Newbury Plus

Hello, again. Been in Newbury for about 6 weeks now and have decided to finally update you on what I've been doing. I'm sure most of you know I've been living with Matt and his family (mom, dad and brother, Andy), in Newbury, since I got here. It's really great, and I'm so fortunate that his parents have let me stay here. Their house is lovely and their garden (NOT yard) out back is very pretty as well. They have a rabbit, 3 chickens, apple trees, coi pond, a hot tub and a small vegetable garden.

                                   (Matt's room is the top right)

The first weekend after I got here Matt's mom, Sarah, had her family over for a bbq. I met all of them. It was quite overwhelming, but they were all curious who I was after hearing some girl was coming to Newbury to stay there with Matt. I volunteered to help Sarah bake before the bbq to take some stress off her to get everything done before the day. As I wasn't used to the measurements here, or their fancy (and celcius) oven, I created some cupcakes that I was utterly mortified of. I think you all know I LOVE to bake and haven't had anything come out wrong in AGES. Luckily Matt came home for lunch the day I was baking and set me straight. AND, to make things worse, I knew his mom baked wedding cakes (WEDDING CAKES!!) and I (having talked about loving to bake) had produced something to the effect of cupcake turds. They were the tiniest little things you've ever seen, and definitely not baked all the way through. (sigh)

My second batch turned out...better than the first ones but not by much. :(  Not such a great success as I had imagined. 

I'm pretty sure she'll never ask me to help her again, but I think that's ok with me. I didn't take a snap of them, but recently I made some scones and they turned out lovely. So there. 

The Newbury Rugby Club where Matt also works nights and weekends and where his friends play rugby together.

I have been lucky enough to have met some of the WAGS of Matt's friends. (Wives and Girlfriends....tho, no wives yet, that I know of, but that's what they call us). They're really great and were REALLY welcoming when I met them all. I met Woosie (that's her last name, couldn't tell you her first but that's what they call her) that first weekend of Matt's mom's bbq and she gave me a great big hug and said, oh its so nice to finally meet you. I really like her. Vanesa, Sam, Nikki and Robin I met at a drinks get-together one night soon after I got there. That night Nikki invited me to a burger-and-beer night with her, Woosie and Vanesa. It was really great to be included as I'm so far from home and haven't had a lot of girl contact like this since I left! Matt and I did go on a 'booze train' outing with two other couples, Phil (Simbo) and Nikki, and Chewy (his first name escapes me at the moment) and his girlfriend Hetty (they call her Hefty...so mean). We bought tickets on the train that runs through Newbury and on (might be the one that goes all the way to London) and at every stop we got off and went to the local pub near the station. It was really fun. 

The other night I was also invited to Vanesa's with Woosie for a chat/snack sesh. So nice to have some girls to talk to. Matt 24/7 is nice and all, but its nice to be able to whinge to someone about how annoying something is and have them agree. Woosie's good for that. We seem to be a lot alike.

One of the first places we went to on a weekend off was to Stonehenge. Not as amazing as I thought it would be, but still amazing enough. You can't get within, say, 30 feet of it (and I understand why) but still woulda been nice to see it more up close.

Then we headed down to Southampton for an overnight and then Portsmouth. Southampton had an enourmous shopping mall with a massive H&M (clothing store) where I bought a super-cute coat (as it's practically winter weather here for me). In the morning we headed to Portsmouth to the Gunwharf Quays where there are ships you can go see and the Spinnaker Tower. We had a nice lunch out on a patio of a restaurant, then walked around to the Dockyard to see some of the ships. 

On the way down to Portsmouth we stopped to see the Salisbury Cathedral. Pretty impressive.

A few weekends after that we headed down to Bath on a Saturday night after Matt got off work and stayed with his aunt Sue and uncle Phillip who live near there. They were nice enough to take us out to dinner at a pub near a lock and Sue was helpful and picked us up some pamphlets on Bath for the next day. She even cooked us an English breakfast the next morning and lent me two books, one on Buddhism (!). Bath was such a cute little town. I loved it. We decided on a free walking tour given by the Mayor's fully-trained honorary guides. The best part is that they don't expect tips/gratuities so you're not left at the end feeling uncomfortable about the amount you should give them. And our guide was really knowledgable, enthusiastic and interesting. The tour was two hours and took us through the Royal Crescent, the King's Circus (a circular street of connected houses), the Queen's Square, the Assembly Rooms,  and our guide told us about Jane Austen, who lived here for a time, and some other stuff. 

