a journey of a thousand miles: A trip to Tenterfield

For my Australian Life and Culture class we got to spend the last three days in Tenterfield while the rest of our classes got cancelled. On this trip we got to experience a little bit of the outback and the real Aussie way of life! It was a blast and we all learned a lot from each experience.

Day one: Monday!
We boarded the bus in Lennox Head at 8am and started the trip with a three and a half hour bus ride. On the way we enjoyed Aussie music and movies. Some people slept...we did have to wake up quite early! Around 11:30am we arrived at the Golfer's Inn Motel in Tenterfield where lunch was awaiting us. The girls were taken to one part of the camp and the boys to another and divided into rooms/cabins. We soon found out that the girls got the better end of the stick! Our rooms were amazing...here are some pictures

My bedroom for three days :)

Our living room

The bathroom...my favorite part! The shower was amazing!!!!!

Kitchen...even though we didn't use it

After getting all settled in to our place we departed for Bald Rock! On the way we stopped off at Thunderbolts Cave and a few Tank Traps as well.

The Group in Thunderbolts Hideout!

Hiking up Bald Rock was beautiful and along the way we stopped to look at wildlife including a wallaby! It was a nice moderate hike.

The first wild Kangaroo we saw on the trip :)

Our path up to Bald Rock

It is amazing how big our world really is

Bald Rock!

If only I was a little stronger...haha

Resting after our walk down the mountain!

Next up was a visit to Deetswood Winery! Ball State actually paid for us to drink on a school field trip...pretty awesome!

In the evening we had a delicious dinner at the motel/camping area followed by a BSU concert. A few people put together a talent show for some entertainment! We had singers, jugglers, stompers, comedians, and dancers.

Afterwords we all went to bed...exhausted

Day Two: Tuesday!
Waking up at 6:15 was hard! Breakfast at 6:30 and then we were off for another plan packed day. First on the list of things to do was a trip to Inverell to do some sapphire fossicking at Billabong Blue! It was a hard and time consuming job but it was also very rewarding. I found a few small sapphires and a few other gems...it was neat to find these gems on my own from the digging to the sifting to the picking them out!

Step one in finding Sapphires!

Step two...cleaning the rocks and gems

Step three...picking the gems out from the rocks

Me with the gems I found!!!

When we were all finished fossicking we boarded the bus again and headed off to have lunch and explore an old Australian pioneer village. There were 25 historic cottages and buildings from Australia's past to look at and they were all filled with authentic and historical items. Jess and I even won 5 dollars each for finding our professors name (Lockery) in one of the buildings!

Old Australian Pioneer School House

Pioneer bathroom

I found a phone!

I was worn out!...naps on the bus are a lot better than getting bus sick!

The day was long and tiring but we had about an hour to relax once we got back to the motel. After that we headed off to a Golf Club where we had a delicious dinner! Fish for me...with a brownie and ice cream for desert!

Our group at dinner

Day Three: Wednesday!
Again we woke up around 6:15 this morning to have breakfast and head out by 7:45. First on our day plan was to go on a historical tour of Tenterfield with a guide. There was so much history to learn about that it took us all day...and we got to meet the Mayor of Tenterfield! Finally we were headed back to Lennox Head...our home away from home...after an exhausting three day field trip.