Harris Family Blog

Vanessa & Toni’s Aussie Visit

2010-07-05T14:39:00.000+10:00

(Note: We are back in the States and are getting settled into our new place. We will try to keep up on our blog to let you know what’s going on with us. This blog is very late in coming, but we hope you enjoy it.)
Vanessa (Anthony’s Mom) and Toni (Anthony’s cousin and godmother) came to visit us in Melbourne for 11 days at the end of March. We had a great time with them and were so glad they were able to come and visit us. We took this first pic from our balcony just after they arrived.The first afternoon was spent looking around Port Melbourne and shopping in the City. Anthony was able to meet up with them after work for chocolate and some more site seeing.
Vanessa in our courtyard:
Toni walking along the boardwalk in Port Melbourne:
Shopping in the “Paris” end of Collins Street in the city: Vanessa’s $1900 shoes!!!
Koko Black Chocolatier: More sites around the city:
You can click on the album below to see the pictures from their visit to St Patrick’s Cathedral.

View Full Album

That evening we took them for drinks at the crown casino and walked around Southbank, which is beautiful at night. We were also able to see the “flame” show in front of the casino, where fire shoots out of towers along the walkway in a synchronized show. We went to Philip Island for one afternoon and evening. Our first stop was the Koala Conservation Centre. We got to see quite a few koalas up close, which was a neat experience for all of us. We stopped at Cape Woolamai, which is a famous surfing beach. We were able to watch the surfers and the beautiful sunset.
We ended the evening with the “Penguin Parade”. The little penguins come out of the ocean every night after the sun sets and cross the beach to make their way to their burrows. It’s such a unique experience and we were glad that Toni and Vanessa were able to see them. We are not allowed to take pictures because the flash scares the little penguins, so this is the best we could do :)
The one downside to the trip was that Toni got food poisoning from the cafe we ate at in Philip Island. The whole next day wasn’t much fun for her being sick in bed. We all felt bad for her, but she was in really good spirits and didn’t let it ruin her trip.
Once Toni was feeling better, she and Vanessa went shopping for souvenirs at the Queen Victoria Market. It’s quite the experience and you can find some pretty good deals.

That night, we went out to dinner at C’est Bon, a cute French restaurant near our apartment. Thanks for dinner, Toni – it was awesome!

We definitely had to take our visitors to the infamous Great Ocean Road. I don’t think a trip to Melbourne would be complete without it. The weather was beautiful and we had a wonderful time. We took a lot of pictures, so click the album below if you’d like to see them.

View Full Album

On our way back to Melbourne, we spotted some kangaroos, so we had to check them out, of course! We may have trespassed in order to get a closer look, but it was worth it!

Here’s our escape route: The next morning, we left to go to Sydney for three days. It was great to be able to get away with them for a mini vacation.
Our friends Ray and Synthia recently moved from Melbourne to Sydney, so we met up with them for lunch at the Sydney Fish Market. It was nice catching up with both of them.
We had three days full of site-seeing around Sydney. We were pretty worn out by the end of each day, but we had a great time. Here’s a recap of our time there.
Opera House and Harbour Bridge:

“The Rocks” district:


Manly Beach:
    Hyde Park and St. Mary’s Cathedral:

Watson’s Bay:
Botanical Gardens:

Back in Melbourne, Toni and Vanessa went to the Melbourne Zoo. They got some great pictures you can see in the album below.

View Full Album

The last full day of their visit, we drove Vanessa and Toni to the Dandenong Ranges. We had tea and scones at Miss Maples’ Tea Room and then drove to Sky High, a beautiful park with gardens and a great look-out over the city. It was a wonderful way to spend our last day together.
We really enjoyed our visit with you both, Vanessa and Toni. Thank you so much for making the long trip! We love you!

Kristi’s Dad and Mom’s Visit to OZ

2010-03-31T14:52:00.001+11:00

At the beginning of March, my parents came to visit. They spent a week in Sydney before meeting up with us in Melbourne. We spent the first weekend in Tasmania, which is an island to the south of Melbourne. My parent’s got the presidential suite at their timeshare and it was very nice – two bedrooms, three bathrooms, private hot tub on the patio, and beautiful furniture throughout. It was a perfect way to spend a holiday.

We spent the first day in downtown Hobart, where we shopped at the market, stopped for coffee, wandered around looking at all the old buildings, and ate at a seafood restaurant for dinner. It was a great day! We also walked along Seven Mile Beach, just across the road from the place we stayed.

The next day, we spent the morning miniature golfing, one of our favourite pastimes :) Then, we visited the Bonorong Wildlife Park where we got to feed the kangaroos – such a cool experience!

We encountered a “talking cockatoo” that we got on video:

And, a cute koala eating his lunch:

To see more of our pictures from the wildlife park, you can click on the album below.

View Full Album

After the wildlife park, we drove up to the top of Mt Wellington – this is one of the lookouts on the way. When we got to the top it was literally freezing (zero degrees Celsius) and extremely windy. Anthony and I braved the cold and wind to get a few pictures, which was definitely worth it – the view was outstanding.

It was wonderful going back to a nice warm fire and fresh baked cookies, hot out of the oven, after our “chilly” day. Anthony had to go back early on Monday morning to go to work, but my parents and I stayed the rest of the day. We walked along Seven Mile beach for a little bit before driving from Hobart to Launceston (about a three hour trip). Our last day was the warmest of the three and made for a nice drive.

My Dad driving on the “wrong” side of the road. It’s such a weird feeling the first time, but definitely something to experience! You can click the album below to see our pictures from the beach.

View Full Album

Once we made it to Launceston, we walked along Cataract Gorge before we flew back to Melbourne. It was a beautiful day and a lovely walk. See the photo album below for more pictures.

View Full Album

One evening back in Melbourne we went on the Colonial Tramcar Restaurant. It’s a five course meal served on a moving tram over three hours of site-seeing around the city. It was a fun experience. These are the flowers my parents got for me – they were on the table when I got home from work and it was such a pleasant surprise :)One night, we had dinner at Meat & Wine Co. My parents tried kangaroo for the first time and really enjoyed it. And, no, it doesn’t taste like chicken :) (more like steak actually) We had the steak skewer – the biggest skewer I’ve ever seen!The last day of my parents trip was spent driving the Great Ocean Road. The weather started out nice and sunny and then began raining about half way there. We were a little bummed until my Dad spotted some kangaroos in the wild, which we wouldn’t have been able to see if it was sunny! My parents said this was a highlight for them :) The day cleared up a bit in the afternoon and ended up being a pleasant day. Here are a few stops along the way.

The “official” sign:Fairhaven Beach: Teddy’s Lookout: Teddy’s Lower Lookout: Erskine Falls: We stopped in the town of Lorne on our way back to Melbourne for a drink and a snack – Cheers ~ to a wonderful day! We saw some more kangaroos in the wild on our way back home, but it was too dark to get any good pictures. We had such a great visit with my parents. Thanks for coming, Dad and Mom – we love you!

New Year’s – Katie’s Visit (Part 2 of 2)

2010-03-10T19:22:00.007+11:00

We spent a week in Sydney over New Years. It’s a great place to visit – so many great things to see. It rained our first day there, but the rest of the time was beautiful.

Our first dinner in Sydney – Cheers! We took the ferry to Manly, which is one of our favourite stops in Sydney. It’s one of the best surfing beaches in the Sydney area. The view of the Harbour Bridge is the best from a ferry!

We had to take Katie to see the Opera House, of course!

The day we went to Bondi Beach was gorgeous, close to 100 degrees. We told Katie about how the sun is different here in Oz, but she wanted to go home with some “colour”. She laid out in the sun for about 30-45 minutes without any sunscreen (despite our warnings) and ended up extremely burned. She said it was the worst of her life!

Just before the burn started…. Beginning to feel it now…The only smart ones of the group :) New Year’s Eve was an experience of a lifetime! Our day started early – we were standing in line by 9am - waiting for the Tarpean Precinct to open. It was a large area sectioned off for the fireworks display at midnight. They only allowed 6,000 people in that area and it was an awesome spot to see the fireworks.We got the perfect spot! We could see the Harbour Bridge right in front of us, which is where the fireworks were launched. We settled in on our blanket with our cooler, games, books, and iPods and waited for the fireworks. It was a long wait, but we had fun.

They had a family firework show at 9pm for all the kids and it was really good. It made us very excited for the midnight show! The finale was definitely worth waiting 15 hours for! It was the most amazing fireworks display we’d ever seen. Here’s a little video from the end of the show.

We spent New Year’s Day at the Taronga Zoo. It was fun to show Katie all the Aussie animals. Anthony and I got to see a tasmanian devil and a platypus for the first time too! The view of the City from the zoo was really cool!For the last two days of our stay, we moved to a hotel in Parramatta, which is about a half an hour outside Sydney. This was one of the bridges we crossed – we thought it was one of the coolest bridges we’ve seen.We spent a whole day at the Blue Mountains. It took us about an hour to get there from Parramatta. It started out raining a bit, but it cleared up and turned out to be a beautiful day. We took a lot of pictures, so if you would like to see them, you can click on the photo album below to see them. It was a highlight of our Sydney trip.

View Full Album

Our last day in Sydney, we went to the Hillsong church. Anthony and I had gone to the City campus the last time we were in Sydney, so this time, we went to the Hills campus, which is close to Parramatta. It was a beautiful building and a great service. A fun way to end our trip to Sydney.

Katie flew home to the States from Sydney and Anthony and I headed back to Melbourne. We had a wonderful visit and made some awesome memories! Thanks for visiting, Kate! We love you!

Christmas – Katie’s Visit (Part 1 of 2)

2010-02-01T20:31:00.002+11:00

My sister Katie came to visit us for two weeks over Christmas and New Years. It was an awesome visit that went by way too quickly. We took many pictures (881 to be exact!) and made some great memories. Here’s some, definitely not all, of the pictures from her first week in Melbourne.

Katie’s first tram ride:

Fun pictures around the City:

Our day trip along the Great Ocean Road:

Amusing sign at one of the beaches :)

Katie wanted to see some kangaroos in the wild while she was here. On our way back from the Great Ocean Road, Anthony took a turn-off down a rural road near some fields. After a bit of searching, Katie spotted some roos peaking above the grass in a nearby field. We pulled over, but the kangaroos were a ways off and across two fences. Anthony led the way in slipping through the gates and sneaking up to the kangaroos. They kind of got scared off as we approached, but we still got some decent pictures!

Hike to Erskine Falls:

Upper Falls lookout point:

At the bottom of the falls – so green and beautiful!

Group shot at the lower falls lookout point:

Climbing back up:

Breakfast and souvenir shopping at the market before driving to Philip Island.

We also took a day trip to Philip Island. :

On Christmas Eve, Katie and I made sugar cookies with homemade cream cheese frosting (Grandma’s recipe, of course!) while watching Christmas movies. It was a very relaxing day.

Sitting down to Christmas Eve dinner:

After dinner, we popped open our “crackers” – an authentic aussie tradition (there are prizes inside each one that pop out when you pull them apart).

Showing off our cheesy “prizes” :)

Christmas morning:

We opened our stockings first and then had breakfast (our traditional cinnamon toast).

After breakfast we listened to the Christmas story from Luke 2 on a bible-on-CD. Usually we read it, but we decided to do something a little different this year.

Next – it was time for presents :)

We had a wonderful Christmas and a great time celebrating together. We felt a little closer to home having Katie with us.

The day after Christmas, we visited Luna Park - a small theme park near our house. We were having lunch along the water and decided it would be fun to check it out. Anthony and I hadn’t been there before, so it was fun for us too. We had a good time riding the roller coasters :)

Later, we dressed up and took Katie to the casino in the city. We tried our hands at blackjack and actually came out even! All those nights playing 21 with Dad paid off :)

At night, the boardwalk in front of the casino lights up with periodic bursts of flames.

Stay tuned for part 2 – our trip to Sydney for New Year’s Eve!

Thanksgiving

2009-11-29T18:48:00.001+11:00

Our Pastor, Silas, is from Texas and invited us over for Thanksgiving this year along with a couple other of our American friends from church. Silas’s wife, Amanda, is Australian, but she lived in the States for a while and so she has adopted Thanksgiving too.

