First Post

A beach called "Manly" (http://tr.im/t60R), falling asleep at the pub (http://tr.im/t660), ~5 mile run through some beaches and a cemetery (http://bit.ly/cxOzS), and a 3 hour drive from Sydney to Canberra - that pretty much sums up my first 48 hours in Australia.

I'm going to chronicle my trip in this blog, but honestly it's too much to tell without getting boring. I'll highlight some things here, but you'll get more from checking out my pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/jennandjer.net/Australia.

It's a little after noon on Monday here which means it's Sunday night back home (add 2 hours, then add 12 hours to get from east coast time to Canberra time). I left Atlanta Thursday night and got into Sydney Saturday morning. My flight was pretty much what you would expect - long - but I slept most of the way so it didn't feel so long to me. My brother and our friend Mike picked me up at the airport and we made our way back to his apartment in Sydney to drop of my stuff and get some coffee before heading out for the day. We walked through the city, past Hyde Park and the Opera House to get to the Manly Ferry. There is an area of city named Manly, "So named after the confidence and ‘manly behaviour’ displayed by a group of local Aborigines spied in Manly Cove by Australia’s first Governor, Captain Arthur Phillip in 1788" according to http://www.manlyaustralia.com . Check out my gallery for pictures from the beach, our hike, and around the town - everything has the name 'Manly' which gave me a good laugh.

me and Bill on Manly Beach


on top of a wall during our hike

Saturday night we met up with some guys at a local brew pub for dinner and drinks. You may notice a lack of pictures once we entered the pub. I wish there was a good story about how the pictures were too scandalous to post, but honestly it was all I could do to stay awake as I was dealing with the time difference. I had to take a little nap at the table while the rest of the party drank up. Oh well, I had fun anyway.
The Pub

Sunday morning we headed to Bondi beach. Again I'll refer you to the picture page, cause the pictures captured it better than my words ever could. I planned on going for a short run down the coast, but it was so nice that I kept going until I ran through a cemetery and ended up about 2.5 miles from where I started. The link above is to the RunKeeper entry of my run, but something went wrong on the way back and it didn't track it correctly. I got some great pictures though.

Cemetery I passed through on my run

After Bondi, Bill and I drove to Bill and Beth's house in Canberra. It's about 3 hours away so the drive was good exposure to some Australian culture (cars, [lack of] billboards, etc). I got to meet my other nephew Liam for the first time since my wedding 2 years ago. He's two and a half and is a funny little guy. His favorite thing seems to be "crash" - whether it's on an xbox game, pinball on the laptop, or dropping Lego's off the table.
Liam and grandma playing with Lego's

Off to enjoy the day!