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  • Tag: Australia

    • forgotten songs

      Posted at 12:30 pm by jasminedesirees, on October 3, 2014

      I read about Forgotten Songs on the plane on the way to Sydney, and it wasn’t too far from Sydney Harbour, so we decided to check it out while we were wandering around one day.

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      It’s kind of hard to find, especially if you are me and are blessed with the combination of being utterly unobservant and also really terrible at directions. I consistently say “left” whenever I mean “right” and if I ever get a divorce, that will likely be the predominant reason.

      Forgotten Songs is down a little side alley, over top of a cute little restaurant. I thought the exhibit was beautiful when I saw it, but since I’d only been in Australia a few days, the significance was kind of lost on me. As I spent more time there, and traveled away from the city, I started to notice the very distinctive and interesting bird calls of the native species.

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      I’m not much of a bird person, although I’m pretty sure I didn’t have a strong opinion either way until I moved to Hawaii, but spending four years dodging pigeons at every turn will put you off the whole species pretty quickly.

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      But even I had to admit that the bird calls we were hearing in Australia were very unique. There was an especially interesting one that sounds almost exactly like a woman screaming bloody murder, so that was a fun addition to the ambiance while we were sleeping in the car on deserted dirt roads in the middle of nowhere, but I got used to it eventually.

      I’m not sure how long the exhibit will be there, but if you’re in Sydney over the next few months, stop in and check it out. You can learn more about the exhibit here.

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      Forgotten Songs

      Posted in art, Australia, travel | 0 Comments | Tagged art, Australia, birds, forgotten songs, sydney
    • the rocks

      Posted at 3:00 pm by jasminedesirees, on October 1, 2014

      The area to the right of the Sydney Harbour is known as The Rocks. It’s a nice area full of restaurants, park, museums, and street food carts, of which we took full advantage.

      I ordered a beef and red wine pie topped with mashed potatoes that was heavenly, but I did have to fight off about 1,000 pigeons while I was eating. I felt like the Tuppins lady from Mary Poppins, but it was worth it.

      We stopped in for a drink at the Fortune’s of War, which is apparently the oldest pub in Sydney, listened to some street musicians, including one playing a didgeridoo, and saw a restaurant sign for a special on kangaroo burgers, which is very common I realized later, but at the time I was a little bit horrified.

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      Posted in Australia, travel | 0 Comments | Tagged Australia, sydney, the rocks, travel
    • sydney harbour

      Posted at 8:07 pm by jasminedesirees, on September 30, 2014

      On a very windy August day, we took the ferry from North Sydney where we were staying, across to the Sydney Harbour to see the bridge and the Opera House.

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      It was pretty warm out, considering it was the middle of winter, so I crept up to the top of the boat for what I assumed would be a leisurely putt across the water.

      I was standing there enjoying the view, when all of a sudden, the driver hit the throttle, and I was almost thrown over the rail.

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      I managed to get myself to a seat, and snapped some pictures of our journey across, but we were moving very fast, the trip across took about 3 minutes, and it was so windy that I pretty much had to keep my eyes closed the whole time.

      By the time I climbed back down the ladder to disembark, I had black marks all the way down to my chest from my mascara running.

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      It was exciting to see the Opera House in person, it wasn’t as big as I thought it was going to be, but I feel like that’s pretty common. The Statue of Liberty always looks huge in pictures and videos, but then when I finally got to see it, it was definitely not as big as I was expecting.

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      It was also very busy, a couple of huge tour buses pulled up as we were arriving, and there were so many people there that we didn’t end up going inside.

      We spent the rest of the day wandering around and exploring the city, and then took a beautiful sunset boat ride back across the channel.

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      sydney harbor

      Posted in Australia, travel | 3 Comments | Tagged Australia, harbour bridge, opera house, sydney, sydney harbor, Sydney Harbour, the Opera House
    • crossroads

      Posted at 6:03 pm by jasminedesirees, on September 19, 2014

      As most of you probably know, we’ve been traveling for the last four months, through Thailand, Cambodia, Singapore, Indonesia, and then about 6 weeks ago we arrived in Australia.

      Our plan was to do some traveling around Australia, and hopefully find jobs so we could actually set up shop and live out here for the next few months.

      We started in Sydney, and drove all the way up to Cairns (stopping in lots of neat places along the way, tons of posts to come) but eventually we made our way back down to Byron Bay, just south of Brisbane, because we loved it here so much.

      Now we’re kind of facing a tough choice. Australia is really expensive, and it’s been a lot harder than we thought it would be to find jobs here. I guess that makes sense, because what employer wouldn’t rather have someone long term than someone that will only be around for a few months?

      Before we left for this trip, we were putting away money every month into a separate account for a really long time, so we had saved up enough for our trip, plus we figured we’d be making some money once we got to Australia.

