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MEP and Paul finished their trip with a few days in Melbourne with us. We did a lot of things but apparently did not take a lot of pictures.

We went out to the Yarra Valley for chocolate, cheese, and wine tasting. It rained a lot. We popped in at Scott’s parents house on the way back so the two sides of the family could meet. Pat even let Paul try one of his VBs. :D Rosemarie was the only other person who was met a Jorna before that!

I took them into the city for a wander through arcades and alleyways. We checked off a bunch of touristy sites, and had a drink on a rooftop patio. Totes Melbs.

Scott picked us up and we headed to St Kilda to look for penguins! Penguins are Paul’s favourite animal so we were originally planning on going to Philip Island to do the penguin parade thing, but the weather was horrible down there so we decided to try St Kilda first.

Sorry for the terrible photo. It was dark and you can’t use flash.

I’d seen a penguin there before, but only one, and it was pretty deep inside the rocks so you couldn’t really see it. I thought it would be like that again but we actually got to see a whole bunch, and they were standing up on the rocks and crossing the path and everything. There were volunteers there to help spot them, give information, and keep the penguins safe. Pretty neat, and freeeee!

The next day we went to Lune Croissanterie for the bestest most expensivest croissants ever. And Costco to stock up my pantry. And then to my regular Monday night trivia for the mediocriest cheapests parmas (another Aus bucket list item ticked). We won too.

I had to work the last day so they went out on their own to meet a distant relative, and do a little last minute shopping. They made us steaks for dinner and we squeezed in a few more games of 7 Wonders.

All in all it was great to see them and we did a lot of fun things together. I hope they still had a nice time in Australia even though the weather ruined quite a few things. We look forward to their next visit!

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HAVE YOU EVER SEEN ANYTHING CUTER THAN A WOMBAT ON A LEASH???

Why is that wallaby glaring at me??

Various Irwin’s and a croc.

We stopped at the Australia Zoo on the way from Brisbane to Noosa so MEP and Paul could see lots of Aussie animals. I liked the koalas a lot.

We went to the famous bird and croc show in the big arena. It was cheesy but entertaining. Bindi Irwin is a surprisingly bad public speaker though? I would have thought she would be better considering she does it every day…

Anyway the zoo is massive!! They don’t have platypus though. Minus one star.

Great view from our apartment in Noosa too.

Of course I had to go for a swim. The ocean was soooo nice and warm. It was so crowded at the main beach though! Easter weekend was over but I guess a lot of people were sticking around for the week.

Scott and I went for a hike around Noosa National Park. We didn’t see any koalas or whales, but we did see dolphins!

We walked all the way from Noosa Main Beach to Sunshine Beach, had lunch at the RSL and then caught the bus back to town.

We all went on a super cheap sunset river cruise that was actually great. $10! The captain pointed out all sorts of things along the way and we ended up at the lake just in time to see a beautiful sunset over the water. He also got some kites to dive and snatch bits of meat in mid-air. It was relaxing and just great value compared to most touristy things in Australia.

We had a bit of extra time on the last day so we took the scenic route back to the Brisbane Airport via a couple lookouts and a cheesery. WILL U-TURN FOR CHEESE. We all had these extremely intense cheese tarts, which probably took two days to fully digest. So much cheese.

Noosa is nice but maybe a bit too fancy for me. I think there are other places along the Sunshine Coast that aren’t as busy or expensive that would be just as good.

After one last game of Ticket To Ride at the airport, Scott and I flew back to Melbourne, and MEP and Paul flew directly into a hurricane, but we would see them again in a couple weeks.

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A thousand years ago Scott and I flew to Brisbane to meet MEP and Paul.

Our Airbnb was right by the botanic gardens. The view was amazing!

They asked if there was anything I would like from Canada and I said MINI EGGS!! Paul delivered!! They are just as great as I remembered. The Mini Eggs in Australia are gross… the shell is really thick and kind of gummy, not very nice.

So actually a big part of the reason we decided to go to Brisbane was because this year’s Lions-Demons game was IN Brisbane, on the same weekend. Scott and I love going to watch that game every year and tbh if it’s in Brisbane again next year I will consider going again haha.

Anyway we dragged MEP and Paul out the very same day as they arrived from their super long flights. What troopers. MEP decided to nap before the game, Paul decided to nap AT the game. :D :D

Which was amusing because it was LOUD!! And exciting!!

Melbourne dominated for the first half of the game, then like Paul, decided to fall asleep in the 3rd quarter. Brisbane had a HUGE comeback, which obviously re-invigorated the crowd a lot, and made me extremely extremely stressed. Thankfully Melbourne pulled themselves together and got a few more goals at the end and the win.

Overall it was a great game, especially to watch in Brisbane. MEP liked it a lot!

Nice views on the walk back to the apartment.

We walked a bit too much that first day, so the next day we decided to see the city by Segway. It was Scott and my first time trying them. It’s fun!!! It didn’t take long to master. The company runs out of a storage locker. They did a quick lesson with each of us individually, and then we set out on a tour of the city. Minus one star because they didn’t really give us any information about any of the things we were zooming past, but plus one star because we got to go really far and fast, haha.

I’M NEVER WALKING ANYWHERE AGAIN!!!!

That night we went out for dinner by the river, and the next morning we headed North to Noosa via the Australia Zoo. To be continued.

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A thousand years ago Scott and I went to Wilsons Prom for a weekend.

We drove down on Friday night after work, stopping for dinner in Fish Creek. We wanted to have a quick meal so we’d arrive at the campground before dark but the food took 5ever to come out. Oh well, other than it making a bit difficult to pick out a good campsite (Tidal River Campground is first come first serve) we were fine setting up in the dark because we are Master Campers.

