Brisbane last class and weeks in OZ

Sorry it's been so long since the last post if you are still keeping up with these!

WE started off with some free days so some of us headed over to the GOLD COAST which is the local beach holiday destination amongst the aussies. We had a blast in the waves which were supremely large and forboding since there was a storm on its way. A few people had to get saved by lifeguards towards the end it was so strong! But it was good fun all the same and we enjoyed the lengthy sandy beaches and the australian lifeguards! AFter  that we joined the fun in the city shopping in local stores getting some hot chocolate and buying unnecessary items for fun. WE warmed up in the hotel hot tub and met some brits americans and french people who we ended up partying with a little later. Being in the raging city on a Wednesday we joined the nightlife with endless bowling, karaoke and ping pong which was all the rage. It was then dreadfully rainy the next day so I headed home to go explore our new residence in Brisbane.

There is a large mall close by with Air Conditioning which is pretty important since it is blisteringly hot at the current moment. Perfect for all the UQ students finishing their finals but kind of bitter for us who still have a little bit of work to go. So we have spent some time there getting groceries and doing a wee bit of shipping as we quickly tire of the clothes we've worn repetitively in the past few months.  We even managed to watch Catching fire part 1 of the Hunger games series last night which was pretty cool!

Otherwise we have had a water management class the past few days where we discussed the ethics of water implementations and the importance of sanitation for everyone in the world and how many deaths are caused by something as simple as not having a toilet. This also involved going to a farm and learning about the construction of some toilets and how they are built structurally to last.  We also spent a day planting trees to give back to the community and help regrow the proper foliage after the destruction of the flood in Brisbane in 2011 which was pretty crazy if you want to go look up some photos!

In addition to that we go to the gym on UQ enjoy their "tressider" which has boba smoothies and a subway. We spent a night at the local school bar and plan on investigating the club scene this Saturday. WE had a group potluck which was cool and lots of fun and we ate WAY too much good food.

We are also keenly aware as the time runs out that we have a test tomorrow and our TRP presentations and papers due and that we only have 1 week left in this country I have come to call home for the past few months. Aussie accents are so familiar, coles is my food store, go cards and public transport are totally normal, drinks are ridiculously expensive, 18 is total adulthood, koalas and kangaroos are just the local wildlife and tim tams are the cookie of choice.  It'll be nice to be home but I sure will miss a lot about this place. Guess we gotta enjoy the next week before its all gone in a flash.

Stradbroke Island- more ocean, fun and quadrats

Straddie (as we call it) is an island near Brisbane which helps create a bay which allows for lots of cool life. There are mangroves, sea grass beds and high latitude coral reefs which are more specialised to their location. We are staying at the UQ research station on the island and have had a fun first week here! Here are some of the highlights:

LABS!
-coral lab - here we went snorkeling in pretty shallow water in order to look at the cool and different forms of coral. Since there is less sunlight availability there is a different variety mostly including brain corals and soft corals which is interesting to look at!
- dugongs and sea grass - we didnt see any dugongs, but we compared the sea grass composition and area cover of two location. One location had evidence of dugong grazing and the other did not. This lab was fun, but we ran into massive swarms of jellies which wasn't too nice as they stung =(. The boat captain did give us jelly dinosaurs which was cool though! And we have soem good scars to show in true australian fashion
- mangrove transects - we waded through some pretty muddy terrain in order to measure the salinity in the water and tree density as we walked from shore towards the inlands. It was pretty fun and we got really muddy! It was fun.
-seagrass transects - here we did something similar except on sea greass beds during low tide. It was fun and we got chased by pelicans and attacked by some mud crabs which was pretty funny.
- pandanas trees - this was less of a lab and more of a really nice hike through the headlands of the island and we walked across and saw beautiful beach coastlines. Then we got to go swimming in the massive stormy waves and it was a blast to be thrown around in the swells just like home (except bigger and scarier cuz you know its australia). We also got bitten by sea lice which wasnt as fun, but hey, can't leave Australia without some damage right?
- the lakes! We analysed the leaf shape of trees at two different lake sites and then got to go swimming in the lake. Brown lake has tannins like tea so has this brownish glow which is pretty cool. It made for some fun photos!

SCUBA!

So we went SCUBA diving and it was really cool! It was a double dive (so two dives with a break in the middle). Despite throwing up during the break, I had a wonderful time! We saw nemo (clown fish), Dory (blue spray), Crush(green turtle), so many nudibranchs, wobbegongs (really cool sharks) and swam in the EAC (also featured in finding nemo).  It was really cool, and there was great clarity as well! The dive masters were really fun and would jump off the boat and stuff, take off eachother's masks and turn the air off for fun!

FREE TIME!

In other free time we have gone back to the beach and the lake for some swim time. We had a halloween party the first day which was also alan's birthday so that was fun. We still play more cards (NERTZ is so much fun). At night we watch movies like the Dark Knight, and V for Vendetta (you know for the 5th of November. sadly no fireworks though =(). One time we made popcorn which was pretty awesome and delicious. During labs we spent most of our free time writing those up. We go on runs, sometimes play basketball and walk into the little shops to get brownies and ice cream (like the day after our test). So we have a few more days here to begin writing up our targeted research projects before we head back to Brizzy for one last class and our presentations.

Peace everyone!