Castle Hill, Fury Game, Maggie Island

The last few weeks have been relatively uneventful (thus the lack of blog posts), just a lot of classes and Townsville daily life. I am currently in my last week of classes (what?!) - time is flying here! I am in Townsville until November 20th, which means I have a week of study vacation next week, then two weeks of final exams. Exams here make me nervous, because in the Australian system, most of my finals count for 50+ percent of my final grade. There hasn't been a whole lot of assignments throughout the year, which means a lot of free time for me but not a lot to judge my progress in each class. Better start studying now!

The weather here is getting hotter and hotter - we are entering Australian summer, which means temperatures in the high 80s every day. We will often get random 5 minute downpours - this is also their wet season, although Townsville doesn't get hit as hard as the rainforest up north.

Some of my weekend escapades are as follows:

A free Townsville attraction is Castle Hill, a mountain in the middle of the city with a steep trail up to the top (there is also a road, for the pansies). Townsville residents use it for fitness - running and walking the steps before work in the morning, etc. Maren, Leah, Hope and I decided to climb it. It was a tiring climb up rock steps, but the views at the top were very nice:It was a little rainy/foggy the day we went, but you can still see 360 degree views of Townsville, and Magnetic Island off in the distance.

On a few occasions, Maren and I have been in the gym when 20 or so very good-looking guys have filed in and filled up entire rows of machines. We realized they were professional soccer players for the North Queensland Fury, who are based in Townsville. We decided we should support them at one of their games! The game we went to was against Perth, and they won! It was a very exciting game, and the crowd was really into it. One section was full of people painted green who chanted non-stop, waved flags, and were generally very rowdy. The only thing was, right at halftime, it started to POUR! Since we were already soaked, we decided to stay anyway and just deal with looking like drowned rats. We went to the afterparty because we wanted to meet the players like the flyer promised, but they took FOREVER and we ended up grabbing some free food and leaving before they arrived (if they even arrived at all).

Our favorite cute goalie in action

Maren and I in the rain

Another Townsville attraction is Magnetic Island - called Maggie Island by the locals. It is a twenty minute ferry ride from the city and is a relatively undeveloped beach and rainforest paradise. Five of my friends and I all went in on a beach house (meant for four people - we squeezed into one double and two single beds), which ended up being the same price per person as it would have been to stay in a hostel! We had our own kitchen, living room, dining room, grill, porch, and bathroom. We cooked all our own meals. First was Mexican night - we made tacos (quesedillas for me!) and Maren's famous guacamole - delicous!

Hard at work cooking dinner!

Family dinner on our porch

The next night, we grilled burgers (hamburgers for the meat eaters and fishburgers for me).

Tom manning the grill

Our house came with its own possum! These guys are like squirrels out here. This one came both nights to clean up our mess outside. They are pretty cute.
During the day, we went to the beach and relaxed. The beaches on Maggie are beautiful. They are a series of bays. I even got slightly tan! (But don't worry, dad, I applied sunscreen religiously. The sun here is brutal, and excellent at burning the tiny spots on my body that I missed sunscreening) It is almost jellyfish breeding season, so we have to be really careful when we swim. The most popular beaches have stinger nets that keep out most of the stingers - but not all! They can be really deadly, and the beaches have little vinegar stations for you to put on your stings.

Me at Radical Bay - we had to hike to get here

Leah, Maren, and Tom rented mopeds to see the island while the rest of us hiked/beached - they thought they were a cool motorcycle gang.

I got to try!

Other times, we explored Maggies extensive network of hiking paths. Some were steep and difficult, others not so much. One walk, the Forts walk, explored a bunch of old WWII forts and ended up at a high point on the island where there were 360 degree views. It was gorgeous! The forts walk is famous for the possibilty of seeing wild koalas! I looked really hard, but didn't get to see any. There was, however, a koala warning sign!

Koalas!

View from the top of the forts walk

It was a very relaxing weekend, and it was good to see Maggie up close and personal. Next week, during our study vacation (when I should be studying...) Maren and I are embarking on our Hinchinbrook Island backpacking trip. We leave Sunday and return Wednesday. Then I have four finals in the next two weeks. November 12th is our tentative dive of the Yongala, the shipwreck off Townsville.

I am hard at work planning the next leg of my journey, which begins once my time in Townsville ends - November 20th. I am doing a mini loop of Australia via bus - the plan is roughly: Townsville -> Airlie Beach (Whitsunday Islands) -> Brisbane -> Sydney -> Melbourne -> Hobart (Tasmania!) -> Adelaide -> Alice Springs -> Darwin -> Townsville. The purpose of the loop is so I can leave most of my stuff in Townsville, then just fly home from there. My flight home is on December 17th, so mark your calendars! I am nervous to travel by myself, but from my experience with backpacking/hostelling around Oz, I will most likely be able to quickly make friends. Should be quite the adventure!!!

