Victoria: Ballarat, Great Ocean Road

I see we did a better job with the Olympic Torch in Canberra than you did in London! Gordon Brown couldn't organise a piss up in a you-know-what.

Spent some time in the NGV gallery. It was the one in Fed Square, dedicated to Aus art. We both really enjoyed it. The building itself is fantastic, the floors are laid out in a geometric figure of eight and as you wander around you get views through glass sections and little cutouts of other floors and other parts of the floor you are on. You get sudden and unexpected views both of artworks and of the vistors in the gallary. A bit like a peep show. I liked " The Pioneer" and the woman being carried out in the flood disaster, Lin liked the moderist view of Melboune. Could have spent more time there. 39 Steps was great, acted by 4 people only, not the Hitchcock style, done as a comedy. Nice theatre.

We have finally got in contact with our old neigbours and we are trying to get together with them when our paths cross in Christchurch.

Drove to Ballarat through the rush hour on a day before ANZAC day, a public holiday. Nice baptism of the hooked right turns. We found a great Motel in Balarat - Sovreign Park - it was better than many so called 4* star hotels I have stayed in. It was attached to the Red Lion, a great family pub with grub and a super atmosphere. We spent the day in Sovereign Hills, a re-creation of a gold mining town in the 1870's. It had loads going on and the houses, workshops & businesses were populated with staff in costume. It was great to chat with them. I especially enjoyed talking with the wheelwright, the shopkeeper and the housewives in the houses. We went down a mine and saw the redcoats in action. I think I saw one of them making eyes at Linda. If he hadn't had such a long barrel, I would have challenged him!




We drove across country from Ballarat and we are now in Port Campbell on the Great Ocean Road. A very small town with a beautiful bay that has been the scene of ship wrecks, so many that the diving schools run tours of them.

I have heard some say that Victoria is very much like England. I can now confirm that belief. It is a bank holiday weekend - it is peeing with rain - I had to drive with my headlights on at 2pm, the fog had descended - it is 10 degrees celcius - we are both soaked through! Not really tho' there are no traffic jams, in fact no cars at all.






We have wandered along the 12 apostles, formally the sow and piglets. I think I prefer the old name. I don't like to think of apostles falling down and collapsing in public. These are a chain of pinnacle islands formed by coastal erosion. The islands are steadily collapsing, but new ones are being formed. Nice to see, but better in the sun, I think. There is one island, Mutton Island, in the chain that is host to 50,000 mutton birds (short tailed sheerwaters) It is supposed to be a great sight to see them flocking in April & May. They raise their single young and at the first storm in May, they leave for their summer grounds. The young can't fly at this time, they don't get any more feed and just have to sort themselves out and join their parents in the Aleutians. Have a look on the map to see where that is, the Aleutians are up by Alaska. Thats what I call tough love. The funny thing is we didn;t see a single sheerwater, I wonder if all the wildlife in Aus are a spoof, we drove 38km of eucalips today, smashing nose clearing perfume, but no koalas - we have seen no kangaroos, no emus, no koalas, no wallabies, no echidnas, now no mutton birds.

Victoria: Melbourne

Another good flight with Qantas from Uluru to Melbourne. They seem to be a pretty good airline. If I were to rank the airlines I have flown so far I would go from top to bottom as follows:- Singapore; Qantas; JetStar; Virgin; ANZ.

We are in the Savoy Hotel, which is an old hotel situated at one end of the CBD, nice room, facilities OK. Victorian with moulded plaster cove and central surround to the rose. We met up with Malcolm & Maria, the nice couple we met on the POW, for a guided tour of the inner city and dinner out on Lygon. We had a really nice time and will be seeing them again on Sunday.

Everything in the town centre is easy to get, either walking, by free tram or free bus. To go wider you can use the extensive public bus and tram system. The tram we were on yesterday was built in 1936 and still doing well. We wandered around the Federation Square, Jarra river promenades, down to docklands and back up to the state parliament building and the parks. Fed Square is a very lively place with free entertainment going on, both street and organised varieties. Jazz was Friday and Oman culture Saturday. We will see what the rest of the week brings. It is all very civilised and the weather so far is fabulous, low humidity and 25 Celsius. We ate in one of the restaurants on the bank of the Jarra and strolled down to the Crown, a big "pokie" place, built on Vegas lines, with an outdoor fireball display on the hour every evening.

