Kamakura And Bunnies

This morning we got an earlier start so we could try to beat the rain. We took the train south about an hour to Kamakura, which is a seaside resort city with dozens of Buddhist Zen temples and Shinto shrines. We started by going to Hase-dera. It has many different gardens and statues but the most well known one is Kannon, which is one of the largest wooden statues in Japan. It's gilded in gold and has eleven heads, which is said to represent the different phases of enlightenment. Unfortunately I wasn't allowed to take any pictures of it. There was also a nice ocean view from the temple grounds. And there was an underground cave which is a long winding tunnel with low ceilings and various statues throughout.

From there we walked to Kotoku-in Temple, which is a Buddhist temple that houses a huge Buddha statue. They date the statue in 1252 and is made of bronze. The temple that housed it was destroyed by a storm in 1334, rebuilt, damaged in another storm in 1369, rebuilt again, and then it was washed away in a tsunami and now the Buddha stands in the open air. It also survived an earthquake and has since been updated so that it would more easily withstand larger earthquakes. It stands almost 44 feet tall and weighs approximately 93 tons. The statue is hollow and Matt and I paid the 20 yen each (less than 20 cents) to go inside. It was really interesting to see how they merged the different plates together.

To get to our next destination we walked along a really cool street, which might've been called Komachi street. It had lots of shops and restuarants and interesting dessert places. We grabbed lunch there of tempura shrimp and soup, since it was cold and rainy. We also wandered into this honey place which had many different flavored honeys to sample. It was delicious! You could try it plain and then also put it in both hot and cold water, which turned it into a sweetened flavor water. It was really good no matter how you had it and we seriously considered buying some but we weren't sure how to get it home. There was also another street in Kamakura which you could take that's completely lined with Cherry Blossoms but they weren't bloomed yet so we didn't go down that street.

Our destination was Tsurugaoka Hachiman-gu. It is said to be the most important Shinto shrine in the city of Kamakura and it's at the geographical and cultural center of the city. It used to be both a Hachiman shrine and also a Tendai Buddhist temple. 

At this point we were tired of the cold and rain so we took the train back to Tokyo and met up with Jack at the airbnb. We rested for a bit before deciding to try another classic Tokyo activity: an animal cafe. We choose a rabbit cafe and took the train over there. It was titled Mimi Rabbit cafe. It was really interesting and not quite what I expected; it was basically just a small apartment with a ton of rabbits and rabbit cages. The "cafe" part was just a small corner of the room where they made us a drink that we didn't actually get until we were almost ready to leave. You pay to be there for either half an hour or an hour and a drink is usually included. So we sat there for an hour and played with the different bunnies and fed them. They gave us shoes and aprons to wear to protect our clothes, since the bunnies pooped and peed everywhere. They also had baby otters! That was random but we got to play with them for a bit too before they put them back in their cages. We picked this particular place because it had lots of bunnies roaming around at all times, whereas we had read at some of the other ones they would only have one or two bunnies out at a time and you may not actually get any attention from it. Here they were all over us. It was awesome. There are a ton of other animal cafes here: cats, dogs, owls, hedgehogs, snakes, etc. Here are some pictures:

Then we met up with our friend Taryn for dinner, she used to work at Epic as well. She took us to a Shabu Shabu restaurant which is a self-cook Japanese hot pot type place. It was all you can eat and they would bring you plates of meat that you would put in the pot to cook. You would also put vegetables and noodles in there as well. It was really good! It was also a nice social meal since it was easy to hold conversations as we were cooking the food. Unfortunately I forgot to get any pictures of dinner. :( But I also tried sake for the first time! So that was cool. They also had ice cream with sprinkles so I was super happy.

Then we went back to Shibuya crossing (the busiest intersection in the world that we went to a few days ago) since we were so close to it and this time we went up to the second-floor Starbucks and watched the crossings from above. I have a video in the google album linked on the right. It was mesmerizing watching the crossings with all of the umbrellas. Then as we were leaving we participated in the crossing again and this time we got some pictures of us in them:

So that's it for today! We've really been loving Japan so far. It's a super cool place and I can't wait to see more of it.

Walking Tokyo

We started our first full day in Tokyo by grabbing breakfast food at the 7-11 right across the street. Convenience stores here have a ton of actual good food so we spent some time there choosing several different items.

We took the train to Ueno Park and we saw lots more cherry blossoms there! And there were a ton of people lounging around and eating. We wandered through there a bit until we stumbled into an area with lots of street food and souvenir shops. I got some candied grapes which were interesting; they just had a hard candy coating on them. 

