First of all, thank you so very much for even considering supporting our love of travel. We're deeply appreciative of your friendship, love, and support-- AND assisting in indulging us on this trip! We appreciate and will feel honored by any contribution you make to not just our dream honeymoon, but a lifetime of happy memories.

A little background about this trip
As it became clearer that we were planning on spending our lives together, it also became clearer that Jen was a bit more 'focused' on the marriage part and I was more focused on the 'living our lives together' part. This became abundantly clear when, over drinks one night, Jen said to me, "Why don't you take care of the proposal and honeymoon and I'll take care of the wedding?" After slowly raising my beer for a drink, stalling for time as I tried to figure out what the catch to this 'too-good-to-be-true' arrangement, I agreed. As it turns out, there is no catch! Jen is a wonderful planner and has enjoyed the planning of the wedding (for the most part) and I love to travel and have enjoyed planning our trip (for the most part).

Our honeymoon
For our honeymoon, I created four different 'adventures' and, on New Years Eve, presented Jen with 'four white envelopes', each containing a potential experience of a lifetime. When I presented Jen with the four options, she struggled with the enormous responsibility of being at the cross-roads and having to decide our fate. She struggled that is, until she realized the three adventures she didn't choose would simply be completed at a future date. With that in mind, she quickly chose an envelope and determined that for our honeymoon, we will be going on an adventure I am calling the Australian Turf and Surf . Our honeymoon will involve exploring the Rocks District in Sydney, a Pubcrawl on Horseback in the interior, rounded off with down time on a remote island (population: less than 14 people) in the Great Barrier Reef.


Trip Details

Via a plane from Sea-Tac, we'll fly to LA and then Sydney Australia. Our plan is to buy a ticket which will allow us to use my flier mileage to upgrade to Business Class.

Once in Sydney we will spend two nights at the Sydney Marriott, using my hotel points, near the <a href="http://www.therocks.com/sydney-Education_and_Tours-Heritage_and_History.htm">Rocks District</a> near the Sydney Harbor. The Rocks is a beautiful, historical warehouse district filled with shops, restaurants, and historical buildings. We've been promised that the original convicts that were brought over from England and 'repatriated' in this location, are no longer there-or at least they will only take your money through over priced souvenirs. Our plan is to spend two days here getting acclimated to sunshine, Australian accents, and the time difference. And we'll do this through strenuous meandering, wine tasting, and sampling of Australian beers.

From Sydney we'll fly to the small town of Glen Innes, NSW and ring in 2010 by participating in a 4 day <a href="http://www.pubcrawlsonhorseback.com.au/default.asp?active_page_id=1"> Pubcrawl on Horseback</a>. Just to clarify-we won't be drinking while on the horses; the horses are a means for getting between small towns in the interior of New South Wales and the drinking will be done at the days end. I did this excursion for New Years 1999-2000 and had a blast. I'm hoping my horse, "Whiskey" still remembers me-and in a good way. There will be lots of opportunities to see wild kangaroo, see some beautiful countryside, and meet plenty of Aussies, Graziers, shearers, prospectors, stockmen and many other characters that live the rural Australian life. We've also been told that we can go 'yabbing' and 'fossicking' but haven't decided if we're comfortable doing either of those in front of others, let alone each other.

After experiencing the Australian countryside we'll make our way to Gladstone, which is located in Queensland, Australia, along the coast. Our challenge is to find transportation that will take us from the remote town of Glen Innes 800 km to another remote town along the coast. We're hoping that we can at least get the Greyhound that will take us to Brisbane and then down to the town of Gladstone.Once we make it to Gladstone, we'll need a night to recover from the 16 hour bus trip. We'll over night at a hotel here.

The next morning, after we're refreshed, or at least showered, we'll jump on a boat that will take us to <a href="http://www.queenslandislands.com/wilson_island/wilson_island_experience.html">Wilson Island</a>, our next destination. Wilson Island, a tiny coral cay located just 2 hours from Gladstone, is both part of the Great Barrier Reef, and surrounded by it. It is a tropical paradise, home to turtles and birds...and not much else.

Finally, after spending 3 nights / 4 days in a tropical paradise, we will make our way back to civilization (Gladstone), down to Sydney, and hop on a flight back to Seattle.

Again, if you feel you'd like to contribute to our memories, see below for specific ways to do so: