Kate

Hey Everyone,

So much has happened over the past three weeks. Dave and I have definitely made the most of our early departure from our Birdsville/Quilpie job. However, this post is not about that. This post is going to be a bit different from our previous ones.

My Aunt Kate passed away one week ago today. She died peacefully surrounded by family, and for that I am very grateful. However, I have a heavy heart today, as my whole family will be at her memorial, celebrating her life, and I am forced to miss it. So, I just wanted to take a minute or two to have a little memorial for myself.

Kate was a character! For those of you that knew her, you know that there was never a dull moment when she was around. She was definitely feisty in all aspects of her life...her fashion sense, her hair colour, her remarks. She challenged all those around her constantly. My cousins and I have been sending messages back and forth about some of the "life lessons" that we learned from Kate. Reading all of these have really shown how much of a impact she had on all of us, and most of them really made me smile, so I just want to share a few of them with you all.

*When you get money in your pocket, never save it...but instead, give much of it to others, and buy gifts with the rest!

*Never spend more than a week with the same hair colour and the best fashion sense is a daring one!

*You're never too old to rediscover your passion and talents. Everyone in our family has at least one of Kate's painting hanging in our homes.

*When babysitting, you can take a nap as long as you tell people that you are just "resting your eyes". (I personally experienced this one on many occasions, and I turned out fine :)

*There's nothing like a box full of candies to get you through the second half of a football game - and it really revs up your steamboat counting!

*Generosity is always appreciated whether it's receiving the perfect dishcloth, or opening an entire bag of jewellery and trinkets.

We came up with so many more...oh, the memories. I had the privilege of spending the majority of my childhood weekends with Kate and I have so many more memories from that. You could always count on dessert on Saturday night - chocolate bars from the corner store. And, she always showed up on Saturday morning with a dozen donuts - and in that box I could always count on Kate for a delicious Hawaiian sprinkle donut. YUM! I am having a donut today in her honour!!

I really wish I could be with my family today. It sure is hard being so far away when something like this happens, but I know that they will celebrate her life in style. I am there in spirit and sending lots of love and positive thoughts their way.

We will all miss you Kate!! May you rest in peace xoxo

 

Make sure you tell your loved ones how you feel every chance you get and have a safe, happy and loving holiday season.

xoxo Steph

The Difference a Week Can Make

Oh, the difference a week can make!!

I am writing this blog post from the comfort of Woody's house in Brisbane. We originally weren't supposed to be back in Brisbane until the middle of December, but plans can change, and in our case, they did so very fast!

Last Sunday we got word that the owners of the caravan park were letting us go early because of a drop in tourists at the caravan park. What we didn't realize at the time was how quickly they were getting rid of us - we were on the bus out of Quilpie by Wednesday afternoon!

Luckily for us, we were able to squeeze in a few more things we wanted to do around the area before being shipped back to Brisbane. Katrina and Jeff were nice eno


ugh to take us on another drive to a nearby town called Adavale. It is a tiny town about an hour north of Quilpie. Like Birdsville, there wasn't much there! There is the Adavale Pub, which we had a drink and snack at, and the cemetery, which had people in it from as far back as 1883, and that's about it! I guess the town used to be a bit bigger, but it's right in a flood zone and it has experienced a few bad floods recently so many of the local residents have packed up and moved away.

Rob, the current manager of the caravan park, also does a mail run for the people living on stations and homesteads outside of Quilpie twice a week. Their mail is delivered to the town of Quilpie and he goes and sorts it and drives it out to them on Mondays and Thursdays. During the peak of tourist season they bring visitors along for the ride so they can see how people live on these big cattle stations. The tour is currently done for the season, but Rob was kind enough to bring us with him when he dropped off the mail on Monday. We had a great day checking out a bit more of the outback, the locals and all the wild animals. We saw hundreds of roos, cows and emus, some sheep, llamas and even a wedge tail eagle (lucky for us no snakes or spiders!). We also got to meet a few people who live on these stations and see their houses. One of the best parts of the day was getting to see what people use as mailboxes out there. Some of them use old oil drums that they've rigged up, while some of them use old appliances like fridges and freezers. Pretty hilarious to see an old freezer sitting by the side of the road with nothing else around for miles and miles! Daves favourite part of the day was a Vietnam Veterans Retreat called Alaric Homestead. There is just one gentleman living there right now, but he upkeeps the place really well. He has a veggie garden and a bunch of fruit trees, as well as a ton of free range chickens around. It was a nice, tranquil place right by a river about 1.5 hours from Quilpie.

