Australia Zoo

Crikey!  One of the highlights of Brisbane was taking a tour bus to the famous Australia Zoo.  This is Steve Irwin's zoo, the Crocodile Hunter.  It is hard to imagine he was killed just a few years ago, but he is alive and well here.  Everywhere you look they have his image.  Even toys in the souvineer shop!

I made a friend while waiting for the bus, who was from England, and we took each other's pictures.  Here I am feeding the elephant.  Most all of the animals here at the zoo are not wild, but tame.  Including the Elephants, the tigers, the kangaroos, the dingos and even the wombats!

You can purchase a bag of feed and feed the kangaroos and wallabies.  They roam around a large area and come right up to you and feed out of your hand.  They are soft to pet, also.

Koalas are everywhere.  They have tree structures up, then place fresh eucalyptus branches in the holders and the koalas feed off of those branches and stay up in the trees.  I never tired of watching them.  I would say most were sleeping, but some were awake, like this little guy!

Steve Irwin, larger than life at the Crocoseum.  We watched a bird and reptile show there.

This big crocodile's name was Graham, and the trainers were trying to prove a point that crocodiles are very slow to move on land, but don't get near the water if there are any nearby!

Here I got to hold a Koala.  SO soft and cute!  Loved it!

And this little guy was SO fast, I could hardly get a picture of him -- the Tasmanian Devil!  Looked just like a little DOG we have here at home, and acted like him too!

Australia - Part 2, Brisbane

After staying 3 days in Sydney, the Rocket Scientist had a speaking engagement at a conference in Brisbane, Australia in Queensland.  He would be busy at the conference for 3 days, so I had time to roam around this city and take a bus tour to see some of the local sites.  I just wish we had more time here to enjoy everything this beautiful place has to offer!

The first day, we thought we would have a quick flight from Sydney to Brisbane with the entire afternoon and evening to take in the sites, but that wasn't the case.  The Prime Minister was speaking just a few yards away from our hotel, which caused many delays in our flight schedule and even getting to our hotel once we landed.  It literally took 3 hours, longer than the flight, to get to our hotel from the airport!  We were not happy...so by the time we got to the hotel, it was dinner time and we were starved!  We made our way down the South Bank and I said let's just eat at the first place we see, which was Ahmet's Turkish Restaurant...and I am SO glad we did! We had a wonderful meal with Turkish Bread and dips, a vegetarian appetizer platter, and lamb, chicken and beef kabobs, all on platters and ready to share!  I brought home the leftovers for lunch the next day...I have got to learn how to make that bread, it was SO good!  Our waiter I asked if he was Turkish and he said no, he was from Slovakia!  I thought it was funny when I asked for a "to go" box, a nearby young waitress had to go ask someone else what I was talking about.  There, it is called "take away"!  Too funny!

Right outside our hotel room on the river's South Bank, there was a beautiful arbour walk and a gondola ride where you could see the city from up high.  There were many shops and restaurants around this area, so I made my way around in the morning to do a little sight seeing and did some shopping in the afternoon.

The Arbour Walk along the South Bank

Streets Beach - an actual swimming area along the north side of the river, where you can swim and sun!

A yummy pastry called a Caramel Slice that was REALLY good!

A short walk over Victoria Bridge takes you to Queen Street, which boasts to have over 700 shops, and boy they were not kidding!  No cars can go up and down this area.  It is all stores!  I bought many of my gifts here and even met some soccer players from the Brisbane Rush soccer team that were signing posters and giving them out.  I picked up one for the College Boy since he is SO into soccer!  He loved it!  It was a little warmer in Brisbane compared to Sydney, and slowly the shops were getting in the Spring fashion line and putting their Winter items on sale, which was good for me since we are just going into fall/winter here.  I noticed the fashion trend was boots or flats with leggings or black tights, layered under skirts, tunics or shorts with large black purses (similar to the girl in the photo up above).  Spring looked like alot of lacey items and stripes!  I asked a girl working in one of the shops if she thought the trend was ahead or behind the states, and she thought their style was behind.  I guess we will see!

Australia - Part 1, Sydney

The Rocket Scientist had a business conference to speak at in Brisbane, Australia a couple of weeks ago, so seeing it was our 25th wedding anniversary, I went along with him and we combined it with a business and pleasure trip.  And boy, am I SO glad I went!!  Such a beautiful place to go and so much to do!

