Rain rain go away...

Hellooo.

Quick update of what's been going on downunder. For a start the weather has been doing it's best to make us feel right at home. Too much rain and clouds, and no sun and warmth to speak of (It's been almost a week and a half since i had to use any sunlotion, totaly unacceptable in my book)... Our new tent is having a hard time keeping us dry, and has been letting through some water during long spells of rain and thunderstorms (yes, bloody thunderstorms!! Don't believe the stereotype dry and sunny australia, it's a deliberate myth the australian government has circulated to attract tourists. In reality the weather here is sooo baaaaad ;) ) But hey, it still beats the weather you're getting in Belgium for the moment :)

I'm in Canberra now. Been here since saturday after a days travelling out of the Blue Mountains (had to take train and bus to get back to Sydney, there we took a greyhound bus to Canberra). The Blue Mountains were absolutely amazing (ignoring the crap weather). We did 3 days of walking in the region (we camped in Katoomba and Blackheath) and the stuff we saw there was jawdropping. Our walks took us from the cliffs surrounding the area of the Blue Mountains we were at, and took us deep into its valleys filled with rainforrest. It's like entering a whole different world. Looking down from atop the surrounding cliffs you'd never guess what beauty is hiding beneath the dense leafcover that dominate the cliftopview of the valley. The plants, the smell, the sounds, the waterfalls, ... It's hard to describe, but i'll try to get some foto's online in the near future that will give you all an idea. The nicest walk we did was the "grand canyon walk", were we descended into a canyon that took us into the Blue Mountains. If you ever happen to be in the area (hey, you never know), i highly recommend it ;)

So like i said we're in Canberra now. Explored part of the city today. It's the political heart of Australia, so we thought we'd visit the "new" parliament building. We even spent a few minutes in the Senate where the opposition was putting its verbal teeth into the ruling government's policy, asking reasonable questions and getting no straight answers. All they seemed to do was go around in circles... Politics don't seem to be to different on the other side of the world... ;)

We're staying here for a few days, and will be making our way to Melbourne thursday or friday i guess. Before we leave for Tasmania we're gonna try and get ourselves a job in the Melbourne-area starting january when we get back from Tasmania.

That's it for now folks. Don't let the weather get you down... rest assured: it's not any good here too :)

bye bye Sydney

We're leaving Sydney sundaymorning! After one and a half week of getting ourselves organised and running around in and around Sydney and it's beaches we're ready to start our journey to the south of Australia. Sundaymorning we'll be taking the train out of Sydney and towards the Blue Mountains, a national park with impressive sights (so we've been told...) and some nice hikingroutes. We'll be staying there at least 2 days on a campingsite in the middle of the park. Really looking forward to that. After that we'll be heading for the Australian capitol city Canberra, and then on to Melbourne. From there we'll be only a short flight away from Tasmania.

Feeling a bit broke for the moment though... A few days ago I had to cough up 1200 australian dollars for a greyhound busspass. It's a good investment though. With that busspass we can use the greyhound busservices to get anywhere in eastern and central Australia (also plenty of places in the outback). We decided after long deliberation that buying a car would be too much of a risk (extra costs for services and fuel, braking down in the middle of nowhere, crashing it fresh from the carsalesyard, stocking up on 100 liter of water when we drive through the nowheresland of central australia, ... and not to forget: driving on the left :) ). At least with the busspass we're guaranteed to get back in Sydney in time to catch our flight back home... and in one piece. We'll probably rent a car once in a while just to explore the areas and national parks around the cities.
Another thing that cost us loads of money was our tent... We bought it with a major discount, but it sure didn't feel like it. It's a good one though, and it is sure to keep us dry, warm and protected for the next 9 months and long after that.

Anyway... the last few days we did stuff like sitting on the beach, going for a swim (well... not really swimming... more like riding the enormous waves the ocean throughs at you), walking around sydney and it's impressive parks, taking a harbour CRUISE (sounds impressive huh? The Jetset is our standard :) ), going to the zoo (only to discover that practicaly all the animals were sunbathing and not moving an inch all day... even a massive mountainlion looks boring when it's snoring...), walking around Watson's Bay (where the first colonists arrived) and it's oceancliffs and just generally getting stuff done (registering for taxfilenumber, getting our australian bankcards to work, keeping an eye out for work in the area of Melbourne, ...).

Great, my internettime in this internetcafe is just about finished, so I'm going to have to cut this update here. Keep those emails and comments coming, it's nice to hear how things are going back in Belgium.

4 days later...

Helloooo

We've been in Sydney for 4 days now. Haven't seen that much of the city yet, but what we did see was really worth it. We're in our second hostell for the moment. It's located in Kings Cross, THE backpacker centre in Sydney. Tomorrow we'll be moving again. This time to a hostell in Bondi, famous for it's beaches and surferlifestyle. It's a bit out of the centre of Sydney, so hopefully life will be a little cheaper there 'cause living doesn't come cheap downtown Sydney. The last days have been stressfull. Paperwork, administrative stuff and looking for accomodation that suits everyone's needs have been keeping us from really exploring the city. What we have seen of Sydney was great. The harbour bridge and the opera are impressive. There's these strange birds here with a long strawlooking thing for it's beek that walks around like it owns the place. Huge bats (at least double the average one in Belgium) hang from trees in the Royal Bottanic Garden by day, and fly around the harbour bridge by night. We saw our first possum the first night we were here (hey i know, doesn't sound exciting but it was the very first thing we saw when we stepped out of the bus that took us from the airport to the hostel). And lizzards and iguana's stroll around parks cassualy barely noticing the interest we take in them... As we get out our camera's to take a picture them, the real Ozzies look at us with the same sort of amusement we do in Belgium when we see a group of Japanese tourists taking pictures of everything and nothing... It gives you a whole new perspective on these things :)

If all goes well tomorrow we should find a place where we can stay for atleast a week. That should give us more time to do fun things and get ourselves organised and get out of Sydney and start discovering Australia. We haven't decided yet whether we're going to buy a car or use public transportation. A car would be the best option (cheapest in the long run, and more freedom), but different agenda's of some of our co-travellers may make it an unpractical solution... Time will tell... but what is sure is that we'll be leaving south for Canberra and then Melbourne in about a week. If our budget is still up to scratch at that time, we'll take the boat to Tasmania and explore the island. Really looking forward to that. The island is well known for it's unique plant and animal life and there is a hickeroute called The Overland Track that shows off Tasmania's beauty in a 5-day-long walk. After Tasmania we'll be in dire need for cash, so we'll be looking for a nice job on the island or in the area of Melbourne then.

That's about it for the moment. Getting up early tomorrow, 'cause we still need to find a hostel tomorrow. Shouldn't be a problem though, as long as we get to Bondi Beach early enough.

Oh, and for the people who haven't figured the timedifference out: we're ten hours ahead of Belgium here :)

David.

G'day

Hello everybody.

Monday 7 november is getting very close. That's the day we (Evy, Karolien, Wouter, Siegfried and yours truly) leave for Sydney, Australia. Our plane leaves Paris CDG airport at noon. Ten hours later we'll be landing in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. From there we'll be taking our flight to Sydney. We'll be landing there the 8th at about 20.00 local time. There a driver will be waiting for us to bring us to our youth hostel where we'll be spending our first three nights.

I'll put a new post up as soon as i get the chance to let you all know whether we made it to sydney in one piece... Fingers crossed :)

David.