To Victoria and Beyond

Aussie term of the day...
"Ta" - it's basically another way of saying "thank you" but is a little more informal in a way. I didn't hear it much in the Queensland region, though every now and then it would pop up.  It became a lot more prominent when I traveled to the Northern Territory regions and just traveling in general with airport staff and such

            The drive to Litchfield was long and uneventful for the most part, the brown and green scenery flying by with the 130 kph speed limit. We took a few stop offs here and there, some for birding opportunities for Dad and another for lunch at one point.  Things really started to pick up when we took a late afternoon birding stop off for dad and we came across a small herd of wild brumbies! Now THAT was cool!

            Of course we stopped for a bit to watch and photograph them before heading back on our way to Litchfield!

            We arrived a while later, checking in to our accommodation for the next two days and settling in to our small cabin.  Mom set to work looking through our provided cooking things and getting dinner started when she came across a rather odd item in our cooking kit; a paint scraper.  That’s odd, we thought, and Dad was sent up to the reception area to inquire about a frying pan and a spatula.  We got the frying pan to be sure and when asked about the spatula the guy at the front desk responded with “There wasn’t one in your kit?” “Uh, well there was a paint scraper.” “Yep! That would be it!” Alrighty then!  And it worked quite well actually.  Now I know!

            The next day in Litchfield we spent hiking to a good number of waterfalls and just enjoying the beauty of the surrounding scenery.  We met up with our old friends the flying foxes on one of our hikes too and just had to be sure we didn’t spend too much time standing under the colony.  You’d risk getting rained on without a cloud in the sky if you did that! Just thought you would like to know. 

It was cool to see just how green stuff is even here in the Northern Territory.  I mean, not all of it is to be sure, but I haven’t seen much in the way of rolling expanses of red dirt void of much vegetation as I expected.  Sure it’s a bit dry in places, but most of the vegetation her is adapted to such climates.

            By the next day we were on the road again, knocking out the last long leg of driving and making our way back to Darwin.  A couple hours of driving and we were in Darwin, and a couple hours later we were saying goodbye to the Northern Territory and riding an airplane down to Melbourne in Victoria.  But of course, I can't forget to mention the little bit of Aussie reptilian wildlife we finally had the pleasure of seeing during one of our short treks through Darwin.  A goanna!

             Mom and Dad’s international flights both take off from Melbourne as well as Mom’s and my flights to New Zealand and Dad wanted to take some time to meet up with an old friend he knew back in West Virginia. 

            Melbourne was different than I expected, the city giving a very strong British vibe.  I think it would be pretty accurate to say that the city looks pretty close to a mix between Oregon and London architecture and feeling.  Cool place! 

Taking a stroll through some of the shops downtown

Taking a drive through the beautiful countryside 

            Dad’s friend took us on a long tour and drive about Melbourne city and one day we took a day trip to a fair sized wildlife sanctuary. Man was that place big and confusing! But really cool, oh man there were some cool critters there! I got to see my very first Tasmanian devil which was awesome! They are actually pretty docile, at least the ones I saw, and at one point we saw a bunch of them in this big pen and they were running around and playing with each other. 

            The big bird raptor show was pretty cool too, the birds coming right down onto the crowd and you could have almost reached out and touched them!

A whistling kite flying low over the crowd

Wedge tailed eagle landing on the rock near the trainer at the raptor show

            And here my days in Australia are coming to a close, that is, until I come back through for a day to take my international flight home. This will be one of my last blogs relating to my Australia travels though I am not quite done traveling yet.  My mom and I are leaving today for two weeks in New Zealand and though this blog was originally meant to carry stories of my Australian adventures, I will be writing blogs about my New Zealand trip here as well. It wouldn’t be quite worth it to make a whole blog for maybe just a couple entries now would it!

A beautiful flowering Turkey Bush