Down Under - 2008!!

24 May 2008 - Aaron arrived in Australia, we went to the Gold Coast beaches. I guess he was pretty excited to see the ocean because he just ran in with his jeans and shirt on. I sat up on the beach and started to feel worried - but after he got smashed around in the rough waves for about 15 minutes he made it back in to shore. After spending some time on the beach, we walked to the shops to buy Aaron some new shorts (there was no way his jeans were going to dry quick enough) - here he saw his first "meter maids" - he couldn't believe that it was legal for woman to walk about like that for their jobs ha ha. We then went and had Tepenyaki for lunch. Kylie and Tomo had taken me there before and I LOVED it, so I wanted Aaron to try it…..sadly - Aaron's meal mustn't have been fully cooked (I think he had fish) and he got pretty sick. We went to Kylie and Tomos house - Aaron had a shower and then had to take a nap cause he felt so ill. That night, Kylie, Tomo and Aaron and I went to the "Outback Spectacular" to show him some Aussie stuff. He was still not 100%, and of course the jet-lag was setting in pretty bad - we had fun though non-the-less. I think I tried to jam too much into the first day he was here - sorry hun!!!

25 May 2008 - was Sunday, so we went to church. After church hmmmm I believe we had lunch and then went to visit Sherri and James Thompson. Quite the awkward experience - mainly because their home teachers were there - but I'll leave those details out. Then we went and picked my Oma (Grandma) up from her house because the whole family was coming over to meet Aaron - not an intimidating thought at all!! The whole way home, Oma had a tingle in her throat and I thought she was going to cough up a lung - literally. She seemed to do OK by the time we got back to our house, but man!! After all the family left that night, we took Oma home, and then went to a nearby beach for a little while - who would have thought that Redcliffe would have nice beaches/parks. We were there for a while, but then started to hear some crazy guy yelling and someone scream so we left pretty quick.

26 May 2008 - Monday - what the heck did we do Monday?!? Aaron - you might have to update this part, because I cant remember for the life of me….wow - like blog sucks.
27 May 2008 - Tuesday - Kylie and Tomo came over because we all headed up to Harvey Bay to stay in a nice hotel the night before we went over to Fraser Island the next morning. After picking up our licence for the Island and Barge - We found our hotel and then went out and ate a fancy restaurant (well it seemed fancy to me) along the water at Harvey Bay. Kylie had swordfish and I think the rest of us had salmon. Man - I'm only 24 and I cant remember what happened 4 months ago!! Anyways - I do remember the meal was sooo good!! Oh, also, Aaron drove that night for the first time in Australia. First time on the left hand side, sitting on the right side of the car. Hahaha, everyone who has travelled overseas in a country where you drive on the other side of the road, knows how off-putting that can be - looking left instead of right when you intend to turn left out of a drive-way. It was pretty funny, but worked out - he did a dang good job actually!! Parallel parked the beast and all!! It rained most of the night and we just hoped that it would clear up for the next day we were heading to Fraser.

28 May 2008 - Wednesday - woke up nice and early to travel to the barge. The whole day ended up being pretty overcast, but the weather was good to us and the rain held off majority of the day. It was a pretty cold day considering that July was the beginning of winter here in Australia. We only got to hit 2 spots on the Island, it seemed like we did a lot of driving - but it was fun all the same. Huge props to Kylz for being pregnant with only 2 weeks to go until she was due - and riding all day in the sand, mud, puddles - and not to mention Tomo getting a bit excited and choosing to drive up the sides of the road etc for some extra fun. Oh, also - she managed to walk at least 1/2 hour straight up the side of a huge hill - was not easy, cant imagine being almost due and doing that too!! Lake MacKenzie was beautiful - crystal clear water!! Was freezing as, but we couldn't resist swimming in it. You can see in the pictures how clean the fresh lake is, and how deep it gets. Aaron decided to brave it and try swim out as far as he could. I was way too scared - it was too dark and deep for my liking. Tourists came to the Lake and left it pretty quick - I'm sure they thought we were a bunch of crazies swimming in the freezing lake with the wind blowing and the clouds blocking out every bit of sun! We then went to Lake Wobbie - this was not as exciting. It was very cool looking from the look-out at the top, but then after conning Kylie to walk all the way down, I felt bad because there wasn’t much to do down there. That night we travelled back home and slept pretty damn good!!

29 May 2008 - Sooooo Aaron got a choice out of "Underwater World" or "Australia Zoo" (basically - sharks or crocs). He wanted to go to see the sharks, so we went up the Sunshine Coast to Underwater World. It really is a cool place, and we spent a lot of time just watching the sharks. We went and had lunch - and because Aaron wanted some real fresh seafood (being from Colorado and all) we drove all along the beach, and NOWHERE was open. It was pouring rain and we honestly could not find anywhere - then there was a small place - and the food was disappointing :( We kept looking at the time and figuring that we had plenty of time before we had to head back to Brisbane to go hang out and have dinner with Peta and Jason that night. We left with plenty of time to get back - that was until I missed the exit - had to drive further half hour down the highway, turn around and drive back!! We arrived at Peta's house almost 1/2 hour late - to only find out that the watch/time we had been watching the whole day was OFF, and we were like an hour and a half late!! They had to feed the kids and put them to bed before we even showed up. We felt SO HORRIBLE!! I don’t think I've ever felt so lame in my entire life. Of course they thought our story was a bit suss (who wouldn't) but in all honesty - that is what happened, and we just felt horrible!! The meal was awesome - then we played some WII and Guitar Hero.

30 May 2008 - This was our last day before Aaron went home. We decided to head into the city and see the Temple, and do a session together. It was really awesome to go to the temple together. We took photos around the grounds, Aaron saw a spider which he thought was MASSIVE….it definitely wasn’t as big as a huntsman or anything, but he thought it was grotty non-the-less. Then a couple of Scottish woman who were in the session with us asked us to take photos of them, and then they took a photo of us right outside the doors, they asked Aaron "is this your fiance?" and he said "nooo, but we're heading that way hopefully"…ha ha we talked about it afterwards and were kinda upset that we didn’t make a scene of it and play it up a bit. Then we got Subway for lunch and sat at the top of the cliffs to eat. We hurried home and that night went out to dinner with Mum and Dad. This was a bunch of fun!! We went to a Thai restaurant at Carseldine. The place was packed, it was another rainy day/night - but they managed to squeeze us in (literally) at a small table out the back with almost no covering or heating. We ordered our meal and waited a LONG time to get it. Dad and Aaron provided plenty of entertainment though while we waited - and I'm sure that we cleared out a few tables because it was so ridiculous. After, Aaron and I went up to Mt Cootha - it’s a look-out in Brisbane that overlooks the whole Brisbane City and surrounding suburbs - very pretty from the top!!

31 May 2008 - Woke up and went to the airport for Aaron's flight at 11am. The week was awesome - and tiring trying to fit so much in, but I wanted him to see as much as the country as he could in those days. Was sad for him to go, but kept in our minds that I would go visit him for a month in 6 weeks.