a lot faster and was more expensive, the mark of being the biggest, most important city for about 4,000 miles.  I liked Sydney, but I'm glad I'm living in Brisbane.

We did the obligatory Opera House (It wasn't as white and gleaming as I expected it to be) and Harbour Bridge (more impressive than I thought it would be).  We also visited the Sydney Fish Market, 2nd only to Tokyo in terms of variety. We went there twice actually.  The place was pretty awesome.  Nicole fell in love with a small little patisserie on the way where we got a mini lemon tart- twice, too. 

Sydney, despite its size and sprawling suburbs (4.5 Million) is a very walkable city, and the CBD isn't nearly as big as it looked on the map.  Darling Harbour, which I assumed would be overwhelming, was rather quaint for its size.  It has several hotels, a couple malls, the aquarium (we went there too), a maritime museum (old ships and submarines), and the convention centre.  All in all I think the 3 days we spent in Sydney were all we really needed.

The next week we went over to the South Bank Parklands early to stake out a spot for the RiverFire fireworks show- the biggest annual event in Brisbane.  Having been to Riverfest in Cincinnati several times, I had reserved expectations.  But after seeing a half hour fireworks show that encompassed 2 stretches of river (going around a corner), 10 downtown buildings, 8 barges, 2 RAAF F-111 dump and burn flyovers, and something along the lines of 3.6 tons of fireworks, it matches, maybe even surpasses Cincy's show.   It was totally overwhelming- there were fireworks going off everywhere.  Check out the finale here.

We just finalized our trip to New Zealand in 2 weeks- we're doing a whirlwind tour of the South Island, and I'm going to have an adventure driving on the wrong side of the road and car.  I promise I'll blog sooner this time.