Month Two of Life Down Under

I haven’t updated this in around a month (woops!) Been very busy, which is a good thing, so I hope you can forgive me!

Part One – 26^th Feb – 13^th March

Things at the DDC (Dolphin Discovery Centre) are going great! Making so many amazing friends from all over the world, all with varying levels of English which has been a good experience! Also, I don’t think I’ve ever used my French so much since I’ve been in Australia – talking to French tourists when their English isn’t so good – I never thought I’d be using my A Level so much!

One thing that’s great about Australia is that wherever you are, there’s a beach. Going for spontaneous swims after working a morning at the DDC is pretty fun :) I’m getting to recognise the dolphins much more, and have a favourite – Eclipse. She’s about 6, and it so playful, swimming really close to you, rolling over onto her back, splashing water at you – she’s brilliant!

Kids Fun Day

We had a kids fun day at the centre which was really good fun. I was in charge of the badge making and now have a small collection of badges that were made for me by various children. At the end of the day we were just settling down for drinks on the deck when we had a phone call from the research team who were bringing in a dead dolphin that had been found in the harbour. It was only about a year old, and smelled disgusting. I stuck around to help out though, and consequently have thrown away a pair of flip flops as they were covered in dolphin blood. We lifted it (yep, I can now add touching a dead dolphin to my list of achievements) into the freezer to await an autopsy. If anyone goes looking for an ice cream in there, they’ll get a 

surprise!

Possum!

Joey :)

I have been Stand Up Paddle Boarding (yes, it’s a thing!) which involves standing up on a board (similar to a surf board) with a long paddle and propelling yourself through the water. Was pretty sure I’d fall in, but I actually wasn’t bad! Also been for a few coffees, and had a bbq on Back Beach with some other volunteers which was fun :) Did my first couple of swim tours too - going out on the boat and swimming with dolphins! I think that’s all that’s noteworthy, but it’s hard to remember everything! Really, I’ve just been busy, but had a lot of fun, and made some great friends :)

Swim tour: Selina, Ferne, me, Lisa

Part Two: Perth

Perth was great! It was nice to see a city, to tell the truth. It reminded me of Birmingham, lots of tall buildings and concrete, but there were lots of little quirks in Perth that gave it a great character.

Night view of Perth

I’ve been shopping far too much in the Op Shops (basically charity shops) but they are so cheap here! Also all the shops are having their end of summer sales, which is perfect to me because when I arrive back in England it will be just in time for summer!

Fremantle

Fremantle is a town just south of Perth, and I went there for a day and fell in love with the place. The markets were amazing, all these quirky little stalls, street performers and live music. It was like Covent Garden, only less pretentious. The atmosphere was brilliant. Walked along the seafront watching the sun set, and listening to people playing guitar… seriously, Fremantle is gorgeous.

Piano at Fremantle markets

I explored the museum in Perth which featured a huge collection of meteorites, and a section on European colonisation which I soaked up (missing learning about history!) and I even took notes on a scrap of paper I had in my bag. Commitment, eh? Haha. I also visited Parliament House - which has nothing on the UK Houses of Parliament in terms of architecture – and King’s Park, the world’s biggest inner city park (even bigger than NY’s Central Park!) The views over the city and Swan River were gorgeous. I visited AQWA – the aquarium – and loved it! There was a 98m underwater tunnel with giant manta rays, a huge loggerhead turtle, and lots of sharks which swam right over your head! On Sunday night I found a cute little church to go to – it was just the Pastor and his wife, and a congregation of around ten, but it was a really good little place; felt very welcome.

Shark at AQWA

A further thing that happened that week was some very good news I got at about 4 am… Joe got into university to become a vet! If you know us at all, you will know how much of a journey this has been, but yes, he is now going to be a vet! I was so happy! (An emotion I rarely feel being woken at 3.30 am!)

Sunset in Freo

Part Three: Back home.

It has been great to be back home (Australian home) with my second family. I had a few days of feeling pretty down actually. Firstly, the journey back from Perth was a nightmare. I was meeting a friend from the DDC, Conny, who was giving me a lift back, but on my way to meet her the wheel on my suitcase broke, so I had to literally drag it through Perth. It was awful. Then on the freeway on the drive home a huge rock flew up and put a pretty big crack in the windscreen, which was scary! That evening I found out some stuff from England that set me thinking, and all in all I was not in a brilliant mood! The past few days at the DDC though, have been really good in teaching me that wherever you go, you will find friends. I was struggling with not having my friends from the UK around me, but then when I got talking to the girls from the DDC it hit me that we’re all in the same boat – away from home, with these new friends we’ve only known a few weeks. We all spilled some stuff, and there were some tears, but it’s pretty amazing knowing that you can talk about all this stuff. Also have been talking to Mandy (my stand-in mum here) and she was brilliant to talk to. The problem is that people assume that ‘real life’ doesn’t happen because you’re in Australia, but believe me, it does! You just have to learn that you do have friends around you, just not the ones you’re used to!

