Margaret River

I know, I know - it's been AGES since I last gave you all an update. Now, not to make excuses, but literally the day I returned from Perth, Jenny arrived and after she left, I was in go-mode to tell The Chocolate Box I was leaving, followed by finding and training a replacement. And on top of that, my laptop has now run out of memory, so there have been many frustrating nights of attempting to download my pictures to share with you all. I'm still working on getting all of them - it might just take a while longer. I now have 3 days off before I start my new job as a consultant at Accenture! I could not be more excited, and even more so, hopefully have some great stories to tell. I will try my hardest to catch you all up to date before my first day!

First things first, there is a quaint little coffee shop by my house that puts out a chalk board easel every morning with a quote written on it. This morning on my trek to the CBD (there seems to be so many errands to run when you finally have a day off work - all the little things that compile and seem to just get pushed to the back burner), the easel stood out on the sidewalk bearing the quote,

"Wherever you go, go with all your heart."

This put a huge smile on my face as not only is it a simple reminder for my everyday ventures, but also for my time in Australia as a whole and the beginning of this new journey with Accenture.

And now just to back-track a bit, I take you to December 26th:

The day after Christmas, Adam, Bec, Emily and I piled into "Ole Blue" (Adam and Em's car which they bought 2 years ago for $1,000 and used to drive from Adelaide in South Australia all the way to Perth in WA - picture the distance of New Orleans to LA). The lack of air con, missing door handles and peculiar smell of the interior were just a few of the charming characteristics of Ole Blue.) We headed 3 hours South from Perth to the Margaret River wine region with all windows down and Dave Matthews band blaring from the radio speakers. Before we left, we had hired a campsite not far from the vineyards to spend the next couple of nights. When pulling into Gracetown Caravan Park, I don't know what I was expecting from an Australian campsite, but the last thing I had in mind was an exact replica of every red-neck trailer park found in the likes of Alabama and South Georgia. Weaving through a maze of satellite dishes, generators, clothes lines and camper awnings strung with Christmas lights, we finally found space 82 after nearly plowing over a group of young boys playing catch and hitting a few dead ends.



We set up our tent and piled in the few duvets and pillows we brought, (Adam immediately decided to sleep in the car since the three of us girls barely fit into the tent as it was), and set out to explore Gracetown. According to the website, this was supposed to be the TOP rated caravan park in Margaret River, complete with all the bells and whistles. I must admit, for a campsite - it was pretty impressive to have, for our use, a large and extremely clean wash house, an outdoor movie screening area and a cooking gazebo stocked with grills, cook tops and a double-wide-size industrial refrigerator to store groceries.

Waiting patiently for a grill to open up, we played card games and had an exciting round of people watching, adding to our perception of the WA "bogan." The stereotype we had heard of and then witnessed first hand on Christmas Day was verified and added to with the colorful and in some cases, confusing, array of people surrounding us. There was the duo of middle-aged Australian men with a Eastern European women who did not speak a bit of English. In the other corner, manning our prized grill, was the dad of 5 sporting a shaved head with a rats-tail gliding down to his lower back. At the picnic bench across from us was the signature Asian family from the grand-parents down to every last Aunt, Uncle and cousin enjoying a nice dinner of...spaghetti? Last but not least was the single mom in cut off jean shorts chasing her son (quite a whiz on his Spiderman tricycle) around the gazebo. Trying to remember not to stare, our turn finally arrived at the grill and after filling our bellies, we decided to venture out of the park to the nearest "town."

The town consisted of one main street boasting about 5 stores total (one of which was a chain coffee shop and the other a local pub.) We decided upon the bustle of the local pub and upon entering, realized this was THE-place-to-be on a Thursday. It was Karaoke night! Settling into a front row seat, we proceeded to have a couple hours of highly enjoyable entertainment from not only the solo performances from the Karaoke host himself (during the down times when no one else wanted to brave the stage), to a local girl who was a regular performer on these such Thursdays, and the saving grace of a huge group of Irish (always leave it to the Irish to bring the party to a place.) After absorbing as much as we could from the performances, we decided to head back to settle in for the (cold) night.