It was Amanda’s first time cooking Thanksgiving dinner, and she wanted it to be the full traditional meal. She followed the recipes of Paula Dean who is a cook on the Food Network specializing in southern-style cooking – perfect for Thanksgiving! All of the food was incredibly delicious.

The table was set beautifully with place cards and a homemade candle centerpiece. Amanda is so creative!

Amanda, our chef:

Sitting down to our Thanksgiving feast. From left to right: Nancy, Mark (Nancy’s son), Anthony, Me, and Silas

We had to get Amanda in the group shot too :)

The desserts were amazing, even though we were so full from dinner!! Homemade pecan pie and homemade pumpkin pie (from a real pumpkin, not a can! We were very impressed!)

Here’s a few more pictures from the evening:

Caitie had the most adorable “first” Thanksgiving outfit :)

We had an awesome time celebrating Thanksgiving this year – even if it was 85 degrees outside :) We are very grateful for the friends we have made here – they are friendships that will last a lifetime (and an excuse to keep visiting Australia!) We hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving as well!

Tulip Festival

2009-11-26T20:23:00.001+11:00

About a month ago, Anthony and I went to a Tulip Festival about an hour from our house. It was a beautiful day, perfect for the festival. Here’s a few pictures from our day:

Our pastor’s wife had her baby the night before, so we went to the hospital to visit and brought them some fresh picked tulips :) They had a beautiful baby girl named Caitie.

And, we brought some home for ourselves too :)

Whitsundays

2009-11-17T17:56:00.001+11:00

Last week we returned from a holiday in the Whitsundays. They are a collection of islands (74 of them) off the northeast coast of Australia. They are very near the Great Barrier Reef and have a tropical climate – so they are a popular vacation destination. They were apparently discovered by Captain Cook on Whit Sunday (whatever that is) and that is how they got their name.

We arrived on Hamilton Island first. The whole island is apparently owned by one family – which is crazy. They have set up a whole resort community. There are no cars – just golf carts.

We went on a dinner cruise our first night and met a couple on their honeymoon from Canberra. He was an air traffic controller, so he and I got along well talking about planes.

The next day we went to Whitehaven beach on Whitsunday Island. The whole thing is a protected park, so there are zero facilities. The sand is 98% pure silica – and is very very soft. Unfortunately, it rained for about half the time we were on the beach (the only time it rained on the whole holiday). Kind of lame – but it was still fun.

On day three we ventured out the Barrier Reef – apparently named because Captain Cook couldn’t figure out how to get over/around it. The company that took us out has a permanent pontoon out in the middle of nowhere on the edge of the reef that includes a hotel, daycare, change rooms, sun deck, water slide, underwater viewing chamber, and more. Its called ReefWorld.

The waters there have “stingers” (jellyfish) this time of year – so we all snorkeled while wearing stinger suits, which were not in any way flattering. We never saw any stingers. A highlight was the “semi-submersible submarine”, which is clever name for a boat with a glass bottom.

On day four, we left Hamilton Island and travelled to our next destination – Hayman Island.

Hayman was amazing. There was no place to go on Hayman; there is just the one resort. And that was the best part. We just relaxed for a few days.

The pool was impressive. They claim its the largest in the southern hemisphere – but the auditor in me wonders how you might validate such a claim. In any case, the pool is apparently 7 times larger than an olympic pool.

One of our favorite parts of the island was the outdoor shower in (or out, I guess) of our room.

One morning there were dozens of rays (sting rays and others) that came up to a cove on the island. We aren’t sure why – perhaps something to do with breeding?

The highlight of Hayman were the 2-person catamarans available for use. The morning we decided to try our hand at sailing happened to be the windiest day of our trip. It was actually quite gusty. The sailing instructor told us in our introduction that it was “the most dangerous day you could possibly do this.” It sounded like an exaggeration to me (though he did mention something about capsizing). But I’m glad we ignored his warnings and took a shot at it. Once I got the hang of it I realized that sailing is something of a puzzle – and I love puzzles. And we both love boats. We had a blast.

This was our favorite holiday yet. We included a few pics here on the blog, but we have compiled the highlights into a web album liked below if you want to see more.

Link to web album with more pics

Catch-Up Blog

2009-10-21T22:19:00.001+11:00

Sorry it’s been so long since we’ve posted on the blog! We’ve had a few people ask us for an update, so we decided to do a catch-up post :) I’ll try to fill you in on what’s been going on with us lately.

GIRLS WEEKEND

Back at the end of August, a bunch of girls from church decided to go away for the weekend. Isabel was getting ready to go back home to Germany, so we wanted to have one last “hurrah” before she left. We rented a big house and left for Friday and Saturday night. We had such a great time talking, laughing, playing games, painting nails, watching movies, eating junk food….all the typical girl stuff. Here’s a few pictures from the weekend.

Isi, showing off her newly painted nails, Samya (at the top) just hanging out, & Sarah smiling for the camera

Here’s a few more. You can click on the pictures to see them a bit bigger.

Group Shot:

YOUNG ADULTS RETREAT

A couple of weekends after the girl’s trip, Anthony and I went to the young adults retreat at church. We went to a campground about about an hour out of town. There was a special speaker from The States that talked about “Hope”. It was a really encouraging weekend and a great chance to make some new friends. Here’s a few pictures from the weekend:

LEADERSHIP RETREAT

Next, came the leadership meeting for church a couple of weekends later. I went since I’ve been teaching Sunday school. There were about 12 of us that stayed in a hostel (we rented the whole place). It was a good weekend of brainstorming and thinking of things for the upcoming year. And we had fun too, of course! :)

VISIT HOME

At the end of September, we went home for a visit. We stopped through Sacramento on our way to Portland. It was great to catch up with our friends.

Anthony had to meet with the partner of the Sacramento firm, so Liz and I got pedicures and Starbucks. It was just what I needed! Dinner at Liz and Ricky’s was a lot of fun and Bella was as cute as ever.

Saturday was Miranda’s baby shower. I don’t think I’ve seen so much pink in a while :)

We went out for frozen yogurt with the boys after the party

Sunday, we had breakfast with Zach and Jen and then went to their son’s 2nd birthday party. Elijah had a great time opening all his gifts.

It’s always sad to say goodbye, but we had a great time. We flew into Portland for the rest of our visit. We spent part of that week in the Tri-Cities visiting Anthony’s family. We first visited with Vanessa’s side of the family and we got to see Grandpa’s new “man cave”, which was a very cool wood shop with a flat screen TV, recliner, and mini fridge. What more could you want?!

Tyler and Laura recently moved to Kennewick so it was great to see them too. We found a new sushi place with them that turned out to be really good! We went back to their place and played the game of “Life”. It was a lot of fun.

We got to have dinner at Jay and Linda’s house one night. It was a lot fun to catch up with them since it had been a long time. Courtney had a lot of fun learning all the Aussie slang and using them in funny sentences.

We then spent a day visiting with Mike’s side - starting at Marsha’s house for some appetizers and ending up at Rita’s for a barbeque. It was great food and we had a fun visit with everyone. Grandpa Harris and Mike and Joyce came from Vancouver for the weekend. Marty and Rhonda were also in town from Texas, which was great timing. And it was a gorgeous day. I think Grandma’s homemade cherry pie was the highlight for Anthony :)

I had my camera, but I mostly forgot to take pictures in the Tri-Cities. We did get one family shot and I took a couple pictures of the gorgeous sunset on our drive back to Vancouver.

Back in Vancouver, my Grandparents celebrated their 50th anniversary. It’s an awesome accomplishment - we are very proud of them! We had a lot of fun celebrating! Vanessa did an amazing job on the food and decorations for their party.

We had to get some family portraits while we were all together:

Mike and Joyce had us and my parents over for dinner one night. We had frogmore stew for the first time with Mike’s infamous apple dumplings for dessert. Everything was delicious!

Amy, MaryAnn, Erin, and I have been friends since elementary school. It was fun to meet up with them for happy hour.

We spent a day in Kirkland, just outside Seattle, visiting with Jason. We went out to lunch and then Jason showed his favourite spot in Kirkland – the docks.

The Boys:

Brother/Sister shots:

Mandy had her baby shower while we were in town. It was a great turn out and she got a lot of cute things for her baby girl, Piper. She was born on October 10th, so the baby shower was just in time.

Vanessa organized a little get-together for some of our friends while we were in town. Anthony D. and Ashley brought their baby twins, Bliss and Felicity, who we got to meet for the first time. They were so adorable!

The girls together again: Ashley, Me, Stacey, Tami, and Tracey

The two Anthony’s:

My parents took me to McMenamin’s on our last full day home. It was a perfect day to sit by the water. Anthony was meeting with the PwC Portland office to talk about moving back to the Portland/Vancouver area.

There are not any official plans to move back yet, but it was good for Anthony to meet with the office again. They will be in touch over next several months to organize our transition back to the States, probably in May or June of next year. It’s crazy that our time here is already more than half over – it’s been amazing! We’ve still got a lot to look forward to which is very exciting.

One last Starbucks before getting on the plane.

A picture from the plane before landing in Melbourne.

It was a beautiful day when we landed, so we took a picture of the bay when we got home. We are going to miss this view!

Thanks for being patient with us. This turned out to be a really long blog, but we had about 2 months to make up for :) We hope you enjoyed the pictures. Have a great week!

Mt Buller

2009-07-28T22:30:00.001+10:00

Anthony has a rental car for work for a couple of weeks, so we decided we should take advantage of it this last weekend and go somewhere out of the city. Given that it is winter, we thought we would head to the snow.

The closest mountain (and ski park) to Melbourne is Mt Buller - about 3 hours away. As you can see from the pictures below, it was super foggy and we couldn’t see more than about five feet in front of us!

We walked around the shops in the “village” to get warm and we saw this Prada beanie. Can you see the price on this?? It’s outrageous! $240 for a hat! We didn’t even know Prada made hats…crazy!

We had fun tubing in the snow! We rode up the chair lift to the tubing hill and felt like kids again! Here’s an “action” shot :)

Even though it was really foggy, the views from the chair lift were still beautiful.

Our 4th Anniversary

2009-07-19T19:09:00.000+10:00

Four years ago, on July 9th, Anthony and I said “I do”. In some ways we can’t believe how fast the time has flown by, but on the other hand, it’s hard to remember what life was like before we knew each other. It’s been an incredible 4 years. We moved from Vancouver to Sacramento to Melbourne. We’ve changed apartments, cars, churches….left family and friends and made new friends. Through it all, Anthony and I have grown closer together and have enjoyed the journey. We look forward to all the Lord has in store for us in the future.

These are the beautiful flowers Anthony gave me:

Our anniversary was on a Thursday this year, so we decided to celebrate the following Saturday. We started out the day at The Pancake Parlour. We’d heard good things and we were not disappointed.

Next, we perused through the book fair at Federation Square. We both ended up with about three books!

Federation Square had an art gallery that we’ve never been to, so we decided to look around while we were there. It was probably the best art gallery we’ve been to yet.

Then we decided to head to the library, but we found that it was sinking into the ground! Just kidding of course.

Our last stop before dinner was Borders. It’s one of our favourite bookstores in the States, but we haven’t been there since we moved here. There were still a couple books we were looking for, so we spent a bit of time here. We walked out with a few more books. We now have reading material to last us for quite a while!

We ended our day at BlueFire Restaurant. It’s on the waterfront in the Docklands, a suburb next to ours. The restaurant was pretty unique in that it was “all-you-can-eat”. We haven’t seen that since moving here. The waiters would bring out large metal skewers with barramundi, calamari, lamb, steak, pork and chicken. They would keep coming to our table until we turned over our card to indicate we were done. The meal also came with appetizers and dessert. It was too much food, but a really good meal.

We had a great day celebrating our four years of marriage. We look forward to many, many more.

LBDO – Little Big Day Out

2009-07-13T22:25:00.001+10:00

The Little Big Day Out is a program our church has once a year during the winter school holidays. It’s just like Vacation Bible School in the States. I had the opportunity of being involved this year as one of the teachers and it was really great! I was so amazed at how much the kids learned and retained. On the last day, there was one girl that remembered the Bible verse from the first lesson of the first day – pretty impressive!

