Brisbane and Gold Coast - September 2017

I was feeling quite good after a great nights sleep...but it was up early and time to head back to the airport to catch a flight up to Brisbane. A short flight but we had amazing views out the window on the way of Sydney, the Gold Coast and Brisbane.

Once arriving we jumped on the train and made our way to some lovely gardens were we found a nice shaded spot to rest with our bags. 

I went in search for some picnic food in the city centre. It was then time to meet up with Joaquín's cousin, Paola, we caught the train with her all the way to her home. This is where we were staying for a while until we found a job. We met Tom, Paola's husband, and got the grand tour of the property with Snoopy the dog. After dinner we had an early night.

I was so lucky not to be feeling jetlagged my body must have set it's clock back very quickly.

The next day we just stayed at the house. We met Tomas another guest they had staying, took the dog for a walk, planed a few things we wanted to do in Brisbane. Then met Francisco when he arrived back from school.

For the next few weeks we either stayed at home chilling and looking for jobs or we were out exploring.

The things we got up to:

Looked at some beautiful churches and cathedrals of Brisbane

Walked in both Botanical Gardens in Brisbane

Hired some bikes to zoom around the city

Jumped on a ferry to see Brisbane from the water

Seeing amazing views over the city from Mount Coot-tha

Museum of Brisbane and going up the clock tower

Planetarium

Queensland museum

Gold Coast
One day we took a trip down to the Gold Coast by train, this took us just over 3 hours. Once we got there we took a stroll along Surfers Paradise beach, ate an early lunch and then ventured up the tallest residential tower in the world. 77 floors up to Skypoint. We had magnificent views of the Gold Coast. 

Of course the day would not be complete without and ice-cream by the beach. In the afternoon Joaquín and I went and played miniature golf...this was his first time playing and managed to get a hole in one but I still won both rounds. It was a lot of fun. We took one last stroll along the beach before making our 3 hour journey back.

My Birthday
This was my first birthday I had ever had away from the UK. It started with Joaquín waking me up with breakfast in bed and him singing happy birthday to me with my cake. I got given some beautiful opal earrings and necklace. It was then a 2 hours drive down to Tambourine Mountain were we went for Tree Top Challenge. This was a high ropes course, first we got suited and booted, then it was off to climb the courses. We started off on the easy green ones making our way up to the extreme black course! The black course was definitely challenging and it was made more difficult because we were so tired from all the other climbing up and down ladders, balancing on tightropes, walking bridges, zipwiers and Tarzan jumps from the other courses. It was then time for the drive back home and stopping on the way home at a restaurant for dinner. I had an amazing birthday.

Driving the car in Australia...at least I am still driving on the same side of the road as England but the indicators are on the opposite side so I kept putting the windscreen wipers on!

In this time we managed to find a job and we were to leave Brisbane for another adventure.

To Australia again...the flight and Sydney - 03.09.17 - 05.09.17

Well after travelling home from Oz to go to the wedding in Santorini and then spending a very short time at home trying to sort my house out and seeing friends I was back on a plane back to Oz.

I said my goodbyes, hopped on a train to Heathrow and checked in for my very long journey back to Australia. I flew on the same plane from London to Sydney only stopping in Dubai to refuel. This was such a quick stop after disembarking, going through security and a toilet stop it was time to start boarding again. I tried to stay on Australian time on the plane after stopping in Dubai so I wouldn't have jetlag too bad. It was easy to stay awake when I needed to but getting to sleep was much harder.

I left the UK on the Sunday 3rd and arrived in Australia on Tuesday the 5th...I had missed out a whole day due to the long flight and the time difference.

Arriving about 5am with virtually no sleep I was in for a day of trying to stay awake till night time. After I collected my backpack and made it through customs I found someone waiting for me...Joaquín! I was so excited and happy to see him after being away. We made our way to the taxi rank and headed to our hotel to drop our bags but luckily they said they had our room ready so we could check in there and then...I was quite relieved to have a quick shower before heading out for breakfast. 

We found Celsius (a great recommendation from Ling - thanks), this was a small cafe right on the harbour with the waves crashing on the rocks beside us. Afterwards we took a ferry over to Circular Quay and made our way to the Pylon Lookout of the Harbour Bridge. 

We read on the way up how they managed to build the bridge and then had spectacular views from the top of Sydney. It was clear but windy so we could see for miles.

I was fighting back the sleep and had lunch but I couldn't resist a quick nap on returning to the hotel. I had to meet up with Susan and Janet very briefly to collect some of my things I had left at theirs (it saved me taking it all the way back home just to bring it back again). 

• It was then time to eat again; Joaquín and I met up with Luis for dinner. We ate yummy Italian food while we had a great catch up but I could keep my eyes open much longer so it was definitely time now to sleep.