Waking up sweating the next morning (I slept in two pairs of socks, jeans and sweatpants and 4 layers of shirts), we quickly changed into biking gear (remind you, I still was sporting my walking cast/"boot" at this point) - and headed back into "town" for our Sip 'n' Cycle tour of the Margaret River wine country. Pulling up next to a van wrapped in obnoxiously loud "Dirty Tours" artwork, we saw our fate: 4 mountain bikes complete with a water bottle (which didn't stay cold for long), our tour guide, and a loud-mouth local who grew up in M.R. and had worked at a couple of the vineyards we were soon to visit. After finally mounting my bike and making a couple quick loops around the parking lot, I felt comfortable enough to hit the road. I was actually surprised to find biking not as difficult as I had expected (and feared)!

We biked for a total of 30k that day to a total of 4 different wineries. It had to have been at least 100 degrees, and with heat comes 1. dehydration and 2. Flies! Now, I'm not talking about pesky house flies, I am talking about monstrous "March Flies" that look for any warm, wet landing place - and what better a place to land than a biker with sweat dripping down their face, mouths hanging open in exhaustion. It was absolutely disgusting not to mention annoying beyond belief! There were moments when I wanted to throw in the towel, give up, leave my bike abandoned on the side of the road and hitch-hike back to the town. However, this was the most exercise I had performed in months and it felt good! Our reward at the end of each stretch of road was the sweet taste of WA's famous Cab Sauv. The last boutique vineyard we visited was Stella Bella, where our tour guide worked part time. She had a spread of anti-pasta and bread for us to feast on after our journey. As frustrated as I was at times, the overall experience was fantastic. We met hilarious cellar door workers, a middle-aged man also sporting a walking cast (who wanted to stop to ask my entire life story) and received some excellent discounts on great bottles of wine (which I am currently aging at the apartment until I find some special occasion to drink them!)

We headed back to the campsite for a rest and re-hydration. That evening, we joined about 100 of our closest 5-12 year old neighbors in watching Cars 2 on the large movie screen set up in the middle of the camp; and then it was lights out for our early drive home the next morning.

It was quite the adventure to say the least and of course, always is a great story to tell.

Christmas Day

So it's been ages since an update - and boy is there a lot to update you on! Since Christmas Eve until today, I have basically been on holiday. The week I returned from WA, Jenny (one of my best friends from back home) arrived for 2 weeks (thankfully to help extend my holiday for that much longer).

I promised though to first paint the picture of my holidays from day one - and will bring you up to speed through to today where I not only quit my job (to start my new job in less than a month!), and finally received the go-ahead from the Doctor to walk without my boot, but am now back to the grind (minus the public holiday, Australia Day, aka "Australia's 4th of July" this Thursday.)

But first, Rewind to Christmas Day:
Woke up early at Emily's (Bec's friend from work back in Toronto) house to sneak downstairs and finding stockings filled with presents underneath our Charlie Brown Christmas Tree. In good fashion, we waited for everyone to wake up, cooked brunch, then around the brunch table, all opened our stockings at once. We enjoyed soaking up some morning rays on the back patio as the sun climbed higher in the sky to reach about 95 degrees.

After admiring an assortment of presents including: socks, a mini champagne bottle, chocolate and chewing gum - we all changed into our swim suits and Santa hats to head down to the beach for a little Christmas Day R&R (notice the lack of cast/boot!)

After some quick showers and a Mario Kart Championship match on the Wii, we headed to our friend Adam's house for Christmas dinner. When we arrived (after maneuvering the black spray painted truck sitting in the front yard and admiring the 3 more "in progress" cars in backyard), we were given the task to bring the house up to proper Christmas decor standards and this was the result from the materials we were provided:

I must admit, I was not too sure I could give up Southern fried okra and mashed potatoes with gravy for a "Christmas BBQ" - but since I no longer eat meat, the array of grilled veg and salads was more than efficient in satisfying my Christmas dinner cravings.

