australian road trip

here's something i wrote earlier while in australia for class. it's pretty choppy because i had to cut out a LOT of it to meet the length requirement, but it's a somewhat interesting write-up of traveling in australia, here it is:

[during the first tuition free week] Some friends and I had decided to go to Monkey Mia to see the dolphins, and stop anywhere interesting along the way. Jake (also in this class), Daniel, Robin, and I, and found a good deal on a Toyota Corolla Hatchback and headed out. On our way out we stopped in the small town of Two Rocks. There is not much there apart from two large rocks, and a large hollow statue. Our first real stop was at Pinnacles, which was really cool. It was also our first encounter with the Australian wildlife. While wandering around the pinnacles, Daniel noticed a huge black snake in the bushes he was about to walk through. I quickly took a picture and then we left the area.
The first night we camped on some isolated beach far from the main road. It was a beautiful and very private place to camp, and my favorite from the whole trip. In the morning we explored the nearby coast and found some very cool rock formations and coral, as well as some very interesting looking crabs. We got back in our car and made it to a small town where we met up with some other exchange students and we stayed the night. It was nice randomly bumping into people that we knew in a place that was so far away, and we all went to the local pub for a while.
The next day we ate at a place called Billabong Roadhouse where we met some interesting people. We were just sitting on the porch eating when a man walked up and started talking to us, and asked where we were from. We told him that we were from America, England, and Germany. He kept talking to us and was very friendly, but when he started talking about a trip he took to England once we realized that he was incredibly racist. At the roadhouse there are signs everywhere advertising a book called “Cut the Bullshit, for Men Only” which I'm guessing was written by a local. Glancing through the book I skimmed through sections about things such as how getting rid of “poofdas” will get rid of AIDS, Aboriginals all look the same and should just be treated like animals, and some very interesting views on women's rights and roles in society. Even more surprising was how every part of this town seemed to use this book as a claim to fame and actually want to be associated with it.
Leaving this curiously racist, sexist, and homophobic stop we made our way to Monkey Mia. At Monkey Mia we saw some really cool birds and we had the good fortune of being there the first morning that a dolphin named Nikki had a baby. After that we went back to the hot tub by the pool and sat for a while, when a man came up to clean the hot tub. He was very friendly though, and rather than tell us to get out in a grumpy voice which is what I expected, he talked to us for about an hour and told us that we should keep going north towards Exmouth and go snorkeling in Ningaloo Reef. He mentioned some interesting places to stop and some nice things to see along the way.
We went on and stopped at Coral Bay, where went snorkeling and saw even more incredible coral and fish. Then on our way to Exmouth we saw Emus on the side of the road, I had never seen one before and was excited to be seeing them for the first time in the wild, not behind a fence or in a cage. After getting to a campground we drove to town to pick up some beer when we finally saw a kangaroo. It was standing in the middle of the road and just stared at us for a while before hopping off. We went back to the restaurant at the campsite with our beer and met some of the locals. We were still sitting there when it got near closing time and as we were getting ready to leave the waitress said we could stay there as long as we like if we turned out the lights when we left.
The next day we went on a nice hike down the coast from Exmouth. We saw more kangaroos and another snake (this time just a small green one) on the hike as well as a beautiful gorge. Now more than satisfied with our trip we headed back home.
All-in-all it was a great trip. We met tons of people, saw countless animals, many of which I'd never even seen before in pictures, and everyone was so incredibly friendly. I was so shocked that people would so regularly forget their job duties to sit down for a long time and just talk to us. They put off cleaning the hot tub, let us stay past closing even after they left trusting us to not make a mess and turn out the lights, and even have a few drinks with us which I've never seen in America. They repeatedly told us where the best and cheapest places to go were even though they knew it would cost them some business.