The Community

On Tuesday of last week, Australearn decided that since Australia is giving us such an amazing experience that we should give back to them. They took us to an area an hour outside of Cairns to help Conservation Volunteer Australia plant trees. We spent two hours planting, potting, weeding, and fertilizing; it was exhausting, but it was a growing experience. We learned that for every seven trees we planted it would cancel out the usage of once car per year and that the trees would be fully grown in three years time. It is important to Aussies tomake sure their wildlife and forest is growing steadily because down here there is no longer an O-zone layer. After we were all finished, we at some sandwiches and headed back to the hotel and attended an information session. This information session was all about what we do after we leave our adventure week and head into the real world of Australia. Our leader told us about different Australian customs, beliefs, and how to travel around the southern hemisphere. He also told us all about culture shock and how most people experience it in some form or another. While he was speaking, I kept thinking how it is not going to happen to me. I don’t want to wake up one morning and be miserable or be thinking about how much I miss home. I know that I’m going to get homesick, that is inevitable, but I want to make sure that my longing for the comfortable does not effect my experience down here. I want to make the most of it and I want to embrace the casual Australian lifestyle. Our leader told us that one sure way to distract ourselves from homesickness and culture shock is to plan fun and exciting get-aways. So tonight, Jenna and I decided we are going to make a “bucket list” of places and activities we want to do while we are down here. We know we want to make it to Sydney and Melbourne, maybe New Zealand (depending on funds) and hopefully enough to get to the outback. But, we know that there are plenty of activities we can do around the Gold Coast and closeto school; such as, learn how to surf, make friends with Australians, and eat kangaroo. It’s been less than a week in Australia and I have all ready done so many things I never thought I’d be able to do in my life, but this beautiful country has so much to offer, I can’t wait for the unexpected surprises to begin.

The next day, I headed to Port Douglas which is about an hour north of Cairns. For those of you who love movies, you might recognize the town as being in the critically acclaimed, award winning Matthew

Mcconaughey and Kate Hudson movie Fool’s Gold. Anyway, the town is beautiful, obviously. The town has shops all along the main road and a beach at one end. It was quite possibly the most beautiful beach I have ever seen. The water was warm that it was almost not refreshing, but we had fun nonetheless.