Family Adventures

On my spring break, my family joined me in the Land Down Under and I got to show them the city that I have called home for a month. I was so happy that I had the opportunity to show my family around Sydney and to just see them again!

My older sister Brennan was the first to join me on the other side of the world. We did the classic touristy things like seeing the opera house and doing the Coogee to Bondi coastal walk, but I also got to show her what my life has been like while living here. I showed her things like my favorite coffee shop, the University of Sydney and where I had lunch everyday there, my favorite brunch place, and the speakeasy a lot of my friends and I found. It was cool so show Brennan the well-known places of Australia but what I really loved was showing her the places that I spend time at everyday.

Once my parents and my younger sister arrived, we hit the ground running to see all that we could. We focused on seeing the famous Australian wildlife during their stay. The first thing we did was take a ferry from Circular Quay to the Taronga Zoo. It’s a little ironic that my little sister, Alexandria, came to visit me in Australia with her fear of kangaroos, something that came out in our visit to the zoo. The zoos here are quite a bit different than the zoos in America. The Australian zoos have paths for the people to stay on and the animals are free to roam wherever they want. Although there are some glass walls in some areas, the majority of the exhibits are open, free of any walls and allow the animals to roam. This is the case for the Australian area where the kangaroos where. It was pretty funny to see AJ react as she was surrounded by free kangaroos who were all being fed dinner.

I also got to bring my family back to Palm Beach and the Ku-Ring-Gai-Chase national park with the wallaby reserve. The smaller and cuter wallabies were a bigger hit with my family. We were all able to take a picture and pet some wallabies even though we didn’t have the experience of one jumping in our lap like my furry wallaby friend Chip.

After our adventures in Australia, we hopped on a plane to New Zealand. I’m not going to lie, it was a little terrifying traveling around New Zealand with my dad behind the wheel. Overall, he did a great job driving, but at first, he kept inching over to the right side of the road and turning his windshield wipers on instead of his turning signal. After my dad got used to driving on the other side of the road, we drove from Christchuch to Queenstown, the adventure capital of the world. New Zealand looked like something right out of a movie; the magnificent landscape did not even look real. We go to experience the beauty of Lake Tekapo, Mt. Hutt, Mt. Cook, Lake Pukaki, Kawarau Gorge, Glenorchy, and Milford Sounds. You might recognize some of the names of the places as The Lord of the Rings filming locations.

Not only did we experience the amazing scenery of New Zealand, we tapped into our adventurous side. Do you remember how your parents always said, “if all your friends jumped off a bridge would you do it too?”… well my sisters are those friends. They both decided to jump off the bridge where bungee jumping was first invented.

I am so beyond thankful to my family for letting me go on this crazy adventure and then joining me here. I loved every second of our Australia and New Zealand adventure and cannot wait to see you all again in late April! But for now, I’m so happy to call Australia my home for another month and a half.


Cheers,
Victoria