Hidden Valley

Last weekend I went on the Hidden Valley tour and stayed at the resort there. It was AMAZING! We were picked up at the uni (oz speak for the university, and oz means aussie o-z get it?) at 9 am Saturday morning and from there we drove north to Paluma. We drove by all this sugar cane and our guide told us about these cane beetles that were eating all the sugar cane. They were looking for a way to get rid of them and some country suggested the cane toad because they would supposedly eat all the beetles. Well after introducing 100 cane toads they didn't eat any of the beetles and they hopped off. But they are poisonous, not bad enough to kill humans, but other animals. There are no predators for the toad, and now it's overtaking Australia. They reproduce at a ridiculous rate too. I thought I would share that little fun fact with you. So the first place we went was Little Crystal Creek. It was this beautiful river with a bunch of waterfalls. We stopped there for a while and we were able to swim and hang out.

So after we hung out at the upper part of Little Crystal Creek we adventured down to the lower part. There was another waterfall and a couple of people in the group we were with were jumping off of the rocks. So I did too, only to read a sign later that we weren't supposed to. Oh well.

Now, I think that's a pretty sweet jump. I kind of look like I'm second guessing myself actually, but my form is top-notch. Don't worry I didn't hit any rocks or anything, I made people go before me to test it out. See, I used my head! So after this we went on a hike through the rainforest. It's not as lush or wet as I had expected. Maybe we weren't in the thickest part of it, but either way it was beautiful. It's so different than home.

We saw a bunch of cool trees, Strangling Figs and Quandongs.

That's me and my friend Nicole in front of the Quondong. We hiked to a lookout that overlooked the valley and the other mountains, you could even see the ocean!

It was really pretty. Later, after lunch because we were all starving, we finally got to the resort. This place was so cool. It was completely powered by solar power. They are totally off the grid. They had a bunch of cabins, but mine was the best. No, really it was. My friend Caitlin and I shared a room and we got our own cabin with a patio and little propane stove and tea kettle. So after we got there we had about an hour and a half before we went on a platypus walk so we had tea and sat out on the patio and played cards. It was perfect. Now here is where I would like to post a picture of a platypus and talk about how awesome it was to see one, but those animals are sneaky. We waited for almost two hours (quietly and you know how hard that is for me!) but we never saw one. We split into two groups, and the other group saw a brief glimpse of one but that was it. I haven't given up hope though- I'm going to find one when I go to Melbourne in 3 weeks. We then went on a night walk to see night animals. We saw possums, gliders, spiders and wallabies.

Ok, this last one wasn't actually on the night walk. It was our other roommate. He was big! The spiders we saw are harmless though, we made sure to ask! Well I still have to tell you about the Sunday, but I'm tired and I need to go to bed. So I'll post more tomorrow. 4 days until opening day. I still get just as excited all the way around the world, even though I can't listen to or watch the games!