Aussie Trip {Part 27} The Finale

: : So pretty : : 

After the zoo, Grace and I had a couple more days together in Brissy, hanging together and visiting the Brisbane wheel (which I can't find the photos from :'( ) On Friday Uncle Richard came back from work, and Aunty Vicki came up with Faith and Luke and we all went to the airport together. And with that, my trip was over. So long Aussie, until next time.

: : Au Revoir, Australia : :

And that, at long last, is the finale of this series!

Aussie Trip {Part 19} Brissy

Today I just have a few random shots from Uncle Richard's caravan before I get into the next big set tomorrow ;) When I first mentioned that I wanted to make a trip over, Uncle Richard encouraged me to follow through on it and was really helpful in making the idea a reality. Apart from the night Grace and I spent with Ben and Kirsten, all our time in Brisbane we stayed in the caravan. I cooked one night, and certainly it would be a struggle to cook for my family without more space, but for just a few of us it worked nicely. :) Oh and the surround sound was pretty cool; at first it was a bit strange to walk away from the screen and have the sound get louder, but now I really like it. Maybe I can hook a whole bunch of speakers up to my laptop?! Haha. It's actually an American model (lolz even the print on the curtains and cushions is the same as some of seen on blogs of American families ;P), so larger than your typical caravan over here. Everything is very compact and well-planned, but it has everything you need (and more) and is super flash. Lol I can understand how people can spend extended periods of time or even live in RVs now ;P

: : This is just the outside kitchen . .  the inside one is bigger :P : :

: : So I heard more about gardening on my 3-week trip in Aus than I've heard in NZ in a long time :P : :

: : So pretty : :

: : Oh look, another food shot : :

Aussie Trip {Part 17} Back to Brissy

I spent the weekend in Maclean since Uncle Richard and Ben had organised work there. Saturday passed quickly with several movies, trying not to fall asleep, and idk what else ;P

: : Those eyes :O : :

: : LOL : :
Too bad I couldn't bring him back with me,
I really he think would make a good friend for my beautiful Snowbell ;)

Sunday we went to the church in Grafton and caught up with even more of the extended family, then went to Bec and Susie's for the day. Thanks for having us! :) And sorry, I didn't get any photos :/ Sitting at the table to eat lunch and looking out the window to see kangaroos on the other side of the fence was pretty cool and definitely not something I'm used to! 

Monday saw us once again packing up our stuff and saying goodbyes. The drive to Brisbane was fairly uneventful; we could hear thunder and see the lightning in the distance, but when we checked the temperature it was still up at 26 degrees. #yay. Roadworks slowed up the trip in a number of places, although it was interesting to note that NSW kept long stretches of road at a lower speed, even though only sections were being worked on, whereas in Queensland there ended up being a lot more signage, but we were allowed to return to the usual speed limit between work sections.

: : Dream road, you guys, seriously : :
#allthosetrees

: : Yay, fuzzy car selfies ;P : :

: : On a clear day that view in the distance would be amazing! : :
Okay, it still was pretty awesome . . . ;)

My cousin Ben and his wife Kirsten hosted us that night. It was actually the first time I had met Kirsten, although they've been together for a few years now. They recently got their wedding album, so it was really cool to look through that since I hadn't seen many photos of the day.

Aussie Trip {Part 16} Grace's Birthday

I love how Grace's 20th was one of the main reasons for my trip but I barely took photos! :/ From what I heard, she and Aileen spent most of the day in the kitchen preparing an African-themed meal for a number of us; I love cooking but a whole day is pushing it! :O It was really nice though, so thanks ;)

So anyways when we arrived at the cousins' place I walked straight in and announced I was home ;P and then greeted the cats as I found them ;) Uncle Richard had come down so it was great to finally see him (he was away for work when I was in Brissy and we headed south before he returned), and the one week I'd been away from Maclean seemed like a long time . . . it was nice to be back with the cousins and Aunty Vicki there as well.

Some of the second or third cousins came as well, we saw them back on our '05 trip and some of them have been here since then, but I'm still not sure I can remember who's who . . . :O Oops ;P

: : Okay so most of these photos I just pointed the camera in the general direction and hoped for the best; : :
it was too dark to see much of anything on the screen 

Thanks Grace and Aileen and Bethany and Uncle Richard and Aunty Vicki, and everyone else who helped pull this off!
And happy birthday Grace! Hope you enjoyed being 20 . . . since that year's actually over now ;P

Aussie Trip {Part 2} Brissy to Maclean

Friday was somewhat overcast and still a bit chilly (so not exactly the weather Aussie is usually associated with :P). We got up at a much less unearthly hour than the previous day, although it seemed fairly early after a long day and a late night. Grace and Aileen cooked breakfast for us all, and we loaded up and left Brisbane. Went to Coffs Harbor since Aileen had an exam or something for uni there. Meanwhile Grace and I got coffee and sat down to talk for a while and catch up on things. (We hadn't spoken extensively since April.) Then we drove around, got lost and took a couple of wrong turns before picking Aileen up and continuing south.  

: : Travelling in your cousin's flash Mazda beats busing any day ;) : :

: : Looks just like NZ :P : :

: : Not too bad for a shot out the windscreen, I reckon  : :

I'm not entirely sure who's idea it was or how it came about, but we decided to drop by Mount Warning and walk up. For those of you who know me well, don't worry; I did change into running shoes ;P Armed with phones, cameras, and a couple of snacks, we started walking (briskly; de Bruins don't do slow). Turns out a lack of fitness, slight breeze, presence of asthma, and lowish temperatures (and possibly some dampness) weren't a great combination.We made it maybe one-third of the way up and by then I was pretty short of breath and the chill breeze was making me slightly light-headed. We decided heading back down was preferable over them having to carry me back, and they proceeded to practically run down :P Thankfully no snakes turned up to alter my pace, and I took it a little easier. Survived the trip and got back to the car, deciding that regular exercise had to become a regular addition to my schedule lol. (After arriving back in NZ I started walking regularly probably would have managed this track fairly easily by the end of summer.)