LBDO was from 9:30 – 3:30 Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. We had between 105-120 kids (from kindergarten through 6th grade) per day. This year, the theme was the underground church when Paul was a prisoner. All of the verses came from Romans. We had five themes about God’s love that we talked to the kids about each day: God’s love is a gift, God’s love changes us, God’s love is always with us, God’s love saves us, and God’s love is worth sharing.

We started out each morning with singing, which the kids absolutely loved! We taught them motions to go with them and it was so neat to see all the kids singing along and doing the motions, even the older ones.

Here’s a group shot during singing time.

The kids were divided into four groups according to their age. They got to go to different places for half-hour sessions. They heard two lessons, went to craft-time, played sports, had group time, and went to the marketplace….as well as morning snack and lunch, of course!

Here’s a couple of pictures from my classes. I taught the same lesson four times a day, just slightly changed for each age group. It was a bit challenging since we didn’t have curriculum to use this year, but it was a lot of fun. I really enjoyed it.

Antoun was the other teacher. He was “Paul” for the week and the kids absolutely loved it. He had chains around his wrists and was in a tent to simulate the underground church. Antoun did a great job.

For one of my lessons, the main idea was “God’s love changes us”, so I wanted to use the caterpillar/butterfly analogy about complete transformation. I found a cute butterfly, but I couldn’t find a caterpillar. So, at about 11pm the night before, Anthony helped me make one. I think it turned out pretty cute…and, it was good practice for kid school projects some day :)

A quick group shot of some of the volunteers. We were pretty tired by the time 3:30 came and all the kids went home, but we had so much fun.

This was the marketplace. The kids each got six gold coins per day to spend at the marketplace.

There were three stations for the kids to spend their coins. They were able to taste some “authentic” roman food; try out some roman activities like bubble swords, archery, & games; and complete different crafts.

This was the craft room. The kids made a journal, a mosaic, and a board game over the three days. They turned out really well.

The sports and games were a favourite, especially for the boys. They loved being able to get out all their energy!

This is the group shot of all the volunteers after the last day of LBDO. It was a long three days, but we had such a great time. Just the fact that we were able to tell so many kids about God’s love for them was really amazing. I am so glad that I was able to be a part of it.

Catch-up

2009-07-09T12:29:00.003+10:00

Sorry it's been so long since our last post. Anthony was out of town for 2 weeks for his job and then came home sick with the flu (not the swine flu though!) :) I was a teacher for 3 days for the Little Big Day Out (like Vacation Bible School in the States) at our church and then ended up with a cold that I'm just now getting over. So, between sickness and being so busy, we haven't had a lot of time to post. But, I will get some pictures together from LBDO and post about that soon.

Also, today is our 4th Anniversary! We're going to dinner this weekend to celebrate, so we'll post more about that later too.

Hope you are all enjoying your summer (it's a bit cold for us here since we're in the middle of winter!). We love you and miss you all and are looking forward to a visit home in September!

"Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say rejoice!" Philippians 4:4

Aussie dictionary

2009-06-21T14:56:00.001+10:00

Before we moved here, we read a couple of books on Australian culture and they both included sections on unique Aussie phrases and slang. Most of them were pretty well-known, including “mate”, “no worries”, “fair dinkum”, etc.

However, now that we have lived here a year, we can say that there are many more unique Australian sayings that we were never warned about in books. And they are confusing. See a short list of examples below.

“Stuffed” = Very tired

I’m stuffed. I can’t wait to crawl in bed.

“Average” = Bad

How did you like the food there?
I actually thought it was average.
Oh, that’s too bad!

“Shocking” = Very bad

What did you think of that book?
I thought it was shocking!
Really? I’ll definitely cross it off my list then.

“Heaps” = Very

That movie was heaps funny.

“Massive” = Exciting/Good time

How was the concert last night?
It was massive.
That’s cool!

“Prank” = Text message

Just prank me when you get here and I will come outside.

“Kit” = Outfit/Clothes

I was so stuffed last night, I just crawled in bed with my kit on.

“Beautiful” = Delicious

This chicken is beautiful!
Thanks! It’s a family recipe.

“Sweet as” = Very good

Your new car is sweet as.
Yeah, and it’s fast as too. I’ll take you for a spin some time.
That would be massive!

“Bench” = Kitchen counter

I left my lunch at home on the bench this morning.
Hopefully nobody sits on it! Ha!
Why would somebody sit on the bench?
Never mind.

“Crack it” = Get really mad

When Rob sees this he’s going to crack it.

“Cracker” = Something/someone funny

Ha! He is such a cracker!

“Icy pole” = Popsicle

It is heaps hot right now. I wish I had an icy pole.
(Me laughing hysterically)
Mate, what’s so funny?

Another update on South Australia

2009-06-13T13:00:00.001+10:00

So I got yet another ticket in the mail from that speed camera in the Barossa valley. This one is $310 for going 9mph over the limit. Seems a bit pricey, huh? That’s because Australian’s are scared of cars. Especially ones that are travelling faster than a bicycle. It’s particularly difficult for me to adjust to, coming from California.

But I may be in luck. One of my options on the back of the ticket is to apply for a “review”, which is an option if you think the offence was “trifling.” I’m not sure exactly what trifling means, but this sounds like a classic case to me. (Certainly my first ticket for going only 5mph over was trifling, right?).

I’m sort of kidding of course. I usually don’t like it when people complain about getting tickets, so I probably will just pay the things and move on. But I will still make my case to Australians that going faster than 48mph on the freeway really is not dangerous.

Our first visitors

2009-06-08T19:21:00.001+10:00

We just had our first visitors. It was quite exciting. Kristi’s brother Jason came and spent a week with us. He was in Sydney for a couple of weeks as part of his university’s international business course. Afterwards, he came down to Melbourne to see us.

For the first few days, a couple of Jason’s friends, Nick and Matt, also came with him. So for part of the week we had five people in our (tiny) apartment. It was cozy, but I think it worked okay. We showed them around the city, took them to Crown Casino, rode various trams and trains, went to a footy game at the MCG, visited Planetshakers church (they had been to a Planetshakers concert in the States) and drove to Philip Island to see the little penguins.

Kristi made most of the meals (which I think were delicious), but we did have one dinner on the infamous Lygon Street where all the restaurant owners stand outside and try to convince you to eat at their places – usually by bribing with you free appetizers and drinks. It is an interesting experience. We also visited one of the great Melbourne chocolatiers– San Churro’s. Yum!

It is nice when people come visit us because we get to hog all of their time (because they don’t know anybody else here!) So we got some good quality time with Jason, which was awesome.

It was sad to say goodbye of course. And now our apartment feels kind of empty without so many people in it. But we had an awesome time and are looking forward to more visitors in the future!

Update on South Australia

2009-06-08T11:28:00.001+10:00

So we just got a ticket in the mail from one of those speed-cameras in the Barossa valley that I blogged about earlier. It is $202 for going 5mph over the limit. That’s a bummer. Hopefully no more arrive though!

South Australia – Part 4 – Flinders Ranges

2009-05-28T22:36:00.001+10:00

Our last stop in South Australia was in the “outback” up near the Flinders Ranges. It was really our first experience being in the outback since coming to Australia.

We weren’t sure what to expect – we have been in a few deserts in our time, and we considered that the outback could either be quite beautiful or… quite boring. It turned out to be amazing. It was our favorite stop on the trip.

We stayed in the town of Port Augusta. It is called the “crossroads of Australia” because it is intersected by the main north-south highway and the main east-west highway. Although it is in the “outback”, the town sits on an inlet so there is a bit more greenery than would otherwise be the case. It even had its own “arid” botanical garden – seen below – which we decided looked a lot like the roadside shrubbery we had just seen during the last 5 hours of driving.

Here is an old water-tower lookout in Port Augusta.

We spent our first evening in town just exploring the area. Earlier in the day we had passed a Chinese restaurant, which we decided sounded good for dinner. I wouldn’t ordinarily bore you with such details except that more traffic enforcement drama ensued. As we approached the restaurant, we saw that it was closed. We weren’t sure what to do next, and at the last second I decided to turn down a side street so we could reconsider our plans. Just after I made the turn, I saw flashing red and blue lights behind me.

We pulled over and waited for the officers (there were two) to approach. They pulled me over for failing to indicate a turn. This is one situation where it is very nice to have a California drivers license. It seems everybody knows, and loves, California. I mentioned that we were on holiday from CA, and the officers immediately started asking me about how we were liking the area, what we had already seen and where we were going next. They even started giving us ideas on where to go. I told them my Chinese restaurant story, and the officers told us that place was dodgy anyway and they gave us directions to a better Chinese restaurant nearby. They then gave me an official warning about using my turn signals. We kept it as a souvenir.

Our next day, we left Port Augusta and headed further into the outback towards the Flinders Ranges National Park. We stopped at the Yourambulla Caves on the way, which are home to some aboriginal cave paintings. We had never seen anything like it before, and it was quite spectacular.

These collages are tiny, so I recommend clicking on them to see more detail.

In the Flinders Ranges Park, we started by hiking into the Wilpena “Pound.” This is basically a section of the Flinders range of mountains that makes a perfect circle with a flat prairie in the middle. The picture above is of the outside of the Pound. The top-right picture in the collage below is on the edge of the Pound looking down into the center. We also spotted some more wildlife on our walk up, which was cool.

To access most of the beautiful scenery, we had to take dirt roads. That wasn’t anything new for this trip, but we ended up on one 38-mile long scenic “road” that I’m sure was actually a 4x4 track. It was pretty shocking in parts. But, our little Nissan made it all the way through without getting stuck or (noticeably) damaged.

Did you notice the picture of the brick house in the Wilpena Pound collage about half-way up? It was a restored homestead of a family who lived there and farmed/ranched the Pound during the late 1800s. There were some plaques telling the story of the family, and their lives were a tremendous struggle – never enough water and therefore never enough food. It was kind of a sad tale, but what was more impactful is that it was also the untold story of thousands of others who tried and failed to make a living in the outback.

As we drove throughout the area, we saw many, many houses that looked like the one below. There were never any markers or plaques on these, but I couldn’t help but think about the families that once lived there – literally in the middle of nowhere. The entire family surely worked endlessly trying to eke out an existence, but they almost certainly never achieved much success. And now their stories are all but forgotten; the only remnants of their time spent in the outback are these ruins.

There are still some people who try to make a living in the outback as pastoralists. They raise cattle and sheep on vast areas of wide open land, constantly herding their animals from place to place. These “stations” as they are called (like really large ranches) are often hundreds of square miles in area. The current largest in South Australia is the Anna Creek Station, which is over 13,000 square miles. That is the land area of Maryland + Delaware + Rhode Island + a bit more.

Our travel agent told us that South Australia was underrated, and I would say that we agree. It was a low-key trip, but it turned out to be an amazing experience. All said and done, we thought the outback portion of our trip was the most interesting. Our scenic drives and hikes in the Flinders were particularly spectacular. Thanks for reading along with us!

South Australia – Part 3 – Barossa Valley

2009-05-24T17:37:00.000+10:00

Our next stop on our South Australian tour was the Barossa Valley - one of Australia's best known (and best regarded) wine regions. We have missed wine tasting since we moved from California, so the Barossa was a very nice treat. For reference, the Barossa Valley is about 50 miles northeast of Adelaide.

We stayed at another bed and breakfast. The only bad thing about staying at B&Bs is that now our expectations are set too high for future trips! This B&B was just outside of one of the little towns in the Barossa up a gravel road and situated on 15 acres of private wooded land. Here is a little picture from our first evening.

We spent three nights and four days in the Barossa, and the weather was beautiful pretty much the entire time. We visited a total of 15 wineries over the course of our stay.

Most of the wineries had elaborate properties - it reminded us somewhat of the Napa Valley.

Down the hill from where we stayed was a reservoir and dam that is referred to locally as the “whispering wall”. The ladies at our B&B told us about it, and we checked it out. Through some accidental feat of engineering, the dam wall is built so that a person at can “whisper” from one end and the sound is carried perfectly along the wall to the other end where those gathered can hear you clearly. It was quite interesting.

The valley happened to be celebrating the “Vintage Festival” while we were in town. There were several art shows as well as cheese and wine pairings (the food-related events were our personal favorite!)

