life in the top end

i've been living in darwin for about 5 weeks now, and it isn't like any place i've ever visited in my life. it's known in Australia as the "top end" as it is in the northernmost part of the Northern Territory. you can't go in the ocean because deadly jellyfish and crocodiles inhabit the waters, so it is a littttle bit different than living in margaret river, where i was in the ocean pretty much every day. it's really weird for me and as i left indonesia, i realized that it would be my last time in the sea for a long time, which made me so sad! bry left about 2 weeks ago for a month in indonesia. it was sad saying bye to her since we've been together pretty much every day for the past 9 months, but i know she is having a wicked time there so i'm happy for her :) there isn't a whole heck of a lot to do in darwin, unless you like partying every night, which most backpackers do lol there isn't a night here that you go out and the main bar monsoons isn't full. it's crazy! i've been trying to get back into running, but it's about 35 degrees here and sunny every day. for the first 2 weeks we got here, it was still wet season so the humidity was 95% and it was 35 degrees. picture me running around town handing out 30 resumes and getting no where. it wasn't the best days of my life lol! now the humidity has dropped a TON, but its still scorching hot everyday. i'm going to remember the feeling for when i'm home this winter. ugh i don't want to think about it right now! there are also these really cool night markets twice a week which i went to on the opening night to see the fireworks. there is so much cool stuff to buy there which is why i've only been once haha trying to save money! i really want to buy a digeridoo, but there is no way i could bring that home in my backpack :P

i'm still working at the restaurant. i'm getting better at being a waitress and making way less mistakes then i was at the beginning haha. i moved into the ymca which is trying really hard to be a hostel, but it's basically low income housing which is fine with me because it is about $75 cheaper per week than the hostels in town so, i'll take it! i booked a glass blown bead making workshop at the local arts centre for the end of may, which i am extremely stoked about. i've been wanting to work with glass for a really long time and have never had the chance so i think this is going to be super cool. when bry was here and working at croc cove (a crocodile park in the middle of darwin city) i went there to check it out and it was amazing! i got to feed teenager crocodiles pieces of meat on a fishing rod and they jumped right out of the water! we also saw the adults getting fed, and the noise of their jaws clamping together is something i'll never forget. those are the 5-6m guys swimming in the waters around here... no swimming! 

i was pretty down here for a while because i'm not darwin's biggest fan, and i had nothing to work towards, i just had no idea what i was doing. i really wanted to go see uluru and all that, so one day i just walked into the adventure tours place to check out the 3-5 day tours. wellll... i ended up booking a 14 day tour through the centre of australia from darwin down to melbourne. it hits every major landmark, uluru, alice springs, devils marbles, adelaide, great ocean road etc etc. i leave on june 9th, and get into melbourne on the 22nd. i'm really looking forward to seeing melbourne as well. a lot of people have told me that they think i'll like it there, so it will be neat to do some exploring. i finished off the day by maxing out my credit card because i bought my flight home! i leave australia on june 25th. melbourne > manila philippines > san fransisco > TORONTO. i booked my flight to toronto as it was actually cheaper to fly there than right to ottawa. ill have a few days in TO with my college peeps (and massive amounts of sneaky dees nachos) and then take the train home. i have mixed feelings about leaving. i am so excited to leave darwin and do some more travelling but i'm sad about leaving australia. I have had the most amazing time here, met some awesome people, and learned so much about myself and this epic world we live in. i know that being home is going to be great for the first little while and i'm so excited to see my family and friends, but how do you go back to a place that has basically stayed the same when you have changed so much? all i know is that i'm not done travelling just yet, so hopefully it won't be long before i dust off the old backpack and whip out my visa card to start booking flights again. 

i still have a month in this beautiful country, which is plenty of time to drink lots of lemon lime bitters, check out the weird aussie fashions (furry sweaters and jelly sandals... so strange!) and hopefully see a few more precious kangies before i head back to canada. thank god it will be summer when i get home so i'll be able to slowly readjust to the canadian climate! although it's winter in the south of australia right now, so about 10ish degrees in melbourne....ICK! 

