Last Day in Brisbane - Oct 31

Happy Halloween! Not a big deal in Australia, so you would never know it was any different from any other day. Seems strange not to be carving pumpkins and getting ready for kids to come knocking on the door (just hope our house wasn't egged in our absence!)

Decided to start our day with a 'breakkie' out this morning (everything in Australia is shortened and then you add an 'ie' on the end, so breakkie is breakfast). Excellent beginning with too much food, as usual :) We then headed straight to the South Bank Markets along the river for some last minute shopping. Within minutes, we ran into our Canuck friends from the softball team that joined us on our sailing adventure in the Whitsunday islands....apparently Australia is still not big enough to prevent us from running into people we know. They said just minutes earlier they had also run into Shelley at the market, as well. Picked up a few goodies and then Gary provided us a tour of Brisbane, including where he grew up. If anyone is planning on making a trip to Brisbane in the future, we highly recommend Gary.... a wealth of knowledge (although we are never quite sure how much to believe of what any of our Aussie friends tell us! Canucks are gullible, eh?)

Went to a movie to end the night at a "Gold" theatre. These are premium theatres of about only 32 seats of fully reclining lounge chairs with tables between and even table service during the movie. That's right, you can pre-place food and drink orders and specify the time you would like them brought to you. As I have said many times this trip, "these Aussies know how to do it right!". And as usual, us Canucks think you have to try everything on the menu to take advantage of the whole experience. Hence we were stuffed at the end.

As this brings us to our final blog for this trip, we just want to say how grateful to have experienced this trip with our friends, Shelley & Jacelyn. We laughed a lot and hope they had as good as a time with us as we had with them. , And most importantly a big thank you to our special Aussie friends/hosts, Nick & Cathy in Sydney and Tania & Gary in Brisbane, for making our visit so wonderful and memorable. They are truly specials friends and we are so lucky to have met them years ago and kept in touch. We had a blast and as any good Aussie would say it was "brilliant" and we can't wait to repeat it (perhaps for Gary and Tania's wedding?? hint, hint)
or hopefully as soon as they can manage a trip to Canuck-land.

G'day Mates.

Day at the Sunshine Coast - Oct. 30

It was a sad start to the day as our first item on the agenda was to take Jacelyn to the airport for her return trip home. That now left us 'amigo-less', as Shelley left us earlier and Jacelyn left us today. Time for an intervention, so Tania and Gary both took the day off work and drove us up the Sunshine Coast to visit a few of their favourite spots.

Our first visit was to Caloundra, a very pretty ocean resort town where Tania's family spent a lot of their holidays at. In fact, they are all gathering there again this year for their New Year's holidays. We went up to the unit that Tania and Gary will be staying in.... a beautiful new condo building with units up for sale....yes, we were tempted to put an offer in on a 2 bedroom, 2 bath with ocean views!!! For only $479,000AUS - a steal of a deal for the area! After a walk around town and along the beach, we then made our way further up the coast to Mooloolaba. Another perfect little beach town, with a very impressive beach/board walk and seaside promenade of shops and restaurants. We had a massive seafood lunch at the Surf Club, although we almost didn't get in as Don was not appropriately attired (showing off to much of his massive biceps!). After he put on a more conservative shirt, we managed to talk our way in. (even though a young girl ahead of us got in wearing a bikini with some kind of FlashDance cover up). We snagged a table right at the front overlooking the beach and ocean....they really know how to live down here.

After lunch, we went for a short walk along the promenade and then Adelle and Don did a longer walk along the ocean boardwalk. Ended up at another beach which was popular with surfers. We say every turn brings another postcard picture. Along the beach in Mooloolaba is the "Best Caravan Park in the World" - or that's what they say and we agree! It couldn't get better waking up looking out over the ocean, but they are packed in there like sardines.

Ended the day with a dip in the pool and then out for pizza and beer. This has all gone by way too fast for us!

