Yongala and Future Travel

I just finished my last final exam - they all went relatively well, hopefully - so I am officially done with fall semester! Yesterday, when I should have been studying, I went on a dive day trip to the Yongala, a shipwreck off the coast of Queensland. We tried to go out last Friday, but due to Queensland's notoriously rainy weather this time of year, the dive company had to cancel. Luckily, our second choice day, yesterday, was beautiful!! We had to wake up super early, since it is a 3 hour boat ride from Townsville. We got 2 dives, and were able to stay underwater for over 40 minutes each dive! That suprised me, because we went deep - to 28 meters max, which is over 90 feet - and you usually can't stay under very long at depth. But we planned the dive so we gradually ascended, making decompression gradual and allowing us to stay under as long as we had air. The wreck was SO COOL - it is basically a reef now, since coral and other reef animals have colonized it. The fish are HUGE - we saw one that was as a big as a small car! I think it was a giant wrasse - here is a picture off the internet:
There were also sea snakes, which are venomous but don't bite humans - they have paddle-like tails and swim all around the wreck. I thought they would be terrifying but they were just another "fish" to admire. Here is a picture of a sea snake:
We saw a turtle briefly, and one cool moment was swimming through a school of thousands of tiny fish, right up to my mask. The big fish in the distance made it even cooler. We saw a school of barracuda, and huge gropers hanging out in the shadows. Oh, and a moray eel! It was an awesome dive. No wonder it is called one of the best wreck dives in the world. A perfect end to my time in Townsville!

I leave for my adventure on Saturday - 2 days. Tomorrow I am packing and putting my stuff in storage, and then Saturday I leave for Airlie Beach. I will try and update my blog whenever I get on the internet, but I make no promises...

Here is my tenative schedule and a map (mom made me type it up for her, so it'll be an easy copy and paste into this blog!):

Saturday November 20^th

Leave Townsville 1:20pm (Premier Bus)

Arrive Airlie Beach 5:35pm

Stay Airlie Beach

Sunday November 21^st

Airlie Beach

Leave Airlie Beach 8:05pm (Greyhound Bus)

Arrive Mackay 10:10pm

Stay Mackay

Monday November 22^nd

Leave Mackay 11:15am (Qantas Flight 2515)

Arrive Brisbane 12:50pm

Stay Brisbane

Tuesday November 23^rd

Brisbane

Wednesday November 24^th

Brisbane

Leave Brisbane 7:30pm (Greyhound Bus – 17 hours)

Begin 21-day Greyhound Bus pass

Thursday November 25^th

Arrive Sydney 1pm

Stay Sydney

Friday November 26^th

Sydney

Saturday November 27^th

Sydney

Sunday November 28^th

Sydney

Leave Sydney 8pm (Greyhound Bus – 12 hours)

Monday November 29^th

Arrive Melbourne 8am

Stay Melbourne

Tuesday November 30^th

Melbourne

Wednesday December 1^st

Leave Melbourne 10:15am (Tiger Airways Flight TT5662)

Arrive Hobart (Tasmania) 11:30am

Stay Hobart

Thursday December 2^nd

Hobart

Friday December 3^rd

Hobart

Leave Hobart 4:10pm (Tiger Airways Flight TT5665)

Arrive Melbourne 5:25pm

Leave Melbourne 8pm (Greyhound Bus – 10 hours)

Saturday December 4^th

Arrive Adelaide 6am

Stay Adelaide

Sunday December 5^th

Adelaide

Monday December 6^th

Adelaide

Leave Adelaide 6pm (Greyhound Bus – 19.5 hours)

Tuesday December 7^th

Arrive Alice Springs 1:30pm

Stay Alice Springs

Wednesday December 8^th

Alice Springs

Leave Alice Springs 7:30pm (Greyhound Bus – 21 hours)

Thursday December 9^th

Arrive Darwin 5pm

Stay Darwin

Friday December 10^th

Darwin

Saturday December 11^th

Darwin

Sunday December 12^th

Leave Darwin 12pm (Greyhound Bus – 11 hours)

Monday December 13^th

Arrive Tennant Creek 2am

Stay at hostel?

Tennant Creek

Leave Tennant Creek 10pm (Greyhound Bus – 8 hours)

Tuesday December 14^th

Arrive Mt Isa 6am

Leave Mt Isa 7am (Greyhound Bus – 12 hours)

Arrive Townsville 7pm

Stay Townsville

21 Day bus pass expires, 11:59pm

Wednesday December 15^th

Townsville

Thursday December 16^th

Townsville

Friday December 17^th

Leave Townsville 5:55am (Qantas Flight 969)

Arrive Brisbane 7:40am

Leave Brisbane 12:05pm (Qantas Flight 15)

Arrive Los Angeles 7am

Leave Los Angeles 11:05am (American Airlines Flight 40)

Arrive New York JFK 7:35pm

Stay Raubsville!