anyways mates, (aka mom) just wanted to post a quick update on what's new on my side of the globe! i'll be seeing you all in just over a month, can't wait! xx

technical difficulties

so yesterday we had a mission: go bring my car to the mechanic and then go to supre and buy pants and sweaters. we were both going to drive so that once i dropped my car off, we could just hop in bry's and be on our way to the store. did it work out that way? of course not! lol

we drove to the first mechanic and i was feeling pretty good about driving actually! we parked and they said they had no room to look at my car today. on the way out, one guy came out and told bryanna that her car was leaking coolant. wtf, this definitely did not happen yesterday! so we continued on and found a midas.

i did basically the dumbest thing, i went in and was like omg i bought this heap yesterday, i don't know what i'm doing i know nothing about cars please help me. HAHA dumb. but the guys seem ok and said they would take a look, not do anything yet and we wouldn't have to pay so we left our cars there and walked back into town (40 min walk but it was a beautiful day!) then we got back, ate a wicked lunch of indian food and ended up taking the free cat bus to supre, which is this really cheap clothing store and its amazing. i got some pants and a sweater so thats good cause it's cold!

got back to the hostel and had a nap. bry was woken up by her phone, it was midas. they continued on to give us the shit list of what is wrong with our cars. hers is some sort of belt or something, and mine is a ton of holes/leaks in the exhaust and head engine or something that basically the cops would pull me over for and put a yellow sticker on the car aka not road worthy. COOOOOOOOOL. they said i got ripped off on buying the car and it was definitely not worth the 1100 that i paid for it. ooops. well, good thing we negotiated, she was asking 1600! hahaa no. 

so we basically freaked out for a while, i thought about buying a ticket home, etc etc. lol then we decided to go for a drink with bryanna's friend anthony who lives here in freo. he's super nice and we talked about surfing and how awesome australia is lol he said that he would come with us to the mechanic tomorrow (aka today) take a look at the mechanics report and help us out with deciding what to do. this is a huge relief because i literally know nothing about cars, except for what my step dad emailed me back when i told him about the weird noises lol so that made me feel quite a bit better. and worse comes to worse, i sell the car, lose out on a few hundred dollars and learn a lesson about buying used cars off gumtree lol not the end of the world. DRAMA!

anthony also said he would take us surfing this weekend! i'm seriously super scared slash excited but with bryanna and him in the water with me i think it will make me feel a lot better about it. ahhh sharks, stay away! lol

so that's the update with me. just waiting for anthony to come pick us up to head to the mechanics and see what they say :S taking it one step at a time haha so it looks like we will be staying here at this hostel for at least one or two more nights, which is alright. it will all work out and will be a funny story to tell later on down the road :P

i'll keep you guys updated on the situation! :)
looooove
soph xoxo

storm chaser

today was my second full day in australia, and i just wanted to say that tim tams are a gift from the heavens. i already knew how delicious they were because i'm pretty sure i ate one once before, but holy jeeze. i am bringing a backpack full of them home with me, it's already been decided. and there are so many flavours i have to try them all! i just got original to start with haha

 

today i woke up around 9 or 930 i believe. everyone in my room was sleeping, so i felt sort of bad rooting around in my bag to get stuff, but i wasn't going to sleep in too long and waste my day! yesterday i had decided that i wanted to try and find a gym that did three day passes, goodlife style, so i could work out! gaaah been missing it a lot! so i went downstairs and had some cereal and did some investigating. 

i found one, on recommendation of a guy i met from the uk called jett fitness, and i checked out the website and they do three day passes yesss! i also could get there on the free Blue CAT bus (which is actually orange what the heck). i know, i know, a bus called CAT and the logo is a cat. this place is made for me!

so i grab all my gym and shower stuff and make my way to the bus stop. sweet, i get off at my stop and promptly forget where i have to walk, so i just make it up as i go. lo and behold i find that i'm on the right road! now i just have to figure out how to cross a roundabout... cool. looked left then right, AHH almost get hit by a car. oops you have to look right then left here, i forgot lol

ok, made it to the gym, pull the door open. doesn't open. a girl comes up beside me and beeps open the door with her access card. so basically, this gym is like snap fitness at home where there are only staff around for a few hours per day, and i had missed them my half an hour! ugggghhhh so mad. so i begin the 2.9km walk home. at this point, there are black clouds around the city, but i'll be darned if i went all this way and didn't get any excercise, so i take off my fleece jacket, put on my windbreaker and cover up my little backpack with the huge raincover that i randomly brought. and i start joggin'. 