      We have about half the money we saved up left, but we’re trying to figure out what we want to do now. It’s basically the age old question of choosing between being responsible and sticking to the plan you made, or taking off on a wild crazy adventure.

      We kind of have two choices. We can stick to our plan, keep trying to find jobs here, and we can spend the next few months working and hanging around in Byron Bay, hopefully making enough money to support ourselves and then spending a couple of weeks in New Zealand before we go home.

      In option A, if we find jobs, we hopefully wouldn’t really be spending anything else from our vacation fund, so we’d have it to put towards our next adventure.

      Or, we can say screw it, catch the next flight back to Indonesia, and spend the next month diving and traveling around Bali, Gili and Lombok, then fly to New Zealand for a week or so and then fly home earlier than we’d planned, maybe sometime in early November.

      In option B, we would basically be spending everything we have left in our travel fund, and we’d be home earlier than we’d planned, but we’d be doing a lot more, and having a lot more fun, which is basically the reason we spent all that time saving money, amiright?

      Sooooo….. decisions, decisions.

      Nobody knows what to do.

      Posted in Australia, Indonesia, travel | 5 Comments | Tagged Australia, byron bay, Indonesia, jobs, life, travel, traveling around Australia
    • oz, so far

      Posted at 7:44 pm by jasminedesirees, on September 15, 2014

      We’ve been here for almost 7 weeks now, so here are some of the things I love/hate about it so far:

      Best things about Australia:

      1. The city names: Toowoomba, Wagga Wagga, Wollongong, Mullumbimby.

      2. The snacks. They sell Dairy Milk chocolate at literally every place in this country, including travel agencies, hospitals, and beauty salons, probably. They also have Smarties. And something that looks alarmingly like it might be dill pickle dip (that’s what a gherkin is right?) but I’m too scared to try it. I’ve been burned before.

      3. The people. The people here are the bestttttt. Super friendly, and chatty, I find myself just randomly engaged in conversation with people all the time. Also, everyone calls me Mate. I respond to that.

      4. The gorgggggeousness. I didn’t realize how few people were in Australia, and most of the ones that are here live in the big cities, so in between the cities, there are just tiny little towns, and vast stretches of land that house the most amazing natural beauty. Every time you go outside there is a mountain vista, a waterfall, an unbroken stretch of white sand beach or a stunning ocean view.

      Worst things about Australia:

      1. Three words: Kangaroo. Koala. Roadkill.

      It is actually heart breaking, and I don’t want to talk about it.

      Posted in Australia, beach, travel | 1 Comment | Tagged Australia, nature, travel, Wagga Wagga
    • farm hand

      Posted at 3:53 am by jasminedesirees, on September 3, 2014

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      Currently spending a few weeks living with an Australian family on a farm just outside of Byron Bay.

      The work is hard, but fun, the family is wonderful, and the benefits are numerous, including fresh eggs everyday, veggies straight from the garden, and the opportunity to finally wear a wicker cowboy hat in an unironic way.

      Posted in Australia | 1 Comment | Tagged Australia, byron bay, farm, travel, work
    • moonlight cinema

      Posted at 1:55 am by jasminedesirees, on August 26, 2014

      I saw a commercial for an outdoor movie theater in Port Douglas that had a bar and lots of yummy food trucks.

      I got really excited, but then I realized Port Douglas is hours away from here.

      So we improvised with BBQ burgers and Gilmore Girls and sunset at the beach.

      It was just as good.

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      Posted in Australia, travel | 0 Comments | Tagged Australia, beach, cairns, outdoor movies
    • lately

      Posted at 2:10 am by jasminedesirees, on August 20, 2014

      For the last few weeks we’ve been road tripping up the Eastern coast of Australia, sleeping in our car, and eating most of our meals as picnics on the beach.

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      Subaru’s are actually pretty comfy, as long as you are kind of short, and not very claustrophobic.

      Posted in Australia, travel | 0 Comments | Tagged Australia, road trip, travel
    • today

      Posted at 1:53 pm by jasminedesirees, on August 13, 2014

      Today was cruising around the Whitsundays, fighting monitor lizards for our lunch, and hiking with snakes and spiders the size of dinner plates.

      Today was sudden rain storms and almost being swept overboard by an errant wave.

      Today was practically perfect in every way.

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      Posted in Australia, travel | 0 Comments | Tagged Australia, hiking, nature, travel, Whitsundays
    • twelve days

      Posted at 10:26 pm by jasminedesirees, on May 27, 2014

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      Today was running all sorts of errands to try to get a few more things knocked off my list.

      It was also the first day that I would have been working if I was still working, but I’m not, so I wasn’t.

      So I guess this is really happening then. Twelve days. Yikes.

      Posted in life, travel | 2 Comments | Tagged adventure, Australia, Bali, Cambodia, Pacific, Singapore, Thailand, travel
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