  ( The Royal Crescent, a residential road of 30 houses, in a crescent shape (duh). The homes have housed some notable people over the last 200 years.)

    (The Assembly Rooms, a gathering place for members of the higher social classes for events such as masquerade balls, public concerts and assemblies. Note the pig to the right of the doors. The lions are the second creation to be sold at auction, the pigs, having been inspired by King Bladud's pigs, the first. More on him and the pigs/lions later.)

                                                  (Bath Abbey)

Matt and I also went and saw the Roman Baths (not included in the tour) but an amazing thing to see as well.The Roman Baths are below the modern street level. There are four main features: the Sacred Spring, the Roman Temple, the Roman Bath House and the Museum. The buildings above street level date from the 19th century. You're not allowed to go in them, but in true boy-fashion, Matt just HAD to dip his toe in, not once, but twice. Supposedly, the British King Bladud discovered these springs in 836 BC and claimed the spring cured him and his pigs of leprosy. The Great Bath is the main bath and its massive...and really green. 

    (The Sacred Spring...where the water bubbles up first...can you see it?)

                                           (The Great Bath)

Walking around Bath was really great. The architecture of the buildings is amazing, as are the little shops tucked in. I particularly like the way England does the pub. I love the way they decorate the front, with a nice sign (with a GREAT name!) and flowers hanging. Its lovely. 

               (Just a view down a street during our walking tour)

(There are a collection of 100 individually decorated lions around Bath. They'll be sold at a charity auction.)

(This is a small tea house that was suggested to us...it had neither scones or tea, both of which we were really looking forward to. Nice enough tho.)

Just this last weekend we went to London to see Matt's brother, Simon, and do some errands whilst there. It only took a little over an hour to get there, even though the motorway was closed and re-routed us through back streets. Simon lives in East London near the Thames. His flat looks out over it. We, unfortunately, didn't go for sightseeing, but we did do a lot of walking, heading first to West London to the Thai Embassy to put in our application for our Thai visas. We had to give up our passports which made both of us nervous. We won't know if we got them until Simon picks them up sometime when he gets some free time. Then we walked from there through Hyde Park and up to Oxford street where I picked up a purse I'd been eyeing and hemming and hawing about for some time, and then off to sell this gaudy ring I found in the ocean on Whitehaven beach in the Whitsunday Islands in Oz. We figured whatever we got for it could be used to get dinner and drinks for the night for the three of us. 

        (Bet you'll never guess how much we got for it? £65. Yep. And the exchange rate is a little over 1.5...so almost a hundo. Sweet! And incidentally, it did pay for food and drinks all night. Perf!...I bet it came from a fat, hairy, sweaty Italian guy who happened to accidentally chuck it off his yacht...sucker)

   (Down the river from where Simon lives. We walked along this to a Saturday market for breakfast.)

 

(Matt and I in Hyde Park. Bad weather. :(  )

                                            (Heck yes!!)

  ( I think we did this because we're 'old'...and check out my previously purchased awesome winter coat...so cute!)

Anyway, this must have been the longest blog I've written yet. Sorry for that. But I wanted to keep a record of what I've done since I got here and this is it. Seems like a lot, eh? Hope everyone's well, Matt and I will be getting things together until Thailand on November 15th. Peace out!  xx

Cairns, Queensland and Beyond

Well, hey, its been a hot minute but I'm back with some more AMAZING blogging for you. :) 