All the towns along the Barossa were quant and beautiful. Unfortunately, they also strongly enforce speeding laws. The town nearest our accommodation used an unmarked police car as a mobile speed-camera. As we passed through town on our first evening, there was a bright flash as I drove by. I was “gutted” (as the Aussies would say).

I was even more gutted when it happened in the exact same place the next day. On the third day, I drove 10 kph under the speed limit all the way through town. As we passed, I commented to Kristi that I was relieved to get through town without another ticket. I must have been feeling a little too relieved, however - just on the other side of town I was blinded by yet another flash! Unbelievable.

I don’t really like it when people make excuses as to why they shouldn’t have gotten tickets…. BUT, I would like to reiterate my frustrations about Aussie speed enforcement: (1) the speed limits here are crazy low (ie, 48 mph on the freeway!) and (2) the speed cameras, which are everywhere, only allow a 1.8 mile-per-hour margin of error (3 kph)!!!! I find it maddening.

The good news is, it has now been several weeks since our visit and no tickets have arrived yet. So, all’s well that ends well I guess!

The picture below is at a little look-out just outside the valley. We actually stopped by here during one of our evenings and did some star-gazing. I mentioned before that there are several signs that we are becoming accustomed to life down under. Here is another: we now look up at the night sky and can spot the Southern Cross constellation as easily as we once spotted the Big Dipper. (We see different stars now that we are on the bottom side of the Earth.) I do kind of miss the Big Dipper though – weird, huh?

The very last winery we visited was one of our favorites. It’s called Seppeltsfield, and is one of the oldest in the region. They specialise in fortified wines, and we particularly liked their Torquays and Sherries. I had never tried anything like them before. Apparently, Australia is somewhat famous for these types of wine. We bought a bottle of Torquay that tastes like sweet iced tea. It sounds random, I know. But it actually is delicious.

Of course, after purchasing a bottle at pretty much every winery we went to, we remembered that we had to fly home and we hadn’t allowed for any extra luggage space. Plus, the airlines now are very strict on weight limits (they actually don’t mind if your bags are overweight – in fact, they are happy to charge or the privilege!). We originally considered finagling the carry-on rules to try to get everything on board, but we quickly decided that wasn’t a good idea. So, we ended up shipping our wine home. That worked out well – in fact, our wine actually got home before us!

So we very much enjoyed our Barossa trip, and our wine rack is now full again for the first time since moving to Australia. Our last stop on our South Australia tour was probably our favorite – part four is coming soon!

South Australia – Part 2 – Limestone Coast

2009-05-17T20:38:00.002+10:00

The next part of our trip in South Australia was a road trip along the Limestone Coastline (see red pin below). For reference, if you keep driving East, you’ll end up in Melbourne via the Great Ocean Road (you may remember our GOR blog post). You can also see Kangaroo Island on the map just South-West of Adelaide.

There are many signs that we are slowly becoming Australian. Here is one: When we used to see a kangaroo warning road sign we would think “Ooh! I hope we see a kangaroo!” Now, we think “Oh crap. I hope a kangaroo doesn’t jump out in front of me.”

There were many kangaroo warning signs on our South Australia trip. I (Anthony) drove nervously through each of these stretches since I didn’t take the extra insurance option for our rental car.

Kangaroos mostly come out at dusk –and it happened to be dusk as we made our way down towards our first stop on the Limestone Coast. I was driving and rambling on about something to Kristi when a kangaroo bounded out from the opposite side of the road and right into my path. My heart stopped, I slammed on the brakes and I swerved to the left – in about that order. Half way across, the kangaroo also realized the err of his ways and performed his own late brake-and-swerve maneuver.

The kangaroo contorted his body in a spectacular way, such that he missed my front right fender by about one inch and still managed to miss my driver’s side mirror. He held this perfect pose for a second before losing his balance and falling sideways in the middle of the road behind me. He then picked himself up and bounced back from where he started – apparently, whatever was on the other side of the road wasn’t so important after all.

I was completely horrified. Kristi missed the whole thing.

So our trip started with a bit of adventure, and I drove about 20 mph slower for the rest of our holiday.

* * * * * * * *

We stayed in our first ever Bed & Breakfast in the town of Robe, our favorite town along the Limestone Coast. The accommodation was wonderful and included a huge jet spa in the bathroom – the best part! Robe is a quaint little beach town filled with interesting shops and restaurants. It reminded us a bit of Seaside, OR.

Robe has some interesting historical sites, including the ruins of the old gaol (note the classic Australian spelling of “jail”).

Here are some pictures of Long Beach in Robe. Just like Long Beach in Washington, you can drive on the sand! Anthony was a little nervous since we didn’t have a four wheel drive, but it was worth the risk…very exciting!

We stopped briefly in Beachport, another small town along the Coast. The jetty here is over 2,500 feet long, but what’s even more interesting is that it was originally planned to be over a mile long when it was first constructed in 1880!

We also drove through Tantanoola, which is home to the largest wind farm in the Southern Hemisphere. We picked up a self-guided tour map at the local info center and went on our way. The map was poorly documented (says Anthony) and we ended up taking an accidental detour onto a dirt road. After spending 20+ minutes turning down a variety of un-named dirt roads, we finally admitted we were lost and called back to the local information center for directions. The guy at the info center said we shouldn’t be on any dirt roads. Oops. But we made it back okay – and we did get some up-close views of the windmills!

Mount Gambier is one of the largest and most popular towns along the Limestone Coast. The most interesting thing to see here was this “sunken cave”. It was originally an underground cave, but the roof collapsed creating a giant hole in the ground. The City has since turned it into a beautiful garden.

Blue Lake, a crater lake just outside of town, was another beautiful site at Mount Gambier. In the Spring/Summer, the lake turns a bright blue color and in the Autumn/Winter it turns grayish-blue . There were a few different lookouts around the lake that were great photo opportunities, as you can see below.

Valley Lake was just a short drive from Blue Lake, but was much more accessible with picnic facilities and boat ramps for water sports.

We had a great time travelling along the Limestone Coast. Our next stop was the Barossa Valley - stay tuned for Part 3!

South Australia - Part 1 - Kangaroo Island

2009-05-10T22:14:00.001+10:00

Sorry we’ve been lax about posting on our trip to South Australia! It’s been a bit daunting sorting through all the photos and stories, so we are going to blog in sections to keep it straight forward.

For clarification, South Australia is actually a state (albeit with a boring name) – not just a region. We started by flying into Adelaide, which is the state capital (unlike in the US, the capitals of Aussie states are the largest cities in those states). We rented a car and spent one night in Adelaide before heading on to Kangaroo Island – a large scenic island about 12 miles off the coast.

They say Kangaroo Island is like a zoo without fences. We did see a fair amount of wildlife, including a handful of kangaroos, a couple of echidnas, lots of pelicans, several bush-tailed possums and one peacock (we’re not sure about the peacock, but it liked the front porch of our cabin).

The more interesting thing about the island was how laid back the whole place was. Most of the island is a national park and most of the rest is unpopulated. The remainder is sheep farms. The majority of the roads were dirt (which tested the off-road prowess of our small Nissan Tiida). The slow pace reminded us a little of a Hawaiian island.

The weird part of the island was that there was hardly anyone around. Maybe it is a product of living in the middle of a busy city, but it felt a bit strange.

The place we stayed in was pretty much in the middle of nowhere. The nearest eatery to our cabin was about 45 minutes away by dirt road. It was only open from 6pm to 7:30pm and catered primarily the local sheep shearers. When we arrived, it was “schnitzel night” – gravy $3 extra.

The only grocery store within an hour of our cabin was more like a well stocked pantry – they didn’t use barcodes and most items were covered in dust. It was here that we decided that although country life has always sounded appealing, we’re not sure we are cut out for it. We like our city conveniences.

We did see some great sights though. We toured around the “remarkable rocks” (not to be confused with “The Remarkables” - a mountain range in New Zealand). They were fascinating, as you can see in the pictures below.

The views were gorgeous along the coastline.

We saw a ton of fur seals at “The Arch”. It was hard to see them at first because they blended in with the rocks…can you spot them?

There was a beautiful lookout up 512 steps. It was well worth the trip up!

The highlight of the island for us was a sheep dairy where they use the sheep’s milk to make cheeses and yoghurt. We are now the biggest fans of sheep’s milk products. It tastes better than cow’s milk and is way easier on the stomach. We tasted haloumi cheese for the first time and have now eaten it several times since. It’s delicious.

Most of the island and surrounding lands are comprised of limestone, and there are several magnificent limestone caves in the area. Here are some photos of one of the Kelly Caves we toured.

Bald Hill was another beautiful lookout. The sun was just beginning to set while we were there, which made for some neat pictures.

Overall, Kangaroo Island was beautiful and the slow pace of life was very relaxing. We will post the next part of our trip soon!

Off to South Australia

2009-04-03T08:43:00.005+11:00

Anthony's work has requested that all of their employees take any vacation time they have during the Easter holiday. In Australia, the Friday before and the Monday after Easter are both public holidays. So, Anthony has to take two weeks off, beginning Monday.

We decided we can't just stay home for two weeks and do nothing, so we are going to South Australia. We are flying into Adelaide and then going to Kangaroo Island, the Barossa Valley, Flinder's Ranges (Outback), and the Limestone Coast.

We weren't planning on another vacation so soon, but we are very excited for this next trip! Anthony has been working long hours this week and has been a bit stressed with the amount of work piled on him, so this vacation will be a welcome relief.

We will be sure to post lots of pictures when we get back!

"Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom. He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint." Isaiah 40:28-31

New Zealand

2009-03-14T20:27:00.002+11:00

One of our first major vacations since we’ve been in Australia was actually to New Zealand. Of course, we consider the two countries to be kind of the same thing, but residents of either country would very much disagree. In any case, we spent 9 days in New Zealand and could have spent many, many more. It was amazing. Absolutely amazing.

We started in Christchurch, which is the second largest city in NZ and the largest of the south island, but it actually feels quite small and laid back. It is a beautiful city with a nearly endless supply of perfectly maintained buildings and houses from the 1850’s (when the city was first settled).

The art gallery:

One of the best features of the city is the meandering Avon river, which flows through the city-center and nearby botanical gardens. The river is shallow and relatively slow-moving, but it is a nearly constant flow given that it is fed by a spring. We took a “punt” boat ride through the city, which was very relaxing indeed.

Rounding out our first couple of days in Christchurch, we took a historic tram journey through the city and then took a gondola ride up 1500 feet to the top of a hill on the outside of town, which provided views of Christchurch city and the nearby Pegasus Bay and Pacific Ocean.

The gondola ride:

Views from the top:

We next took a train journey across to the west coast of NZ over the Southern Alps. As with every part of our journey, the scenery was amazing. I’m going to be using the word “beautiful” frequently, but NZ was the most consistently beautiful place we have ever been. Here’s some views from the train ride.

On the west coast, we rented a car and travelled down the coastline to the village of Franz Josef. The town basically exists exclusively for the tourism of the country’s two most famous glaciers: Fox and Franz Josef (there are many glaciers though – over 3,100!). These two popular glaciers are rare in that they are some of the most accessible in the world – that makes them good candidates for guided day-hikes.

We went on a half-day hike on the Fox glacier, which is the larger of the two. The guide company listed the hike as “moderate” difficulty. Hmmm… I’m not sure how you define moderate, but it was moderately more than we were prepared for! Parts of the trip were pretty intense, but we did actually get to hike up the face of a glacier (using crampons, ice picks and the whole lot!). Although difficult, it was one of the most amazing experiences of our lives.

The danger quotient was kind of high too. We passed several signs that warned of falling rocks and ice (we even had to climb through a rope barrier designed to keep people out!). And to emphasize that the warnings are legitimate - two Australian tourists were killed by falling ice on Fox glacier in January about 100 yards from where we were walking (they told us as we passed).

We also had to walk quickly through several areas where rock-falls are nearly constant (including one called “shotgun alley” where the guide stopped and watched for rock falls and told us to run if/when he started yelling). The most fascinating part: We didn’t have to sign a release waiver. We were told there is no such thing as a personal injury lawsuit in New Zealand (Quote: “We just assume people will take responsibility for their actions”). It explains why there are so many adventure activities in the country – and why bungy jumping was invented there!

