Australia, home to the Great Barrier Reef and many of the world's most deadly animals. It is known for many things, including the Sydney Opera House, cuddly koalas, wallabies, and wombats, but the thing that it is best known for would probably have to be the kangaroo. Amazingly, the Great Barrier Reef, off the coast of Australia, is the world's largest reef and it covers about 133,000 square miles, the diversity of marine life that it houses is astounding. Australia is also home to the Sydney Opera House, one of the world's most famous buildings. It was built by Jorn Utzon in 1973, inside the Opera house the sound is incredible, many of the world's most renowned performers preform here. Rugby is very popular in Australia. Since the Australian national team is one of the best in the world, they went to the Rugby World Cup finals this year. Australia, which is a facinating country, has many unique aspects about it.
Sydney is the capital of Australia and is a massive city situated right in the middle of a beautiful ocean-front harbor. When we first arrived in Sydney we spent three days in an apartment, mostly doing school. We were situated in the middle of many different restaraunts, my favorite one was the wood-fired pizza. This pizza restaurant had the greatest calzone pizza ever, it was stuffed with three different cheeses, ham, and bacon, then folded over itself like a taco. Disappointingly, one thing that I have noticed as we have been traveling, is that pizza in the States is just not on par with the rest of the world. The majority of pizza in the States is Papa Murphys, Dominos, and Pizza Hut, whereas the majority of pizza everywhere else (at least the countries that we have visited) is all authentic wood-fired Italian pizza. I think that a wood-fired pizza restaurant in the States would do quite well. The second day, we went to Bondi Beach, here we surfed and just chilled on the sand. Afterwards we went on a walk along the coast, we saw many different smaller beaches, and at the end of the day we went out to eat. The third day, we left early in the morning to transfer to our other house that we rented, which was quite a bit larger because we were going to stay here with our Grandparents. The walk to the house was brutal, it was only 1.5mi, which doesn't sound like much, however, when you add 40lbs to your back it suddenly becomes quite far. When we arrived, we grabbed some breakfast and did school for the rest of the day. The next day we went on a bike tour of the city. This was an all day event and was really fun. We biked past the Sydney Opera House, the most expensive hotel in Sydney ($18,000 per night with a minimum of two nights), the Botanical Gardens, several monuments, and the local Chinatown (which we went back to to have dinner). The bike tour was really fun and turned out to be a great way to see the city. The next day, our grandparents came at 12pm, we just hung out with them for the rest of the day. The day after they came we simply walked around town all day. On Sunday we went to Hillsong, this was so much fun and it was great to be at a church again, it was similar to home (our church is modeled after Hillsong), just twice the size. The worship was amazing and the sermon was fantastic. After church we went to get lunch, then since we wanted to stick around to see Hillsong light up the property for Christmas, we decided to do something close by. Since bowling was full we decided to go rock climbing which was a lot of fun. My sister even made it to the top! On Monday we went on an all-day driving tour with a man named Sam. We toured a wildlife sanctuary where we got to pet kangaroos, koalas, and emus. We also saw wombats, snakes, and a brilliantly colored peacock.
Our Grandparents got us some boomerangs, which were really fun to throw around. The day after, we went surfing at Manly beach. This has honestly been (in my opinion) the best surfing beach on the entire trip, the waves were absolutely perfect. For our last full day in Sydney, we toured the famous Sydney Opera House. It was built in 1973 by Jorn Utzon. Sadly, he didn't even get to see it completed because due to politics and many complications in the building process. The Opera House is beautiful on the outside, however the inside is equally as beautiful. In the amphitheater, the sound is incredible, you can hear someone talking on stage all the way in the back of the massive theater. Sydney is an incredibly beautiful city with friendly locals and lots of fascinating things to do, my favorite part though, was the tour of the Sydney Opera House.
After Sydney, we flew into Cairns and then drove to Port Douglas. Port Douglas is a small little town that seems very tropical. Our Airbnb apartment that we were renting was really nice, it had a pool and we each had our own bed. When we went out to eat that night we took a short walk along the beach. While we were on the beach we found some ripe coconuts and took them back with us to try and crack them open. We were able to open them by repeatedly smashing them on a sidewalk until the outer shell broke off. Once we broke the outer shell, we then smashed the inner shell (the nut) on the sidewalk until this part broke open. When it finally did, we would quickly scoop it up and pour the coconut water into our glasses. The coconut water tasted like sugar, but it was not very good in my opinion. We then went out to eat and I had a great burger. When we were walking back that night we noticed lots of bats in the sky, they were everywhere. Batman must have been nearby. The next day we went on a boat to go snorkeling on the Great Barrier Reef, this was incredible. There were so many different colors of coral and tons of different fish. We also got to go scuba diving, which was really fun. Sadly, it messed up my ears for about two weeks. It is amazing how diverse God has made the ocean. As amazing as the Great Barrier Reef was, I personally liked the snorkeling in the Galápagos Islands better because I thought that there were "larger" animals in the Galápagos waters. In the Galápagos we saw seals, turtles, starfish, penguins, sharks, fish, cormorants, whales, and much more. At the Great Barrier Reef, I saw a very small shark, many fish, and a ton of coral. The Great Barrier Reef is unique in the aspect that it is a reef and has large amounts coral, however the Galápagos had better animals but very little coral, so it really just depends what one prefers. I really liked Port Douglas, it was similar to a remote little jungle/surfing town with many small restaurants, and bats.
