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Published: March 14th 2006
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Anaconda III
steady as she goes Probably one of the biggest things inconveniences about living half way around the world from home is missing your friends and family. As I’m slowly finding out friends made over decades aren’t easily replaced.
So I was delighted when Biesty decided to make his first visit to Oz coincide with my birthday. Even though I’d only seen him the week before the first night in a new city was always going dangerous but with it landing on a Friday……. Toxic!!!!
Starting off across the bridge a quick trip to the offie (bottle’o) stocked us well for a Japanese BYO perhaps a little too well as only four out of the nine attending seemed to be drinking. Ditching the non drinkers and heading back across the bridge for some bright lights. The Establishment has imported it’s door policy from London so we choose the tacky bar across the way to be a point of rendezvous before moving trying to get in……. but it didn’t take long for a few rounds of shots to start up and before we knew a couple of hours had passed. Not even getting within five meters from The Establishment before we turned away it was
sounds like sundays
where are the three lucky ladies time to pick new final destination. Tank just behind seemed to be with our stumbling distance and having been kicked back just moments earlier everyone everybody had quickly gone to acting school. Yet still the doormen let us in only on the condition that we drank water for the next hour…..????? So first round at the bar five beers, five shots - one hour later… out we went. Many people had said that Jacksons on George was a last salvation and even they had to persuaded to let us in…. so old friends and new cities don’t match!!!!
Saturday was much tamer with the only point of interest being a first and last visit to the Chinese Laundry a club for which reputation seems to be the only good thing.
There was only one place to go for Birthday celebrations…. Sounds on Sunday - for the three months I’ve been residing in Sydney already spent six of my Sundays there. I seriously have it as the best club in the world. The music and atmosphere is tops, the girls a world class, the drinks are reasonably priced and it’s all outdoors in the sun…. Chamone! It
Khello Ladies
two more glasses pleze... was only the three of us that made it out but for m the best nights are always in small groups….. plenty of boots boots the chemist and one massage to go was pleasant if not alarmingly immature way to welcome my 29th year.
The next weekend we were up the coast for some sailing in the Whitsundays. Stephen (biesty senior) had organised the accommodation and boat. I arrived a day later and was surprised/amused/loving it when I saw they were staying 10 mins walk out of town… in a hostel….. in a shared dorm…. with no en-suite and it stank. People often mention my name a flashpacker in the same sentence but I do budget when I need to however a weekend away when I’m working there’s no need. ‘Verbal warning’ to organiser number one!!!!!
The boat didn’t set sail till 7pm that night so after frying ourselves on Airlie beaches beautiful lagoon for a few hours we hit the pub where we found are selves in the middle of happy hour…… when in Milan Rodney When in Milan.
How much fun was going to be had over 3 nights on a boat
was always largely going to depend on who the other 20 strangers were going to be but with a days worth of watching the Airlie Beach clientele experience behind us we were fairly confident we’d be fine. Still turning up at the boat nicely lubricated the apprehension was almost like a first day at school, checking everybody out!! At first glance we were slightly disappointed to see that it was going to be exclusively couples. ‘Verbal warning’ to organiser number 2!!!!
Our boat the Anaconda III wasn’t BYO and had a tick sheet ‘honesty’ bar system. So after the safety presentation The Biesty boys and I decided to ‘push the boat out’ and hit the hit the booze sailer style. Beers, red wine and more beers; a quick toast to our missing crew man Pronzato (always a handy man to have when pushing a boat out) and then over some serious conversation about wether the lights in the sky were satellites or stars it did seem we were the only ones who knew there was a bar.
The next morning we awoke to the dropping of the anchor which is several decibels louder than a numatic drill and
Captain Crosbie
Port....? better not mate..i'm driving! to find out some interesting stats. On the first night The beasty boys and I drunk all the red wine and 4 times more than the entire ship combined… and that’s not counting the time in the pub
We’d chosen our boat It had a dive master and compressor on board so there was a lot of diving to be down on and off the boat…. Although they wouldn’t stamp my log book for the former. I hadn’t done a scuba dive for a couple of years as I have trouble equalising one ear so it was a little disappointing our first dive site visibility was barely 5 meters. However the decongestants I got from the chemist had done the trick and the whole thing was pain free.
That night a beautiful sunset… set the tone for a calm night!!!!
Sunday and the sea and weather had turned for the worse where we went to do our first dive of the day on the outer reef. With the currents strong we had to descend quickly to get to calmer waters but it was too much for my ear and after being stuck around the 5m for
a while I decided to give up and get back to the out board - it was then I decided to make that the last dive of my trip.
The last night again was slightly subdued but a few party games kept us entertained
We were staying the night in Airlie Beach (this time in a shared flat rather than dorm) so headed along to our ships landing party which was shared with two other boats that had docked that day. With one long table was set out for each boat we were initially drawn to the table with the familiar faces before being quickly distracted by the table with 20 girls and 2 guys - The Sweedish sunbathing team had indeed been sailing that weekend they just weren’t on our boat……Three stikes and you’re out….. Organiser in the boardroom… YOU’RE FIRED!!!!!!
Back to Sydney and to meet my new but temporary house mate who greeted me with a bottle wine…. Not exactly what was required after such a weekend or carnage but definitely nice to find a new friend on the doorstep and a groovy dancer to go to ‘Good Vibrations’
Festival with. It was around 5 years ago that I missed James Brown at the Brixton Academy and I really did think that it would be my last opportunity to see the aging star. But a prison sentence and world tour brings our paths meet again with him headlining the festival…… I can now not only say that I’ve witnessed the hardest working man in show business but at 73 on of the oldest!!!
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shanabananas
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Rock On Stella!
Sun, fun and games then? Keep up the good work!