More from my family about their visit last month...It is I, Justin.
I can now add something to my bucket list and cross it off right
away. I have surfed in
Australia. We hauled Aubree
and Zack’s surfboards with us on our car trip down the Great Ocean Road on Tuesday, November 15. We stopped at the first good spot to
surf (Torquay), and I promptly volunteered to try it out. It took some effort to fit into Zack’s wetsuit, but
eventually it was on, and I was looking official. Surfing is not that easy because there are too many
variables that keep changing, so it is hard to learn from one’s mistakes and
improve for next time. There is
the left to right balance, the front to back balance, the paddling as the wave
approaches, and the getting up on the board. When it all comes together perfectly, it is a lot of
fun. The waves don’t always
cooperate, but I did well considering.
I did wipe out quite a few times and swallowed tons of salt water, but I
finally got up and rode a wave for a little bit. I would do it again as falling down is less painful than the
time Aubree taught me how to snowboard in Colorado. Yay for Australia and surfing.
Do I look like a good teacher?
He got up! Time for some fish and chips for lunch!
Morgan on the wildlife report…On our way down the Great
Ocean Road, we made several attempts to see wildlife. Some were more successful than others. Golf course in Anglesea with supposed kangaroos…not
so much. We made a stop at Kennett River, which had “guaranteed” koala sightings, and Aubree spotted the
first one high up in the eucalyptus trees. We were pretty excited, and then some tourists on the same
trek tipped us off to one closer to the ground. We inadvertently discovered that the sound of peeling out on
the gravel road in our van made the koalas bellow and grunt, which was a little
unnerving, but helped us find a few more.
We were still reveling in wild koala glory when BAM, there was one just
sitting on a post on the side of the Great Ocean Road. We pulled over, and got up close and
personal (as close as we thought was okay with one in the wild), and watched
another tourist try to get close enough to get his face ripped off by the
koala’s claws. As far as we know,
he escaped being maimed by a wild koala.
Yes, this is a real koala sitting on the side of the Great Ocean Road!
So amazing to see them in the wild!
We decided to make a detour to see the Cape Otway
Lighthouse, and found ourselves distracted by koalas in the eucalyptus
trees. At first we were excited to
see one, and then they were everywhere.
It only took a little looking to see them in the trees. It seemed to be the waking hour, with
koalas walking on the road, climbing trees, reaching out for food, hanging out
with their babies (Cindy saw the first little one!), and every cute thing a koala
could possibly do. We spotted at
least three dozen koalas, with little effort! We later learned that this population of koalas is
significantly higher than is sustainable for the area, and they were introduced
approximately thirty years ago.
Magnificent sights for us, but many of the eucalyptus trees in the area
were stripped of their leaves, and the future of this koala population is not
too bright.
This guy was just walking along the road!
How many koalas can you spot in this tree?
Just some of many koalas we saw.
This guy was huge!
We didn’t get to see the lighthouse up close (it was already closed for the day), but that mattered
little, because on our way back from our detour we saw somewhere near 100
kangaroos in a field. And not
little kangaroos, but big ones!
There were so many, and it was like a herd of deer, or as Justin put it
“deer that could box.” The largest
of the bunch were a little intimidating.
Cape Otway ended up being quite the wildlife detour!
Aubree here now: It was awesome to finally see kangaroos and koalas in the wild in Australia! On top of that, the scenery of the Great Ocean Road is incredible. I didn't get to fully appreciate it, because I was driving, but the water is SO blue, and there are so many gorgeous beaches. If you come to Australia (or already live here), I think the Great Ocean Road (with the Cape Otway detour) is a must do. Scroll down past the scenery pictures to check out a rather entertaining video of my brother and dad hanging out with those kangaroos Morgan mentioned! We didn't make it all the way down the GOR on our first day, so the next few posts will be about the cool place we stayed overnight and then the Twelve Apostles and other neat things we saw. Thanks for reading!
Mom enjoying the sunshine and scenery.
Bee-you-ti-full...and only a couple of hours from Melbourne!
Well, we did end up going surfing on Saturday. The weather wasn't the greatest, but we avoided the rain and had a good few hours in the ocean at Torquay. The waves weren't that big, so it was good for practicing getting up on the board and learning when/how to catch the waves. After surfing, we almost always seek out a place to enjoy some delicious fish and chips. Something about this salty meal tastes so good after time in the water. Saturday was no exception. We hit up our regular place in Torquay, mainly because you can get a fish and chips meal for $6! We bring along our own bottle of ketchup, because you get charged about thirty cents for a tiny tub of tomato sauce at most places. Excuse the extremely poor quality pictures...I only brought along my little camera, which wasn't even working for a few months because it had sand in it.
Other than surfing, Saturday was a sad day for sports in our household. The St Kilda Saints lost their playoff footy game against the Sydney Swans, so they're out of the tournament. On Saturday night (our Sunday morning), my beloved Notre Dame football team lost a heartbreaker of a game to dumb Michigan. Yes, I am from Michigan. But I went to Notre Dame, so my loyalties are with the Irish. Here is a picture of our darling dog that I stole from my sister-in-law's Facebook page (thanks Cindy!). Yes, Molly Brown is wearing her own personalized Notre Dame dog jersey. No, I don't normally dress my dog...only for very special occasions. Let's hope ND can get their act together for next Saturday's game against Michigan State!
We headed down to Ocean Grove Beach today with a couple of other surfers, Sebastian (from the Netherlands) and Eric (from California). I decided to brave the left side of the road again and rented a Holden Commodore station wagon. It was bright blue, big, and fast. Holden Commodore is like the Chevy of Australia. We piled in the car around 10am and arrived at the Ocean Grove Town Center at 11:30am without incident.
Once at Ocean Grove Town Center, we rented our boards and bought Aubree a wetsuit. We weren't expecting to have to buy one today, but there weren't any 'for hire' and Aubree was going to need one eventually. We were a bit rushed as the guys were waiting, but we ended up getting a good deal on a nice suit. I decided to put off buying a board for another day.
We got to the beach around 12pm and the guys we were with said the surf was really really bad due to choppy waves - the worst conditions they've seen in Australia. It looked fine to me! There were lots of really big waves rolling in again and again due to the strong onshore winds. We paddled out, and I soon discovered that choppy waves are bad. What you want is the long breaking waves and the steady sets. So the other guys quit about five minutes into it as Eric broke his board against his back and Sebastian didn't want to chance breaking his. But being the adventurers we are, Aubree and I kept on surfing. We took a good beating from the constant assault of wave after wave for two hours but managed to catch a few good rides and had lots of fun.
Oh yeah, and this place is known for sharks! I looked up reviews of Ocean Grove and one said: "It's crazy... surfing here is like a death wish." The guys we were with confirmed sharks congregate there, especially in summer (due to the fishermen). Sebastian actually saw two sharks there last weekend. When the sharks were spotted, all the surfers were supposed to get out but instead they huddled together in the water, thinking they stood a better chance together. Not to worry folks, we didn't see any sharks this weekend. But if we did, our comrades said we'd be okay because you can spot their fins fifty meters off :)
After the surfing, we stopped in for fish and chips, and discussed starting a fish and chips blog where we review fish and chips places in Australia. Don't think that idea will take hold, as all the fish and chip places seem to taste the same, but it is delicious nonetheless. We made it home and watched the kite surfers for a bit until the sun went away. Tomorrow I start my first day on the bench at work. I suspect I will get staffed this week and am very excited to start working again, as it's been a while. I'm also anxiously awaiting the location of the project, as there is a chance we could move to where the project is for a temporary period of time.
