Though it has been quite a while since my last post, it
hasn’t been for lack of excitement. In fact, the main reason for the hiatus
from the blog has been all that has happened!
As many of you already know, the main cause of the
excitement in our lives over the last few months has been the discovery that we
are expecting! Though I have been quite
sick over the last few months, we are very excited for our little baby set to
arrive in early October. We are grateful
that God is giving us this little peanut and hope for a healthy birth back in
the U.S. In the mean time, we have been
navigating the Australian health care system, and I have been laying low for
the most part due to the sickness.
However, we have not put our Australian adventures on hold
and have had the chance to do two more trips since Tasmania. The first was a really nice short weekend
getaway. My golden birthday was at the
end of February, and my lovely husband and parents teamed up to give me a
weekend trip down the coast of Australia to Jervis Bay. Though I was about 8-9 weeks pregnant and a
little concerned about not feeling great, we were able to rent a car and take
our time driving down the coast, exploring beach towns, and having a leisurely
few days. It was a nice relaxing time
and we were able to enjoy the nearing end of Australia’s sun and beach season
at beautiful Jervis Bay, which apparently has the third whitest sand in the
world (don’t ask me how that is determined.)
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| The sand was so white it was blinding! |
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| Overlook near Jervis Bay |
More recently, we were able to enjoy Australia’s four day
Easter holiday weekend by taking a trip to Melbourne. Australia’s public holidays include Good
Friday and the Monday after Easter weekend, so we had a nice amount of time to
fly to Melbourne and see all that we wanted.
We first spent a day wandering the streets of Melbourne, as
one typically does in that city. It was
easy to see why Melbourne is routinely ranked among the top few cities in the
world to live. It definitely lived up to
all we had heard about it. Melbourne is
a city with a vibe about it that is difficult to explain, but very cool,
charming, and culturally rich. The
neighborhoods reminded me of an old ivy league college town on the U.S. East
Coast. They are filled with beautiful
old brick homes, rich architecture, clean, wide, tree-lined streets, and cable
trains running down the middle of the streets.
The architecture of Melbourne city itself is similarly rich and
beautiful on every street. The city is
also full of art, museums, theaters, and events which add to its richness. Probably the most charming feature, however,
were the little alleys (called “laneways”) peppered throughout the city which
are bustling with cafes and street art, and emanate a funky feel.
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| St. Paul's Cathedral - one of a few beautiful cathedrals |
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| Flinders Station |
In the evening, we then took the opportunity to drive to
Phillip Island, an island about 2 hours from Melbourne which is accessible by
bridge. The main attraction which lured
us was the miniature penguins on the island which make their appearance on a
beach at the far end of the island every night around 8pm. Hundreds of penguins emerge from the surf
under the cover of night to waddle up the beach, up the bluff, and into their
burrows in the bluffs of the beach. As
we arrived, there were already a few dozen penguins in the midst of their trek
and we wandered for almost two more hours as dozens more filtered in. Though it was dark and the park rangers were
very strict about not taking pictures of the penguins, we were still able to
see the cute little penguins emerge in groups, plan different parts of their
trek, call to each other with a variety of sounds, fight, play, and find their
families. They were adorable!
The next days were spent driving the famed Great Ocean Road
and viewing the beauty that is the south coast of Australia. The road starts not that far to the west of
Melbourne and we spent two days driving west and then looping back to
Melbourne. Along the way, we stopped in
many unique coastal towns, did a forest walk to a waterfall, and enjoyed the
views. I was also on koala watch
throughout the trip and was fairly proud of my success by the end. Koalas are deceptively difficult to spot as
they are often perched very high in the trees and curled up in a crook where
they tend to blend in with the tree.
Despite this, I managed to spot many koalas and a few kangaroos as
well! Brad did a great job of quickly
pulling over to the side of the road and not complaining about me yelling
“koala!” at him time and again.
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| One of many beautiful overlooks on the Great Ocean Road |
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| Waterfall walk |
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| One of several koalas that we spotted |
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| Our day spent looking for dinosaurs didn't go quite as well ... |
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| We spotted a few of these guys right next to our car |
Even though the koalas were irresistible, the highlight of
the Great Ocean Road was definitely seeing the famed “Twelve Apostles” rock
formation at the end of our journey. The
“apostles” are large limestone stacks carved out of the ocean cliffs, but one
should be sure to note that there are only eight apostles (there were only nine
to begin with, but one collapsed.) The
apostles were more grand and impressive in person and a beautiful cap to our
Melbourne trip.
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| A few of the apostles |
Our remaining plans for Australia from this point are still
a bit up in the air, but we are now looking forward to whatever our time holds. We send much love to all our friends and
family and hope all are well.
