Melbourne to Sydney

---

From Melbourne we headed down to a massive national park called Wilsons Promontory. It's the southern most point on the mainland, in case that ever comes up in a pub quiz or something. We'd read that there was a beach within the park called Squeaky Beach, so obviously that was what we headed for. Something to do with the sort of sand on the beach means that when you walk, it squeaks. After a bit of a walk through woodlands to get to it, we found it deserted except for a few old folks, who soon scarpered when they saw the menacing shapes that we cut on the horizon...or perhaps they were going anyway. The thing that the guide books don't tell you is that to make the sand squeak, you have to walk like a bit of a twat! Thankfully, we're both well rehearsed at this so were soon making the beach sing like a little mouse. Rather than walk back the same way, we decided (after carefully studying the tiny map on some flyer) that it would be the same distance to walk a different way back. 1 hour and a severe case of sunburn later, we arrived back at the carpark. I'm sure the drivers who passed us on the road as we traipsed, shirtless & delirious had a good chuckle at the 2 loonies who decided to walk along the roads where there is absolutely no cover from the sun. Oh well. As we left the park we tuned in to the local radio station, (by accident really, we were looking for a decent rock station) and found out that most of the area around us was on fire. Bit of a strange position to find yourself in. On looking more carefully, we realised that most of the clouds we could see were actually smoke clouds from the fires. Wasn't til we saw the papers over the next few days that we realised how big a deal it was. Pretty devastating. Saw some horrible photos and stories in the news over here.

That night we arrived in Maffra. A funny little town which earned the vastly hilarious moniker, Her'maffra'dite. There was no one around so Gary seized the opportunity to organise his 1st weeks worth of collecting Australian pamphlets and flyers and to re-organise the contents of his rucksack which seemed to have managed to spread themselves across all 4 corners of the car! That night at the hostel (Cambria Backpackers) was open mic night so we enjoyed watching the locals do there thing until they somehow got it out of us that we both played guitar. While Garys left handed "excuse" stood him in good stead, I had to whine my way out of getting up there to play instrumental versions of our old bands songs. I don't think the small town of Maffra was quite ready for that. The couple who run the hostel are well friendly and the woman kept popping her head round our door for a chat. I like it when people at hostels seem to have a genuine interest in what you're upto and want to help out. Didn't really get much of that in the Melbourne hostels...probably cos they were too busy cleaning up sick. It's a shame that, due to our limited time in Oz, we tend to be staying in places for just 1 night. Doesn't really give you time to settle down and see the area or get to know any people.

Our next stop was Jindabyne. Like the movie, yes. It's mainly a ski resort but Gary had been talking to a guy up there about some mountain bike rides. On the way we stopped at 90 Mile Beach for a spot of lunch and a bit of a walk down the beach. Only managed 88 of the 90 miles though. Good beach though. Nice and deserted. The drive to Jindabyne took us 4 hours from there, as opposed to the hour and a half we'd estimated by looking at the map. We hadn't taken into account the crazy dirt track that went through the mountains. Beautiful to drive through really, but not when you're in a rush to get somewhere...and definitely not when there are some serious drops off the edge of the roads and not even a hint of a barrier. The town and the hostel were both pretty much empty. The guy from the hostel got his mate to drive him round from home to let us in. Had a 10 bed dorm to ourselves which was cool, but felt like a missed opportunity to bond with some other traveller types. There was only 3 other people in the place. 1 guy went on the ride with Gary the next day while I started to walk around the lake. After an hour I thought that walking any further around the lake in 40 degree heat might start to do some permanent damage so retired to the hostel for a few hours quality reading.

After Jindabyne we returned to the coast where the little towns, beaches and national parks continued to be quaint, beautiful and breathtaking (in that order) and a joy to drive through. I think we might have experienced our first cool breeze at this point on the coast too.

The Narooma YHA is a converted motel and our room had an ensuite, a sink and a fridge! Pretty swish. Our room mate here was a guy from Chicago called Kyle who was cycling up the east coast. He was big, hairy and very American. He just talked so much. I think he might have had 1 or 2 beers before we got there though. He tagged along on our walk to the local supermarket and entertained himself by laughing at the funny foreign foods that he found. Chilled back at the room watching the end of Election. Said our goodbyes in the morning and said that we'd get in touch when we hit Chicago. If there's the chance of a free night somewhere, we're most definitely on it!

Our mission for the day was to get as close to Sydney as possible. We stopped at Batemans Bay for lunch and saw a few sealions twatting about on the rocks. They're just posers really. Actually, this might have been at some other bay. We stopped at a few that day. Kiama had a blowhole but it wasn't blowing when we got there so had to make do with a pretty sunset instead.

