So, its been a long time since Bali, and alot has happened.. brief summary::
We arrived in Sydney after a pretty drunken week in bali. The taxi from the airport to our hostel (about 20kms) cost more than our bus ticket from Saigon to Hanoi (the whole lenght of vietnam). this was a sign to me that things were about to get very different.
instead of the usual language barrier and arguing over the price of a room for the night, we were prebooked on the computer system. the hostel was huge, seven floors, and full of young people but seemed more like a university than a place for travellers. people were wearing trainers everyone was white, there were loads of cars and traffic lights outside instead of a thousand mopeds carrying pigs and six people. it all felt completely alien and i just wanted to hop on a plane back to the simple life in asia. WE got into our dorm room, the first time we had to share a room with stangers, there was a british chav in one bed, and a late twentys danish girl in another bed. there were two swedish girls and i cant remember who else. I got the bed above henriette the danish girl who had been there for six months. (and is still there now)
Basically, we got drunk. got introduced to 'goon' wine which is 4litres of nasty tasting wine for 11dollars. playing ring of fire with that stuff got us completely wasted pretty much every day over the xmas period. we met so many people there, lots that i hope to stay in touch with. xmas day we made a picnic, after having salmon and champagne for brekky like proper flashpackers we went to bronte beach near the crowded commercialised alcohol free bondi beach. we sat there in the sun eating drinking and throwing a football around then took a two hour journey to olympic park (using the time to make the xmas phone calls home) where sallys new cousin was renting anice apptment, we got way too drunk there and chanted oasis songs off the balcony into the early hours of boxing day. after a few days recovering (well drinking) it was time for the new years celebrations. We qued up at miss macquaries point at 9am. the que was huge already and luckily we had some friends nearer the front who saved us a brilliant spot. by three o clock there was about thirty of us drinking wine and having a laugh in the sun, with one of the best views of the opera house and harbour bridge in the city. it was a great day and i just about remember seeing the fireworks go off at twelve. Best new years of my life by a million miles.
After a few more days in sydney, we mangaged to get organised a plan for our next travels. on the 7th of January we set off in our Newly aquired holden commodore which we payed just 800bucks for. said goodbye to all the friends we had made and took on the roads of sydney and headed out to the blue mountains to do our first nights camping, the first of many! it was the school holdiays so campsites were full but we managed to squeeze into one shabby one a bit of a drive from anywhere. the blue mountains were awesome, some amazing views, gorges, you could see how huge bushfires had spread recently. was really glad we bothered going, lots of flies though.
the next day we took on our first big trip. we drove from the blue mountains to melbourne in a day. arriving quite late but luckily jane who we met in sydney and was already in melb managed to book us into a hostel, all in seperate rooms but it was only for that night.
melbourne was good quite a nice place, except st kilda where we stayed which was full of tramps and prostituts. i took a fishing trip one day but caught nothing but flathead, watched an aussie guy moan about catching a huge eagle ray because he couldnt eat it. wanker. unfortunately we didnt spend long in melb to really get a feel for the place, everyone i have spoken to loved it.
We drove from melbourne to adelaide in about four or five days i think, taking in the great ocean road along the way. the most beautiful coastline and the road sits right on the cliff edge most of the way. we had perfect weather for it. some places were fairly busy due to school hols still but this put a good atmosphere in the air. we stayed in some great places, Warnambool was a real old small town that was so friendly which was a welcome change from sydney. it still has old style 'milk bars' which are basically sweet shops, post office internet, bait shop everything all rolled into one. we stayed right by the beach for a few days there, went to a fairground one night, and had bbqs and beer the other nights.
We also stopped just outside lorne, this was gregs birthday so we found an empty beach and took some beers some music and a football down there and had some time off driving. this is where me and greg went drunken swimming, got caught in the rip and nearly smashed up against some rocks in the water we later found out was a known area for great whites to breed. clever!.
another stop off was Johanna, nothing there but a free campsite and a beach that must have been ten kms long. without a soul on it. me and greg walked the whole lenght. we passed one guy with a backpack on and hiking boots walking right by the water. he looked as if he was walking the whole bloody coast and i wish we had stopped to ask him. the only other soul we saw was on the way back (after some rock climbing and nearly getting trapped by the tide) i heard a yelp and thinking it was a dog i turned around to see a small seal jump into the surf. we watched fora while as it looked like he was performing tricks for us then he got bored and vanished.
Next stop was adelaide, a really small city almost felt like a ghost town there didnt seem to be enough peopel around for all the buildings that were there. we didnt do much there, visited a casino and a nature park where we met our first Roos (live ones, had only seen about twenty dead ones on the road) and emus and koalas etc.