It looks very dry here, like there has been little rain through the summer, browning grass and signs declaring that the green grass is only watered from reclaimed sources. We are opposite Southern Cross railway station, a big place, Euston size, with a modern new, award winning roof. Its huge, acres, but none of the rain is collected for re-use. Pity when water is so short.

After the lack of wildlife in Uluru, we have come across some her. Rats, bats and possums as we drank coffee on the Jarra bank as the sun went down - stacks of birds and loads of eels in the lakes in the botanic gardens.

Melbourne is really nice, the best place we have stayed in Aus. The CBD is compact with a mix of historical and modern. There are a lot of nice walks - around the original Victorian parts, now worth millions of course - around docklands, old and new, the botanic gardens which are magnificent - around the alleyways. There is a good free circular bus and tram system, narrated, hop on-hop off variety. There is loads and loads of eat out streets, both on the river and in town and the suburbs. We ate out in Ivanhoe, v. romantic Arthurian name eh! This is a suburban high street but we had great grub with the Malcolm & Maria, the Aussie folks I mentioned previously.

We are going out to the theatre tomorrow, 39 Steps, old Buchan classic & Hitchcocked into a film in the 30's.

Driving is interesting here, what with the trams. They have some "turn on red" lefts, which we could do with and also "hook" right turns. You have to be careful and watch out for the signs on the intersections. You have to turn right from the LH side of the road, you pull over to the middle of the LHS and wait until the crossing road goes green and then you go. Its interesting parking 90 degrees across the tram lines with the tram approaching.

I have seen a lot of people who look like Mark Neal over here, they also behave like him! I wonder - could he have moved over here and made a success out of cloning technology - spooky.

Speaking of people, my cousin lives here - but she is in England, visiting. Our old next door neighbours emigrated here to Melbourne 30 years ago. We lost touch with them, but super sleuth Lin found their address and tel number in the book. We rang them, guess what - they are on hols in NZ. Bizarre.

We will soon be leaving for the gold fields - Ballarrat, Bendigo and the Great Ocean Rd. We have done it again, we are leaving on ANZAC day, which is a public holiday. Duh, duh, duuh! will it be a re-run of Mackay, with no room at the inn, wait and see.

Northern Territory: Uluru

Early 8:00am Qantas flight, so up at 5am. Flight was good into Ayers Rock. Half hour time zone change - a bit odd. Picked up a Hertz car. Car hire can be a bit of a rip-off here in Aus. The hire is cheap enough, but you can get some massive accident excesses, in this case about $3500, which costs you $35 per day to insure against. You can buy insurance in the UK, I got some for the Perth car hire in the UK with AIG, that cost me £4 per day. On top of this Hertz put a 100km/day limit 25c/km over that, so Hertz look to be in rip-off mode in Uluru! Be warned.

There is only one resort area here in Yalara, run by the one company, so no competition. The resort comprises about 4 or 5 different hotels offering different levels of quality. We are staying in the Pioneer Outback, which is the lowest. Its still OK, we have a big room, en-suite clean and quiet. The bar and restaurant are great, you buy the meat and they provide the BBQ for you to cook on and give you an all you can eat salad bar and desert. Its really nice and lively, live music, dancing & plenty of people having a good time.