After the glacier, we made our way to Queenstown. The drive – like all of our drives – was beautiful. We passed dozens of pristine rivers, lakes and waterfalls. Many rivers = many bridges, but because there are so few people on the south island, they don’t bother to build two lanes on the bridges. We probably crossed 40+ one-lane bridges!

Queenstown was our favorite city. The scenery around the city was outrageous of course – like out of a movie… probably because it is! They film hundreds of movies in NZ because it is so stunning and largely untouched. Some films include Lord of the Rings, Narnia, Last Samurai, King Kong, and many others (including a lot of car commercials, if you wondered were all those perfect winding roads were located – we didn’t see a pothole on the whole trip).

Queenstown sits on a lake and we spent quite a bit of time by the water. We rented a wave-runner for part of one day and went on walks by the lake.

We also drove up a small mountain nearby that is used as an animal preserve. There were some great views (it also was apparently used for 13 scenes of Lord of the Rings as well as other films).

This is an old movie set from an 80’s Disney movie called “The Rescue”.

One of the highlights of Queenstown was a tour we took of Skippers canyon, which included a drive through a ridiculously narrow gravel road with very steep drop-off over the edge. We eventually made it down to the river and took a jet boat ride through the often quite narrow cliff walls. It was pretty intense and overall quite amazing.

Our jet boat ride:

The jet boat went (quite fast) through the narrow passage way to the left of the rock pictured here. Again… no release waiver!

Standing on an old bungy jump bridge across Skippers Canyon:

A little town about 45 minutes outside of Queenstown:

We next made it to Dunedin back on the east coast. There we spent some time at the beach, drove up and down the world’s steepest street, and toured the Otago peninsula, which includes New Zealand’s only castle as well as some more great scenery. We also got to see some cool wildlife including Royal Albatross, little penguins and fur seals.

We ended our trip back in Christchurch for one last day. We didn’t want to leave. Some friends of ours said it’s good that we saw Australia before New Zealand because once you have seen New Zealand, nothing else seems quite as impressive. I would say we agree.

We took so many pictures, but it’s hard to fit them all in a blog, so we added a link to our photo album that has more pictures if you’d like to see them.

Click here: New Zealand Pictures

Great Ocean Road

2009-02-26T21:13:00.003+11:00

The Great Ocean Road is a 243 km stretch of road along the south-eastern coast of Australia. The road was originally constructed to provide work for returning soldiers and dedicated as a Memorial to those killed in the First World War. It starts about an hour outside of Melbourne. We had a three-day weekend here recently and decided to spend it in Apollo Bay - a small town about half-way along the Road.

The Great Ocean Road is one of Australia's top tourist destinations, and so they provide some friendly reminders for those of us unfamiliar with the road rules...

On our first day, we stopped at many scenic "look outs", our first being Torquay, the first town on the Great Ocean Road.

The second stop of the day was Anglesea, which was home to several of what turned out to be many great beaches along the Road.

Our next stop was the Aireys Inlet, where we saw an old lighthouse.

The next destination was Erskine Falls. There were stairs that led about 750 feet down to the base of the waterfall. The falls were really beautiful and it was well worth the trip down, but it was a bit a work-out going back up all those stairs! :) Needless to say, our calves were a bit sore the rest of the trip.

Next, we passed through the town of Lorne, which is one of the most popular towns along the road. There is a great look-out above the town looking down over the road.

In between Lorne and Apollo Bay, was a memorial from an old shipwreck...you can still see part of the anchor sticking out of the water in the middle picture below. There was also a grave site there, which we thought was odd since no one actually died in the shipwreck.

Apollo Bay itself was an awesome little town. We spent two nights in a cabin right off the Great Ocean Road, which was a perfect location.

The Appollo Bay beach was just across the road from our cabin.

Appollo Bay had several amazing little restaurants (like pretty much everywhere we go in Australia - the food always seems to be great). We ate at Buff's Bistro for dinner since it came highly recommended by one of Anthony's co-workers. We tried out first meat pie and it was actually delicious. Australians love meat pies, so we figured we'd "give it a go".

We took a walk on the beach after dinner. I thought we needed some "sand art" pictures, and Anthony played along :)

Day two began with a trip to The Otway Fly Treetop Walk - a 1.9 km round walk among the trees. It's the longest (1,900 feet) and highest (80 feet) steel canopy walk in the world. There was a 150 foot spiral look out as well. The views were incredible.

The rest of the day was spent driving to The Twelve Apostles. It is about two hours one-way from Apollo Bay, but it was well worth the trip.

On our way home, we decided to relax a bit and stopped at the main beach at Lorne. It was a beautiful day and a great way to spend the last day of our Great Ocean Road journey.

It was an amazing trip, and we agreed that we can't believe we hadn't seen any of it earlier given that it is relatively close to Melbourne (Lorne is about 2 hours from our house). We will definitely be back.

Break Through

2009-02-16T09:38:00.001+11:00

The worship pastor at Living Hope in Vancouver, WA sang this song awhile ago and it's on one of their worship CDs. I downloaded it to my iPod and every time I hear it, I love it even more than the last time. It's quickly become one of my favorite songs. It's a reminder of how amazing it is that we can bring absolutely everything to God and He will help us through. I wanted to share it with you all and hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

Here's some of our favorite scenic pictures we've taken over the past few years to accompany this song (turn on your speakers if you'd like to hear the song). The words are below as well. Enjoy.

Break Through
By: Living Hope Worship Team

Break through, break through all my doubts
Break through, break through all my fears
Break through...that I may worship you

Break through, break through all my pain
Break through, break through all my guilt and my shame
Break through...like only you can do

You are brighter than my darkest night
Stronger than my toughest fight
Just one touch from you, my king, my friend
And I'll never be the same again

Break through, break through all my doubts
Break through, break through all my fears
Break through...that I may worship you

Break through, break through all my pain
Break through, break through all my guilt and my shame
Break through...like only you can do

You are brighter than my darkest night
Stronger than my toughest fight
Just one touch from you, my king, my friend
And I'll never be the same again

Break through, break through, break through, break through

Break through...like only you can do
Break through...like only you can do
Break through...like only you can do

More Babies

2009-02-13T09:05:00.003+11:00

It seems like so many people are having babies these days. It makes me want one too :) But, we want to wait until we move back home so we can be around our family and friends.

My 3rd cousin, Mandy had a beautiful baby boy on November 2nd (sorry it's a bit late!). They named him Micah James and he was 6 lbs, 13 oz and 19 in long. We were supposed to see them when we were home for Christmas, but it didn't work out. We can't wait to meet him the next time we're home. Congrats Caleb & Mandy! We are so happy for you both!

Crystal, also one of my 3rd cousins, had a precious baby girl, Kaylee Anne on January 4th. Kaylee was 5 lbs, 15 oz and 19 1/2 in long. We can't wait to meet her either when we're home next time (hopefully September). Congratulations Landon and Crystal - we are so excited for you!

There are a few more family members and friends who are pregnant, so I'll be sure to post pictures of there babies too.

We hope you all have a great weekend! HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!

Wild Fires in Victoria

2009-02-09T23:01:00.001+11:00

I'm not sure if you have heard about the wild fires that are burning here in Victoria, but it is the worst series of bush fires on record. Actually, they are saying it's the worst natural disaster ever to hit Australia!

The fires are still blazing about an hour from where we live in Melbourne. We can see the haze here from all the smoke. It's been devastating for those involved. Currently, about 130 people have died, and many more are injured. Over 750 homes have been completely destroyed - along with entire towns - leaving over 5,000 people homeless.

The people here have done an amazing job helping out everyone in need. The citizens have already donated millions of dollars in support along with food and clothes. Several of our coworkers have gone out to participate in the volunteer firefighting effort as well.

It is a sad story - please pray for all the people involved.

Abigail Grace

2009-02-06T12:35:00.002+11:00

My friend, Natalie just had her first baby - a precious baby girl - a couple of weeks ago. She was born on January 21st at 5:36AM, weighed 8lbs 7ozs and was 20.5 inches long. Natalie was my roommate during my first year (1999-2000) at Trinity Western University in Canada. We immediately hit it off and have been friends ever since! Even though we're on opposite sides of the world (literally) we try to keep in touch as best we can :) I miss her a lot and wish her all the best with her new addition! Congratulations Kurtis & Natalie! We love you guys!

HOT, HOT, HOT!!!

2009-02-03T17:31:00.002+11:00

We never thought we'd be so grateful for 90 degree weather! Last week, it was about 110 - 115 every day! It was extremely hot, which caused a bunch of problems around the City: power outages, train cancellations, heat exhaustion, etc.

Fortunately, our power only went out for an hour on Friday night (some people had their power out for days!) and we had already had a chance to run our AC and cool our place down before that. Also, neither of us have to rely on train transportation, so the cancellations didn't affect us. The news was full of stories about people in the hospital due to heat related issues. The Australian Open finished last Sunday, so the tennis players had to endure the heat as well. It was record-breaking weather - the hottest it's been here in over a hundred years!

On Sunday, it was about 90 degrees and it felt so much cooler...it was a little weird that 90 was a relief! :) More hot weather is in the forecast, but hopefully not as bad as it's been! Our AC came just in time!

Our New Church

2009-01-13T21:49:00.008+11:00

Two Sundays ago we went to International Baptist Church for the first time. One of my Dad's friends knows the pastor there and told him that we should go check it out. It's a little bit far from our apartment, so we were hesitant at first. We planned our trip, which included a bus ride, a tram ride and then a 1/2 mile walk. So, Sunday morning came and we decided to give it a try. But we waited and waited and waited and the bus never showed up (apparently, the public transport is less than reliable on Sundays). We decided that if we were going to make it on time, we would have to take a cab. It turned out to be about a 25-minute cab ride, so it wasn't too bad. And it was definitely worth it. As soon as we walked in, we had several people greet us, including a girl who lives somewhat close to our area and immediately offered us rides to and from church (we'd just met her!). Everyone was very nice and made us feel very welcome.

The service was really good and the pastor ended up talking about things that Anthony and I had just been discussing the night before. God works in awesome ways! After the service, we met the pastors who ended up taking us to lunch! Two other couples came with us and we got a chance to know some new friends. We felt like we had known them for much longer than a couple of hours. After a great lunch, the pastors drove us all the way back to our apartment, which was completely out of their way and incredibly generous. It was a great day!

We went back yesterday and pretty much decided that this is the place for us! The regular pastors were away on holiday, but the guest speaker did an awesome job. He ended his message with an incredible acapella song that gave everyone goosebumps. More people asked us to go out to lunch again this week and we got to know 3 new people. One of the girls took us home as well, which was such a blessing! Apparently, the "young adults" get together about once a month for a game night or some kind of activity. I'm so excited for their next event!

Anthony and I had been struggling with finding a church and meeting other Christians. God has definitely blessed us and answered our prayers (thanks to all our family who were praying for us). We can already see this as our church home. We are so excited for what God is doing.

Christmas 2008

2009-01-13T21:28:00.004+11:00

We have now been in Australia for about 8 1/2 months, so we were very excited to go home for Christmas this year!

On the plane from Melbourne to LA, we were actually bumped up to Premium Economy...man, we were spoiled! Not quite First Class, but a good step up from Economy. The seats have foot rests in them, recline a bit further back, and are a little wider. The blankets and pillows are better, as well as the food options. It was hard going back to regular ecomony on the flight home.
On our way to Portland, we made a stop in Sacramento for the weekend. We were fortunate to be able to spend some time with our good friends there. Here's a few pictures from our brief time in Cali.

We were supposed to fly out of Sacramento on Sunday night, but our flight was cancelled. The Portland area had several inches of snow, which is highly unusal for them, and the airport was basically closed. When we called the airlines to find out when we would be able to get home, they told us the soonest flight out would be Christmas morning! That was an unacceptable option for us, so we looked into train options, but they were either completely full or cancelled as well. So, we called Budget and asked if we could keep our compact car (Mustang!) for an extra day & drop it off in Portland. They allowed us to, so we bought some chains and headed home at 5am the next day. A normal trip from Sacramento to Portland takes about 8 1/2 hours. And 12 hours later, we pulled into my parents driveway. We made great time all the way to Salem (about and hour from Vancouver) and then we pretty much crawled at 20 mph the rest of the way (4 hours instead of 1!!). We were so happy to finally be home though that we really didn't care :)

The driving put us about a day behind and the snow slowed us down a lot. We ended up rearranging some plans and weren't able to see everyone on our list. But, we really enjoyed seeing the snow and being with our family!

