I am reminded of the Dr. Seuss book, “Oh the places you will go”. Australia is a land of some of the friendliest people. We traveled up and down the East coast, from Sydney up the Gold and Sunshine coasts to Cairns in Queensland, and from Sydney down the coast to southeastern Australia and through the wine country into Melbourne in Victoria and the beginning of the Great Ocean Road.
We met old friends and made new friends. Met families traveling and met my brother David. The most amazing thing while traveling is the ability to meet all sorts of different people from all over the world. Many of the people we have met, we hope to see again on our travels, in other parts of the world.
Katie and Oyvind, our very good friends in Seattle were finishing their trip in Oz upon our arrival. We were able to meet up with them twice in our first five days in Oz. Thanks you two for showing us around and treating us to a meal! We really enjoyed seeing you.
People, people, we met so many people at every stop we made. We made our way north up the coast, camping at Holiday Parks with our newly purchased tents and cooking with fellow campers in the camp kitchen. One of the first couples (Australians) we met had just finished a year traveling the world. We shared travel stories for hours. Once up in Cairns we stayed at a Holiday Park for many days and met fellow travelers and several families. Cairns is a very touristy area.
This is where we met a Polish family of four traveling around the world for one year. Blazej and Beata are traveling with their young daughter and son doing school on the road…sound familiar! It was lovely getting to know them and sharing many similar experiences in trying to accomplish a year of school while traveling. They are more than half way through their year so have many more months of experience under their belts, but many of the same challenges we have had. We hope to meet up with them again in SE Asia as this is where we both are heading, and most likely in Poland when we head to Europe in the summer.
We also met an Israeli family, living in Oz, out camping on holiday. Many of the people we met while staying in the Holiday Parks where fellow travelers like us and happy to share experiences and give recommendations, many of which we took. We found some great waves, thanks guys! We also met many Australians in the Holiday Parks as it was summer holidays and Aussies love to get out and camp. Teachers from Queensland schools shared what schools are like and what is happening in them. We had a great time chatting with teachers Jeff and Carolyn and their daughter Jessica. Good luck Jessica with your Javelin. Make that national team! The various teachers we have met have some pretty interesting ideas about furthering education, but of course they face some of the very same problems we do in the states.
We made it back down to Sydney for the holidays. Our best memory of this time was New Year Eve. Jeff and Tim went to the park early and set up camp. We met so many people, young and old alike from around the world. The girls from Brazil – Anna and Marianna and their friends. Martin (from the Netherlands) and his family. Pat from Sydney with her two lovely grand daughters. Everyone was there with the same purpose…to experience NYE in Sydney. It was amazing.
Once again we head off out of Sydney, this time south where the landscape differs from the north and reminds us wine country in CA. We find ourselves camping again at Holiday Parks, everyday meeting different people and even meeting a German couple at two of the same parks on consecutive days.
We met up with old friends of Jeff’s in Melbourne, Daryl, Mel and their 3 year old son Jack. The last time we saw them was in Seattle 11 years ago, when Tim was 3yrs and Jeff and I had just met. We met their family and friends and felt very much at home. Tim got to hang out with Yerri and Luca (thanks Wayne and Lucy).
We went down to Torquay and the beginning of the Great Ocean Road and stayed at the Holiday Park on the shore. Our neighbors Denny (the Horse) and Jackie were super nice and invited us and Tim over in the evening to meet their friends and share time. A fantastic evening that included some nice nibbles (Fried holoumi – greek cheese).
Australians are fabulously friendly and we enjoyed our 8 weeks, although it went by too fast.
~ Karen ~
For Karen and I, people are travel. Places are nice to visit, but without people, they are just that, places. What adds life to these places is the people and the different cultures. I would be quite happy traveling and not seeing a single site as long as I got to meet someone new every day.
I can’t possibly mention all the people we have met while we were in Australia, but as Karen said it is a very friendly place. Here are two quick examples.
On new years eve, I was trying to figure out how to get good pictures of the fireworks. Jack noticed that I had no idea and spent a ton of time trying to teach me how to use my camera. (He was a good teacher, but I wasn’t such a good pupil. I still didn’t get any good pictures of the fireworks.) At a holiday park outside of Sydney, I met Paul taking a couple of days off for surfing. We spent a lot of time talking about business, investing and politics. His insights were wonderful and made me think about things in a new way. I hope we can continue our conversation in Seattle at some point.
Our discussions with the various people we have met in Australia have given us a lot of different views on things and confirmed some of our own views. Australians have a wonderful view on life. Much more focus on living life rather than accumulating stuff. I hope Karen and I can feed off what we have been exposed to here to alter our life when we return. Family and friends are what make us happy and we need to make more time for them.
~ Jeff ~
PS – while putting this entry together we realized we hadn’t taken many pictures of the people we met in Australia. We will try to do better in Asia.
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