 

We also had the opportunity to play one last night of bowls and one last game of touch footy. Brendo was kind enough to let Dave and I both bowl for his team - which probably wasn't a very good idea, because we lost! Lawn bowling is much harder then it looks, but also really fun! And our last touch footy game was pretty eventful also - I scored a try!!! Wahoo! It was the very end of the game and I caught a pass from Dave right at the end zone and was able to ground it before being touched. Needless to say, I left Quilpie on a high!

Instead of going right back to Brisbane on Wednesday, we took the bus back to Charleville and spent 2 nights there and took the train from Charleville to Brisbane on Friday night. Charleville doesn't have a ton to offer, but we wanted to stay because they have The Cosmos Centre, which is an observatory that runs star gazing shows at night and some daytime interactive displays. Unfortunately, both nights we were in Charleville were cloudy and rainy so we didn't get to do the star show with the telescope, but we did do the day displays. It was a good thing we had the opportunity to do the star show in Birdsville because from what we heard from the locals, they show you a lot of the same stuff. But off we went on the train on Friday night for our 17 hour train ride back to Brisbane. We weren't really excited about the experience again, especially after our first time on the train with "the screamer" so we asked the conductor how much it was to upgrade to a sleeping compartment. We decided it was too expensive for our tastes and settled into our seats with the rest of the rif-raf. When the conductor was coming around to check our tickets he stopped and wrote on the top of ours "Sleeper cabin 16, 17, 18" and then said to wait 5 mins then go find the cabin. He upgraded us to a private sleeper for free. It was the best news we had gotten in days!!! We had this cabin all to ourselves - it was quiet and comfortable and had more then enough room for us. It was a much better night on the train!!!

Since we were coming back to Brisbane early, we decided to look into things happening in the next few weeks to fill our time. We were in luck - The Ashes was just about to start in Brisbane the weekend we were getting back. The Ashes is a cricket tournament played every year between Australia and England. There is quite a bit of history about this match and between these two teams so we immediately looked to see if there were tickets available - and we got 3 tickets for Sundays match!!! It was pretty neat to go to our first international cricket match. And the icing on the cake was we were there to watch Australia kill England. They beat them by 381 runs!!  The day was long, but really fun! There were 2 rain delays, one of which had some hail also. We got to watch the Barmy Army (the England cheering section) go to town with all their chanting and cheering and we got to see the Aussies win! All in all a great day!

 

We have also decided to take a little trip with our new freedom. We have booked ourselves on a flight next Wednesday to head down to Tasmania for 2 weeks before the holidays start. We are really looking forward to spending some time down there. It sounds like such a beautiful place and we can't wait to explore it. Not sure yet what we'll be doing, but I think there are a few good hikes and some good wineries around also. If anyone has ever been and has some suggestions please feel free to contact us!

That's it for now!

I hope everyone in Canada is staying warm these days...I know we sure are!!

xoxox

In and Around Quilpie

So, we have been in Quilpie for just over 2 weeks and we have managed to keep ourselves pretty busy! There really is a lot more to do here than in Birdsville!!

Every Friday night we head up to the Lawn Bowling club for 'bowls'. Pretty much the whole quilpie community comes out for it, so it's a great place for us to meet new people here. This past Friday Dave even had the opportunity to bowl with Brendo's team. Brendo is a boilermaker in town and he was kind enough to save a spot on his team this week for Dave. Boy, was it ever an crazy night for bowls. The night started great, then came the weather. Dave bowled in a wind storm, dust storm and rain storm, all in a matter of a game. It was insane how quickly the weather changed! They ended up calling the game a little early because of weather, which is too bad because I know Dave was having a great time And next Friday Brendo said I would get to play...fingers crossed I don't make a totally fool of myself. Lawn bowling is actually pretty hard because the bowls (you can't call them balls or else you get in trouble here!) are weighted and they curve different ways depending on how you throw them, so this should be interesting!

