June 16th Blog Pictures

June 15th Blog Pictures

June 13th Blog Pictures

June 12th Blog Pictures

June 16th Blog

This journal is really hard to do because I don't know if I can narrow everthing that I've done in the past week to my top ten. My number one expierience was snorkeling in the Great Barrier Reef. I chose this because I will probably never have the oppertunity to do this again and it was very beautiful. Also, due to coral bleaching, future generations may not have the oppertunity to see it. My number two expierience was going to the Blue Mountains. Even though it was foggy ands raining so you couldn't see anything, it was still breathtaking and the immensity staggarded me. My number three was walking around Sydney. I enjoyed this because I like seeing cultural differences in different societies. My number four was walking around in Cairns. I like being at the beach and Cairns was a perfect beach town. I also enjoyed the freedoms we got when we walked around. My number five was going to the Redwood forest. Even though the rain nearly ruined the expierience, the trees were so enormous that it made up for the lousy weather. My number six was luging. I loved this because it was a great introduction to New Zealand and the views and ride was spectacular. Number seven was O- going. I enjoyed this because it was a great oppertunity to do something that we can't do back in Illinois. My number eight was going to Rangitoto College. I loved talkig to the students and taking a tour around their campus. Number nine was swimming at night with my friends. We had some good times swimming and it was a good time to relax and unwind. Finally, my number ten choice was going to the Maori village. I found the tour to be very facinating and the food was great!

June 15th Blog

My day at the Great Barrier Reef will never be forgotten for the rest of my life. Just the ride there was amazing in itself. The boat ride there was especially fun because the ocean waves really rocked the boat. After the hour and half or so long boat ride there, we arrived at a permantly marooned pontoon at the edge of the reef. On the pontoon, they had a bunch of picnic tables and all of the snorkeling and scuba gear. I was so excited to get in the water so I rushed to put on my gear and me and my friends ended up being some of the first people out there. The first glance I made underwater was truely breath taking. The vivid colors of the coral and all the fish was almost overwhelming. For the first ten minutes, we swam around the perimeter, just to get used to snorkeling. We all then decided to go and get lunch so we could then spend the rest of the day out swimming. After a quick lunch of bread and other carbohydrate packed foods, we set off again. The first thing we did this time was stay near the pontoon and swam with the fishes. I then split off from my group and did some solo expeditions to some of the shallower portions of the coral. I saw so many fish and even some sea cucumbers and even a moray eel! After a while Mr. Schagrin and Mr. Ewen even caught a video of a shark swimming underneath me. After swimming for about another hour or so I got tired so I got out. On the boat ride home I just took a nap. That day was truely one of the better ones of my life.

June 13th Blog

I believe that I am a good traveler because of many talents and expieriences I've had in my life. First off, I've been traveling all over the country since I was a baby since I have family in all corners of America. For this reason alone I think that qualifies me to be able to do this trip alone. I know the ins and outs of security and traveling light so packing and repacking doesn't affect me. Also, I have very good common sense. I understand what to do and what not to do. Common sense also comes in handy when you are walking around a city that you've never been in before. The only thing that I believe would be hard to do by myself in this trip would be organizing the flights and getting the best deals on airfare. I would hate to play the websites waiting for the best possible deal so I would probably over pay for tickets. Another hard thing would be getting all the hotels in order. Whenever I travel with my parents, they usually cover all that so i have no idea how to handle that kind of stuff.