Thursday Oct 29 : Brisbane

We spent the morning by the pool - lounging in the sun and reading. Really one of our few "down times". And then we were off in Tania's car with her GPS to get us downtown to park at her office and set off by foot to explore the South Bank area and downtown. But first we came across a River Cruise to tour you down their river with some historical narration. So we jumped aboard for the 1.5 hour trip. Brisbane is really a beautiful city with so many wonderful homes and condos all along the water front. Ohhhh...to be rich & famous! The river cruise gave us a wonderful view of the city.
After the cruise we walked through South Bank which includes many shops, restaurants, and even a man-made beach in the middle of the city. What a great idea! We thought Mayor Atchinson could take a few notes from this to make our river bank even more inviting.
We walked across their pedestrian bridge over into the downtown core where they have a large Botanical Garden running along the river. The park was filled with people playing cricket or catch or just walking and enjoying the sunshine. We of course had our stop for ice cream and cappachino.
Afterwards, we walked through some a part of their major pedestrian shopping mall (Queen Street) and saw how busy it was for a Thursday afternoon.
Our day ended with a brilliant seafood feast put on by Gary and Tania - prawns, mud crabs, scallop/shrimp/mussels served on a shell with cheese sauce, and steamed fish were on the menu, of course with Tania's famous salad! They sure know how to do up a proper feast.

October 28 - Brisbane and Byron Bay

We've made it to Brisbane yesterday, our last "home" destination for our Ozzie Adventure. We were met at the airport by our friend Tania and her fiance, Gary and are staying at their beautiful home. It is a large home with a brand new pool and we have our own 'wing' to stay in....life couldn't be better! Shelley was met at the airport by her friends in Brisbane and has 3 more weeks to enjoy in Australia. It was hard saying good bye to her at the airport :(

It didn't take long for Tania and Gary to make us feel at home as the Corona quickly made an appearance and Gary fired up the 'barbie' for a steak, potato and sausage feast. It is so hard to believe that it has been 9 years since we last saw Tania...she hasn't changed at all, and she was kind enough to say that we hadn't either (that is why we like her soooo much!)

Today we headed south to Byron Bay for a day trip. This was one of Adelle and my favourite spots in Australia and we wanted to show it to Jacelyn. We borrowed Tania's car and with the assistance of our Aussie GPS navigator, we travelled the M1 highway for about 1 and half hours and found our way quite easily. We encountered rain along the way and were dreading the possibility of a grey and wet visit, but mother nature smiled on us once again.

Once we arrived, we headed up to the famous lighthouse on the top of the peak. Byron Bay is the most easterly point in Australia and is also famous for being a good surfing spot. Our visit rekindled many fond memories and some not so fond (this is where Don almost broke his back thinking he was a surfer and also where Don got stung by jellyfish.....hmmmm, we see a pattern here). Glad to report that no major or minor injuries occurred this time around!

While doing the hike by the lighthouse we spotted a wallaby along the path, goats along the cliffs and whales off in the distance (was a real national geographic experience!!)

Byron Bay still has the laid back beach town feel it had before, but certainly has grown. Even so, it still is one of our favourite areas of Australia. We took a short drive to another pretty historic town, Bangalow, and then made our way back to Tania's and Gary's. We went out for Thai food with Tania, had a nice visit and now it is time to hit the hay. Can't believe we are coming to our last few days....

Oct 24-27 : Airlie Beach and Whitsunday Islands

Early departure from P.D. for our flight to Townsville where we rented a car to drive to Airlie Beach to catch our "yacht". Met up with our other Canadian friends from the Masters Games so there was a total of 11 of us "seniors" onboard the Atlantic Clipper with 35 other youngsters. They soon realized that us seniors could equal or surpass their ability to have fun. Besides that we felt someone should be onboard to supervise!! Weather was perfect for all 3 days - beautiful sunny skies, hot, slight breeze, and calm seas. We anchored at 4 spots during the sailing trip to snorkel and/or dive and beach visits on one of the many Whitsunday islands. The coral was amazing and again the many varieties of fish. The highlight for everyone was Whitehaven Beach on Whitsunday Island - it is consistently rated one of the top 10 beaches in the world - 7 kms of white silicone beach and blue, blue waters, Postcard Perfect! 3 days went by too quickly and now we are on the homestretch. We catch our flight to Brisbane in a few hours to spend our last 5 days with our friend, Tania. We will do day trips out of Brisbane to some of our favourite spots. Stay tuned for that.

