Swimming with the Whale Sharks!

I've been looking forward to the Easter long weekend since the beginning of the term. I had long ago decided that if the opportunity presented itself to swim with whale sharks, I would grab it as I had passed it up last time I was in Western Australia due to a lack of funds. Whale shark season is from mid-March to July, so we would be at the early end of things, and I was a little worried that we wouldn't see any, but I didn't know if I could get to Ningaloo Reef at any other time this year. I contacted Katherine Macnaughton, a Scottish teacher on exchange in Perth, and we made plans to meet up. She would fly up to Karratha and we would drive the 580km together in my Astra. We left Karratha before 9am on Friday, March 29, and arrived in Coral Bay mid-afternoon. The drive through the Pilbara and Gascoyne regions of WA is not the most exciting, but we had excellent conversation and the time passed fairly quickly.

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After eating a quick lunch, we headed to the beach to stretch out and relax under the hot sun. We stayed until the sun set, which was quite spectacular. Check out this image I caught:

The next day was the start of our whale shark adventure. After checking in with Ningaloo Reef Dive, conveniently located beside our hostel, and getting outfitted in wetsuits and fins, we boarded the bus for the short trip to the jetty. Once on the boat, we were off to search for whale sharks! The crew gave us a lesson about these giant fish of the ocean. They are indeed fish, not mammals, which makes them more like sharks than like whales. They do not come up to the surface to breathe, they have gills like all other  fish, which makes it even more amazing that we get to swim with them at all. It is thought they come up to feed on on the plankton found in the warmer water near the surface. Check out Ningaloo Reef Dive's website for more information: http://www.ningalooreefdive.com/whaleshark.html

We divided into two groups so that no more than ten swimmers would be in the water at one time. Our group was the second to go in. The first whale shark we saw I swam right over! It was a small one, only (!) 5 metres, but it was amazing! We got to swim with it for a few minutes and then it was back on the boat, so the other group could get back in. We got in a second time as well and this time I got to swim alongside it. We got out yet again and went off looking for another one with the help of a spotter plane. In the end, we got to swim with three different whale sharks, which ranged in length from 5 metres to 9 metres. One was very curious and went up to the bow of the boat while we were in the water with it. Group 1 got great pictures from the boat and hopefully one of our fellow swimmers will be emailing those to us shortly. They are beautiful, peaceful creatures and it was truly phenomenal to swim with them. Check out this short video created by Migration Media, who also filmed our adventure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=VFKdkVXd6RE

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After that awesome experience, we spent the rest of the afternoon on the beach! What a day!

Sunday we drove to Exmouth, which is 150km north of Coral Bay. We had a bit of a lazy start and didn't get to Turquoise Bay until after lunch, where we snorkelled and saw loads of amazing fish. The last time I snorkelled there (four years ago) I saw sea turtles, which was really exciting, but no luck this time around. We also went on a hike in Mandu Mandu Gorge, which was lovely.

Our last stop was the Vlamingh Head Lighthouse for sunset. The sky turned a beautiful pinky purple colour moments after we left, so no great photos to show, unfortunately. We did see some emus before heading out, but from a distance, so no photos of them either!

Monday was our last day of holidays and we spent it at the beach. After another lazy breakfast, we headed to the beach to snorkel among the coral that is only a few metres off the shore. Heaps of beautiful fish, especially these electric blue and green ones I just loved. Also lots of small black and white striped fish. Made me want to take a course and learn all these fish names. In the afternoon we hired a stand-up paddle board and had a go. It was easier than I had imagined, although hard going against the wind (and it was quite windy). Lots of fun though and I'd love to have the opportunity to do it again. After another snorkel and a quick walk down to Paradise Beach, we headed back to the hostel to shower and change for our last dinner together. 

An early morning saw us heading up to Exmouth before 7:30am so I could get escorted back to Karratha by two of my colleagues. I was a little wary of driving that distance by myself with no mobile reception as Katherine had opted to fly back to Perth from Learmonth instead. Having four days to chat with another exchange teacher about my experience was fantastic and I'm so glad I contacted her last month. It was reassuring to hear from another exchangee and it was great to swap stories with someone who understands where you're coming from. Hopefully we'll meet up again before the year is over. Kalbarri for the June long weekend, perhaps?

