Three Weeks In Australia

Today marks exactly 3 weeks since we landed in this beautiful place! Brandon and I landed in Australia on February 16th and it feels like its been forever. We are still adjusting and getting settled because moving across the world to Brisbane was a BIG change but we are loving it here none the less.

Driving on the opposite side of the road is something that drives us both mad. The driving here is crazy and terrifying and I’m glad I won’t be driving at all during our stay. We have just been taking Ubers everywhere because its 1/3 of the price of a cab here. We took a cab once and definitely will NEVER ever be taking one again. The cab companies here are disgusting both in service and price. If you guys want to try Uber use my code “christinap6514ue” for a free ride 🙂

Going clubbing was an interesting experience here. People are rude compared to back home in Canada. I had about 6 drinks spilt on me without the person apologizing and most times without them even turning around to make eye contact. Most people smash right into you while drunkenly stumbling around and keep walking. Just so irritating. I was not that drunk yet to be chill with drinks spilt on me left and right. ANOTHER thing is the new law that was passed where you can’t have shots at the bar after midnight…. we both HATE this rule as I only do shots when I go out normally and we head down to the club for 11:45 ish so this just ruins everything. Oh well I guess. Not a super big deal but just a big bummer. Other than that the clubs are beautiful in Brisbane and there are a ton of stunning rooftop bars to drink at with a stunning view of the city.

The weather here is insanely beautiful. I feel like I’m a tropical island every day. It is very very hot and was hard to cope with at the beginning but I am used to it already and have learnt that most days I will not be wearing makeup outside because it will melt off in an hour. It’s so hard to find a dryer here though for clothes as most people just hang theirs to dry and I know this is so “naggy” of me but I hate waiting for clothes to dry and I hate the stiff feeling left on them after they are dried outside. Once again though, NOT a big deal.

One good thing is that I am a candy freak and eat way too much normally and here in Brisbane, finding the candy back home is pretty much impossible. They have Australian “chocs and lollies” here but none of which compare to my sweets back home so I have been eating a lot healthier since moving. Restaurants here also have way healthier menu items available. When going out to eat, the dining is completely different most places since I am guessing the waitresses do not make tips. One place, for example, that went to, you walk in and find a seat and grab a menu from the bar. Once you are ready to order you go up to the one bar and order your food and grab cutlery and they give you a Wait Timer Buzzer thingy (idk) and when it buzzes you go up and grab your food at the bar again. There was a separate bar for drinks that you can order and pay for there. They also have self serve water almost everywhere so there really is no service from a waitress at all yet the place appears identical to an upscale restaurant. Very different from what I’m used to but I enjoy it!

We checked out Gold Coast for a day which was beautiful! I have always dreamed of going there so it was lovely to see in person finally. Super convenient that it took only 45 min to get there on train. Loved that.

Brisbane has been good to us so far. We have many trips planned and upcoming so stay tuned to see vlogs and photo diaries of those 🙂 We just wanted to get permanently settled before flying away. Here are some photos of our move so far (warning: a lot of food pics haha). Hope you enjoyed this post, don’t forget to subscribe in the side bar for updates 🙂

Love you guys!

 

Orlando, Florida Photo Diary

For our Christmas Break trip Brandon and I went on vacation with my family to Orlando, Florida. We have all been here many many times but it’s always fun and definitely nice to get away from the cold Canadian snow. No complaints here! Hope you guys enjoy some of the photos we took 🙂

Elora Camping

I am super late posting this but since I think the photos are so beautiful from our thanksgiving weekend camping I decided to post and share them with all my blog readers. Brandon and I went camping in Elora, Ontario which is pretty close by us and had such an amazing, and sadly short, time. It was beautiful there with the fall weather but the town is also just super cute in general. We definitely want to go back. This place makes for some great photo spots. Definitely check it out in the future.

Thursday Mood Board

 

Hawaii Travel Diaries- Kauai Day 4

Day 4: so relaxing..

This day was so much more relaxing than the prior day we had. After all the hiking we did, and the bug bites I had gotten, we just wanted to chill out and see things that didn’t involve a crazy amount of physical exercise. We headed our for breaky in the morning at this ultra modern cafe-ish business down the road from where we were staying. It was in the “downtown-like” area I mentioned before in Kapaa. It was attached to a little store that was just so…. Instagram? Is that an adjective now? I can’t really describe it in any other way other than being crazy aesthetic and hip. Not to mention crazy EXPENSIVE. The bikini top I loved was $213 USD… and the sunglasses I also liked were $260 USD and weren’t even a name brand I knew. Our breakfast was $40 so that wasn’t terrible compared to their other items.

