We are settling into our new home and area. We spent a night with our host family before they left and got a chance to meet them and find out how the house works. They are so nice, I was really glad to get to meet them. We won't get to meet our exchangers in Feburary. We have talked on Skype and met that way, but it is not the same.

We had 3 days of fantastic weather. Just in time for a week of rain again. Oh well I feel like I got a reprieve in the sunny days.  This is so abnormal for their summer weather! I hope it is over in a week and we can get some good beach time in again.

A couple of days ago, we drove the McPherson's to the Coolangatta airport and then continued on to Surfer's Paradise. We really loved it. The beach is fantastic, even with skyscrapers right at the beach. The waves were really fun for Nathan and us. The beach is so clean even though there are so many people there. It feels a bit like Waikiki with the city and beach together, but it is much bigger. The sand squeaks when you walk on it. ? 

There was a great park for kids there. We have found 2 parks that are really beyond parks we have seen at home. Fun for all ages together is the goal. I will post pics later. Our computer went into be debugged as soon as we got here. We will have it back tomorrow. We are lucky to have access to a computer at the house we are staying at, but pictures later.

Heading out for some Dec 23rd crazy Christmas shopping.

I hope you all have a great Christmas season and a fantastic NewYear.

Love Lana, Tom and Nathan

PS I have been asked how to know there is a new post. There is a link at the bottom of this that asks if you want to subscribe or at the top you can be a follower.

Home Sweet Home

Today we are going to our first home exchange. Yippee I am excited! I am looking forward to being in a house we can (temporarily) call our own. We can unpack and settle in a bit. Our place is in a small town called Alstonville, near Byron Bay, New South Wales. This is about 3 hours south of Brisbane and about 15 min from the beach. When we look on Google Earth it is in the Macadamian area. Are macadamia’s orchards? Or groves? Or hmmm, things to learn.  I am looking forward to getting to know the area and the towns around it. I am planning on taking a few surf lessons while we are there. That should be interesting!

They have a pool too. Nathan has surprised us the one first time we got to a pool he took my noodle and waded right in and started swimming with it. He has just taken lessons and still seemed so tentative about the water, but I guess he is ready. Hopefully the weather will warm up soon, so we can use the pool. I know I can’t complain, it is hovering around 20C and we have shorts most of the time, but it is really wet and cold for what this area usually is like at this time of the year. We only packed for hot weather. We have had rain in the forecast everyday so far, but only the last couple have actually been rain. We changed our direction to travel after we left Sydney area because of all the rains. There are a lot of areas south that have flooded in the past few weeks. The 20+ year drought is over at least for most of the area, but we are ready for some sun now!

Nathan and I got a chance for a few craft days when we did finally get rain. He was so excited to be making Christmas decorations! We made coloured chains for hanging and snowmen linked holding hands. There was lots of cutting and gluing different bits on. We got a new activity book for a preschool program that has been fun activities for him also. He needs a lot more stimulation every day. It is so fun to see all he learns so quickly. But, can I keep up?

We found some kangaroo’s in a few spots, but the golf course was the easiest to see them. Can you imagine golfing along and there goes a kangaroo? I guess it’s a little bit like deer for us. We also saw Koala’s at a koala hospital which is for rehabilitating hurt koala’s to put back in the wild. They are so cute. There was a 9 month old that was just brought out of one on one care and it was really active for the day time. Lots of pictures and video. There were lots there and we were fairly close to them, but Koala’s really just sleep in the trees all day. It was not the type of place where you can hold one, but we will go to a zoo along the way and get to do that.

I am having some computer issues, and camera downloading issues, so the facebook pictures will come in a bit.

We finally got ourselves up to speed with technology. We struggled along without a ‘mobile’ for a week or so and finally got one. We also got a wireless broadband set up instead of paying for internet everywhere we go. We are connected! 011-61(from Canada) 04 28058478 Anyone have international text. Ours is free! Free incoming calls over here too.?

