Another cool night gave way to a lovely day and we headed off to our next destination, Margaret River. This was not a particularly long trip so on the way we stopped off at Cape Leeuwin Lighthouse. The lighthouse, which was built in 1895, is open for tours (although not when we were there!) and guards one of the most treacherous coastlines in the world. We didn’t stay as long as we would have hoped because, although the lighthouse was closed, they still wanted to charge us to walk around the grounds - bit of a cheek we thought. But because this is the place where the Indian Ocean and the Southern Ocean meet it was a must see. So we saw the Cape, looked left and saw the Southern Ocean, looked right and saw the ... read more

After our holiday within a holiday we were back in Perth for a few days before venturing off again, but this time down south. Our first day back (Saturday) was reserved for those tedious post-holiday chores - washing etc and for Chris and I to also plan and book our trip down south. On the Sunday, just before dusk, Diane, Richard, Chris and I made our way up to Kings Park, a welcome green expanse which stretches from the Swan River back up to the inner suburbs. It affords a great view of the city and the river by day, but the reason we were here at dusk was to see the city light up at night. But firstly, before our free light show, we had a quick walk around the park taking in a small ... read more

Our lovely journey along the Great Ocean Road continued on to Port Fairy. It was once a busy trading port which reached its peak during the 1850s and exported items such as bales of wool, gold and bushels of wheat. Today the port is still active but the main trade is quite different, being crayfish, shark and abalone and also a small fleet of leisure craft. Just off the mainland is Griffiths Island, accessible over a small bridge which was named after John Griffiths who established Port Fairy’s whaling industry, which, thank goodness, doesn’t exist today. The island is mainly known for its large colony of Mutton Birds which arrive in late September from the Aleutian Islands (near Alaska) for a bit of warmth - sounds sensible to me. After laying and incubating their eggs in ... read more

On the flight across the Tasman you realise how far away New Zealand is from even its nearest neighbour, we can fly to Egypt in about the same time it takes to get from Auckland to Sydney. We landed at Sydney airport, hopped on to one of the very fast and frequent trains to central station and, wow, there are people in the Southern Hemisphere, hordes of them in fact. That is just one of the differences between the two countries. Their histories begin differently with Sydney’s indigenous inhabitants going back over 45,000 years as compared to the few hundred in NZ, but their recent tales dovetail with the onset of European settlement. In Australia it began in 1770 when Capt Cook landed at Botany Bay, claiming the East Coast for Great Britain and immediately turned ... read more

Well it’s back ‘oop north’ for what will be the first of a series of second chances. We arrived back in ‘Windy Wellington’ after a lovely ferry ride only to find out that the city had obviously been expecting us because right up the main street, almost to our hostel was a huge red carpet. At last, recognition, maybe we’ll be upgraded as well so Lisa can have her own bathroom. But no, dashed again, it turns out all the fuss and gathering crowds were in aid of the New Zealand premier of the new Peter Jackson film, Lovely Bones. So we did what all cool, laid back travellers would do, we stood and screamed “We love you Peter”. Not quite but an hour of star spotting resulted in a close encounter with Susan Sarandon, Saoirse ... read more