Semester break in Australia

So I started this blog because I have a lot of stories that I need to share with people being abroad and all. But there are too many people and too many stories to keep repeating them one-by-one. I was never really good with keeping a diary or anything like that. Even xanga eventually fell off my list of things to keep track of. So here goes nothing.... Enjoy!

My two week semester break was a very well needed one. JD, Sarah, and I had a plan to half-ass backpack our way up the east coast of Australia. We started at Sydney, went to Gold Coast, ventured up to Cairns, and finished off at Brisbane. Our adventure began in Sydney because really, who goes to Australia and doesn't visit Sydney at least for a little while right? Well our lack of planning on finding a place to stay caught us in an awkward situation. We booked a room in a hostel in Kings Cross... I know... WHAT WERE WE THINKING?! right? As soon as we got there and saw the disgusting room we would be staying in we bailed. We called our friend Alex and Simon to see if one of them could put us up for a few nights. Luckily we were able to crash at Alex's house even though he wasn't arriving until the next day. Sydney was pretty chill. I shopped a lot there :P.
Then we were off to Gold Coast. We were hoping our hostel there wouldn't be as bad. At the very least we wouldn't have a roommate who smoked... YUCK! But we were staying at a YHA so we trusted them a little more. We really didn't have much of a plan except beach it. So we did that on the first day there. Then we saw this thing called Plan B: 1 hell of a night. It was basically a club crawl where you pay $50, get into 5 clubs/pubs/bars via VIP entrance, one free drink at every venue, and no cover charge. There were about 100 people there and everyone was pretty cool. We had so much fun that night. Then we hung out at the beach again because really what else is there to do? I taught Sarah how to surf (sort of) and JD attempted to stay on the surf board long enough to paddle a few feet out. Then we went out at night again. We were given VIP passes to CD's and SinCity. The VIP passes included not only free entry before 11pm but free drinks as well. CD's offered three drinks for the whole night (but we were only there for an hour) and SinCity offered two free drinks. Since we had to catch the bus back to the hostel we left around 11 having had out 5 free drinks in two hours. I was pretty drunk because I only had basic spirits all night.
In the morning we were on a plane headed up to Cairns. This is where the 'REAL' adventure began. This is where we spent the most amount of money because we took a cruise on a locally owned boat called Passions of Paradise. It was the best experience of my life! The crew was friendly and they took really good care of me while I learned to SCUBA dive and they taught me about the wild life of the GBR. I had an absolute blast on that boat. Cairns is also where Sarah reached her goal of cuddling a Koala. I too held the Koala and we all had out pictures taken with it. I also held a croc. it was kinda creepy but still SO COOL! Then we went to the butterfly sanctuary (you all know how much I LOVE butterflies). That was just the best day ever. Did I mention that at the hostel we were staying at we got free dinners every night? It was amazing. Our roommate was super cool too. She was an exchange student at JCU Townsville from Germany. On our last night there was a power hour at Rhinobar. Power hour means that we pay $6 entry charge and drink all you can drink in an hour for free. Yea we had a lot of free drinks on our trip. Thankfully none of us got sick.
Our last stop was Brisbane. We stayed at a friend's house and had a lot of fun just chillin' in the city. Once again we had no real plan. The highlight of that trip was probably meeting Sarah's friend from F&M, Victoria. She was so bubbly and fun to hang out with. And she gave us places to go for a fun night out. We ended up going to UJ's and getting pretty wasted. There were these drink cards that you could buy that allowed you to basically get drinks for $3. I could only handle three drinks because at that point I was already pretty trashed. Sarah managed 7 or 8 and JD had 13. All within the span of about 3 hours. These guys from WA talked to us and bought Sarah and I shots of what we think was Bailey's and Kalua. I couldn't take it because I was already way drunk and didn't want to get sick. JD took my shot for me. But still it was nice to have someone buy me a drink when they really didn't need to. It was also hilarious to see two girls with six guys hanging around them. In any case we were done for the night and left.
Our two week break was such an amazing one that I doubt I'll ever top it. Although it was exhausting I still enjoyed myself. It was a huge success considering we hadn't really planned anything to do at each location, we just went with the flow. It's times like these when I really realize how lucky I am to have met people like JD and Sarah who are willing to just hop on a plane and say 'Let's party!!' You guys are awesome! Thanks so much for giving me a vacation worth remembering!
As for the rest of you, hope you enjoyed reading about my semester break adventure in Australia! Cheers :D