With Sydney still a little further away than expected we decided to hit the happening sea-side town of Byron Bay for Christmas. We though we would celebrate the occasion by staying a whole 3 mights in one place! Although due to the collapse of our $5 charity tent after night 2 we did end up moving from one side of the campsite to the other so take refuge a hug tent owned by a couple of Dutch girls.
We arrived much later than planned on Christams Eve (partly due to the bizarre 1 hour time differnce when you cross the, err, North/ South divide between New SouthWales and Queensland and I set up camp while Jonno got down top the important task of brewing the mulled wine. We thought we had purchased a good 5 litres of red goon for the purpose but it turned out to be white. Luckily white mulled wine was an absolute triumph and som of th best I have ever tasted. After a lie in on Christmas morning we exchanged ou not-so-secret sant presents and christmas cards and then headed down to the beach where we lounged for most of the day, apart from when we were getting angry waiting 2 hours for a bit a bbq space to cook our traditional backpacker christmas stir fry.
We had planned to spend the evening partying down on the beach, which was a fine idea. Sadly having got totlly lost walking back to our campsite and spending a few gazzillion hours wandering around instead of 30 minutes we didn't quite have the energy left to go back into town and instead whiled the night away playing cards with a group of 3 dutch we met at the campsite (whose tent we would later retreat to). We had a little more success the next day by driving into town and back to our campsite in their car (so we didnt have the chance to get lost) and after a valiant effort at surfing we just about managed to party in the evening before all crashing out early and needing to go to bed.
Tuesday, 26 January 2010
Wednesday, 20 January 2010
Back down again...
So they say what goes up must come down...and so it was that having reached the most northerly point of my travels I must start to head south again to Sydney away from the tropics and back to the cosmopolitan with just 2 weeks until Christmas and 3 until my parents were arriving in Sydney coming to see Australia for themselves, and to check I was still alive etc.
It was an awesome few days of powering up and down beaches, jumping in crystal clear rain water lakes and camping out under the stars. At night the sand would sparkle if you moved it due to tiny phosphorescent particles that released light when activated by movement, a surreal addition to the beautiful landscape!
Sadly though the trip did wind to an end, and as we caught the ferry back tothe mainland a thunder storm ripped across the skies. We returned to Hervey Bay just inorder to make our way down to the nearby Rainbow Beach, the first place on our journey south not covered by the Great Barrier Reef (which is flipping huge!) and therefore the first place with waves! Rainbow was a small and quiet town, relaxing after the major backpacker hotspots we had been in before, we liked it so much we turned our 1 day trip into a 2.5 day stay and happily spent our timetrying to learn to surf...and kind of succeeding, standing up pretty regularly on a big board with small waves and thinking we looked much cooler than we really did! Surf wasn't the only thing Rainbow had going for it though, as a short walk out of town there was an enourmous sand blow (a huge area of sand, a bit like a dune but further inland and much larger area) on top of a cliff which gave fantastic views out to sea and round the coast on the one side and inland over miles of bush and rivers on the other. Accompanied by the harmonica, and a few litres of good lemonade we waited there until darkness and a massive thunder storm came in before making a run for it down the dune, through town and back to our tent. We paid the guy who rented out surf boards one 6 pack of beer for 2 night camping in his backyard and in return he gave us the consolation leaving gift of fresh mackerel, caught by himself that morning that we took down to the beach a barbequed straight away.
By now Christmas was fast approaching and we had decided that when it came Byron Bay was where we wanted to be. There was just one place left in mind to reach before then and that was Noosa, a busy beach town another short hop down the coast from Rainbow. Noosa was a large town compared to most paces we had been so far and the 24 hours or so we were there weren't enough to really do it justice apart from for a couple of walks I took through its Nature Reserve on a search for koalas which I finally did spot (very cute picture to follow!) on my way home from the second walk having pretty much given up.