sooner than later, i have to stop because not only do i suck at jogging as you all know, but i'm also carrying a 15 or 20lb bag on my back. this sucks! the wind is blowing seriously so hard, and the ocean (i'm right beside south beach) is looking really stormy. it's quite awesome actually! so i make my way over to the path beside the beach and continue my jog.
earlier in the day, the english guy who i had met and i were discussing the various things in australia that could kill you. apparently, his roommate had found a silvery sort of transparent spider in his bed, yes, his bed, the week earlier. SWEET. so now i had creepy crawlies on my mind, and im running on this path beside all of these wicked cool trees and vegetation, but i'm just picturing scary snakes and stuff jumping out at me... so that was freaky! i continue on until i get to the harbourfront. 

i really felt like i was in halifax. all the ships were there, the same smell, and boy was it windy! i was pretty hungry by that time, and honestly, a bowl of cereal was not going to cut it. i really wanted fish and chips. so, being the worst vegetarian everrrrrrr, i caved. i mean, how many times are you going to be in australia eating fish that was caught like 1 hour ago? YOLO. i sent my thanks to mother nature and the beautiful fish i was about to eat for giving me energy and life, and then i dug in. sorry guys, i had to. and omg it was good. like maybe even better than the fish and chips i've had in nova scotia (sorry homeland). i was so full, but i made sure i ate every single fry because that shizz cost me 18 dollars. and i didn't end up having dinner, thats how full i was! 

best garbage can EVER

i wrapped myself back up in all of my layers and was about to trudge home, and i spotted the western australian museum shipwreck galleries. y'all know i cant resist a museum!!! so of course, i head inside. 

this place was seriously SWEET. they had so many artifacts, including a working engine from a ship that had been underwater for over 100 years, called the Xantho. they were working on restoring it, and have been working at it for 20 years, but they were able to restore it, and it even runs! they also had so much cool stuff from ships from the dutch west india trading company who had shipwrecked in western australia in the 1600s! like bits of porcelain, pipes, whole plates, jugs, coins, even some textiles. also, there was a section of the hull of this ship called the Batavia, which was sailing to Indonesia with supplies in the 1600s and was wrecked off the coast of WA. i didn't quite get the whole entire story, but somehow, a lot of the people who survived the wreck ended up being murdered, i'm pretty sure by the captain or something! it was crazy. they had a full skeleton that they found, of one of the very first europeans to land in WA. man, the size of this thing was amazing! it was in it's own separate room, and they had a video playing of the process of salvaging all of the things they found. i must have watched it for 45 minutes and it was still going, but i had to move on because there was so much more to see! in another exhibit, they had some of the native animals that were stuffed to demonstrate what the dutch people would have seen when they landed, including a cutie lil quokka!

that one's for you dad!

part of the recovered hull of the Batavia

some artifacts from a ship from the 1600s

pile of coins and burnt wood

ship's bell. HAHA (billy, nat, chris)

QUOKKA!

all in all, i basically stayed at that museum for at least 3 hours it must have been. i was so happy, i love that kind of stuff! the whole time i was there, i heard the wind and rain howling outside and i wasn't too keen on heading out into that. but i had to get back! so i put on my extra sweater, and tied my hood tight around my head, i obviously looked super cool. it actually wasn't that cold and only rained for a few minutes. the walk back was very quick! by the time i got home, i was so tired i just wanted to sleep, but i didnt because i dont want to mess up my sleeping schedule. i had a shower, because i was pretty sweaty from jogging and wearing all those layers. then i read a lot of my game of thrones book. i attempted to repack my bag, don't know how i'm going to do it without mum! haha tonight is my last night at the hostel, and tomorrow i begin my couchsurfing adventure! check out time is 10am, but i'm not leaving for my host's house until about 6 or 615. luckily they have a room where i can leave my bags locked up until it's time to go. the markets start tomorrow, but i think i'm going to save that and go on saturday. tomorrow i will probably just walk around on the other side of town that i haven't visited yet, maybe go check out the prison tour, who knows? :) also, today i walked past a salvation army, so that made me super stoked for when i have money and can buy clothes! all i need is a value village too and i'd be set haha

