Our One-Year Mark!

Today marks our first anniversary in Australia! One year ago today we left the US en route to Australia. (Today also marks another year for Bryan . . . it's his birthday!) It's hard to believe that its actually been an entire year. I'm sure most of you are surprised too, thinking that we just left not too long ago! Well, it has been a great year, full of trials (having a baby in another country isn't as easy and as similar to the US as you may think!), memories, exploring, and fun times as we have discovered Australia, it's culture, and everything that it has to offer.

We went whale watching on Saturday off of the Gold Coast at "The Humpback Whale Highway" and it was SPECTACULAR!! The humpback whale season is June-November as they are now migrating north from Antartica to have their babies in the warm waters of the Great Barrier Reef. We were somewhat unsure of what we would see or if we would even get to see a whale and boy were we surprised! There were TONS of whales out! At one point there were 4-5 whales "mugging" our boat (that is what they call it.) One even swam right up to the boat. Evan and I were standing on one side of the boat and got to watch it swim under us while Bryan and Kaden, on the other side of the boat, got to see it emerge and were able to hear the low rumbling sound it made. We witnessed all of the "tricks" that the whales can do as well. Such as a full-body breach, half breach, lobbing/slapping of the tail, and fin slapping. At one time one whale continuously completed about 30 tail saps while lying on his back. It was an exciting tour and a unique opportunity, even the skippers on board told us that we had received quite a show.

Here is a video clip of one whale doing a half breach and a tail flap. It's kinda blurry and bumpy but considering we were on a boat and constantly rocking back and forth it came out fairly good.


We also took many photos . . . more than you can imagine . . . so here are some shots for you to see. We were never able to get a good full body breach photo though. By the time it was happening our reaction time to take the picture wasn't quick enough and the photo just ended up looking like a big splash. (I have included a photo I found though so you can see what a full-body breach looks like!) The slide show I used is also called "magnifier" and comes with a magnifying glass that you can use to scan over the pictures and get a better look at the whales.
I also included some photos of some pretty posh houses that we rode by through the channel getting out to the ocean.

Here are some additional pictures of our time with the Davison Family. We hit alot of our favorite spots during their trip here, as well as some new locations.