Little Scholarly Differences

Duo-tangs. How I miss them. And three-ring binders. I'm learning to make do, but it's been a slow process. Here in Australia, they use folders with plastic sheets inside, so students put their photocopied booklets into the plastic sheets instead of a duo-tang or a binder. When they want to use their booklets, they take them out of the plastic sheets. While we moved to binders at Esther Starkman School this past September, I have to say I've been missing duo-tangs more due to their simplicity and ease of use. Pop your booklet into your duo-tang, open when needed. Take out unit when done and start all over again. Binders are more cumbersome and take up more space, but they still allow you to look at pages without having to take them out of a plastic sleeve. They also use scrapbooks for subjects such as health, so we're gluing pages into our scrapbooks, rather than popping them into a binder or duo-tang. I can't double side because then students can't glue their page in. It's been a very interesting experience, learning how to organize our materials in our folders and scrapbooks rather than binders and duo-tangs!

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I've also had to learn brand new classroom vocabulary. Here are some examples of Australian school supplies and their Canadian equivalents:

textas = markers
coloured pencils = pencil crayons
rubber = eraser (and rub out = erase)
tissue = Kleenex
outliner = Sharpie/permanent marker
rubbish bin = garbage can (and rubbish = garbage)
sport = physical education
LOTE = Language Other Than English (in this case, Japanese)
duty = supervision

And yes, it's texta and not texter, Google it! I've been trying to use the Australian words rather than the Canadian, but sometimes I forget, so the students are adapting to me as well.

The paper in their workbooks doesn't come lined with margins, so Australian students are always "ruling up" (drawing their own margins with red pen or coloured pencil). They definitely know how to use a ruler better than their Canadian peers! They seem to enjoy using a ruler too, much to my surprise.

Another difference at school is the fact that there's air conditioning in all the rooms. In Edmonton, it would be nice to have air conditioning for the 15 days or so during the school year when the thermometer makes its way past 25 degrees Celsius. We don't have it, but it would be nice. Here, it's a necessity. Since school started February 4th, the average temperature has been about 37 degrees (and that's not including what it really feels like with the humidity). Unfortunately, I find the air con cold and often have goosebumps. It's hard to know what to wear when it's so warm outside, but so cool inside. I didn't pack my cardigans as I knew it would be warm, but now I'm wishing I had a couple. I will have to go shopping sometime soon.

For physical education, or sport as it's called here, students play outside in the undercover area, on the basketball/netball courts, on the oval or in the school yard. There is no gymnasium. They have a specialized sport teacher who takes them for one hour a week. On Fridays there is Senior Sport for students in grades 4-7, where they rotate through winter carnival sports, including soft cross, netball, tennis, soccer, touch, volleyball and cricket. My station is soccer, which I can handle (I wouldn't have a clue how to run soft cross, netball or touch). My students are going to teach me how to play cricket and maybe touch sometime during the year. I look forward to bringing it back to Canada to teach the students there next year.

Students also have LOTE (Japanese) and Music once a week for an hour, and another teacher takes them for Science for an hour once a week as well, which means I get 4 hours of DOTT (Duties Other Than Teaching) time a week, which is a much sweeter deal than what I get back home in Edmonton, which I think was 80 minutes a week. During that time I can actually get most of my planning and photocopying done so that I don't have to go in on the weekend and I don't bring a lot of work home (besides marking). School starts at 8:15 and runs until 2:30, with one 20 minute recess and one 40 minute lunch break. I have three 20 minute duties per week, which I think is reasonable considering the size of staff and the student population.

Coming soon, a post about swimming with whale sharks and snorkelling the Ningaloo Reef!