: : Imagecredit: Grace : :

: : Image credit: Grace : :

We continued our drive south, eventually arriving in Maclean at my cousins' house in the late afternoon. It's amazing how big the toddlers I remembered from our last trip over had grown! ;P We chatted and caught up for a while; they discovered their NZ cousin could also be pretty sarcastic, and might actually be some fun. Luke even decided I was cool enough to share his snacks ;) Aunty Vicki had very thoughtfully prepared a roast dinner for us, which we all enjoyed. More talk and catching up ensued and another late night followed. lol

Aussie Trip {Part 1} ~ The Beginning

My grandparents moved to Aussie while most of my mum's siblings were still at home. A couple have moved back to NZ since then, but we still have a few cousins, friends, and other relatives over there. The last time we made a trip over as a family was in 2005! We had only four children then :P In that time, another cousin had joined the party, and a couple had married. One of my friends turned 21 late last year, and a cousin wanted to do make her 20th a big celebration. I decided all those things made for a good excuse to head over for a few weeks! :D

: : Temperatures like these provide me with good encouragement to head over the ditch :P : :

In the weeks beforehand I didn't have a huge amount of time to think about or prepare for my trip; I stayed fairly busy teaching and such, fitting in a few make-up classes (if someone's sick or something and we have to change the date), organising classes for the following term (I arrived home late Friday/early Saturday and started up teaching on the Monday), and I'm not really sure what else right now, but it was busy! Lol. A few days before I realised I didn't have time to make anything new for my wardrobe (didn't have a lot of summer clothing anymore), so I started enlisting help . . .  managed to get both my mum and my bro sewing skirts for me!! :P I packed the night before, then tried to get some sleep before leaving. 

Even though I was exhausted, sleep was slow in coming. Once I was out, I was out pretty solidly though; I didn't hear my alarm go off at 3:45am on September 24th. It must have roused me slowly though, because I was awake by the time Mum came in saying we didn't have much time left and had to hurry. Right then I really just wanted to sleep, but figured missing my flight probably wouldn't be the best start to the trip! I don't think I would have had much more than a couple hours sleep :/ We grabbed my stuff and tried to rush/sneak out without waking the little people! Got my bag checked in okay, and then I went through so Mum and Dad could get back to bed. It's amazing how much the airport has changed . . . actually I think something's different just about every time I go there! Although, it was about 10 1/2 years since I had been in this section. Thankfully this wasn't a flight I had to race to catch, so I worked out where I had to go and then sat down to tap into the free (30-min) wifi for a bit. Snapped the following pic to make everyone staying behind jealous :P

I don't remember much between the above pic and being on the plane, so presumable everything went pretty smoothly and ordinarily :P I do remember feeling VERY tired, and feeling like it was a bit strange sitting parked on the tarmac and watching it get lighter and lighter outside, when I really just wanted to be asleep lol. I think we may have left a little late, but the flight was pretty good once we got going. 

: : Not entirely sure how to feel about the direction we were taking here . . . :P : :

: : I love the invention of this app, with a live map and flight details! : :
Look at that destination time though, wouldn't really want to message them before take-off! :P

When I booked my flights I just picked the cheapest options + bag, but ended up with a meal on the flight over there; I wouldn't have chosen to pay extra for it, but it worked out really well, being that the flight was so early and I hadn't ended up managing to eat anything beforehand -- hunger was setting in pretty strongly when they brought it out! Admittedly it can't beat homecooked, but I wasn't about to argue with bacon, sausages, scrambled eggs, fruit, juice and bran muffin right then! ;)

: : Not far now!! : :

So my nearly 4-hour flight that I got up in the middle of the night for, arrived in Brisbane around 8am their time! I think we made pretty good time travelling, not sure whether we ended up getting in early or not. I managed to find my way (and suitcase) -- that airport seems pretty big to me :P -- and get through customs in pretty good time. Took off my jacket and cardigan which were a must in Auckland, and just had the problem of the temperature not quite being warm enough for half-sleeves, but too warm for a thin cardigan over the top. Anyways. Connected to the wifi again and messaged home to say I had arrived. (Dad was at work by this stage, not sure that all the siblings were up though :P) 

Waited a bit (since I got through customs faster than my uncle had calculated), and then got picked up by my cousin and a friend who had traveled north the day before and spent the night at my uncle's caravan in Brissy. Turns out they weren't aware I was eating on-flight, so they planned to take me out for breakfast. After we took a couple of detours and got lost a couple of times, we found the mall and went to look for a cafe. By this time I was about ready to eat again anyway so it worked out all right. ;P

: : Iced coffee and cheesecake might not be the best morning tea, but hey : :

: : That jar of coffee in the previous pic was pretty big :P : :

We looked around the shops for a while, then headed back to my uncle's caravan for the rest of the day. Took it pretty easy, organised our stuff, shopped for snacks, made dinner, and watched a movie or two. Finally got to bed; I must have been up for close on 24 hours after only 2ish hours sleep?! Slept pretty solidly, thankfully; just need the nights a bit longer after a day like that ;P

: : And that is actually in the caravan . . . RV or similiar?! : :
Whatever it is, it was shipped over from America and is flasher than our house, if a fair bit smaller ;P 

And that concluded my first day in Aussie after just over a decade! It actually may have been my first time in Brissy, I'm not sure we had been up that far before. But I'll save my thoughts on the city for another post ;)