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So 7 of us hired a gorgeous Kia Carnival 8 seater car and were armed with a map, a week and a plan...
Our original idea was to try and go around the coast and the most southern poiunts of Australia... but just like at home there has been an enormous amount of flooding here in south New South Wales and the main highway was closed.
So plan 2 was to head inland over 1200km to Sydney. We picked up our sparkling new car and tried our best to fit 7 large Backpacks and numerous other little bags into the back. We headed out of the main part of Melbourne and found our way to Ramsay Street! its the set where Neighbours is filmed and even though its just a tiny little cul-de-sac of 5 houses and its not even called Ramsay St...its called Pinoak Court...it was still really exciting to stand outside the old Robinson House and Karl and Susan's bungalow etc! how sad!
Our first day after Ramsay Street we hit the highway and headed East towards a really nice small town called Eildeen next to a lovely lake. we stopped for lunch..sarnies in the car
a "Dom Dom Saddle" (we are still amused by the names). Then Ant jumped behind the wheel and did really well on the mountain roads until we got to our Caravan park for the night called "Blue Gums" we had a cute little row of dorms rooms almost to ourselves and had a good time driving to the spectacular lookouts over the English looking landscape. Then a fab Spag Bol for 7 people me and Leanne made. It was really nice to be somewhere itn Oz that had never seen a backpacker before.
Up early on our second day packed the car and headed off towards our second stop...(which we literally chose to visit just because it had a funny name!!)...called "Wagga Wagga"! we drove for just over 6 hours and eventually arrived at our lush private cottage. it was lovely and warm and it was so nice to have our own kitchen and not have to share with other scruffy backpackers. Had an amazing meal that me and Lindsay prepared of pork stirfry...yum yum...and the Israelies taught me how to make rice..got it down to a T now!Wagga Wagga was also untouched by backpackers and the next morning
we were totally shameless at standing having our picture taken with the sign in the middle of town...yes we all got some funny looks!
The next morning after our tourist picture taking we drove through the town of "Gumly Gumly"...honestly im not making these names up! and drove towards the Snowy Mountains...stopping at the pretty Adelong Falls and Blowers Dam on the way... the spectacular Snowy Mountains are very popular this time of year for the skiing season...yes there is snow here now! we saw lots of the white stuff and even had to put on Snow Cahins at one point in a blizzard. Ant, Will and Dave between them did an excellent job of getting them on and off in the freezing cold! and was amazing to say we saw snow in July! After the Snowy Mountains we drove the last few hours to Canberra and into a seperate state the Australian Capital Territory. We found our hostle and had a few drinks out in the Aussie Capital. Whilst having very amusing shopping trolley races on the wasy home!
The next day we spent our time wandering around the Capital city. its completely purpose built and there
isn't much going on apart from the Parliment buildings... we walked to the New Parliment Building and had an interesting tour around the massive building. Then we walked past the Old Parliment and walked to the impressive War Memorial. which are all the most famous attractions in Canberra. Then we cut Dickies hair! lol
After Canberra we headed off in our car upto a place called Bathurst about 5 hours north of the Capital. Dickie was desperate to visit there as there is a race track there... it looks like the real thing and Dickie, Ant and Lindsay (aka Mrs Stig..taking the mick out of Top Gear) all had a good exciting drive around the track. It would probably have been more exciting if it wasn't still classed as a public road with a speed limit of 60kmph!
After our fun at Bathurst we drove the last hour or so to Katoomba which is a lovely little mountain town in the heart of the Blue Mountains. There we went out to the local pub and sat there listening to karioke surrounded by the most Australian stereotypes of propa 'Aussie Blokes and Sheilas' you can think of!
The next
day we had a chill out day and just had a lesiurly drive around the Mountains stopping at a few lookouts and waterfalls. and that night had a fab curry made by Anthony, Dave and myself! twas amazing. The next day we checked out of our hoistel and drove to Echo Point which looks over the 3 Sisters and with everyone else we did the walk that we did in March when we visited the Blue Mountains for the day. We had lovely blue skies and sunshie both times and it was still exciting to get the steepest train in the world back up!
After that we drove to Wentworth Falls and had Sarnies in the car before walking down to the lookout over the lush waterfalls. and on the way back into Sydney we stopped at the Olympic Park where the 2000 Sydney Olympics were held...everyone else enjoyed our mini tour! it is really nice to be back in Sydney..back on Kings Cross just like old times!
Had a canny night out last night in the Cross...hope evryones ok back at home...still missing you all loads. xxx
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Grandma Betty & Bronwen
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Great to keep up with your travels, sounds like all that cooking when you were little paid off. Lots of love from both of us