I think we did right by only staying here a short while, there is very little here. We have been to both Uluru and Kata Tjuta which are two huge red rock formations sticking up out of the desert. Uluru is 348m high and Kata is even higher. The aboriginies - the Anagu tribe - now look after the National Park. We learned about their culture and their view of how the area was created. You can climb the rock, although they don't want you to, but it was closed when we were there as it was too windy. The flies are great here, they fall in love with you immediately, particularly your eyes, ears and nose, and flock to kiss you. My jungle strength deet had very little effect, the net hat is the only answer. We watched the sunset on Uluru, it was a very clear day and the colour changes on the red rock as the sun goes down are nice. Being dark and clear out in the bush there was a great display of stars. I am really surprised how little wildlife there is out here. It is not really desert at all, it is savannah with plentiful green plants and trees, thay have around 300mm rain per year. It looks similar to when I have been out in the bush in Africa, execpt there is no wildlife, nothing, just a few birds and flies. Contrast that with Africa which had thousands of deer, elephant, zebra ands also lots of different small mammals and a wide range of insects lizards, apes etc. Perhaps the Anagu have eaten them all.

As regards natural spectacles that I have seen, Uluru falls behind Grand Canyon, Niagara, Kilamanjaro and maybe even Teide.

Prices are steep here, no liquor shop, a bottle of plonk in the hotel bvottle shop is min $30, cf $6 in any other town, gas is $1.88 cf $1.38.ltr. Perhaps that's only to be expected in such a remote place.

We have just seen our first wild life - and in the resort, can you believe it! We saw a koala up a gum tree, but it was rubber and we saw kangaroo, emu and croc, but these were on our dinner plate. We had a self cook BBQ with all of the above. Croc was a bit chewy, I think we overcooked it, but the 'roo was delicious a bit rare and tasty, steak like.

We are sitting in Connellan airport awaiting our flight to Melbourne, where we will be meeting up with some friends we made on the POW in India.

NSW: GREAT PACIFIC DRIVE

We have now left Canberra and are on our way to Ayers Rock, Uluru, Yulara - I don't really know what it is called. The section of the Great Pacific Drive we are going on runs from Bateman Bay up to Sydney. We start by driving through Braidwood. This is a small town encapsulated in time like a fly in amber. It looks rather like a US western town, small stores and old bars along both sides of a straight main road. Most of the bigger buildings appear to be preserved, perhaps by the equivalent of our National Trust. The roads running into town are lined by poplar trees, a bit like France or Italy. They look beautiful in the clear sunlight, covered in their autumn gold foliage.

 

The drive runs over some high hills and down into valleys along steep winding roads to arrive at the coast at Bateman. We continue north through Ulladulla - sounds like a character from Star Wars - but is in realty a nice seaside town, and onward toward Nowra. We detoured down into Jervis Bay, which is a National Park and lovely bay. Its a bit chilly here, definitely Autumnal with a stiff breeze blowing. Nowra is a much larger town and went straight through this looking for somewhere to stay in Berry. Berry is very chintzy, with the usual Aussie bars but many small shops selling arts & craft stuff and antiques. The only motels we could find were "boutique" or pretty basic. I don't shop in boutiques, so off we went to the next town, Kiama, where we found the usual reasonable motel. It is getting a bit more pricey because it is Aussie Easter school holidays ( I know, I know its not Easter, but don't ask me) - so not the great bargain we had in Canberra. Kiara is nice enough and we had a smashing Italian meal in a little restaurant we found in this coastal town. It was BYO, like many small restaurants here. Kiara is pleasant enough, but closes down at 5:30. It is famous for a blowhole? We saw this which was running very well in the sea running from that stiff breeze I mentioned.

 

We set off again and arrived in Woollongong which is a working fishing town, fishermen's co-op and all. A large range of steep hills runs behind the coastal strip here and we took a scenic drive around Mounts Kemble and Keira. Ascended the steep winding road, driving pretty cautiously, turning around one of the tight bends, we were surprised by 5 guys coming down the hill on racing skateboards. They must have been doing about 40mph, fully kitted out with leathers and helmets. The skate boards were the standing variety not the luge style you see in X games. I wouldn't fancy one of them running into the front of my car at that speed!

 

We continued on our way up onto Bald Hill ( Sandra - I'm not really sure how to pronounce that) Its a bit like Beachy Head, 200m high cliffs with a great view down the coast and the winding Great Pacific Drive. There were hang gliders in action, taking passengers for half hour flights. They simply stepped off the cliff and rose straight up a thousand feet or so. It looked so smooth and calm, that had we had more time there, I would have had a go. They flew around the hills and then glided down to land on the beach.

