Life is a Musical

Wombat crossing

So at this point in the tour, we have all acknowledged that we are all realizing our collective childhood dream: life has literally become a musical. Each of us has gotten into (or simply stopped filtering) the habit of singing about everything we do.  And inevitably, the others join in harmony because, well, we can!  I'm sure this must seem very strange and possibly annoying to those around us.... but you wouldn't believe the hits we've been cranking out, such as "My Hand is in my Armpit", "Country Eggs" (sung to the tune of "Country roads") and "I'm drinking a beer in the back seat" (which, by the way, is one of my best).  Actually, spontaneously bursting into song is great practice and we've also taken to walking the streets singing together before we get to our busking spot for the day.  It gets us warmed up and helps us test out which spots will work best... kind of like dowsing - get it dowSING? YEEEAAAH puns are fun!  Wait... wait don't leave!

Ok so after Nimbin we drove to Maroochydoore to play Sol Bar.  It was a hot one (30+). We checked into a Caravan park and then drove to the bar to drop off our gear.  We arrived at what we thought was on schedule, but after some confusing conversations we realized we had actually arrived in another time zone!  This luckily worked in our favour because we had time for dinner. Sol bar was pretty funky (in a good way) and they were very good to us! 

After our show we got the pleasure of watching Kim Churchil and Carl Wockner (who were also playing Sol Bar). They were super chill Aussie guys and each gave us a CD to listen to on our travels (awww!).  Jaime and I are not-so-secretly stalking Kim's manager for his Austral-Canadian booking skills so it was amazing serendipity that we ended up opening for Kim by chance!  He regularly tours between "Canadia" and Australia - our dream!

Cyborg Possum in Maroochydoore

They also had WiFi, so I got to finish my last blog! Such a luxury. The bartender was also very sweet and gave me a generous free-pour of some top shelf tequila (YUM) which made things extra fabulous.  Tequilla is funny, I know a lot of people hate it, and I used to need lime and salt just to get it down, but man, the good stuff is smooth as silk and tastes like liquid sunshine.  It's also a party in a bottle, until you end up on the floor... so they say... ;)

We stumbled home to our tent that night.  At around 7am I awoke with a frantic feeling I was being burned alive!  Our tent had transformed into an Australian death sauna! Eject eject!!! I launched out of the tent, half naked and completely disoriented... then I crept back inside to try and sleep some more but found it impossible.  I opened my blurry eyes and watched as Marina slothily began to move next to me, one inch at a time. Her sleeping mat was stuck to her like a snail in a shell. Eventually she was completely outside in the shade. Genius!  Jaime remained dead to the world (clearly she's more Australian than we are).  I followed Marina's example but the BEAUTIFUL, GLORIOUS early morning birds... well, they had other plans. 

After that, we continued on to Brisbane where we met another internet friend Alex Edwards (also a muso).  Brisbane was quite hilly and we had "fun" maneuvering the ute, as Alex lived (in the words of Jaime) "on the edge of a cliff". After the tenting experience we were very grateful to have a house to crash at.  We freshened up and went to our next venue, Tall Poppy studios, where we got the full recording treatment!  Alex opened for us and we were blown away - he's so talented!  Great tunes!  Gareth and Sarah (our hosts) were extremely kind as well.

They even made a backdrop of the North-Western hemisphere's constellations to make us feel at home!

 After that we had a few days off so, naturally we went back to Nimbin and Byron, enjoying some special treats and busking to keep our bellies full.

Rainbow marzipan dumpling, Nimbin

Nimbin

We camped near Nimbin the first night and searched for a waterfall (unsuccessfully). We ended up at a campground in Whian Whian State Forest, and discovered a secluded little shady glade to pitch our tent (away from all the families).





At dusk we heard the distinct OOmph OOOmph of  EDM bass pumping and discovered a little rave had begun next door - complete with tables and a full light show!  We had mixed feelings about this; on one hand, the lights were extra trippy that night.... for completely unknown reasons. On the other hand, what a random place to have a dance party! Plus nobody danced.  What a WASTE!  Well, our earplugs came in handy for two reasons: the bloke in the tent next to us also had a snore loud enough to frighten a mama grisley! Yikes!

Mullumbimby "friend"

We would have danced in the forest but we were in the mood for a night hike. Cool and creepy fact: when you shine a flashlight in the Australian bush, the spiders eyes shine like little dew drops all around you! Another thing: When you catch the eye-shine of an animal, it shines RED!
 

Gold Coast "friend"

Speaking of bugs, we also ended up staying in a caravan park on the water (aka mosquito hotel) in a little town called Mullumbimby. This was at the end of one of those days that didn't quite work out the way we planned...  we were all tired and a bit cranky-pants, when we realized we didn't know where we were going to stay!  Wellll mosquito hotel ended up being the cheapest place (I wonder why!?). 

Oh well, we made up for it by drinking delicious piña coladas (ala Jaime) and getting smashed in the tent later that night whilst listening to Justin Timberlake and Brittany Spears... don't judge us!  It was a hard day! ...there may or may not have been a pillow fight. Needless to say, that did a good job of cheering us up... though I did end up with a generous collection of mosquito (mozzie) bites (they love me, what can I say? It's because I'm so sweet).  It was the next morning that I first heard Marina have a very stern conversation with the morning birds, which involved some very strong language.