Our first stop was Airlie beach, gateway to the Whitsundays, a group of small picturesque islands off the Queensland Coast ideally suited to cruising about in a yacht over a few days, awash with snorkel spots and silica beaches. Sadly despite being a big backpacker destination it is also a fairly exclusive and expensive place full of posh island resorts. I was also wary of much here first time around as I knew I would be back for a week with my parents the following month. Having almost decided that it was too expensive to do anything here we took a last walk into the tour agents to ask about deals and settled on a standby rate for and inclusive resort on nearby Long Island. We raced to catch the earliest ferry we could and once on the island determinedly worked our way through kayaking, tennis, bush walking, swimming, crazy golfing, snorkeling (again in silly stinger suits) and eating (and stashing) as much as we could from the buffet, oh and picnicking with a giant monitor lizard!
Refreshed from our break in Airlie Beach the next spot we aimed for was Hervey Bay where we stayed a day before joining a group of 7 other backpackers in a landrover to explore Fraser Island. The biggest sand barrier island in the world.For the trip we got an extensive briefing on 4wd driving as there are no roads on Fraser, just sand tracks, beaches and alot of dingos (wild dogs!). The first obstacle though was to meet at 7am in the morning with a bunch of other backpackers and try to decide what and how much food to buy for 3 days for 9 people (not a calculation any of us had done often) let alone how much alcohol we would also require! Luckily we still j 
ust about made it intime for the 9o'clock ferry and were happily pushing landrovers out of sandpits by mid morning.
It was an awesome few days of powering up and down beaches, jumping in crystal clear rain water lakes and camping out under the stars. At night the sand would sparkle if you moved it due to tiny phosphorescent particles that released light when activated by movement, a surreal addition to the beautiful landscape!
Sadly though the trip did wind to an end, and as we caught the ferry back tothe mainland a thunder storm ripped across the skies. We returned to Hervey Bay just inorder to make our way down to the nearby Rainbow Beach, the first place on our journey south not covered by the Great Barrier Reef (which is flipping huge!) and therefore the first place with waves! Rainbow was a small and quiet town, relaxing after the major backpacker hotspots we had been in before, we liked it so much we turned our 1 day trip into a 2.5 day stay and happily spent our timetrying to learn to surf...and kind of succeeding, standing up pretty regularly on a big board with small waves and thinking we looked much cooler than we really did! Surf wasn't the only thing Rainbow had going for it though, as a short walk out of town there was an enourmous sand blow (a huge area of sand, a bit like a dune but further inland and much larger area) on top of a cliff which gave fantastic views out to sea and round the coast on the one side and inland over miles of bush and rivers on the other. Accompanied by the harmonica, and a few litres of good lemonade we waited there until darkness and a massive thunder storm came in before making a run for it down the dune, through town and back to our tent. We paid the guy who rented out surf boards one 6 pack of beer for 2 night camping in his backyard and in return he gave us the consolation leaving gift of fresh mackerel, caught by himself that morning that we took down to the beach a barbequed straight away.
By now Christmas was fast approaching and we had decided that when it came Byron Bay was where we wanted to be. There was just one place left in mind to reach before then and that was Noosa, a busy beach town another short hop down the coast from Rainbow. Noosa was a large town compared to most paces we had been so far and the 24 hours or so we were there weren't enough to really do it justice apart from for a couple of walks I took through its Nature Reserve on a search for koalas which I finally did spot (very cute picture to follow!) on my way home from the second walk having pretty much given up.
Friday, 8 January 2010
Up Top
At Cairns, while enjoying some time relaxing by the lagoon and planning our next few days we met a new friend, Jono, who I've now been travelling with for several weeks. Sitting on a wall by the sea we discovered that we had both just graduated in science degrees, were starting teach first next year taking a gap year on the way and had both just done the same trek in
Nepal. It was enough coincidences to keep us chatting long enough to decide to hire a car together along with Sarah and drive on up to Cape Tribulation, the most northerly you can go on the East Coast on sealed roads, after that its a 4wd adventure.