 

We ended the run with a drive through the Royal National Park that took us to the southern edge of Sydney and the airport.

CANBERRA

Here we are in Canberra, Australia's capital. The Sydney motorways can be a bit of a minefield, some of them are toll roads, with no cash booths, only taking E Passes. That would be a bit of a bugger arriving at one of them in the middle of the rush hour just imagine! As per normal we arrive when there is some big event going on and rooms are at a premium. We fell on our feet this time and got a smashing suite, 3 rooms our own fully eqipped kitchen w/ dishwasher, washing machine and drier, £65 per night.

Canberra seems a bit of strange town, the very large centre built around the lake is totally dedicated to the parliament and other public buildings - so it is bit dead at the weekend. There also appear to be some homeless here squatting around and we met a guy with a llama on a leash at the old parliament building raising money for them - he was getting a free breakfast on the parliament house lawn, the llama not the man! All the embasies are here, all very snazzy, see picture.

We spent some time up at the war memorial, which is a bit like a combination of the cenotaph in Whitehall and the Imperial War Museum. A piper closed the memorial for the day playing Flowers of the Forest - Wee Bob would have felt at home. We have also been to the new and old parliament buildings, also nice places to visit with lots to see and free guided tours. We have both enjoyed Canberra, it comes highly recommended.

That's Linda with Simpsons donkey - I wonder how Peter is getting on!

I am fighting a losing battle in my pie quest. Ever since we met the other Brit couple in Airlie, who told us about the great home made curry pies with mushy peas on top, I have been searching, but without any joy. Its a bit like my eels quset in London. I don't think I am going to be successful in Ayers Rock, its not pukka abo tucker ( theres a mishmash of lingo for you), perhaps I will have more luck in Melbourne or Ballarrat.

We are setting off tomorrow to drive up the Grand Pacific Drive along the coast passing through Shell Harbour, Jervis Bay, Woolongong and back to Sydney.

NSW: Sydney

Flew down Jetstar from Hamilton to Sydney, cheap airline, but super no hassle service. Got E exit seats, took our own picnic on board, arrived on time and got our luggage back in the quickest time so far, even before Lin came back from the loo! Finally got the hang of packing the cases, so they both weigh about the same.

 

Used the train to get to the centre of Sydney, 2 deck train and in about 20mins - $5. We are staying in Regent St, just by Chinatown, so Asian is the grub style. Had Thai and Vietnamese so far. Hotel is OK, bit like the city Travelodges, modern, clean, but not too many frills.

 

We have wandered about the CBD, been to Darling Harbour, like docklands but with life. Maritime museum, Hyde Park, Kings Cross, Paddington, could have stayed in London. Opera House is nice, bars, live music, next to the botanical gardens. The architecture of the Opera House is interesting, it really looks something from the harbour, but not much from the land side. Tried to book a night at the opera - no seats for Swan Lake, didn't fancy Moving Target and high tea is $145 each. So, very groucho, we made our marx and didn't go. 

 

Bought a Red Rover that covers bus, boats and trains, but not automobiles and planes! You can also get a hop on-hop off circular tour. This takes you to lots of famous houses and spots around Sydney. No good tho' , as they are all closed in the week! It is also twice the price so not a good deal. We took a bus out to Vaucluse, nice spot overlooking the harbour, and then on to Bondi. I would like to tell you about Bondi, but it's nothing to write home about. We came back to Circular Quay and took the ferry out Manly, this is a nice trip that takes about 30mins and you get super views of the Opera, Bridge and bays. Manly itself is very nice, much, much better than Bondi. It has a nice relaxed atmosphere, great beach, great proms, lovely shops and restaurants. We stayed and ate dinner on The Corso, a tree lined, pedestrian prom with, bars, shops and hotels - great.

 

We had v. heavy showers today - Aus weather is not all its cracked up to be, but as you guys are having snow, I guess I mustn't grumble too much.

