Around the World: Stradbroke Island

While in Australia I had the chance to visit three islands, all during weekend vacations. I have already written about Fraser Island, even though it was the third island I visited. The very first was Stradbroke island, and I actually visited it twice. Both times were weekend camping ventures with people I was living with.

That in itself made the trip relaxing and culturally diverse. On the two trips combined there were people from Australia, Denmark, France, England, Zimbabwe and of course, Canada. We also met people from all over the place while we were there.

A lot of the time was spent on the beach. The first trip was in mid fall, which was April there. The second trip was in the middle of Winter, which was August. It was good weather for both trips and we were able to go swimming both times. We even tried to do some surfing during the trip in August.

We slept in tents and barbecued food for our meals and hung out on the beach during the night. We also did tons of random things on the beach, from creating sand sculptures to wrestling in the sand. As a result, it took weeks before I stopped finding sand.

We even had a bonfire one night where I brought marshmallows, cookies and chocolate so we could make s'mores. This was a pretty exciting idea because as I found out, it is more of a North American campfire tradition. It was the first s'more people we were with, as well as other random campers who joined us, ever had. Basically, you cook a marshmallow in the fire and then you sandwich it with two cookies and a piece of chocolate. The heat from the marshmallow melts the chocolate and the result is a delicious taste in your mouth along with sticky fingers.

During both trips we took a nature walk to point lookout. It was a great walk full of great sites overlooking the ocean. My favourite picture from this walk was of a kookaburra. I have been complimented several times on the shot, it has the perfect background. Some people also saw whales and dolphins on our second trip. I unfortunately never saw either.