We had a 4-day, 5-night orientation called the Melbourne welcome at Ormond College (pictured) that was put on entirely by students. They took us to places like the zoo, the museum, and the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG...or "G" as they call it. Apparently "G" does NOT mean "gangster" in Australia...I asked).





Emus are my new favorite animal. I think this expression explains why.











Cricket is the most stunningly boring sport in the universe. Now you may ask, "Is that man stretching in the middle of the game?" Indeed he is. While the ball is being thrown, as a matter of fact. Yes. It's THAT boring. The most exciting part for me was when the players left the field and two men had to come out to pack down the loose dirt with a steam roller thing. This particular game was in its 3rd day, and we were there for the first 2 hours of it. They can last up to 5 days, starting at 11 a.m. and ending at 7 p.m. with a 40-minute lunch break and a 30-minute tea break. How British of them.

Two days after we'd gone surfing near Anglesea as part of the IES orientation, the Melbourne Welcome program took us to Ocean Grove in Geelong - minutes from Anglesea. We basically did nothing on the beach for 4 hours, unless you count getting up to eat and going for the occasional wade in the water. This was also when I decided it would be a good idea to NOT put sunscreen on my back, and now I am suffering greatly for it.

For our IES orientation, we were hauled on a bus to the town of Anglesea just off the Great Ocean Road, about an hour and a half drive from Melbourne. We stayed in a boyscout camp for three days (it reminded me SO much of Passages - freshman orientation at UPS) in the heart of the bush. Our first night we saw three wallabies and two kangaroos! This is looking straight down the camp driveway toward the water.









One of our "extreme" activities was an "extreme" mountain biking excursion through the bush along the Great Ocean Road to Bell's Beach, famous for it's annual surf competition.









After mountain biking (and I mean almost immediately after mountain biking...as in an hour after) we went surf kayaking, which is pretty much the most fun you can have in a bathing suit. It happens to be exactly what it sounds like: surfing in a sea kayak.















Our final "extreme" activity was surfing at the main beach in Anglesea. They wouldn't let us bring our bags with us onto the beach so I don't have any epic pictures of the process, but these are our wetsuits. Yes, I wore a wetsuit. Twice.