After breakfast we started our drive to see Queen’s Bath. This is something I’ve been wanting to see for ages and have had photos of it saved on my Macbook for years. It looked amazing in photos and since I was in Hawaii I may as well go see it in person. We finally found it and took the mini hike down to the water to see it, along with King’s Bath. This place was crazy; so unique and like nothing I’ve ever seen before. I wouldn’t swim in it though because I’ve heard of the dangers of Queen’s Bath and the warning sign with the death count on a wooden plank out front really turned me off. It was fascinating to see and even more fascinating to see all the local kids (around 13/14 years old) back flip in and all lounge like it was really no big deal. They were so trained for this and held no fear.. truly jealous of these island kids.

After seeing everyone swim in Queen’s Bath and being too chicken to join in, we were determined to find a waterfall to swim in. So we headed on out and made our drive to Wailua Falls. It was very easy to find, GPS showed us how to drive right up to it and it was viewable from the street. That was not good enough though.. we wanted to find a way down and I knew it was possible because there were 3 people swimming at the bottom. We started walking down the road that just brought us here and saw people soaking wet walking back towards the parked cars. They actually approached us and asked if we wanted to go down and showed us how and so we went.

It was so steep to get down, jesus. Brandon actually fell and scraped his knee up pretty bad but after numerous ropes and muddy path ways we finally got down and boy was it breathtaking to be that close to the falls and be able to swim at the bottom of them. Truly a mermaid moment.

Once we finished and made our way back up to the street to our car, we were covered in mud… it was bad. All we wanted was food and a hot shower so we headed back to our home and made dinner and cleaned up. But the night was not over… there were more things we wanted to see but were so drained of energy so we went to watch the sunset at Poipu Beach near the south point of the island. Super beautiful.

xo Christina

Hawaii Travel Diary – Kauai Day 2 & 3

Continued from first post….

We got off our flight at Lihue Airport and immediately went to the car rental building on the site. We ended up being convinced into renting a brand new Mustang convertible which was actually great to cruise around in on this AMAZING island. I have never been to a more beautiful place in my entire life. Truly surreal being there. We forked out the money for the stang and took the bad boy to our beach home. The place was alright and super hot… No air con, as most homes apparently don’t have in Hawaii. We lived off fans for these 4 days. Thank the lord.

We were super tired from the flight. I, once again, get super sick from planes and just wanted to relax again so my nausea could disappear. After relaxing and making ourselves at home we went to explore the town of Kapaa where we were staying and discovered all these cute little food trucks and a somewhat “down town” area where you could park and walk around a bunch of shops and restaurants. This area was lively and had horrible traffic. We drove through and went to get smoothie bowls and once again the place had just closed. Legit missed it by 5 minutes. Thank you traffic. We grabbed a bite to eat at a Mexican style restaurant in that “down town” area I just mentioned and let’s just say I lived off fish/shrimp tacos and quesadillas this trip. As well as Acai bowls.

We went back to our new home after and just relaxed and went to bed so we could get to hiking early the next morning.

END OF DAY 2.

START OF DAY 3- I will never hike again…

This was Thursday morning and I think it may have been the craziest day we had during the entire trip. We decided to hike this day and boy am I sorry we did. We started the day off with a grocery shopping trip to the local Walmart (wasn’t expecting one on the island) and we grabbed all the food we would need for the next three days ahead. I also grabbed the cheapest bikinis ever! They had just regular style bikinis in bright neon colours for $4 a piece. I grabbed a pink set, neon yellow set, and white set. Also grabbed some pairs of shorts and souvenirs for the loved ones back home. Now onto the hiking…

We went back to our home and dropped off our groceries and got changed for hiking. I wore a bikini with shorts and a loose forever 21 active wear top. Super comfy for the long day ahead. We started off with driving to the smoothie stand (I’ll look for the name) that was closed the day before and actually got something this time. I got pitaya lemonaide (SO GOOD AND FRESH). Brandon got a smoothie since he was just LIVING for them on both islands. We started driving towards the north coast of the island and stopped at Kealia Beach and just enjoyed the sun, sand and ocean. Super beautiful and empty which I loved about Kauai.. Everything was super private unlike O’ahu.

After we had a beach break we continued up to Hanalei. This was one of my favourite places during the entire trip. The atmosphere was so awesome, people walking around drinking from coconuts, camping, food trucks and fresh coconut/pineapple stands everywhere, as well as Shave Ice huts surrounding you. The environment was beautiful as well, all mountain and cave around you right on the waterfront. I would definitely stay in this area if ever returning to Kauai. We made our way to Hanalei Bay and it was GORGEOUS. So relaxing and beautiful and felt like a little piece of “untouched, natural” beauty. I had my first fresh coconut there; got to watch them cut it for me with a machete , drank the coconut water, had them recut the coconut in half, scrape out the coconut meat, season it with lime and salt and I got to enjoy. I WANNA BE AN ISLAND GIRL. It was sooooooo good, I didn’t want my little coconut to end. There was also a cave directly behind the stand that Brandon and I checked out. This cave was so flat and far back an entire tribe could have lived in there.