Have been saying a few goodbyes lately, so the Sundowner on Friday was the last ‘social’ event with some of the girls! Anouchka left on Saturday, Lisa on Sunday, and I’ll have to say goodbye to Selina this week as she’ll be gone by the time I get back from Sydney! I’m definitely going to visit her in Berlin though – we get on so well, and we’ve only been friends a few weeks. I spent Sunday being followed by a camera  - Lisa (Sweden) is filming a pilot documentary to send to some companies about people who work with dolphins, and she stalked me for the day to shoot ‘A day in the life of a volunteer’. It was strange, but fun!

Busy being a tourist...

I’m headed to Perth (again) on Friday to fly out to Sydney on Sunday night, and will be back in WA on the 10^th of April, at which point I’ll only have three weeks left in Australia! This trip has absolutely flown by, but I am looking forward to seeing Joe, family, and friends again. And then to backpacking around Europe!

I've been here a month?!

(wrote this midweek)

Yep, that’s right, I have officially been in Australia for one whole month. Actually, more than a month, but I’ve been pretty busy these past couple of weeks so the update has had to wait until now. I’ll try to be brief!

Car washing

On Friday, Greg took me to the Speedway. It was pretty awesome! A car set on fire, and there were a few crashes – I was biting my nails the whole time. On Saturday night, I went out with the girls for Bronte’s birthday to a Chinese restaurant (yes, I survived!) Afterwards we went for a late night beach trip, and then onto Henry’s for coffee and smoothies. It was strange being in a group of all girls because most of my closest friends are guys. I’d forgotten how much drama there is with a big group of girls!

The girls

Sunday was the long-awaited ‘Mystery Tour’ for Greg’s birthday. It was also the day I saw my first Australian rain! It turned out that we were going on a Bushtucker Canoe tour! It was such an amazing day! We canoed all up the Margaret River – well, we tried. Our boat was not the most successful at the canoeing – in the boat race we got out and pushed as it turned out to be faster… We stopped along the river for a proper bushtucker lunch – I had wild fruits and then tried kangaroo (yum), emu (bland), and crocodile (too fishy in texture for me). The kangaroo went nicely with the sundried tomato bread and bush chutney! Next stop was a cave. Now, I’m pretty claustrophobic, and was reluctant to even go into the cave, but I did. Then, we were offered the chance to do a cave tunnel crawl. I really wanted to seize the opportunity, but was worried I’d panic in the middle of the tunnel. In the end, Bec just grabbed me and pulled me in behind her! I’m so glad I did it though! You had to crawl through gaps that were only just big enough to fit through, and there were parts where you had to pull yourself along on your elbows and belly. I was so proud of myself when I came out the other end! Went for a quick swim in the river to wash some of the mud off. After the canoe tour was done, we stopped off at the Margaret River Chocolate Factory. It’s a good thing I don’t live in Margaret River, because I would be at that place all the time. It was completely free, and you could just help yourself to as much chocolate as you wanted! I had so much that I couldn’t even eat bring myself to eat ice cream afterwards.

Canoe Crew

This was my first week at the Dolphin Discovery Centre, which I am loving! There’s an aquarium with a crazy octopus, seahorses and starfish the kids can touch, and a turtle that’s being rehabilitated. I fed the turtle the other day which was awesome :) The centre is right on the beach, and there’s a group of wild dolphins which swim in pretty much every morning. Big Nick practically never leaves. When a dolphin comes in, all the volunteers head to the beach and guide the public into the water to stand in a line at about thigh-deep level. The dolphins love people, and swim right in front of you, so close that you could touch them. It’s a pretty amazing experience – and I do it every day! Aside from the dolphins and other animals, the other volunteers there are brilliant. There’s loads of people around my age (although I think I’m the youngest!) and I’m making friends from all over the world! We had our first Sundowner on Friday after work, which is drinks and a bbq at the centre. I bought a 1.18 ltr bottle of Bud for $8 – bargain! Don’t worry, I didn’t drink it all myself, Julia (from Germany) shared it.

I spent a good half a day at the library on Thursday sorting out university-related things, and I still haven’t achieved much! It’s hard to think about all that while I’m in Oz, although I am missing education – I spent last night teaching Bec about sibilance and multiple co-ordination, haha. Yesterday, Mandy and I drove to Busselton and had lunch and went for a swim. When I came out of the sea, I had a weird itchy swelling on my back, with no clue as to how I’d got it. It could have been a jellyfish, but surely I would have felt it as it stung me?

The legend Big Nick

It’s just over a fortnight till I head to Perth for a week, and then I have just over a week at home before flying to Sydney for ten days! When I’m back from there, I only have three weeks left in Australia! The time here is going far too quickly for my liking!

Listening to the radio – feel proud to hear the ‘Poms’ Ed Sheeran and McFly played!