**This just reminded me I need to change the batteries in my headlamp. Thanks guys.

Anyway after setting up we just chilled in our camp chairs and watched the wombats wander around and surprise people. Very entertaining. They are brave wombats!! And so pudgy. :D :D

 

After a delicious camp breakfast of bacon and eggs we set out on a little hike. Check out this wombat hidey hole!! And check out my muscley legs!!

We walked out to Pillar Point Lookout and then down to Squeaky Beach. We ate our sandwiches and decided we wanted to swim but it would be a lot easier if we headed back to the beach near our campsite. It was sunny and nice out, but close to the end of summer so the water wasn’t super warm, but once we got in it was pretty nice. I put my head under and everything.

Later that afternoon we put our shoes back on and drove to the car park for the Mount Oberon “hike”. I put that in quotation marks because it was just a road that goes up up up up up up forever. I did not care for that much up hill. It’s not very scenic until you get to the very very top and then it’s SCENIC AF, as you can tell from that picture. We timed it so that we’d get to the peak at sunset, and succeeded, but unfortunately the sunset was a bit boring that evening. Unlucky because the night before the sunset was spectacular!! (We saw it as we were driving to the campground.) Then we hustled back down the mountain and only had to use our headlamps for the last ten minutes back to the car.

PS that’s Tidal River Campground on the right side of the picture. Scott used extreme zoom on my camera and took a picture of our tent. He debated running up the next morning so I could wave at him from down there and now I have ragret that we didn’t actually do it.

We actually had a really miserable night though. It suddenly got super windy, and sand was blowing everywhere. Our tent has a full fly but somehow sand was flying under the edges and into the tent and EVERYTHING was covered. Our pillows were gritty. Our sleeping bags were gritty. Our lips were gritty. To make it worse, it was super hot but we couldn’t open anything up because we would have been covered with even more sand. So sweaty. I did not sleep very well at all. When we woke up in the morning we had grey faces!!

Our breakfast pancakes came out horribly rubbery for some reason and then we felt a few drops of rain so we shook everything out and packed up in record time.

We had planned on doing another hike that day but instead decided to just give up and head home, via a cidery and cheesery.

We went to Gurney’s Cider, which is a family run farm that makes very simple and tasty dry cider. I loved their Scrumpy cider made from foraged apples but it was a bit too pricey for me. I did get a bottle of Wild though.

And we checked out Prom Country Cheese for lunch. We had a massive cheese board. It was intense. It came with a whole bunch of huge pieces of sheep, cow and goat cheese, warm bread and crackers, meat and more. I’m drooling reminiscing about it. Lovely place.

Anyway other than the sand we had a lovely time at the Prom. I would like to go back again next summer, for a bit longer. The beaches there are really great, and wombats are soooo cuuuute. It’s really competitive/expensive to reserve spots there though so dunno. Maybe somewhere else along the coast is better.

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You sick of Korea posts yet? :P Last one.

Scott and I checked out the Noryangjin Fish Market in Seoul. It’s a cool set up, they have A LOT of different types of seafood, and you can choose what you want and they will take it to their associated restaurant upstairs who will cook it for you for a couple dollars.

What kind of ray is this?

It was a little overwhelming though, there wasn’t much English inside, and some of the portions were enormous. So we just decided to get some salmon sashimi to go.

Which we ate outside in the sun on the steps of a random building.

Checking out the beach near our hotel in Donghae. The water looked beautiful and clear. I bet the Korean seaside is really nice in the summer.

Variety gimbap in Gangneung. I love how many elements they cram into a roll, even cheese!!

Eating during the Olympics was tricky. We seemed to always be racing to get onto the bus or train that was just about the depart so we ended up missing a lot of meals. And the food that was inside the Olympic venues was cheaper than I expected, but pretty bland. Anyway at least we ended on a pretty good note when we found a nice restaurant to have another dolsot bibimbap, gimbap, and mandu (Korean dumplings) on our last night.

I do regret not eating more seafood while on the seaside though. And we never found the soft tofu local speciality. Doh!

These doughnuts were amazing. Korea knows how to make a good crispy doughnut omg. The market stall was selling doughnuts stuffed with savoury fillings like: kimchi, pizza cheese, red bean, squid, and more. I had a japchae (glass noodles with vegetables) doughnut, and Scott had curry sweet potato. SO GOOD. We also tried hotteok which are like fried doughballs filled with lava caramel and seeds and nuts. Very difficult to eat (I may have had a molten sugar explosion all over my gloves and jacket), but very tasty.

Scott got a red bean fish ice cream from 7-11. It was nice.

Korea seems very… prepared. Our hotel in Seoul came with a fire extinguisher, a flashlight, and a little suitcase with an emergency ladder, and every subway station had these cases with tons of masks. I suppose technically they are still at war…

We stayed in Hongdae for our last night. It is a university area so there are a lot of things around for young people to spend their money, such as: escape rooms, arcades, animal cafes, 85 million coffee shops, phone case shops, karaoke, billiards, smash rooms, etc. And, speciality cafes, like Scott’s dream cafe: Mint Heim. Everything was mint chocolate, aka Scott’s favourite dessert flavour combination. You could even get mint coffee. It was a tough choice, but we decided to try a piece of the mint Nutella cake, and it was good.

Well that does it, I’m all caught up. It was an epic trip. So much fun! It was just so easy to travel there: plenty of English, fantastic transit, quite cheap, amazing food, tons to see. I would return to Korea again for sure, with an extra suitcase and an extra stomach! :D