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Cyclone Rusty Heads to the Pilbara

Many of you in the northern hemisphere were probably unaware, but last week Karratha almost had an encounter with Tropical Cyclone Rusty. The week leading up to landfall, Rusty was all anyone could talk about, and to these unexperienced ears, a little anxiety began to sneak in. Back home, in landlocked Alberta, we have no real weather worries. The occasional tornado does touch down, sometimes with devastating results, like Black Friday in 1987, but that doesn't happen very often. We do get the odd snow blizzard, but buildings aren't destroyed and people aren't killed. In the grand scheme of bad weather, we've got it pretty good in Edmonton.

Talk of Tropical Cyclone Rusty had me going out to Woolworths to prepare: I bought a case of 24 water bottles, canned fish, canned beans and canned fruit. I loaded up on other groceries too, with the thought that if the roads flooded at least I'd have food to eat (although at the back of my mind I was thinking what if there was a power outage and all my food went bad?). I bought a battery powered radio and got my head torch out. I was ready to head to Beck's if a yellow alert was called, ready to hide out in her bathroom under a mattress if need be. The thing with cyclones is they're so unpredictable and it could have turned and headed straight toward us at any time. It was frightening and I don't know if following Oz Cyclone Chasers and the Bureau of Meteorology online helped or made things worse. The feeling of relief I felt when I found out it was heading toward Pardoo Station and not Karratha was indescribable. Poor Pardoo, but thank goodness it wasn't Karratha was all I could think. Even Port Hedland, which did go on red alert (the next step up from yellow), escaped the worst of it, ending up with hundreds of millimetres of rain and terrible winds instead.

This is an image from February 26 at 5am. Pretty scary, eh?

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And a satellite image of Tropical Cyclone Rusty heading toward the Pilbara Coast:

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March is apparently the worst month for cyclones as the seas are at their warmest. Hopefully we won't get as close as we did with Rusty, but you never know. They are unpredictable and funny things can happen. I will be more prepared heading into the busiest time for cyclones~ I've got my water and tinned food ready to go. While it was exciting, I can't wait for cyclone season to end April 30.

Car Shopping

I finally bought a car! It's a 2004 Holden Astra City edition. It's white, it has four doors and it has air conditioning. It does NOT have power windows, but I imagine I'll mostly use the air con anyway, so no biggie. It's also an automatic, which is not something I thought I'd drive again after discovering that I love driving stick. Last time I was in Australia I drove stick around Perth and I was fine, but this time around I was a little anxious about it and thought an automatic might be easier to handle driving on the left, so an automatic it is.

I bought it off of Karratha Buy, Sell and Swap on Facebook, not Dreamer's Hill, which is where I thought I'd find it. Buy, Sell and Swap is where Karrathans post items to (you guessed it) buy, sell or swap. You can find anything on it: dining room sets, gym memberships, video games, vehicles... I had been scanning the site for a couple weeks and noticed that most things went pretty quickly. You had to act fast to get in on the deal. When Ashleigh's ad came up for the Astra I was the first one to reply. I viewed it that afternoon and had my friend Beck's husband check it out the next day. I had bought my three previous cars privately before, but never without having a mechanic checking it out. Apparently that's quite pricy to do here and while I was a little nervous about skipping this important step, it seemed like a good buy, so after doing a Revs Check (a vehicle history check) I went ahead and bought it. The last Revs Check I had done showed the vehicle in question, a Mazda 3, had flood damage and had been written off, so that was $35 well spent. This one turned up nothing, which eased my mind a bit. I'd be happier if my brother the mechanic was here to check it out, but I think I did pretty well all things considering. Dreamer's Hill is a large lot on the corner of the Dampier Highway where people park their cars, utes and boats hoping for a sale. It's where I found the Mazda 3. It's a quite a busy place on the weekend and gets lots of traffic. When it comes time for me to sell the Astra in December, I'll probably use both Dreamer's Hill and Karratha Buy, Sell and Swap. I'll need to make a quick sale too!

A surprising thing about buying a car in Australia: you have to pay a stamp duty when you transfer ownership. It cost $220! What?! This car buying business was more expensive than I had thought. The car itself was $7400, the two Revs Checks were $70, the registration fee was $436 and then comprehensive insurance was ~ $900. Crazy! Just over $9000 initial investment and then gas (I mean, petrol), which costs $1.68/L. At least it's not New Zealand, where prices were as high as $2.16/L! Hopefully I'll be able to recoup most of the cost of the car when I sell in December.

