The Forest was by far the coolest place I stayed so far. It was just a bunch of kids living together, hanging out, laughing, fire twirling, just being young together. At one point I had said that I wanted to have a
bike to ride, so Diego and I spent a morning dismanteling other bikes we found beneath the house and building one for me. It was hot in the sun and took some work, but finally we got a bike together that only had front breaks.
I had a good little bike ride around St. Lucia but it was so hilly I was nervous to ride too much beacuse of the breaks and I was also unsure of how well the gears worked. A few guys working on a house noticed me walking my bike
up the hill and called for me to ride up it, in which case I asked if they wanted to be the ones to test the gears and breaks fo rme. They did and it again it was ok. That was a good day for me actually. Diego built me a bike
and Mikey taught me how to fire twirl. It’s not nearly as complicated as it looks and I wasn’t even nervouse with it ablaze. I haven’t written during my stay there so its hard to recall everything.. I’ll just recap the highlights.
One night Vera and I decided to go into the Valley to meet up with Andrew and Brian. We didn’t quite make it that far because The Forest had already started to drink and we had a bit too much, rode the Fairy into town, did a few
laps around the CBD and came back, got in trouble of the Fairy and I went to bed. The next day sarah, Vera, and I wanted to go across the river to the West End to get produce for Juevos rancheros for dinner that night. We were having
such a great time talking that we got on the wrong fairy, went all the way to New Farm, which is about a 40 minute ride in the opposite direction. No worries though, because we had a great time and its so easy to spend all day everyday
in the Forest, so when you manage to get out, you remember how nice it is to be in civilzation once again (but after a while you just want to return!) Let’s see..each night is about the same there, we make a delicious meal together, meals like
Veg Curry, Pasta bakes, grilled out foods, everything was so gooooodd! Home made tiramasu! Home brewed beer! Nearly everynight we’d have home brewed beers, Janne makes the best beers I’ve ever had. I spent some time hanging out with Drew and that was
always a good day. He is a great person, really intellegent, the nicest guy in general, and just has a great calmness to him, but he’s still loud and fun and goofy when he wants. He is leaving soon to go on an adventure through Asia. We may meet up in
Noosa this week for a camping trip but not sure what will happen with our travel plans. Some night last week we all hung around the Forest and then caught the Ferry to the West End. dollar taco night! There is this place called the Shire which is an
awesome spot, The Shire. They play live music and don’t sell alcohol, so its BYOB. The venue gets packed, its mainly outside, people spilling into the street. its just there for the community, not to profit. Really cool hang out. That was a fun night out, the
whole household went. At that point there was a few new couchies. By the end of my time in the Forest I began to feel like a house mate rather than a couchie. Sarah, Vera, and I didn’t even sleep in the couch surfer room by the end of our stay, lol. The Forest
is amazing because you became a family. The three of us girls became quite good friends and I of course became good friends with Drew and a few others. People always return to the Forest and I will be back there by New Years because we are all going to volunteer
at a Folk Music Festival together.
After about three weeks at the Forest, we decided we should head north. Vera came with me and now we are in a small town south of Noosa couchsurfing with some really nice guys, Che and Nakol. Vera and I took the bus here. It was quite an adventure. We were
a bit late so had to take a different train to then catch a bus, which threw off our whole travel plans and took a few hours longer than we wanted. When we were catching the bus to Nambour there was a young kid drunk off his ass waiting for the bus along with us. All the old
ladies and just everyone just kinda chuckled at his stupidity and thought nothing much of him because for the most part he was staying to himself. At some point on the ride, he took a swig of his Jack daniels which caused the bus driver to get a little annoyed. He told him it was
illegal and then the kid asked if he wanted a drink himself. THe driver just told him to sit down and put it awawy or else he’d get off at the next stop. The boy threw out some harmless banter and was about to slump into his own world again but this “agro” man sitting across from
the kid got up and just started at the boy’s neck, which of course provoked the kid into self defense. That’s exactly what the older man wanted. He had to have been a little drunk as well, or just crazyas, because he had the most evil look in his eye and for about 15 minutes held
the young kid and at one point was choking him a little. The bus driver refused to stop and the old ladies on the bus were screaming for him to stop and for the old man to let him go. The problem just escalated because the more the boy struggled under the old man’s weight, the more
the old man wanted to abuse the young kid. At one point the boy was trying to stand up to get away from his grip and the two slammed into the asile of the bus. Vera and I were sitting in the handicap seats right where they were and we were so scared that one of them was going to get
thrown onto us. It was so scary and sad but there wasn’t anyone who interferred at first. But what could we do? It was mainly older women, the two of us, and then the two animals fighting. They wasn’t even a trace of civilized humans to be found within their eyes at that point.
Finally two men from the back of the bus came to do something, but I felt that the man that came to help was siding with the vicious older man and was still roughing up the kid, who was retardly drunk, but still needed protecting. At one point, the two were in a standoff of strength near the door
and the women were screaming bloody murder for the bus driver to stop so the boy wouldn’t fall out the bus. My heart was in my chest the whole time. We got to the next stop and the driver kicked them off. The fear and tension was still permeating the bus because we were scared that the older man
would stay nearby and seriously hurt the boy who was passed out at the bus stop. I hope to God he is alive and well. I hope that is the worst thing I’ll experience while here.
Che picked us up at the bus stop then drove us out to Nakol’s house. Che is a professional photographer and has traveled the world doing free lance photograpghy. Just the other day his photograpgh was front and center of the national paper, equvalent of USA Today. Impressive. Anyways, he’s so nice,
he brought us two surfboards to try to surf that night. The water was warm and it was beautiful as the sun set over the trees. Neither of us were that great at surfing so we played frisbee instead. That night we Balderdash, a great game!!! TOday we woke up and Che brought us to Noosa where we went sea kayaking,
surfed the waves with the kayak and hiked a little up the mountain. These guys are nice. Its cool to be out of the Forest as much as I miss it and everyone there, its nice to do something else. Vera and I want to travel a little, maybe start to do some farm work, and be in either Fraiser Island or the Whitsunday’s
within the next two weeks so that we can do all those excusrions with Sarah. That’s a quick catch up for now. Sorry that I rarely write and that when I do, its pretty cut and dry. I am experiences some great things that could make a great story, but I don’t have the patience to write it out that great.
So I wrote that a few days ago… didn’t proof read..sorry. Since then, we went to the Eumundi markets, which were boring and expensive, the beach, made dinner for our hosts, and that’s about it. Today we are heading to Noosa, these guys are nice but kinda not our people type thing if that makes since. Oh the pictures I’m adding are of my favorite quote on the wall at the Forest, the boy from the Forest that everyone is asking about..and then us couch surfing with the Sunshine Coast hosts. We saw this couch sitting on the side of the road on our way home from the beach. Later that night we deicded to put it on skatboards and ride it to the beach. We ended up leaving it there atop a dune. So many people have sat there to enjoy the view, I feel we did something nice for the community…