October 19- 24: Port Douglas

Arrived in Cairns and picked up our rental car in an absolute torrential downpour. Somehow managed to pack up the car and find our way out of the city to head towards our next destination of Port Douglas. This stretch of highway was VERY slow going with many tight curves and drop offs along the coast....made for an interesting couple of hours to only go 70km!Our accommodation in P.D. was brilliant. Fully self-contained apartment: 2 bedroom, 2 bath, full kitchen, laundry (it's funny how excited a traveler gets when laundry is included!), living area and balcony. We were just one block from the beach and one block from the main strip so perfect location. Lots of funky restaurants and shops...really a fun little town.
The next 3 days we did a number of day trips to the surrounding attractions. Most of these consisted of hikes: Mossman Gorge (where Don jumped into a fresh water swimming hole and Jacelyn ran into a former co-worker from Halifax); Daintree Rainforest (excellent boardwalk hikes on many different levels of the tree canopy with some great lookout points); Maardja (sp?) (botanical walk through mangroves); full day to Kuranda (which included a 7k sky gondola ride over the mountain and treetops to the townsite and then a scenic historic railway trip back down the mountain.) All were great days with spectacular views and experiences.
The weather was really warm in P.D., but there were very high winds which kept us off the ocean the first few days. The wind finally settled down by Friday to 15-20 knots, which allowed us to head out on our Great Barrier Reef snorkeling adventure. We went out to 3 outer reef sites and spent the entire day snorkeling. Brought back our memories of how magnificient the Great Barrier Reef is. Shelley even experienced snorkeling for her first time. Saw amazing coral formations, incredible variety of fish and even some turtles. Was a great day!
Our last night at P.D. was at a local restaurant/bar that we heard about that had cheap fish/chips night with live Rock and Roll band. The highlight was Don and the waiter competing in a 'dance off'.....winner to be determined! The verdict was that they should BOTH enter into "So You Think You Can Dance AUSTRALIA"

Our next leg of the trip is off to Airlie Beach for our sailing trip through the Whitsunday Islands.

Sunday, October 18th...RACE DAY!

The alarm went off at 5:00am this morning to allow us time for the preparation required by elite athletes such as ourselves (provision of toast with peanut butter and many trips to the washroom as the nerves were in full effect!)

We left for the Olympic Park around 6:00am to arrive by 630am and checked our bags and then it was race time!! They organized the race a bit different from other races we have run in and sent waves of runners off based on gender and age. Seemed kind of a strange way to do things, as grouping runners by "expected run times" might have made more sense. So, Don was off in the lead group (obviously having nothing to do with the speed of the runners) and Adelle and Jacelyn were together two groups behind (4 minutes after Don left). It would have been nice if we could have all started together, but 'thems the rules'.

The weather was pretty good for the race, about 15C with little wind and overcast. So, running conditions were very good for a race this length. The course had a few climbs in it, but nothing these prairie folk couldn't handle.

There were definitely some elite athletes competing in this event. Some of the age group winners times were absolutely unbelievable. Certainly faster then any other race the 3 of us have taken part in. The overall winning time for men was 1 hr 8 minutes(how is that even possible...21K in 1 hr 8 minutes??? and we think he was in the 50-55 age group!) and the winning time for women was 1 hr 24 minutes (she was in the 35-39 age group). AND....it definitely didn't matter how old you were, as some of the winning times for the 60 and 70+ aged runners were just as competative as the winning times for the 30+!!! I guess that should be inspirational...but it was almost more humiliating...I mean humbling.

The good news was that all of us achieved our personal goals for this race: Jacelyn, our Speed Bunny, set a new PB of 1 hour 50 minutes; Don at 1 hr 55 ; and Adelle at 1 hr 58 (both our goals to be under the 2hr mark). So all was good in our world today! We were cheered on by Cathy and Gizmo (their dog) waving Canadian flags (and Nick taking the photo) as we entered the stadium at the 20K mark. You are feeling pretty crappy by that stage of the race, so it was great to see familiar faces and hear our names and chants of "Go Canada"...even with an Aussie accent!!

Tonight we attend the Closing Ceremonies in a park downtown in Darling Harbour. Then it's off to the north (and hot temps) as we head towards Port Douglas.

All in all, our World Masters Games experience was a very rewarding, memorable and satisfying experience. Already talking about Italy (Torino) in 2013!