The night ended with the opening of more presents (one being a picture of the cat who belongs to Adam's housemate Dave. This cat is all black named "Whitie" and creepier than any other cat I have ever seen -which is exactly why Dave took a picture of him and framed it for Emily to keep forever.) We had chocolate trifle for dessert and wrapped up the evening with a round of flip cup and a punching bag show-off between the two "local" girls at the dinner. (Yes, one of them was showing off her kick boxing skills while wearing a red maxi dress). Blaming this end-of-the-night behavior on the fact that we were in the middle of "bogan" (Australian for "redneck") country  - I justified this abnormality of a Christmas Day as to why it was ok to not be with my family. I did Skype with the fam when we got home on their Christmas Day to help satisfy some of the homesick pains.

I must say - celebrating Christmas with a complete group of strangers, in a polar opposite atmosphere and climate, really helps you appreciate your home traditions, though I would not take this Christmas Day back for the world. I am so happy I was able to experience how an entirely different part of the world celebrates this special holiday and now just have a story to tell for years to come. The Christmas Day where I looked to Bec and asked "where the h*ll are we?!"

Summertime Bliss in WA

First, Merry (Happy as they say down under) Christmas and Happy New Year!

Bec and I sporting our must-have festive hats on Christmas morning

I am now home after almost 2 weeks of exploring the west coast of Australia. I cannot wait to see what this year holds for me and for new and exciting adventures. I am so blessed to have such amazing friends and family back home supporting me as well as a great group of friends here as well.

Now to be able to paint the most perfect picture of this first-time-away-from-home-at-Christmastime-experience, I will break up my stories into parts based on the different little adventures we had throughout the Holiday, so stay tuned!

Western Australia (WA), in comparison to all the pictures I have been sharing of Melbourne, is HOT, dry, sticky and very much just a large desert. (Literally, I did not feel clean the entire 2 weeks - mostly sweaty, sandy and a bit smelly, I was just happy to call Melbourne home for that very reason).

Because of the rough terrain, you will be hard to find anything but a 4x4 camper van here in WA

The draw to even venture out to WA you ask? The beaches are AMAZING. Turquoise blue waters that are so clear you can see the coral reefs from the shore that you can then snorkel out to in order to see fish and fauna of every color of the rainbow.

Off the coast of Rottnest Island (more details on this later)

The Departure:

Christmas Eve, Bec and I took the Sky Bus from Southern Cross train station to Melbourne Airport where we boarded a 3 hour flight (I had an entire row to myself!) and headed to the largest city in WA: Perth. We were invited to stay with an old friend of Bec's, Emily and her British roommate, Kim because their third housemate was away in "The States" for her holiday. 

(Side note: almost every single person I have talked to so far has only been to what I now like to call "the standards" of places to visit when they travel in the states. I bet everyone can guess: #1 NYC, #2 LA, #3 Vegas, #4 San Fran - I am still on my campaign of why they should head South next time they head over).

Interestingly enough, Bec (because she was a sweetheart and let me keep that entire row to myself, sitting on a full row across the aisle from me), started talking with the gentleman next to her who happened to have visited Marietta, GA back in 1984 and it was, in his words, "the couuuntry, with confederate flags a blowin." I assured him, if he had the chance to return to Marietta, this is not at all what he would find.

The rest of the flight was pretty uneventful, but because of the 3 hour time difference from the east coast, we were tired, yet starving when we arrived. Heading down the escalators toward passenger pick-up, we were greeted by Emily, complete with a Santa hat  of course, wildly jumping up and down. This welcome pretty much set the tone for the entire rest of the trip.

We had some pizza, put out our stockings and headed straight to bed in hopes that St. Nick would soon be there...

Our Charlie Brown tree

Back on the Workout Regime... Sort Of

After beginning my physio on my ankle last week (consisting of writing the ABC's, making circles and repeating a series of point and flex with my ankle), I was given the go-ahead to do a bit of swimming as well. Eager to for a good cardio workout, I headed to the pool after work today. The physical therapist said I could swim slowly, only if I used a float on my legs to keep my ankle still.