Totals:

Airlie Beach – 1.5 days, 1 night

Mackay – 0 days, 1 night

Brisbane – 2.5 days, 2 nights

Sydney – 3.5 days, 3 nights

Melbourne – 2 days, 2 nights

Hobart – 2 days, 2 nights

Adelaide – 3 days, 2 nights

Alice Springs – 1.5 days, 1 night

Darwin – ~3 days, 3 nights

Tennant Creek – 1 day

Mt Isa – 1 hour

Townsville – 2 days, 3 nights

Total Bus Time: 117 hours!!! ~5 days!!!

~11,000 km = 6,800 miles

It should be quite the adventure!!!

You know you are becoming an Australian when...

...someone from home makes a comment about a temperature of 47 degrees, and your first thought is "wow, that is so hot!!!" I guess I think in Celcius now.

Thorsborne Trail, Hinchinbrook Island

Last Sunday my friend Maren and I began our hike of the Thorsborne Trail, a 32 km (20 mi) trail on Hinchinbrook Island, 1-2 hours north of Townsville. It was actually pretty complicated to actually get to the island, so I'll begin my story with our journey to Lucinda, QLD.

Saturday night was a special farewell dinner paid for by Butler, so the whole group of us got together for a fancy dinner in town.

Some of my closer Butler friends at the dinner

Maren and I had a 7:30 AM Greyhound bus to catch the next day; however the city buses didn't run until 8AM. It is an expensive cab ride from Uni to town ($30-$50), so as poor college students we decided to use our bus day passes from the dinner to take the LAST bus on Saturday to the bus stop and wait/sleep there until 7. This last bus was at 3:30AM. So after the dinner, we headed home of a few hours of sleep, got our stuff, and spent the next few hours at the bus depot (there were a few other backpackers doing similar things, so it was perfectly safe). We arrived in Ingham, QLD and got a shuttle to Lucinda, QLD, where we took a "ferry" (actually a little tin boat) to the island. The boat just pulled right up to the shore and dropped us off (no dock) and set us free! We felt like we were on Survivor. Two other people, a couple, took the boat with us, so we ran into them frequently throughout the trip.

We hiked the trail in four days, three nights, although the last day was not a very far hike to the pickup point. It was GORGEOUS. The first two days had tons of beautiful swimming holes scattered along the trail, which was a welcome relief from the heat. There were rivers, waterfalls, rainforest, regular forest, beaches, mountaintops - basically every ecosystem we could think of that didn't involve snow.

The trail was relatively flat with a few areas of elevation gain, however it had a lot of difficult parts. There were TONS of river crossings (usually shallow), so our feet were usually wet. At one point, we had to cross a huge swamp - we tried to hop from dry island to island, but always ran into places where it was impossible to cross without entering the swamp. We would have to step into shin-high murky water in crocodile territory (there were warning signs at places where crocs were known to inhabit - none at the swamp but still possible!). A large portion of the last day involved rock hopping around a bay covered in boulders.

We didn't have all the right gear for the trip, since mine is in the US, so we had to improvise. We borrowed a tent, but had no sleeping bags/ sleeping pads, so we slept with cotton sheets on the floor of the tent - very uncomfortable and hard. We didn't have a stove, so our food was limited to that which didn't need heating up. We took loaves of bread from our dining hall and bought peanut butter and jelly, along with granola bars and mixed nuts. My loaf went moldy at around Day 2, so I had to pick off mold spots until it was just unbearable, and then ate Maren's bread. Delicious! My boot also fell apart on Day 3, so I had to tie it together with a piece of my sheet.

On the last day, we met another, nicer ferry at the other end of the trail, which took us back to Cardwell, QLD, where we caught a Greyhound home. As soon as we got on the ferry, it started to POUR - we just beat the bad weather! It rained the rest of the night and into the next day. We were lucky that the bulk of our hike was beautiful weather. When we arrived in Townsville, I felt like a real local as I explained to a backpacker how to get to the hostel in town. After a quick stop at Maccas (what Aussies affectionately call McDonald's), we were safe and sound in our beds!

Overall, it was a great hike!! We saw tons of wildlife (lizards, birds, sharks - see below) and the scenery was great.

Me on top of a peak

At the top of a waterfall/cliff overlooking a bay - note Maren for scale

At Zoe Falls - the waterfall is a lot taller than this picture makes it seem, and the pool at its base is perfectly crystal clear

Swimming at Zoe Falls

Treacherous swamp crossing

HUGE spider! I don't think this guy is poisonous, but still terrifying!

One of our campsites, right on the beach

Boulder hopping

Shark things - there were tons of these along the coast, we think they are bottom feeders

One of many lizards

Now I am buckling down and studying (right now, writing this post to procrastinate) since I have finals in the next two weeks. Then, goodbye Townsville! Where did the time go??

For more pictures of my hike, check out my facebook album: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2071229&id=1479180374&l=f92fc74f6f