so that was my day. i'm pretty boring by hostel standards, but i'm just doin what i do, and i am having a great time! so that was today! and as i time travel forward into friday, while it's still thursday for you guys, just know that i'm thinking about all of you and miss you guys so much! everyone come visit!!! maybe wait until summertime though, it's cold now haha <3

lots of LOVE
soph

first full day in aus!

wednesday i got everything all sorted out. i didn't set my alarm and i didn't need to because i woke up at 1am, 5am, 7am and finally 930am. i ended up going to bed at 745 the night before, so i basically got 14 hours sleep! obviously i needed it!

i decided to set up my bank account and cell phone today. i headed over to commonwealth bank, and a super nice gal helped me get my accounts figured out. then i went to telstra, picked up a mobile SIM card from the convenience store right next door. it's pretty weird how the pay as you go plans work here. i got a $30 card which gives you $250 in credit to use for phone calls and texts. and 400 mb of data which really isnt a lot at all! i've been trying to use the wifi i found in this park and i pretty much sat there for a long time today figuring stuff out on the phone and posting my blog from yesterday! 

i went back to the hostel to have some lunch (ramen noodles lol) and to charge my phone and laptop. i got some reading in, and then this guy came over and started talking to me. he was from morocco, and then his friend from france came over and my two italian friends joined as well. it was super interesting, they were talking about the different political situations and stuff and how it was in their countries. i felt sort of dumb because i am so out of the loop with all that stuff! 

then i decided to walk to the beach. it is about a half an hour walk but i wanted to go anyway! the walk was really nice, it was cool to see all of the different styles of houses, they all looked so different! i'm pretty sure it was the rich area of town, and there were a lot of yacht clubs and things along the way. the trees and plants are all really cool too. two houses i passed along the way had lemon trees! and one had a little orange tree :) so cute! 

the beach was lovely! white sand, seaweed on the shore, it looked and smelled pretty much like nova scotia haha and the water was cold enough to be nova scotia almost! definitely not swimming time for me. the weather was very cold and cloudy today, but it actually got warmer in the evening and the sun came out. this made my walk home very enjoyable! i got pretty warm so i took off my sweatshirt and just had a tshirt and scarf. the looks people were giving me were so funny! here they were in puffy down jackets looking at this girl walking around in a tie dyed tshirt LOL! it must have been 16 or 17 degrees out in the sun and they were all bundled up.

at this point, all i had eaten was a cliff bar and a cup a soup, so i was really starting to get hungry. all i wanted was pizza... i couldnt find it anywhere! it seems like there are a ton of sit down type restaurants here, but no fast food. all i wanted was pizza pizza lmao! i ended up getting subway nooooo!!! here i am halfway around the world, and i end up getting something i could have eaten at home?! ugh. i went with my classic veggie (although they had no pickles, which was a cryin' shame!) so i scarfed that down and headed back to my hostel. i met up with julia and chiara, who were about to head to the grocery store to get something for dinner. i went with them and shopped at coles for the first time (last time i went to woolworth's) i'm super happy i went, because julia ended up finding hello kitty pasta! i got really excited and explained to her my love of hello kitty and all of my hk things i have at home :) i also bought some pasta sauce and some tim tams! can't believe i have been in australia for a whole day and hadn't bought them yet! 

