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Oceania » Australia
April 19th 2007

Published: August 7th 2007

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Charlie Boy

No Worries

This is my last blog entry for Australia, but it covers loads! Since last time I wrote I've surfed in Byron Bay, seen an Aussie Rule Football match, travelled the Great Ocean Road (GOR), slept underground in Coober Pedy, camped out under the stars and trekked around Ayers Rock (Uluru). I've covered over 5000km, or put another way I travelled from one end of the UK to the other 4 times in under 2 weeks.

I'd like to start this blog with a thank you to both Mike and Tracy because they were brilliant company and treated me to surf and turf with a heavy side serving of beer. Also thanks to Trent for putting me up for a week and showing me all sides of Melbourne!

Trent's a mate I met in Thailand and travelled through Laos with. Having a room at his place was a fantastic change from dorms, where you live in fear of bed bugs, are woken by the world's worst snoring and put up with the stench of sweaty feet (I'm little to blame there). A high point in Melbourne was watching Aussie Rules Football. Unfortunately, Trent's team got stuffed, good job I was

The MCG

Score Bulldogs 72 Adelaide 110

seceretly supporting the other team (only joking Trent!).

After Melbourne I hopped on a 3 day tour of the GOR. The people and the tour guide made this trip. Even though we covered over 1000km and had 6am starts we still partied till 5am on the last night. On our final day we chilled on a beach and went pier jumping (ignoring the shark warnings). After I'd jumped in and climbed out I noticed a huge black object swimming around my mates who'd just jumped. Obviously everyone feared the worst and as it came closer to the surface people started panicking, that is, until a guy shouted seal and sure enough up pops a huge seal, but you know what eats seals? Sharks.

The place I slept underground was really odd. There's a reason I slept underground, it wasn't for a laugh, it's because 80% of the population there sleep underground! The name comes from Aborigine and actually means white man's cave. Their homes are like caves and after talking to the people who live there, trust me when I say it's not good for you! Coober Pedy is the world's Opal capital so guess what the locals

Commiseration Drinks

Keep smiling Trent.

do? They constantly 'extend' their homes and if they stumble across some Opal it's theirs to keep. After that odd experience I travelled an unpleasant 3000km to Ayers Rock.

My Ayers Rock experience was the best thing I've done in Australia (maybe that's because I couldn't get booze so I actually remember it!). I spent 2 nights and three days camping and trekking around the national park. On both nights I slept under the stars, which was brilliant once I ignored everything waiting to kill me. During the day I trekked 30km around the three main sites. These areas are to the Aboriginies what Mecca is for Muslims. We probably wouldn't be allowed to visit if the Australian government hadn't made the Aborigines sign a contract when they gave the land back to them. The Aborigines have been in Australia over 50,000 years, which is a little longer than the people who followed Captain Cook in 1770. Regardless of that the settlers took the land and didn't recognise Aborigines as citizens of Australia until the 1960s and up until then it was legal to kill them (shocking pub quiz knowledge for you).

Now I'm sat in Sydney chilling

Melbourne

A great city!

out before I fly to New Zealand - the land of Hobbits and insane adventure sports.

Hope everyone is doing well. I saw the UK weather report over Easter and it looks like you got your first BBQ of the year, well New Zealand is cold so I'll be wearing hiking boots and a rain coat!

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