Australia Day 5 - The Blue Mountains

This morning we headed west on Great Western Highway into the Blue Mountains. Our first stop was at Echo Point in the city of Katoomba, a popular spot for tourists. Unfortunately, it was a little too cloudy to see much past the nearest rock formations.  

We continued driving west, and stopped at the visitor center for Govetts Leap, where we learned more about the Blue Mountains. They are a series of ridge lines separated by deep gorges. The morning clouds had burned off.

Eventually we reached the town of Lithgow, where the grass turned brown and the trees became sparser. We headed back towards Sydney on the Bells Line of Road.

This evening we visited Wet N Wild on a cheaper twilight pass. It was a little cool, but there was almost no lines for the slides. They were fun, but like the one in the Gold Coast, it was just a basic water park.

Australia Day 4 - Sydney

This morning we drove over the Harbor Bridge into downtown Sydney, and managed to find our way to the Opera House Car Park.

We toured the Opera House. It was pretty interesting, and not too expensive. There are actually five theaters located there, the large Concert Hall, which seats over 2,000 people, the Opera theater, which seats about half that, and three smaller theaters, which are used for plays and smaller concerts and recitals.

Then we went to the Museum of Sydney, which was a lot cheaper. It was built adjacent to the location of the first government building in Sydney, and they marked where the foundation was in the area in front of the museum.

We then walked through part of the botanical gardens on our way back to the car park.  

We stayed at a new hotel in Blacktown, a suburb west of Sydney, next to the new Wet n wild park. Anyone thinking of doing a driving vacation in Australia should make sure they either have a plan that supports their smart phone with a map feature, or buy a gps. It is really easy to get lost here, the road signs don't tell you which direction a road goes, it just tells you which town it goes to next, so unless you know the area well, it is really easy to get turned around and have no idea how to get back to where you want to go.

Australia Day 3 - Driving

Sunday we headed down the coast toward Sydney. Lots of driving. Right side steering wheels and driving on the left feels weird but so far I have avoided a collision. There's a lot of stuff in Australia that is very similar to the US, but a lot that is just a little different, like Burger Kings being called Hungry Jacks. McDonalds are everywhere, but some of the menu choices are different, and they always don't have free Wi-Fi. Wi-Fi seems to be hard to find in Australia; when it is offered, like in the two hotels we have stayed in so far, the signal is pretty poor. 

Still a lot of sticker shock at how much everything costs. Our room tonight was $140 and for two twin beds and no breakfast and a lousy air conditioner. There was a tall building in Gold Coast that I thought it would be fun to go up to the top, but it was $22 each. I didn't figure that was worth it for a few minutes and a few pictures.

The worse was the large soda at McDonalds was $3 and it was the size of a medium and there were no refills. We stopped for the night near Newcastle, a couple hours north of Sydney.

Australia Day 2 - Gold Coast

 

This morning we headed south from Brisbane and stopped at the WB Movie World and Wet n Wild on the Gold Coast. The Gold Coast is like the Southern California of Australia - Australians go there to enjoy the warm beaches and several amusement parks and water parks. We got the 3 for 3 passes for an extra ten dollars so we could spend the morning at Movie World and the waterpark in the afternoon.

Movie World is fairly nice, although it is no Disneyland. It has three big coasters lightly themed to the DC superheroes, a couple of shows, and a couple of other things. One of the big roller coasters was down and my son didn't care about riding the others, but we enjoyed the Justice League ride and the Scooby Doo coaster. The Justice League ride is most similar to Men in Black at Universal Studios. Or for those who haven't done that, sorta like Buzz or Midway Mania. It uses both physical props, some animatronics, and some 3D projection screens. Nothing as elaborate as the Spider-Man or Harry Potter rides at Islands of Adventure in Florida, though.

The Scooby Doo ride is mostly a wild mouse in the dark. It starts out like a dark ride though, with some partially moving figures, and then uses an elevator system instead of a chain hill. There was a 3D movie that was basically a short version of Journey 2 the Mysterious Island that also had the usual moving seats and water jets that Honey I Shrunk the Audience did.

In the afternoon we visited Wet N Wild. It is a basic waterpark, with metal structures supporting plastic slides.

Our last stop was at Surfers Paradise, which is the heart of the Gold Coast. 

Australia Day 1 - Brisbane

This spring, Bryan is studying abroad at the University of Notre Dame near Perth, on the west coast of Australia. Before his classes get started, he and I are spending a little over a week touring the east coast of Australia. We began our trip on Wednesday with a flight down to Los Angeles, where we boarded a Virgin Australia jet to Brisbane. 

Arriving in Brisbane Friday morning, we rented a car and headed to the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary in a nearby town. We saw kangaroos and other unique Australia animals. We also took a picture with a Koala.

In the afternoon and evening, we walked around Brisbane, checking out the old buildings and green spaces. We ate in a restaurant above a pedestrian mall, and noticed a lot of local kids walking around in their school uniforms.

After dinner we walked down to the river. Bridges like Story Bridge link north and south Brisbane.   

On our return to our hotel, we walked through the botanical gardens, and saw the Queensland Parliament building.

Rainbow

We drove down to Salem multiple times in January for Rainbow events. Jennifer helped Cherry Assembly with an initiation, doing two Bow stations, Fidelity and Service.  

A week later, we attended their installation. Jennifer was introduced with the other Grand Officers in attendance.

Then Harmony Assembly held their election meeting, deciding on Jennifer's successor as Worthy Advisor.

California

Over Christmas break, we drove down to California to visit my parents. On the way back to Oregon, we drove through the Bay Area, stopping at Casa de Fruita on the way over. 

We then drove through Stanford University, so Bryan could see the campus. He would like to go to graduate school there.

 We looked around the Union and the Bookstore. 

Our final stop was at the Walt Disney Family Museum, in the San Francisco Presidio. Much of the information we've seen before, but it was nice to have it all in one place. The model of Disneyland was very impressive.

It was a beautiful day, and from the lawn of the Presidio we could see Oakland and Alcatraz and other sights around the Bay.