Travelog for: PampleMoose

Right now Im just poking around in Sleepy's kitchen. I could have some fun here.

Sleepy's family's digital camera isnt working right now, and Verizon is being stupid and not letting her update her plan to include pictures. We're trying really hard to get my lil fuzzy face out in the world. Stay tuned.

If anyone can teach my computer illiterate mother how to easily shrink digital pictures using paint, or to make cell phone pictures full size, my mother and I would be eternally grateful. Until then, these will just have to do.

This is me with a distant cousin. Must have been a very distant cousin because he did not have much to say at all.


All that exploring has made me really hungry. I had to stop for a snack. Sleep says they make a flavor of ice cream called "moosetracks." It would be really neat sometime to get to taste moosetracks, or maybe even see Ben and Jerry's ice cream being made at a factory.



Sorry the pic is a bit blurry. This is me, hanging around, hoping for a snack


Ok, mom says this isnt a stewpot, nor a bathtub....Im not convinced.



Ever see a moose climb trees? it was absolutely pouring rain outside so I decided to just explore here for awhile.



I found this interesting old building. I wonder how old it is? I think I'll peek inside.



Eeeek! Im soooo sorry I looked in there! Gotta give a poor moose his privacy!

Pamplemoose has just (within the last 5 minutes) started his journey to visit QLD Australia to see Spanks!

He brings his travel log, some international and domestic stamps for post cards, and a small gift for his first host that she should keep or give to one of her tvs

Well here I am, in sunny QLD, Australia, altho it's not very sunny today, or warm (so they tell me!).

It was so exciting, i got picked up at the post office by 2 very chatty and giggly fellow TV's, i met Bonnie's mum and 1 of her brothers and they brang me home where we had some happy snaps done. It was so good to be out of the bag, I seem to be feeling very awake and lively and Bonnie said she was very happy that I arrived today otherwise it would have been 2 whole days before they could come back to check for me! So i'm very glad too!

Bonnie had made us some morning tea, which is Sao biccies with vegimite on it. At first I wasn't so sure, it looks real black and has a funny smell, but a moose has to do what a moose has to do, so I jumped on in and had a taste. I'll admit, I wasn't keen to begin with, but it's not so bad after your tongue goes numb

I'm off to hang out with Bonnie and Berlin for awhile, but i'll be back to check in

Life has been easy and slow lately, but now that school holidays have begun and there is a gaggle of kids home it seems a trip or 2 is on the cards for us 

during the last week of school, chook, bonnie's 6yo sister, had a couple of things happening at school, and she invited us to come along.

On the tuesday we went and helped the yr1's do their reading, I charge of the stamps, i had so much fun stamping the cards and the kids hands! bonnie had the cards and berlin had the books, so we all took turns and had some fun

Afterwards we went to "mums" friends house for a little farewell morning tea for bonnie, we got to play with the other kids and then we had a ride in the big yellow giraffe!

it was sad saying good bye to bonnie, and i really hope that somewhere at some stage we meet up again, but i know she's having fun and is on a whole new adventure of her own!

On the wednesday we were invited to attend Dinosaur Day at chooks classroom, it was very exciting and very scary! we saw sooo many dinosaurs, all the kids had to design their own and then make it out of clay, there were some very very good dinosaurs!

The "Jackosaurus" is chooks dinosaur!

Hi
I've arrived safely in Sydney.

Here I was when I arrived. Luckily Berlin Bear and I have gotten to know each other quite well, so it wasn't a problem to share a ride!


Our host took us outside to enjoy the beautiful weather. It is spring here - but the weather goes from beautiful to wet and rainy very quickly and there have been lots of thunder storms.
Berlin Bear and I made use of the new decking and furniture to relax and get ready for our upcoming sightseeing expeditions.




See how beautiful and green everything is? Bec used have this pot plant in her flat, but she says she has black thumbs, so her mum has to look after it for her now.

Tonight we went to see Damien Leith in concert at Star City. Unfortunately Mario couldn't come with us as he was too big to fit in our host's bag!
Damien Leith won Australian Idol last year and recently won an ARIA (Australian Record Industry Award) for most record sales in the last 12 months. My host's sister is a big fan and talked my host into going to the concert with her. We had a lot of fun and even the support band was really good too.

Here we are outside the Casino. There are a lot of water falls out the front.



The star at the top lights up from the top to the bottom in all different colours.

This fountain was especially interesting. You could pretend you are on a ship – at the bottom is a waterfall that looks just like the water splashing at the front of a ship on the sea!


Across from the Casino is Pyrmont Bay. In the distance we could see the Sydney Harbour Bridge. The white shell type thing to the left of the bay is a floating stage. There were many of these around the Harbour during the Sydney Olympics for live performances and screening of important events.



And here is the City skyline. We meant to come back after the show to get a pic of the night skyline, but it was raining too heavily! The tall, skinny tower is Sydney Tower which has a observation deck and revolving restaurant.

We made a Sunday drive through the Royal National Park today.


The Royal National Park was established in 1879 and is the world's second oldest national park - after Yellowstone in the USA. In July 2006, this park was added to the National Heritage List, which are places with outstanding natural, Indigenous or historic heritage value to Australia.


We spent a lot of time driving along the road as we were headed to Bundeena, which is 23km in from the highway. We saw lots of native plants and trees.




We crossed the Audley Weir (which has a tendency to flood after heavy rains, but the sky was clear, so we knew we'd be ok getting back out!)


The road was so windy too. All those tight bends!




I thought the cyclists we passed were very brave - the road is very narrow!


