Wet but not Drowned

Most of you would have heard that Brisbane is in the midst of terrible flooding.  Leah and I are fine, our house is high up a hill.  The water didn't get as high as they expected but the devastation is terrible.  Our neighbourhood is all but cut off, though the waters are going back down.  Thankfully we've had two days of sunshine in a row.

We took a few pictures but, honestly, if you aren't from here you wouldn't know what you're looking at. I'll try and find a few to post in the next few days. Basically I wanted to post so you all knew we were fine.

Ross got out just in time.  The day he flew out the rain was coming down in buckets and that afternoon the river burst its banks.  They're saying the clean-up is going to take weeks and the rebuilding could take years.  There are thousands of people here who have been chased by water out of their homes.  15 people have lost their lives and there are grave concerns for a dozen more.

We're going to look for opportunities to volunteer this weekend.  In the meantime, I'd ask you all to make a donation to help the people of Queensland who have been stricken so hard.

http://www.qld.gov.au/floods/donate.html

This is the Regatta CityCat stop.  The blue part is the roof of the shelter. I'm pretty sure the whole thing broke it's moorings later in the day and it's now gone.  Lot's of ferry stops were lost yesterday.

This is Sylvan Road.  From here we're over 200 metres to the river.  On the right hand side is a huge liquor store and several body shops that didn't make it.  At the end of this street is the Regatta Hotel.  A Toowong landmark.  These last two pictures were taken yesterday before the peak.  The water came up about a foot more than this photo, but it was expected to rise more than three times that.  Thank goodness it didn't.

Here's a picture of the park, another several hundred metres back from the river.  The footy field is completely under water.  This is 3 minutes walk from our house.

The water is going down, but if we have another big rain event we could be in for some trouble. The grocery stores in our neighbourhood have been closed for two days, and they were pretty much stripped of goods before.

One thing is for certain.  These floods are going to have a long lasting impact on peoples lives.

I warned you.

See, I really am slack.  Sorry about that.

I've been super busy with my new job.  (At least that's what I'm telling myself)

Tomorrow Leah's brother is going to be here!  We're both really excited to have some family around.  We've made arrangements to do quite a bit of travel while Ross is here so he can get a good feel for Oz.  Maybe we can convince him to write an entry for the blog.  We'll see....

The state of this blog is pretty sad these days.  I'll try and stop in more often.  I know some of you like reading this.

Meanwhile, here are some photos from the past few months.

Australian War Memorial

Little Dress up Time at the War Museum

Wombat Crossing

That's an Echidna that was on the trail

Parliament House

Ok that's it for today.  More soon...

So, turns out I'm a Slacker. Who knew?

I guess I knew all along that I was, but looking back at the dates on this blog proves it.  I've been letting it go for a while and I know some of you aren't too happy about that. (I'm talking to you three nine)

Well for those of you who don't know, I've landed a new job.  That is my big news.  I'm leaving the auto industry and starting a new career.  I'll be working for a company that places students from North America into universities here in Australia.  My actual job will be placing students in unpaid internships with companies around the country and in New Zealand. I'll also be their point of contact for support while they are in country. It's quite a leap professionally for me and I'm quite proud of myself for landing it.

I've been trying to get my head around it for the last two weeks.  I got the job last Monday and had to give my notice the next day.  It wasn't as easy as you might think.  As soon as I thought about it I started getting a sinking feeling.  It's not that I was in love with the job as much as I didn't want to disappoint my co-workers.  Remember, I'm new to this country, a foreigner, and as such my boss took a big chance on me.  Also, I've gotten pretty close to Kev, sitting at the same desk day after day.  So while I look forward to embarking on my new voyage, it's bittersweet.

They actually took it quite well, as I knew they would, and my two weeks notice is now nearly over.  I have two days left of the job and most of my loose ends are tied up.  I have to tell you, it's a bit like waiting for Christmas morning to arrive.  The days seem to drag and it's hard for me to worry too much about petty details at this point.  I just want the new job to start already.

My new job, well, it's a ripper (sounds like RIPPA!), as they say.  It comes with a lot of responsibility and a lot more freedom than my last job.  I'll be the only person in the company based here in Brisbane so I'll be doing a lot of work from home at least until I can set up an office.  The company is based in Denver!  That's right, I travel half way around the world to find a company from Denver to work for.  They have an office here in Queensland, about an hour by plane north of here, and I'll be going there next week for training.  And that's just the beginning of the travel.  Looks like this one is going to keep me moving.  I'll be in Sydney for a week in October and in Melbourne (pronounced Mel-bin, btw) for a week at the end of November. And that isn't even taking into account other various little day trips. My calendar is filling up pretty quick and I haven't even started working yet. I think I'm going to see a lot more of Australia than I bargained for.  Woohoo!

Today is the first day of spring here in the Southern Hemisphere and a new chapter in my life is starting.  The weather is getting nicer and the days longer and I'm feeling excited and hopeful.  I'll try to write about it here a bit more.  I should have a more varied and interesting experience now that I won't be stuck in the same office day after day, selling parts for broken cars.  I've been doing that for something close to ten years and It's about time I got out.