When I first arrived to the pool, it was fairly empty with clearly marked "slow" and "fast" lanes. I met a nice girl (while gathering the courage to get into the water) who was there for a water aerobics class. She also had broken her foot and said swimming was a great workout - this made me feel better about being there.

I hobbled up to the edge of the pool, took my boot off and lowered myself in. With a giant purple noodle in between my legs, I began an awkward, stiff-legged free style down the length of the pool. The few other people in my lane had to swim around me, so I opted to switch to the slowest moving lane (and I figured this much because of the 85 year old lady in her white bikini slowly making her way down the length of the pool doing a frog-crawl. She was zig-zagging across the entire lane, attempting backstroke, by the time I reached her. I tried to stay against the side wall to let her pass all the while trying to keep the noodle from slapping her in the face and despite my attempts to pass by unnoticed, she whacks me with her arm, which startled her more than me. She then proceeds to flail hopelessly for the lane rope while screeching in a raspy voice - "pay attention, I'm old! Why don't you watch out? I am an old lady!" Glaring in a confused and utterly disgusted brow-furring way, I continued my swim and immediately moved back over to my original lane.

I got down a routine, but without using my legs, I was wearing out fast - its a tough workout! Stopping for a rest at the far end of the pool, a guy walking along the edge asked if I would be so kind to move out of the way - his water polo team was now using the far two lanes for water polo practice. If I had to get out of that lane, then the old lady should have had to get out too - she began to squawk at every water polo zipping by her as well! By my last 50m lap, I was having to rest with a little side stroke from time to time. So I hoisted myself out of the water - too tired to move over two more lanes to one of the two free lanes left in the pool - ever filling up with more people who would have to swim around me and my purple noodle. Sitting on the edge of the pool, a nice man retrieved my boot for me - and as I sat recovering and warming up, the cocky water polo coach wandered over to inform the lifeguard that the old lady "had to go."

Leaving to head back to the locker room (and being cut in line for the water fountain by a 40 year old squash player) - I of course got all sorts of looks for my mighty boot - but felt good for having finally done a cardio workout.

Despite a cranky old lady, a pompous water polo coach and a line-cutting squash player, I am happy that I am able to become active again, a little at a time. Here's to recovering and beginning my triathlon training!

Sleigh Bells Ring...Are You Listenin?

Michelle and Eric arrived a few weeks ago. They both know Scott through working at Manhattan and just recently engaged, decided to start their life together, in Australia. Eric had to return to the US for a bit, leaving Michelle behind to find an apartment and furniture. Knowing how hard it is to get all settled in, I decided Michelle needed a nice dinner on the town - and we decided upon Cookie. Situated in a multi-level building, Cookie is one of the 3 restaurants, taking up an entire floor of a building with one slightly hidden entrance. The other floors of the buildings are other restaurants, boutiques, pubs, and a rooftop terrace that plays movies during the summer. Cookie is a Thai inspired restaurant (we order savory and crunchy cabbage rolls to start, then a white fish curry to share - which we both sweat through, so were happy when the waiter brought us cucumbers to cool down our mouths). The bill came to us, not in a traditional waiter book, but in a Little Golden Book! Just another quirky Melbourne discovery.

Leaving my apartment this past weekend, our garden was all abloom, so I am happy I captured this moment before the heat of summer set in and all the gorgeous flowers wilted.

Onto the CBD for the Christmas tour around the city:

Town Hall

The Famous Gingerbread Town

Australia Post HAS to deliver to Santa too

Entering Federation Square - turned Christmas Land

Bourke Street

Myer is the large department store I mentioned in my Horse Race blog. At Christmas, they hire a team to create entire scenes in the store windows (think NYC Macy's). Mid-November, the windows are revealed. This year the theme is "Santa Clause is Coming to Town" - The Nativity Scene takes up one window, then all the others are different scenes of Santa with his elves.

The weekend ended with a 12 Pubs of Christmas crawl. A group of us, dressed from head to toe in Christmas attire made our rounds to different locations in Fitzroy, spreading Christmas cheer! (My hat may or may not have sung and danced - it was pretty much the life of the party).

