ROOS!

I heart white kangaroos, and brown kangaroos, and every other color kangaroos (I'm hoping to see a grey one next)

Angry Emu

Don't insult an emu. They don't appreciate it. Especially when you suggest that they are ugly.

Being a good person

It was time on the journey to dump all fruits before crossing the state line into South Australia. We ate what we could... and dumped the rest.

More fun at the Giant Koala

It's important to get good bush tucker on the long car trip.

Giant Koala

How can you not stop when you see a sign that says, "Giant Koala - 300 metres ahead"?!!!!

On the road again!

We hit the road for the long [Australia Day] weekend. Seeing these signs still seems a bit surreal!

Happy Australia Day!

Thanks www.google.com.au!

Australia shaped hamburgers

<-- Insert photo here of a hamburger patty in the shape of Australia. "Why?" you ask? Because we went to a bbq yesterday and that's what they were serving. They were the greatest [novelty] treat ever! I was too shy to be the goofy American who took a photo, and figured I could rely on Google images to find some other schmuck who had taken a picture of such a delight. Boy was I disappointed when I couldn't find a picture. So just use your imagination... picture a beefy Australia with little grill marks on it. :)

Double Coat Tim Tams

Yum yum yum yum yum yum yum yum yum yum yum yum yum yum yum yum yum yum yum yum yum.

YUM.

"It's looking a bit dodgy"

What a perfect summertime sky.

Spider

Unlike the icky spider on our ceiling... this is a delicious treat known as a spider.

A spider = vanilla ice cream + lemonade + strawberry flavouring (or any other flavoured syrup of your choice).

Yummy.

Aussie "crackers"

Kids like to play with these on Christmas, which meant they were perfect for us to purchase for 50% off after Christmas and enjoy on New Years Eve. You each pull an end and they pop open revealing a prize (such as a puzzle or a plastic cowboy). I pulled too hard and gave Megan a paper cut. Aussie life is tough.

New Years dinner

What a perfect evening...
-chicken potstickers
-rice
-diet coke
-sparkling cider
-roo watching
-my lady
Goodbye 2007!

ROOOOOS!

You're going to have to use your imagination on this one... but those are roos. They come down each night to the cricket pitch behind our hostel. We kept our distance and let them eat in peace... hence the pics being so boring. But, it was our FIRST ROO SIGHTING! (I'm not counting the 2 dead roos on the side of the road on our drive up).

Like I said...

... so buggy. Luckily Megan is quite clever. No bugs in her ears!

A buggy walk with a nice reward

So many flies.

happy megan.

happy jenny.

Venus baths

This was a pleasant surprise after a long hot drive to the Grampians. We walked along a nice 1km +/- trail to a natural rock formation where the river creates small pools (or "baths") of cool water. It was a great way to relax away New Years Eve!

Where not in Kansas anymore

Sometimes it's hard to tell if we're in Australia... or middle-of-nowhere-USA.

Hitting the road...

Here's our route from Altona to the Grampians for our New Years adventure!

What was especially wonderful about this road trip was that the car started to get a little warm when we had the AC (or "air con" as they say here) on. We thought we'd be fine without it, so we rolled down the windows for the 3 hour drive. Note to self, 3 hours in 42+ degree heat (108+) is MISERABLE! Not to mention the lovely one-arm sunburn you get from hanging your arm out the window!

Yummy breaky

Yes, more food obsession. These are pancakes with cranberries and raspberries and a white chocolate sauce. Mmm...

"Pork dumpling" night

Ok... it's chicken. But there's TWO platters! YUMMY!

Bloody legend

What a great ad campaign.

"You are a wanker!"

This is hands down the BEST part of cricket! Every time someone knocks a beloved beach ball onto the field (where it is promptly flattened by the police) the crowd erupts in a "You are a WANKER!" cheer! Priceless.

Little Aussies give it a go

The tiny tots get to play a little [t-ball style] cricket during the lunch break. They were so in to it, and sooo cute!

Typical Aussie bloaks

Andrew Symonds

Here I am, posing with Andrew Symonds. Yes... that is a Diet Coke instead of a cricket bat!

Success!

We got tickets to "the cricket"!!! We arrived bright and early for the world famous Boxing Day Test at the Melbourne Cricket Grounds between Australia and India. We picked out our very special green outfits :)

Another reminder that everything here can kill you.

happy.

That's a BIG fern!

My lovely assistant is demonstrating that indeed that IS a big fern!!!

Erskine Falls

A lovely waterfall we visited as part of our Christmas Great Ocean Road journey.

Spiders are icky.

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=syc6GnoOBA8

No really...

...click on the picture of the spider if you don't believe it was big!

WTF?!!!!

So we woke up this morning and discovered that this not-so-friendly fella on the ceiling above us (I pointed, without my contacts, and said, "What's that?" before we both RAN). Neither of us have ever seen a spider so big.

Australia is the land where everything can kill you... and Aussies aren't afraid to remind you of that! They have just about every species of venomous-EVERYTHING here. Megan tried to research what kind of spider he was before we attempted to approach it, and every website she found revealed that we were probably going to die if we got too close.

We finally made the drastic step that only Americans could... we called the non-emergency police number. They chuckled quietly while telling Megan that "with judicious use of a broom we should be ok." He also said that, "they're not particularly venomous. They might give you a good bite but the worse you'll end up with is nausea or a swollen hand." WHAT? She then called our landlord because this issue of not having screens on our windows has OBVIOUSLY led to unwanted pests. Maybe we could get someone to come out and kill it! Nope. She told us to spray it with bug spray, which wouldn't kill it but would allow us to kill it with a shoe. Ew. We were not keen to squish it out of fear of the huge mess it would leave on the wall.

We were, officially, on our own.

We crafted the brilliant plan of opening the window and trying to convince it to exit with the vacuum extension. It scurried a few inches before leaping off the ceiling and nearly eating Megan alive on it's way to the carpet (I stood back screaming and hand flapping... let's be honest). Finally I got the nerve to help out. I grabbed the vacuum and screamed at Megan to turn it on. The trauma of watching (and hearing) it get sucked up made me sick. Ick, yuck.

Good job us. We killed our first Huntsmen spider.

Megan & Jen 1 - Australia 0

A friendly reminder

Happy Christmas

BTW- This Great Ocean Road journey was on Christmas day. Not too shabby!

Another pretty one

Pretty as a postcard

Flies

No really... they're TERRIBLE.

Great Ocean Road

Here's the beginning of the Great Ocean Road... a 273km stretch of GORGEOUS coastline between Torquay and Warrnambool.

We're baaaaaack!

Sorry about going MIA loyal Hey Walshers! We're back in action! I'm going to try to get more pics up tonight. I'll load as many as our slow internet connection with allow.

Oh, and guess who finally has a pay day?! YUP... that's right, I get paid this week for my first THREE days at work! Woohoo!

Hey Walsh Neglect

Hey there Hey Walsh fans (all 3 or 4 of you)! Sorry we're so behind on posting. We have so much to share... from our journeys on the Great Ocean Road on Christmas to the cricket match on Boxing Day to Grampians National Park on New Years (where we finally saw ROOS!!!!).

But for now, we're just got back in to town and are going to wind down before going to work. That's right... WORK. I'm finally going to work tomorrow. No more daily walks to Pier Street!