I'm a little sad I don't have an SUV (I really had my heart set on a Toyota Rav4, a Honda CR-V or a Jeep TJ), but with gas prices being what they are, I don't want to shell out more than I have to. So I'm not driving what I pictured myself in, but I am driving an Aussie car, which I love! Hopefully it'll grow on me. My first big road trip will probably be to Coral Bay over Easter, which is at the end of the month. It's a six hour drive, which is a long day driving by myself. I've driven to Canmore by myself before though, so I can do it. I'm not sure how to do it without music~ I have no CDs here and I'm sure the radio won't work the entire time. I guess I'll be listening to my iPod through my ear buds- yuck!

This weekend is the Labour Day long weekend. It kind of snuck up on me, so I'm not going away anywhere special. I've been invited out on both Saturday and Sunday nights, so that's exciting. Hopefully I'll finalize Easter plans and make some headway with my April holidays as well. 

Back in Oz to Stay

Arriving in Karratha in January, you hit a heat wave as soon as you exit the plane. Lucky for me, Perth was also quite warm (38 degrees, if I recall correctly), so it wasn't too much of a shock. Fortunately there's air conditioning everywhere you go, so you don't have to stay in the heat too long. My first taste of Karratha confirmed everything I remembered from my short visit here in 2009: it's hot, it's red and there's a lot of neon workman's clothing!

Emma's friend Nicole picked me up at the airport (she even held a sign with my name on it) and took me on a short tour of the town, showing me the school, the shops and my new house. After visiting the shops and stocking up on groceries, she dropped me back off at home, letting me get accustomed to my new home on my own. Unpacking my bag and putting things away made me realize that I was living here, that it was permanent. I would no longer be unpacking and repacking my bag every 24 hours, like I had been in New Zealand. I was staying here, and for the next 11 months it would be home.

The first week passed in a blur. I spent a great deal of time at Millars Well Primary School, my new workplace, getting ready for the students to arrive on Monday, February 4th. I met Weston, the principal, as well as many friendly staff members who welcomed me with open arms. Thursday and Friday were non-operational days, so we had the usual staff meetings and PD to prepare for the new school year. It was a bit overwhelming, with lots of new acronyms and ways of doing things that differed from back home. After coming in on Sunday to prepare my classroom for the big day, I felt a little more ready for parents and students.

Monday proved to be the easiest day of the week, as I had done the first day of school many times before. The students were great and we got to know each other just like we do back home. We even played the same classroom bingo game I had started with in September (I did change some of the items though~ Likes to cheer for the West Coast Eagles instead of the Oilers for example, or Went to Bali instead of Vancouver) and it proved to be a hit. Over the rest of the week, rules and routines were established and curriculum implemented. The rest of the week passed more slowly, as I had to think of things to do in each subject area. Not being as familiar with curriculum as I was back home, this took more time and thought. In a lot of ways, it's like being a beginning teacher again, where everything is new again.

One of my new colleagues, Beck, has been wonderful. She lent me her daughter's car until I bought my own this past weekend, she invited me to go 4x4ing the weekend before school started (the perfect way to not stress about the first day of school is going 4x4ing and then going for a dip in the sea) and she's been able to answer my questions about curriculum even though she's making her own way through a new curriculum this year, having moved from year 7 to Pre-Primary (4 and 5 year olds). She's been absolutely amazing and I thank her everyday for all she's done for me.

This photo is from the place we 4x4ed to and swam in. The earth really is that red, which I always thought made the sky seem that much bluer for some reason. It was a lovely stop, even though Beck and her friend Jodie said there were much more beautiful places around town. One of them, Hearson's Cove, we visited briefly the week after. It's one of those places where you need it to be high tide and we were there when the tide was going out, but it was still beautiful. I'm sure I'll get back there one day soon to swim.