Last I wrote I was starting work in Cairns. It happened to be at The Courthouse Hotel (NOT a hotel, though) and I was meant to be bartending. It worked out ok. And not to be a chooser, you know how that goes, but I really hated 'sprooking'. That's where they send you out front of the bar on the sidewalk, with menus for the restaurant (when did I sign up for restaurant work again??) and make you talk to EVERY person who walks by, offering dinner or letting them know happy hour was on or whatever dinner was on special that specific night....blah blah blah. Now, if you don't know me, I'd have to say I'm not a big people person. Don't get me wrong, I like people, I just am not a sales person type person. Thus, I HATE approaching people offering something that they could come looking for if they really wanted it in the first place. And I'm not a pusher. If someone says no I'm like, yeah ok. I wouldn't want someone in my face. Probably because that would make me want whatever they had even less. Am I wrong? No, I don't think I am. Anyway, some things I did notice while sprooking that kept me entertained for those 4 hours (and the longest 4 hours of my life!!): there's a large group of bats that come out around 7p (sprooking starts at 5p) that fly overhead to wherever they're going to eat/sleep. And by large I mean both a big group and that the bat is larger than any I've seen in California. They're pretty amazing to watch fly overhead. Now, the Courthouse also has a massive outdoor beer garden where we have a massive screen where we play music videos (and on Thursdays Wii games). Another thing to keep me entertained was watching the couple of aboriginals dancing to the music on the large divider in the middle of the street. I happened to sprook for a few thursdays in a row and they were always there. They could cut a mean rug too. I might just steal some of those dance moves for the future. A short while before the bats came out there'd come the rainbow lorikeets. Gorgeous multi-colored birds flocking to their sleeping tree on the Esplanade. More on the esplanade later. Anyway, they'd come flying over in packs of 10 or so screeching and bobbing and weaving. The only other two things to keep me from pulling my hair out was the ABC license plate game (going thru the alphabet on the license plates that drove by) and seeing how many of the Asian tourists that came by would nod back at me if I nodded at them. Certainly more than ever returned my greeting or came in to the restaurant. But that's neither here nor there. The days I wasn't sprooking I was working behind the bar, getting people 'a beer' when they requested it and cleaning incessantly. Got paid well, and it covered my housing and food and anything else I wanted to do so it all worked out in the end.

About a week after getting to Cairns, I got said job at the Courthouse, and then managed to find a share-house that had 5 other girls in it to live in. It was a good 20 minute walk out of town, and thru a small shady neighborhood, but it was really nice and cheaper than staying in a hostel for the duration of my stay. The other girls also worked so it wasn't a party house, which was really nice. They were Aki, a really nice, quiet Asian girl who took care of the spoiled house cat, Tina; Alex, from New Zealand; Pamela from Switzerland; Theresa from Germany and her always-there boyfriend Stefan; and Jenna, I think she was Aussie but she walked, I mean, stomped around the house all the time making a racket. Luckily she was almost always at her bf's house so I never really saw her. The owners Shane and Tanya lived next door so that was kind of cool. 

He replaced our massive tv with a flat screen, mowed our lawn, did repairs to the house and we could borrow DVDs as well. My room was a good size with a full-size bed. The house had a nice big shower, overflowing with girl products of course, and a washer and dryer, which is almost unheard of around here. I walked home from work every night, thru the shady neighborhood, but was very cautious and careful so it turned out ok. 

Cairns has an esplanade. It goes along the waterfront. Can't call it a beach because its mud and you can't go in it, I think because of crocs, and the water receeds about 300 yards daily. So instead they have a lagoon which was being renovated until a few weeks after I got there. It is surrounded by grass which is nice for a sunbake and is pushed up on the water's edge so is a nice view out across the water when it's around. I had many a sunbakes there with Paul, my English friend who was working in Cairns too, and whichever friends were in town who were traveling through Cairns at the moment. We'd sunbake and play cards, get 50 cent McDonald's ice cream cones and just laze around all day.

The Esplanade also had a small street with the grass and water on one side and shops on the other. The Night Markets were there, which were open from 4-12p nightly and where you could find any little souvenir you desired. I really enjoyed going to Rusty's Markets on the weekends for fresh (cheap!) produce. I'd buy kiwis (my new favorite fruit), Pink Lady apples, oranges, pineapples, stir fry vegetables, 'fancy' lettuce (as the sign said) and anything else I fancied eating that week. 

Paul and I made time to go to Cape Tribulation/Mossman Gorge, Kuranda and snorkeling/diving on the Great Barrier Reef. Kuranda is a small little town in the mountains about a 20 minute drive and 30 minute skyrail trip away. We took the Scenic Railway back. We got to go to the Koala Sanctuary where I FINALLY got to see some crocs, Koalas (so freaking cute!) and I even got to feed some kangaroos. Lazy fellows, but I would be too if people approached me with food all day! 

There's not much to do in Kuranda but its beautiful and has a few markets you can go to for souvenirs. The train back was ok. Unfortunately I was put in the middle of the car and was facing backwards so I couldn't see much. The window nearest me faced the mountain wall so I pretty much napped on the way back...mostly so I didn't barf from going in reverse. 

Snorkeling and diving was one of the best things I did in Oz. Of course the day we went it was SUPER windy so the boat ride out there I was sat with the other sea-sick kids outside at the back of the boat with my barf bag.

