mood okay

Sunshine Coast, where sleepyheads rule the town.
(super long post with heaps of pictures)


I am hallucinating about a mug of hot mocha latte at this very moment.

Yesterday after badminton we watched TV as usual, but instead of watching the taped shows in installments as civilised working adults normally do on a weekday night, we watched the whole lot, which was 3 hours' worth of Getaway, Missing Persons Unit, and Amazing Race. Crawled into bed only at 2+ am, having to wake up 5 hours later. So Wayne was a grump the whole morning!

This whole week has been such a relaxing week because I have simply been left to my own vices with a computer in front of me. Which is why my blog posts have been materialising at quite regular intervals because otherwise, at home everyone is taking turns hogging the phone line there is hardly any time for peaceful blogging, except in the blind of the night. And since I've finished all my reports, today is like taking a full day leave to cyberspace. Does that deserve a yay or what?

Sunshine Coast pictures, oh finally! :D

Last saturday Wayne had badminton tournament (again! that badminton junkie!) at Sunshine Coast so while he was sweating it out on the court, maysan and I went sight-seeing. I had been downloading bus and train timetables a few days prior to the trip, but while excitedly ploughing through rows upon rows of numbers on the timetable, it was with utmost horror that I eventually discovered, the train line along Sunshine Coast comes only once a day! at night! Like HUH?!??

So pre-trip bad premonition aside, we left home around 6 am because Wayne's game started early morning. But the moment the car finally wound up at Nambour around 830 am, the only thought that was in my mind was, "Omg, what kind of a shithole sleepy town is this??"

The town just had this slumberish and lazy kind of atmosphere that I fell compelled to just immediately check into a random motel and snooze the day away.

We took a bus to Eumundi Market, a famous giant market which happens only every wednesday and saturday. It was hugeee.. with many nooks and crannies, small alleys and all, that it probably would have helped to have a compass while you browse the rows of stalls that seem to go on forever. A market is like singapore's equivalent of pasar malam, but more high class, with way better stuff, and way more happening.





Then we went to Noosa, the place where our dreams got shattered.

No, seriously. That's because all the travel guides and brochures had made it seem like Noosa is a damn happening place, maybe a sleepier version of Surfers' Paradise. But blimey, I didn't expect it to be THAT sleepy. We started at Noosa Heads, and then took a ferry down the coast to Noosa Ville, a stretch of road along the coast which was supposed to be "really beautiful" according to the fella at the information centre. Come to think of it, seeing that he is probably a generation older, his idea of happening probably would have meant sitting for 5 hours on his butt fishing for trout. We should have known better!

Because alas, Noosa Ville was just a tiny suburb with some very mediocre shops along the road which were not even worth patronising. So much paying 12 bucks for the ferry! So. When all else fails, what do you do? You take lots of pictures to get your 12 bucks' worth.





Waiting at the ferry terminal. Well, at least the place has got some nice views to compensate for its somewhat lack lustre tourism appeal.








I really love this last picture (of the boat) that I took while on board the ferry! :)

And just like that, the day had passed us by. We came back to Nambour to meet Wayne and drove to the place where we were supposed to spend the night, which is a caravan park!! I got so excited when Wayne told me that he had booked a place at a caravan park instead of a typical motel, despite all his "typical-wayne" false alarm, about the place being really crappy, small, devoid of utilities and all.

The caravan park was like a parking place for caravans (duh), but they have a few demountable cabins which looked like little containers. Reminded me of my NYJC days when we would have lessons in containers while waiting for the new building to get built!





I personally think that it was a great place! Fuzzy and quite comfy too. Maysan and I slept in the bunk beds while Wayne had the queen sized bed at the other side of the cabin.

We went to Mooloolaba beach for a drive after dinner before coming back for a super early night (because there was nothing else to do in this lazy town!)

Bedtime affair was really hilarious because after closing the partition (see 2nd pic) between our bunk area and the main room, maysan and I were left to our claustrophia-inducing little space wedged between the toilet and the beds. I had such a laughable moment settling down to bed, because to squeeze myself into that little space above the mattress without making myself feel like an elephant was just such an impossibility. Come to think of it, I must have made a heck lot of noise.

"How come the door is closed?! I feel like I'm in a storeroom!!"

"Oh no, I cant get onto this bed!"

"OUCH!"

"How do we turn off the light? I can't get out!"

"How come I can't open this window?"

"OUCH!!"

"It's so dark, I can't see anything!"

"This bed is so short, I can't stretch!"



So while I squirmed and wriggled in the dark and bumped my head against the ceiling a hundred times a minute, Wayne was in stitches at the other side of the room.

The next day we went to the Ginger Factory, which I enjoyed tremendously!





They've got the factory tour, where you also get to taste some of the products like ginger refresher, ginger BBQ sauce, ginger cheese spread yadda yadda. They also made their own ice cream, which was a myriad of mind-boggling flavours like (you guessed it) Ginger cinnamon, Ginger mango, yadda yadda. I had a scoop each of Gingerbread and Ginger chocolate chip flavour, and they were surprisingly yummy. Damn, I should have just bought one whole tub.






They also had a very impressive collection of ginger products for sale at its humongous ginger shop. All the stuff that you never thought could be edible. Ginger champagne cherry marmalade, Ginger syrup, Ginger lemonade refresher, they had a whole lot of bizarre concoctions which made your taste buds tingle just thinking about them.

I wanted to buy so many things! Which was heart-breaking because I knew I couldn't carry them back. But isn't it such a shame, having travelled all the distance, all the way down under, and not being able to shop with total abandonment just because of a 25kg baggage allowance. SIGH.

So i only settled for a bottle each of Ginger, Lime & Lemon Conserve and Ginger & Mango Marmalade. Gonna bring one to melbourne for Rudy. Yang, which one you want?? :D







They had other non-ginger stuff for sale too. All the exotic sounding sauces in pretty little bottles. But instead of drooling over them, Wayne and I were going from shelf to shelf inspecting, examining, and having retarded conversations such as this:

"You see, this one the machine must have been not hot enough. The capsule isn't wrapped properly."

"Hmm yeah.. but the labelling quite impressive. See how they are all so perfectly aligned. We normally have a lot of problems with it at work."

"Yeah you're right."

"They need to wipe all these bottles. Noone will buy them if they've got so much dust on them."

"Hmm true.. true.."

*nods in agreement*


HAHAHA.

I hope the shopkeeper didn't hear us because gawd, we must have sounded like such dorks. The woe of working in QA department.

Then we went to Ettamogah Pub! Which is one of the landmarks of Sunshine Coast and such a head turner of a building. It was a quirky little watering hole, with all its cartoon graffitis and typical OZ nonsense one liners and quotes splattered all across the walls. There was a car on the roof of the pub too! But can't be seen from the picture.





It felt a bit strange going to a pub in broad daylight, but I suppose the place was more like a tourist attraction than a pub, so...

Anyway, Wayne bought us a drink each! I asked him if he could just choose a beer for me, and he ordered me a glass of Pure Blonde.

"I got you Pure Blonde. Because it's got low carbohydrate."

And the bartender gave me a very amused look while trying to stifle a laugh and I just burst out laughing.

Labels: aussie, travel