Getting ready for week 3 this weekend and Meet the Teacher tomorrow afternoon. I made a Power Point presentation, so hopefully that will make things go smoothly and parents will see that while yes, I'm not Australian, I can still teach their children everything they need to know. I'm a little nervous about it, but I'm sure things will turn out for the best. I will let you know how it goes in the next post! Have a great week everyone, especially those in Alberta who get Monday off. Happy Family Day!

Saying Goodbye to New Zealand

My sky dive was over Abel Tasman National Park and I got the best views of the Park from 16 500 feet. However, kayaking the next day was also amazing and offered spectacular views as well. At low tide, when we went out, you have to take a tractor out to the water (it's a fair way from the boardwalk). We kayaked around Fisherman Island, where we debarked for some morning tea and to stretch our legs.

We then continued on to Adele Island, home of fur seals, but sadly didn't see many. We continued onto Akersten Bay where we stopped for lunch and a sunbathe. I went for a short hike and saw some terrific views of Adele Island. There's the Abel Tasman Coastal Track, which I would love to explore one day when I have the right equipment. On the way back the tide was in, so we had that much farther to kayak in to shore. It was a bit of challenge, especially since our boat seemed to have a mind of its own when it came to directions! We did, however, manage to get back safely. That night we went to Fat Tui's for dinner and had the largest burgers I've ever seen (I had the veggie option, which was fantastic) to cap off our last night on the South Island.

The next day it was off to Nelson for a hike to 'the Centre of New Zealand' and lunch. Nelson is wonderfully situated by National Parks, which makes it a great jumping off point. I think next time I'm in New Zealand, I will spend more time there as well. The Centre of New Zealand was a short hike up Botanical Hill to a viewpoint that overlooked Nelson. You could see Abel Tasman National Park from the top, which was beautiful. Here we said goodbye to our guide Emma, as she was going on holidays with her family. Thanks for the memories!

We said goodbye to Grant in Picton after visiting Forrest Wines. That evening we took the ferry from Picton to Wellington, the capital of New Zealand. The ferry ride offered gorgeous views of the sounds as we passed through.

A couple of us decided to stay at the YHA in Wellington, which was a good choice, as it was clean and quiet. The following day was a public holiday (Wellington Day) and most shops were closed. We did manage to find a restaurant open that served us breakfast before heading to the railway station to meet our new guides.

Back on the bus, we were heading north, up to the Bay of Islands. Unfortunately, the clutch on the bus gave out and we ended up spending an afternoon in Levin, where there wasn't much to see or do. We did end up at a very nice camp site that was off the itinerary, so that was a bonus. The next day we continued our journey North, stopping at Waitomo Caves to see the glow worms. They looked like constellations on the cave's ceiling! That night we were in Auckland again before heading to Paihia in the Bay of Islands. That night was a cultural show at the Waitangi Treaty Grounds. It was excellent. Told through music and dance, it featured a grandfather telling his granddaughter the story of New Zealand and how the Maori people came to be.

The following day we took She's a Lady, a beautiful sailing boat, out to Stingray Cove on one of the bay's islands. I hiked up the hill to have awesome 360 degree views. Our skipper also made us lunch to order, which was delicious. Carol and I went for a swim in the sea as well, which was fantastic! The water was cool, but you got used to it fast. We swam around the sailing boat before returning to the beach. It was a lovely afternoon.

The next day, my last day with Flying Kiwi, saw us hop on and off the bus quite a few times to see big Kauri trees, similar to the ones in Pemberton, where I worked when I was in Western Australia four years ago. They were quite impressive and pictures can't do them justice, they were indeed massive. This is a picture of Tane Mahuta, the largest Kauri tree in New Zealand. Without someone standing in front of it for perspective, it's hard to appreciate how big it truly is.

Our last night was spent at a holiday park. Carol and I went for a long walk along the beach. It was an uneventful end to such a terrific holiday. Our Flying Kiwi guides were awesome and the stops we made on our tour of New Zealand were, for the most part, outstanding. I had an amazing four weeks with many highlights, including kayaking Cathedral Cove and Abel Tasman, parasailing in Queenstown, sky diving, glacier hiking, swimming in the sea.... It was a wonderful holiday and I'm so happy I got to spend four weeks in New Zealand. I will definitely be back to explore some of New Zealand more in depth, including Nelson, the Abel Tasman Coastal Track and the Routeburn Track.

