After a three month stay in Brisbane, we are happy to embark on a new adventure. On the other hand, we are going to miss many lovely places and some daily routines which we have developed since the beginning of September.

I wrote a lot about typical things here in Brisbane and described some trips we made, but now it high time to say something about our homestay. At least, we spend more than 50% of our time at this amazing place.

Our homestay is located in the suburb Chelmer, which is around 10 kilometers from the citycenter. Dissimilar to the neighboring areas, Chelmer is quite flat and it’s easy to walk or to cycle in there. Although it isn’t so close the center, the railway takes only 15 minutes to the downtown. A magnificat river is flowing through the outskirts and makes them much more green and natural. And indeed, our homestay is build directly on the river. The house has a very charming and shady terrace on which you can easily relax or work.

We lived in quite comfortable room with a big king size bed, a large wardrobe, and desk and some shelfs for our staff. Furthermore, we had a separate bedroom with a restroom and a shower. We were also be allowed to use the kitchen and, of course, the terrace. As an impression, I added the following pictures.

Besides the marvelous location, we had a very lovely housemother. She is a piano teacher and pianist and plays very impressive. The teaching lessons started often before seven, but it didn’t disturb us at all. Like a typical Australian, she is very open-minded and kind-hearted. It was a very pleasure to stay with here and had a profound insight in the Australien way of life.

Some of you asked what I was doing when Jonas was taking his language course. Well, there were many things:

As all of you know, I don’t like to get up early… So sleeping in was the first thing I did 😉 After that, there were a few things I did:

• Get ideas for the Sonnehuus Fest (Flyer, Guestbook, Information…)
• Create the Sonnehuus Fest flyer and send to the print company
• Write invitations to doctors, mayors and many other people
• Find all the addresses to send the letters
• Create the “Gönnerverein der Rudolf Steiner Schule Solothurn” flyer and sent to the print company
• Read a quite interesting book about beeing a Steiner School teacher
• Write some portfolios for my studies
• Type a paper for the AfaP-students to help them working with Microsoft Word (no, you don’t need to write the index manually… Word can do this!)
• Get the new AfaP forum ready and inform the students
• Finish the new http://www.sonnegold.ch website (have a look 😉 )
• Work on the Sonnehuus work schedule for next year
• Wash our laundry

Seven days ago we spent a long weekend on the famous Fraser Island. The island is made from sand and is indeed the biggest isle of this kind. We booked a guided tour with 34 other tourists from all over the world (one Swedish family, a talkative Italian guy, who is living in Australia for about two years, a couple from Mexico and one from South Korea, two independent travellers (UK man & Japanese woman) and two large groups from South Korea and China). The level of understanding was very differing, the UK man was able to understand any detail from the guide and mostly of the Asians didn’t catch a word – I guess. Anyhow, the tour was very exciting, and we discover all the main attractions of this beautiful part of the world. But, what is so spectacular on Fraser Island?

As I explained before, Fraser consists only of sand, no stones or something similar. Of course, there is some organic material that are being produced by the various and numerous trees. Besides the large forest, there are some lovely and clear water lakes and endless and quite superb beaches. These beaches are definitely not suitable to take a bath (to the dangerous causes of sharks, sharp stones and poisonous jellyfishes). They are more ideal replacement for the missing streets on the island. If you want to visit this sandy place, you will use a four wheels drive vehicle. Even then, you could bog down in the sand. But, which were the main appeals of this tour?

First at all we visited a very Maggi Place. The rainbow beach got his name from the different colours of the sand. The sand cliffs is made of yellow, red, white and brown kinds of sand. The name “Rainbow beach” is furthermore the name for a little village next to this beach and close to the ferry bridge to the Fraser Island. The transfer from the mainland to the isle is unexpected simple, a small ferry and two natural, sandy shores. That’s it.

After a four hours drive in the coach, we needed an active break. How about walking through a fairy-tale wood and taking a bath in a lovely lake? That was less a question than a fixed event in the guided tour. However, I enjoyed the barefoot stroll to the little pond in the middle of a moving sand dune. Without a doubt, sand dunes are shifting from one place to an other and during this walk they bury the forest without any hesitation. No matter what, we took pleasure in spending some time at this wonderful place.

The next day, after a very entertaining evening with our roommates (a swedish doctor and the independent UK traveller), we did some sightseeing on the island (visit an old shipwreck, take a bath in a Champaign baths and a very refreshing river) we were offered the opportunity to take an island flight. Ok, 75 $ / person is a bit pricy for 20 Minute flight. But, firstly we haven’t known the length and secondly the airplane was starting and landing at the beach. How awesome is that! Regrettably, we only were flying about 20 Minutes, but it was quite magnificent.

The sum up, like in an advanced writing, the whole trip was imposing.

After two weekends full of work (writing an essay and preparing the final presentation for my language course), we visited the rainforest mountains near Brisbane. The region with the name “Scenic Rim” has a very green and hilly landscape and includes a lot of breathtaking outlooks. We looked up four different locations: the skywalk, the Polish Place, the curtin falls and the botanic garden.

Our stations in the area of the Tamborine Mountains

The skywalk in the Tamborine Mountains is a well-prepared path trough the rainforest. The roundway is a combination of small trails on the ground and a stable stale constructive bridge trough the treetops. It was very impressive to walk in an Australian rainforest and discover the different local plants. The flora is quite dissimilar compare with the trees and grasses in a european forest. Especially the large and playful roots and the high-rise and tropical trees are just imposing.

A second attraction in this countryside was the Polish restaurant on the top of the hill with a breath-taking outlook. A second appeal was the high number of parrots, which has been fed in the restaurant. By the way, my food was delicious, but the assortment for Maggi was not that big.

We spend the afternoon in the national park. This green area is quite extensive and includes different places like a small waterfall or an attractive and lovely botanic garden. This botanic garden was more garden than botanic. Even then, you can easily study the diverse plants and insects. (–> the owners also created a fantastic and particular informative path for children which explains the fundamental knowledge about nature and the specific rainforest environment).

impressions from the Tamborine Mountain