We spent Christmas Eve with Mom, Tyler, and Laura. We played games, took some fun snow pictures, had an amazing Christmas dinner, opened lots of awesome presents, and just enjoyed each other's company. We planned on going to church for Christmas Eve, but it was cancelled because of the snow storm....we still can't believe all the snow we had!

Christmas Eve night we went over to Dave & Sandy's house with my Mom's side of the family. It had been about 5 years since I'd been able to be there and Anthony has never been there for Christmas Eve, so it was really special for us. Almost everyone was able to make it and we all had a great time!

Christmas day was spent at Mom & Dad's with Katie & Jason. We slept in after a late night and woke up to open stockings, have a cinnamon roll breakfast, and then open presents. Jason wrote each of us a letter that was really special and definitely one of the highlights of Christmas this year. We all took turns opening gifts and we didn't finish until the early evening! It was so much fun and we lost track of time until it started getting dark outside :) Anthony's Mom and my grandparents joined us for the traditional prime rib dinner...yum!! It was so good - the perfect ending for such a great day!

We had to postpone Christmas with Dad & Joyce due to the crazy weather, but we had a wonderful time with them as well. Grandpa & Grandma Harris and Joyce's Mom were also able to join us this year. Joyce made a wonderful ham dinner that topped off the evening. It's always great to visit and catch up...especially since it had been so long!

Grandpa & Nan came down from the Tri-Cities to visit with us the week after Christmas. It was so great to see them! We really appreciated them making the trek out to see us in the crazy weather. We were able to have lunch with them at the infamous Olive Garden (this side of the family is where Anthony's Italian heritage comes from) and then breakfast at IHOP before they left the next morning. We always have a great time visiting with them.

New Year's Eve was spent with my parents and Katie. It was very laid-back. We ate some good food, played our new Wii, and watched the ball drop at Times Square.

Our time home flew by way too fast, but we enjoyed every minute of it! Our parents and siblings had lunch with us at McGrath's (our favorite seafood restaurant) before we headed to the airport. It was bittersweet - we always hate the leaving part. We miss everyone already, but are looking forward to some more travelling around Australia. Our time here is almost 1/2 gone, which is amazing to think about. We are so blessed to have such awesome friends and family and we wish you all the best for 2009! We love you all!

Back in Oz

2009-01-05T20:53:00.005+11:00

Anthony and I landed back in Melbourne yesterday at about 10am. We had an awesome visit home and miss everyone already! Our flights went smoothly and now we're just trying to adjust to the time difference. Anthony was really excited because we got to fly in the new Airbus A380 from LA to Melbourne (he's fascinated with airplanes!). It's a huge double-decker airplane that was just introduced this year. It was really nice!

Today was about 85 degrees and it was nice to be in warm weather after a snowy Christmas. We loved having a white Christmas though - we can't even remember the last time that happened! But, the sun feels soooo good! :)

Well, it's back to work for us tomorrow and right into busy season for Anthony! But, we'll sort through our pictures from our trip home and post them soon. We had a wonderful Christmas and a great time with our family!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Welcome, Tristen!!

2008-12-16T13:37:00.004+11:00

My best friend, Jocelyn just delivered baby #2, another boy!! All went well and they came home from the hospital today. You can read more & see pictures on her blog. There is a link to it on our blog list.

Congratulations, Jeff & Joc! We are so happy for you & wish we could be there with you!! I know you will have an awesome Christmas, now that you can relax a bit! We wish you all the best!! Lots of hugs & kisses for Tristen (and Aiden too!) :) We love you guys!

Albert Park

2008-12-09T21:29:00.007+11:00

The other day we decided to take advantage of the nice weather and walk to nearby Albert Park. The park is huge (560 acres), which is especially impressive considering it is only about 1.5 miles from downtown Melbourne. The park also has a large lake in the middle. In fact, there are several sailing clubs located at the park and the lake is used for sailing competitions. The day was really nice and there were a bunch of sail boats out on the water.

The roads in and around Albert Park are also where the Australian Formula One Grand Prix is held every March. The Australians follow Formula One pretty closely, and I guess this is a pretty exciting event.

Here are a few pictures from our picnic:

Our Dinner

2008-12-01T18:39:00.004+11:00

Our Thanksgiving dinner turned out really well, with all the favorites: turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, broccoli casserole, and salad. It was a little different since it was just the two of us, but we had a great, relaxing day and the food was really good!

Our favorite though, was dessert...apple pie! I swear it's the best recipe I've ever tasted!

We hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving day!

Happy Thanksgiving!

2008-11-27T11:48:00.000+11:00

We wish we were home to celebrate with you all, but we hope everybody has a great Thanksgiving! When we stop to think about our lives, we realize how much we have to be thankful for! Anthony and I have talked lately about how lucky we are to have each other and our family and our friends! God has blessed us more than we deserve and we are so grateful!

We both have to work Thursday and Friday (since they obviously don't have Thanksgiving here) so we're going to do a small Thanksgiving dinner together on Saturday. We lucked out and found a frozen turkey, a box of stuffing (although it looks a little questionable), and sweet potatoes. The only thing they don't have here is canned pumpkin. Thanksgiving just isn't the same without pumpkin pie! When I asked some co-workers about it, they said, "Couldn't you just use 'real' pumpkin?". Ha! I guess I could, but I don't really want to, so we're going to have to settle for apple pie (my Aunt Sandy's amazing recipe!). Apple pie is Anthony's absolute favorite anyway, so he's okay with that :)

My cousin, Ronda, posted this verse on her blog. I'm going to copy her because it's one of my favorites and a great one for this time of the year:

"Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with THANKSGIVING, present your requests to God, and the PEACE of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." Phil. 4:6-7

Sydney

2008-11-22T12:55:00.001+11:00

Kristi and I went to Sydney a couple of weekends ago. It was our first trip together outside of Victoria. Thank you, Dad & Joyce, for letting us use Worldmark - the condo worked out very well and we had a great time!

Since being in Australia we've learned that Melbourne has a funny relationship with Sydney. The two cities have enjoyed a complex rivalry through most of the history of Australia - going back and forth over which is the more significant city. They take it pretty seriously here. And so, when we told others we were going to Sydney for the weekend, we would often get responses like "I'm sorry" or "Why?". Even at the airport when we asked a fellow traveller if they come to Sydney often, his response was "Not by choice." It's quite odd.

Luckily, we were not deterred by the cynics. We thought Sydney was awesome. Sydney must have more waterfront property per capita than any other large city in the world. It seemed there was an endless supply of hidden tree-lined coves, many with picture-perfect white sand beaches.

An integral part of the Sydney transportation system is the ferries, which carry only people - no cars. They take you to all over the Sydney harbour, and it was one of our favorite ways to get around. We spent the first half of the first day seeing the opera house, harbour bridge, botanical gardens, etc, and we then spent the next three days out exploring the harbour. It was beautiful. You can see some of our pictures below, but they don't really capture all the beauty.

Oh, and we found our first clothing-optional beach. We did not venture down to the beach itself, but we could see from the distance that some people were on the beach... and exercising the "option."

We spent one full day on Bondi beach, which was amazing. It reminded us of a nice beach in Hawaii. Australians claim it is the "most famous beach in the world," but we are not so sure. Have you even heard of it? In any case, the day we went it was 28 degrees (~82 degrees F) and it was perfect for relaxing after a couple days of walking around the harbour.

Here's a little video...we could have sat there forever and watched the waves roll in.

On Sunday, we went to Hillsong church, which has two "main" campuses and a dozen or more "extension" campuses. We went to one of the main campuses, but it was apparently not the main "main" campus because Brian Houston and Darlene Zschech weren't there. Still, it was pretty cool. We determined that Hillsong does Hillsong better than any other church. And then we lucked out because the church was celebrating 25 years and they had a big celebration down at Darling Harbour later that night. We went and got to see Darlene Zschech singing Shout to Lord, which was pretty cool.

So in summary, we had a great time in Sydney. It was nice to have a little vacation. I already want another one!

PS. Here's some more pictures from our trip that didn't fit in this blog.

Sydney

Quick update on the Prom post below...

2008-11-09T16:55:00.001+11:00

Just letting you know that we have now edited the "Prom" post below so you can click on the collages to see larger versions. That should help since the pictures look pretty tiny in the standard blog format.

The Prom

2008-11-06T22:15:00.036+11:00

So, I know this post is a little late. Technically, Kristi and I went to the prom quite a while ago - nearly ten years ago in Kristi's case! No, I'm just kidding of course; this post doesn't relate to the high-school dance. Kristi and I went to Wilson's Promontory - known locally as "the Prom" - a couple of weekends ago.

The Prom is a peninsula about 3 hours east of Melbourne. It is unadulterated "bush country." We did quite a bit of hiking and got to see some really nice coastal views, rivers, eucalyptus groves, waterfalls, and the like. It was very relaxing. We stayed at a cabin located about 2 km's down a dirt road and situated just off the water.

It really squeaks!!

The highlight of the trip, however, was the wildlife. We mentioned to the visitor center at the Prom that we would like to see some wildlife if we could. The lady was very nice and told us about a spot near an abandoned air strip where lots of animals come to graze at night. She told us that we would need to pull off the road at a specific place (it is unmarked) and then make our way through the line of trees/brush to find the clearing. If we got there right at dusk, we should see animals. We were pretty excited.

We found the unmarked pullout (mostly by luck) and proceeded to make our way towards the dense tree growth along the side of the road. We found only one trail that appeared to lead through the trees and promptly took to following it. After several feet we determined that we were actually on a wombat trail. The primary evidence for this was that wombats are about two feet tall, and so was the clearance for this trail. Kristi rationally concluded that this was obviously not the trail we were meant to use and we were likely in the wrong place. I saw no other trails and irrationally determined that what was good enough for a wombat was good enough for me. I volunteered to go ahead alone to see if there even was a clearing ahead. After several yards of clumsy crawling, crouching and hobbling (and one ripped tee-shirt later), I did in fact come to a clearing. And in one of the more exciting moments of my life, I saw two wild emus standing about 50-yards in front of me.

I called for Kristi to crawl through the wombat trail, and just as she made her way to the clearing I spotted a gravel maintenance road off to the side that would have provided easy walking access. Sorry honey. In any case, we were both too excited about the emus to care.

We wandered around the clearing quietly and saw some heads poking above the grass in the distance. We slowly progressed towards them and eventually discovered dozens of kangaroos coming out to graze. We kept our distance at first, but we found that they didn't seem to be bothered by our presence in the slightest. So, we continued to inch closer in order to get a better view. At various intervals a random kangaroo would stick his/her head up, would look at us, and would then return to grazing as if he had seen nothing unusual at all. Apparently kangaroos are not too shy around humans, which was good for us because we were able to get an awesome view. As kangaroos came out of the woods we were eventually surrounded by perhaps 50 to 60 of the animals. It was one of the most satisfying experiences of my life. We had our camera and we took lots of pictures and videos. I felt like Steve Irwin.

One of the cutest things we have ever seen was a group of joeys in the middle of the mob ("mob" being the technical term for a group of roos). The joeys would stand around for a minute and then suddenly break into little boxing matches. It was hilarious. We tried to get some video, but it was a little far away.

I say the boxing joeys were one of the cutest things we've ever seen - probably the absolute cutest things were the wombats. As we were standing among the kangaroos, we saw a couple of wombats come out of the woods. These guys were definitely more shy than the kangaroos, so we didn't want to scare them by getting too close. Even so, they were incredibly cute. They look like large hamsters - only with cute, chipmunk-like faces. Too fun. See our video below.

Kristi and I agreed that we could have stayed in that clearing for pretty much the entire night. It was an amazing experience. We had to leave before it got too dark because we were basically in the middle of nowhere and they caution you to stay off the roads at night to avoid animal collisions (which are unfortunately quite common).

The next day, we enjoyed more scenery including an amazing waterfall and some cool coast-lines. Of course, we kept our eyes peeled for more wildlife - and we were not disappointed! We first saw a wallaby hopping along the side of the road, but the driver was going too fast to get a picture (sorry about that). We next spotted an echidna crawling up an embankment. Echidnas are also pretty cute. I think maybe all Australian animals are cute.