 

Last Tuesday was also Melbourne Cup in Australia. Melbourne Cup is the biggest horse race in Australia and known all over the world. The country pretty much shuts down for it (depending on what state you live in). Quilpie had a public holiday to celebrate - it is the only holiday I know of where people get time off work to gamble and drink! But it was pretty exciting. Everyone dresses up with their fascinators/hats and gorgeous dresses to watch a 3 minute horse race. And the gambling...insane! Most people in Quilpie went to the Bowls Club for the afternoon for a luncheon and to watch the race. We had to work so we didn't get there until after the race was done, but we did get to watch the race on TV. Neither of the horses Dave and I picked to win did though :( But once the races were over the club put on some races of its own for more gambling! There were Chook (Chicken) races and a race of Jack Russel's, which was my favourite part of the day. For the dog races, they dress them up with little saddles on their backs with tiny fake jockeys while they run...it's so cute! The Chook races weren't very entertaining because not many of the chickens ran. People had to go up behind them and scare them just to get them to move! That night we went over to the pub for a post-Melbourne Cup celebration with some people...I am sure that some of those people did not have a fun day at work the next day if you know what I'm saying! It sure was a party!

We have also kept ourselves busy on Tuesday nights with touch footy (rugby). It was cancelled last week because everyone was too drunk after Melbourne Cup to play, but it'll be back on tonight and I plan on trying it for the first time this week. It looks easy, but this whole not being able to throw backwards thing may prove a little harder for me. Dave played a few weeks ago and really liked it, so I"ll give it a try this week and see how it goes.


Our neighbours at the caravan park, Katrina and Jeff, have also been kind enough to take us on a few outings around Quilpie to see some of the sights. Two weekends ago they took us to Lake Houdraman (or Lake Boogeyman, as Katrina likes to call it), which I wouldn't really classify as a lake, but they sure do. They even take their jet ski's out on it and water ski. The water level is apparently pretty low right now because Quilpie is in a drought, so not many people use it much anymore except the wildlife. We got to see a bunch of emu, cows, herrings and other birdlife there. From the lake we went to Baldy Top and Table Top, which are two hills nearby. The best part of the trip is we got to see some wild kangaroos pretty close to the car and I even got a few good pics of one. This past weekend they took us to another town nearby called Adavale. It's smaller than Birdsville if you can believe it. Apparently it used to be a bigger town but it is right in a flood plane, so every few years it gets really flooded and most people have just decided to move away. The population now is only 25 people. But don't you worry, there is a pub there! Outback towns have to have a pub in them! There is even this place nearby that is a pub without a town called Toompike. We haven't had a chance to go yet, but hopefully we will because it's apparently pretty neat. Lots of animals around, but all there is, is a pub!

 

This past weekend we also got to see our first live cricket game - Quilpie vs Charleville. Unfortunately Quilpie lost, but it was still fun to go watch the game. Although, it isn't the most exciting game to watch and it was hot as hell outside, we still had a good Saturday afternoon!

Other then that we've just been working and hanging around. The managers of the caravan park have gone away on vacation for a month so Dave and I pretty much run the show here right now. There is someone filling in for them while they\re away, but we feel in charge most the time! I have also had the chance to ride my first ride-on lawnmower. That was exciting. And we spend a lot of time sitting outside with Katrina, Jeff and Hank just chatting. For those of you gymnastics enthusiasts out there, I have finally figured out who Hank reminds me of...Bela Karolyi!! He looks exactly like him and has an accent as well, so I crack up everytime I see him! Laura and David, all I can think about when he talks is an announcer saying "what a birthday gift for coach Bela Karolyi" ...remember that! hahahah

Anyways, I digress...

I hope you are all doing well. Thanks for reading!

xoxo

...Hello Quilpie

We made it!!

We decided to say a proper goodbye to Birdsville at the pub on Thursday night, and,wow, did we ever have a little bit too much fun! Neither of us were feeling optimal on Friday morning - it was all we could do to finish packing and make it to the plane on time. So, you can imagine how much fun our plane trip was to Quilpie. I actually packed extra plastic bags in my carry on bag just in case...hahah. But we made it safe and sound and started our time in Quilpie with a 2 hour nap!