Then when we got to the reef we did the free intro dive first. It was so crazy. With my minimal asthma it freaked me out at first breathing thru the regulator. But I told myself to breathe deep and stay calm and it worked out amazingly! I can't wait to get certified in Thailand. After that I sat in the boat being really seasick while Paul snorkeled. I decided I paid for the trip so I'd snorkel once more before we left and I was really glad I did. I got to see some rainbow fish and all kinds of other really cool fish and coral. It was kind of scary looking down where the coral ended and seeing nothing below. Freaky! Since it was still really windy the ocean was like stewing and wavy and angry. Made it really hard to get around.

It's not that I didn't enjoy my time in Cairns but I had to make a decision. The job wasn't ideal, I may or may not have kicked up some drama between the managers and ended up paying the price for it which ended up in job dissatisfaction. It got better in the end but I was really missing having close friends (Paul was the only one I had! even though I met lots of people in and out of work) so it was either stay there in Cairns working at my job I was not particularly liking and waiting until mid-October to go to SE Asia or go to England and be with a great Englishman I met traveling in Oz, and stay with him until we went to SE Asia together. My lovely mother helped me make the (obvious) decision, so in the last week I've moved out, quit my job and moved temporarily to England. It's been amazing so far. Living with Matt's parents has been great, they're lovely.  I have also met his group of friends and been invited this very night to a burger and beer dinner with the girls. Something I've been missing since I left CA....the girl time, not the burgers and beer. :)

Whitsundays sailing

    

     After Fraser Island and the amazing adventure I had there I took a bus to Hervey Bay (with Greyhound this seemed to be the only way to get to Airlie Beach without an overnight stay in Brisbane) where I planned on stowing my stuff in the bus station until my 855p bus, and tooling around town, checking things out. Hervey Bay is the other departure spot to go to Fraser Island. Silly me didn't realize all of Oz shuts down on Sundays. So I show up at 2p, realize the bus station (a tiny little shop) is closed and I have to sit on the benches outside until 855p. :) Love my life. I couldn't even take all my crap with me if I'd wanted to eat, so luckily I made not one but TWO, PB&J sandwiches. So I sat there for 7 hours and ate my sandwiches, read my crappy book, and slowly put on more and more layers. Ended up with a long sleeve shirt on, another long sleeve sweater type dealio, my hoodie, my scarf and my knee high socks and tennies. Still cold. Always am. Finally the bus came and I threw some bows to make sure I was the first on, picked my seat and passed out. It wasn't actually that uncomfortable. I was surprised. Don't get me wrong, sleeping with your knees in your chest isn't bad, but we weren't picking people up so you could stretch across the aisle and be safe for the most part.

     I got to Airlie Beach at 940a but couldn't check in to the hostel and get a room until 1p. Stumbled around for a bit, did some interneting and then finally got to go have a shower! After that, met another roommate, Jack, who was on my boat the next day so we hung out, went next door to the bar for jugs of beer and chilled. The next day Jack and I decided that two boxes of goon should probably suffice for the two of us for three days. After lazing around and eating the most amazing Greek food, we practically had to run to the meeting point for the boat, not realizing it was so far away. When we got there, we checked in and they took us down to the boat. Before we got on we had to give up our flip flops and shoes...and our boxes of goon, but only so they could put our names on them and put them in the eskies for later. Then we got assigned beds and had our informational meeting about only putting the 3 P's down the toilet, how we were only getting a 30 second shower, ONCE, and we could only use shower gel for it...and then we got to go to the top deck.

   Luckily the weather was GREAT and so we all sat on deck enjoying the sun and breeze. Six volunteers put up the sails and we went sailing. Right when we were getting hungry Mel, the cook, brought us some nachos. When we had gone far enough for the first day, we had the option of going onto one of the islands and drinking some beers. That's where I saw my first Curlie (not sure on the spelling...can't find it on google.) Its quite large...looks like an overgrown baby bird. They're about knee high. Crazy looking. 

Then we got back to the boat and Mel said, 'Dinner's served...girls go first.' Music to a fat kid's ears! I had thirds that night...but only because Mel was going to throw away the rest of the chicken if nobody was going to eat it and I couldn't let it go to waste! So I ate it....and was sooooo full for a while. Disgusting. But worth it. Then we hung out on the deck drinking goon and socializing. I met a couple funny English girls traveling together, Mary and Anna. Jack and I hung out with them. You could see the stars so well from the boat since there were no lights. Saw a few shooting stars as well. The milky way looked like it was just out of reach, it was so gorgeous. 

