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Published: July 12th 2012
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Melbourne
Great night out with good food, music and friends At last, here’s what you’ve all been waiting for. That last entry!
I have to admit that we actually finished our trip 2 weeks ago but due to a whirlwind time of it finding somewhere to live, furnish it, get a job and buying a new car, the blog has been pushed to the side. However, I now have a spare evening to delight you one last time with our final few adventures and I’ll try to make it shorter than the last one.
Actually, the last 4 weeks of our trip went pretty smoothly. We left Maleny and followed the coast south making a detour through Dorrigo national park where we checked out some more waterfalls and had our first ‘snow in Australia’ experience. Quite bizarre really.
Popping back out at the coast again after driving through beautiful green farm land and hills, we continued south for a few days until we by passed Sydney and turned sharply west to chug our way up the Blue Mountains where we were met with the most stunning views overlooking the Three Sisters rock formation. The photos don’t do it justice nor do you get the sense of just how
gigantic these formations are. We had a good look around, did a little walk that led down some very steep steps and onto one of the sisters. A great work out coming back up!
We had a chat about where we wanted to stay that night and decided it was high time we stopped being soft and bush camped. We’d had the luxury of caravan parks for quite a while and wanted to find our inner nomad so we picked a spot at the bottom of the blue mountains called (now, this is true and it still makes me giggle) Bummaroo. And yes, there were heaps of kangaroos. A beautiful spot and all to ourselves. We settled in for the night and started to notice how cold the temperature was getting. Out came the hats, gloves, scarfs, layers, sleeping bags, and blankets. A chilly night passed only for us to wake the next morning to discover that ice had formes on the INSIDE of our van. This didn’t bode well for the rest of the trip and I wasn’t looking forward to a month of freezing cold nights. Now we know why everybody else was heading in the northern
direction! Great planning on our part! Plus, the van was so cold we couldn’t get it started. It’s definitely a WA van.
Canberra was a little better. Still really, really cold but no ice inside the van this time. Woo Hoo. We caught up with a friend of Tom’s, hit the most awesome mountain bike trails (though Tom has a different opinion, which I suppose he’s entitled to) and checked out parliament house. A pretty good few days really.
Continuing south towards Melbourne, we couldn’t resist stopping off at one of the most famous Towns in Victoria. GLENROWAN! Heard of it? Probably not but it was the location of Ned Kelly’s last stand. This funny little village has all the spots marked out and descriptions of how that last night played out. It’s actually quite interesting plus it holds the biggest Ned Kelly statue ever AND does great pies!
Another interesting bush camp, this time a little warmer as Tom built a fantastic camp fire, and accompanied by some a nice group of hunters there for the long weekend with their prize catch hanging in a tree. Interesting fellows to chat to though.
A beautiful sunny
morning spent on the Howqua (Toms dream fly fishing location) fly fishing though on the last day of the season, so not much luck. But we did get to see Fry’s hut which was cool and have a nice amble in the countryside. A stop over that night in Bonnie Doon (anybody who’s seen ‘The Castle will appreciate this), and then onto Melbourne.
An awesome –almost a week- time spent in and around Melbourne catching up with friends and relatives, mountain biking, drinking beer and coffee, eating and hanging out at the Peninsula Hot Springs. A beautifully set up Hot Spring with wonderful views, when you could see them through all the other bodies, lots of different pools hot and cold, and steam rooms. A very relaxing afternoon.
Passing though Leongatha we decided to head to Wilsons Promontory and take in the stunning coastal scenery. It was wild and windy and fantastic. We were warned not to leave food out as the wombats get a little aggressive so of course that’s exactly what we planned to do just so that we would get to see one. This was not necessary however because, as we were chilling out reading
our books in the van, it suddenly started rocking (and no, it was nothing to do with me and Tom) so we poked out heads out and there was a wombat having a good old scratch against our roo bar. Of course, we then rugged up with hats and scarves, head torches and camera and went on a wombat hunt. They managed to allude us for quite a while until, as we were doing the dishes, we practically tripped over quite a few of them as they wondered about the camp ignoring us as we snapped away. They’re pretty cool.
Sale was our next stop over to visit Tom’s aunty, uncle and cousin and then the grand finale!! Snowboarding in Perisher.
This was always going to be the most expensive, no expense spared ending to our honeymoon and it was too. We stayed in a cheaper end of the market lodge but it was still lovely. A cooked breakfast every morning and a bar on site.
We arrived on the mountain on Friday afternoon to their first blizzard of the year. The snow dumped down all night and to our delight produced some fantastic snow for the
whole weekend. We had two great days though even with lessons, I never did regain the top quality skills I had in whistler (he he) and by the end of the second morning I was battered, bruised and sore, but content.
It was then a matter surviving the drive over the Snowy mountains where we reached the hight of 1500 meters and loads of warnings about wearing snow chains (we didn't have any). Luckely, even though it did snow, it wasn't thick enough to cover the road. It was still a little nerve racking. The next part was easy, hopping from one farming town to another, though Parks where thay have a huge telescope that looks like a satalite dish and has a movie made about it, until we finally reached Brisbane and it’s all over red rover!
We have had the most fantastic and were both very sad to finish. We even miss the van just a little bit. She did us proud!
We’re now just about settled in Brisbane. We’re renting in Chapel Hill – within riding distance of some mountain biking trails –and have lots of space for guests. We’re looking to down size
our transport tomorrow to something more fitting for the Brisbane hills, our van doesn’t like the ups and downs much, plus I found out today that I have a teaching position that starts a week on Monday. It’s all go, go, go. It doesn’t feel like we’ve had a holiday at all!! Only joking.
Anyway, we’re going to be here for a while and everyone is more than welcome to come and visit. We’re also setting up a land line so I’ll pass the number on when we get it.
We hope everyone is well and that this last blog isn’t too long.
Loads of love
Anna and Tom
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