So far, Quilpie looks like a nice little town and I think we're really going to enjoy it here. Everyone has been really nice and kind so far and there is a heck of a lot more to do here then there was in Birdsville. For instance, on our first night here it just happened to be the night that pretty much the entire town goes to the lawn bowling club for dinner and bowling. It was hilarious to see everyone there - kids, parents, adults, teenagers. Everyone there just to have a game of bowls before continuing with their Friday night. It seems like a really nice community of people who enjoy spending time together - especially when lawn bowling is involved!

We are starting to look forward to all that Quilpie is going to have to offer. There is Tuesday night touch rugby that Dave wants to join and a cricket team that he may also try and see if he can play with. We're going to see if we can get involved in the Friday night lawn bowling. The caravan park has hot tubs and the town has a public swimming pool that we'll hopefully be able to put to good use. And there's even a library and a few stores to help pass the time. It was nice being able to walk down the street and stop into the butcher or the grocery store to pick up a few things for dinner over the weekend. Oh ya, and there's grass! It's amazing to see greenery around again. And to keep their lawns in order a lot of people own rams, Shetland ponies and horses as pets to help keep the grass in their yard under control. Just hilarious! The person who lives beside the caravan park has a massive ram as a pet that Dave and I fed the other day.

It looks like we'll be able to keep pretty busy in Quilpie. There is lots of work around the park for us - especially Dave. They already have him really busy building a chain-link fence and helping to lay a new floor in the Heritage Inn Hotel with Hank. Hank is a hilarious man from Holland who has done a lot of travelling in his life. He is a 72 year old who never stops working. He's been hired by Troy (the owner of both caravan parks we've been at, as well as the Heritage Inn) to do odd jobs here and there and it seems like Dave has become his side-kick! The two of them go off and work away together and Hank tells Dave hilarious stories and keeps him entertained!

I just wanted to say a big Happy Birthday to my sister Laura today!

I hope everyone is doing well and Happy (almost) Halloween!!

xoxo

Goodbye Birdsville...

Well folks,

We finally got our marching orders the other day and we are flying out of Birdsville on Friday. We have been in this tiny town for 5 weeks but it's gone by so fast! We've had the chance to experience a lot of what the outback has to offer and we have really enjoyed ourselves! We have seen amazing things, met some great people and had the unique opportunity to explore this outback town and all its charm.

The last week and a bit has been relatively uneventful. We did have our campfire with friends. I ate a few too many roasted marshmallows, but it was worth it :) And we also had the privilege of experiencing a Birdsville Bakery Friday Night Dinner. This is a new tradition in Birdsville, but it's a great one. Dusty and his wife Theresa have started Friday night dinner, as a change from only being able to eat out at the pub. They even have a signature dish...Major Mitchell's Birdsville Fried Chicken (the B.F.C.). Get it...like Colonel Sanders Kentucky Fried Chicken. And it was actually really good fried chicken! Not too greasy but full of flavour! If you ever find yourself in Birdsville on a Friday night, make sure you go see Dusty at the bakery for some B.F.C.

Other then that the only interesting this has been the weather. It has been crazy recently. We've had 3 days straight of over 42 degree weather, then it will change to a wild dust storm. we've survived a couple dust storms so far - they kinda suck though. Nothing like getting pelted in the eye with sand! But they are really interesting to see coming. They block out the sunsets and moon rising and just give the town this eerie feeling - kind of neat to experience.

So, we are heading out tonight to the pub for one final goodbye to Birdsville, then we are off to Quiplie tomorrow for the next 6-7 weeks to work in the Channel Country Caravan Park. I think it's going to feel like a luxury working there - they have 3 hot tubs, beautiful amenties, a caravan for us with an en suite bathroom. And Quiplie will probably feel like a city - a library, 2 motels, 3 restaurants, a bakery, a coffee shop, a newsagent, post office, a public swimming pool, etc.

Bring on another new adventure!

I hope everyone is getting excited for Halloween! What are your costumes going to be??
xoxo

Thanksgiving in Birdsville

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!!

We hope everyone enjoyed spending time with friends and family over the holidays! We sure did miss being in Canada to celebrate, but we did our best to celebrate here on our own. A delicious dinner, phoning home to family and talking about what we are thankful for.

We have been pretty busy since our last blog post so bare with me…I know, can you believe it?! Busy in Birdsville!! We have almost checked everything off our ‘To Do in Birdsville’ list, which is good timing because the caravan park in considerably slower these days, so I think our days here are limited.

