So the Great Ocean Road is this strip of road along the ocean that goes for a couple hundred kilometers and it’s absolutely beautiful. The water is as blue as you would want the water to be. The road is very winy (spelling?) but I think it adds to the charm of the place.

We made a quick stop in the forrest and saw a bunch of koalas in the trees. It was our first encounter with koalas – we can check this off the list

A little later we saw a wallaby. He was hanging out on the side of the road and at first we weren’t sure what it was so we turned around and stopped right next to him. He was just having a snack, eating fresh grass from the side of the road. He didn’t seem to mind us until I said “wow, it’s a kangaroo!” and bounced away. Tina pointed out it was a wallaby, which was later confirmed after talking with new friends. For info, wallabies are smaller and darker than the “basic” kangaroos.

We stopped at the 12 apostles, which I guess is the main touristy thing on the Great Ocean Road (see image below). That was pretty nice to see these big rocks stick up from the ocean. A bit trippy too.

It was getting late so we looked for a place to stay in Port Campbell. After talking to a man whom we couldn’t understand, we found this amazing place called Port Campbell Guesthouse. I thought it was a backpacker and I was a little skeptical but after checking the room for myself, I was really reassured that this place was really nice and inexpensive.

Tonight we had dinner at a shitty place in town. Worst burger ever! A labrador that was sitting next to us enjoyed it more than I did so I gave him all my burger and got something else to eat.

We then returned to the guesthouse where Mark (the owner), his girlfriend and a guest were having dinner. Mark invited us to join them and served us some wine. We talked about everything and nothing. It felt really good to socialize for a bit. It really felt like we were among friends and Tina and I really enjoyed that moment because we don’t get to experience this much these days.

After a couple bottles of wine, Mark left and we went to bed, which is where I am typing this from. Isn’t technology amazing?

We have new adventures ahead of us tomorrow…

The next day, November 3rd, Sebastien went to a real salon and had an expert shave it off.

After we were clean, waxed, and packed we headed to the Phoenix airport for the first leg of our flight.  My big backpack was stuffed and my carry on backpack was full as well.  A little heavy but doable.  Our flight to LAX was about an hour with no complications.  Once in LAX we had walked about a half a mile to the international gate.  Qantas had a very small area for check in and the lady at the counter was not very friendly.  I had to eliminate a book from my carry on because I was over the carry on limit.  The most you could carry on is 7 kilos.

Once we had our bags checked-in Alison picked us up for dinner.   I am bummed that I will be missing watching her transformation over the next 9 months.  After some food we returned to the airport and tearfully said “good bye”.  Now it was just Sebastien and I on our puffin adventure.

We quickly made it through the security checks and headed to Chili’s for some beers.  There we meet two New Zealand guys who come to the states about 4 times a year to buy old cars .  They were very interesting and I only understood half of what they were saying.  However, they were able to inform us that instead of our flight being 16 hours (which is what we had initially believed) it was only a 12/13 hour flight.  YIPPEEEE!!!  After a few laughs with them we boarded our sold out plane towards Brisbane.

I sat next to this gal who had flown from Brisbane to New York City to run in the marathon.  I couldn’t believe she had flown all that way just for the marathon and then back within 5 days.  She provided us with some hints and tips for getting around Aussie.  The flight on a whole wasn’t to bad.  We both got about 4-6 hours of sleep and the food was decent.  It was a good idea to leave late at night.  We landed around 8 AM on the 5th of November.  We lost a full day somewhere over the Pacific.

Once we landed we gathered our belongings and conveniently took and train and bus to Burleigh Heads.  Which is a beach town south of Surfers Paradise.  We are staying in a Quality Inn like hotel called Outrigger Hotel.  It is decent.  It is a block from the beach which after we dropped off our stuff we checked out.  The sand here reminds me of the sand on Coronado.  Very beautiful stretch of beach.  There were a ton of clear jelly fish on the beach.  We asked John, the lifeguard, about the dangers of them.  He chatted with us for about 10 minutes about this and that.  From surfboards to his motivation in life.  Again, we understood about half of what he was talking about.

We also went grocery shopping which was a shock!  Food here is very expensive.  We purchased a loaf of bread, hummus, some fruit, chicken, and a few other things which cost bout $50.00.  A 4 pack of Guinness was $15.00.  After making ourselves some dinner I was exhausted and we feel asleep pretty early.  Our bed is very hard but it didn’t seem to disrupt my sleep.

Since we fell asleep so early we were up around 6:30 this morning.  After doing our morning routines we walked to the beach and eat our breakfast.  We noticed a dark sky far off the coast and as we watched it the darkness grew closer and closer.  After about 30 minutes it was upon us as was the rain.  So we returned to our hotel and was able to skype with my mom and Alison.

Here are some pictures the view we have of Surfers Paradise and the area where we are staying.

We finally scheduled our departure for the first leg of our year-long trip and we’ll be leaving from Los Angeles to Brisbane, Australia on November 3rd. We found some pretty inexpensive flights on Qantas for about $1,200 for both of us. We were looking into buying one-way tickets but turns out one-way tickets were more expensive than round-trip tickets.

It’s the first time we’ll fly Qantas and I’m really excited because it’s said to be a good airline. Plus, it’s a direct flight from LA to Brisbane so we won’t have to worry about running around to catch connecting flights. The flight is about 16 hours I think. It’s going to be awful so I’ll make sure to make a stop at the drug store before leaving in order to make this flight more enjoyable, if you know what I mean

We wanted to go to New Zealand first but we heard from several sources that NZ can be cold at this time of the year. We don’t want cold. We want sun, beach, and surf. Maybe we’ll change our mind once we get to Australia.

Next step is figuring out where we’re going to stay. I want to be on the Gold Coast, right by Surfers Paradise. We’re looking into several options like renting an apartment or house sitting for other people. We’ll see how it goes…