Having arrived in Cairns on a sunday we spent monday chilling out and getting organised and then headed up on the tuesday. It was a meagre 1.5 hours up the coats first to a place called mossman to swim in their famous gorge full of rapids that turned out to make a pretty bumpy waterslide! We also bumped into a bunch of 4 kiwi guys who had been in our hostel the night before and we seemed to have the same sorts of plans. From Mossman we carried on up to the cape stopping only for some freshly made icecream from local fruits (including the 'chocolate pudding plant') and then on to our campsite. The receptionist happily told us happily that even though the area is renowned for its killer saltwater crocs and literally lethal jelly fish (including a close relative of the portuguese man of war)
she regularly runs in and out of the water and we ought to give it a go! She also let us know that the legendry cassowary had been seen about our camp, a bird the sixe of an ostrich with black and blue plumage we had been looking out for all day! Unfortunately we didn't spot a cassowary but on the other hand nothing ate us or stung us to death so overall I think we came off well. The afternoon was spent wondering through boardwalks in the rainforest and the the evening was spent making camp fires with the kiwis and the star gazing on a stunning deserted tropical beach, it was a moment when you have to pinch yourself that its still real.
After the cape myself and Jono dropped Sarah back in town as she was on a quest to Tasmania to refind her true love whom she had met 2500km further south and headed into the Atherton Tablelands. It is an area of high ground inland of Cairns full of picturesque lakes, waterfalls and wild life. The first night as we drove around the lake looking for a campsite a stunning crimson sunset was followed up by what looked like a trail of lava across he hill. It took a moment to realise that what we could see was several mile of forest fires!
Nepal. It was enough coincidences to keep us chatting long enough to decide to hire a car together along with Sarah and drive on up to Cape Tribulation, the most northerly you can go on the East Coast on sealed roads, after that its a 4wd adventure.
Having arrived in Cairns on a sunday we spent monday chilling out and getting organised and then headed up on the tuesday. It was a meagre 1.5 hours up the coats first to a place called mossman to swim in their famous gorge full of rapids that turned out to make a pretty bumpy waterslide! We also bumped into a bunch of 4 kiwi guys who had been in our hostel the night before and we seemed to have the same sorts of plans. From Mossman we carried on up to the cape stopping only for some freshly made icecream from local fruits (including the 'chocolate pudding plant') and then on to our campsite. The receptionist happily told us happily that even though the area is renowned for its killer saltwater crocs and literally lethal jelly fish (including a close relative of the portuguese man of war)
she regularly runs in and out of the water and we ought to give it a go! She also let us know that the legendry cassowary had been seen about our camp, a bird the sixe of an ostrich with black and blue plumage we had been looking out for all day! Unfortunately we didn't spot a cassowary but on the other hand nothing ate us or stung us to death so overall I think we came off well. The afternoon was spent wondering through boardwalks in the rainforest and the the evening was spent making camp fires with the kiwis and the star gazing on a stunning deserted tropical beach, it was a moment when you have to pinch yourself that its still real.After the cape myself and Jono dropped Sarah back in town as she was on a quest to Tasmania to refind her true love whom she had met 2500km further south and headed into the Atherton Tablelands. It is an area of high ground inland of Cairns full of picturesque lakes, waterfalls and wild life. The first night as we drove around the lake looking for a campsite a stunning crimson sunset was followed up by what looked like a trail of lava across he hill. It took a moment to realise that what we could see was several mile of forest fires!
Although we did eventually find an open campsite the peace did not last long as I woke up half way through the night with an eye so swollen I could hardly open it! In the morning we delayed our trip to the Tablelands to go via Atherton hospital where we sat in the waiting room and ate cereal with long life milk out of plastic bowls with 2 of the jokers from a pack of cards as we had forgotten our spoons. It was I think perhaps my most quintessential backpacker moment so far. The mystery of the swollen eye was solved after the long ditherings of a plump junior doctor by a House like figure who strode in trailed by all the female stud
ent doctors in the hospital (not a big place) and gave a decisive run down of possibilities, problems and solutions, deemed a certain prescription suitable and swooshed out again.
