My three day weekend...

Another whirlwind weekend is behind me. I swear I have been studying but one would definitely not think that I was learning a darned thing… except about back-packing (they call it bush walking) and water sports. This past Friday was a Queensland state holiday because of Gold Coast Show Day. Australia sure is different, this holiday is a day off in order to allow everyone to go to the “Gold Coast Show” aka: the local county fair… This does not really seem like an event that warrants a three day weekend but I didn’t question it and Tellu, Todd, Al, Jeff and I began our weekend of craziness on Thursday night. We stopped in Coolangatta for some really dear (their word for expensive) but really good pizza. Coolangatta is the location of the gold coast airport that Jan flew into and a quaint, less touristy area which is a welcomed change. That night we hiked 4.4K for an hour and forty minutes until reaching the top of Mt. Warning. (The mountain as photographed from the road the next day) I have to pause my laundry list of activities right now for a brief reflection: the night hike was absolutely amazing. It is so incredible to have all your senses heightened (clarification: we did have flashlights) and to be walking through an environment than you can only experience through the sounds around you. The ring of lights at our feet prevented us from tripping but did not shed light (no pun intended :-) ) on the grandeous beauty all around us. After refueling with snacks we chased down some lurking possums and then crawled into bed. We awoke to see the sunrise and I took on the role of sun paparazzi. Before us was a landscape scattered with canyons and rivers as fog danced around the groves in the ground floor. It was amazing to hike down right after dawn as the rising sun was constantly changing the view of the valleys below. The rest of Friday and Saturday was a blur of sleeping, disc-ing (yup that is actually me) and having a BBQs with Todd’s family where I proceeded to play hide and seek with two of his adorable cousins: Jayda (age 4) and Haylie (age 2). I guess even Australian kids like me because by the end of the night I was deemed Jayda’s favorite much to Todd’s dismay ;). All that chasing was good practice for the next day when Tellu, Todd, Me and some of Todd’s coworkers ran the Bridge to Brisbane 10K charity run. Tellu and Al knocked their time out of the water and ran it in 46 min while Todd was an amazing sport and ran at my slow pace of 10K in an hour. Now I have pretty much locked myself in the library - no fun allowed; and writing this entry has been a pleasure as a break from reading contempt of court cases… Media Law paper… nuff said. I guess I am here to learn something after all! Miss you all! :-)