Australia Part 1: A Beautiful Place

As I mentioned last week, I went to Australia over the Easter Holidays. In addition to the statutory holidays of Good Friday and Easter Monday, the university is closed on the following Tuesday, so I had a five day weekend, and took advantage of it to fly to Brisbane to visit Amy, Doug, and Sorenne. Some of you will remember them as the wonderful family I nannied for in Manhattan from the end of 2008 to when they moved to Australia in 2011, when Sorenne was 2 1/2. I even went with them to Australia for a couple weeks during their transition, which was amazing. Getting to be a part of their family and spend so much time together was a very special time in my life, and we've kept in contact ever since (thank goodness for Skype), and so I've gotten to see Sorenne grow into the amazing 9-year-old she is today, and their friendship is still very important to me.

When I arrived on my direct Wellington-Brisbane flight (which is a rather new and fabulous air travel advancement), we went to their house just for a bit, then headed out to Cooroy Country Cottages, a couple hours from Brisbane towards the sunshine coast.

The cottages are tucked into beautiful, lush forest, and the whole setting was breathtaking.

This was my lovely room upstairs.

I was lucky to have the upstairs room, because look at my amazing view! That's Mount Cooroora you can see in the distance. It was very beautiful, as was the greenery all around.

Also, just because I couldn't resist, check out this hilarious wardrobe with an odd, deeply recessed, chest-level mirror in the middle! I was so entertained! If anyone has theories about what in the world this is for, I'd love to hear them.

One of the first things we noticed were all the beautiful flowers, and while Amy and Doug got checked in and talked with the owner (who was from Iowa of all places, just like my Dad's family), Sorenne and I admired them.

We were both very impressed with this perfect pink one that had fallen. We gathered several pink and yellow ones from the ground for the vase on the kitchen table, and they looked beautiful for the rest of the day, but when we woke up in the morning, they were unrecognizable, astonishingly brown and wilted. We just admired them on the plants for the rest of the visit.

There were flowers of all shapes and sizes, including these amazing upside down ones that reminded me of chandeliers.

On our daily walks, we usually passed this charming little pond. We learned the the stunning bright orange flowers in the lower left-hand corner are actually a variety of ginger, which is pretty cool.

Sorenne took this lovely picture of the beautiful lilies, which we both loved.

One of my many great memories of being in Australia with Amy and Sorenne when they first moved there is seeing the birds of paradise. I just think they are incredible flowers.

This one, too, was gorgeous, although I have no idea what kind it is.

The flowers of this tree caught our attention even from a long way off, as they were practically glowing vivid orange. Our host told us that the tree is an African tulip, and even though it's invasive, he quite likes it.

Again, I don't know what this is, but isn't it beautiful? I don't think I've ever see such striking purple leaves.

Sorenne and I agreed that we think this one is a hibiscus, and are definitely sure that it is amazing.

We drove to the base of Mount Cooroora, the one I could see from my window, but discovered that the trails up it do not allow dogs, and as we had darling Ted, the Cavalier King Charles, with us, we elected to go exploring elsewhere. It was still lovely to see it up close. 

As we explored the trails around our cottage, Sorenne spotted this unique and fascinating tree, covered with very serious thorns. Actually, while I'm sure thorns is the accurate word, I think that horns is a much more apt description, with their wide bases and bony appearance. Sorenne tried to put one in her pocket to keep for later, and it poked right through!

This post is setting the scene for my next few posts, which will be about the glorious things we did while I was there. Hard to imagine a more beautiful place for fun, exploration, and quality time together.