The Daintree Rainforest is the oldest rainforest in the world, we came here after Port Douglas. This rainforest has many different kinds of animals living in it. We stayed in a fully self-sustained house in the middle of the jungle. This house was in the middle of nowhere and was powered by solar. Amazingly all of the water came from the rain, which collected in a massive water tank in the backyard. We even found a white tailed rat hanging out in a chair on the deck. With it were some newborn babies on its back. Our first night we went on a sunset cruise with an older man from the States, who gives tours on his fishing boat. I have to admit that when we first showed up I didn't have very high expectations, however it ended up being really fun. He practically knew everything that there was to know about the river. One interesting fact that I learned was that here in this rainforest was the finest collection of mangrove species in the world, meaning that 36 out of 70 mangrove species lived on this river. We saw lots of bats, birds, flowers, and crocodiles. The next day, we went jungle surfing, which was the exact same idea as the canopy tours in New Zealand. It was supposed to be educational but it didn't really end up that way. The canopy tour in New Zealand was much more fun. We also did a jungle walk with a native guide. This potentially could have been fun, however, I wasn't feeling great and so I needed to stop walking and sit down, so I missed most of the tour. Another interesting fact about the Daintree Rainforest is that the world's most dangerous bird lives here, it is called the cassowary. It is the most dangerous bird because it has actually killed two people. Despite being dangerous, it is a very facinating bird. It cannot fly, and it has a horn-like structure on the top of its head that it uses to produce a low sound that can actually go around trees so that it can be heard by other birds. It also has a built in fishing net. The cassowary has a large mat of feathers that are more like string. The feathers are hollow and so they help it to float. The cassowary will jump into the water near the mangroves where the little fish are feeding. Since its feathers are hollow, they will rise and float. All of the small fish will then swim under this big mushroom-like object and then the cassowary will climb out of the water. When it walks out of the water all of its feathers will go back down trapping all the little fish. When it arrives at a dry spot the cassowary will then shake out all of its feathers causing all the little fish to fall out. The cassowary will then eat the fish for dinner. The Daintree Rainforest was really fascinating and there are so many animals living in it including snakes, crocodiles, cassowaries, lizards, and kangaroos.
After visiting the Daintree Rainforest, we drove for two hours to get back to Cairns. Cairns is a mid-sized city on the ocean. Our apartment here that we were renting was great. The wifi was really fast, and we had air conditioning. The first day while we were here we went on a scenic railway up to the tribal village of Kuranda. We rode on an old-school train for about two hours before arriving at the village. At the butterfly garden we saw many native Australian butterflies. We then went to a parrot house where there were all kinds of colorful parrots. I love parrots. I even got pooped on!!! After the parrots we went to a zoo where we got to hold koalas. This was so cool and the koalas were very soft and cuddly. Interestingly, there are only a few places in Australia where you can actually hold a koala. After going to a few markets, we took a gondola down to the bottom of the mountain that Kuranda was on. The gondola was really fun and it went over the canopy of the rainforest, which was really cool. The next day we worked on some school and then that night we went to see a cultural demonstration of the aborigines. This was okay, but it was not as amazing as the Maori demonstration in New Zealand. I was even called on stage to dance (not by choice). Overall we just did a lot of school in Cairns. One of the days we went to drive around the country side. We stopped at a local fruit, nut, and vegetable market to get some macadamia nuts. We also stopped to get fresh homemade ice cream at a local dairy farm and saw an old castle. Cairns was really fun, and it was awesome to have wifi again. The village of Kuranda was fascinating and it was incredible to get to hold a koala.
After Cairns, we stopped in Brisbane for a day, here we just relaxed and spent the day at the beach before heading to Thailand the next day. I think that our time was divided wisely by spending three weeks in Australia and eight in New Zealand. Interestingly, Australia has amazing animals, which can be incredibly dangerous, but the landscape is not as facinating as in New Zealand. I really liked Australia, however, I would rather go back to New Zealand.
