Jun 25, 2017 - Townsville, Magnetic island and nature

We arrived in Townsville courtesy of our recently purchased Queensland rail coastal pass which allows us unlimited travel between Cairns and Brisbane within a month. The train was 6 hours which would pretty much get you anywhere in England, however it barely looks like you have moved in Australia! Townsville is a coastal town and our main reason for passing through was to visit Magnetic Island. It was named as such as Captain Cook's magnetic devices stopped working when he reached these islands. However, before going to Magnetic Island we...

Oct 26, 2016 - Trip to the Daintree

Hey y'all, I kept a detailed journal of the trip that I took over lecture recess and I would love to share it with you all! It's in pdf format and thus, it would be much easier for me to send it to you via email. Please message me (on facebook, email: chase.schober@my.jcu.edu.au, or on mytripjournal) so that I can send it to you. Cheers mates! -Chase

Sep 12, 2016 - Breakdown of my last month

Oh mah goodness it has been a while since I last journaled... I'm not proud of it but at the same time, I've been doing so much and I'm happy that I haven't missed out on any experiences because I'm busy journaling about other stuff I've done. There is so much to talk about I'm just going to jump in and go paragraph by paragraph. Netball: This sport is straight bonkers. It was kinda frustrating for me since I've grown up playing basketball and developing my dribbling and shooting specifically for a 10' hoop with a 29.5" circumference...

Aug 14, 2016 - Three Weeks In

Whoops, It's been far too long since I last journaled about what I've been up to, sorry to keep y'all in the dark. I've definitely been settling into a routine here which is strangely comfortable. The classes have been certainly keeping me busy, I have my first round of assignments due this week for most of my courses. One of these is a "pet element" project in my Environmental Geochemistry class in which we drew a random element (I got Molybdenum) and we will present a short summary of the element to the class. It's a pretty cool concept...

Jul 31, 2016 - First Week of Classes

Good afternoon fellow Seahawk fans, So today is Sunday July 31st and I'm finally getting around to catching everyone up on my first week of classes. I'm enrolled in 4 classes and I'm really excited about all of them, here are some highlights from each: Biodiversity of Tropical Australia- this is kinda my guilty pleasure class. It's learning about all of the wildlife in Northern Queensland and has 2 incredible field trips that are going to take us to the rainforest and to the coast. As some of you may have noticed, I'm really into taking...

Jul 22, 2016 - End of Orientation

Goodday Mates, Incidentally my favorite new expression to pick up from the Australians. I’ve been searching for a new greeting since “What’s up?” and “How’re you?” Are pointless since nobody ever really answers that question. I’ve been keeping super busy and have been having a great time settling in here. The weather is starting to heat up which I have mixed feelings about and I’m a weekend away from starting up school. Some cool things that I’ve done in the past couple of days: Pub crawl- for $10 I was able to go on a tour of 6 local bars...

Jul 18, 2016 - Start of Orientation

Quick update for y'all, Today we had our start of orientation week which was a lot of fun. I ate breakfast and walked to the auditorium with the international folks I met last night at dinner plus one other guy from Germany. We got checked in then sat down facing the speakers. There were a lot of exchange students, a large chunk of them were from Denmark, Norway, Germany, and America. Before it started we had a couple of competitions for prizes and one of them was to assemble a team of 4 people who had 4 different traits. As it happened, we...

Jul 17, 2016 - Exploring Townsville

Yo yo, Today I had a chance to explore Townsville and it was really incredible. We had a brief orientation after breakfast talking about the rules of the halls and some upcoming things that we should expect then we got on the bus from campus heading downtown. We being the group of Tulanians, a girl from Norway, and one other fellow from DC. The bus fare was pretty cheap, we got a day pass for $8 which gives us unlimited rides around the city. Our goal was to get some room supplies because as I mentioned, I lacked some necessities such as: a...

Jul 16, 2016 - First Day in Australia

What up? Incredibly, after 28 hours of travelling, I have found my way to Townsville. I gotta say, I’ve tremendously enjoyed my travels so far. I’ve been on the same flight schedule as a fellow Tulane student since LA and it has made the trip so much better. She is a super awesome outdoorsy person and together we managed to make our way through customs and delayed flights with all of our belongings. The 14 hour flight from LA to Brisbane was quite the experience. It was the first time that I remember being on a Boeing 747 and it was...

Jun 21, 2016 - Townsville

Tuesday 21 June A pleasant cool night and the first time we've used a blanket for quite a while. Following breakfast Don called the RACQ service people to talk to them about the car. They hadn't started looking at it but were confident they would have it ready later in the day provided no major issues were identified. Don asked them about the windscreen replacement but they weren't sure they could get it done today. Shortly after the RACQ Ultimate people rang to tell us they were going to book us in for another night at the caravan park as...

Jun 20, 2016 - Mission Beach to Townsville

Monday 20 June The day started off as usual on a pack up day. Plenty of sunshine today, and we were on the road by 9am. Good road, plenty of vans heading both ways, and lots of four wheel drive campers heading north. Must be something on somewhere. Our first stop was at Cardwell where we enjoyed our morning tea overlooking the blue ocean and looking out to Hinchinbrook Island. So good just sitting in the the sun enjoying the view. We hadn't planned our lunch stop, just going to look for a nice area somewhere on the way to Ayr/Home Hill...

Jun 16, 2016 - Townsville

16/6/2016 Thursday Ian took the car in for its first service this morning and unfortunately there were no 'loan cars' available, so he had to sit and wait nearly 3 hours till it was done. It was nearly lunch time when he got back to the van, so I missed out on a trip to the Heritage Tea Rooms at Herveys Range. We went to Stockland Shopping Centre and I've never seen so many dress shops in one area - and I wasn't even tempted. We didn't stay long!! We came straight back to the van, not going to the airport to see the jets land, but we heard...