We set off to explore, first stop the "Giant Curtain Fig Tree" of which we were both seriously cycical and both extremely impressed as a growth that Tolkein himself would have been gutted to have missed out of Lord of the Rings, had he got the chance to see it. This followed up by a series of giant waterfalls, some deep ethical discussions, a few tyre skids and the decision that this was quite fun and
we might aswell carry on travelling together so we booked back into the same youth hostel and got excited about diving on the Great barrier Reef the next day.
Diving was particularly exciting for me since I had only dived 6 time before (4 on my Open Water course) so although I was qualified I was far from experienced and these promised to be my first ever unguided dives. The reef is actually a couple of hours by boat off the coast of Cairns (or at least the good diving is) and so we settled in for our boat trip on deck, trying to tan on the waay to our first
dive site "labyrinth". I was guided afterall for this die as a group of us less experienced ones buddied up with each other and were led by a Dive Master incase any of us had forgotten the basics, and after diving we were allowed as long as we wanted snorkelling off the back, clad in the extremely sexy 'stinger suite', an all in one lycra creation designed to defend one against the tentacles of killer jellyfish which unfortunately roam these waters along with the killer crocodiles and killer sharks. I did have fun though playing with myunderwaater camera (see opposite) and the reef was often shallow and good for snorkelling too. It was at the second site though that I really had fun! Now allowed to roam free of a guide, I buddied up with Jono and his previous dive partner and we reeled about, somersaulting and exploring tunnels and crevices in the coral. It was like escaping the teacher on a school trip, except for...underwater, and in Australia.
Friday, 11 December 2009
Road Trip!!!
Right! Ok, so after the hippie music festival I headed further north to the so-called "gold coast" in a car with Ammon and Sarah. The Gold Coat is an infamous sport for surfing and partying, the epicentre of which is ata place called "Surfer's Paradise", it used to be called Elkton or something but when it didn't bring in enough tourists it changed its name to be called after the nearest hotel, Surfer's Paradise, and has never looked back! It is now the Miami equivalent here with high rise buildings, malls, bars and many ways to part with cash. Oh and a big gold beach with surf. Thats what I hear at least because we stayed just down the coast from surfers in a very sophisticated apartment of a friend of Sarah's who doe something well payed in supermarkets and while she started work at a new job we fully took advantage of her new pool and beach location :)
We used the time on the gold coast there (Palm Beach to be specific) to decide on our routes onwards. I had left Sydney with the aim of seeing what turned up, Ammon had a car to return to Sydney (as he was weirdly uninsured to drive in a different state! Which incidently also has an hours time difference despite being on the same longitude) and Sarah had a one-way bus ticket to Cairns. My dilemma was that I wanted to go North but was wary of getting stuck in Cairns, 4000km from Sydney with only very expensive routes back! I decided to sign up for a car relocation for the hire company Apollo who needed a car delivered to Cairns in 4 days and would pay up to $250 of fuel and give me the car for free to do it! Luckily Sarah took pity and decided to accompany me and so we set off for Brisbane the next day to pick up the car.
After taking the wrong turn out of the train station 3 times on the way to the hire place we finally picked up our car (named WOU after a distinctive number plate) and invested $10 per day for a sat nav that we named Berty, who was not always on the ball and certainly easily confused but I'm sure meant well. The car was a shiney air conditioned automatic Toyota with cruise control, by far the slickest number I have ever driven and it certainly felt like backpacking in style! We took along our tent and provisions and stopped off first at the Galss House Mountains. Tese are a very distinctive land formation that look not much like mountains but are names after the glass houses in Kent apparently. They rise with vertical sides out of a completely flat plane and are apparently volcanic plugs in old tectonic hotspots which thousands of years ago were the same height as the land around them but now that land has sunk they remain like great volcanic posts on the landscape.