We started our busy 2 weeks with the star show. The police officers wife, Sandra, used to work in an observatory in Charleville and has since bought her own telescope and runs star gazing shows in the Birdsville desert. It was AWESOME! It was about 1-1 ½ hours of her talking about planets, stars, galaxies, pointing out constellations and specific stars. She was s knowedgable and we even got to see some neat things through the telescope – including Saturn and its rings! That was definitely the high point of the night for both Dave and I…it was so cool!

That weekend, there was a ‘fun-day’ at Pelican Point here in Birdsville (just across the billabong from the caravan park) put on by the Diamantina Shire Council, which is the council that looks after Birdsville and surrounding area. It was called Wet Fest. After we were done work we went over to see what it was all about. We knew it was mostly for children, but we thought it would be nice to try and socialize with some locals. It was actually a really fun day! There were tons of organized games and activities for kids and adults to participate in – tug of war, 3 legged race (Dave and I won the adult division!), kayak races, etc. And the prizes…insane! The prizes for the kayak race, which Dave won with two local kids, was sand toys and a Canon camera each! Obviously we declined taking the camera and Dave made some friends with some little girls playing in the sand fast when he asked if they wanted the toys. But it was a very well-run day, with lots of fun for the Birdsville and surrounding community. People actually came in from the next town over called Bedourie…over 200km away. So hilarious how they describe being from the next town over – only 2-3 hour drive!

One of the best parts of the day was meeting some of the local people. We met a man named Jody (a local) and his German girlfriend Franzie. They were both so nice and welcoming. They even invited us back to their house after the day because they had some friends coming in for the weekend from a nearby cattle station. Obviously we agreed! We went back to Jody’s house and met a group of 6 people who he used to work with – they were from all over the world! Tanzania, Australia, Denmark…it was so nice to spend some time with them and have a few drinks as well. We also spent our first night at the local pub – a hilarious establishment with amazing sayings all over it. For example, they have a 7 course meal for only $22 – a pie and 6 beers…hehehe. We played pool late into the evening and got to spend some time getting to know our new friends J Some of the most hilarious parts of the evening were the animal life we encountered. In a 3 hour span I got to hold a baby pig (named Terry) and feed a baby calf. The things you can do when you are open to any opportunity.

The next day was the NRL finals – so we found ourselves back at the pub to watch the game. It was a pretty good game actually – the Sydney Roosters won over the Manly Sea Eagles. Rugby League is a much more interesting game then Rugby Union, which is what we play in Canada. If you haven’t seen a game ever, you should try – so insane how much contact and tackling there is!! We watched the game with our new friends and the night got away from us again! We are definitely too old to drink 2 nights in a row and have to go to work the next morning….but it was too much fun not to join in, especially since all of our friends work on a cattle farm that is over a 3 hour drive away. They only make it into town every 3-4 weeks, so we may never see them again, but it was so nice to get out of our little caravan and make some friends!

One of the nights we were at the pub we also met a girl named Jenna. Her family is from Birdsville and we have since found out that they pretty much own all of Birdsville – the Brook family. They also own 2 of the 3 cattle stations around the area. Anyways, she is about our age and very nice. She even invited us over to her house a couple of nights later for a games night. There were 6 of us there and we played Pictionary – Dave and I won! It was a really nice relaxing evening with people who actually live in Birdsville and who will hopefully get to see a little more before we ship out of here.

One of the best things we’ve had the chance to do since being in the outback is spend a sunset at Big Red. Big Red is a sand dune about 40km outside of Birdsville and it is one of the main attractions of Birdsville and the Simpson Desert. It is the tallest sand dune in the Simpson Desert. We got there just in time for the sunset and it was spectacular. A warm, still night, with a beautiful sunset! One of the managers of the caravan park, Neil, took us out and we were so grateful that he did. It was amazing!

We’ve been keeping our evenings busy with campfires, roasting marshmallows and watching The Wire and The League. We are thinking of hosting Jenna and our Birdsville friends for a campfire tomorrow. That is, if the weather cooperates! We’ve also started to plan our adventures after the outback. We have bought a flight to New Zealand – leaving Brisbane on January 1, 2014. New year, new country! We are starting to really plan things to do while in New Zealand so if you have any suggestions please feel free to email! So far we have planned a 4 day hike, a 3 day kayak trip and a rugby weekend in Wellington in February… we are very excited about them all!