then we sat outside with a bunch of people in the back patio area just chatting, most people were smoking and drinking, which is the standard (it is a hostel here! haha) everyone was really confused when i told them i don't drink much. i got the whole "you're canadian though, you guys love drinking!" too funny. met some cool guys from the uk, and julia and chiara met some more italians, so they were chatting it up. what a beautiful language. i told julia to say something really mean to me, or to swear at me, and even that sounded so lovely! lol
then i went back in the hostel to check out some wall postings of cars for sale. i found one good one, but its from june so i doubt it's still there. i might text them tomorrow to double check. then i was looking on gumtree and found a few options. i sent some links to my mum to show wayne, so hopefully he will be able to point me in the right direction :) 

now im just sitting on my bed writing this, and was talking to another girl who lives in this room. she's from belgium and has been living in this hostel for one year! this whole lifestyle is just so new to me, it is crazy and overwhelming and intriguing! i've been here for one day and i've already met people from italy, morocco, france, the uk and belgium! that would never happen at home! i feel like i've learned so much already :) she was saying that this place is like a trap, once you stay here you never want to leave and a lot of people don't! there are a lot of long term residents here it seems, so everyone knows everyone which is cool. i think it would definitely take me a while to get used to this lifestyle, especially because i don't party a lot so i feel like i don't fit in as well as most people. it's still very neat, but i am looking forward to having a room to myself and putting my clothes into drawers in margaret river :) 

as for right now, i think i'm going to get ready for bed, eat some tim tams and read a bit, like the nonna i am haha (i practised some italian today!) 
xoxo soph

that time you travelled and everything went right...

you know how you read travel blog posts of horrible flights, difficult customs officers, delays and lost baggage? well, you will be reading none of that today. my 30+ hour trip halfway around the world went off without any major glitches. also, my jet lag isn't so bad as i write this (knock on wood) at 6:45pm australian time, which is 6:45am in my head. 

this adventure starts off at the ottawa airport. the guy at the check in put my bag in a big plastic bag, added the bag tags and then it was time to say goodbye to my mum and wayne. obviously it was going to be hard. i definitely balled pretty much from the time i woke up that morning, almost to the time i boarded my flight. but then it hit me that i was going to australia and i was stoked! flight to toronto was simple. tried to skype with ness and victoria when i got there, as i had a 2.5 hour layover, but it was all  blurry. iMessaged with a lot of people nonetheless, so that was great! i bought a yummy kale salad and had a cliff bar while i waited to fly to lax.

that flight sort of sucked because all i ate for 5 hours was a bag of pretzels lol as we were getting ready to land, all you could see was this city, it just went on and on and on! i'm 99% sure i saw the hollywood sign in the far distance, but i couldn't be positive. this airport was seriously massive. i walked over to to the international terminal. there were palm trees! i walked right through an animal rights protest that was in front of the entrance doors to the check in area of south china airlines. it was protesting testing on primates in china. i pretty much wanted to join in, but i didn't want to be late! it was super weird because you could just sense the american-ness. i don't know if that sounds rude, i'm really not trying to be. basically what i mean is that you really realize those stereotypes of canadians are true when you go to america! 

i went through the security, bought a 14 dollar sandwich and went to hang out at my gate and use the wifi. my stupid soap container leaked in my carry on, so i spent a good 20 minutes cleaning that sucker out! haha then it was time to board the flight to melbourne. uggggh 16 hours. by this time it was 1130 so it was dark which was nice. this is when i started hearing people with australian accents! not going to lie, i love it :) i plopped down in my seat right near the massive wing (the captain said you can park 70 cars on each one!) there was an empty seat beside me, and then another girl. we ended up talking a bit, she was super nice! she lived in canada a bit before on a working visa, so it was neat that she knew some stuff i was talking about. the seat in between us stayed empty which was nice to have that extra space. that plane was seriously huge. i was in row 70 of 88! 3 on one side, 4 in the middle, and 3 on the other side. whoa. pretty soon after we took off, they served dinner. they remembered my veggie meal which was nice! pasta with sauce, a small salad and a roll. after i finished, i put my eye mask on, snuggled in a blanket and went to sleep! i woke up about 6 or 7 hours later and watched some episodes of new girl! lots more sleeping, some brekkie and then we got there! not going to lie, i only stood up and walked around once haha so lazy. i did a lot of those sitting exercises though so it was fine. went through customs there, they brought around a cute black lab drug dog haha then i went to double check that since i already had my boarding pass i would be good to go, and the lady said there was an earlier flight and did i want to switch? yes please! that cut my layover down from 4 hours to 1. i just had to recheck my bag. thank god for that plastic bag or i'm pretty sure my bag would have been toast! it was ripped to shreds. ah well, thanks air canada! 

