The Travel Tales of Julia Sheldon

February 23 Bula! Welcome to Fiji! 6am flight from Melbourne to Brisbane, then on to Nadi, Fiji. Landed at 3pm, and was definitely not expecting mountains or a musical welcome. It was gorgeous, and immediately I felt the humidity of the tropics. In the 80 minutes it took to get to the Fiji Hideaway Resort, I learned that it takes 9 hours to drive around the biggest island in Fiji (which we were on). Their four biggest industries: water, sugarcane, lumber, and gold. There were roadside hot corn stands all along the drive. Fiji is part of the British Commonwealth, so Queen Elizabeth is on all of their coins. The drive was incredibly lush and green and gorgeous. Homes appeared to be made of tin or concrete, with several rooms. Upon arriving at the hotel, I was greeted so warmly. Met up with Tom and Katie, my Aussie travel buddies from Queensland, and enjoyed an absolutely stunning sunset before dinner. I was wiped and passed out before 9. February 24 Wok...

Jan 12 Gold Coast  Flew to Brisbane, got on a train and then a bus to Surfers Paradise in Gold Coast to meet Sarah, a Canadian CISV friend. I arrived to the hostel at 9, ate some food and went to bed. Travel day, for sure.  The Melbourne airport is funny Jan 13 Gold Coast We made breakfast and lunch at the hostel, checked out, and walked over to Aquasplash. We were hoping to get in for the noon play session but had to wait an hour. It's a giant inflatable playground in the water. We laughed SO much over the two hours and it was an awesome workout. Such a great afternoon. Oh, and I bought a children's fish swim cap to protect my colourful hair (saltwater pulls the colour out really fast). HA! It was a perfect way to spend the day. We got ourselves Go cards and got ready to move along to Brisbane. The state of Queensland has ONE transit system; it's AMAZING. We could use this one card to get around wherever there was public transit. Otherwise, Gr...