I think that’s about it for now! We really are enjoying our time in Birdsville, as crazy as that sounds coming from a city girl who never thought she could live in a town of 80 people. But everyone has been so nice and we have had some great experiences and been able to spend a lot of quality time with each other also. It’s been great so far and we’re ready for any other adventures ahead!

Special shout outs now: Congratulations to our friends Meag and Andrew on the birth of their beautiful baby boy, Harrison. We couldn't be happier for our friends Laura and Forrest on the birth of their baby boy James (a 4meister in the waiting). Last but certainly not least, congratulations to our amazing friends Gorman and Zulys on their engagement!!! Yay! Cannot wait to celebrate when we are back in Canada!!!

Miss you all

xoxoxo

 

 

Last Town Before Nowhere

So, we have been in Birdsville for a full 2 weeks and things have been going well so far. The caravan park has been busier than we expected, which is keeping us out of trouble! Our cleaning partners, Barb and Steve have left the park though, so now it’s just Dave and I here. It makes it a little more boring, so we do miss them! We spend about 4-6 hours a day cleaning, laundry, making beds, etc. It’s not mentally hard, but it’s keeping us moving physically, which is nice. Now that school holidays are coming to an end, the work should start to slow down a bit…but we’ll see.

So, with the rest of our days we have been exploring Birdsville and surrounding area. Before Barb and Steve left, they took us on a drive out into the desert. We got to see an old cemetery in the city, as well as this form of tree (a Waddi tree) which only grows in 100-120 sq km in Australia. It’s pretty rare and apparently very durable. You have to cut the tree while it’s still alive, because if you try to wait until its dead then it essentially turns to rock, it is so hard! They also took us over to the Birdsville Race Track, where the famous Birdsville horse races happen the first weekend in September every year. Then Steve took us to a small sand dune nearby where we watched the sunset – there are some pretty spectacular sunsets here in the outback! And the stars….wow! You can see so many stars here, with all different constellations also. There is a woman in town (the police officers wife, Sandra) who runs a star show with a telescope every once and a while, so that is definitely on our list of things to do while we’re here. Another day, Dave and I rented bicycles and went for a ride. We made a few stops – a local Aboriginal area, as well as Pelican Point. There is a ton of birdlife around Birdsville: pelicans, corellas, Australian ravens, galaws, butcher birds, etc. We’ve also seen a feral cat that likes to hang around the caravan park, and a goanna walking around. No scary snakes, scorpions or spiders….yet :/

 We have also been frequenting the gym here a few times a week. It is hilarious trying to use their few pieces of equipment to put together a full program. But the workouts are definitely better than either of us could have imagined here in Birdsville. And the best part is that the gym is air conditioned! It also has a huge TV and Wii unit – we’re trying to hunt down the hand held devices so we can try playing Wii cricket while we’re here.

 The weather has been so variable while we’ve been here, you never know what you’re going to wake up to. We have had some days around 23-24 degrees and others over 40 degrees. The evenings can actually be pretty cool also. The last two nights have dropped down to about 10-12 degrees. And the wind can be insane! We’ve had a couple of days when the wind has been over 50 km/h causing huge sand storms and wreaking havoc all over the caravan park. The last few days have been beautiful though – 25 degrees with a light breeze, and nice and cool at night for sleeping! We’re enjoying these days while we’ve got them because before you know it, it’ll be 35+ degrees almost every day…eek!

 We’ve also seen and done a few other random things. Dave has eaten a Kangaroo pie at the local bakery (I stuck with a chocolate milkshake). And we have seen this man who has 6 camels that he just walks around the town. Almost every day you can see him herd his 6 full camels from the Billabong through the town and back again. I was able to catch up to him one day – man are camels ever huge when you’re standing right next to them. I’m not sure what he does, or why he has the camels (no one around here really is) but it’s a spectacle non-the-less.

 

We’re hoping you are all doing well and starting to get excited for Thanksgiving!

We’ll be in touch again soon

xoxo

Planes, Trains and Automobiles

Hey Everyone,

We are alive and well in Birdsville! We had a great last few days in Brisbane before heading out. We got to watch some Rugby League playoff games with Woody and some NFL football with Ryan, as well as see some sights in Brisbane. We took a city cat boat tour along the river in Brisbane one night, which was beautiful with the water front all lit up. There was also the Brisbane festival going on, with light shows and other attractions, but we didn’t make it to anything because we had some rain. But Brisbane was a great city and we are excited to have another chance to see it once our adventure in Birdsville is over.