Then we continued walking to Asakusa, which is a district that's famous for Senso-ji, a Buddhist temple. It's also now a market area with a ton of tiny shops full of trinkets and small dessert type things. It was really cool to walk around and see all the things and all the people; lots of women were in traditional kimonos. We kind of rushed through the area though because we were hungry and we thought there would be a lot more food than just desserts.

So we left there after only about an hour and caught the metro back to Ueno Park just so we could get food from that street food vendor area we had previously explored. We got lots of food there: I got a spiraled-fried potato thing and then a chocolate covered banana with sprinkles, Matt had sausage, corn, and chicken (which turned out to be just chicken skin- weird), and Jack had octopus on a stick, a cherry blossom rice cake, and a turkey leg. The cherry blossom rice cake was yummy and different.

We wandered back through the trinket area where I bought a few souvenirs. These are really the first things that we've bought since we didn't want to be dragging things all around the world with us, but I'm planning to ship a package home in the next few days anyway so I figured now's the time to buy stuff and send it home.

Then we spent quite a bit of time wandering around an area called Ameyayokocho. There was just everything there: clothes, shoes, desserts, fish, fruit, bags, makeup, pretty much anything you could think of. We found an arcade and checked that out for a bit; it was pretty intense. There were a ton of games in there that I'd never seen or heard of before. Then Jack and I split a dessert titled "Hong Kong egglet", which was different. It was similar to a waffle but instead of squares it had lots of circular bubbles, then it was wrapped in a cone with ice cream, bananas, whipped cream, and sprinkles. 

At this point we had done a ton of walking and were pretty tired so we caught the train back to the airbnb and just chilled for a bit. For dinner we went to a sushi place that had a conveyor built of different sushi options and you just grabbed plates that looked good to you. It was very different from anything I've experienced before, both in types of sushi and just the logistics of the place. I had some shrimp, and crab, and also tried some cuttlefish.

Before heading in for the night we decided to first check out the Golden Gai area, which is full of tiny tiny bars (a lot of them only fit about 5 or 6 people). There were a ton of them all crammed on these tiny, historic streets. A lot of them were themed as well, and some of them only served "regulars" . We didn't go in any of them because most of them charged a cover but it was really neat just to walk around and check it out.

Another big day in the books and I'm dog-tired. Night all!

Kon'nichiwa, Japan!

Hello Japan!! It's been a big day!

We flew on the red-eye last night from New Caledonia to Tokyo. We're back in the Northern Hemisphere! It was a nine hour flight but at least it was direct! We each watched a couple of movies (I watched Arrival and Doctor Strange) and got a couple hours of sleep. We flew Aircalin again and had some really good food; the warm chocolate croissant at breakfast was particularly tasty. And we're here now! We landed shortly before 8am and got through customs just fine. Then we successfully exchanged our vouchers for Japan Rail (JR) Passes. We were lucky because we got to the office right as it was opening; the lady who helped us said there's generally a 2-hour wait the entire day! Then we caught the train to the Shinjuku station and then searched for our airbnb.

Wow! Tokyo is fabulous. Everywhere you look there's so much to see. I'm just constantly swiveling my head around trying to take it all in. And the best part is I can hardly understand a word of what anything is! It's all just a big colorful mystery.

We got to the area of our airbnb but couldn't quite figure out where exactly the apartment was and how to get into it so our host came and rescued us. He showed us in and gave us the key. Success! The place is... compact. But nice enough and has all the essentials. It's also very close to a couple of the train stations so that's super convenient. We'll be staying here for five nights.

It's also much cooler here than our previous locations- it was in the mid to low 50s today and mostly overcast. I might actually get to start wearing the other half of my clothes that I've been dragging along!

Once we got settled in then came the internal battle of which primal need to take care of first: exhaustion or hunger. Hunger won out so we went exploring for some food. We found it everywhere! The struggle was understanding anything enough to know if it was a place you wanted to eat or not, then what exactly you wanted, and then how to order it. Lots of places had pictures of plastic replicas of their food in the window so you could just point to what you wanted. We decided to really put our chopstick skills to the test and settled on a ramen place and successfully communicated our order to the waitress. It was really good! I had the miso and Matt had the shoyu, then we split some rice and dumplings. We were both fairly successful with the chopsticks; we each slurped soup on our shirts a few times and I had a dumpling causality which landed in my ramen that I had to dig out. But we were fed! Check.

