Darwin

Bit of a nightmare at Sydney airport - being rational humans, we assumed that if we are flying to a domestic location we should go to the domestic terminal. Not so. We made it, just. Darwin is a nice enough place, with pleasant bars and restaurants, and much warmer than Sydney. There's no photos to post as there really is nothing worth taking a photo of in Darwin itself. We've booked a camper for seven days and intend to head out to Kakadu National Park, Katherine Gorge, Lichfield National Park and then back to Darwin to fly to Mumbai. As a result of our "going bush" there probably won't be any photos for a week...never know though....

Blue Mountains

We hired a car in Sydney and drove out west to the Blue Mountains. We stopped in the biggest town in the region, Katoomba, and stayed for three nights. We had trouble finding accommodation on the Saturday that we arrived as it's a popular weekend destination for Sydney residents, especially in the winter (apparently they like the whole mountains & log fires thing, and even have some bizarre Christmas type celebration in August!?). We had to spend the night in a nasty place called Katoomba Mountain Lodge, which was like stepping back into the early seventies. After that we spent two nights in Hostel No 14, a really homely, cosy place. The Blue Mountains are quite impressive, and there are lots of great bush walks around the area, some of which required really long, hard climbs up steep staircases (but were definitely worth it). We also went on the worlds steepest railway, which really did border on vertical at times. We met a Canadian guy called Sam (a resident in Oz for 9 years) and his Aussie friend visiting from the Gold Coast in one of the local pubs on Sunday afternoon. We ended up having quite a lot to drink and heading back to Sam's for a barbecue. They were great guys and extraordinarily generous to us, treating us to steaks, expensive wine and not letting us pay for a thing. I hope we get the opportunity to return the favour some day.

Back in Sydney today. Tomorrow morning we fly to Darwin for 9 days in the Northern Territory. Not really sure what to expect. It's going to be nice and warm (30-32) and is apparently one of the best times of year to visit. Might hire a camper for a week (or a car and camping equipment) and head out to Kakadu National Park and Katherine Gorge. Alternatively, we'll do day trips from Darwin.

Sydney

We arrived in Sydney on Saturday after 9 hours on the train from Coffs Harbour. We’re staying in a nice hotel as the price dropped significantly if you booked for seven nights. It’s just off Darlinghurst Road in Kings Cross and anyone who’s been to Sydney will know that means we have to fight our way through junkies, drug dealers and prostitutes every time we leave the hotel. It’s not as bad as it sounds though – it feels seedy rather than particularly dangerous. It rained solidly throughout Sunday and Monday, but the sun shone for most of yesterday. We’ve been out walking round the city mostly as there are lots of interesting and diverse districts to see, as well as the obvious world famous sights. We went to the cinema yesterday to see Sicko, a Michael Moore documentary about health care in the US. It’s quite an eye opener and I’ve never felt more pleased that we have the NHS in the UK. Not sure what we’ll do today yet – still have to visit Bondi Beach and take the ferry over to Manly, but the weather dictates when/if we do those things. We’ve booked a hire car for Saturday and intend to drive out into the Blue Mountains and Hunter Valley for a few days before flying up to Darwin next week.

A Passage to India

The visas have arrived! Which is great news as any significant delay would have cost us dearly in time and subsequently money.

Getting a little bored of the east coast now to be honest. It's very nice and I'm sure it would be great to live here, but all of the towns down the coast are fundamentally the same and so once you've seen one you've pretty much seen them all. Going inland might prove more interesting but car hire anywhere other than in the major cities is fairly expensive. We may head down to Sydney this weekend on the train (9 hours) and decide what to do once we're there. Looking at the possibility of visiting Melbourne too....mmmmm.

Coffs Harbour

We're staying with friends in Coffs Harbour at the moment, a biggish town roughly half way down the coast between Brisbane and Sydney. We're waiting for our Indian visas, which should arrive here within the next week, at which point we'll head down to Sydney. We've been on a few day trips to surrounding towns and inland into the mountains. Lot's of national parks with good walking and endless, perfect beaches around this part of the coast. We went to see the Simpsons movie yesterday in a tiny, one screen, 1930s cinema in a small coastal town called Sawtell. Rained a tiny bit last night, but back to intense sunshine again today....bloody winter ;o)

Might hire a car tomorrow and head off somewhere else for a night or two.

Sunshine Coast & Byron Bay, Australia

We've been staying with friends Steve and Maria just north of Brisbane on the sunshine coast in a place called Currimundi for the last week. It's been really great to chill for a while and excellent weather too, and it was really nice to see where Maria is now living, having emigrated from London six months ago. We've been up to Noosa and spent time in and around Caloundra, down on the beach playing tennis and cricket, went to see some wild kangaroos, fishing in the sea etc. We had a couple of BBQs in their back garden and even had a barbecued breakfast one morning. They live only a 20 minute walk from the local beach, and it is definitely an enviable lifestyle. Having applied for our India visas in Brisbane and posted some of our winter clothes home, we headed south yesterday to Byron Bay. Byron is a beautiful place, with an incredible sandy beach that seems to go on forever. The town is quaint and friendly with lots of great shops, restaurants and bars. Apparently, it used to be a popular hippy hangout here in the 70s but with the rise of tourism, locals have been priced out of the area and only the richest hippies remain ;o) We went walking around the cape of Byron today, which was a relaxing experience until a kangaroo suddenly burst across the path not 15 feet in front of us! We've booked our tickets to Coffs Harbour for tomorrow morning.