So, now to the nitty gritty. We left Brisbane on Tuesday, September 17 at 7pm on the overnight train to Charleville. Oh man, was that a hilarious night. First of all, it is a 17 hour train ride west into the outback – the line is called the Westerner and we learnt while we were on it that they may be shutting it down soon because not many people use it anymore and because it is OLD! It sounded like it could have used some oil on it because it squeaked and squawked all night long. Also, there were two options of tickets – since ours was bought for us by the people running the caravan park we were in economy with all the rif raf. We had one gentleman who coughed a gross phlegmy cough the entire night long and screamed out randomly, just for fun it seemed. There was also 2 little kids who ran up and down the aisle and screaming, stood on top of chairs to turn the lights on and off constantly and stole a pen from a man near us and started drawing on seats. Needless to say, their grandmother wasn’t very good at keeping them in line. We may spring for a sleeper cabin if we train back to Brisbane J

The train only goes as far as Charleville these days, so we switched onto a coach bus for a short bus ride to Quilpie, which is a town of about 300 people. The owners of the caravan park also own another park in Quilpie, as well as the Heritage Inn hotel. So we stayed at the Heritage Inn for the night before our flight out to Birdsville the next day. Quilpie was a cute little town though – we went for a short walk around and saw a little museum about the area, as well as the town pool, pub, grocery store, post office and coffee shop. It only took us about 20 minutes to do all of that!

On Thursday afternoon we finally boarded our last mode of transportation to get us to Birdsville. Laura, you would not have enjoyed this! The flight starts in Brisbane but makes frequent stops landing and taking off again in small communities along the way – including Charleville, Quilpie and Birdsvile, as well as 5-6 other towns. Man, were the landings and take offs rough!! I think I almost broke Dave’s hand grabbing it so hard out of fear – and were my hands ever sweaty! Once we were in the air it was okay and the view was pretty amazing, but I am not excited to do that again on the way home! But we successfully made it Birdsville by mid-afternoon…we had arrived to our new home for the next 3 months!

 

We immediately got a tour of the town and a run-down of its history from Neil, one of the managers of the caravan park. It probably could have been summed up in about 5 minutes but man, can Neil talk! We were out there roasting in his Ute (his truck) for about 30 minutes getting driven around the town, which only consists of a bakery, police office, hotel, community centre, info centre, gas station (which also doubles as the post office and bank) and the caravan park. Apparently, the population of the town is 80 people, except on the weekend of the Birdsville races (which happen on the first weekend of September). The population of Birdsville increases to almost 7000 people who camp all over the town to enjoy the races.  The best part of the tour was when Neil mentioned that the community centre had a gym. Apparently the Australian government and donators like to donate random stuff to Birdsville and one of those donations was money for a gym and two tennis courts. The tennis courts only ever have 4 people who play on them and the gym has about 4 pieces of equipment, but we should be able to do a little bit of stuff there, and it’s got A/C!

So, since being in Birdsville, we have settled into the Roma (our caravan) and had 2 days of work. We have been working with Barb and Steve cleaning the caravan park – they are so very sweet and very helpful! They retired about 3 years ago and have been travelling around Australia ever since. They go from little job to little job and travel the rest of the time. You should see the set up they have in their car! They even have a satellite dish with them and TV so they can watch over 300 TV channels. We went to watch another National Rugby League (NRL) playoff game with them last night!

Our job at the caravan park is basically trying to keep the desert clean! We have to do a lot of laundry, clean all the rooms and cabins they have on site, as well as keep the amenities clean. It’s not hard work, but it is exhausting doing it in 30+ degree heat – and the temperature is only supposed to climb while we’re here. Oh yeah, and one exciting feature of working in Birdsville is constantly being attacked by flies! They don’t bite, but they sure are irritating, especially when they try to fly into your nose and eyes!

I think that’s it – sorry I’m rambling! I hope you enjoy hearing about our small town outback life. We will continue to post updates when exciting things happen – so you may not hear from us for a little bit because we’re not expecting many exciting things to happen, hehe!