That nigh we set up camp in Bundaberg, a small sea-side town infamous here as the brand name for a large percentage of the nations alcoholic beverages. Howver we were more interested in the loggerhead turtles who lay there eggs on its beaches and once it was dark we went over to sign up for a $10 trip down to watch. It was an incredible sight to see the huge (100kg) turtle lay its eggs, then thoroughly bury them and return to the sea (it all took about an hour and she laid over 100 eggs) although we did share the experience with about 40 other keen spectators!
In the morning we headed off early with great ambitions to arrive at Eungella National Park, inland from the Whitsundays, another 600km or so up the coast. We also took our lunch break at Rockhampton where we visited our firts Aboriginal Cultural centre where apart from having a good chat with some aboriginees we were given a personal didgereedoo recital and taught to throw a boomerang! (Well at least made a start). From there we went on up to some well-regarded caves where we were given a tour round by someone clearly just out of the girl guides and learnt about how some people get married in the caves there which could only summon Miss Havisham style imagery! The cherry on top though was that walking out I saw my first wild kangaroos and wallabies (smaller kangaroos) which was very exciting!
The next 350km up to Eungella certainly felt long, and unfortunately Sarah's driving liscence had expired leaving me to cover all the miles with a steady supply of coke and cheese straws for focus. After a very unfortunate hour detour due to missing a sign post we arrived at the Platypus Bushcamp an enchanting little campsite in the middle of the forest! Unfortunately despite our 80km detour the platypus that we got up at 5.30am to look for did not appear...possibly because a barramundi fish presented itself instead but we just cant be sure! Still, with less mileage to do the next day we chilled out in rubber rings at the water hole there for a happy while before hitting the road again this time aiming for Townsville, the capital of Far North Queensland, for no more particular reason than being in the right place. We arrived and found fpr the first time we were not the only campers and actually had to share the site with others! It is strange thing here that actually there are so many amazing things in Australia that there never seem to be many people at each one...they are simply too spread out! After a very long walk into town the main highlight was a race up a giant spiders wed climbing frame on the beach there and a very nice esplanade!
On our final day we set out at 8am giving us time to visit Mission Beach before returning the car to Cairns. The beach was a beautiful secluded spot and on getting out our lovely AC car we realised we had finally reached the tropics! Palm trees and rainforest surrounded us and we also enjoyed some thai noodles from a little local market. We delivered the car just about on time and after a whistle stop tour of the coats and alot of fun had arrived at our destination!
We used the time on the gold coast there (Palm Beach to be specific) to decide on our routes onwards. I had left Sydney with the aim of seeing what turned up, Ammon had a car to return to Sydney (as he was weirdly uninsured to drive in a different state! Which incidently also has an hours time difference despite being on the same longitude) and Sarah had a one-way bus ticket to Cairns. My dilemma was that I wanted to go North but was wary of getting stuck in Cairns, 4000km from Sydney with only very expensive routes back! I decided to sign up for a car relocation for the hire company Apollo who needed a car delivered to Cairns in 4 days and would pay up to $250 of fuel and give me the car for free to do it! Luckily Sarah took pity and decided to accompany me and so we set off for Brisbane the next day to pick up the car.
After taking the wrong turn out of the train station 3 times on the way to the hire place we finally picked up our car (named WOU after a distinctive number plate) and invested $10 per day for a sat nav that we named Berty, who was not always on the ball and certainly easily confused but I'm sure meant well. The car was a shiney air conditioned automatic Toyota with cruise control, by far the slickest number I have ever driven and it certainly felt like backpacking in style! We took along our tent and provisions and stopped off first at the Galss House Mountains. Tese are a very distinctive land formation that look not much like mountains but are names after the glass houses in Kent apparently. They rise with vertical sides out of a completely flat plane and are apparently volcanic plugs in old tectonic hotspots which thousands of years ago were the same height as the land around them but now that land has sunk they remain like great volcanic posts on the landscape.