The highlight of the second day, however, was on a secluded road heading down to some coast off Cape Liptrap: We saw a wild koala sitting at the base of a tree by the road! We stopped and got out and the koala quickly raced up the tree. I feel bad about scaring it, but it was a pretty short tree, so we were able to get some good pictures while staying a safe distance back.

So I think we have now seen nearly all of the primary Australian animals in the actual wild: emus, kangaroos, wombats, wallabies, echidnas and koalas. Of course it would be fun to see a platypus, but they are nocturnal and apparently quite rare. Overall, this trip was great for the relaxed pace and amazing scenery, but the wildlife made it unforgettable. It was awesome.

Stay tuned for our Sydney post!

A Little Craziness

2008-10-30T21:36:00.007+11:00

Tuesday started like any other day... I went to work as usual, but on my home way home I nearly missed the bus. Since I worked late, I didn't know how long I would have to wait for the next one so I ran after it. The bus driver was a little annoyed, but he let me on. I took out my wallet with my bus pass in it and punched the card. I took a seat and settled in for the ride home.

I stopped by Coles (the closest grocery store to our apartment) for a few items I needed for dinner. As I was checking out, I reached in my purse for my wallet only to discover it was missing. I didn't panic at first because I figured I just stuck it in a different section of my purse since I was a little frazzled on the bus earlier. But I couldn't find it anywhere. I dug through my whole purse while the check-out lady was staring at me like I was an idiot.

I immediately called Anthony (slightly freaking out) while I turned my purse and my bag inside out with no luck. I re-traced my steps to the bus stop and all over the grocery store looking for my little black wallet with no success. Luckily, I did find about six $2 coins in the bottom of my purse (I love those coins!) and was able to pay for my groceries.

I called the number on the bus stop only to get an answering machine telling me the hours were 9-5, Mon-Fri. So, I walked home, stressing all the way. When I got home, I figured out that my wallet contained the following: my CA driver's license, my debit card for our bank here, my debit card for our account at home, my social security card (don't ask me why I carry it around with me - that will change!), my monthly bus pass that I just bought a few days earlier, and my blockbuster card. Needless to say, I didn't sleep very well that night.

At exactly 9am the next day, I called the bus company. The lady who answered knew right away what I was talking about, and I can't tell you how relieved I was to find out they had my wallet in their safe!!

The lady gave me the directions to their office and said it was about 10 minutes from the City. I figured it wouldn't be a problem to go on my 1/2 hour lunch break. I left at noon and caught the tram outside my office. 40 minutes later, I ended up at the bus depot! I waited at least 5 minutes before a stout woman came up to the window to help me. I explained my situation and she left for 15 minutes before coming back with my wallet. I'm not sure what took her so long, but I was just glad to have my wallet back! Meanwhile, my lunch break turned into 1 hour and 40 minutes.

After a couple of crazy days, everything turned out fine. My wallet was just as I left it. God is so good! He watches over even the smallest details of our lives!

"Cast all your cares on the Lord and He will sustain you" Psalm 55:22

Traveling

2008-10-24T15:01:00.003+11:00

We are going to Wilson's Promontory ("The Prom") tomorrow. It's the southern most point of Australia and it's about 3 hours from Melbourne. We are staying the night at a little cabin, so we'll be gone Saturday and Sunday. I'm so excited to venture a bit farther outside the City. One of Anthony's co-workers has said good things about this place so I can't wait! We will post pictures when we get back.

Then, next weekend, we are off to Sydney for 5 days!! We are so excited for our first trip outside of Victoria. It's about 2 hours by plane and we're leaving Friday afternoon and coming home that following Tuesday. We can't wait to see all the exciting things Sydney has to offer...they have some nice beaches too! We will definitely be blogging about that when we get back too!

We hope you all have a great weekend! Bye for now.

Melbourne Zoo

2008-10-13T20:20:00.002+11:00

This post is actually a little late. We went to the Melbourne Zoo two weeks ago. We had good intentions, but we decided (quite ambitiously) that we would try to incorporate a slide show into the post to show off our pictures. We inevitably encountered some technical difficulties, which led to frustration (technology frustration no less) and then temporary abandonment of the project. We have since regained composure and had a second go (and I think we got the slide show to work - fingers crossed!).

We initially weren't sure what to expect at the Melbourne Zoo. We wanted to go to a zoo, but this particular zoo was not first on our list (it was actually third). Unfortunately, the other zoos were quite a ways out of town and required creative transportation solutions... and a little more planning than we allowed for. The Melbourne Zoo is in the heart of the city, so it was easily accessible. However, given its location in the city, we were thinking that this zoo might be a little cramped (for the animals, not us). That made me nervous (I blame a wildlife conservation class I took in college).

But we went, and the whole experience actually turned out to be highly impressive. The exhibits were all top quality and we even learned a few things (like what an echidna looks like - or even that echidnas exist). We both thought it was probably the best zoo we had ever visited.

Here's the infamous slide show of pictures from our visit:

Melbourne Zoo

Kristi also got a few videos that turned out pretty well. We wanted to adopt one of the little penguins as a pet. They are hilarious. Hope you enjoy!

Happy Birthday, Anthony!

2008-10-10T13:37:00.005+11:00

Anthony turned 25 on Tuesday! Since we both had to work, we just celebrated at home that evening. I made him one of his favorite dishes for dinner...spaghetti pie. For those of you who have never tried it, you're missing out! :) It's an italian recipe I got from my mom-in-law and it's to die for! We found a good Shiraz that complimented the dish and made for a great dinner.

Then, for dessert, I tried something new. I made a cake from scratch...no box involved! It was a Sour-Cream Chocolate Cake from the Better Homes & Gardens Cookbook. I was a bit nervous since I've never attempted one before, but it turned out really well! I would definitely make it again! It was so moist and fluffy and really good! :)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ANTHONY!!

Mornington Peninsula

2008-09-25T21:41:00.006+10:00

This last weekend we hired a car and took a day-trip to the Mornington Peninsula. It's about an hour-and-a-half from our house and is home to wineries, gardens, natural hot springs and several popular beaches. The weather forecast called for scattered showers last Saturday, so it was a bit of a gamble. Indeed, it was kind of gloomy when we picked up our car, and the clerk at Budget warned us that it "was not a good day" to go. Hmmm... too bad we were signing the rental papers as he said that. So we headed to Mornington.

The first thing we did was get lost. It was a little stressful, I won't lie. I (Anthony) don't like being lost. I also refused on principal to use the new tollway (Over $20 to use a road?!?). So that didn't help. Luckily, our first destination was the Peninsula Hot Springs. So when we (eventually) made it, we were able to relax for a while. It was quite nice.

Although it rained a little on our way to the peninsula (which didn't help with being lost), the weather actually cleared pretty quickly and it was sunny and warm most of the day.

After the hot springs, we decided to head to the Enchanted Gardens, which included several large hedge mazes and other such attractions. Even though most of the day was sunny, the moment we arrived at the gardens it started to pour down rain. We passed on the gardens and instead decided to drive a bit longer.

We headed to the Cape Schanck lighthouse, which actually still operates (unlike most scenic lighthouses). The sun came back out, which is good, but what we didn't realize about Cape Schanck is that it is apparently the windiest place on earth. It was very scenic (see some pics below), but I have literally, no exaggeration, never felt wind like that before. There is a boardwalk down to the beach and we were warned, in all seriousness, to be careful as we progressed down the walkway because the winds got even stronger and we could actually get blown over the side railing! We decided not to go any farther.

We drove along the beach on our way home and found that most of the beaches were lined with "beach boxes", which are apparently little colorful beach huts that people use for lounging at the beach in the summer.

Oh, and perhaps the highlight of the trip was that we stopped by the hardware store (since we had a car) and bought a barbecue grill and an outdoor table set. It had been about 5 months since we have been able to BBQ. We've now had it every night since. I'm not sure how we lived without it.

Port Melbourne Tour

2008-09-21T18:16:00.012+10:00

Last Saturday, we were planning to go to the Maritime Museum, but after enjoying a lazy morning drinking coffee and "vegging", it was too late to get to the museum before they closed. So, instead, we walked around our little town of Port Melbourne and decided to take some pictures for you all so you know where we live :) It was really sunny and actually too warm for the fleece jackets we were wearing!! Great news for us since we just went through our 2nd winter of the year!

The picture above is of our building - we live up on the 6th floor (of 9). There are four buildings in our apartment complex with a little courtyard in the middle. It's secured by locked doors that only open when your swipe your key. You can see the courtyard below.

This is looking down from at Bay Street from the stairs that lead out of our apartment complex.

The pics below are of Bay Street - the street we live on. The bus stop is right here on this street, so it's a pretty convenient way to get to work in the mornings. (Anthony and I have been able to ride into work together most mornings. He gets off one stop before me, so it works out perfectly!) Bay Street has everything we need: grocery stores, cafes, restaurants, a post office, lots of little shops, a cute wine store with free tastings on the weekends....what more could we need?

It was such a beautiful day! Lots of people out walking their dogs, playing in the sand with their kids, and flying kites.

The Spirit of Tasmania is a small cruise ship that sails to Tasmania every night from Port Melbourne. Someday we'd like to take it over to tour around Tasmania...probably once the weather gets a little nicer.

Yah for the first signs of SPRING!

This is the closest tram station is to our place. There are a bunch of restaurants along the water - the ones we've tried so far have been good.

Here's a short little video I took from a dock in the water. It's looking back on the street. We love Port Melbourne!

There are a lot of statues and historical monuments along the walkway by the water. There's also 2 lighthouses (1 in the water & 1 on land) that used to be used for navigation for ships coming into the port. If the beams were lined up, then they knew they were coming in straight. Very interesting. The lighthouses aren't really used for navigation anymore, but they do still light up at night.

There was a bit a breeze that day. When we got back to our house, we could see tons of sail boats out on the water. I love our little view of the bay :)

We've also attached a little map below so you can see where we live (it's the blue marker). For reference, it's about 3 kilometers (2 miles) from our apartment to downtown Melbourne.

Since we didn't make it to the museum on Saturday, we decided to get an earlier start and go visit it on Sunday. After wandering around for awhile looking for it, we came across a couple of parking attendants and asked them if they knew how to get there. They informed us that the museum was closed for renovations. Sad. We'll just have to try again later, I guess.

Instead, we decided to take the tram to St Kilda Beach area since we haven't been there yet. It was actually a pretty windy and cool day, but because I thought we were only going to the museum, I was in capris, flip-flops, and a short sleaved jacket. Of course, by the beach the winds were even stronger/colder! So, we didn't stay very long. I did get a little video of some kite surfers though!

St Kilda Beach Park is about 4 kilometers from our place in Port Melbourne and there's no convenient public transport between the two towns. So, we just decided to walk home. This really reinforced the bad choice of wardrobe on my part! My feet hurt for the next two days! But, we found a cute little coffee shop along the water about 1/2 way home, so we stopped and warmed up before finishing our journey. I'm definitely looking forward to going back with the appropriate shoes and warmer clothing though! :) Here's a little collage from the St Kilda trip.

We hope you all have a great week!

Travelogue

2008-09-09T21:47:00.009+10:00

Well, it has been a little while, but I thought I would give an update on some of my recent travels.

I was able to make a quick trip to the US a few weeks ago for a work training in Chicago. I stopped by Vancouver on my way, and it was great to get to see family for a few days. The trip there was a little crazy though. My flight out of Melbourne was delayed because the baggage system was down at the Melbourne airport. I had to stand in the check-in line for over an hour. When we finally got on the plane (1.5 hours late), we then had to wait on the tarmac another hour because they said it was taking longer than anticipated to gather all of the bags. At that point, I was pretty sure I would be lucky if my bag ended up on the plane. It didn't.

I also missed my connecting flight in LA. The whole thing was generally pretty chaotic and required standing in several more long lines. I've never been a big fan of the LA airport. However, I will say it felt like home when I asked a food vendor at the airport for a cup of water and they promptly filled the cup with ice. I haven't had ice-water since leaving the States (outside of my apartment, of course). Why don't Australians appreciate cold water like I do?

