Rugby and Nurse Sharks and River Fire, Oh My!

      I went to my first rugby game friday night.  Lots of fun!  It was the Broncos vs. the Raiders.  Being raised in the states, I automatically associate Broncos with the colors orange and blue and Raiders with silver and black so it was funny to see the Broncos wearing maroon and gold and the Raiders wearing lime green and white.  Also funny, rugby shorts; they're so short, and all the men are so giant.  Aside from not knowing any of the rules of rugby, the game was entertaining.  For the most part I just cheered when everyone else did, so I at least seemed like I knew what was going on.  Every time the home team would score, they set off some small fire works, which is a great addition to any event.  I'm still not sure who actually won the game, though.  I never did find out where the score board was and I left a few minutes early so I didn't have to deal with the whole stadium of people trying to leave at once.  Maybe at some point today I'll look up the scores online, maybe.

      My friend Shannon and I decided to go diving this Saturday.  Instead of going home after the rugby game, Shannon and I went and stayed with some of the other members of the University of Queensland Dive Club so that we could all be picked up at one place at 5:40 in the morning.  Such an awful time to be awake!  We drove for about an hour to the ferry that would take us across the bay to Stradbroke Island where were diving.  Everyone, about ten people, crammed into one car so we could board the "Big Red Cat."  You aren't allowed to just walk onto the Big Red Cat, you have to drive onto it and then you can get out of your vehicle and walk around the boat.  The ferry ride took about 45 minutes, then we piled back into the car, picked up our boat and gear, then headed out to the beach.  We launched the boat from the beach then drove out to a reef about an hour away.  Oh, and I just need to mention the water in Australia... it's in the 70s nearly all the time, so getting in the ocean is like jumping in the bath tube; such a nice change from diving in the Monterey Bay.

      The first thing I saw after descending into the ocean for the first dive was a grey nurse shark about three meters long just hanging out in a little underwater canyon.  Then I saw a turtle!  We dove to about 20 meters then surfaced about a half hour later, jumped back into the boat and headed over to another reef a little ways away.  After switching out our empty tanks for full ones, we hoped back into the water for a shallower dive, about 12 meters, for about 43 minutes.  Visibility wasn't as great as it could have been, but it was still amazing to be swimming around in an environment I had only ever seen on tv or in magazines.  I saw a few wobbegong sharks, a huge puffer fish, corals, schools of fish, crab, urchins.  

      As a beginning diver, maintaining neutral buoyancy and breathing efficiently are two of the most difficult skills.  I was very proud of my self for being able to maintain neutral buoyancy, which I could not do during my first four dives.  I used up air fairly quickly during the first dive, but I ended the second dive with 100 bar more air pressure in my tank than I had at the end of the first dive.  So on top of having an amazing time diving in Australia for the first time, I'm excited at improvement of my diving skills.  

      Diving took up most of the day, but under no circumstances was I going to miss River Fire.  I got off the train for home and onto the train back to the city within ten minutes.  I got home, dumped my dive gear on the bed, hopped in the shower, hopped out of the shower, dried off, got dressed, grabbed a sandwich, and ran back to the train station with time to spare.  Yes, I know, I am amazing.  haha  Since I got back from diving so late, I didn't have time to find my friends before River Fire started, so I just stood by the river by myself.  A nice couple kind of took me under their wing and showed me where to go, which was very nice.  I got off the train in the city just in time to see a jet fighter fly low over head with its tail on fire; I'll take this time to point out that it was supposed to be on fire, it's part of the River Fire celebration.  Shortly after, the fireworks started.  There were fireworks everywhere.  Everywhere.  The Aussie's launched them off every bridge along the river and off nearly every building as well.  I've never been surrounded by so much noise.  The show went on for thirty minutes and it was constant explosions the whole time.  Toward the end, another plane flew by.  This time I was closer to the river, so I had a better view.  The plane was sooo loud and it was just amazing to see it on fire.  Honestly, there is no way for me to describe it.  Afterward, I found my friends and my roommate then went to bed.