Good-bye Oz

So I know this blog is a month late, or I should say a month since the last one was written. I should have wrote this blog at least 2 weeks ago! Bad me! But the fact is I have been quite busy as we have already arrived back in British Columbia 2 weeks ago. It has been lovely being back with my family and friends again. I really did miss a whole bunch of dear peeps to me :)

Well I will finish the sage on our last two weeks in Oz. We left Brisbane on the 21st and camped one night near Coff's Harbor. We loved the campsite, the tenting area had a wonderful view of the beach. We arrived into Sydney in the late afternoon Sunday. Our lovely and hospitable sister hosted us at her flat for 2 nights. During that time we got info about closing our bank account and an inspection on our Mandy Mazada as we were about to start putting her up for sale. The mechanic told us the shocks were quite soft (we already knew that) and the transmission was pretty dodgy in the reverse gear. We learned it was something that has actually been quite common in that car model especially once the car reaches over 200,000 kms (ours was 215,000). That was just a little worrying to hear, as we wouldn't want to lie to our potential buyer, but we also still needed someone to buy it from us.
After two days with Cessi (Andreas sister), we went to our last house sit in Oz. We were watching 3 dogs and 2 cats for a very nice woman. The dogs were a mix of terrior and something else. The cats were a beautiful short-haired grey, it was a mother and son duo. They looked almost identical and were very friendly. We were so grateful to have a place to stay for our last 12 days in Sydney.

January 26th was Australia Day, so we went downtown and saw some cool jet show with parachuters drop out then unravel the aussie flag. There was a neat antique car show that Andreas really enjoyed and we also got some little flags and aussie tattoos.
We posted ads of our car up online, we also made signs for it that we taped to the back windows. We spent 3 different days driving downtown (which took at least 45 mins) to park on a popular street, where backpackers were selling their vans. However no one really showed much interest in either our car or any of the other vans. We also parked the car at the end of the street where we were staying with a big sign on the windshield. One man showed interest but then never phoned us the next day. We also went to the Hillsongs church on Sunday (city campus). Then we went to Bronte beach with Cessi in the afternoon. At the end of the week though our car was not sold I felt sure of faith that it would be sold by the following tuesday. We had posted a listing on facebook market place and on Monday we had an interested man in the car. Andreas drove the car to Jonothan's place that afternoon and he liked it. That evening he told us he wanted to buy it. We were honest with him and did tell him all the things that did need repairing soon. We also gave him a good price for the car, it was the lowest amount we were still happy with.

We went to the beach Bundeena on Tuesday and the following the Saturday. It was the best beach we went to in the Sydney area. Wanting to work on our tans the last week :) Gina came home on the Wednesday early morning and was incredibly nice in letting us stay at her place till we left for the airport Monday morning. We got to know her abit in the next 5 days and we also had bought several books to read for our last few days in Oz. Since we didn't have the car anymore we couldn't get around to much. We did explore the suburb of Liverpoool on the 6th, which was our first year anniversary :) We went out to eat at an Indian place.
Gina was very nice in driving us to the nearby train station. We took the train to the airport. Then on our way back to Canada!

The last few weeks here in Canada we have visited with friends and family, I have done some massages and we filled out the information needed for the residency form. We also went to Vernon for our "One year" and enjoyed a day of skiing and two nights in a hotel. Married life has been marvelous!

The blog will continue when we travel to Finland beginning of next week :)

Good-bye Brisbane and flooded Queensland

Our time in Australia is ever drawing closer to the end. We only have 16 more days in this lovely country. Today we are leaving Queensland for the drive down to Sydney.

The last two weeks here have just flown by. Unfortantly Queensland has suffered some very serious flooding during that time. We had so much rain in the last 10 days of Dec and then 9 days at the beginning of Jan. It was just to much for the Brisbane river to hold, plus water from the rivers up north that were swollen were travelling into the Brisbane river. The areas of the city centre that were close to the river flooded big time, shops, banks, restuarants, botanical gardens, boat transit terminals. Plus there were a number of residential areas lining the river and they all got flooded out. It has been so heartbreaking for the Aussies. The guesstimated cost of all the damage, and to rebuild/repair is in the billions!
But I am so impressed at the Aussie spirit of reaching out and helping that neighbors and locals have been giving. There has been so much clean up that has had to be done, and the mud and water are extremely dirty and contaminated. Thankfully it has been beautiful weather and dry for the last 11 days so the river has gone down alot, though it is still high. Andreas and I drove into the city yesterday to clean the windows for our last client. The river looked incredibly muddy and still quite high in it's banks. We will be donating some money to the government flood appeal account.

Our last two weeks of work went well. We have so enjoyed not only the opportunity to work together, but of meeting some lovely elderly people who genuinely needed our help. So many of them were so sweet and it was interesting hearing abit about their life story. We loved meeting Effie Munday who was a strong Baptist and a genuine and lovely lady. She is in her eighties but still sharp as a tack and pretty good on the computer. Effie had a heart for missions and is still trying to get Bible material out into Africa. She was an inspiration!

We also had the opportunity to pray with one client who was actually quite young, in her 30s but with a nerve disorder from a complication of anathesia. She needed some encouragment so we talked with her and prayed with her and it was a special moment. We do hope and pray that this next year will be so much better for her.

Our last full weekend here in Brisbane was lovely so we finally went to the Gold coast and Surfer's Paradise. The beach was so good and the waves were spectacular. It was our best beach day that we've probably had for the last half a year. Of course we used spf 30 but still got sunburnt!

Now we hope to sell our Mandy Mazada quickly and for a fair price, to pass the vehicle road worthy inspection and spend some time with our sister Cessi before we fly to Vancouver.

New Year 2011 ;)

Yikes, hard to believe that we will only be in this great country for about 4.5 more weeks. The time has flown!

We had a lovely weekend with Cessi, though unfortantly it was very wet. Then we realized all of last week that the office through which we work were closed for the holidays.

So Andreas and I had a long break. Unfortantly it was quite deary outside, but we did read alot and go for some walks, plus take down the Christmas decorations. Then it cleared up last thursday, and friday. We went to the beach on thursday on the Gold Coast. It was a nice, though windy day. We will still make it right to Surfer's Paradise one weekend! New Year's Eve on friday. Thankfully a nice day. We celebrated the coming of 2011 at a nearby hotel. There was some good music and it was very nice to dance again! I love that my man is willing to go dancing with me, when he knows how much I love it. Even if it's not Andreas forte he's a good sport and lots of fun!
Though of course we left at like 12:10 and then went to bed. :P

Back to work this week. We have been filling in for several staff who are on holidays so we have been split up and going to seperate people's homes. The only downside is some confusion among clients who have not expected us or been home. I think the work office could be a bit more organized. This has resulted in some lost hours of pay for both of us, but mostly me. I sure hope our last two weeks will be the full amount of hours we usually have. We both would like a steady income for abit anyways.

We have definitely enjoyed our conversations and meetings with the seniors we are helping. They are so sweet!

Will write again shortly before or after we leave Brisbane.....then God's leading for a good sale of our car!