That nigh we set up camp in Bundaberg, a small sea-side town infamous here as the brand name for a large percentage of the nations alcoholic beverages. Howver we were more interested in the loggerhead turtles who lay there eggs on its beaches and once it was dark we went over to sign up for a $10 trip down to watch. It was an incredible sight to see the huge (100kg) turtle lay its eggs, then thoroughly bury them and return to the sea (it all took about an hour and she laid over 100 eggs) although we did share the experience with about 40 other keen spectators!
In the morning we headed off early with great ambitions to arrive at Eungella National Park, inland from the Whitsundays, another 600km or so up the coast. We also took our lunch break at Rockhampton where we visited our firts Aboriginal Cultural centre where apart from having a good chat with some aboriginees we were given a personal didgereedoo recital and taught to throw a boomerang! (Well at least made a start). From there we went on up to some well-regarded caves where we were given a tour round by someone clearly just out of the girl guides and learnt about how some people get married in the caves there which could only summon Miss Havisham style imagery! The cherry on top though was that walking out I saw my first wild kangaroos and wallabies (smaller kangaroos) which was very exciting!
The next 350km up to Eungella certainly felt long, and unfortunately Sarah's driving liscence had expired leaving me to cover all the miles with a steady supply of coke and cheese straws for focus. After a very unfortunate hour detour due to missing a sign post we arrived at the Platypus Bushcamp an enchanting little campsite in the middle of the forest! Unfortunately despite our 80km detour the platypus that we got up at 5.30am to look for did not appear...possibly because a barramundi fish presented itself instead but we just cant be sure! Still, with less mileage to do the next day we chilled out in rubber rings at the water hole there for a happy while before hitting the road again this time aiming for Townsville, the capital of Far North Queensland, for no more particular reason than being in the right place. We arrived and found fpr the first time we were not the only campers and actually had to share the site with others! It is strange thing here that actually there are so many amazing things in Australia that there never seem to be many people at each one...they are simply too spread out! After a very long walk into town the main highlight was a race up a giant spiders wed climbing frame on the beach there and a very nice esplanade!
On our final day we set out at 8am giving us time to visit Mission Beach before returning the car to Cairns. The beach was a beautiful secluded spot and on getting out our lovely AC car we realised we had finally reached the tropics! Palm trees and rainforest surrounded us and we also enjoyed some thai noodles from a little local market. We delivered the car just about on time and after a whistle stop tour of the coats and alot of fun had arrived at our destination!
Sunday, 29 November 2009
Sydney Goodbye
Well...for those of you who don't know. last wednesday I made a snap decision to go travelling up the coast to Cairns rather than stay in Sydney right up until New Years. I had had a good month but couldn't see much excitement on the horizon in staying another one and was starting to fel like the adventure I set out on in September was grinding down slowly to a safe standstill. My itchy feet got the better of me and now I am gone.
I am now in the visitors centre of a small town called Mullumbimby which even the people half an hour away in Byron Bay have not heard of. I came to meet up with some friends here from the Blue Mountains who were camping here at a music festival. I think we were safely the only internationals there, and the whole festival was a fantastic affair full of more hippies than I have ever see, young, old, middle aged and toddlers. My own highlight was a final rave to aboriginee didgeree doo band but the real life Aussie Sound of Music styule family country jug band were also memorable!
I'm sorry I can't add any more pictures now but we are on our way up to the Gold Coast where we hopefuly won't have any TVs thrown on our heads by partying "schoolies"!
here are a few of my last images of sydney...
I am now in the visitors centre of a small town called Mullumbimby which even the people half an hour away in Byron Bay have not heard of. I came to meet up with some friends here from the Blue Mountains who were camping here at a music festival. I think we were safely the only internationals there, and the whole festival was a fantastic affair full of more hippies than I have ever see, young, old, middle aged and toddlers. My own highlight was a final rave to aboriginee didgeree doo band but the real life Aussie Sound of Music styule family country jug band were also memorable!