 

Its odd that the ANZAC's are so hot on the environment when they have traffic congestion, drive huge gas guzzlers, air-con like mad, all smoke and drink like fish and throw the remains all over the street.  The smoking is interesting - who would have thought that the Indians smoke as little as the Aussie smoke so much!

 

Spent the last couple of days walking around city centre. There was a memorial service going on at their Cenotoph, lots of school children taking part. It was run by the Returned Services League, a bit like our British Legion. The Botanic Gardens are great, free entry, delightful park, plantings, art. There are nice lakes - with lots of large eels - yum yum! Got bats as well, Grey Headed Fruit Bats, big buggers, 1.5m wingspan, noisy and you don't want to be below when they poo.

 

The Rocks is very nice area, lying between the Opera and the bridge, it is where the original landings took place in Sydney. It has been nicely gentrified, a bit like the Shambles, for those of you who know York. Spent time at Darling Harbour, nice docklands like place, plenty going on, you can spend time there at the cafes watching the world go by. Linda wanted to do the walk over the Bridge, but I couldn't handle it - the vertigo was really vicious - what a whimp!

 

I can recommend Sydney for a weeks stay, lots to do, easy to walk round, public transport pretty good.

 

 

 

Queensland: Never Too Late to Go To Airlie

Having broke the back of the run yesterday, we a had nice easy journey into Airlie and the GBR. Its a nice little seaside town and we have booked 3 nights at a beachfront hotel and a trip out to the GBR on Friday for a bit of snorkelling ( submarine for Linda) Apparently, I have to have a stinger suit. I hope there are no tigers like I saw up at Fraser - ooh!

Our flight out is from one of the islands here in the Whitsunday group and we have to get a water taxi out, a bit like Venice NOT. The Aussies have screwed up daylight saving, until this year the 1 hour back was last week in Mar, now its the 1st Sun in April. Well, many of the Airlines and phone companies didn't get the change sorted and their software did its auto thing last week - tales of woe were aplenty in the news. Our airline advised us of a one hour flight change - I don't know if they speak with forked tongue and I can't telephone them.

Lots of wild life here - 20 bites on my right leg - ants break out in swarms (is that the right collective?) as soon as there is a crumb of sustenance, aparently mouthwash is food to them, an animal turned up to join in our pre-dinner cocktails on the balcony. Can anyone identify it - the one of the left is Linda.

Its a small world ( anyone know the tune) When the animal turned up, our neighbours asked what it was as they don't have beasts like that back in England. This was Malachi and Frances from Loughton, came originally from the middle of London, M is a gooner, so not too happy about 1-1 with Liverpool. They're doing the same sort of trip as us, except it is over 6 months and they have given up their jobs

Airlie is a small seaside town, high street strip with all the usual types of shops, marinas and hotels. There are lots of backpackers here, they seem to delight in lazing during the day, getting sloshed in the evening and then nightclubbing. You can get BP accommodation for $15 per night if you are willing to slum in the dorm. We are in a a nice beach side motel that overlooks the public park and swim pool. Nice facility, shaded padling pools, filtered salt water pools, shallow lagoon style entry. Moched around the area and went to some out of the way beaches and the water fall. At Cedar Falls, I went to the loo, pretty clean, no flies. Linda went in after me and after some problems with the big drop inside the pan, about 8 foot down to the chemis, she noticed a great big hairy spider, probably 3 inches across, all black, very hairy and not at all spinly. Tarantula, maybe, anyway it explains why there were no flies. No one at all on the beach, except prawn fishermen netting the pools at low tide. There were armies of blue crabs marching up and down the beach, when you get near them they all frantically bury themseleves out of site in the sand. Bit like UK politicians!



