The Strand

Last night I went to The Strand (that's the name of the beach) with some of my friends. At night here they light up the stinger nets and the beach so anyone can swim if they want. There is a huge section of parks and playgrounds that run along the side of the beach for people to play on. It's really cool because the beach stretches for a couple miles. It's not the nicest beach, the water is kind of murky because it's muddy around here and there aren't big waves because the reef blocks them from coming in to shore. But it's a beach and still a lot of fun to go to. Last night we played frisbee and went swimming. There was no one else on the beach, which made it strangely quiet, but nice. Today is my day to catch up on some work, and get ahead because I'm going away 5 of the 6 weekends coming up. Next weekend I'm going on a Rainforest and Waterfall Safari! They claim I'll get to see a platypus, so I'm going to have my camera ready! Did you know that a platypus has spurs on their hind legs the male's spurs carry venom. It's one of very few venomous mammals. It has to be one of the weirdest animals, maybe I should make one my pet!

Finally, an update!

Hey everyone! I know I've been slacking in my updates of this thing; I don't even have an excuse for you! I've been trying to get into the routine of actually going to school here, but it's been hard. I don't think I've ever been to class where it is nice out every day. It's not exactly conducive to studying if you ask me! The way they have classes here is really weird. Each class has a lecture for two hours and a tutorial for an hour every week. I feel like I am never in class! It doesn't help that every weekend is four days long for me! It makes it hard to get into a routine, but I can't really complain! It gives me plenty of time to go to the beach! Let me think about what I've done since I've last updated. I should update more frequently, it will save me the trouble of thinking about what I've done. Last weekend it was two of my friend's birthdays so we all went out on Saturday night to celebrate, which was a lot of fun. Last Saturday I was supposed to go to Maggie Island, but then we found out we might get hit with a cyclone! So we changed our plans and decided not to risk our lives-we went to the aquarium instead! It was awesome, they had a green sea turtle (the one in the picture above) that is supposed to be a vegetarian but because it is in a tank with so many fish and stuff it has started to eat other fish! Pretty sweet! We didn't end up getting hit with the cyclone, which was pretty intense from what I heard, it was just a little more cloudy and windy than normal. This week was pretty uneventful, except for some technology difficulties right before I had to make a presentation, but I won't get into that.

This past Friday there was a full moon party on Maggie Island. The party itself was alright, nothing too special, but we went and hung out on the beach for a couple hours and that was awesome. It was beautiful out and completely wonderful! Then we all ended up pushing each other into the water, which in retrospect was definitely not a good idea, but hey we all made it out alive! With a good story to tell too! I swam with killer jellies and didn't die. How many people can say that? Saturday and Sunday we went to the beach, I actually just got home! It was beautiful! The water here is so warm it always surprises me that it's salt water. I'm still expecting it to be fresh water because in my mind there is no way that the ocean can ever get warmer than freezing cold. I was supposed to go kite boarding this weekend too, but we messed up the lesson times, whoops! We might go tomorrow though! It's great to not have classes on Mondays! I'm going to post you some pictures of campus, because my mom has been requesting that I do so!

This is my frog friend. He lives in the stairs that I take to get to my room, he's nocturnal but he's there a lot. I'm pretty sure he protects me from anything gross coming into my building.

There's me holding a crocodile! He was much softer than I thought he would be. I was told that he could get up to 6 meters long! That's huge!

I couldn't figure out what kind of bird this was, points to anyone who can identify him.

This is just between some of the buildings classes are in. Some of the classrooms open up to the outside, it's so different than at home!

This is the path between the many buildings that the classes are in. The way the number the buildings is ridiculous. 302 is next to 24 which is next to 3. There is no order and it drives me crazy, on top of making me get lost all the time!


These are bush turkeys, and they are kind of annoying because they hang out by the student mall, probably because everyone feeds them. This is one of the buildings I have class in, I think it kind of looks like a castle!

This is on the walk back to my room, I was playing around with the settings on my camera that's why it looks funky.

I was walking across campus to see my friends the other day and there were wallabies all over the place! It was so cool, I had to have seen about 10 of them on my walk.

This is looking up at one of the sets of stairs that lead to my suite. I live to the left on the second floor. It's really pretty! The flying foxes (which are what the giant bats are called) like to hang out in the trees pictured.

I'm heading to Sydney for Easter! I'm really excited for it. We're deciding what we are doing for spring break tomorrow but so far the idea is to rent a van and drive up to Cairns and drive around there for a couple days.

I hope everyone had a good weekend, I'm off to "do some homework" which will probably turn into watching a movie. What can you do?

This is me doing my homework...

It is a good thing I don't go to school "for real" here because I'm pretty sure I would fail out. I can't bring myself to do any work; maybe it's because I just had over two months of vacation and it's hard to get back into the swing of things. Either way, I've been procrastinating my homework for a while now and I thought I would write an update for you guys while I did. See, I'm being productive...kind of. Anyway after I last posted I hiked up Castle Hill, which is this giant hill that is in the center of Townsville. You can see it from everywhere downtown, which would probably be a good way to know what direction I am heading, but I don't know enough to know where to head based on it. It was a great hike, and I didn't die from heat stroke! It was pretty hot, but I think I'm getting used to it. I'll probably be cold when I get home this summer, crazy I know. This weather is kind of confusing me though, because I keep thinking that because it is this nice out I should be going to Maine soon, but that's not happening (which I'm kind of sad about, I will miss Maine in the spring. Actually I'm going to miss Spring in general, which is upsetting). Anyway, the hike wound around the mountain because if it went straight up we would have needed rock climbing gear. I could see Townsville and the ocean the whole way up, which was strange to be able to see the city on a hike. It was beautiful though, the dirt and rock here is so much different then at home, it's almost red. There were stairs that were built into the path to make it easier to climb--I was pretty grateful for these! The view from the top was neat, we could see everything: JCU, Magnetic Island, all of the city, and much more. It was so nice and peaceful on the top of the mountain, after I caught my breath that is! We stayed there to watch the sunset, which was definitely worth the wait. I didn't even fall down the mountain on the way down. It must have been the fact that I thought ahead and brought band-aids, or maybe my sweet new hiking boots. Here are some pictures from the day...

I love this picture! Too bad I was only halfway there though.

Other than Castle Hill, nothing overly exciting is going on here. I'm missing spring training a lot, I've resorted to streaming WEEI over my computer. It's weird to listen to the Big O at 7 am though. I am going on a trip at the end of March to the rainforest and a waterfall. I'm pretty excited! We are planning our trip to Sydney tomorrow, so hopefully we'll book that soon. My friend Caitlin and I are looking into going to Tasmania during our Study week before finals. They give you a whole week to study for your finals before you take them, it's crazy! I plan to take full advantage of that and not study one bit! I'm still trying to figure out a way to get to the Outback, but plane tickets to Alice Springs are pretty expensive. I'll figure something out though, hopefully! O.K now that I have officially wasted enough time I'm going to go finish my work! Or I'll go catch up on what the sox are up to. I love Youk's new facial hair, I think it disguises his massive chin a little better than last years style!