Advertisement
Published: November 19th 2008
Edit Blog Post
G'Day Mate
Nothing more Aussie than a "Roo G'Day Mate!
Many good days in fact. What a country! I think it would take a book of many chapters to give a fair account of all the good things on offer down under so I'll apologize in advance to the Aussies for not doing it justice. Needless to say we had a wonderful month, highlighted by the reunion of old friends and filled with the exploration of a land and culture at once so alike and so apart from our own. The Aussies are a good bunch indeed, and why shouldn't they be, the lucky bastards get to live here!
Australia, as we discovered in LARGE! Far to large to get around in a month, or many months for that matter, so we decided to stick to the East Coast and have a nice relaxed time of it rather than breaking our necks to see it all.
Our first port of call was Sydney...what a city!!! Certainly the bar has been raised and all the other cities we've seen and loved will shine a little less brightly in Sydney's shadow, with the exception of ole New York of course (let's not get carried away here) 😊. I
Jolly Swagman
Our home in Sydney, and a fair home indeed. can't really think how best to describe it. It's certainly clean...public toilets are spotless, you could eat off of the subway floor, litter does not exist on the streets, and I don't remember seeing a single rundown building. It's modern and young, it's cosmopolitan and full of character. It's beaches are world renowned and it's parks are amazing. It's large, yet not immense and it serves as a finacial capital in this part of the world, which has put some spare change in the pockets of it's citizens. It's confidant, even a little cocky, but not arrogant, and it has the swagger of a city that knows it's attributes are well above the mean. Could I live here?...I'd move here tommorrow!
Anyways, we spent 5 days here getting a good look around and enjoying some beach time. We stayed in Kings Cross, which never lived up to it's seedy reputation, but rather proved to be a vibrant little neighborhood full of character and certainly full of characters. people watching could be a sport here.
To get north from Sydney we opted once again to hit the road under our own guidance. We had heard rumours of being able
Sydney Subway
This is a subway system? Where are the rats?, the graffitti? the musicians and screaming schoolkids? If i wanted a spotless, timely and comfortable ride i would have takena cab to relocate campervans pretty cheaply and decided to check it out. Sure enough, we found one that needed to be up in Cairns in six days time and signed up to deliver it. It's a pretty sweet deal. It's only 5 bucks a day and they give you gas money and mileage and a map showing you all the places you can spend the night for free along the way. A backpackers dream really, and the campervan itself was probably better equipped than our old apartment (oven, microwave, AC, shower, toilet) it even had a dishwasher (when she wasn't navigating....hehehehe....shhhh!)
So up the coast we went, thru the ever changing and endless Aussie countryside, with eyes peeled for kangaroo's and koala's (and Fosters-which we amazingly never found!) Five days, and many many miles later, we dropped of the Campervan and hopped aboard a liveabord dive boat to go dive the great barrier reef. Needless to say the diving was amazing and after driving for five days, just floating around the reef for a few days was exactly what the doctor ordered. After diving we hung around Cairns for a few days had had a pretty good halloween night out
Bondi
The infamous Bondi beach. Hop on the subway, hop off at the beach, and a nice beach at that. These Aussies have it good with some mates from the boat. To put things in perspective, Lee went out without a costume, and came home a penguin!
After diving we made it down to Brisbane and the town of Byron Bay. It's an awesome little town on the Gold Coast, with a good mixture of beach, surf and characters mixed up from it's hippie past and yuppie present. Certainly the highlight of Byron Bay, and, I'd say Australia was meeting up with old long parted friends, that fate seemed to have conspired to reunite for a while. Lee and Myself, MK and Franscois, who met up in Byron, headed up to meet the rest of the Kennedy clan in Tallai, a cool spot just south of Surfers Paradise, where we spent an awesome week catching up, relaxing and enjoying the company of good friends. It was also the meeting of the "wife" and I'm glad Lee got to meet the folks I've spoken so fondly of for so long. Thanks again, John and Annette!
After saying our goodbyes again it was time to head back down to Sydney. We rented a little car and did some town hopping back down before heading inland
Bondi
There is a string of beaches from Bondi going south and a good Ocean walk linking them, this is from along the walk a bit to drive thru the Hunter Valley, which I guess would be akin to the Napa Valley. We did some wine and cheese tasting and did the whole vineyard thing which was pretty fun and educational, and then landed ourselves back in Sydney for a few days to get ready for the next adventure.
Australia was awesome. Having read what I've just typed I realize it's mostly bones, so we'll have to discuss the flesh over beers when we get back.
cheers for now,
Andy
Advertisement
Tot: 0.202s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 11; qc: 66; dbt: 0.1236s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
Sara Kennedy
non-member comment
Tallai Mob
Hi just loved the "tour" through Aussie. It was so wonderful to see you again Andy and we were absolutely delighted to met Lee who definitely meets with the family's approval! Love to you both Sara and JD xx