Australia has been good to us, to me in particular.  Not only did I find a good job nearly right when I started looking the first time, but when I looked further it provided what I hope will be a dream job.  According to new boss, I wasn't the most qualified candidate that interviewed for the job.  I'm not sure if I would have even gotten an interview in the states.  But in Australia they pride themselves on giving everyone a "fair go" and I've now seen it myself more than once.  Talk about making a bloke feel at home.

We got big news, the party boat is here...

I got some big exciting news tonight, but I can't share with the whole world until tomorrow. I'm going to have trouble sleeping but I have to wait until some key people hear before I can broadcast. (no it's not that)  Sufficed to say, this is a real game changer.  Stay tuned for news.

P.S. thanks to Abbey for sharing photos from Robin and Chris' wedding, and thanks to Kari for sending us those videos, it was the next best thing to being there.  We miss you all.

I mean, shit, I got nothin

Guys, I'm sorry I've been letting you down with this blog thing lately.  We've been just livin, ya know?

I have some stuff to write about but I can't let it out just yet.  Gotta wait until the time is right, so to speak.

We do however want to take a minute to ask you all to send your thoughts and prayers for Leah's grandpa.  He's been in the hospital for a few days and is fighting a hard fight.

Also, we want to say good luck and congratulations to Robin and Chris who are getting married this weekend in Madison.  We wish we could be there to party with you, but you know, the whole other side of the world thing and all.

Those of you who do read the posts here, thanks for reading.  Promise not to stop just yet, we've just both been pretty busy.

Quick Trip to Sydney

A couple of weeks ago, my coworkers and I went to Sydney for a business trip.  Actually, we had won a sales contest and the trip was our reward.  We had a really busy schedule that included tours of the "home office" and other pretty boring stuff, followed by an awesome climb to the top of the Sydney Harbour bridge followed by a dinner cruise on the harbour.  

Me, Jay (my boss), and Kevin on top of the Sydney Harbour Bridge.  They make you dress up in those jump suits and the headphones are so we could hear our guides.  You're not allowed to take cameras up the bridge with you. They stop at four or five places and take your photo and charge you $25 to buy one.  We split the cost to get this one.  The climb costs about $250 each to do but the company we work for put us up for it.  It took about two hours to climb up and back with ample time to look around.  We got to watch the sunset from the top.  Two thumbs up.

Sydney from the plane.  The harbour is enormous. (Yes, they spell it with a "U")

On the ANZAC bridge.

Kev takes a moment to snap a couple at the docks

Yeah, that's about it.  I was only in Sydney for 24 hours and it was work related.  Most of the time I was on someone else's schedule and didn't drag the camera out.  What I can't show you is the huge yacht we were on for dinner and a cruise around the harbour.  We drank lots of free alcohol and played back jack on the boat. Kevin wound up winning the black jack tourney.  I woke up the next with a pretty massive headache.  I can't wait to go back and see the place properly.

Where did I leave off?

I had intended to continue with the recap of our trip to the Whitsundays, but our internet was slowed for the last few days of last week. (Leah was off for most of the month and was downloading lots of TV)

Since we've done that trip with Dave and Sarah, I've been to Sydney and Leah and I have been to two different rain forests.  If you want to see the whole mess of those photos, send me an e-mail and I'll send you a link to them.  Lets just call it trip of a lifetime and leave it at that.

This weekend Leah and I went down to Lamington National park and camped a couple of nights.  On Saturday we did a big 17.5k hike (about 11 miles).  It took us through subtropical rain forest, along a stream compete with tons of awesome waterfalls and up into the cold rain forest, where we saw some trees that are nearly 2000 years old.  It was misty, cloudy and a little bit rainy and I walked away with a few leech bites, but it was well worth it.  And the best part is it only takes about an hour by car to get there from home.

I'm too tired to write anything substantial, but I wanted to post a few pics tonight.  Forgive me if there is no rhyme or reason.

A little brekky in the mist, if you look closely (click photo to enlarge) you can see the little padmelons (tiny little kangaroo/wallaby thingos) in the background.   Thee were super cute and hung out most of the time we were at our tent.  

Hey little guy!

Large tree, little person

A rare open view, we were either deep in the forest or it was cloudy the whole day.  This was the only time we could see any distance.  Gorillas in the mist, yo.

Strangler fig on an angle looked pretty tempting for climbing.  

The first of about 40 waterfalls.

Some of them were more spectacular than others.

We had been told by a ranger to watch out for Lamington blue spiny crays.  A type of crayfish that lives in the creeks in the park.  We had seen a bunch of smaller ones in the water but Leah about jumped out of her boots when this guy showed up right in the middle of the path.  He was about 6 inches long and put up an impressive defensive show.  

Best of several attempts to get the waterfall in the background.

This spot was so lovely that we had to stop for a bite to eat, then we noticed the leeches and got the hell out.  I got several bites during the hike.  Did you know that leech bites continue to bleed for a really long time after?  I do now.

We both agree that this is one of the most beautiful hikes we've ever done.

As we worked our way up the mountain from the waterfalls, the forest changed character from sub-tropical to cold rain forest.  Everything was covered in moss.

If it wasn't covered in moss it was covered in fungus.

The rocks were super slippery, and by the time the day was over we were covered in mud.  I'd do it again in a minute.