   In the morning our captain, Gary, started up the boat at 6a and we started moving towards the island that had Whitehaven Beach on it. It was something else to see the sun rise over the ocean. Probably one of the most beautiful things I've seen in a long while. We got to the beach at 8a and had to be back to the tinny (the smaller boat that shuttled us between the island and the sailing boat) at 11a. So we had almost 4 hours on the beach. The sand is 98% silica so it's good for brushing your teeth (which I did twice!), polishing jewelry, exfoliating, of which I did my face, hands and feet. I couldn't do much more as I had on my trendy and fashionable stinger suit, so that we didn't get stung by the jelly fish that are in the waters up North. Kinda scary thinking about it though. 

     Luckily, being there so early we had the beach to ourselves! Jack and I raced down there to get snaps of the beach looking pristine before there were towels and footprints all over it. You probably had to be there, but at one point, Mary and Anna, sitting about 10 feet from us, had this massive black bee (?) that wouldn't leave them alone. It mostly focused on Anna. By that time the beach had quite a large group of people on it, and she couldn't get away from it. She got up and ran around screaming and swatting at it for a good...30 seconds. It was the most hilarious thing I'd ever seen and practically the whole beach was laughing at her. Epic. When we got in the tinny, Ben, one of the deck hands, told us to look for turtles in the water. We saw quite a few surfacing, it was pretty cool. We left afterwards, and moved on to the spot where we were going to snorkel for the day. Jack and I paired up as snorkel buddies. Ben was waiting in the tinny for us if we wanted to get out early, and he also had a bucket of fish food. If we got close enough he'd throw fish food on us and the fish would swarm around your face getting at the food. It was hard to keep still and not freak out. Haha. But it was pretty cool.

   At one point Jack had to fix his mask and afterwards he pointed to his toe that he'd scraped on a rock and it was BLEEDING a little bit. I was like OMG, WE'RE GONNA GET EATEN BY A SHARK!! But luckily that didn't happen, but I did think I might want to get out at that point. We stayed in the water for maybe an hour or so. It was really cool. The water was really clear and we got to see massive fish. I LOVE snorkeling! When we were back near the tinny, Ben threw fish food on Jack and as my ears were out of the water I could hear Jack screaming into his snorkel freaking out about the fish swarming and I just started laughing, and the crinkling of my face made water seep into my mask so I couldn't see and then I inhaled a ton of water so that I was choking and laughing and couldn't see and was grasping for the side of the tinny. So funny to hear a dude freak out like that. As much as I was freaked out too! 

   After snorkeling we got back on the boat, had some lunch, and went to a sand bar dealio. Jack and I took a walk across water knee deep to another part of land, like a really small island and it felt like we were walking on water. It was quite long so it looked like it coulda been deep. We missed the tug-o-war game but were around to lay out and drink goon. After dinner we drank more goon and hung out. In the morning we got to snorkel again if we wanted but Jack and Sven and I decided to just jump off the side of the boat for a while doing dives and stuff. I chickened out a few times at doing a back flip off the side....damnit! :) Such a wuss sometimes! Then we headed back to Airlie Beach to go home. :( Nobody wanted to go home. We all wished it could have lasted for a week at least. On the way back we got to sail again and I was one of the volunteers to help put up the sails. It was sooo hard. We had these three pedal type things, with two people facing each other on each one, so 6 people, and when Ben said toward the back of the boat we pedaled that way, and towards the front we went the other way. When the sails got near the top the tension was so hard! I'm pretty sure that's why my back hurt the next day. Ick. The boat got to a 30 degree angle while we were sailing, with all of us on the high side, of course, but it was kinda scary. I had to get my sweater at one point and it was really disorienting to be down under when the boat was listing to one side so bad. Funny trying to get around and not fall over. 

    The whole trip exceeded my expectations. It was worth every penny I paid for it and I would love to do it again! Anyone willing to lend me $400? Thank you please. Food was amazing, people were great, crew was really nice, adventures were wonderful. Couldn't have asked for more. And did I mention I hadn't washed my hair in 3 days...ick. But living in my bathing suit and nothing else for 3 days was heaven!

     Had a boat party that night with the people on the boat, had cheap meals and beer. Got to meet up with Matt again after his sailing trip. Was nice. Left Airlie for Cairns the next morning at 7a and with 60 (!!!!) mozzy bites! SIXTY!! And 40 of those were on my legs...the rest on my arms and back. WTF? How does that even happen?? One night in the hostel and I'm eaten alive. Crazy.