**NOTE: Take note of our BEFORE photo - where we look refreshed...and our AFTER photo on the podium - not so refreshed!

Sydney's Beaches & The Blue Mountains : Wed & Thur

Our day started with a quick little tempo run lead by our Speed Bunny, Jacelyn. She sure knows how to turn on the speed - unfortunately Don and Adelle only have ONE speed. Then we were off to watch our friend, Kathy, play on the Edmonton Softball Team representing Canada (sorry, she asked us not to post which age category they fell under). Glad to report they are winning all their games quite easily and should be in the gold medal final this weekend for their division. We expect our first gold medal amongst our group!!
Jacelyn, Adelle, Don were driven by our personal Aussie chauffeur, Nick, to check out popular beach spots even though the weather was pretty miserable with a cold strong wind (made us feel right at home). Beach stops were Bondi, Coogee, and a stop at Maroubra Beach where the beach volleyball was being played for the Masters Games. Unfortunately, just as we arrived the wind picked up and the rain started to move in so we didn't stay to watch any. We still hope to make it there to catch some games. It was back home for a snooze before catching the train to city centre to meet our friend, Jeni, for a nice supper in The Rocks area. We enjoyed the view of the Opera House at night while dining on the harbour. Just a few more photos of the Opera House HAD to be taken.

Thursday was our sleep in day...till 730am!! Then we were off to the ball diamond again to catch Kathy's game before heading to the Blue Mountains for the day. It's about 1 1/2 hours from Nick's house on some very windy roads. The blue haze above the "mountains" comes from the eucalyptus oil being released from the trees. We drove to Katoomba and did the short hike to the Three Sisters - which includes the scary walk across the plank - and even scarier with the high winds today! We then did the steepest railway descent down the cliffs to the hiking path. And after our hike we took the skytram back up! Beautiful views and photo ops around every corner.
Tonight we are heading to a Club...not what you think. A Club here is like a Legionaires club that serves good food at cheap prices - gotta like that! We are meeting a group of Nick & Cathy's friends - I'm sure it's just to display their crazy Canucks to their friends. We'll try to be on our best behaviour.

P.S. We are sad to report that Benny Bread will no longer be posting on this blog as he had an unfortunate accident of falling into the toaster at breakfast yesterday morning. May he rest in peace!

Benny Bread's day in Sydney

You don't know me, but I have infiltrated my way into the elite group of Canucks travelling in Australia. I discovered that I could share my story on this blog, so have snuck into the computer room to post my days events.

It all started in a Sydney City Centre bakery very early in the morning. After exiting the oven, I was "bagged" (must come up with a better term for that) and prepared for distribution. Of course, I thought I would be placed on a comfortable rack and be put of for sale, but different events were planned for me today. Instead, I was carted out onto the street with a box of other poor loaves of bread and I was GIVEN away for free (how humiliating!!). Fortunately, I ended up in the hands of the travelling canucks and their accompanying Aussie friend. Myself (and 3 other loaves of bread) joined this group of explorers as we toured around the city of Sydney. Oh what joy it brought to us, as we headed north, south, west and yeast (I love punning myself.....). We enjoyed lunch at Darling Harbour, but loafed around there a bit too long. We made our way to the peirs and headed out over to Manly. I understand there was a conspiracy to try and leave us behind, but the handsome gentlemen in our company made sure that we would be brought along for the duration of the journey.

After Manly we headed back over to the city via the Ferry. Such an experience. Although difficult to get a really clear look through our cellophane bags, we did catch glimpses of the beautiful Sydney Bridge and the marvelous Sydney harbour.

After the site seeing, we made our way home on the train. Myself and my new BF, Don, had a wonderful time sharing stories. He just slices me up! I over heard someone saying that they were planning having French Toast in the morning. Must confess this has me a bit excited, as I have heard the French Toast are quite amorous!!! Well, I best end this post, but do hope to post soon.

Benny

Day 3 - Darling Harbour, Manly and Bridge Climb

Our day started early as we had to get in a 10K training run, so we were up at 6:00am....remind me again why we thought this was a good idea?? After the run we headed into Sydney city centre for Jacelyn to do her Bridge Climb! On the attached photo, she is the 3rd ant from the top. While she was doing that, the rest of us (Adelle, Don, Nick and Shelley) explored downtown and the Darling Harbour area. Had a quick bite at Darling Harbour and then hooked up again with Jacelyn. Her Bridge Climb went really well and she really enjoyed it with outstanding views of the city and harbour. The only down side was that there was a lady from Dublin that required numerous stops during the climb and apparently looked as if she could have a cardiac event at any time. This kept Jacelyn on her toes the entire climb!

