EllienMark

We arrived in Christchurch late on a friday night and the place was still buzzing. After a 5 hour flight however, we weren't so we stocked up on food and settled in to watch Oceans 13. Can't beat a bit of Brad! Next morning, after a quick scout round town to get breakfast and a fishing rod, we were picked up and taken to our new home for the next 3 weeks, our very own Campervan!!! It was a transit van but was quite spacious inside as long as we didn't both want to move at once. After going though some of the faults that we noticed we hit the road and headed south to Lake Tekapo. The journey was 'awesome'. The mountains were snow capped, fields were green and the roads went up and down ... read more

Doing this the other way round now, you get to see the pictures first instead of a big long essay on where we've been and what we've been up to! Stories will follow, but heading out for last few hours of Melbourne sightseeing and that's more important right now! As you may have noticed I've gone back and put on loads of other missing photos, only a couple more entries still to go (Thanks very much to Bettina for the unlimited computer access (as well as many other things including your wardrobe, home and fridge!). Unfortunately we lost a few entries when the Blog computer crashed so if anyone has saved our story about the trip South with our mums could you please let us know, I can't get it back. My mum has saved most ... read more

We've been on the road (sea) again, hooray! Our mums arrived in Perth on Tuesday and after a couple of days acclimitising (to the cold and rain????) and getting over jet-lag, we headed off to Rottnest Island, a mere 26 km from Fremantle Harbour. The crossing was a tad choppy and Kay got soaked but we spotted dolphins bobbing around in the harbour before we left so that made it quite exciting (Mark and I have spotted dolphins every time we've gone to Freo on the train so I guess they are quite common for Ozzies who laugh at us when we get so excited to see them). Louise and Tom met us off the boat and we had a barbie together catching up with news on our balcony before they had to head off for ... read more

It was so hard to leave Mabul! I got up for an early morning dive on the last morning where I saw lots of really interesting stuff - rare nudibranches that looked like flowers and a mum and dad fish blowing oxygen onto their eggs! It was just me and the dive master so we were able to take our time and look at all the micro stuff that Mabul is famous for. The way the sun was streaming through the water picking out colours was just amazing and even down there the light has that special early morning quality to it ( I don't get to see it too often!). It was so peaceful and inspiring. I love diving. Before we left I got another specially made veggie lunch - an omelette. That was my ... read more

We stayed at the Sepilok Jungle Resort which really is a jungle resort. It was a stunning setting with wooden walkways through the trees to the accomodation past lakes and over bridges. There was so much to see there, loads of birds, butterflies, beautiful plants, big lizards, turtles and the noise they all made was incredible! The cafe was full of people swapping stories of their adventures so far in Borneo, people had been up mountains, through jungles and down to the depths of the sea! We didn't boast about how many James Bonds we had seen as we knew they'd all just be jealous. After an early night we were up bright and breezy for breakfast (eggs, would you believe?) and then off to the Sepilok Orang-Utan sanctury just along the road. It functions as ... read more