I'm sorry I can't add any more pictures now but we are on our way up to the Gold Coast where we hopefuly won't have any TVs thrown on our heads by partying "schoolies"!
here are a few of my last images of sydney...
Saturday, 21 November 2009
Sydney the third
Hello there!
Well I am once again writing to you from sunny Sydney, although I'm sorry to say that this time there a few less exciting adventures to report because I was actually doing some work for several days this week! I have moved base from Coogee which is down in the south, near Bondi beach to Mosman which is a lovely surburban area on the north shore. I am currently house sitting (and more importantly plant watering) here pending a probable move even further north to Manly if I can find a place I can afford! Later today I am going to view a room in an apartment up there which makes me feel very grown up indeed!
The real highlight of this week has been dinner at Royal Sydney Yacht Squadron (I am not sure why it is known as a squadron rather than a club...but if you can shed light please leave a comment :) ). It is in a beautiful location with sweeping views out over the harbour but I was shocked to find that on ordering the marinated lamb it was given to me raw on a plate. Now, call me old fashioned, but not cooking the food in a posh institution in England would not go down so well I don't think! It turns out however that these folks are so addicted to barbeques that it is not infrequent for it to be a DIY job. Being both English and a girl I felt about as unqualified as you can be for cooking steak on a barbie, but luckily there were some Aussie blokes around with helpful tips, like please go away and leave it alone. Perfect!
Saturday, 14 November 2009
Mountains and Sea
Hello again from Sydney again!
Australia is a stranger place. It is the most like England another country could possible feel I think. It is full, well, firstly of us. I work with english people (who all had the same idea), I live with a half english person, I go travelling and meet english people. It is also full of our history, Queen Victoria buildings, Prince Henry Cliff walk, and Queen Elizabeth Road. The coins are stamped boldly with the face of our Queen, and the dollars strangley mimic our pounds and the 50cents are link enlarged 50p hectagons. They even have a national holiday for the birthday of OUR Queen, we don't get that!! My heart warmed a little when I saw that I could take the train to Croydon, which along with many other English place names is immortalized here. It si strange to think on the way past Penrith (lake dist.) or Torquay (Cornwall) that really is what the founders of these places came from and yearned. On the other hand the Australians wear pants, drive on freeways and eat chips out of foil packets so its not quite right. Oh, and the sun shines (one of my favourite bus advertisements here states simply "someone has to look after the English backpackers" It is for suncream). I find it ironic that here we are colloquialy (I would say fondly, but I suspect it is more mocking) referred to as Poms, translated to me as "Prisoners of Mother England". Centuries ago we packed off our convicts here and now the ones are left are all thinking ...dammit, if only my great grandad had been a bit more wayward I could have had all this too!
I am sorry that it has taken so long to update you on things here, just as I thought it was getting boring alot of fun things started happening again! I thought I would let you in on a few of the best bits! The picture opposite is believe it or not the hub of one of the wprlds most succesful, innovative and influential companies: Google. Although you could be forgiven for mistaking it for a children's play area. This here is the "barrier reef room" but there were beaches and jungles galore throughout the building. Still, you can't knock a system that has worked so well, and besides they let guests eat their amazing staff buffet lunches for free :)
A little while later (even if I wanted to tell you exactly I can't quite remember any more) I decided to take a trip to the blue mountains. This was partly because in all the excitement of google's inflatable crocodiles, sailing schools and living in a nice apartment I wasn't feeling much like a backer and I was becoming increasingly suspicious that I hadnt seen much of a glimps of Australia at all or met nearly enough random characters. I am extremely glad that I decided to go, because I got the lucky fortune of staying at a fantastic and friendly hostel where they had a fire outside in the evenings and once brewed a big pan of mulled wine just for free :) Also despite a setting out in the rain (again! why does this happen everytime I start walking anywhere?) on my own, ipod plugg
ed in and stomping away, I soon stumbled upon another english girl on my route and having got chatting after about 20 minutes we then caught up with a set of 3 banterous American guys and the five had a fun day of wondering about in the bush, eating cake in town and talking about the little idiosycrancies of all our commonwealth countries. I was more than chuffed at the days social success and the next day I went to Wentworth Falls with Sarah, the girl I had met first (the guys headed back to Sydney), it was an absolutely stunning walk in glorious sunshine and here is a picture that does it no justice at all.