Then we all headed over to Manly via the ferry. It is a great way to see the harbour and is about a 3o minute boat ride over. Once to Manly, which is like a little beach town, we headed directly to the ocean to dip our toes in....a little chilly, but there were still lots of people in swimming (must have been 'tourons'). We snuck down the beach a bit to get a group photo by a lifeguard surf board....don't we look the part of lifesavers??!!

We then grabbed another quick bite to eat and then the girls had an hour to shop before we caught the ferry back to Sydney and met Cathy at the peir to catch our train home. We are doing a home cooked meal tonight....getting a late start on it, but looking forward to it. So far our holiday has included lots of walking but also lots of eating. The walking usually includes circling around the same area at least 3 times! ....good thing we are finding a balance between the eating and walking.

Sydney Day 2 : Opera House

After a good night's sleep, we were ready to tackle a day of sightseeing. We took the train from Nick & Cathy's to Circular Quay (city centre) which is a quick 25 mins train ride on one line. Our accreditation gets us free transportation throughout Sydney on the trains, buses, and ferries for the week (pretty good deal). We walked along the harbour to Sydney Opera House and managed a few dozen photos from every possible angle of this famous building. Don't worry...we narrowed it down for you. It really is an amazing building and you just keep clicking the photos as one angle seems better than the last! We did decide on buying tickets to a play at the Opera House on Friday evening.
We also walked to The Rocks for a good pub meal and beer (found out what a Schooner and a Midi is when ordering our beers...so we are set for the rest of our trip!)
Checked out the Bridge Climb which Jaclyn booked herself on for tomorrow morning (I'm sure a full report will follow in the next posting).
Then we did a walk through their Botanical Gardens along the harbour. This botanical gardens is full of flying foxes (aka BATS). They literally are the size of small foxes with their rubber-like wings stretched over their bodies as they hang upside-down in the trees for their naptime...in the hundreds! We met Cathy at her work place which is right downtown and she managed to get passes for the Canucks to go to their 28th floor for an incredible view of the city centre, harbour, and Opera House. It pays to have connections!
Ended the day with a great Lebanese dinner back near our "home".
Tomorrow morning will start early for us with a training run at 7am (gotta get used to the early morning start for race-day...uuuggghhh!)

Opening Ceremonies for World Masters Games

We arrived safe and sound and were picked up by our Aussie friends, Nick and Cathy and taken back to their place to freshen up. We then headed directly to Sydney Olympic Park to pick up our accreditation and check out the Games Expo. Lots of interesting displays from essential oils (???) to SKINS (don't ask!). Actually it was quite good, although the gullible Canucks quickly took up an offer for some energy water that we were sure was free and then had to fork over $3.50 for the water....oh well, it was good.

We then assembled in an adjoining stadium to prepare for the marching in of athletes (still can't get use to calling us that). This started at about 3:30pm and we didn't march into the main stadium until 5:30pm. But, when you are trying to organise 30,000 athletes into groups by their sports, it was quite a feat! At least there was good music playing and even better people watching. From the amount of Canadian flags we saw, it was clearly evident that, next to the Aussies, Canada has the next largest delegation in attendance.

At 5:30pm we started our walk towards the main Olympic Stadium. While assembling, we met Jason (a fellow Canuck and half marathoner) in the line. He had a Garden Gnome along with him that became an instant celebrity and was in huge demand for photos. We (Jason, the Gnome and ourselves) created quite a stir. As we were in the "Athletics" sport division, we were one of the first ones into the stadium, so we got to enjoy the next hour and half of athletes marching in from the comfort of our chair in the in field area of the stadium. Of course, we madly waved our Canadian flags and cheered for every Canadian that walked by our section.

After the parade of athletes and the raising of the Games flag, the opening ceremonies started with an Aboriginal dance performance and then other music, dancers and fireworks. These Games are the largest multi-sport event in the world (twice the size of the Olympics) and the Sydney Games set a world record for most athletes (30,000) and countries (95) represented! It was quite special to be a part of this.

Then it was home to bed (after some hot chocolate and toast). It was an awsome start to our adventure!

Departure Day

Well, this is what we woke up to on our day of departure (Oct 9th)! Hard to believe we are leaving the frigid tundra of Saskatoon for the warm and tropical climate of Australia....sorry, just had to rub it in a bit. Once we get to Vancouver today, it is a just a short little flight (15 and a half hours) over to Sydney. That part we are not looking forward to....

We look forward to keeping you posted along the way and hopefully we will figure out how to add our photos over there. Until the next post...G'day mates!