this flight from melbourne to perth was 4 hours, but i think it was actually the hardest one. by that point i just wanted to get there, knowing that i was already in australia, but not really "in" it ya know? haha. so, this is where qantas kicks air canadas ASS. 4 hour domestic flight = full meal, 2 rounds of drinks and a snack before landing. take that sucky air canada 5 hour flight across the US. ihatechu. so yes, if anyone ever has the chance to fly qantas, do it! they didn't get my veg meal here, but obviously that's because i switched flights. i reached perth, grabbed my backpack and headed to the freo shuttle which would take me right to the front door of my hostel.

i find the shuttle stop, and ask the guy directing traffic for info. apparently, the freo shuttle didn't operate anymore. they need to change that on the website! lol basically, what i did was take the perth shuttle to the train station ($15) and then take the train ($4.20) which was basically like an aboveground subway. i saw the ocean! but sadly, no kangaroos. that will be my mission for tomorrow. i found the hostel easily enough from the freo train station. it was a nice walk, and i can already tell that i enjoy this town. there were palm trees too! it was a breezy 15 degree winters day, sun shining and crows cawing as i walked towards my hostel. i head in and look for the reception counter... "it's behind the bar!" one guy yells towards me. hmm... okay... so i head back to the bar counter and check in. i pay 81 dollars for 3 nights and a 10 key deposit. i head up the stairs to my room. the door is open, with the key in the lock... 

i walk in and there are 3 bunk beds. stuff is EVERYWHERE. like people have been living here for weeks. and i'm sure that's the story actually. of course im on the top bunk, so i throw all of my bags up there and clamber up the railings to have a seat. it is everything you imagine a typical hostel to be. dirty, loud and not seeming too organized. i'm not super stoked on the situation, generally overwhelmed, very very tired, and feeling pretty alone. not long after, two of my new roomies show up. i meet cara and julia from italy. they have been here for one week and are trying to get better at english. we chat and decide to go grab some food. this hostel has a communal kitchen, and as i have no food yet, the girls offer to share their toast and nutella with me. this is starting to feel better. i need to buy food though! so i head out..

i find a woolworths grocery store and stock up on things that dont need to be refrigerated. i bought a few cans of beans, some apples, some soups and a box of cereal. i spent about 20 which isn't too bad. i have a feeling i'm going to get skinny here because i'll only be eating like twice a day haha i walk back from the grocery store, stopping in at rip curl and a few surf stores along the way and chatting with some people. i get back and spot a guy giving another guy a tattoo in the common area. casual. college rez flashback, eh guys? haha! then i am ready to shower (can't go to bed yet, it's only 530pm!) surprisingly, the showers are clean and have nice warm water :) of course, as soon as i start to unpack my things to find my pajamas, i can't fit it all back in. my mum is a packing wizard. so now i have 3 full bags and no space to put them. i'm really really ready to go to sleep, but im going to try to push it until 9pm. luckily i have my GoT books to finish, so i'll do that as i am serenaded by beyonce at eardrum shattering levels, and the sounds of drinking games being played in multiple languages in the bar below. tonight's sleep will be brought to you by melatonin pills and earplugs. even as i write this, new girls come in and see if the two empty beds are taken. and with that, i don't feel so new anymore.

tomorrow, i'm not going to set any alarms, partly because i don't know how to use my watch, and partly because i want to see what time i wake up naturally. i may go for a run, but i'm definitely going to check out the beach, and see about setting up a bank account and getting a SIM card for my phone :) 

life's good so far down unda! now just waiting for bryanna to come join me... 6 days! i feel like when i have a good night's sleep under my belt, i'll be able to embrace the hostel experience with a new outlook, it was just a lot to take in after travelling for 30 hours! i've already met some lovely people and i'm sure there are plenty more for me to meet in my next two days here! after that... it's time to couchsurf! 

miss everyone a ton! love you lots and once i get adjusted to the time change, we can set up skype times with everyone :) 
peace love and KANGAROOS!
soph