One more week to go of feeling like a cross between an Oompa Loompa and a Christmas Elf (all I have been doing the last 3 weeks is packing Corporate Christmas orders and eating chocolate for lunch because I do not have time to stop to eat a real meal). By this time next week, I will be making my way to Perth for 2 weeks on the beach, celebrating Christmas and New Years, with a trip to Margaret River and Monkey Mia in between.

I will miss home, family, friends and traditions terribly - too much so that I try not to think about it. But all in all, I am happy to start my own memories of the holidays and cannot wait to share them with you!

Springtime in South Yarra

Springtime in South Yarra is well underway and I can't help but feel that I am walking down some quaint street in Europe every morning I leave my house (now that I am walking again!) I wanted to share with you just a few of the great architecture and beautiful greenery I get to see right next door to me.

It might be hard to tell, but also every morning (well, on sunny mornings), there is are streaks across the sidewalk, glistening in the light. Only recently did Bec find out from our neighbors (Dave & Pete - who are both divorcees and obsessed with cycling, hence the reason I have gone to them for bike buying advice) that the same magical creatures who form these glistening lines are also the same magical creatures who have been shredding our mail inside our mailbox: snails. They live in the "garden" around our building and leave a trail behind when criss-crossing the sidewalk down to the mailboxes. Apparently they also enjoy eating paper, especially all the hospital bills that have been coming in.
Despite the snails, I am happy to be on my feet again. To easily walk down to the train station (this morning there were carolers inside the station showering all the train travelers with Christmas Tunes!) It's beginning to feel a lot like April but look a lot like Christmas around here! Christmas pictures to come.

Golden (*Champagne*) Birthday

I could have never imagined in a lifetime that I would have spent my Golden Birthday (turning 24 on the 24th of November) in Australia. (They call it Champagne Birthday in Canada - and Australia just doesn't celebrate such a thing at all). If anything, I had always had visions of going out in Atlanta in some fabulous gold dress with my closest friends. Instead, it went a bit like this:

Wednesday night before my birthday, Bec came home and surprised me with two blue sharpies (thank you KPMG stationary supply room). Over a glass of wine, we proceeded to graffiti my soon-to-be-removed cast with mantras that have become standard conversation since this whole ankle fiasco began. We dubbed this night the "trash the cast, party of two."

Feeling slightly like a 4th grader, I donned a large, black athletic sock up over my cast the next morning to head to Alfred Hospital Round 3. The day of Freedom had finally arrived! Bec and I had a quick pit stop at a cute local cafe right at the end of our street and she treated to a skinny flat white coffee, my new favorite (can't drink skinny caps ALL the time!) We toasted to: A Golden Birthday, American Thanksgiving and Cast-Off Day. What more could I ask for on this very special day!? Literally I day I felt like a kid on Christmas Eve waiting for Santa. I was so giddy and happy and the sun was shining, it was a great day.

This Round 3, a slightly more competent taxi driver took me the rest of the way to the Alfred and after a slight panic attack in the X-ray waiting room (the nurse said I might not get the cast off that day), I hobbled over to the second waiting room filled with 100 other patients all sporting variations of bone injuries. A nurse I recognized from the "plaster room" during Alfred Hospital Round 2 came to escort me back to the plaster room where I then had to....remove the sock. Bear in mind, I am now in a small room, with 5 other people, all over the age of 40. So the fact that I am in my 20's, in a cast... which is covered in graffiti, does nothing to help my: "I broke it in an innocent accident" claim.

Waiting for about an hour (all the while being harassed by the 40 year old show off/know it all across from me) the nurse finally wheeled over a large shop-vac looking machine equipped with a rotating saw blade connected to a long tube. This was the cast removal system, the ONLY cast removal system (unfortunately for Mr. Know It All who was keen to just rip it off himself.) She assured me the cast would only cut through the plaster but would stop automatically if it came into contact with skin (how a blade knows such things is beyond me, but I trusted her.) She also assured me that mine was one of the most tame and 'G' rated graffiti job she had seen and sent congratulations my way. A few cuts later, the cast peeled away, I look down to a hairy, pale, crusty, sorry excuse for a lower leg. The nurse brought over a wet towel for me to wash away what grime I could, which really just took off an entire couple layers of skin. To have the cast finally off my leg though felt fantastic.