Went out on the Great Barrier Reef (GBR) It is about a two hour boat trip. We were on large comfortable catamaran that was managing about 35-40 knots, so we were some way out to sea, nothing in site when we got there. The reef and sea were beautiful, stunning bue aand green sea. The reef was about 6 ft under at high tide and above water at low. The edge of the reef fell off to about 16m deep. I snorkelled for about 1.5hours, first with a guide that showed us all the fish, wild life and corals - stunning, then on my own. The boat moored up to a tethered platform that had, viewing areas below sea, 2 submarines, shwers, sun bathing etc etc. You scuba and take helicopter trips as well. There were about 50 of us, so it wasn't at all crowded. Lin did the subbing as she's not too keen on swimming in deep water. There were thousands of fish, coming right up to your mask and the big Maori Wrasse, 6ft and 100lb, was so tame it would come right up to you and let you touch him. His name was Wally, so a bit like me. Interesting fish, the wrasse, all born female, with one male in the shoal. When the male get sick or dies, the boss female changes sex and becomes the boss male - I believe I know some people who would like that deal! There was also a groper (sic), so you see fish are really like people. He was a big boy tho' - 3m long and 200+ kilos. No sharks, no jellyfish, although I had a nice skin tight stinger suit that revealed all my lumps and bumps, my knees are so embarassing. It wasn't only me, some of the suits had hoods and the plumper wearers look like TellyTubbies! You can tell Eevie that I met Nemo, he's not lost any more. There was quite a strong tidal run, so much so that when it ebbed, the re-filling of the lagoon formed by the exposed reef created water falls.

It was a very nice deal, not really expensive about £75 each, for which you got 3 meals, tea and coffee, a 4 hour journey through the beautiful Whitsunday Islands., air conditioned boat, sun screen bathing suits. I'dlike to do it again sometime, and maybe Scuba next time. That was £60 for divers with no experience, pretty reasonable, I thought.

Now sitting in Hamilton Island Airport, this is a bit different. Very small, 3 or 4 flights a day. You get a ferry to the airport terminal from Shute harbour on the mainland, its an hour trip. Goodness knows what happens when the weather is bad and the ferries are delayed, there's no other way to get to the airport. No securit restrictions as regards liquids. No air conditioning in the lounge, just big open windows overlooking the sea, nice cool breeze - smashing.

I'm not sure that all this is wasted on the BP's, who seem obsessed with drink and sex.

How are you getting on with our "modes of transport" question>?

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Queensland: Mackay

Decided to do a long drive, 800km, to break the back of the journey up to Gt Barrier Reef (GBR). Driving was easyand interesting - all of the drive was on single carriageway road, but we didn't see any vehicles going our way for hours. Speed limit 100k but you could go as fast as radar traps permit. I hve come to the conclusion that the only 'roos in this country are dead ones, 'cos thats all we see. You can't imagine driving 800km on small roads in the UK, it would be impossible. The scenery north of Hervey Bay is no where as nice as that between Brisbane & Hervey, that stretch is spectacular. The countryside goes from big forest to savannah and sugar cane is very pre-dominant. We have gone all tropical having crossed Capricorn and th humidity is rising noticably. The trucks are something here you get artics, semis for US readers, which have big trailers attached to the back, and these buggers are not content with you sticking to the speed limit, they tailgate you and pass you on single carriageway roads going 125kph, it put the willies up Linda.

 

Because of the long run we arrived late in Mackay anticipating no problem getting a motel room - wrong! Everything No Vancancy. Mackay is very much a working town rather than a resort place. Sugar cane, chemical works, port and lots of coal mines. There was some type of business show on and all the rooms were taken by business types. We eventually found "The Whit", a no star hotel in the center of town. You get an idea of what it was like if you saw the big iron gates on the staircase and the "No Work Boots, No Overalls" sign in the lobby. The room was pretty knackered having seen its best days in the 70's, a bit Bates Motel except that Vivian would have been OK - she would have never gone in our shower! It was such a contrast with our last place, the Pialba Motor Inn. Anyway we survived it and the good breakfast redeemed it a bit.

 

Speaking of tucker we ate out at an Italian. Interesting - we had bruscetta as a start. How can I describe it, It was cold, not hot, the bread was Swedish crisp bread, you know the sort of thing, and the topping was diced cold tomatoes and fried onion. It was more like a smorgasbord and salsa dip. Vive La Difference. I had a prawn pasta and it came up with sweet potato, mash potato, carrot and broccolli???? Nice tho'.