Sydney

Sydney is an interesting city. In ways it is very similar to London, or any other big city, with masses of people, endless streets and sprawling suburbs. There are lots of beautiful areas; the Botanic Gardens, Circular Quay, Darling Harbour, The Rocks. And then there are the streets with the same shops and eateries repeated every 500meters. Hungry Jacks, Lorna Jane, Pie Face, JB HiFi, 7/11. There is shopping centre after shopping centre, no less than 8 on the street I lived on - although to be fair it is quite a long street. And with everything built in blocks, with long straight roads crossing long straight roads, it's far too easy to walk in the wrong direction! I have wasted many hours walking the wrong way on the right street!

I spent a long time searching for work in the city, getting stressed looking for somewhere to live and some way to pay for the expensive cost of living in Sydney. I was getting tired and grouchy with living out of my backpack in a noisy hostel where every night was disturbed by some rowdy roommate or other stumbling in at silly oclock. 

I felt trapped.

Until eventually I realised I didn't have to stay. Yes, my friends were staying, but that didn't mean I had to. As much as I liked being with them, this was my trip, and it was up to me to make the most of it. I didn't come to Australia to live in a city and work in an office just like I did back in England. 

It was time to move on. 

So I started making plans as we moved into a suburb of Sydney called Drummoyne. I worked for a wine festival, Vino Paradiso, in The Rocks, a hip area down by the water that is full with cool bars, restaurants and local markets. And I spent my days doing all the tours and trips that were included in my 2 week introduction to Australia package. I visited Hunter Valley and the Blue Mountains. I had a day surfing at Umima beach in Woy Woy. That was a beginner surf day, and because I knew what I was doing, I spent the whole day on the water with my own personal coach. I also went to Tarronga Zoo, and Sydney Aquarium where they have 2 of only 5 dugongs who live in captivity. I'm usually against creatures in cages, especially when they are as big as dugongs, but these 2 have been rescued from the wild and after release attempts it was deemed they would not survive alone. So I indulged in their beauty, and even got a high 5 from Wuru.

The problem was, I fell in love with life in Drummoyne. We lived in Bayside, an old conference centre, that was gradually being converted into accomodation. The rooms still had an office desk and filing cabinets to store our things. The media room had a big tv at the end of the huge board room table. It was a quiet, homely place, and felt a lot like living in halls at uni. I was sharing a room with Cara, David and Marcus from our original 6, and there were a lot of other couples and individuals. People would be working but we would hang out in the kitchen in the evenings, cooking and eating and drinking together.

I started acroyoga with Will, an English guy and intrepid traveller. He learnt the techique in Bali, or Indonesia, or somewhere else in South East Asia, and we built on what he knew with youtube videos and a lot of practice and falling. 

Acroyoga involves 1 person lying on their back and using their hands and feet to manipulate another person into positions in the air. It's an incredible work out and really works your flexibility and core strength. I loved it. And I loved life in our strange little conference centre.

But I had made plans and needed to follow them through. So I caught my bus up to Port Macquerie and met up with my wonderful friend Toya from uni. She is working out here as a doctor in the Emergency Department, and has a beautiful appartment that looks out over the water. We went on a jet boat ride, saw dolphins from the water, climbed a mountain, visited a koala hospital, had many delicious brunches with her friends, and Toya cooked me her famous Thai Soup That she once made me in Plymouth - it was so good!!

Blue Mountains

The Blue Mountains are definitely up there in my most beautiful places list. I spent a day exploring them, but could have stayed for much longer!

On the way I stopped at Feathervale Wildlife Park and made some new friends. Kangeroos and wallabys roam freely, and they're curious little things. Especially if you have an icecream cone filled with food!

The Blue Mountains is a huge region of cliffs, waterfalls and endless eucalyptus forests. The oils in the eucalyptus leaves diffuse into the air which creates an ethereal blue haze across the sky.

One of the most popular landmarks is the Three Sisters. Its a huge rock formation with an Aboriginal legend. The story says that many years ago a magical witch doctor named Tyowan lived in the mountains. He had 3 daughters, Meehni, Wimlah and Gunnedoo, and he would leave them on the cliff when he went down into the valley to hunt. One day they were frightened by a giant centipede (because that happens) and one of the sisters threw a stone to scare it away. The stone fell down the cliff side and awoke the Bunyip, a monster who lived in the bottom of the valley. The Bunyip raced up to the sisters, but Tyowan turned them into rocks to protect them. The Bunyip then turned his anger on Tyowan and chased him throughout the mountains. At a dead end Tyowan turned himself into a lyre bird to hide in the cracks of the cliff face. But in the process he dropped his magic wand. To this day the lyre bird roams the mountains searching for the lost wand, unable to turn himself or his daughters back to their human form.

