(Pictures were to be included, but this internet connection... sucks... sorry all!)
Imagine my surprise when a rather round woman in bad glasses leaned her head into our car while we were parked at the giant banana (on our quest to make a giant smoothie) and asked us that very question.
I admit, I was somewhat surprised. “Depends on what you call a foreigner – I’m from Canada. They’re from the UK,” I said, pointing at Jayne and Ben.
“See? I told you we’d be able to cross a few things off the list here,” she said, gesturing to the three young kids there with her (who were making crude gestures while in the shadow of the massive phallic fruit).
Apparently – and I wonder what this is all about even to this point – they were doing a birthday scavenger hunt and on the list were things like ‘take picture with a foreigner’, ‘take a picture with a giant phallic fruit’ (I’m guessing on that one), and ‘kiss a stranger’ – we helped them with two out of their three, and the banana took care of the rest.
Also on our travels, we were able to track down a few more giant things: a giant avocado (at, you guessed it, Tropical Fruit World) and also a giant shrimp. That was sheer luck.
This has been the summary of our day, during our travels from Surfer’s Paradise, to Coffs Harbour in New South Wales. This is our third state and is a great start to our third week. Tomorrow we end up in Sydney – one day after Jessica Watson, thankfully.
Tonight we’re exhausted, and all feeling somewhat under the weather. Ben’s been asthmatic and coughing, Jayne’s been achy, and I managed to do in my leg a couple days ago – clearly we’d be terrible gypsies as we’re so fatigued after two weeks of constant movement. My daily regiment for healing has included an excessive number of over-priced naproxen and fists full of ibuprofen. I must be in tip-top shape for the six days of walking I have ahead of me!
We’ve taken this evening to relax – we’ve curled up in bed with bad movies and stuffed animals – a slew of stuffies, actually – and plan to retire quite soon. We’ve got a long drive tomorrow to get to Sydney, and then thankfully we have three nights in one hotel before we move on to three nights in our final hotel.
Since today was a quiet day, spent mostly in the car, on the beach, and in bed (what a luxurious combination!) I decided to share some previously acquired knowledge with you – it seems only fair to keep you updated of all the goings-on here in Oz.
A few interesting things we’ve noticed on our travels:
- Australians are paranoid about dying in car accidents (or at least in Queensland as every traffic sign en route seems to be berating drunk drivers and those who travel with fatigue…) We know now that this holds true for NSW as well, as they are constantly berating people for their poor driving – whether on bulletin boards, TV adverts or with speed posting signs. In watching and reading the daily news, I’ve come to learn that a disproportionate number of Australians do actually die in automobile accidents. The only rationale I can come up with as to why is boredom. Or wandering Cassowaries.
- Bananas quite possibly grow in bags, as evidenced by the farms along the way, and if they do, you are not allowed to move them as they are apparently quarantined. Does that strike anyone else as worrisome considering we eat them? Also quarantined is sugarcane – which at one point we almost thought was corn.
- When we came to Australia, we expected to find animals in the wild – it may have been a naïve tourist sensitivity expecting the great wild, however we were not prepared for the fact that the only animals we seem to find are roadkill – a wombat, a small kangaroo, and several small feathered things that were beyond identification. After two weeks and thousands of kilometers, we’ve still not seen any of the aforementioned wildlife alive
- Australian media gets away with a lot more than our North American media outlets. Where as we have very subdued billboards, theirs are really quite dirty and funny. One sign for Mission Beach (a famous location for swimming, skydiving and hostelling) read: “Get High, Get Wet, Get Laid” and beside each was a picture – one of a skydiver, another of a swimmer, and the final of a person laying in bed. Brilliantly funny. There was another sign further along that said ‘Tired and Drunk Drivers RIP’. So do you spontaneously die because you’re tired and/or drunk or is that a preventative thing?
- Bacon comes not in strips, but in rashers, and is similar to pea-meal bacon but way better: less ham-y and more yummy.
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