some time in december. in australia. in a galaxy far far away...

18th december
Still in Burleigh heads. Went to the beach, Surfed a bit. Fell off a bit. Got caught up in the rip a bit. Drowned a bit. Got tired a lot. Joey sunbathed. Maybe next time i'll join her. In the afternoon (or arbo as it's known here) we walked in burleigh heads NP. This walk was notable for having the biggest lizard i've ever seen. It was a foot and a half long basking in the sun. Maybe he too had had a tough morning on the gold coast's waves. This is probably the best campsite we've been in. Everyone's really friendly and it wouldn't be the end of the world if we were staying here over christmas...


19th december
Goodbye gold coast. Goodbye queensland. Hello new south wales. The only differences so far is traffic volumes. Anyway, two hours after leaving goldie, we arrived in Byron Bay. Where do I begin. Beaches? Stunning - you can see shipwrecks just off the coast. Town? Very nice. Amenities? Excellent. Camp-site? Okay. Locals? Pleasant. Travellers? Freaks. Serious freaks. Look at me, i'm finding myself. Look at me i've dyed my dreads pink and made my own clothes, i'm so unique. Sure, you and the dozens of other crusty clones. We went to lunch at a pleasant café, but ended up leaving abruptly after somehow ending up in conversation with two of the strangest (and drunkest and highest) men ever. They tried to buy us lunch and drinks. Then they admitted that they were making a film. Cue joey putting her jumper on, despite the heat...

At about ten pm the drumming circles started on the beach. Tools. The biggest irony was that by about midnight it was silent and all the wild ones were tucked up in bed.

20th december
After the huge success of snorkelling on the reef, we decided to go out onto the julian rocks marine park 3km off the coast. We were told that turtles were common and we might see giant rays and sharks. No matter how hard we looked, we couldn't find those darned sharks, however we did stumble upon one giant turtle napping on the sandy bottom and one young turtle swimming near us. Not to mention a myriad of brightly coloured fish. As this was not shallow coral, it was far more affected by the weather than at the great barrier reef. After an hour bobbing around on 3-4ft swell, all but one of the seven of us started to feel a little peaky. In fact on the boat back I was so close to puking. I went white but recovered quickly on dry land.

I had another go at surfing later in the afternoon (more bruises and near death experiences), and then we went out for a couple of beers after dinner - just to see what the fuss was all about. Pretty tame...

A lot of people love byron bay, and it's undeniably beautiful but it's no longer the hippy epicentre (hippycentre?) it once was. As our guide book says "these days it's about as alternative as MTV".


21st December
Drove down to Port Macquarie. Macquarie was an early governor in the original colony down in the south and his name crops up everywhere - towns, parks, buildings, malls... Nice town but it rained the whole time we were there...

Hmm, I smell a 30th birthday on the way...


22nd December
Cessnock is the main town in the Hunter valley. It's probably the closest we've been to the outback, but it's actually wine country. It was also mosquito country. We'd avoided them on the coast once we left the tropics and didn't expect to meet them this far south... Anyway, I got eaten alive. Again. We spent most of the evening drinking with an aussie family who were local to the area but spending christmas in the campsite. They had really strong accents which must have been the aussie equivalent of an english west country accent. They taught us some new words. My favourite being "wozza", which is really woman or your wife. The example they gave us in context was "hey, wozza, get us another beer". Amusing.


23rd December
Hunter valley wineries. We went to draytons, ivanhoe, rosemount, lindemanns... The list went on. I tasted quite a few, and joey drove. It was a really nice area and really easy to navigate, despite the amount of wine i'd drunk by 11am! Unfortunately though, we couldn't spend all day there as we'd decided to get down to sydney in good time for christmas.

After an uneventful drive we arrived at narabeen (north sydney) only to be told that the campsite had a four night minimum stay, which at $60 a night was $240. We were booked into an apartment the following day, so there was no way we were paying $240 for one night in a campsite when our apartment was only $180. So, whilst the staff at the campsite were completely unhelpful, the staff at the apartment were bonzer! They managed to squeeze us in a night early, and the apartment was awesome! Massive one bedroom with two balconies giving distant views to bondi, located above a mall with nice restaurants and a supermarket. Ripper!


24th December
Still can't get my head round aussie christmas. It's too hot. Why are people wearing santa hats and reindeer ears. Reindeers would hate this heat. I fear santa might struggle himself with all those layers. Maybe he just wears his undies and a vest on the aussie leg.

We went to the supermarket and got the grub in for a makeshift english christmas day - chicken, potatos, veg etc. Everyone else was buying sausages, burgers, steak and shrimps. I wanted a bbq so badly...

In the afternoon we got the train into the city and caught our first glimpse of the opera house and bridge. Very impressive. Obviously by this point I was getting rediculously excited by the prospect of santa's arrival. As they say here - one more sleep!


25th December
Christmas Day......(Joey)
Well, in true Aussie style we decided to spend the day at Bondi. After a delightful cooked brekkie, we sauntered down to the beach to watch the revellers, tourists and families celebrate santa's jaunt down under! No reindeer for this guy, a ute pulled by NSW's finest sheep maybe! The sun was shining, the surf was up and a great time had by all. We then bused back to the junction for a spot of roast choock and a few glasses of hunter valleys finest.


26th December (Joey)
The festival that is my birth began today! After a morning spent watching the cricket on the big screen downtown, my lovely husband announced that he had a surprise planned for the afternoon......yes, that's right, the Harbour Bridge climb! Apparently there were no climbs on the actual birthday as apparently there is this little tinpot firework display going on in the harbour which means preparation on the 30th...very selfish if you ask me, all for the sake of a few bangers and a ropey catherine wheel! The bridgeclimb was brilliant, it involves donning a rather fetching all in one suit with a harness to secure yourself to the bridge when you walk. It takes about 2 hours and you get to climb right over the steel girders, above the cars to the highest point. The views were amazing, we could see right over to bondi and out to sea and the jewell of the harbour (the opera house) was right in front of us....a brilliant and memorable start to the birthday celebrations indeed!


27th December (Joey)
Lane Cove Campsite
Now downgraded to the local campsite, except it's not really a downgrade as is situated in a National Park a few miles from Sydney CBD. Saw possums, cockatoos and skinks loitering round the van....excellent. Met nice fellow campers and enjoyed a few drinks al fresco listening to the sounds of the forest.


28th December (Joey)
The Blue Mountains
Drove the 2hours west from Sydney to the Blue Mountains National Park. They are referred to as "blue" because of the blue tinged mist given off from the native eucaliptus trees that grow all over them. The mountains are UNESCO world heritage listed and surfice to say are very pretty indeed. We stopped at Wentworth falls on the way to Katoomba (the central point to visit the mountains). The falls were relitively small compared to the beasts in NZ but this was mainly a result of the lack of water due to current drought conditions in the region. Went for a nice walk admiring the 3 sisters rocks and kings tableland on the way. Saw lots of cockatoo's too....very nice indeed.


Joey's Musings:- 2 more sleeps till i'm 30! xxx