Then we returned to the room for an hour nap. I had to set an alarm which woke me out of a deep slumber. But we were rested enough to finish the day. Double check.

Then off exploring again! This time: mission cherry blossoms. We're here in Tokyo at the perfect time to witness the famous cherry blossoms blooming so we wanted to go see them as soon as possible. The first park we tried to go to, Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden, we arrived just after it closed (we had no idea it would close so that was a surprise). But we were not to be deterred and continued on to Yoyogi Park.

We wandered around Yoyogi Park for awhile searching for the elusive blossoms but it seemed the paths were determined not to lead us to them. We did find the Meiji Jingu shrine in the park which was pretty cool though. It is a Shinto shrine dedicated to the deified spirits of emperor Meiji and his wife. A lot of it was under construction having the roof repaired so I didn't get many good pictures, but here's one.

The path led us to one of the exits where we got shuffled out of the park due to closing so we thought we had missed our chance for the day. We decided to instead go check out the famous Shibuya crossing, which is rumored to be the busiest intersection in the world. But first! On the way there we were still walking along the edge of the park when we found an area that wasn't closed off. And we found the cherry blossoms!! It looks like they are just starting to bloom so not all of them are very full yet, but they are still very pretty. Mission accomplished!! There were a bunch of people hanging out around the blossoms- eating picnics, tossing a ball around, etc. Apparently this is called "hanami", which is cherry blossom viewing and a huge cultural tradition in Japan.

So then we continued on to the Shibuya crossing. On the way we saw lots of street food vendors which looked really good, but we had our hearts' set on a secret mission that we knew we could find near Shibuya crossing: Taco Bell. And we found it! I was so excited; I've been craving it hardcore lately. And it's the only one in the 15+ countries that we are visiting! So we definitely had to stop and grab a couple of tacos. This is the face of happiness:

Okay now really this time: Shibuya Crossing. It was only a couple of minutes away from Tbell and we got to take part of the massive migration across the street. It's just crazy how many people cross this intersection each day. Hundreds (sometimes over 1000 at peak time) cross at a time, coming and going from all directions. It was really cool and the pictures don't do it justice, but here's a look:

Then we took the train back to our place and settled in for the night. Jack just landed in Tokyo so he'll be rejoining us shortly as well.

Just one other thing that I have to mention: the toilets. The toilets here are superb. Truly first rate. I really don't understand why the US has not adopted these porcelain thrones. I probably won't do it justice explaining it since I still don't understand what all of the buttons do. But I can tell you that when I sat down to do my business it was on a nice heated toilet seat. Then it played music (presumably to cover any noises made) and released a nice perfumed scent. It also has the option of cleaning your sensitive parts and I believe you can control the pressure and temperature of the water. What an experience! I think Matt and I will have to install one in the house when we get back.

I published my New Caledonia summary page for anyone who wants to check that out. Good night, all!

Poe Beach and a looooong day

Our last day in New Caledonia!

We rounded our stuff up, swept up the airbnb, and drove off. We rented a car for the day so we could explore outside of Noumea.

We drove northwest along the coast for a few hours until we got to Poe Beach. The drive was really pretty; everything is very green and mountainy. We spent several hours there just lounging in the shade on the beach. It was a very long beach and had a very very gradual incline into the water; you could walk out a long ways into the water and still not be very deep. I walked probably 30 meters out and still didn't get much above my ankles. As I was walking a saw a decent sized sand-colored crab. I also saw a really cool shell that I picked up and then realized it was still inhabited; I could see little crab-like legs sticking out so I put it back in the water. Also, in true-New Caledonian style there were absolutely no waves. We could see the waves breaking off in the horizon which must've been where the reef was.

Almost the entire time there we were the only people in sight, but shortly before we were left we were joined by a few people, and one lonely stray dog who decided to take a nap right next to us for awhile. A couple of guys took off windsurfing right in front of us and that was entertaining watching them set that up and head off into the water. It looks like fun but also an extreme workout trying to hold on to that parachute and guide it where you want to go.

After Poe Beach we drove just a few kilometers south to go to La Roche Percee (I don't know how to type an accent with this keyboard). It was a rock formation which by itself wasn't super impressive, but we were there just before sunset which made it really pretty. What I liked most about the area was the beach though. This beach actually had waves! It must be one of the rare breaks in the reef where it lets the waves in, and the beach was really nice as well. Very soft sand without a lot of rocks (unlike Poe Beach). I wish we would've hung out there more today instead of Poe, but you live and you learn.

