Saturday, June 23 - Wujal Wujal

Just so that everyone is clear, I am blogging for everyone to see, but also so that I can piece my trip together for my own recording by mind.

Today was all about Wujal Wujal. The class was on city planning, and Wujal Wujal was near the city we were planning for, Rossville. Wujal Wujal is one of the many aboriginal communities in Northern Tropical Queensland. On the way to Marilyn Wallace's Land, we passed the Black Mountains. These were pretty cool, but we didn't have time to stop and take more pictures, so excuse the bus quality once again.

 We had to take part in a smoking ceremony to get all of the outside world smells off of us, and be welcomed into the land. You had to rub your hands into the smoke, turn around with your arms up and rub your hands in the smoke again. Here is a picture closer of the leaves used, and Peter and Marylin Wallace, who toured us and talked to us about their communities.

We then drove into Wujal Wujal, which took like an hour from where we were. We looked around the town and observed a rickety bridge. We had morning tea at an aborginal art and jewelry store. I bought some earrings for mom and a necklace for my grandma. They were pretty and pretty expensive. 

Their yield signs said, "give way" instead of yield! There were many of these, but I captured this one! 

We next visited Wujal Wujal Falls, which were definitely the largest I'd encountered my entire time in Australia! We had to walk on these crazy rocks to get to the falls, but again, so worth it! 

 There was a croc sighting around this area (before we saw the falls) by two guys that were on their way back to their cars. We looked, but couldn't see him. I really wanted to see one in the wild, just for the thrill of it. However, at the same time, didn't want to put my life in jeopardy.

 New friend Lisa at the falls!

And of course, Jeff taking a drink.

Peter Wallace told us a few stories at the falls before we headed to lunch. I believe this place was called Cow Bay? It was very windy, because of the ocean. We were going to eat here though, it was pretty! Bus Driver and Jellyfish extraordinaire Matt, pulled the bus in front of the ocean so that we could eat with significantly less wind. Before we ate, we took a look around the shore.

We had our lunch and then we headed to our night accommodations, Home Rule.  On the way, there were plenty of bridges over creeks throughout the bush that required us to get off of the bus while Matt drove across the bridge. This was one of the more scenic moments. There is also a picture of what a student drew on the dusty bus window. 


 According to the online website, this place was nicer than Peninsula Caravan Park in Cooktown...boy was I wrong. First of all, the appearance of this place to guests needs some serious work. As we pulled up, there was some question about how the place would be. The group toward the front, consisting of The US students, my friend Amanda, and three high-maintenance girls like myself, were looking around for the bathrooms. We started joking of these coffins that we saw at the front, thinking that they would be our bathrooms...or coffins. Sharon had a laugh about this when we told her.

 As we explored our accommodations, there was an abundant supply of horse poo all around the grounds to watch out for. There were dead cane toads on the walkways, and possible snake hideouts to worry about if you had to pee at night. If the outdoors wasn't as fearful enough, the rooms were hideous. The linens had dead (or alive) bugs on them, even the supposed CLEAN ones hidden away in lockers. It was extremely disappointing.

I took a shower that night, since it really didn't matter to be clean sleeping in bug infested beds. After shower time, we had dinner, Beef Stroganoff. Not too shabby, but we had an even better dessert; passionfruit and cookies! After a bottle of wine, halfway through by Jeff alone, he was sorta tipsy, which made ping pong so much more fun. We all had a blast talking in the common room, which was also filled with dead bugs. We didn't go to bed until kind of late, considering no one knew what sleep would bring in this place.

Amanda and Rachel and I roomed together on this one. We stayed up probably an extra hour talking. It felt like a true sleepover! As we were about to fall asleep, Amanda hears something. It's Jeff, lurking outside our window. Possibly the funniest moment on this trip. This quickly turned the phrase of the week to, "F**k Off, Jeff!" What a time these people were.

In the middle of the night, Amanda suddenly woke me up, asking me if I had to pee. We went together. It was a terrible fright to walk through these trees and plants to get to the stupid bathroom! I was so ready to leave Home Rule and to never return.

Read the next blog post for more adventures! Cheers!