That's All Folks!!

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The big banana certainly was big - and the chocolate ones would have been nicer if they had been less intimidating.

The koala hospital was very moving, made you want to bequeath your life savings to them. They were able to treat up to 100 koalas, but fortunately for them, but not for us, they only had 5 in there (and 5 more we couldn’t see, in intensive care). These were mainly suffering from age related illnesses, but they often get car accident victims and, of course, victims of bush fires. They have a 2 year waiting list for volunteers from overseas – I’m not surprised. It is all so sad, the councils keep cutting down their food trees, for housing.

We left Port Macquarie and headed for Nelson Bay, an absolute jewel – allegedly – we couldn’t actually tell because it bucketed down with rain and the clouds were so low you couldn’t see the hills, islands, or, indeed, anything, We had intended to stay for a few days, but it was really expensive, and the weather so bad, we decided to move on.

We took the Grand Pacific Drive down towards Sydney, through pretty fishing villages, and managed, with a bit of skilful navigating, to avoid Sydney altogether. The weather forecast was for the same weather for the reset of the week, so we took a decision, turned right, and headed inland towards Adelaide to meet up with our mates Greg and Trish.

We found a route to Adelaide we hadn’t taken before, and headed off – only 1790km! The weather improved greatly on our 4 day trip inland. There wasn’t much to see, mostly wheat fields, and fortunately no sign of the threatened plague locusts. We did see about 30 emus though, so at least there is still wildlife about.

We arrived in Oakbank on Friday evening, just in time for home made pizza – lovely. We then spent the next 2 days doing absolutely nothing. Just chilling on the deck with a beer or two and a continually sizzling BBQ. We did venture out on the Saturday night to see the new Harry Potter film in the local cinema – 10 screen cinema, Day 2 of the film, and there were all of 50 people in there!

On Monday we left Greg’s and headed south to go back to Melbourne along the Great Ocean Road. We had 4 nights, so had a long drive to Portland, then a day off, then another long drive and another day off. The weather got steadily worse again. Don’t believe anyone who says it doesn’t rain in Australia.

And now it’s all over. Syd has been polished and painted and scrubbed. He looks better than he did when we bought him Our lovely mates in Monbulk are going to sell him for us. With any luck we will get what we paid for him, and with the exchange rate difference, may even make a profit!

We have had a FABULOUS 9 months in Oz. We have seen everything, been everywhere. In total we have done just shy of 47,000km – now it’s time for more sensible(?!?) things – LIKE EUROPE and the UK CANAL SYSTEM. WATCH THIS SPACE!!

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Photos

banana
Told you the banana was big

banana2
scary things but quite yummy

caravan
This has to be the smallest caravan in the world!

locust plague
Not as many as we expected

seacliff bridge
The road goes right out into the sea.

sign
these signs are everywhere on the Great Ocean Road. I blame the Germans!

talltree
This is the tallest tree in New South Wales (alledgedly)