While the recounting of my Flying Kiwi Ultimate Adventure is now over, I hope you stay tuned to read about my teaching exchange in Karratha, Western Australia, the real purpose of this blog. Entries to be posted soon!

The Greatest Thrill of All!

We left Queenstown at 3pm on Sunday. Shortly after leaving, we stopped at Puzzling World in Wanaka (http://www.puzzlingworld.co.nz) where we participated in life size puzzles and completed a complicated maze. One of the best ones was the room where one person appeared larger than life and the other person appears tiny. I was in a similar room in Holland at the Escher Museum in the Hague. Very cool!

We biked into our next campsite, a beautiful location beside a tranquil lake. It was a super windy evening and some of us hung out in the bus, singing songs and playing the guitar. We were a much smaller group now, with many people having left in Queenstown.

The next morning we left for a jet boat ride on the Makarora River. It was awesome! I was the lucky one who got soaked when our guide Hayden did 360's, but it was lots of fun (although a bit chilly~ even with my toque!). After the boat ride, some of us cycled down the Haast Pass, one of three passes through the Southern Alps. It was a thrilling ride, all downhill with lots of turns. We stopped at a waterfall, which was lovely, and then for lunch a little further down the road at Pleasant Flats (or Unpleasant Flats, as Grant called them, due to the amount of sand flies). We had been introduced to sand flies the day before at our wilderness camp, but they really came out full force at Pleasant Flats, making it difficult to eat lunch. Lots of us got bitten, with welts decorating our legs and feet. It wasn't pretty!

Upon arriving at Fox Glacier, Jodie and I biked further on to Lake Matheson. If you're lucky you can see the reflection of Mount Cook in the water. It was a very cloudy day for us, thus no reflection. It was a nice walk, however, and an excellent bike ride too.

The following day was our full day hike on Fox Glacier. After getting kitted out in borrowed boots and socks, we hopped on the bus for the short ride to the glacier. Our American guide Tyler was awesome and we learned a lot of glacial facts that day. The hike was amazing and we got to climb right on the glacier. The views were amazing, the ice so beautiful.

In the evening, we camped at Okarito Beach. We had a beach fire, which was awesome. In the morning we left for Hokitika, where we visited the National Kiwi Centre and a greenstone factory. I actually saw a live kiwi. They're funny looking birds with long snouts. It went around trying to dig around for food with its beak. It was quite amusing. I also ended up buying a greenstone necklace, even though it's bad luck if you buy one for yourself. So far, so good....

That afternoon we arrived in Punakaiki, where we were to stay for the next two days. We got to see the pancake rocks (so named because they look like pancakes!) before heading to camp. The following day we went on two hikes, the Truman Track (short walk, but ended up on a beautiful beach and had it all to ourselves) and the Pororari River Track (a 2+ hours walk through LOTS of mud, but well worth the effort). The weather was very up and down. It would rain down hard for 20 minutes, then lighten up for 20 minutes. After one particularly hard downfall, we sought shelter in the Punakaiki Tavern, where we warmed up in front of the fire. The tavern itself was something of a find, as it had different countries' currency all over the support beams. I found a $1 Canadian bill and a $5 Canadian bill.

The next day, Friday, January 18, was sky dive day! All during the tour, I kept waffling back and forth about whether I was going to do it or not, but I knew I would regret it if I didn't, so then the decision became 16 500 feet or 13 000 feet? I decided to go with the higher altitude, as I would probably only do this once (it's expensive!) and you got a longer free fall (70 seconds vs. 40 seconds, or somewhere thereabouts). I'm so happy I did, because I loved it! It was the best feeling, I can't describe how exhilarating it was. I was very proud of myself for having the courage to do it too. It was definitely the greatest thrill of all!

The fourth and final instalment of my Flying Kiwi Ultimate Adventure will follow soon. I have to start posting about my teaching exchange too, so stay tuned to hear about how hot life is in Karratha, Western Australia.