I have been having a bit of trouble with the plants here. I think I expected house plants and our tender annuals, but instead I am shocked at all the temperate things they also have in their gardens. I think in Mexico there is not much for landscaping unless it grows there, but in Australia they have imported a lot of natives back and forth and we all grow whatever we can. Things like boxwood, abelia and London Plane tree seem wrong to me. Never mind the deer fern. It grows huge here. I even saw a small hedge of it, yes a sheared hedge. I didn’t say it was pretty, just a different application! I need to go to the north to get just tropical jungle I guess. I find the weeds the most interesting for things like coreopsis and bears breach growing wild. Gazania’s are a grass weed down here. Tom is making fun of me taking pictures of the weeds.

We have been seeing a lot of areas along the coast. We have been better for traveling now that we have had apartment style accommodation. A full kitchen and laundry makes it a lot easier to be on the road. We are so not in ‘on the road’ mode this year. None of us are happy with a few hours of driving in a day. We would have made it to LA at the most if we were driving to Mexico this year!

Love to all,

Lana, Tom and Nathan

New things

One week down under and, what have we learned? Australians and Australia are very the same as us but so different in some unnamable way. The differences are slight, but they are in everything and everywhere just hard to pinpoint past the noticeable words like ‘crikey’ and  ‘ta’.  An easy country for us to travel in.

The most obvious difference for us is driving on the wrong side of the road. How did this originate is my question. It seems so crazy to have ever changed the side of the road everyone drives on, nevermind the side of the car you put the steering wheel on. We were the stereotypical  Canadian dodging traffic for a few days in Sydney. It is strange how hard it is to cross the road at first. After 4 days it came down to a rental car. We got a Holden, Commodore which is an Aussie made car. Who knew they made cars? It is actually quite nice, but I felt like we were given the no name version of a car. This was quite an experience for the first hour. Really funny anyway. We really were getting a good laugh out of how strange it felt to have to turn the corner or change lanes. It isn’t as funny anymore, but I think Tom has to really stay thinking and more aware than normal. I have to give it a try soon.

 

Sydney fashion is a bit different too. There are short short skirts and really long ones. And ruffles! There are ruffles everywhere I look. Tank tops, to wedding dresses.  The food prices are crazy for eating out. We were a little shocked at how much a meal costs. Entrees were $30-40 everywhere.

We stayed in a nice laid back area in Sydney called, North Sydney or more specific, Crow’s Nest. It was like Kits. There were lots of great restaurants young healthy people and close proximity to the down town. We bid on a room that was close to the city and ended up with an ok place for reasonable. Although we booked a place with a pool, the pool was ‘ Not open until summer’ What? It is summer, OK technically it’s not for a few days, but come on we want a pool! I think it is a lame way to get out of saying the pool is broken and we won’t give you a discount for not having it. OK I got over that and paying for inernet and enjoyed the view.

Max was still in Sydney and we got to see him for a short bit, before he headed to Adelaide. He is going to come out to the West Coast when we have a house out there.

Sydney has Oprah fever. And yes I did mislable the Opera house in my facebook pictures the Oprah house. I can blame jetlag. I think it will be the Oprah house for a few days this week when she is filming her show there. She is here with 4-500 others on a 10 day tour and the news has been ‘chockah’ with Oprah everything. There are banners downtown welcoming them, they closed the zoo for a day for them, and there is a huge O on the harbour bridge that lights up at night. I guess that was as close as I am going to get to meet her. That is much closer than I think I have ever been.

We have made some great setups for house exchanges while we are here from homeexchange.com. We will be at our first place December 21^st and they will be at our house if you feel up for spreading some hospitality to some Aussies this winter. We also had some people who offered us hospitality. We just stayed a few nights in the Blue Mountains with an Australian couple with a  5 year old  and a 6 month old boys. Nathan was in heaven with a boy his age to play with! We felt so at home. They filled us in on the Assuie way as they know the differences as they have lived in Canada.

We have had little problem getting our sleep back on track and the weather has been easy since it has been mild for Sydney. There has been a lot of rain for weeks and now southern New South Wales has a lot of flooding. We have seen very little rain even though it has been predicted for every day we have been here. We will see a good plant life display all the way around after all the rain. Now we are ready for the heat.

The flight was ok. Nathan did really well after he stopped asking ‘When are we going to be  in  Stralia?’ He did realy well with the flight, just the normal restlessness and lack of proper sleep.

Speaking of proper sleep, I am going to go off now. Please email at lmartin@pacificlandscapes.ca or call us on skype at lana.and.tom.martin

Cheers,

Lana, Tom and Nathan