Jolene gets Facebook! <----Link!

Hello! I have just joined Facebook, so if you are interested, you can visit my BandPage and listen to my music! http://www.facebook.com/pages/Jolene-Maggie-Pollard/268084476597069 Thank you for still being curious about my life!! Now, I will sing for you. You rock :) xo Jo

Sailing the Whitsundays

From Brisbane, I flew to Airlie Beach and hopped on a beautiful sailing ship. I woke up the first morning at 5 am to snap this first photo (among..many..others). I overshot the sunrise by at least a half an hour, but I waited it out, reading David Suzuki's "Legacy: An Elder's Vision For Our Sustainable Future" and feeling in awe of the world around us.
http://legacy.davidsuzuki.org/home <---watch this trailer

The Solway Lass

The tallship "Solway Lass" was a beautiful old ship that sailed in the First and Second World Wars.
The vessel was gorgeous and wooden, and apparantly haunted, though I never had a visit in the night...
Here I went scuba diving for the first time! I saw beautiful reef, and loads of different fish, including a clown fish (Nemo!), and a giant blue fish ("Elvis" the locals called him) with intricate designs all over it.
Also, there was a rope swing(!) (as you can see),it was great, but I was a little freaked due to all the jelly fish floating around. We had to wear wetsuits at all times because there are some deadly jellyfish in Queensland. The ones you can't see are the deadliest... how convenient.
The bottom photo is one of the crew members binding a sail.
Anyway, the boat was beautiful, and I spent 3 nights on board. It was lovely and peaceful, and I had a wonderful time.
Unfortunately, I left my camera somewhere at Airlie Beach... luckily I had just developed 3 rolls that were with it. However, I lost a half exposed roll ...farewell dear camera...

Campervan Traveling

This top photo is one from a misty campsite I stayed in outside of Melbourne.
In Sydney, I picked up a dear old friend of mine. We traveled together for about 10 days, up the coast to Brisbane. This second photo is of Port Macquarie where we spent a lovely free night and day!
I don't know what this next bird is called, but I'm trying to find out.
The next is a photo of a dinosaur. It's a lie, they aren't extinct. We pulled up to find this massive dragon/lizard around a public beach/BBQ. It was crazy big and relatively scary, and it wouldn't leave us alone for ages... you should see the tongue on that sucker up close

Sydney & Blue Mountains

So, this is a beautiful view of Sydney that I was able to see with the generosity of my Dad's cousin, Judy, and her wonderful family!! They have a lovely home with a view of the water, and they made me feel so welcome, it was hard to leave! I had my campervan when I passed through Sydney, first to see the Big Day Out, with music and artists crammed into one day. Highlights: Ratatat, Die Antwoord, Lupe Fiasco, Tool, Rammstein, Angus & Julia Stone, John Butler Trio, M.I.A, SIA, and oodles (heaps!) of others...
Then before returning, I burst off into the Blue Mountains, which was such an amazing refuge: vast lush mountain ranges, with dense foliage and a wonderful scent. There are paths and tracks that weave all over. The Blue Mountains are named so due to the reflections of light off of oil droplets from the Eucalyptus trees. I always think that our mountains in B.C. are blue silhouettes, I guess it's the same with pine and cedar.
I spent hours just sitting there in peace, watching the valley, listening to the waterfalls, and watching and listening to the birds.
Incredibly peaceful.

another road trip...

These are the 12 Apostles, on the Great Ocean Road, just outside of Melbourne. This was the start of a 3 week venture in another campervan! 4000+ kilometres to Brisbane...!!

Melbourne

Loved Melbourne. I want to go back there and work. Unless I find somewhere better, or change my mind! It's such a vibrant, creative city. There are loong streets, full of all kinds of cool funky bars and restaurants and art shops and music stores... and all over the city. There are less cafes here, Aussies love their instant coffee ;) nah, I think they just prefer tea. Or flat whites (lattes) and long blacks (americanos). I'm dying for a proper cup of drip coffee! That said, there have been moments of precious heavenly relief when I've borrowed a french press or two for a cuppa. Melbourne is like... when I was walking along one day (to a Dracula dinner theatre show where everyone was singing and dressed hardcore like vampires and dead people) I came across a building that had this ginormous green goopy thing that looked like it was literally oozing from the top of a building and leaking over onto the next one..! So cool. I think it may have been an art institute or something, but nonetheless, it's the epitome of the craziness and artisticness of this lovely musical city. And everything painted and decorated in graffiti

Adelaide

Made it to Adelaide where I was greeted by a wonderful woman called Carmel. She is the wife of the brother of the woman who is married to the brother of my Uncle. (Who is married to my mother's sister). Get that? Anyway I had a lovely time in this beautiful place, recuperating after my long ride across the desolate Nullarbor. We went kayaking with dolphins and we paddled around a ship graveyard. Adelaide was nice, the weather was cooler than I had been used to in WA, but it was smokin' during the day. Carmel had sent me a photo of a koala in their backyard. Unfortunately, I didn't see one up that close while I was in their home, BUT when we were driving along one day, I spotted one up in the trees! Since then, I've seen a few more up in the very tip tops of the trees!! Very cool.

All Aboard

So I finally left WA a couple of weeks ago. I took a train from Perth aaall the way over to Adelaide (2 nights later)(in an upright chair)(never felt so good to be horizontal again)(slept for like 12/13 hours), which was relatively gruesome, but was mostly awesome!! The Prairies ain't got nothin' on the Nullarbor!! The Prairies are flat, but things change up every day or so at least..!... Out here, you could see just flat out both sides of the train, and the same scenery all along more or less. It was shocking. But beautiful still! We caught the sunrises and sunsets still, which were really nice. Also, I partied in the party cabin with a handful of awesome people, most mentionable were Corrine and Lorraine. These were two recently widowed ladies of ... won't guess the age, but they were more frail than my 83 year old Grandma. We stopped one night in a town called Kalgoorlie, not far from Perth (9 hours or so)(!!), and we all decided to go for a drink. Another wonderful lady was this wild Australian-Russian who led us directly to the nearest nightclub. We all piled in and one nice man with us bought all of us ladies a sophisticated glass of white wine. The girl who served us had on a tiny piece of lingerie with both cheeks clearly out and ready for the night. Corrine hadn't noticed yet, so I was sure to point it out. She responded with wide open eyes and a hand across her mouth. We all moved through the young bustling Australian crowd to the upstairs where we rested on the silent balcony, overlooking the night. It was a hilarious night :) The women just loved it!!!! The next day, Corrine was saying, "it's taken me 70 plus years to have an experience like that!" They were so awesome and full of life, and it made me open to being 70 plus myself.

Road Trip

I took a little road trip while on the farm to the surrounding areas along the beach in Southwestern Australia...beautiful scenery and beaches. Unfortunately I picked a week of rainy weather, but that was the rainiest time I had in Western Australia, and I loved every moment of being over there. Outside of that week, the weather was perfect and hot and dry. I didn't realize how dry until I got to the East coast... I'm in the mountains near Sydney now, and it's very hot and humid.