Hunter Valley

Hunter Valley is beautiful! It's real countryside, with sprawling vineyards covering the hills. And I was lucky enough to travel through the valley and stop and visit 3 of the many wineries. And all 3 provided a wine tasting session...

First up was McGuigan Wines. 

I got a tour of the factory and saw the presses and the huge fermenting barrels. The biggest one is 54,000 litres, which converts to 72,000 bottles!!

Drayton Family Wines was vineyard #2 And they provided 9 wines to taste - and not in a small measure either, it was almost half a glass. Wine gets me very drunk very quickly, so by this point I'm feeling substantially pissed!

A stop for lunch and then onwards to Wynwoods Estate.  By wine #23 we are all starting to get pretty rowdy.

Until the 2 hour bus journey back to Sydney, where everybody fell asleep. It was a beautiful sunny day, and the free flowing wine meant we made friends quickly and had lots of interesting conversation!!

 

 

# Hostel Life

Welcome to Wake Up

I've been living here for 3 weeks now.

Life in a hostel is a strange cross between living in a house and a hotel. You live in a dorm room with between 4 and 10 bunks, and the more people the cheaper it is, so Iv'e mostly been living with lots of people. Which is good, except people snore.
Or return from a night out at 3 in the morning, and stumble around drunk turning on every light, knocking things over and talking really loudly. You never really get a good night's sleep. Especially if you've got a creaky bunk without rails.



The hostel I've lived in for the longest is Wake Up, and in the basement is Sidebar, one of Sydney's most popular clubs. It's a great place with an awesome buzz. And it's great to be able to just get the lift upstairs and fall into bed - no long walk or taxi ride. But you can hear the bass line even from the 7th floor.


Meal time is always quite frustrating. Though the hostels have kitchens, they are always far too small for the ammount of people trying to use them. There are never enough pots or pans, plates or cutlery, so you end up waiting to use something - usually a hob. Though there are lots of stations and hobs, most don't work. And everyone is jostling for the same spaces. And then, of course, people don't clear up after themselves. If you've ever been to uni or lived in a flat with 4 or 5 people, imagine that times 100!!!

I have lived in Wake Up, in the Central Business District for 3 weeks, and that is far too long! This weekend I moved to a suburb called Drummoyne with 3 of my friends. It's a lot cheaper to live outside the city, and quieter too. We now live in Bayside Conference Centre. It used to be an office building, and is in the process of being converted. People only started living here about 2 weeks ago, and there is still a lot of fine tuning going on. But it's another good crowd with a mix of age ranges, nationalities and personalities. The 4 of us, Cara, David, Marcus and I are sharing a room - complete with office desk and filing cabinets. The media room still hosts the boardroom table! It's spacious and comfortable and quiet here. There are no bunks, instead we each have our own single bed, there's a clean kitchen and a bus stop and supermarket round the corner and a short walk to the harbour. Not too shabby at all.

SURF CAMP

I'm back in Sydney now after what was one of the greatest weeks of my life! 

Monday morning I got a coach down to 7 Mile Beach in Gerroa with the rest of my crowd, and checked in to our bunks in a caravan park. After the initial talk we suited up (though it is sunny, the water is still pretty cold as we are only just in Spring over here), and headed down to the beach.

It's been so long since I surfed, and I never had a proper lesson, so I went completely back to basics and learnt from scratch, getting rid of all of my bad habits. We started off small on white water waves, working on balance and the correct pop-up technique. The Chicken Wing method is so much better than what I was doing; I always used to lose my balance and fall down.

Chicken Wing; push upper body up, back heel to knee with flat foot, straighten arms, step through with back foot into safety position, push off arms and stand.

Up at 7 for breakfast before the morning session, then a bbq lunch, rest and session 2. Then drinks and chilling into the evening. Quiet time starts at 10, so you either go to bed or to the beach, where the stars were incredible. I have never seen them so bright!

Just like everywhere else I have been to, the people at surf camp were great. The guys who ran it were so much fun and really great teachers. I learnt so much from them.

I learnt to turn left and right properly, and ride the wave to the side instead of straight forwards. We progressed onto green unbroken waves pretty early in the week, learning the easiest ways to paddle out back behind the impact zone. At first the guys were pushing us in to the waves, telling me when to paddle, when to get up. But I quickly got my head around it. I watched them judging the swell lines as they came in, saw when they would send someone or hold back. I got familiar with which bumps in the water were going to grow into a good wave, big or small, where they would break and where the best position was to catch them. And then it was game on. I caught green wave after green wave, and headed back for another with the biggest grin. 

