Cairns, Australia, Australia Today has been a VERY long day, but a good day as well. It started out with a 3:30am alarm clock and will end with me setting my alarm clock for 5:30am tomorrow. I thought this was a holiday! I woke up at stupid o’clock in the morning to catch a bus to the airport at 4am to then catch my 6am flight up to Cairns. Everything went very smoothly and the 3.5 hour flight was a…
Melbourne, Australia, Australia So I was supposed to fly up to Cairns this morning for a 3+ week trip around the north east coast of Australia, including a sailing trip through the Whitsunday Islands. Unfortunately, a category 5 (yes, that’s the worst there is) cyclone decided to come through that exact area today starting at noon! Yesterday involved calling the airline, every hostel I had booked going down the coast and the cruise company trying to reschedule everything for a…
Melbourne, Australia, Australia So the Australian Open is finished and I’ve definitely gotten my fill of tennis! After the four nights in the Rod Laver Arena, we were in the Hisense Arena for the next four days, then we had ground passes for the quarters, the semis and the finals. I got to see almost all of the top tennis players in the world. The only men’s player I didn’t get to see was Rafael Nadal. I saw Roger Federer…
Melbourne, Australia, Australia Monday night was the first night of the Australian Open, which was perfect timing considering I needed to get my mind of the Patriots blunder of a game that morning. We headed down to Melbourne Park a little earlier than we had to so we could have a look around and familiarize ourselves with the complex we would be spending the next two weeks in. It is a huge place with over twenty courts, included two arenas…
Melbourne, Australia, Australia I packed up my stuff and left the Crossley Hotel at 10am sharp on Saturday morning. I was off to pick up the keys to the new apartment and I wasn’t going to waste a second! Lisa and I were in the apartment by 11am and I was absolutely thrilled! The rest of Saturday was spent unpacking, doing much-needed loads of laundry, picking up groceries and other necessities, and relaxing in our new pad. We are up…
Melbourne, Australia, Australia I haven’t done a lot over the last few days, but they have managed to be very eventful anyway. I went to see The Tourist on Sunday night, which was very good. I enjoy watching movies that take place in cities I have visited. This movie brought back memories of my trip through Italy with my Dad in 2006. I never got to meet Angelina Jolie and get caught up in a web of lies, but I…
Melbourne, Australia, Australia Yesterday was a big day of apartment hunting for Lisa and me. We got off to a rough start though. We went out for breakfast and got to 107 Little Lonsdale Street about 10 minutes early for our 10am viewing. We waited around until just after 10am before calling the agent Mariam only to find out we were at the wrong address. Apparently in Oz they write addresses as apt number AND THEN building number, rather than…
Melbourne, Australia, Australia I arrived into Melbourne on Wednesday morning at about 10am, and was very happy to see that Southwest had somehow managed to get my bag over to the Qantas flight before we took off. So that meant I wasn’t going to have to spend my first couple of days walking around in the same pair of jeans that I’d just worn for 36 hours on my way to Oz. Good for me, and great for everyone around…
Firestone, United States of America, North America I am writing this blog entry from my flight to Melbourne from Los Angeles. This is a 15h 20m flight, so I figured I’d have plenty of time to finish this entry. After coming back from Vegas I spent about a week down at Mom’s house relaxing. We visited the puppy mill rescue again, but unfortunately my favorite dog (Buster Brown) was already gone. I suppose I should be happy that he’s now…
Las Vegas, United States of America, North America I am on my way back from Las Vegas, after a somewhat disappointing 5 day trip. We arrived on Saturday morning and the weather was pretty decent. We met up with Mom, Steve, Bill, Bridget and Pat and then we all went our separate ways to check in to our hotels. Pat and I were at Hooters, the parents were all at the Hilton at the Flamingo, and Nikki and Leo were…