We then had our final day in Byron Bay and enjoyed some long-awaited Margaritas (I know, we're suckers for Mexican cocktails).  After a long hot day of busking and swimming in the ocean, well it was just the ticket!  Plus we'd been eying these beauties up for a while! Definitely worth it.

That night we decided to look for another caravan park but we left it quite late (once again)!  Ooops. Do not recommend. The wind picked up and, as we were setting up the tent in the dark (trying to brace it against the ute for shelter) the sand whipped our legs and faces like a sand blaster!  Ok... maybe I'm exaggerating a BIT... but it really hurt and I got sand in my eyes and it made me cry!  WHY IS LIFE SO HARD!?


After our adventures in Byron and Nimbin, we continued up the coast.  On our way, driving down a winding country road near Nimbin, Jaime suddenly slowed down the car next to a patch of forest and in an urgent tone whispered "Shhhh, listen!  Bell Miners!".  Marina and I listened intently as a cacophony of shiny tones rang through the trees. It was as if the woods were full of little fairy bells!  What a beautiful sound!  We didn't realize it at the time, but this was a very significant moment.  Bell Miners are certainly magical; they migrate in flocks to random locations, filling a forest with their calls for a short time, then suddenly they've disappeared to a new secret spot.


Next we had a little show booked at a place called The Cave in the Gold Coast.
To be totally honest, this was not one of our most exciting shows. There was barely a soul to speak of! Thankfully they had Wifi and we got a good chance to catch up on some internet time!  Marina got to catch some great waves at the beach as well, which was quite lovely.  We did meet one nice Canadian fellow named Dan, who bought our CD and made a new friend in our waitress Ash!  She offered to put us up for the night - YES!  After our mozzie "fun", well, we were more than grateful.  Ash was major cool but had to work early in the morning and sadly, we forgot to get her picture.  We DID, however, get a picture of her amazing cat Millie!  People's pets offer a special energy on this trip.  Not many things are more comforting than cuddling a friendly animal after a long day. 

After that we had a few more days off, so we decided to do some exploring.  We hit Ash's home town of Lennox Head!  She told us that there was a fantastic lake we should check out.  We decided to try out another busking set after breakfast.  We all have our various morning rituals that make us slightly more sane (relatively): Jaime enjoys a special coffee from a premium local coffee shop (she has an app for this) and I have my matcha green tea!  Matcha is very hard to find in Australia, but luckily Jane was able to find me some (PHEW!) in Newcastle. Marina took a little video of me preparing my morning fix.  

Our busking set was a SUCCESS!  We even got in the local paper! Doug, the local press, happened upon us and got our photo. Now we're famous, no big deal.  As the day wore on, the heat subsided to clouds and a cool wind.  We figured we better get to that lake quickly and figure out where we were staying that night!  The forecast was for stormy weather (and tropical storms are nothing to mess with)!   The lake (Ainsworth) didn't let us down.  WOW. This was a major highlight for me.

At first the water seemed formidable: it was a dark amber-red, similar to the colour of Red Rose tea, and the wind was picking up.  As soon as I dipped my toe in, it was love.  In my perfect world, I would live at the edge of this lake and swim in it every day.  Not only was it right next to the ocean and surrounded by tea an eucalyptus trees, it was also gloriously warm!  The colour was caused by tea tree from the surrounding trees - it was so dark that you couldn't even see your hand after submerging it a few inches.  Still, it felt healing and smooth and the air smelled wonderful. We knew we had to get ahead of the storm, but as the air got cooler, the water became more and more inviting.  We got out several times, only to run back in to warm up!

We finally tore ourselves away and went off into the night to find a bed.  We decided to try and find a hotel that night, as we didn't trust the skies.  We ended up in a small town with a pub that happened to have very cheap rooms!  The town itself had a shady vibe... as we drove through, we got some very strange stares from the thirsty locals.  One dude stuck his tongue out at me from the bar window!  Of course I returned the gesture. When in Rome!

Next we went to a lovely little town called Bellingen and got a great response with our busking set!  People crowded around us an made us feel at home.  We also saw a great national park, called Dorrigo National Park.   It was very rainforest-like,  filled with lush greenery, birds and trees with big vines (just like in Tarzan)!

We enjoyed playing with the local Bush Turkeys (especially Marina).  Jaime kept licking her chops and telling us about her dreams to raise them for game.  "They look so juicy!" she kept saying.  Too bad, they're protected because they're local wildlife.  That night we had to get a roast chicken to appease her craving!

Marina playing with the bush turkeys.

We also saw a Pademelon, which is kind of like a Wallaby crossed with a bunny rabbit. In other words - CUTE!  We were still running from the storm, so we tried out a website called Air BnB to find a cheap room (kind of like couch surfing).  We ended up finding a lovely woman named Iris in the small town of Nambucca Heads.  We had an adventure finding her house because we never actually got her ADDRESS, but the fates prevailed!  Her house was a cool oasis, with delicious fresh drinking water, comfy beds, breakfast and WIFI!  Low and behold, there was even a POWERFUL OWL shrine right on the patio! She said they had  a running joke in her family that her son looks like an owl, so they always get him owl themed gifts. Random. She let us stay for a discount and even bought a CD and came out to watch us busk! 

Iris and the owl standing in front of one of her beautiful mosaics.

The next day we were back on the road heading to Port Macquarie.  It was exciting to have some more shows lined up, I was beginning to miss the feeling of the live stage.  Imagine how it will feel after we're done this tour!!  No, let's not do that ;).