We grabbed a quick dinner in La Foa on our way back down the coast to the airport. We ended up at a Vietnamese restaurant. We couldn't understand a word the waitress said or read anything the menu said, so I ended up getting a chocolate crepe since that seemed the safest. Although after I ordered I saw a nice plate of steaming shrimp and noodles being delivered to the man at the table next to us which looked really good so I clearly should've been more adventurous.

We got to the airport over 4 hours before our flight, simply because it was dark and we didn't know what else to do. So now we're sitting at the airport waiting for our 1am flight. :/ And then we get to sit on a plane for 9 hours! Yay- it's going to be a super long day for us! But then we'll be in Japan and that will be awesome, so it's all worth it.

Au revoir, New Caledonia!

Isla De Amedee

Aka, Amedee Island.

We decided to go on a field trip today to Amedee Island. It wasn't the easiest thing in the world to arrange, especially since we didn't even start trying until last night. Mary D is the only "official" way to get there and they weren't taking people out on Monday. Plus they are expensive and include lots of other activities that we didn't need. So we found another blog which mentioned a fellow named Dimitri (phone number +687 77.27.16) who would take you to the island for a smaller fee. We were actually able to reach him on Sunday night and he agreed to take us Monday morning, so we were really thankful that he was flexible for the last-minute planning. "Meet me at the taxi hut on Anse Vata at 8am" he said. He was 40 minutes late but he did show up in his 7-seater boat. He charged us a bit more since he hadn't planned on taking anyone out that day and we were the only two; 10,000 XPF/person instead of the quoted 6,500/person we saw on the blog, but that's still significantly cheaper than Mary D's so we were happy with it. Plus since Mary D wasn't operating that day we basically had the island to ourselves which was really cool. We were able to sit in the beach chairs wherever we wanted without paying. We were able to snorkel all day, as Dimitri had lent us snorkels/masks. We brought our own food since Dimitri doesn't provide that (Mary D has food/drinks included). The only bummer was that the Amedee Lighthouse wasn't open since the big groups weren't there. 

He told us to meet him at Anse Vata beach at 8am but he didn't get there until 40 minutes later. In his defense, he did try to call but I didn't have my phone on me. But anyway, he got there and a 20 minute boat ride later and we could see the famous Amedee Lighthouse.

Before taking us to the island he took us out to the reef and explained to us how the reef around New Caledonia is the second-longest coral reef in the world. It's the world's largest lagoon and it surrounds the entire nation and is the reason why there are so few waves on the beaches. It's a UNESCO world heritage site since 2008. He also explained a bit how the coral reef forms which was quite interesting (although I had a hard time catching all of it due to his thick French accent).

Anyway, we got to the island and he told us to meet him back at the boat at 4pm. He also told us that the island would be mostly empty today since the bigger touring companies weren't working that day but that there was some sort of local function being held there that he was attending. Which meant that we were some of the very few tourists on the island for the day which was really cool. We had our pick of all of the lawn chairs (which normally cost money to rent but wasn't being enforced today), we had no interference from other people while snorkeling; we basically had our run of the island. The only thing we weren't able to do since we were practically the only ones there was go up into the famous Amedee lighthouse, since it was closed. But we got to see it from the outside and take pictures so that was okay.

So we set up for the day at the best lawnchairs we could find then took a stroll around the island to check things out. Almost immediately Matt spotted a sea turtle swimming in the water about 5 feet from shore! Here is a picture:

Only a couple of minutes after that I found a (in)famous Amedee Island water snake, slithering out from the grass and into the water. It was amazing how fast he took off once he reached the water! You don't even need to ask if I was thinking about that while I was snorkeling...

After walking around the island as far as we could go each way (part of it was blocked off to prevent people from interfering with the mating of a rare seagull) we decided to check out the snorkeling. Dimitri had lent us the mask and snorkel so we were free to go as long as we wanted. Apart from eating, I spent most of the day snorkeling. So much so that I ended up getting a sunburn on my back and bum, even though I know better. I just did this in October in Hawaii and it hurt so bad I can't believe I let it happen again. I don't think it's quite as bad this time.

While snorkeling I found three other sea turtles! I was hanging out with two of them at a time for awhile! It was really cool. The first time I was out there I ended up hanging out with one of them for like 30 minutes. She was just doing her thing: eating grass, swimming around, getting air periodically. I was only a couple of feet away from her for most of the time. It was great, and I got some great videos, but more about that later.