Oh, and for those of you who read about Birdsville on Wikipedia, they caught the fresh water crocodile a few weeks ago…don’t fret J

We hope everyone is doing well and we’ve really loved reading your comments and emails!

And It Begins...

How Ya Goin'?

We just wanted to say thanks for coming to check out our blog. This is where we plan on updating you all on our adventure's during our year abroad!

So, it all started in Toronto, on September 7, 2013. It took 2 car rides, 3 plane trips, many sleepless hours (that is, until we got some Gravol in our system), countless movies watched and 2 days to get us to our destination...Brisbane, Australia. We have never been so happy to see a familiar face waiting on the other end of that journey. Jeff Woodroffe (or Woody) welcomed us into his home with open arms and has been a spectacular host since we arrived. He has given us free reign of his house, his internet, his permanent address and maybe one too many beers :)

The first few days were spent setting up bank accounts and cell phones and starting to hunt for jobs and apartment. During our travels we stumbled upon Travel Bugs and a friendly Australian named Patrick - this is where the craziness began. So, Patrick's main job is to find short term employment in rural Australia for backpackers. We weren't too keen on the idea of rural Australia, but figuring we had nothing to lose, we sent him our resume's and contact information. Before we even had a chance to think things through, Patrick had called with a UNIQUE experience for us. Has anyone ever heard of Birdsville, Queensland? Nope, neither had we and neither had most Australian's we've talked to since then. Well, Birdsville is a small town of approximately 280 people in very rural Queensland - by rural I mean 1700km inland from Brisbane...I know you're starting to chuckle to yourselves and think...WHAT?!?! We were doing the same thing! I dare you all to now google Birdsville and say a short prayer for us.

So, Patrick proposed this opportunity: work in Bridsville for 3 months at a caravan park and help Trish, Margie and Troy with reception work, housekeeping, gardening, etc. We had a chance to think things over and chat with Margie and Trish, who were absolutely amazing in answering all our questions and reassuring us that this was do-able and actually a really great opportunity to see a part of Australia that most Australian's never have the opportunity to see. Only a few tears were shed (by Steph obviously) and the decision was made - Birdsville here we come. The deciding factor came down to what we like to call "Our Year of Yes". Our goal this year is to never say no to an opportunity presented to us (within reason of course) and see where it takes us. So far, it's taking us on what we hope is a pretty unbelievable experience in the Australian outback.

We leave on Tuesday, September 17th, so the next few days will be spent setting ourselves up for what's to come - loading up on sunscreen, hats, downloading TV shows and movies (recommendations are welcome!), ensuring we have enough data on our plan to survive three months in nowheresville and seeing some of Brisbane before we head off.


But that's not all the fun and excitement we've experienced in the past 5 days in Brisbane. We have also seen and learned a few interesting things about Australia that we thought we would pass on. First, every one is so nice! The thing we have been most impressed with is how appreciative and pleasant people are to the bus drivers in Brisbane. No one gets on or off the bus without saying "hello" or "thank you". It really is amazing! Also, we knew that people drove cars on the other side of the road in Australia, but didn't really think about how this would impact walking around. Dave learned this the hard way when we were in the New Zealand airport bathroom and he was trying to enter the men's room. Being from North America, he kept walking on the right hand side of the hallway leading to the washroom, but he kept bumping into people coming out of the bathroom. He tried to stand his ground before he realized that he was in the wrong. Not only do they drive on the left side of the road, but they mirror that when they walk as well. That took some getting used to!

Lastly, we have had the opportunity to spend some time with some other transplanted Canadians in Brisbane, care of the lovely Ryan Latimer. Latimer is doing med school here in Brisbane and he has been extremely kind in inviting us along on some adventures. We've thrown rocks at a wild turkey that was trying to set up a home in his backyard. We've spent an afternoon in his pool. We've been able to go out to a cool bar called Archive to celebrate his birthday. And we've met some of his great friends, who were all so nice and welcoming.

All in all, we've had a fantastic first week on our adventure in the South Pacific. We will try to keep you all up to date by frequently blogging about our adventures. But, if anyone want's to get in touch with us you can email: stephgardonio@yahoo.ca, dibrown2@hotmail.com, or add us to Skype (dibrown2).

Thanks for stopping by and reading - please know we miss you all already!
xoxo