Are you ready for some football?

We are! We live for college football. Especially Virginia Tech football. We will get to see some games here in Australia. They ESPN here, so we will get to see some of those. We are very excited that Tech's first game is on ESPN and we will get to watch it. I say we, but really mean I. It comes on Tuesday morning at 10 am, so unfortunately Jason will be working. But don't worry, I'll record it for him. Keeping the score a secret from him is a different story!

Back to Symbio

This Sunday, following our fabulous Saturday, we headed back up to Symbio Wildlife Sanctuary, just at the top of the hill.  We got ourselves some season passes so I have a feeling we will be headed up there a lot.  We took the wagon, which by the way, all Australians LOVE and have never seen anything like it before.  They kept asking if they could hire one at the zoo or where we got it.  Kind of funny.  But anyway, we also took a lunch and snacks and made our way around the small zoo.  Here are some videos of our day.

This is the sound an emu makes.  If you listen carefully it sounds kind of like someone is beating a drum.

Evan and Avery feeding the wallabies and kangaroos.

I don't think the US would let us bring a kangaroo back into the country!

Gobble Gobble.  Go Hokies!

A Gorgeous Saturday Afternoon

We enjoyed a lazy Saturday afternoon outside.  It was a picture perfect day.  Warm and sunny.  Not quite summer warm, but still beautiful.  We headed to the top of the hill to the overlook at Bald Hill.  We had some ice cream and let the kiddos run wild.  Here are some picture from the day.

Illawarra Fly Treetop Adventure

This weekend we headed about 30 minutes south to a place called the Illawarra Fly Treetop Adventure.  It is up on the escarpment and situated in a jungle.  It is an elevated walkway high in the trees that looks out over the countryside and the ocean.  It was a little frightening to look down, especially when the wind blew, rocking the walkway a bit.  But it made for a fun day and some spectacular views and fairly decent photos.  Enjoy.  

Kiama, NSW

So today we ventured just south of Wollongong to a small town called Kiama.  It was a fairly nice day with just a few clouds.  They have this volcanic rock formation with a hole in the middle leading to the ocean.  Every time the waves would come it, the water would shoot up the hole, giving it a blowhole effect like a whale.  Strangely enough, they call this the Kiama Blowhole.  Very creative.  Anywho.  Here are some picture from our day. 

Coledale Wings?

Okay, so they are supposed to be sails on a boat, but we thought they looked like they could have been wings on my little angels.  It was a cold, rainy day, but they sun came out of a bit and we got our quick photo shoot in.  One day we will dress they kids nicely and do a proper shoot.  But here are the pics as of now.  Enjoy!

Eeeewwwwww

Well.  I guess I am getting to know the local wildlife.  Hooray.  This lizard was found by Jason while he was raking the yard.  It was a chilly day, and lizards being cold-blooded and all, well this guy wasn't going anywhere fast.  He let us gawk at him and take pictures.  We left him alone and didn't not alert Scarlet as to his whereabouts.  He has since moved on.  Smart lizard.  

The next one is part of the local spider wildlife.  He is a huntsman spider.  Apparently they can grow to be the size of a human hand.  Ick.  He was on his last leg, so putting the quarter next to him was not much of a challenge.  They are not terribly dangerous to people but I would still not like to run across a healthy one.  He must have been picked off by some birds, because later in the day all I found were three of his legs.  Some bird was well fed that day.  

P.S.  I let him have the quarter.  Just in case.  

Taronga Zoo

Recently, one weekend, we packed the kids up and took the train to Sydney.  After a quick ferry ride across the harbor, we made it to Taronga Zoo.  It is a fairly large zoo and we did our best to see it all.  While we may not have covered the whole thing, we put a good dent in it.  The kids enjoyed it and so did we.  Here are some pictures from our adventure.