Today, as I write this I
have just got back from my first yacht race which started in Pittswater, about 25miles up the coast from Sydney and finished up in none other than perhaps the most famous harbour in the world. It was fantastic fun, the wind was good, the sun shined, we messed up the start but still managed to pull in about 5th across the line. Here is a picture of the exciting arrival at the opera house and bridge, pleased note the actual matching team kit!!
Australia is a stranger place. It is the most like England another country could possible feel I think. It is full, well, firstly of us. I work with english people (who all had the same idea), I live with a half english person, I go travelling and meet english people. It is also full of our history, Queen Victoria buildings, Prince Henry Cliff walk, and Queen Elizabeth Road. The coins are stamped boldly with the face of our Queen, and the dollars strangley mimic our pounds and the 50cents are link enlarged 50p hectagons. They even have a national holiday for the birthday of OUR Queen, we don't get that!! My heart warmed a little when I saw that I could take the train to Croydon, which along with many other English place names is immortalized here. It si strange to think on the way past Penrith (lake dist.) or Torquay (Cornwall) that really is what the founders of these places came from and yearned. On the other hand the Australians wear pants, drive on freeways and eat chips out of foil packets so its not quite right. Oh, and the sun shines (one of my favourite bus advertisements here states simply "someone has to look after the English backpackers" It is for suncream). I find it ironic that here we are colloquialy (I would say fondly, but I suspect it is more mocking) referred to as Poms, translated to me as "Prisoners of Mother England". Centuries ago we packed off our convicts here and now the ones are left are all thinking ...dammit, if only my great grandad had been a bit more wayward I could have had all this too!
I am sorry that it has taken so long to update you on things here, just as I thought it was getting boring alot of fun things started happening again! I thought I would let you in on a few of the best bits! The picture opposite is believe it or not the hub of one of the wprlds most succesful, innovative and influential companies: Google. Although you could be forgiven for mistaking it for a children's play area. This here is the "barrier reef room" but there were beaches and jungles galore throughout the building. Still, you can't knock a system that has worked so well, and besides they let guests eat their amazing staff buffet lunches for free :)A little while later (even if I wanted to tell you exactly I can't quite remember any more) I decided to take a trip to the blue mountains. This was partly because in all the excitement of google's inflatable crocodiles, sailing schools and living in a nice apartment I wasn't feeling much like a backer and I was becoming increasingly suspicious that I hadnt seen much of a glimps of Australia at all or met nearly enough random characters. I am extremely glad that I decided to go, because I got the lucky fortune of staying at a fantastic and friendly hostel where they had a fire outside in the evenings and once brewed a big pan of mulled wine just for free :) Also despite a setting out in the rain (again! why does this happen everytime I start walking anywhere?) on my own, ipod plugg
ed in and stomping away, I soon stumbled upon another english girl on my route and having got chatting after about 20 minutes we then caught up with a set of 3 banterous American guys and the five had a fun day of wondering about in the bush, eating cake in town and talking about the little idiosycrancies of all our commonwealth countries. I was more than chuffed at the days social success and the next day I went to Wentworth Falls with Sarah, the girl I had met first (the guys headed back to Sydney), it was an absolutely stunning walk in glorious sunshine and here is a picture that does it no justice at all.Today, as I write this I
have just got back from my first yacht race which started in Pittswater, about 25miles up the coast from Sydney and finished up in none other than perhaps the most famous harbour in the world. It was fantastic fun, the wind was good, the sun shined, we messed up the start but still managed to pull in about 5th across the line. Here is a picture of the exciting arrival at the opera house and bridge, pleased note the actual matching team kit!!
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