Lifesaving in the Tropics [14 March 2006]

Well I had my first patrol on Sunday.......on Magnestic Island! After hearing so much about the island, it was fantastic to see it and I finally felt a lot more like I was in the tropics.

So we took the barge across - free for us but $140 if a general person wants to take their car across due to the monopoly of the company on the market (and you may have thought that the ferry trip Sorrento-Queenscliff was expensive.)

Alma Bay is the name of the beach that the Arcadian surf club patrols. Sunday there were winds and that meant surf! So we took out the rescue mals for a bit of a play before setting up patrol. (Need to work on those board skills.) After summer down at Gun then post-race lazy afternoons with Jules & friends at Barwon Heads etc I had been worrying about leaving for a place with no surf. So as you can imagine, I'm stoked.

Well I have free accomodation at the island as we can stay at the club house.

Of note lifesaving in the tropics: there were a couple of coconuts lying between the flags and I was prancing around in a royal blue stinger suit. I showed my housemate the sexy stinger suit and we decided that I looked like a character out of one of those Japanese cartoons. As her netball outfit looks like she should be wearing matching roller skates, she said that she wasn't in a place to laugh! We went through stinger drills but apparently Alma Bay is fairly protected.

Another funny incident consisted of a Bondi lifesaver getting photos with his Bondi bathers in front of the clubhouse then giving us a thank-you wave as if he was thanking the local lifesavers. We thought it was hilarious as it was my first day and I'm from way down south.

Spot the difference:

Gunnamatta - From the access track
(Who took this pic with actual clean surf?!!)







Alma Bay,
Magnestic Island

Tropical Townsville [8 March 2006]

G'day from tropical Townsville.

Well it's been a couple of weeks of getting my bearings here is Townsville while in the process meeting amazing people from all around the world!!! It certainly is a city with a transiant population and the university is packed with overseas and interstate students as well as local ones. For instance in my class I have met people from the U.S., Canada, Seychelles, Maldives, and Tasmania for a start and I have been assigned my group presentation with a guy from France of all places!

If all the doors in Melbourne were closing.......since arriving here, doors have been opening from the moment I stepped out of the plane..........

Kath picked me up from the airport and totally made me feel at home with a tour of the city. We first went to the Strand (Townsville beach fromt) where I spotted the red & yellow flags. I was suprised and there is no surf in Townsville but there are stingers......So of course I had to speak with the lifesavers and they gave me the details on how to join the club. Apparently they race row boats down south (ie. on the Gold Coast!), so I'm hoping to do some training with them and get into that.

Next she gave me a tour of James Cook University - such a contrast to Melbourne Uni! It's so pretty and set in tropical savanna, you can barely see one building to the next. The uni is scattered with bush turkeys and we even had a snake slide out of the pathway in front of us.

On Monday it was sorting out my subject timetable which was an amazing story. To cut a long story short, I just happened to walk past the course coordinator's door that was open and someone recommended that I should speak to him. He got me to sit down and gave me a chat about the whole course, giving me tips or what to do and not. For my work experience placement, he gave me contacts and advice of who was likely to put me straight on the payroll. I was so fortunate as the next day he was off to Scottland for his son's wedding! Anyway from that chat, I've now got a paid position at Thurwingowa council as an assistant planner and also had the senior planner at the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority give me a personal kind of interview where she gave me a run down of what they do, how she got her job there and introductions to the department! Wow so I really feel like God's been looking after me.

And that's not all....on that night I checked out my new place (other later ones were terriblle). It's a 10 min walk from the beach and 10 mins from the city. Nicole, my housemate is fabulous. She's interested in heaps of diiferent things, loves her sport too and living with her will keep me on my toes with what's up in politics as she's an ABC radio braodcaster - she has so many interesting stories of people she's interviewed.
Next awesome encounter was the person in the street that gave me directions to my new place....a French student here studying her PhD in Anthropology. She invited me to my first party (her French housemate's 27th birthday) on my first Friday night up here when I met all sorts of amazing people! So even my social life's sorted.

On the training front I have met a former triathlete & politics student who's moved here from Darwin for her boyfriend in the army and we're checking out training groups together. Kath & I visited CU where we were recommended a good church which we're yet to check out At the one I went to on Sunday, one of the guys had been at St. Hil's for 3 years and knew Ros (now Erskine) well!

Well I'd better stop there.

The beginning of les adventures encore........[8 February 2006]

Hi all (people in Melbourne + interstate + overseas),

I'm doing an update on Mel's life.............

For those of you who don't already know, I'm off to Townsville to finally follow one of my dreams!

I'm going to James Cook University, next to the Great Barrier Reef and studying a Masters in Tropical Urban and Regional Planning (focusing on my interests in marine management and indigenous issues).




It's all been happening very rapidly and I'll be leaving Melbourne on the 19th Feb.
I have sent this email to people overseas to let you know what I'm up to in life.................. but for those Melbourne people who would like to say goodbye till uni holidays:

I'll be having drinks Friday 17th February from 8pm onwards at -

CHI WA WA
212 Camberwell Rd
Hawthorn East

Anyone is welcome!

I hope to see you there,

Mel.

...............................................................

Pour les francophones (Aussies disregard),

Salut! Comment ca va?!!

Voici les nouvelles tres recentement de ma vie. Je suis au bout de partir Melbourne de continuer des etudes a Townsville en l'etat de Queensland au nord d'Australie. L'universite a Townsville est pres de la Grande Barriere de Corail. J'y ferrai une maitrise dans les etudes sur l'environment tropical.

Je pars Melbourne le 19 fevrier.

Je vous raconterai mes aventures quand j'y serai.

Gros bisous,

Melanie. xox.