When I stepped off the plane a wall of humidity hit me and I thought "What have I done" Roslyn (sister-in-law) picked me up and I stayed with her overnight and nearly melted. I went to my unit the next day which was right behind the hospital. Dale arrive later that day and we started settling in to our 2 bedroom townhouse with everything provided.
The Mater is very different (I had no expectations). Everything they do is different and the only familiarity is the anaesthetic machine which is the same as the old one at St. V's.
We had many an enjoyable weekend whilst in Townsville. We stayed at home one weekend and went away the next. The weekends we were home we went for a walk along The Strand which is a 2.4km walking/bike track along the foreshore with beautiful gardens, bbqs, benches and a water playground for the kids - although some were big kids.
We had a weekend on Magnetic Island - a small island 20 min ferry ride from Townsville. It has 4 bays catering to the holiday makers.
Early Feb Cyclone Yasi paid us a visit but we were not in the eye of it and only lost power for 24 hours and no damage to our unit but it certainly caused havoc around Townsville with powerlines down and trees uprooted.
There are other agency nurses here Gayle, Maree and Lisa who are very friendly and love a chat they have been on other placements like Burnie, Hobart, Saudi and the Emirates.
Dale commenced work mid Feb repairing household whitegoods full-time which part of the plan but that was what the company wanted.
We also did the 3 historical walks around Townsville visiting the old pubs, railway station and shopfronts. One one of our walks we found the old government offices and were invited inside to view an apartment - it was beautiful and all for a cool $1.49mill. The building had been converted into 5 apartments.
Charters Towers was our next visit just 1.5 hours drive from Townsville. It is a very quaint town with beautiful historic buildings. Gold was discovered here in 1871 and at one time was the 2nd largest city in Queensland with a population of 30,000. This very wealthy goldmining town had 3 calls a day at the gold stock exchange when mining was at its peak. There were 92 hotels in the city to cater for the miners thirst and had its own brewery. During WW11 15,000 USA military personnel were stationed at Charters Towers. Whilst here we visited the family history centre to track down Purdys as they lived here in Cemetery Rd and 2 purdy children were born in Mt Leyshon Rd. We got a little lead but Dale found other living relatives so we spent an entertaining afternoon with them. Dale's father went to school here.
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