Happy Australia day

---

21st Jan
Stayed in a great free rest area right in the bush - idealic - until the logging lorries started coming past !

22nd Jan
Went Canberra today and had a look around the Parliament Building - very impressive. Sadly they are not sitting at the moment - summer recess, otherwise we could have sat in on the debates in both the House of Representative (based on our Commons) and the Senate (based more on the American system than our House of Lords as the members are elected).
They even have a copy of our Magna Carta there! And a monument which looks vaguely like the real one in Runneymede, but not quite!

23rd Jan
Arrived at the Sydney RV centre to see what they are going to do about all the problems we have had with the van. They did give us a really nice television (to replace the one that should have been in the van and wasn’t) but I suspect they will wriggle out of paying for all the things that should have been under warranty. They deal in $400,000 Winnebago’s so I think we are probably an embarrassment. They have agreed to take the van into the workshop and make sure there is nothing else wrong which is nice of them, but I would rather have my $3000 back!
It also means we have to stay here for several days as it is the Australia Day Bank Holiday weekend. Luckily we managed to book the last remaining pitch on a nice site right on the beach. They only had 3 nights available but we are hoping someone will go home early and we can pinch their pitch. It is nice to have a proper pitch for ones, but they are really close together and this site is so busy and so noisy we are already longing for the stars and the wildlife.

24th Jan
Purchased a Daytripper pass ($17) and headed to Circular Quay via bus to Manly then the ferry. It was a great trip but it took us nearly 2 hours. How they can call the place we are in Sydney is beyond me - it is like saying Brighton is a suburb of London - still it keeps their prices up! These passes are great, you can use any train, ferry or bus in the greater Sydney area. So we did! We ferried to Darling Harbour for Lunch then messed about on boats and busses for the rest of the day. Temperature was up to 43° today which was awful! Nice to be back in the airconditioned van!! Temp is supposed to be back to something sensible tomorrow so will spend the day on the beach doing nothing. Monday is Australia Day so hoping to head back to Darling Harbour to see some fireworks.

---