The next time I was out and found another turtle and I was hanging out with and another one showed up! They each had fish that were sucked on to them catching a free ride. I hung out with them for about twenty minutes as well. Here's a video! It's a little hard to see the first turtle; he's only in the frame for the first few seconds.

I also saw lots of other interesting fish as well: some big unicorn-looking fish with a big horn on it's forehead, some big purple looking ones, some big blue ones that kind of looked like really big Dory fish. I also saw one big long fish that might've been a barracuda but I couldn't swear to it; it didn't look quite as creepy as the one I saw when scuba diving at the GBR. A couple of times I also ran into these brightly colored fish who seemed very territorial; they weren't very big but every time I came around they started charging at me until I left. I just did a quick google search and I'm pretty sure they were Titan triggerfish, who live in lagoons and are notoriously territorial. I'm glad I didn't realize they had teeth or I would've been a lot more frightened!

By the time we left my final count was 4 sea turtles and 4 snakes, although I never saw the snakes in the water. thankfully.

We got back to the main island no problem and then wandered around looking for a crepe. Matt had read that the best ones in town weren't far away so we went searching for those. Google took us on a very indirect, long route and by the time we got there it was closed so that was a bummer. But we stopped at the same place we went yesterday and got another one, even though the service was terrible there.

We walked back to our airbnb and hung out here for the evening. We made spaghetti for dinner again and did a lot of Japan planning. We also did laundry since we're not sure when the next chance will be. This is our last night in New Caledonia!

About the videos/pictures: I took about 50 pictures and videos while snorkeling but then my underwater camera failed again. This time instead of mysteriously corrupting all of my files it just decided to overwrite all of the previously taken media with the last two videos I took. So those two videos are all I have! :( But at least I do have one (crappy) video of me and the sea turtles. I did have a lot better ones, but they are now erased. You get what you pay for I guess! (don't ever buy the SJCAM cameras, just splurge and get the GoPro.)

Birthday Spa

Short post today all; it's my birthday and I don't feel like working!

Matt took me to the spa today for my birthday and it was wonderful. I got a 50 min massage and a 45 min facial. It was very relaxing and a perfect birthday gift. While I was doing that he decided to climb a hill and got some really good pictures, which are added to the album.

The rest of the day was spent relaxing until dinner, which was a very simple affair. I didn't feel like eating much so we shared a croque, which is popular around here. It's basically a toasted sandwich but they put the cheese on the top of the bread for some reason. It's good though.

Night all!

Duck Island and an Octopus

Another steamy day in New Caledonia. I think it was about 85 degrees today and sunny.

We walked down to the water taxi this morning and took it to "Duck Island" (Ile aux Canards). It was a three minute ride and a very small island. The first thing we did was walk the entire perimeter which took under five minutes. There was one restaurant on the island which pretty much monopolized everything; they controlled the food, the beach chairs and canopies, and the snorkel rentals. There was hardly any accessible shade either other than the canopies so we bit the bullet and rented a canopy. We also rented the snorkeling gear but we brought our own food so we saved a bit there.

The snorkeling was good; they had an underwater trail that you could follow and each post would have information that you could read. The problem was it was all in French so that wasn't super helpful for us. But we got to see lots of interesting fish and schools of tiny fish swimming all around us. The highlight was definitely the octopus. It was awesome! I saw one at the beginning just before it crawled under a rock but couldn't get Matt's attention in time. But later we found a bigger one and we watched that thing for almost half an hour. It was really big. It's hard to describe octopus sizes since they don't really stretch out for you to take a measurement, but it's tentacles were between 1-2 feet long. And it's body was another foot high probably. Just the way it moved along the ocean floor was mesmerizing. And it would literally change colors before my eyes. One second it was off-white with brown spots and the next minute it was a dark brown/red color. It would change colors instantly, like a TV changes colors. I've never seen anything like it. And if you're wondering where the pictures are do't hold your breath; the entire time I was kicking myself for forgetting my camera! It was really really cool though. It was also amazing how many people swam close to it and never even noticed it. We literally watched it for half an hour and no one else even noticed until the last few minutes. From a quick google search I would say it was probably a "Common reef octopus" since that's what it looked like.

So anyway, after snorkeling we hung out on the beach for a bit fore taking the water taxi back to the mainland. We walked back to the room and hung out for a bit before dinner. We walked back down to the beach area and grabbed dinner at a place called Pizza & Pasta, which is definitely my kind of place. It was good but not the best, but it was pretty pricey. Which is to be expected on an island.

Here are a couple of pictures I took from Duck Island.