There was only 1 afternoon, at low tide, when the waves weren't great. And then we just got silly and had fun. Practicing silly tricks; the coffin (lying on your back, hands crossed), driving the car (bit of mime work to keep it fresh), the golf swing (you get it...), 180s, and my personal favourite, the buddha.

 Two lessons a day, 3 hours each. By Wednesday I was starting to ache. By Thursday the bruises were showing and by Friday the friction spots were all red and bloody. I feel like I have spent a week in a boxing ring - my body looks like it too.

Dream Team

A 21 hour journey on a Greyhound Bus and I arrived in Sydney.

Sydney is a great city. It is very like London with interesting cafes and restaurants lining the streets, beautiful parks, big shopping centres and hip people. It's huge, sprawling over miles of streets and suburbs, and I'm really struggling to orient myself - I spent a couple of hours this morning on the same few streets trying to get back to where I'd come from, walking in circles. I even had a map and couldn't figure it out! (I blame the map!)

I am here with a 1 year work and travel visa, on a 2 week orientation package with AIFS - the American Institute for Foreign Study. There are 6 of us on the programme, all from England! From left to right, Marcus, David, me, Cara, Lauren and Jonno. Everybody is great and we get on really well. We are thinking of getting an apartment in Sydney together and staying here for Christmas and New Years - they are BIG in Sydney!!

Marcus and I have an interesting back story. We met, not in Sydney, but in LA. We were sat together on the flight from Los Angeles to Fiji! And in Fiji we just happened to stay in the same hostel for a few days at the end of my trip. He stayed in Fiji while I was in the Sunshine Coast, flying over a week later, and yet we still somehow managed to walk into our hostel here at the same moment!

Time has flown! So far we've been so busy without actually doing much! We've had a few talks about working here and travelling. We've set up bank accounts and applied for Tax File Numbers. We've done a great walking tour of the city, sat around in the sunshine, and worked on CVs, looking for jobs and apartments.

We've also done lots of socialising!! Lots of places here do free pizza and drinks evenings, before moving on to a bar. Our first night we joined the party in the Greyhound store and made friends with the guys who work there. We got free drinks all night, Lauren won a skydive, and we have been promised an incredible deal travelling up the East Coast. We are going in to see them about it today, so more on that later...

We took a day out from job hunting and headed into the sunshine with a couple of other friends. We got a ferry from Sydney Harbour, sailing past the Opera House and Harbour Bridge, and 30 minutes later arrived in Manly beach, one of the most beautiful beaches in Sydney. White sand beaches, sunshine, waves, the perfect place to chill out. Surprisingly the water was FREEZING! Much colder than the Sunshine Coast, though perhaps not as cold as England.

We've split our 2 weeks in half, and in the middle, we've booked in to another great deal. Tomorrow we are going to SURF CAMP! We travel down to Seven Mile Beach where we will live in cabins on the beach for 5 days. 2 surf lessons a day, with bbqs and camp fires and 100 people. From everything we've heard, it is going to be epic. I am ridiculously excited and acting a little bit like a kid on Christmas Eve.

Sunshine Coast

G'day from the Sunshine Coast of Australia!

After a slightly dubious night at Nadi Airport in Fiji I boarded a time traveling plane and headed to Australia. I gained 2 hours and am now 9 ahead of the UK - that was good because I had chance to sleep - you don't get much on a floor in the corner of a foreign airport...

My wonderful cousin Saffron and second cousin (?) Sofia met me and took me back to their beautiful house in Alexandra where I met the gorgeous Oscar. I have my own room with a proper bed, a power shower and a washing machine - I've never felt so clean!!

It is great to spend time with Saff and Sofia. They moved here from England years ago. And I've seen them maybe twice since. But they are so much fun! I've been shopping with Sofia and latin dancing with Saff and we've climbed mountains together.



It's a 5 minute walk to the beach, less if you take a bike with the clever board racks! The surf here is great, the sun is always shining, I'm in heaven! I've been given free reign to the supplies in the garage and I've been using them well...

I've been to a pottery class, with my aunt Lindi. Saffron took me to the incredible Eumundi Market (I now have to learn to cook Tibetan Momo!). Houses in the trees, cocktails at Noosa, countless beaches, mountains and fish and chips.  Claire, my cousin from my dad's other brother has also just moved to Australia, to the Gold Coast, and she and her boyfriend Matt came up to say hi. 

There's so much to do here. Surfing and spending the day on the beach, reading and topping up the tan. Making sand castles too, though this one wasn't made by me...

The Sunshine Coast is full of birds. Ibis and Egrets roam the beach fronts, and bush turkeys are everywhere! The trees are full of parrots and lorakeets, and huge pelicans sit in the waters waiting for their next catch.

 In short, Sunshine Coast is amazing. And I'd very much like to stay here!