Life, Sunkissed

I’ve been quite awful at keeping up with updates for my Aussie blog, especially since I promised myself I would maintain it on a regular basis! There’s a lot to say about the last few weeks, time is moving by way too fast and it’s sort of freaking me out.

A few weeks ago, some friends and I took a bus tour through Byron Bay and Nimbin, with a few stops in between. Nimbin was.. different. When you visit a place with the motto: ‘Hippie Capital of the World,’ you know what to expect. The town was essentially one block long, with stores full of hippie clothes and jewelery, and a few stores even sold records.. I was so tempted to get some classic rock but there would be nowhere to play it, but my dad would’ve been impressed. After Nimbin, we headed to Paul’s house. Who’s Paul? A Long Island native who’s gone insane. He lives in the rainforest and is a hippie to the extreme, I can’t even describe it. I think our bus driver, Ivan, was friends with him or something so we took a tour of his land and there were gorgeous wild flowers and things I’ve never seen before, not to mention random childrens toys in clumps throughout his land… I’m assuming it’s a trail so he doesn’t get lost, but it was pretty creepy. We went to a waterfall after that which was beautiful, then headed back to Byron Bay for dinner and hung out on the beach until sunset. After, we were all pretty exhausted but our bus driver asked if we wanted to head up to the lighthouse right there in Byron. Some people complained, but the rest of us figured ‘why not?’ because who really needs sleep? So happy we did, because going to that lighthouse was the most amazing thing ever! The view was stunning and the lighthouse itself looked like it was right out of a tourist magazine. The picture of the sunset below was taken at there. Standing up there, I once again thought about how lucky I am to be here and how badly I wish I could share it with my friends and family.

That was several weeks ago (like I said, I’m really behind) so within the following weekends we visited a few beaches on the Gold Coast: Broadbeach, Burleigh Heads, Surfer’s Paradise, and Coolangatta and Palm Beach where we went last weekend. All of them are beautiful but Coolangatta was my absolute favorite! There was hardly anyone there and the waves were perfect for surfing (not that I surfed, but there were plenty of surfers there) and there was a big rocky area where we sat and just let it all sank in. You could see Surfers Paradise in the distance (a town big on nightlife, reminds me a lot of Miami) on one side and on the other, they had a few booths set up for the Quicksilver Pro surf competition in a couple of weeks. There were even skydivers who landed right there on the beach! We cheered for them, threw the football around, and got reconnected with our silly side because everyone was in good spirits. That night, we went to see Shutter Island and it was so good! I was terrified going into it but there were only a few jumpy parts, and the plot was excellent… I won’t lie, I was proud of myself for lasting through the whole thing.

Rewinding again, two weekends ago we headed to Arrawarra (which I later was told has the same spelling backwards as it does forward… did you just go back and check?) to go surfing at the Mojosurf camp. I had an absolute blast there: the instructors were so cool and friendly, and surfing was a little hard at first but after getting into the swing of things and standing up a few times, you got used to it. There’s something personally satisfying about getting back out there and trying again and again after you’ve fallen or took a nose-dive. Big waves usually freak me out but with that surfboard and rashie on, I was thinking ‘look out Kelly Slater!’. I got pretty bruised up because my rashie only went halfway down my arms and legs, but my battle wounds are gone for the most part… good thing they are, because they were pretty nasty-looking. I had such a great time there hanging with the instructors and enjoying the weekend, I decided to fill out a job application… you know, just in case I decide to move to Australia after graduation! Did I mention it was pouring rain all weekend?

Currently, I’m watching So You Think You Can Dance Australia and it’s so funny to see how different it is from the american version. The dancing is nowhere near the level of the american dancers, and the judges are way too nice. Nevertheless, I love to watch it, because of course I love dance, it’s cool to watch an Aussie show, and it reminds me of summer with my best friend Kaitlyn and how we would watch the show religiously. Earlier tonight, my residence hall competed in Res Wars, which is held every Wednesday with a different sport each week. This week was Netball, an Australian game that’s similar to basketball. I was the only American on my team this week, but once I learned the basics I think I did pretty well! It was a lot of fun, just like it is every week. It’s great to meet others in my hall, and we even won a few times! Tonight we lost in finals, but at least we made it that far!

Tomorrow we’re heading to Sydney for the Mardi Gras parade and I’m so excited I can hardly contain it! I might cry when I see the Opera House… not sure why, I just have a feeling I will. That’s all for now! Shout out to my dear friend Brad back in Connecticut- I miss you!

No worries,

Tracy