Beach Bums

We were some lazy beach bums today. We checked out Noumea's beaches and alternated walking around, swimming, and lounging. The beaches were nice but a little rocky, but that helped with the visibility as the water was very clear. The water was very warm as well. One interesting thing we noticed about the beaches is that there were like zero waves. I mean, it depended what side of the island you were on. But on the west side beach there were literally no waves. It was amazing. I've never seen an ocean so calm. If someone would've told me that it was just a big swimming pool I would've believed it. The south beach (where it's windier) had some small waves but hardly anything there either.

That was pretty much our day! We had a crepe snack at a waterside cafe this afternoon and we made spaghetti for dinner in our airbnb.

Maybe we'll get up the motivation to do something more energetic tomorrow. Maybe.

Bonjour de Nouvelle-Caledonie!

That's, hello from New Caledonia! We speak French here. Also, we're back to driving on the right side of the road!

Not much to report today since we spent most of the day traveling. Had to pack our bags up this morning and say goodbye to Jack as we're parting ways for a few days. He didn't have a lot of interest in coming to New Caledonia so we're going to meet back up with him in Tokyo in a few days.

We flew Aircalin over on the 3 hour flight and it was very nice. They served a full meal which was surprisingly good: beef stroganoff, a roll, some veggies, a piece of cake, and a tim-tam. No in-flight entertainment options as far as I was aware of but that was okay because I worked on my blog and then we watched "Orange is the new Black" on the iPad.

We landed and got through customs just fine and then met up with our pre-arranged transport which took us to our airbnb. It was quite a long drive, over an hour. Our airbnb hostess met us here and she was very nice. It's a small studio and she lives right above us. She showed us around and pointed out some POIs on a map for us. The best part of the place is that it's got a view of the ocean. :)

We had a quiet evening. We walked to the small grocery store and got some provisions for the next few days. We made it back right as it was dark so we decided to stay in for the evening. Which gave me a good chance to work on my blog and publish my Australia page! That's the link to it but you can also always find it under the "Destinations" tab at the top. Let me know what you think!

Kangaroos and Opera

Today is our last full day in Australia and there was no way I was leaving the country without ever seeing a kangaroo. So we started off the day by going to the Wild Life zoo in the Darling Harbour. It was a 20 min walk from our hotel and we pre-bought tickets online last night so we saved a bit of money that way.

It was pretty good. We got to see the quintessential Australian animals so it was exactly what we needed: Tasmanian devils, pandemelons, wallabies, kuckaberras, wombats, a cassowary, echidnas, koalas, quolls, lots of snakes, and finally... kangaroos! We also finally got to see some platypuses and a huge saltwater crocodile! Here are some of my favorite pictures from the zoo, as always you can check out the album for more.

A wallaby:

A cassowary (the third largest bird in the world):

Kangaroos! The guy on the left was hopping all over the place; I have a video of him too.

An echidna:

A Platypus! These little girls were tricky to get pictures of.

Here's the croc:

And another koala picture, because they are so dang cute:

From the zoo we walked over to the Sydney Fish Market. It was really crowded with a ton of tourists, but we managed to pull together some lunch. We ended up sharing some oysters, a lobster tail, and fish & chips. They had some huge crabs there though. And lots of octopus.

The rest of the afternoon was spent grabbing snacks at the hotel and running errands. I wanted to go see if I could find a cheap dress to wear to the opera for tonight. We went to a few stores that were way out of my price range before we wandered into H&M. There I found two dresses! One was $15 and the other was only $5! And that's Australian dollars so I was pretty pleased with that. Now I'll just need to figure out what to toss in order to make space in my bag for those... We were about to walk back to the hotel to get ready but it was pouring! So we grabbed an Uber instead.

We ate dinner at the hotel and then got ready for the opera. Luckily it stopped raining before we had to walk there. The opera is only a ten minute walk but it still would've been less than fun doing that in our nicest clothes.

The opera was great! We had pretty good seats in a side box so we were pretty close to the stage. We decided to see Tosca, which is a classic Italian opera that's set at the end of WWII in Rome. It had a powerful plot and the singing was amazing. It's unlike anything I've ever seen before and it's difficult to describe. It's a little strange at first that it's all in Italian but you get used to it eventually. There are subtitles at the top to help you understand what's going on, if the emotion in the songs doesn't make it clear enough. But I would definitely recommend the experience to someone if they've never seen an opera before to check it out. Plus it was fun getting all dressed up for once. Here's a picture of us right before the opera:

That's all for tonight! Matt and I fly to New Caledonia tomorrow.