Welcome Team USA

Molly woke up at 4:15 this morning. She was hungry and immediately asked for cheese and crackers. To let Cheryl get some sleep, Molly and I ventured out to find a better breakfast. After some wondering around we found a pastry shop and place to buy the newspaper. We then headed down to the beach as the sun was rising and had a chance to dip our toes in. There was no doubt today was going to be a beach day!

After breakfast we headed straightaway back to the beach. The sand is very soft and fine and the water could almost be called warm. There was lots of sand castle building, cookie making, and wave jumping. We also chatted with a couple from Sydney who were on vacation with their 2 1/2 year old. Molly and Maddie became fast friends while Cheryl and I learned a little more about Australia:

• Brisbane is called 'Brizzy',
• There are two types of Rugby played in Australia,
• Australians do not wear Uggs (except for the occasional drunk teenage girl at Surfers Paradise),
• In Cricket, a ball batted out of the field of play is worth 4 or 6 points,
• 'POMs' are the British and it stands for Prisoners of the Motherland,
• There a lots of fakies at Surfers Paradise,
• Property values in Sydney crashed in 2003-2004, but have been steadily rising since then,
• Australian's either love or hate Cricket,
• Molly has an adorable accent, and
• The don't call them shrimp, they are prawns (e.g. "Let's put some prawns on the barbie.")

As we were heading back, we ran into the rest of Team USA. They had arrived in Brisbane this morning and were shuttled down to Broadbeach. They all had that look of runni

ng on the last fumes of adrenaline. I am very happy we arrived earlier and took some time to relax. Or so we thought. On the way to lunch Molly fell fast asleep in my arms. We found a restaurant with a couch and let her sleep. I than carried her back to the room and she continued sleep until after

5:00 pm when Jim and Dani joined us for wine before heading out to find supper.

While Molly was sleeping I took Cheryl's bike over to Gold Coast Triathlete (www.g-t-c.com) to have it rebuilt after shipping it. While the bike box was a little unwieldy (thank you Bike World - www.bikeworldiowa.com) it did the trick and Cheryl's bike arrived in one piece. I than had to ride it back 3.5 kilometers to the hotel...on the wrong side the street without a helmet. Challenging to say the least.

Oh, and remember the bridge we mentioned back in Brisbane with the apartment. During the tour up river, the guide explained that the resident has lived there for 20 plus years and has trouble sleeping other places because it is too quiet. Well, the paper today (see here) had a story about that guy who a debilitating asthma attack. Despite the steps he has apparently become a little overweight. As a result, the rescue team had to use a crane to lift him from one of the upper window to transport him to the hospital. Small world.