Already discouraged by the state of my leg, the Doctor came back to announce I could keep the cast off but would have to use crutches for 6 more weeks - and then he disappeared (have I mentioned yet though that he is a young, charming, very attractive doctor??) - therefore mustering up every ounce of charisma in me when he returned, I convinced him to let me go straight to a "moon boot" so I would at least be able to walk, on two feet, without crutches - it was "my birthday after all!" (Actually in the back of my mind, all I cared about at that moment was the gathering of friends later that evening for my birthday and seeing all the disappointing looks on their faces when I would walked up on crutches instead of both feet - that would just not do.)

Scribbled prescription in hand, Dr. Charm wished me a Happy Birthday with a grin and sent me on my way to the Ortho equipment rental center to have my 'Cam' boot fitted. 20 minutes later, I was outside, on two feet, with a huge grin on my face.

Meeting at The World Bar was the plan for the evening, arranged by the fabulous Bec. After work, my friends met me here after work and I could not have ask for a better birthday celebration: right on the Yarra River walk, looking out to the water, sitting on the patio with great food, drinks and warm sunshine. It was perfect. Topping on the cake, my Birthday card from the Irish guys (this was inspired by a REAL sign on a tram in the city encouraging passengers to offer their seats to cripples - how appropriate!):

The Packed Car

Celebrations continued on into the weekend (and this time a drawn out Birthday was actually warranted because my birthday in the US was not until my Friday.) After work 5 of us piled into Bec's little Holden Hatchback loaded down with gear for a weekend at the beach in Fairhaven (literally a little strip of beach houses between Torquay and Lorne on the Great Ocean Road.) 12 of us met at a fabulous beach house, in the hills overlooking the water. Although it rained the majority of the weekend we still had an excellent time with home cooked meals, dance parties in the living room, swimming in the ocean (yes, I got in with my boot on - the other option was standing in the rain with FOMO (fear of missing out) and that just really wasn't even an option) and a trip to Koala Cove after a nice brunch in Lorne.

The most exciting part to the brunch (minus my amazing fluffy scrambled eggs on thick cut, grilled sourdough bread) was the people watching. "Schoolies" as they call them here are the high school graduates. (A bit odd to think of high school graduation in November/December, but this is Australia summer time - so their academic calendar follows suit. ) Schoolies are the 18 year old, but "I think I am 25 and cooler than you" type of kids. Donning outfits I that should be illegal to wear (worst offense: high waisted jean shorts with a 1/2 an inch inseam - worn by girls of ALL shapes and sized), these kids come to the beach to celebrate graduation and just wander up and down the beach. Bec and I had to restrain to keep our thoughts and judgements to ourselves.

The Great Ocean Road

Onto Koala cove (and only having to stop once for directions) we finally found the turn off. Rumored to have 100's of koalas sitting in the trees, this is a popular tourist attraction. So popular it even has a cafe named after it at the bottom of the hill required to climb to see the fluffy little guys. After hiking up the hill we saw one, not 100's, and it was asleep. Quite disappointing but after such a tiring weekend, I was envious of the little fella. All I wanted to do at that point was to curl up with him in the tree. Much more exciting were the enormous amounts of colorful birds. Entirely accustomed to tourists, a handful of birdseed would attract one of these parrots and they would eat right out of your hand. We each had a go (Lynsey and Rigel had more than they bargained for with birds landing on their heads), but this brought us entertainment for much longer than it should have.

Koala Cove

Saying our goodbyes then, all three car fulls headed back toward Melbourne, back to reality of Monday work day. I could not have asked for a better birthday. And although I missed Thanksgiving dinner (I had my moments of home sickness - especially after attempting to call my Mawmaw on her birthday, the day after mine and receiving emails from back home about a family effort to make heaps of mashed potatoes and pies), I could not have asked for a better way to spend my Champagne/Golden Birthday.