Tag Archives: Australia

Stone the flamin’ crows!!!

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If you know me, you’ll know that I love Australia.

And where did my love of Australia begin? From watching Home and Away.

The Logies award ceremony was tonight (basically like the Aussie TV BAFTAs) and I was so annoyed they don’t 1. show the Logies in the UK 2. let non-Aussies like myself vote for who wins.

And I really wanted the legend that is Ray Meagher to win. That’s Alf ‘flamin’ Stewart for those of you who have ever watched Home and Away over the last 22 years (he’s the only original cast member left).

Well, he did win! Yay! Thank you to my Aussie twittering friends – Paula & Diane – for letting me know by tweeting as you watched the whole thing live.

It made me, Becca & Ruth well chuffed….since we are huge Alf Stewart fans. We’re actually planning a bloggers meet up to see ‘Alf’ as he’ll be in the UK for 6 months to act in Priscilla: Queen of the Desert in London’s West End. I think Carolyn is coming too now.

Sooooo excited!!!!!

I’m off to save up now…

Travelling Tuesday: Neighbours in St Kilda, Australia

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Neighbours is like the bread and butter of student life in the UK. I didn’t have many friends at uni who didn’t have a study schedule that revolved around the show. Exam time rolled around and you knew that everyone would leave the library at 5 p.m. for ‘a break’ so they could get home in time for Neighbours.

Before I left Aberdeenshire, a member of staff in the community centre informed me of a pub called the Elephant and Wheelbarrow where the cast of Neighbours often hung out…well, you know that we had to go there. Thankfully we arrived on the Monday which was Neighbours Night, and even better it was the Monday where The Waiting Room were playing. Plus it turns out we were staying in the district where they film Neighbours (St Kilda) which we didn’t know until we arrived. Rock on!

Libby Kennedy sings...I mean...uh...Kym Valentine...

Yes, that is Alan Fletcher (Dr Karl Kennedy…is there any branch of medicine he’s not an expert in?), why the blurry photo? Because has energy equal to a pre-school kid on blue smarties!! Seriously, I’m not kidding. This guy is defying his 50s.

It's crazy Sindi...remember her? She broke poor Stu Parker's heart she did...

we're just chatting about singing/music...you know how it is...

The Waiting Room in action...seriously Alan Fletcher is a legend. Fact.

Thank you so much to the folks who work on the show who happened to end up sitting at the same table as Vikki and I and took some of these pictures for us. You were total stars, plus you helped us on the quiz! Especially as our chat wasn’t so great having been on the sleeper train the previous night, I was STILL jet-lagged and we really should have been in our beds.

But we wanted to meet Dr Karl.

Karl + Susan = Forever (just sayin’)

Travelling Tuesday: Australia Day

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Australia is a place that means a great deal to me. It is the one place I’ve felt truly ‘at home’ while being away from home. I remember how contented and at peace I felt when I was there despite some very crazy circumstances…like getting your passport & credit card stolen, or having a skin cancer scare, or being completely alone in an unfamiliar city thousands of miles away from family & friends.

I’d dreamed of visiting and even living in Australia growing up amongst many other places. Usually when I get to those places, it doesn’t meet up to my dreams. Australia exceeded those dreams.

Maybe it was helped by the fact I didn’t meet a single shark or spider while I was there. ;)

And so today is Australia Day. Australia’s very own ’4th July’. For a former prison it sure is a beautiful place.

I hope I make it back there one day.

Especially as I didn’t make it to Uluru or Palm Beach (known to us as ‘Summer Bay’)

Where the heck is my Jesus-lovin’ Aussie surfer dude?

I miss you Australia!

yes, of course there is a story behind this picture.

:)

More Australia Day posts:

David Goodwin

Travelling Tuesday: 12 Apostles, Australia

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And this is what we travelled down the Great Ocean Road to see (in addition to the wild koalas and kangaroos)

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And as the sun was setting, a procession of penguins (little ones) were coming in from the water, up the beach below into caves where I presume they nest…but my photo didn’t come out because it was too dark.

And my friend had changed the settings on my camera, and to this day I don’t know what she did!!

I know that Carolyn has her Travelling Tuesday post pre-scheduled to appear today, so do go check it out. She’s in Cambodia at the moment.

If you want to join in with Travelling Tuesday, either with pics from a place in the world or a memory of somewhere you’ve travelled to please feel free. You can leave a comment with a link to your post here. :)

Travelling Tuesday: Great Ocean Road, Australia (Part 1)

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So we’re working on the going back to our regularly scheduled blogging. Only 2 more days of South Africa blogging too. Sniffle.

These pictures are from one of my favourite days in my trip to Australia. While we were staying in Melbourne, Kate, Vikki and I hired a car so we could drive down the Great Ocean Road. We were really blessed with a guide of places to stop and check out  by the woman who managed the youth hostel Vikki and I stayed at in St Kilda.

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I love the Aussies - they get straight to the point...! Ha ha!

I love the Aussies - they get straight to the point...! Ha ha!

Kangaroo on a golf course

Kangaroo on a golf course

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Travelling Tuesday: Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary, Australia

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I was going to do New York City this week, but Connor already beat me to it and I didn’t want to seem like a copycat. :)

So since it was ANZAC Day at the weekend just past, and ANZAC Day just happens to be the day I hugged another koala (a real one, not a stuffed one), I thought I’d show you some of the pics me and my Brisbane friend, Pippa took while spending the day at Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary, on the outskirts of Brisbane, Australia.

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Some of the same pics and my blog post about that day can be found here. (It’s not really that interesting a read though…)

April 10th Reflections

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2 years ago today I was landing in Sydney International Airport in this plane…

Kumala Dreaming at Heathrow

…and greeted by my two very excited friends who just about made me throw up on the spot when they mentioned the word ‘champagne’ as I was already feeling sick from the sleep deprivation (4hrs sleep in 48+hrs will do that to you) and weirdly timed (& gross) plane food.

1 year ago today I was sitting at home dosed up on painkillers when I got a text from my friend’s husband to inform me that Elastababy was born, he was a boy and they hadn’t decided on a name yet! This was a birth that had been much anticipated, and we were so excited. I probably annoyed the snot of Carrie by texting her asking ‘have you started getting contractions yet?” I don’t know how many times. I can’t believe that little baby boy is 1 year old. But can I just say I can’t wait until he is 3? There are so many cool toys and books you can buy once they are 3. On the same day I got asked if I’d be able to sing at a city wide youth event…it did mean I missed out on seeing the newborn baby boy in hospital which I was less than pleased about but did find it ironic that the topic for that night was sacrifice. ha ha!

This April 10th is Good Friday.

Apart from the fact it means I’m off work, I have to say it’s not a huge day for me. Easter has never meant that much to be. Maybe because there’s always so much else going on this time of year. Maybe because Christmas is really the only time I think about the birth of Jesus, but I kind of think about Jesus ‘last supper’, death and ressurecction on a pretty regular basis. So it makes Easter less ‘special’ because aside from the days off work, and chocolate egg it’s not really all that different from any other time of year for me. I don’t ‘feel’ it any more this weekend than I would any other weekend.

On a side note though, I noticed a TV advert that they are showing Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ. I still don’t understand why  they went to all the bother of making them speak in Hebrew/Aramaic and yet pretty much everyone in the film is white. I wonder if Jesus is blonde haired, blue eyed, wearing a white nightie and levitating around the Middle East too. Interesting. Mind you he was born in the cleanest stable to a very old looking teenager wearing a halo and blue nun outfit. Hardly what you’d call ‘normal’ during that time. I wonder if he had a baby bouncer too?