AUS17- Oh, Starry Night

me, duh
Jul 3, 2018
7 min read

Updated: Nov 21, 2021

I had no idea what to expect for this trip. Natascha had gone the weekend prior but would not spill on any deets. She was killing me. How am I supposed to pack correctly? Australia is trying to turn me into a relaxed hippie, I swear.

I'll start off by saying the trip was amazing. With three days of bush walking, stair climbing, and waterfall seeing, how could you go wrong? I'll tell you. Maybe, on day one, hop up something called the "giant staircase" on one foot at a time. Someone counted there being 993 steps and I read online that it ascends about 300m (1000ft). Nikki, our prof, said that some guys had done it in the past but no girl has ever attempted it. Is that a challenge? Sounds like it. Three girls from mountain-countries and little ole Louisiana me decided to "give it a go". I had no idea what I was getting into.

I had really gone in over my head, I thought. The closest thing I had to this type of experience is the stair climber at the UREC or those crazy times when I would do lunges around my FLAT neighborhood. This staircase had parts etched into the cliffside, some metal parts, and even a few wooden boards nailed above each other. These stairs were STEEP and all cattywampus. **my document keeps underlining "cattywampus" in red bc its "not a word"**

The sections that had a hand rail were like little angels from heaven as I could use my man arms to heave me up for a while...until my arms were just as tired as my thighs. Then I was in a pickle. In the video below, you'll see (and hear) some Norweigan singing and two videos from the giant staircase.

SIDE NOTE: Vic and I are spending the day getting road trip details together and finishing up our assignments. We decided to go to a cafe around the corner. The people that work there are just lovely. Two old gay guys work the counter and are always showing me pictures of their puppies and things that they grow in their garden. I only go here for a "treat" bc my 7eleven $1 coffees usually get me by. Anywaysssss, today the barista just looked at us, went to the display area, and brought back two fancy cupcakes. HE GAVE THEM TO US FOR FREE. I joked that i would use it to catch my tears of joy that were welling up. But really, how sweet is that? I just want to take the cafe home with me to America. Ahh but then I would never be able to decide between that place and PJ's. That must be the reason God placed them on two different continents. It would be too much joy for any one place to hoard. It kind of sucks, in a way, to start your day on such a high note because you basically have to meet the Pope to keep up the excitement.

Back to the mountains! Alright, I peed in them. Yep, I did, right on a tree, like I as a big manly bear or something marking my territory. I was weirdly proud of myself and remember telling the girl next to me that "I did it!" and now feel "one with nature" while we were both bare-assed on side of a walking trail. You become very close to people whilst in "the Bush".

see mom, I still wear it.

three sisters formation

If you look between the lefternmost "sister" and the side of the main mountain, you may be able to see the walking bridge with a few hikers on it. This was a little past hallway of the staircase. So just to give some bearings for our friday walk; we started from a point above the three sisters formation a ways away, went down into the valley below and then back up the back of the three sisters.

We were split up into little cabins. They were adorbs. It was like we were playing house for a weekend. The water was from rain water tanks so it was rather yellow. Rikki kept thinking that someone just kept forgetting to flush *cry laughing emoji*. I drank my water from a black canteen that I brought with me. It tasted fine when I didn't have to look at it! There was a fireplace/heater thing in the living room. I can only relate to the one my dad had in a hunting camp-- I burnt myself on it (the one at the hunting camp, not this one). Oh, that brings a memory. Remember that one Dad? You had taken me either deer or turkey hunting, can't remember. I had the flu and the camp had no hot water. It was FREEZING. I remember walking from the blind to your truck so I could lay down away from the cold. I couldn't turn on the car for the heater, however, because it would alert the victims to our position. The things us southerners do for dinner, I tell ya. Wow, maybe i should title this blog "sidetrack city".

We met at a campfire for our debriefing and official lecture time. I remember being in awe when I walked out of the cabin and looked towards the sky. The sheer amount of stars in the sky....just wow. Kristine and I were saying how we wanted to just lay on the ground and look up for a while but it was too cold and there was sheep and goat poop everywhere. Nikki, our professor, mentioned that we could always sleep outside if we wanted. I'm still not sure if she was serious or not but we really did it. I was stoked. Kristine and I went in the cabin, put on every piece of clothing we had brought with us for the weekend and carried the mattress through the door and placed it outside. When I say that we wore everything that we packed, I'm not being sarcastic. We actually did wear every single thing we had at one time. Sure, it wasn't the coziest pajamas but the bell-minors, starry sky, and crispy-fresh air made it worth it. Kristine said I slept like a rock. She also said I did some weird spazzy things as I was falling asleep. I just think that is funny. It was probably hilarious. We were woken up by roosters. I want to look up why roosters have been used as old-timey alarm clocks. Someone told me that they hate sunlight and so they just yell at it when it comes out. Pretty sure they were taking advantage of my gullible-ness on that one right there. I really am curious though because these roosters were way off, maybe 3 hours before sunrise. I wasn't mad though. It gave me time to sit on the porch, look out, and have a pocahontas moment of the day while I ate some almonds. **sometimes I read the sentences i type and just laugh**

We were told that if we got up early enough and walked down the path a ways we may see some Roos, wallabies, and wombats. Of course I will take that chance. I have still yet to see a living wombat and my obsession with them grows every day. We stared out into the bush for a good while without seeing anything. I started climbing trees just because.

find the brookie

Right before sunrise, BM waved us over all excited-like. Some roos had come to visit! There were no wombats....harumphhhh. Although, it is highly possible there were there. These kangaroos were huge and we thought they were trees for the longest time. This picture is with a large zoom on the camera. Wombats are much smaller and we likely couldn't have deciphered it from a stick

wild Roos!

There were so many waterfalls on our walks that I lost count of the "waterfalls brooke has seen" number.

Did you know that they don't have S'mores in Europe? or Australia for that matter. This is so "american" of me but I just assumed everyone had these. My cabin mates were rather excited to try one so I brought the goodies. They don't have graham crackers here, at all, so I used "digestive biscuits" because someone else's blog suggested them as a replacement. I still don't know if they are for help in digestion or if it just the name given to them. It was about the best I could do with what Aus had to offer. The only marshmallows they have are tiny, like maybe 1/3 of one of hours, and half of them are strawberry flavored. See that tiny blue bag on the floor by my knee? Yep, $6 worth of tiny marshmallows. I shared the mellow roasting technique and set each of them on their own. It was like watching little baby birds leave the nest. Cher bebe.

s'more lessons

someone was a fan!

Let's just call this next section--> Weird things Brooke does that get captured by a camera when your friends take pictures all the time.

le moustache de fern

trying to be Jane from Tarzan

rock surfing? idk...

afro plant

On another day's hike, we went down into the valley shown in this picture, walked along that river for a while, and then straight up climbed up the edge of the mountain to get back to an area that the bus could reach us.

Yeah, this is what we climbed up. Right on the side of this waterfall. I thought our guide was kidding. He wasn't. This climb was like the "giant staircase" on steroids. Luckily, this time I could use both legs. Unluckily, my thighs were feeling the soreness from the day before. Our total hike time was somewhere around 8.5 hours.