We got as far as Woolongong and pulled up outside the YHA there, which also happened to be the university. Weird. Although not as weird as the fact that the whole town seemed to shut down at 9pm! We had a wander round to see what was shakin but the only things we could find that were open were a few kebaberies. Not sure who they were open for, we were the only people on the streets. Saw a few people hanging around by the beach, but they looked a bit dodgy so we stayed clear. Didn't want to stumble across some sort of secret dogging scene! Actually....

After a night of pretending we were students back at uni, we got an early start and finished the Grand Pacific Drive to Sydney. Didn't stop anywhere on the way. Think we may have overdone the scenic coastal stretches over the last few days. Got to Coogee beach at lunchtime and had a mooch around the place. Nice enough beach resort but nothing too spesh. Decided instead to head to Bondi Beach as they had another open air cinema type thing going on there too. The YHA here had a bit of a crazy guy working there, well not just a bit, all of him worked there. Spouted some bollocks with him for a while. Afterwards we debated whether he had a wang eye or not. I said he did, Gary suggested otherwise. Methinks this was because he was looking at both of us at the same time. In our dorm we talked briefly with some English guy who had come over here to look for teaching work. He was a bit dull really so I opted for the 'stare out the window' approach to the art of conversation. The loony at reception gave us his own interpretation of the directions to the open air cinema. After driving half an hour we found out that it was 10 minutes walk from our hostel. Twat! The film was a documentary type thing called Shark Water about the shark fin industry and conservation efforts. Pretty interesting and weird that a week or so later there would be 2 shark attacks right here in Bondi! Spooky. This was nothing like the open air cinema in Melbourne though. Half way through the film, the heavens opened. Literally dampened our spirits a bit. We spent the rest of the evening in the common room drying out while some Italian guys played dodgy euro pap out their laptop speakers.

From Bondi we drove to the northern part of Sydney and stopped in Manly for a late breakfast on the Corso. The weather was gorgeous so we had a meander round the town. Found a charity shop with an amazing selection of cheap books. It was here that I started my great Australian book collection which would number about 7 by the time we left the country. Manly was a cool place but we'd only heard bad things about the hostels so decided that we'd drive a bit further north to the Collaroy YHA which came highly recommended by well travelled little sister. All was going well until 30 seconds after dropping our bags in our dorm when we discovered our room mate was a 70 year old cockney racist. Great. Didn't want to spend too much time in there anyway! The place was cool though. Pretty big hostel and the beach was just over the road and there was an old cinema just next door.

Our 1st day there we drove to Manly and got the ferry from there straight into Sydney Harbour. The by now legendary views of the opera house and bridge still seemed pretty impressive to us as we pulled into the dock. Although, the opera house isn't as white as you expect it to be. We spent the day walking the streets of Sydney. It was a scorcher of a day and developed a bastard of a headache pretty quick. Spent the day trudging round in a mood while Gary went in search of some vegan friendly place. The Newtown district was pretty cool but the rest of Sydney that we saw was nothing special really. Lots of expensive shops if shopping's your thing. Back in Collaroy we went to the old cinema to watch Vicky Christina Barcelona. Really made me want to visit Spain. Really made me want to marry Scarlett Johansson too. Our last day in Collaroy was spent bumming around and not doing much. To make up for this we decided to head into Sydney to, and I quote "Australias number 1 alternative/rock night". Oh dear. It was like the DJ had about 10 dodgy rock albums that he just had on random all night. The same rubbish bands all night. In addition to this there were 3 shit electro/goth bands downstairs and more security staff than punters. To top the night off, we got pulled over by some police road block on the way home. It looked like an accident at 1st with all the lights and the policeman signalling for us to drive around it. When we started to, he jumped out in front of us and waved us down. When we'd stopped he told us that when a policeman flags you down, you should stop. Felt like giving him some lip, probably cos I was a bit pissed, but thought better of it. It just cemented my opinion that Aussie coppers are all bastards. Turns out it was only a random breathalyser check. Good job that Gary's been sober for over 10 years then.

The drive upto Sydney was amazing. Some beautiful sections of the coast and loads of cool little towns to stop for lunch at. Didn't think that much of Sydney though. Preferred the beach resorts to the city itself though. Way more chilled out. Our attempts to break free of the city were hampered by some particularly nasty weekend traffic that we were sat in for over an hour, but finally we were free and headed towards the Blue Mountains National Park.

---

Comments

[Chubi Jr]

Nice bloggage Chubensk! Sounds like hilarity has indeed prevailed. V nice work on the police check. Well done Gary for hating alcohol. Never thought I'd say that. Liking the writing bro, seems to be getting better with every entry. I knew you had it in you, you twat. Lots of love, and etc, and fags....Chubi Jr xxx