Mooloolaba

We left Stanthorpe on Wednesday. The night before we left, Keith and Claudia went to Toowoomba so we brought Petal and Tess into our room for the night so they weren't lonely. Petal slept with me all night and she takes up a lot of room for a small dog. We caught the bus into Brisbane, where we spent the night at Sue's.

Sue made us a lovely dinner of pumpkin (butternut squash) and corn soup with a bread bowl of spinach dip. It was super tasty. Mike and I had snuggles with Eric on the carpet as well. We also saw a possum in Sue's backyard. It was another great, but short visit.

Now we are in Mooloolaba. Our roommate at the hostel is from Montreal. Her name is Genevieve and She is a pretty cool girl. We went to the beach with her and an Aussie bloke from the Northern Territory named Jamin. We did this after Mike and I had a stand up paddle board lesson.

Stand up paddle boarding it awesome. It requires a lot skills in the areas of balance, core strength and arm strength. We didn't do the full two hours, which I am happy about, because the first hour was exhausting. My legs felt like jello after and my left foot cramped from holding/balancing on the board. I was the last one to actually stand on the board (rather than kneeling) and I am proud to say I did not fall off the board. Mike fell in 2 or 3 times and the guy from Switzerland, who was there for the lesson fell in twice. I have to say all the balance postures in yoga that I have done really helped. When the wind was low and/or the current was the right direction, it was very relaxing. When the wind picked up, it felt like no matter how hard you paddled, you weren't going anywhere. It was a great work out and I would definitely do it again.

I also wanted to share some Aussie slang.
Bikkie(biscuit)= cookie
Chips= fries
Tomato sauce= ketchup
Capsicum= bell pepper
Avo= avocado
Smoko= smoke break/coffee break
Macca's= McDonalds
Ta= thank you
Carrying on like a pork chop= someone who doesn't know what they are talking about (one of my favourites)
Pumpkin= squash
Bikie= biker
Crims= criminal
How are you going?= how are you doing