So to continue from my little blurb earlier. I am a 29 yr old girl (I say girl cause i dont believe I'm grown up yet) who has 2 jobs in the gold coast. 1 of those jobs I love as I work at Dreamworld and it is the place of FUN! the other, hmmm blah, so I have decided that its time to change things. I was sick of feeling low and angry. I have debts, most of them are from all the traveling I have done. So I need to get my fat arse into gear and save up some cashola to head off on some more adventures. It's a disease I have decided and as a registered nurse I do know a little about diseases.
This little problem all started when I was in my last year of high school pondering on what I would do for the rest of my long and fruitful life. See i always wanted to travel I knew that. I would forever dream about the world outside of my tiny small town box and set of on epic adventures in my daydreams and drive my teachers batty. my perfect escape was books so i guess that helped foster my escapes as well. So in those all important moments in time where it is somehow sooo important to decided you life at the ripe old age of 18 (have those lovely teenage hormones don't help either) you are forced to make uninformed decision about university and life all that good stuff. my step mother told me i would make a good nurse, so I laughed in her face and scoffed behind her back, thinking she doesn't know me and continued to think. someone else then told me I would make a good nurse. oh really?? and as it didn't come from the woman who had married my father (another story here) it was food for thought...then came the clincher, the money is good and you can travel anywhere in the world with it. BINGO!!! golden words to my ears. so it was decided. I changed all my subject at school so I could get into university, passed with flying colours (barely) and got in to uni; studied and partied my arse of for 4 years. I failed a semester see! And then WOW my registration came through and I threw my preverbal hat in the air and i was out in the wide world of nursing.
So fast forward a few years, after i lived and worked in Melbourne then headed on up to tropical Queensland to where my family had settled and the urge to head off overseas, which had been silently sitting there in that special place in the back of my head, was creeping its way forward to make its presence know. See at this stage it hadn't morphed into the disease it is now but was a tiny little travel parasite the was slowly getting fed by more and more travel pictures and stories from friends, family and random strangers I stalked on Facebook (no one is ever safe!) I fed the little creature on my 1st International trip to Bali. I went there with a fellow health professional in the form of a Emergency Department Dr, Miss lovely Kerri. I figure between the both of us we'd have the medications and health shit covered. I discovered a whole new world beyond the borders of Australia and thirsted for more (damn that travel bug). We got the Bali belly, and alcoholic gastritis, which by the way doesn't go away if you continue to drink on through it. If it was alcoholic we drank it! We had fun, we fought and am I'm pretty sure hated each other for a bit.
I then come home to ponder about all the other places in the world I could see and experience. another few months past and I was getting restless. Got my tax back and it was a significant amount just sitting there quietly whispering to me 'take me away, take anywhere overseas and spend me' I tell ya once you have that going through your head its kinda hard to get rid of it! So I put the call out on Facebook (where else?) to see if there were any takers for a trip overseas. I mean really why not? I'm awesome! One of my colleagues son's took up the call and we embarked on a ritual journey that most young adults do. Contiki!!! bhahahahahahh its exactly how everyone tells you. Most people are quiet young between the ages of 18 and I'd say 23, and most of them drank every single night, gah here comes that alcoholic gastritis! and there is always one person the the trip that gets sick, yep that was me and I got the whole bus sick too!! damn knew I shouldn't have smoked all those joints in Amsterdam but seriously when in Rome right? We managed to shove 8 countries in 12 days, visit some of the most amazing historical sites in the world, not to mention the unmentionable sex show and spend 7 hours a day on a bus. But it was an amazing experience and I totally recommend it to anyone, as long as your between the ages of 18-32, but only as a starting point to travel. Its a stepping stone in the whole scheme of things, its a small glimpse of what there is out there to explore. I'm so glad I went on it. I had a friend who was living and working in London at the time so I caught up with her, she was fantastic, a shout out to Jess for that. She had an oyster card and a underground map ready for me with the stops marked out for all the touristy things. It was a God send. Post Contiki Jaryd and I managed to see Scotland, well Glasgow, and Dublin. We had fun, we fought and I'm pretty sure we hated each other.
So I couldn't get the annual leave I wanted to do this trip so I quit my full time position. Yep pretty crazy hey. But in the wide world of nursing there are always jobs going and at this time I know had about 2 yrs in an emergency department and had gotten a few extra skills. So I went causal and applied for a nursing agency. I went on a contract to a small rural town after I returned from Europe. I continued to do agency nursing and become a little but of a blonde nomad for a while using Hervey Bay (mums house) as a base and fed my little parasite some more travels in my own backyard. Thrown in here over the past few years since my Europe trip is a couple of trips to Melbourne and country Victoria, seeing people I went to school with and family. Some trips up north to Townsville, working in an Aboriginal community in the cape, working in Mackay and experiencing the gateway to The Great Barrier Reef- all I can say is WOW. Airlie Beach will always be equated to a bloody good time in my mind. So once again this little ticking time bomb inside of me was just tick tick tick ticking away. To what you ask? Well my best friend Aleasha and my brother broke up (another long story) and I happened to mention a wish to go see the big wide world of Canadian winters (I think it was the hot snowboarders that drew me there! Have you seen them whew enough to melt the pile of snow your standing on!) and she agreed with this need, so then the boring life of saving money began, again. I had many moments where I wished I would somehow magically come into some string-free money. I have had this dream for a while and the plans had been brewing for a couple of years. We decide to do a working holiday and after extensive research, which proved very misleading, joined up with The Global Work and Travel Company. We flew to Vancouver in November 2011 and after a stressful week in Vancouver thinking we would not have a job, managed to snag one each at this little unknown ski resort in northern BC, called Powder King.
Small family run business with the most EPIC powder runs and back country! though I don't have much to base it one hahaha. We had a ball with lots of adventures including a few midnight runs up the hill in the groomer to smoke some Canadian weed. and I seem to recall sometime spent getting drunk in the ladies bathroom when we were in freeze down and couldn't get off the 'island'.
Oh the things you do to entertain yourselves when you have cabin fever. I had to depart from the big white land before my time was up as I was maid of honor for my other best friend. the bonus being that her wedding was on a week long cruise around the South Pacific, Noumea, Ilse of Pines, and Vanuatu. Not bad heh? get home from one holiday and then go on another? I love my life!!!!
As the Canadian adventures weren't quiet finished I booked flight outta Australia, via Las Vegas baby! hahah one night there by myself was so overwhelming! I felt so shifty walking the streets sipping on my alcohol! and lost money too ahhhh so easy to do!
but at the moment gotta go do work so this story is TBC