After we enjoyed more Shave Ice and snacks, we got back on the road towards the Na Pali Coast state park. We parked by the Ha’ena Beach Park and started our long and trecharous venture town Kalalau Trail on the Na Pali Coast. Now looking at a map.. It seems like we did no hiking at all… Our goals was to get out to the Kalalau Valley but that was 5 miles into the trail (then another 5 miles back). We were hoping to see some waterfalls but just saw some amazing views of the Na Pali Coast. We truthfully only made it 2 miles in and found Hanakapi’ai Beach and a cave. Both so beautiful.

We started our horrible hike back (I was actually dying) and got in the car and made our our drive home. Not going to lie, we found a McDonalds and totally chowed down because we had barely eaten all day and I was going to puke. I think the McDonalds probably made it worse but whatever.

xo Christina

Honolulu/Waikiki Travel Diary: Day 1 & 2

Hello everyone and welcome to my Hawaii Travel Diary! This diary entry is from our time in Honolulu and Waikiki beach area during Day 1 & 2.

Day 1 – dumbest cab ever…

On Tuesday we landed in the beautiful Honolulu Airport and began our adventures. The flight was long and dreadful and super confusing from the time changes. We flew from Toronto to Chicago, then Chicago to Honolulu. I was so relieved when we finally landed.

Our first day was exhausting so when we arrived at our condo we laid down right away and then went for a walk towards Waikiki Beach. We stopped at a place called Tropical Tribe and grabbed smoothies and Acai Bowls for a bite to eat. Sooooo good. After that we headed back to our little condo and got dressed for hiking because we wanted to see Diamond Head… this is where it got fun..

We didn’t have a car rented since we were only in this area for less than 24 hours before our next flight to a different island so we were going to try using the public transit. I have NEVER been on a bus before because the town I’m from is out of boundary for my cities transit service so I got a car immediately upon having my license and am used to the freedom of a car. We asked multiple shop workers for help on what bus to use and after waiting around half hour and going to different bus stops we gave up and hailed for a cab.

This is where it gets even more fun..

The driver seemed SICK at first… not like ill, but super chill and helpful. He was laughing with us and giving us all these suggestions and is obviously a local so knows pretty much everything there is to know about the island. Brandon and I immediately grinned at each other in basic agreement that we liked this guy. We started the long expensive cab to Diamond Head. I even asked for his number so we could call him after for a ride back to our condo and so he gave us his card. When we got to Diamond Head, we paid and got out of the cab at a turn around where many other cab drivers were waiting and talking to each other and the young man working the entrance booth shouted out to us that the park had already stopped allowing visitors in for the day. We immediately were bummed out… we had just spent so much money getting here and the park didn’t close for over another hour and a half. The driver was like “omg soooooo sorry come back in” but just didn’t not seem that sorry at all. I can’t blame him, but being local shouldn’t you know that last call for visitors was 430? It seemed that way when every cab driver waiting started shouting out “HE KNEW IT WAS CLOSED HES SCAMMING YOU!” “HE SHOULD TAKE YOU BACK FOR FREE!” “HE DID THIS ON PURPOSE DON’T GO WITH HIM!”… Brandon and I stood there awkwardly at this door as the driver looked around in panic and quickly told us to get in. Such an awkward situation. We got in hoping we could gain his trust back.. and instead he tossed the meter back on and began charging us again for our way back… a–hole.

We had the driver drop us off right in the midst of Waikiki in the insane Louis Vuitton, Hermes, Kate Spade, Prada, etc… shopping area where rich, blonde mothers with their Gucci Soho Totes swarmed the perimeters. We were dressed for hiking and did not fit in at all but we continued along knowing there is a beach entrance coming up. We hung out at the beach and enjoyed the stunning sunset and began our search for food since all we were thriving off of was blended fruit with dried coconut toppings. We found a burger placed called Cheeseburger I believe (don’t know how they came up with that) and had dinner and pina coladas (grossest ever, it was pure rum). The fish tacos were bomb though (those are my shit) and we went back to the apartment afterwards and cozied up and went to bed. Not so successful day, but not complaining.. we are in Hawaii after all.