At times it felt like we were never going to get there! The road just kept going on and on and on!


But then we came over a bend and I could see water. My hosts and travel guides had told me I could play on the beach at Bundeena, so I knew we must be getting close! (The excitement was a little too much for Berlin Bear!)

Bundeena is a tiny beach side village in the Royal National Park. It is quite isolated even though it is right on the edge of the city. You can only access it by the long, winding drive we took or by a ferry service from Cronulla. Sometimes it is cut off by flooding at Audley, bushfires in the National Park or bad weather that makes it impossible for the ferry to run.

The beach is very beautiful and a nice place to spend a Sunday afternoon relaxing.

Berlin Bear, Mario and I had a lot of fun on the beach before having a late lunch and heading back 'home'


I tried to chat with some of the guppies that had gotten caught behind the sand bar, but I guess they've never seen a moose before, because they all swam away!


This park looked like a good place to have lunch, but we didn't pack a picnic so we went to the cafe instead!


Check out the view from the ferry wharf!
up the river:

back to the beach:


Before we could go home, we just hadto experience life in a gum tree in honour of one of our hosts.


I was also intrigued by this tap. How do you get the water out of it with no handle?

My host explained that due to the water restrictions with the drought in Australia most taps in public places have had their handles removed so that people can't waste water.

Today is the first Tuesday in November, which means that it is Melbourne Cup Day!
Melbourne Cup Day is Australia's most famous Tuesday. At 3.00 pm AEST, on the first Tuesday in November, Australians everywhere stop for one of the world's most famous horse races - the Melbourne Cup.

It is called "The Race That Stops a Nation" and even those who don't usually bet try their luck with a small wager or entry into a 'sweep' - a lottery in which each ticket-holder is matched with a randomly drawn horse. (Our host had a small win in the $1 sweep at work, but doesn't know how much she's won yet!)

Us ToyVoyagers decided to get in on the action - one problem though, we had no money  so we just had to pick a horse to barrack for. I chose Eskimo Queen (#22).



Then it was time for the race to start. It was so exciting!




Sadly, my horse didn't win or place, but it was still an exciting afternoon!

Today I visited Nan Tien Temple at Wollongong with my host, her mum and cousins.
It was about a 1 hour drive down the coast but I enjoyed taking in the scenery. A lot of it is the same Royal National Park we visited last weekend. I also enjoyed the nice sunny day after a week of heavy rain!


Our first stop was Sublime Point to take it the view of where we'd be going from the lookout.


Look at the view - you can see why they call it "Sublime"



Our eventual destination (for lunch) is on the 3rd peninsula you can see in this photo. On a clearer day you get a much better view of the lighthouse on the point, but today was still a little hazy from the poor weather!

The lookout had these really cool Morton Bay fig trees. The boys we were travelling with had the idea to climb them. I decided to join them. I really like this tree climbing thing!


to be continued ...... my typist has to go and smash potatoes!!

Well, I'm back - sorry for the delay. The computer's been getting used a lot lately for writing end of year school reports!

Did I show you these pretty flowers earlier? The red one is an Australian native called a Grevillia and we're not sure what the white one is! They don't have much of a fragrance, but birds enjoy eating the nectar the grevillia's produce.


Here I am at Nan Tien Temple near Wollongong. "Nan Tien" in Chinese, literally means "Paradise of the South". This is the biggest Buddhist temple in the southern hemisphere. It also has the largest terracotta tile roof of any building in the southern hemisphere.


This is the "Great Hero Hall" which is the largest of the two shrines. We went inside and enjoyed the sense of peace.


Here is the incense pot(?) outside the main shrine where people make their incense offerings. The smell of the incense up close made my nostrils tickle, but it was a pretty smell and you could smell it everywhere you went.


The large drum outside the main shrine. The monks have to climb a ladder to reach it.


There are a lot of Buddhist statues around the beautiful gardens.


It is such a nice place to just sit and relax and take in the natural surroundings (if you can ignore the sounds of the cars whizzing by on the highway!!)

It was getting late in the day and we were all hungry so we went into Wollongong to get fish and chips for lunch and watch the water.


Luckily, being so late in the afternoon (almost 3:30!) the fish and chip shop was not as busy as normal and we could get seats right out front (not a normal occurance on such a nice day!)


Look at those seagulls. Would you believe that one of them had the audacity to steal a piece of fish directly out the hands of Bec's mum right when we all weren't looking!?!


That building at the end of the pier used to be a fish and chip co-op but is now an expensive seafood restaurant. Behind it is the lighthouse Cassiopeia visited when she came to Wollongong with Bec & Kalli




Following lunch it was time to head home. We chose to take the older, more scenic route rather than the same expressway we'd travelled down on. The old highway follows the coast and winds through the old coal mining villages.
Look how steep that escarpment is!


BTW - That's the Tasman Sea you can see to the right of me!

We had to follow tradition and watch the hang gliders at Stanwell Tops on the way home.
There weren't that many about as it was getting really late in the day. They're so brave! We all agreed that it's probably ok once you're up there, but taking that last step off the cliff?? No way!



Oops, that one's a bit blurry!!


That's better! Did you know that this area (called Bald Point) is important in the history of flight because in 1894 a man called Lawrence Hargreaves was the first man in the world to fly with the help of four box kites on the beach below here?

And, look, that's the coastal highway we drove up. Can you see the bridge in the middle? It's called "Sea Cliff Bridge" and actually goes out over the water as the old road that ran along this point was blocked continually by rock falls from the cliff. I've put in a link to a proper photo of it. It's amazing!