Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Welcome to Australia!

It's been a crazy week since landing in Sydney last Thursday morning.  After a shorter than expected time in customs and then picking up our rental (a ginormous Mitsubishi Pajero), we were off to our new home of Nelson Bay, New South Wales. 

After a beautiful 2-1/2 hour drive through mountains, the coal port of Newcastle, and the largest sand dunes in the Southern hemisphere (Stockton Dunes) we pulled up to our condo.  We quickly got our luggage in and were headed off to Birubi Point, a beautiful beach on the Tasman Sea.  William loved it and ran directly into the water.

                                               He knows no fear...

                                         ..which can be a problem!

Nathan was a bit more reluctant.  The next picture in comparison to Will's shows the difference between the two boys in a nutshell.

                                        Thanks, but I'll stay and climb on rocks

We eventually convinced him to get closer to the water, but only because the sea was as calm as a lake.  More on that in a later post, however.


                                                 This far, but no farther guys.

We stayed at the beach for a bit, had a bite to eat, and then collapsed into bed.  I have no idea what or where we ate - jetlag from a 15 hour flight that causes a 14 hour time difference is a killer.  Brian made me stay up until 8:00pm which was an incredible struggle.

The next day we were up at 4:30 in the morning.  Not only did our bodies have no idea what time it was, we have what appears to be a flock of Magpies and parrots outside of our windows.  I guarantee that Magpies are at least as loud as you may have heard. 

We got up and head to a local patisserie for breakfast and Flat Whites for the adults.  The best description I can give of a Flat White is a cross between a cafe au lait and a cappucino - and they are wonderful.  After a lovely breakfast, we headed back to the beach.

Since we still had an all wheel drive we wanted to make the most of it and go drive on the sand dunes.  Unfortunately, you have to have a permit from the Worimi people and we were unsure of how to do that, so we decided to go for a walk on the beach instead.

We ended up at the north end of Birubi Point, which is where the sand dunes begin.  The water was a sparkling blue and the winter weather was 20 celsius, which is equivalent to 70 farenheit. 

                       This is the first time Nathan has been able to get us in frame.

After walking the beach for a bit, we decided to let the kids play on the dunes.  They had a great time trying to run up them and sliding down the dunes.  We will be taking camel rides some time soon on these same dunes.


                         Nathan complained about the sand in his pants afterwards.

After this adventure we were off to the Oakvale Farm, a place to view and feed the local animals.  I'll post more on that tomorrow.

All in all, we've had a great first week.  The kids are doing fairly well adjusting, although Nathan has his moments.  I think after he starts school on Monday and gets on a schedule he'll do much better.  The Aussies are a lovely, friendly group of people who have been nothing but incredibly welcoming to us.  As far as places to relocate to, you could do worse!

1 comment:

  1. Kristi, Brian and Boys! What a great idea .. keeps all of us who love you in the loop. Keep us tuned in.
    All my best.
    Jack
    (p.s., thank Nila for getting the blog address around the crowd.)

    ReplyDelete