Our hotel was right on Circular Quay on the Sydney Harbour.  Everything was within walking distance, and since they drive on the other side of the road over there, we were ok with that!  Most restaurants and pubs are in an area called The Rocks.  This area is wonderful, old and full of history.  It is where the settlers first landed with Captain Cook when the city was born.  The steps, buildings, roads...just wonderful!  We had a few meals in this area that were wonderful, like Lamb Shanks, Kangaroo Loin and Guiness Beef with Mash and Mushy Peas!

Our first day there, we walked across the Sydney Harbour Bridge.

There were so many beautiful views of this Opera House.  I never tired of seeing it.  Such a beautiful place!

Here is a beautiful view of the Harbour Bridge at sunset.  We walked across the lower walkway of the bridge, but you can climb up and over the top of the bridge as well.  We passed on that.  :-)

We then took a tour of the Sydney Opera House.  You can't take pictures inside the building, but we did get to sit in on a rehearsal.  Sometimes they can have up to 5 venues playing at the same time, not only operas.  The Opera House needs a 1 billion dollar makeover.  When it was first built, they thought it would cost 3 million to build it, but it ended up costing 15 million.  The money they used to pay off the loan was made from gambling, and it took just 18 months to pay it off.  That  is quick!

The next day we took a Harbour Coffee Cruise.  We looked at all of the many spots around the harbour, many expensive homes, and beautiful beaches.

The pillars you see in the water are where they put up a shark net so swimmers can safely swim.  I diver just two years ago lost his leg and part of his arm to a shark in this same area.  Yikes!

Halfway through the cruise, they served coffee, tea, filled scones, biscuits (cookies) and these lovelies!  Lamingtons - which were white cake squares dipped in chocolate, then rolled in finely shredded coconut!

We also took a bus trip out to Bondi Beach.

One of the highlights of the trip was going Whale Watching.  The boat went out to the pacific ocean just two miles off shore, and they found 3 humpback whales!  I have always wanted to see whales in the wild, in their natural habitat.  This was so thrilling to see!

Such a beautiful sight, and they were so close to our boat!

After the whale watching we walked around the Botanical Gardens that backs up to the Opera House.

Sitting on Mrs. MacQuarie's chair.

Happy 25th Anniversary!

Spring Break!

We are on spring break this week!  The weather has finally cooperated, and we are in the 70's and 80's, so hopefully we will be spending alot of time outside.  Have a great week!

New Art Journal Page

You can tell it is close to summer here - we have been bombarded with rain now for a few hours. We definitely need it here, so I won't complain about the rain. Decided to work on an Art Journal project to learn a few techniques in. I figured I would begin by what is going on at the moment, and right now that is thinking about what to do for summer vacation! We have toyed with a few ideas, like going to Clearwater or St. Augustine or Disney or Busch Gardens. We just haven't decided yet. I love to go where the beach is and the hotel is right on the beach so you can shower off and jump in the pool, then go back out to the beach again. I love looking for cool shells and sea glass the most. Fun, fun times! So here is my page. I was going to journal right on it but then I chickened out. Not sure if this will be a journal or not. We'll see if I have the guts to write on the pages!

Back in Town

Well, what a fun and fast weekend! We started it off on Friday flying to Arizona on a 4+ hour trip. The flight wasn't too bad at all. It helps when they show a movie during the flight. It makes the time go by much faster. We landed and rented a car and drove to Sedona for the day and then spent the night there. The Rocket Scientist and I had a great time shopping and having a fabulous spa treatment. The next day we drove to the Grand Canyon, and boy was that a great site to see! It was chilly and I wore my jacket for the four hours we hiked around there. Such a fabulous site to see. I wanted to see some wildlife there, and all I saw were ravens, chipmunks, and two condors. No jackrabbits, no coyotes, no elk. We even saw snow! So funny to think there is snow there at the Grand Canyon. We brought back some rocks for Little Man, which he loved. We bought goodies for all of the kids and they loved them. The next day was my birthday, and we went to downtown Scottsdale and shopped in the old town, then made our way up to the Fashion Square mall and did a little damage there. All in all, a fabulous trip with good food, good fun and good margaritas! yum! The kids did fine with their "Aunties" while we were gone. I will forever be grateful! Love you guys!

Last night the girls went out for our annual birthday celebration. Always so fun to get together and chat and laugh all night. College Boy is coming home today for the summer. Little Man has been asking about him for weeks now, and Sweet Girl can't wait to see him also!

Lisa