So Montreal is in the Grey Cup eh! Awesome! I really hope they go all the way they deserve it after so many consecutive appearances to the final. I’ll try to catch the results when I’ll be in Hunter Valley where we’ll be heading after spending a wonderful week with Terry and his family. The first Australian vineyards were started in this region where it is world known for producing good wines over the years. I look forward to going on a wine tour.
We had such a great week with Terry. We based ourselves at his place for a few days where we were able to do laundry, use the internet freely and eat really well, Terry is quite a cook. It was great to spend a lot of time with him and learning more in depth about the Aussie ways. One exciting thing is we learned about the game of cricket. It is truly a fascinating game! It makes it a lot more exciting to watch it now that we understand it. There are three different game formats, one of them could take up FIVE days to complete a single game: it’s called a test match. I’m actually watching one right now as I am typing away, this game started three days ago and the Kangaroos are leading. At this pace, they probably won’t have to play on the 5th day... We also learned about the subtle differences in rugby league and rugby union. All in all, the Aussies are huge sport fans and have lots of sports to keep them entertained. Their newspaper has the news in the front page but if you want the sport news, you would flip the papers over and read it from the last page forward (which is the front page for the sports section). We can also get the results and highlights of all the NFL, CFL and NHL games.
Terry hooked us up with free tickets to the Taronga Zoo where we saw a lot of Australian wildlives. As expected, the species look very different from what Gen and I are used to seeing in Canada. Of course, we saw kangaroos and koalas. We also saw a platypus, this is an amazing specimen: it’s part duck, part beaver and part otter, pretty much the best of each everything in one lucky animal. I accompanied our good host to one of his coaching session. It was good to see how they do it here – not a whole lot different from the Canadian way eh. So guys at home, trust your coach and do as they ask. I think the difference is in the attitude, the Aussies want to be the best! We then came home to have dinner with his entire family. It was awesome. The food was good and the company was fun. That was a good way to end the day.
Bondi Beach - it’s famous, it’s nice but overrated. I prefer the Palm Beach in the North. However, the action around the beach was worth the trip. There were lots of nice people around and there were nice shops. I think this place would be really fun at night time to go out for dinner and drinks.
Our last few days with Terry were spent at Terry’s holidays home in Bawley Point. It’s a quiet place about three hours drive south of Sydney, right on the Coast. It’s not a popular destination for locals since most of them prefer the beaches on the North Coast so it was very quiet while we were there. The beaches were wild and lots of the time, we were the only one there. The highlight of our stay was the many kinds of bird that came and perched on the balcony for food. They even ate straight from our hands! Check out our photos. We also fed the possums. A possum looks like a friendly giant rat. Over all, it was a really pleasant stay in Bawley Point. I definitely recommend it to any travellers. Oh, and you must have the fish and chips there, Gen says it taste like heaven :)
PS: I drove for the first time in Bawley Point. Even when I focused hard, I almost drove on the wrong side of the road (well, really it’s the proper side, the Aussies are the one who drove on the wrong side! Haha!)
