metat-ow-sal

I think I broke a metatarsal... again.
Mateus and I went to the Gold Coast on Monday, which was really nice.. we borrowed George's van from his work for the weekend to go van hunting, and on Monday decided to go down to the GC. You know, I actually can't remember ever going to the Gold Coast, which makes me think that I've either never been, or I've only been when I was really really little... So, that means I've never been to the Gold Coast! Hah.. how cool is that? I'm pretty proud of myself. I always thought it was a little like uhm... Miami when it was cool, only teleported into the future, so it isn't cool anymore... if you know what I mean.
So we made the trip to Surfers Paradise, which is definitely not a surfers paradise, the waves are crap apparently (so Mateus told me). We drove in and parked the car a little way from Surfers, so that we could get a free park, hopped out and proceeded to walk down the beach, towards Surfers... We were walking and talking and walking and talking and walking and walking and talking and walking and talking and walking and walking... We realised early on, that the buildings in the distance were a long way away... hmm.. ah well, the beach was nice anyway. Walking walking walking... then we stop... and we're thinking, hmm.. this is a long way to go.. we must have parked a long way away...
Then I turn around, and I see the Q1 building rising up behind us... WAY behind us. Hmm.. wait a minute, wouldn't that building be right in Surfers??
Hahah... we walked for about an hour and a half in the entirely wrong direction!! Hahahah... which meant we had to walk for another hour and a half to get to the place where we parked, and then walk a little more to get to Surfers, only this time in the right direction.
During the walk, my foot was fine, but at the end of the day, it started to play up... and everyday its been almost impossible to walk on by the end of the day. These bones suck... Take ages to heal too... *humph*
Anyway, the walk was really nice, and the beach was good, sunny, warm... ocean was there.. cold, but it was there.
It was a taste of the days to come.
Looks like we'll be able to pick up our van tomorrow, depending on whether they got the parts they needed today... and we found our carpark now too, so we'll be able to park the van when we do pick it up.
The apartments here don't have correlating carpark numbers, which makes it really confusing when you don't know what your carpark number is. The other weekend, we spent an hour wandering around the carparks trying to figure out how it worked... Our unit number is 3106, but our carpark number is C118. Yeah... logical!
Van pictures to come... :)

oh what a feeling

GUESS WHAT?!!

We bought a van!!!

It looks a little something like this.. only ours is a little different. I stupidly didn't take any photos of it when we were there... but anyway, ours is cooler. For starters, our has these really cool wheels. I'm talking tyres that you would see on a custom car... big ones... hehe.. shiny and they look cool...
Anyway, its a Toyota Masterace Surf. (we liked the name too...) 1991 4x4 Diesel, 8 seater, sunroof, electric windows, automatic, air-con... Its only done 157,000km's, which seems rather low for a car that is that old... especially because it had a Northern Territory parking sticker on the inside. All the better for us! It was imported in 2000... from somewhere around the world...
So, ta da!!
We're very excited... It has to go and get its road worthy certificate, and they will renew the registration on it too, but hopefully, this time next week we'll have it!
We drove around this morning, had all these vans lined up to look at, looked at one before this one, an old Mitsubish Delica... hah, yeah.. it was not so good, and the dealer looked really shonky. Creepy looking guy that when we walked into the place came up to us like he was coming up to us to steal our money walking home late at night.. just this creepy look about him.. dodgy dodgy. So, promptly got out of that place.. and this was the second van we looked at. We pulled up behind it and liked it from the start.. seriously, you have to see the wheels, they make the van!
Anyway, inspected it all, few things need fixing inside, which they are getting done for the roadworthy, and took it for a test drive.. seemed pretty good to me. Mateus was the one listening to the engine to see if he could hear anything wrong, and checking the smoke etc. While I was the one looking at the 'look' of the car.. heh, i liked it. Pretty good suspension I noticed though.. anyway.. took it for a test drive, came back, had a bit of a chat about it etc... and put a deposit on it!
Its really big inside, and we can put all the seats down in the back, and wah-lah, we have a bed! And yeah, cool sunroof in there too.. curtains... great air-conditioning, works really well. Stereo is old, has a tape deck, but they still make those things that you plug into your ipod or whatever that is a tape right? So all is good!
We're looking forward to going away... Will be just what we need!