Hello Australia!

We had a day and a half between Beth's family leaving and us departing for Australia. We relaxed and prepared for our three week trip.


We left Thursday afternoon for the airport. We boarded the plane and were on our way to Kuala Lumpur, 3 hours away. We landed and disembarked the plane, and walked a ways, outside on the tarmac into the terminal. We had about a 4 hour layover, then at about midnight we made our way on the tarmac to board our plane to Perth, a 5 and half hour journey.

Relaxing in the Bangkok Airport

 We arrived just before sunrise, very tired as we didn't sleep much on the flight. Katrina and James were there to meet us - big welcome hugs after a year and a half! We hopped in their car and drove to their place. It was odd not getting in a taxi but instead driving a personal car and it had seat belts in the back! We were also a bit chilly, this 70 degree weather is much different the 95+! We arrived at their place, had some breakfast then warmed up. Josh and I caught up on our sleep.

It rained most of the day we arrived, which James and Katrina said rarely happens in Perth. We stayed in and played Catan after some family bonding. Bonding and catching up had to come first - catan never makes friends...haha! Later in the week, after playing normal Catan we broke out their new Seafarers expansion.

We have been doing little things here each day, exploring the city and enjoying company. Here's a glimpse of we we've been up to over this past week.

Seafarers!

We went to Caversham Wildlife Park with Katrina one day. It is a very large wildlife park with over 2000 different animals in large caged areas, which visitors can enter and interact with the animals. We played with kangaroos, koalas, and other Australian animals. It was a very fun day!

Milking a Cow

Sheep Sheering Demo

Black Swan - only found in Australia!

Joey!

We attended an awards ceremony for James, at University of Notre Dame Australia, beautiful campus. Way to go on all your awards James! One day Josh drove after 5.5 months of not driving at all! We have also enjoyed a quick beach trip - surprising cool water but so refreshing! We had a great tea party with some of James family members. Josh went to an olive farm with James and friend this week. He enjoyed seeing a farm on this side of the world.

Olive Farm

One day us two traveled in the free city bus to the Perth Mint. We did a tour and learned about how the gold rush contributed to Western Australia and the Perth area. We got to see replicas of the world's biggest existing gold nugget, which is in Las Vegas. We also to to see the 2nd largest in the world, held in the Perth mint, along with many other gold nuggets and gold plates from around the world. There was a bar of gold we could lift - very heavy!! The Perth Mint, created the largest coin in the world, which we saw. Next we saw a gold pour demonstration. It took 15 minutes or less from the liquid gold to a solid bar!

The Perth Mint

Gold Campsite

James and Katrina live in a great area with nice city views and right next to Kings Park, the largest park in an urban city in the world! We have been to the park a few times - walks, afternoon reading sessions (or naps.) It is a very nice park, so lucky to be near it!

That about wraps up our first week in Australia. Weather is more bearable here than in Bangkok, that's for sure! 80-85 with little humidity much better than 95+ with very high humidity - and it cools down at night!