Lecture Recess: Cairns Trip

Last Friday was the beginning of our lecture recess, a sort of spring break (since, after all, this is the Australian spring semester). After my lab on Friday, five of my friends and I took the train from Townsville to Cairns, a city about 6 hours north of us. It is known for its proximity to the Great Barrier Reef, and its tourism industry takes millions of visitors each year on reef trips.

Waiting for the train:

We got into Cairns around 8, walked to our hostel, Global Backpackers, and went to get our free "dinner" promised by the hostel. It turned out to be about 6 spaghetti noodles on a plate, with a teaspoon of sauce. It seemed like someone was playing a joke on us, but I guess that's what you get for $16/night! The next morning, bright and early, we headed out to our liveaboard boat! Basically, a huge boat is anchored on the reef, and a little day-tripper boat shuttles people back and forth every day. We were staying for 3 days and 2 nights. You dive right off the back of the big boat, which also has cabins, a "saloon" where all meals are provided, and a sundeck for hanging out.

Our cabin

The five of us (Hannah, Maren, Alicia, me, and Tom) from JCU aboard the Kangaroo explorer!

We were going to do ten dives in three days: 3 the first day, 4 the second, and 3 the third. All of us except Hannah were just open-water certified (Hannah has completed all certifications possible, and now is an Instructor - it was very handy to have her as a free guide! She took care of most of the navigation when we were underwater by ourselves) but Alicia, Maren, and I were getting our Advanced certification on the boat, along with a couple from New South Wales, Australia:

Our advanced class in the saloon with Brendan, our instructor

Getting advanced certified entailed a deep dive (30 meters, or about 100 feet), a night dive, and a navigation dive, along with our choice of two other specialty dives - I chose "boat" (instead of entering the water directly from the dive deck, they took us out in a small boat and we had to roll backwards off the edge into the water), and underwater naturalist (where I just had to identify different fish). The deep dive was not super different from a regular dive (open water divers are certified to 18 meters, or about 60 feet) except a little darker and colder. Brendan, our instructor, cracked an egg underwater and the yolk remained intact, showing us the increased pressure down there. As we were passing the yolk around, a huge fish was hovering over our shoulders eyeing it, and as soon as it got far enough away, the fish gobbled it down! The night dives (we did 2, one with Brendan and one by ourselves) were awesome - a huge red bass followed us around because he had learned that our flashlights would illuminate little fish that he could eat. We saw a sea turtle on one of the night dives, and a lionfish. For the last few minutes, Brendan made us turn our flashlights off, and our eyes adjusted just like walking at night. There were bio-luminescent particles in the water, so with every fin stroke the water lit up like fairy dust. SO COOL! The navigation dive was difficult, but my dive buddy was very helpful. The rest of the dives we were free to wander around in pairs (or our case, a group of five) and we saw SO many different kinds of fish. We saw sharks, a barracuda named Barry, and about four sea turtles! I got to scratch one of the sea turtles on the back. Some of the highlights:

Lionfish

Sea Turtle!!

Holding a sea cucumber - its tube feet would suction to your hand!

Clownfish - we found nemo!

Me with a giant clam

Me underwater

Pufferfish, I think

Fin blisters

After our trip ended, Alicia, Hannah, and I spent two nights in the city of Cairns in a hostel. We upgraded a little from Global and stayed at Gilligans, which was a good decision (the free meal was slightly bigger, and the rooms were SO much nicer). In our hostel room we stayed with 2 girls from London and 2 guys, Ian and Erik, from Nevada, who we got along with very well. Cairns was a lot of fun, and is full of international backpackers. On Tuesday night we went on a pub crawl, which included transportation around the city on a double decker party bus. We met a lot of people from all over the world, which was really fun. We also went souvenir shopping and explored the city.

Hannah, Alicia, and I

Our new friends from the hostel, Ian and Erik (with Alicia)

Double decker bus

I had SO much fun on this trip, and look forward to doing more travelling after classes get out! I was definately bitten by the travelling bug this week! But for now, we have a month left of classes, then a week of study vacation and 2 weeks of finals. Then, my time at JCU is over! It went super fast, and I'm a little sad it is already drawing to a close. I plan on travelling for a few weeks by myself after finals, then will be heading home in time for Christmas. In the next few weeks I am looking forward to diving a shipwreck off the coast of Townsville, which supposedly has HUGE monster fish and is amazing, as well as a backpacking trip on Hinchinbrook Island with my friend Maren. Should be an exciting next few months!