DAY 2– bluest water ever…

This day we woke up at 630am and damn, I have never felt more responsible in my life. Little did I know this would be my routine the next week. We had a flight to catch at Honolulu airport to Kauai at 1:29pm and we wanted to make the most of the day and actually see Diamond Head this time. We started our walk for breakfast to Tropical Tribe only to learn it wasn’t open yet so we found an even better place in the Hilton Plaza called Lanikai Juice and OMG it was amazing. Best bowl I’ve had in my entire life. I got the Pitaya Bowl and I seriously recommend. Afterwards we headed over to Diamond Head and actually figured out the public transport this time and made our way there (photos below… it was awesome).

Diamond Head was seriously a must see. I must say, I am out of shape and couldn’t even breathe that well going up, but I survived and it was so worth it. The water from above was a stunning teal and we found a helicopter landing and got great pics (then got kicked out by security… oops). We made our way down after and took the bus back to our condo, packed up and grabbed a cab to the airport. On to the next adventure…

 

Landed in Honolulu

The sunset at Waikiki Beach

View from our condo

Waikiki Beach

Acai Bowl at Tropical Tribe

Waikiki Beach

Diamond Head

Diamond Head

Diamond Head

Pitaya Bowl at Lanikai Juice

Diamond Head

Diamond Head

Diamond Head

View from Diamond Head

xoxo Christina

Long Weekend Camping – Canada Day!

The long weekend just passed and it seemed as though half of us went camping. It was such a great weekend and Brandon and I saw some beautiful places! We took a small road trip to Niagara and stayed near Port Erie in the cutest campsite. On the way, we stopped in Hamilton to see Webster’s Falls and Tew Falls. Those were both so beautiful, yet so close to where we live at the moment. While camping in Niagara, we drove downtown to see Niagara Falls even though we’ve both seen it many times, and we went around shopping and exploring the entertainment in the area.

I have to say though…. sleeping in a tent IS SO UNCOMFORTABLE. This the second time I’ve been camping (both times with Brandon thank god because he is a master camper I swear) and both times I could not sleep well. The first time we camped in Tobermory, we didn’t have an air mattress or anything and I swear I had a rock stuck under my back the whole weekend…. and this time we had air mattresses… yes two. We had two singles and tried to put them into one Queen sheet…. we ended up rolling in between the mattresses all night. Also, IT WAS FREEZING the first night. I woke up shivering and we had multiple blankets, sleeping bags and hoodies. Overall, it was still a great weekend and I would love to go camping again, I just wish I could get better sleep haha.

CP’s TBL | Kauai, Hawaii

Number one place on my travel bucket list right now is definitely Kauai, Hawaii. This place looks absolutely breathtaking and almost like it hasn’t been discovered by man yet. I have a strange obsession with deserted islands and abandoned buildings so anywhere that looks as though I won’t be in touch with civilization is a must-go in my books.

Kauai is an island that is part of Hawaii. It is nicknamed the “Garden Isle” since it is mostly covered in tropical rainforests. Sounds stunning. There is also only 65k people that live there so I stand by my previous comment about it looking undiscovered.

Things To See/Do In Kauai:

1. Na Pali Coast State Park 

Aerial views of the Na Pali Coast, Kauai

2. Waimea Canyon State Park

3. Wailua Falls

Aerial views of Wailua falls, Kauai

4. Kipu Falls

5. Kalapaki Beach

6. Hike the Kalalau Trail

There are so many ways to see and experience this island, from boat tours to helicopter rides and I seriously cannot wait to go here and live the experiences first hand! Although there are many more places to see on this island, these are the top ones I am adding to my list for when I go one day. These are what interest me the most and I feel would make a perfect trip if seen.

Thank you for reading and I hope you feel inspired to check out this beautiful place.

CP’s TBL | The Ultimate Travel Bucket List And Guide To The World

Hello angels!

Since I love the idea of travelling and definitely think I should have been born and raised on an island in paradise (thx mum), I have recently decided that all I want to do is see the world and experience different cultures. Since that costs money (and I don’t have much of that) I decided to start a bucket list for the future for Brandon and I because literally all we do each day is discuss parts of the world we want to see. It’s hard to keep track of the all the amazing places we hear about or see somewhere on social media, so I told him I would find a way to gather all of the places we want to visit on my blog so they are here forever to pick from for when we actually do go on holiday.

This is now a category on my blog that you can find under the “Travel” tab and it is called “Travel Bucket List”. (CP’s TBL is a short form and stands for Christina Petrovski’s Travel Bucket List to make these posts easier to recognize and find). Each week I will be posting and researching beautiful places in the world, hidden gems, and straight up tourist locations we want to visit one day. We have vowed to at least travel to two new places in the world each year (if we can) for the rest of our lives so lets see how this goes! Hope you guys stay tuned on this part of my blog and can’t wait for you to see the places I add onto the list! Feel free to comment on any recommendations and don’t forget to subscribe in the side bar to get updates on my posts! Much love xoxo