I had to borrow my brother's clothes (thanks Tyler!) for the three days I was in Vancouver. My bag finally arrived the evening before I left for Chicago. My suitcase looked like it had seen better days, but I was just happy to have my clothes before leaving for Chicago. My training was nothing special, but I did realize how much I missed Americans.

Do you know what else I missed? Side dishes. For instance, we had a "boxed lunch" on our last day of training that included a sandwich, a bag of chips, a side of fruit salad, a side of pasta salad, and a cookie. That was probably a bit much, but an Australian lunch consists of a sandwich and nothing else. It drives me crazy! I'm sure eating side dishes with every meal doesn't help our waistlines, but I feel like after I eat a couple bites of something, I want a bite of something different to mix it up. In Australia, I have given up asking for side dishes (eg, requesting a bag of potato chips at a sandwich shop) because I only get looks of confusion.

So it was good to be in the US again, but it was also nice to get back to my adopted home in Melbourne (especially because that's where Kristi was!) Unfortunately, one week after being home, I was sent to Adelaide for a one-week business trip. I discovered mainly that Adelaide wasn't too exciting; Although, at about 1.5 million people, the city reminded me more of the type and size I am used to in the US (ie, Portland and Sacramento). In that sense, it reminded me of home.

Travelling domestically in Australia is something quite different than travelling in the US. For instance, I've now flown on three round-trips in Australia and I have never once been asked to show ID - not even to get my boarding pass. In fact, you aren't even required to have a boarding pass to get through security. And speaking of security, they look at you funny if you take your shoes off, all liquids are allowed, and although they do perform spontaneous bag searches, they ask you politely if it is okay if you are selected (what if you say no?). I set off one of the alarms once (I think because they told me to keep my belt on), and the lady just told me to go back and "run" through the second time. It didn't go off and I was on my way.

On my way from Chicago back to LA on my US trip, I happened to be sitting next to someone who was from Australia. She asked me if American Airlines was one of the "discount" carriers in the US. I said "of course not - this is one of our full-service airlines". She looked puzzled and asked me what "full-service" they provided. Indeed, they charge for in-flight snacks and checked bags and don't offer any in-flight entertainment, or any other perks for that matter.

Meanwhile, on my one-hour flight to Adelaide on Qantas I got a complimentary newspaper, complimentary in-flight entertainment (TV shows), complimentary drinks (including free alcoholic beverages), and a full hot meal (which I thought existed only in old movies). And, they didn't charge to check bags. Travel in the US now seems a bit lame.

Now I am back and don't foresee having to travel again any time soon, which is nice. However, Kristi and I are looking forward to going to back the US for a longer visit over the holidays. We'll hope for smoother travels!

Melbourne Museum

2008-09-09T20:34:00.012+10:00

We haven't had much to blog about lately, so we decided to venture into the City this last weekend and visit the Melbourne Museum. It is kind-of like OMSI in Portland with different exhibits that frequently change, as well as an IMAX theater.

There was an actual rain forest that had cute little birds flying around, some different kinds of fish, and a pretty waterfall. It felt like we were somewhere tropical...we can dream, right?

They had an exhibit called, "The Melbourne Story", which was all about the history of Melbourne. These pictures are in a replica of a house built to show the living conditions in the late 1800's. This tiny house would have held 2 adults and 9 children. I can't even imagine!
A few more pics from the Melbourne Story:

This was just for fun :) It's an old roller coaster car.And you can't have a museum without dinosaurs!

The museum also had a thing for "stuffed" animals. They were all over and a little bit scary actually. I took a couple of pics to show you what I mean. This one was actually kinda cool.

This one is Phar Lap, a famous Australian racing horse. There's a movie about him and a whole exhibit dedicated to him. It's just the "stuffed" version that's a little weird.

After the museum, we walked around the Carlton Gardens, which is actually just a big park. It was pretty though.
Next door to the museum is the Royal Exhibition Centre (yes, I know I spelled it that way!). It's the largest building in Australia. I love the architecture and culture in the City!

We ended the day with dinner in Chinatown.

Not Again...

2008-09-01T17:35:00.002+10:00

After only being home for a week, Anthony got a message at work that they needed him on a job in Adelaide (South Australia) for this whole week. He left this morning and won't be back until Friday night.

So, once again, I'm home alone :(

At least it's only 4 nights instead of 11 this time!

13 Hours

2008-08-23T21:23:00.001+10:00

until Anthony comes home!! I'm soooo excited!! I miss him so much and can't wait to see him!

My new job...

2008-08-19T19:52:00.000+10:00

So, my new job is going pretty well. Last week was orientation and training. I sat next to a more experienced employee and listened while they were on the phone, so I could hear how they handled calls. On Wednesday afternoon, I started taking the calls and the experienced employee listened as I talked to the customers. Yesterday was my first day by myself at my own desk. I liked it sooo much better than the training, which was a little frustrating because my trainer would be talking to me while I was trying to talk to the customers. I'm so glad I'm on my own now!

I don't actually have my own desk yet...they haven't figured out where everyone is going yet. So, I'm borrowing a desk from a girl that's in training this week. I'm hoping to get my own desk next week. I also don't have email access set up yet...I've had about 4 calls into the IT department, which has gotten me nowhere. So, it's hard to know what's going on in the company without access to any emails. We had a little team meeting this afternoon and they informed us that we are not to go on the internet or use our cell phone at any time during working hours, unless we're on break or lunch. It's a little weird because there's not much to do in between calls. Who cares if we check our email or look at yahoo news?? Apparently, my new company does...oh, well.

Basically, my job is to set up new gas connections. A customer calls in wanting a new gas connection to their property. If it's a brand new home, we just send them an application by fax or email. If it's an existing property, we fill out an application over the phone. That gets sent to the distributor who actually coordinates the whole job from there. The whole process takes about 6-8 weeks for the actual connection.

And, that's it. We also get enquiries (the Australian spelling for inquiry) on the status of the customer's connection, but that's pretty much it. I'm not sure at this point if this is something I'll do long term or not, but for now it gets me out of the house and keeps me busy during the week :) It's supposed to be a 3-4 month contract, so we'll see how it goes.

For those of you that don't know, Anthony is in the States for training right now. He left on Thursday morning and went to Portland for the weekend. He just got to Chicago today - he'll be there until Friday afternoon, but he won't be home until Sunday morning with the time difference. This is the longest (and farthest) we've been apart since his 2-week training in Chicago a month after we got married. He'll be gone for a total of 10 nights. I'm lonely here without him and I miss him so much. I am glad I have a job that is keeping me busy during the days...I'd be going crazy without it! Anthony has had a bit of a rocky trip so far, but I'll let him blog about that when he gets home (he's a better storyteller than me). He has enjoyed spending time with our families though. I wish I could've gone home with him, but it would have cost about $4000 for me to go, so it wasn't really worth it. I do miss our family though and can't wait to see everyone at Christmas. I'm excited because Anthony's bringing me some essentials from the USA...crystal light, make-up, advil, captain crunch...YAH! :)

We're still waiting for our weather to warm up a little...we've heard that it should start getting nicer by September. I hope so!! I'm really tired of the cold, windy, raining weather...can't wait for the sun! I hope you're all enjoying your summer - I've heard it's been super hot at home!

I got a job!!

2008-08-07T20:30:00.002+10:00

It's nothing too exciting, but it's a job! After a lot of dead-end interviews, I finally decided to go through a temp agency here. I interviewed on Tuesday for a call center position. They immediately set me up for an interview at AGL (an big energy company) on Wednesday and I heard today that I got it. It's a position answering incoming calls and it will probably be pretty basic, but it will get me out of the house and I'll be able to meet some new people. It's a temporary position that is supposed to last 3-4 months. There is a possibility of extension, or maybe something else will come of it. It's a huge company and they always have openings in all different departments. I'm very thankful for this opportunity. God is good! Also, the timing is perfect since Anthony will be gone for a week and a half starting next Thursday. It will keep me distracted and hopefully make time fly while he's gone :)

I hope you all are having a great week! I'm counting down the days until our Christmas visit :)

Unexpected Differences (by Anthony)

2008-08-05T20:17:00.000+10:00

When moving to a new country, you of course expect many things to be different. I think we did a pretty good job preparing for this fact. We purchased a couple of “How to prepare for life in Australia” type books prior to leaving and we did some other research before arriving. We’ve also kept an open mind throughout the whole process, which has gone a long way toward mitigating any culture shock.

However, there have been many differences that we didn’t expect. We thought we would list a few of the more interesting ones here.

Deodorant – The closest thing I have experienced to culture shock occurred when I realized that the entire country of Australia only uses roll-on deodorant. My first time using it, I thought perhaps this whole international move wasn’t such a good idea. Luckily, I’ve since gotten used to it.

TV times – We did expect several differences in the local TV, but we didn’t expect odd TV time schedules. Just looking at prime-time TV tonight, the shows on one popular channel are listed to start at 7:15, 8:05, 8:55, 9:50, 10:40, and 11:35. Often these listed times are only approximate (the show will actually start a few minutes before or after). One late-night comedian joked at the beginning of his show, “Don’t worry; I forget when this show is supposed to start too.”

Coffee – We’ve had to get used to new coffee styles (eg, “flat white”, “long black”, etc.), but the oddest phenomenon is the widespread acceptance of instant coffee as a genuine coffee option. Nearly every one of my clients (and even my own office) only provide instant coffee in their break-rooms. And often when you are asked if you would like coffee, you should expect that it is instant.

Laundry – Front-load washers are the norm here, which is actually kind of nice. However, the significant majority of households air-dry their clothes. Tumble-dryers are rare (and they are a weaker variety than we are used to in the States). Every balcony in our apartment building has a clothes rack on it. We too are going without a tumble-dryer, which saves space and electricity but requires us getting used to stiff air-dried shirts and towels.

Keep left – We expected to drive on the left. For some reason, we didn’t think that we should also walk on the left. We have nearly bumped into many people (and bikes!) as they are coming towards us and move left while we move right. It’s kind of embarrassing. In keeping with this theme, revolving doors open clockwise (counter to the States) and several door knobs and handles turn the opposite direction that we would expect.

Differences eating out – “Small” restaurant sizes mean really small (US child size) while “medium” is more like a US small (if you can even find small in the US) and the “large” sizes are akin to US mediums (although the “large” McDonalds drink here is the same size as the small at a US Carl’s Jr); You cannot take leftovers home from restaurants; And dinner salads at restaurants are served with the main course – not before.

Apartment Pics...Finally!!

2008-07-30T11:33:00.012+10:00

Sorry it took so long to get these posted! We finally got the last of the things on our list a couple of weekends ago and our home is pretty much complete. We hung the pictures and everything we own has it's "place". Granted, there are always things we can add, but we now feel like we're "officially" moved in! And, it only took us 3 months :)

Here's our living room. There is a sliding glass door to our balcony, which is just big enough for a couple of chairs :) It will be nice in the summer to be able to sit out there and see our "slice" of the water.

This is the kitchen - it's very small and there's hardly any storage - and, the cupboards that we do have are too tall for me to reach! It works for the 2 of us though.

This is our dining area - we found the cube shelves and thought it would work great as a storage unit too. We think it works out pretty well.

This is the "alcove" that is kind-of like a second bedroom. It's actually been really nice to have the extra space. We would feel so cramped without it.

This is our bathroom. It's a pretty good size, but it's the only we have. Our washer is behind the closet and there is enough room for some storage in there too.

There are a couple of differences we've had to get used to as well. One is that showers don't have full doors or curtains like we're used to, just short glass partitions. It's been an adjustment because it's really cold in the mornings since you can't close the door all the way and because water splashes all over the floor!

Another weird thing is that all toilets here have 2 flush settings - half and full. Apparently, it's to conserve water?Also, every electrical outlet has it's own on-off switch. So, sometimes, I'm waiting and waiting for the iron to heat up or the coffee to start brewing or wondering why the toaster won't stay down... only to realize that the switch isn't even on!! Crazy! :)

This is our bedroom. It's pretty basic, but since we had to buy all new furniture when we got here, we pretty much went for the bare minimum at IKEA.

So, there you go! This is where we live. It's become quite cozy and we're enjoying our place in Port Melbourne. We hope you are all enjoying your summer! Ours is coming soon...hopefully!! :)