Torchlight Prison Tour

Yesterday we went back to Fremantle and after sampling some fresh seafood for dinner we went to Fremantle Prison which sells itself as one of Western Australia's most fascinating and significant cultural attractions. Convicts first came to the Swan Valley in 1850 to help build the infrastructure for the Swan River Colony. They built lots of local road, bridges and government buildings but their first task was to construct the 'Convict Establishment' in which they would be held, Fremantle Prison. The impressive limestone building was completed in the late 1800's and was used as a maximum security prison all the way up to 1991.

We were going on a night-time 'torchlight tour' so were met by our guide, Matthew, at 7.45pm. He was an excellent guide and could really tell a good story, always handy on a spooky tour! We started off in the prisoner registration and processing area before turning on our torches, walking through the shower block and out into the main parade ground. From here you can see the hundreds of windows where over a thousand prisoners were once held. After a couple of stories we went into the first cell block. It is a really spooky feeling being inside, it was very dark and looking up there were 3 levels of thick doors, railings and netting. Matthew then told us a story about how a woman had been in there on her own one night and had looked up and seen the figure of a man standing on the very top balcony looking like he was screaming. She ran straight outside and through her tears told the tour guide what she had seen. The guide told her about a convict in the 1800's that couldn't take being in the prison any longer and had thrown himself off that very balcony. All the way through this story I was expecting something to jump out at us or a weird noise to make us jump but there was nothing. As Matthew finished his story I let my guard down just as he said "and if we all look up there" pointing his torch towards the top balcony. Just then there was a massive bang, a piercing scream and a body came tumbling down from the balcony. Obviously I almost crapped myself, screamed like a girl and shoved my head into Megan's shoulder! Looking back up I could clearly see that it was just a dummy but even though I had been expecting something all the way through I definitely wasn't ready for that! Luckily I wasn't the only one that jumped, Megan thought for a split second that someone had actually tripped and gone over the edge and the other 20 or so people in our group must have thought the same!

From then on we were slightly more on our guard and weren't quite as shocked (I still jumped and shouted) when a man jumped out of one of the solitary confinement cells we were being shown. These were tiny cells with 2 lots of doors, extra thick walls and only the tiniest holes as windows. Prisoners would spend 23 hours a day in here, alone.
We were then shown the gallows where 44 people were executed in the time that the prison was operating. This was quite weird to know that 44 lives were ended in that one small room. We also heard the last sound that each of those people would have ever heard, the trapdoor opening. A horrible noise.

It was about the gallows that we heard possibly the scariest, spookiest story of the night. It was a daytime tour and a mother was going round with a very young child in a pram. All the way round the baby had been screaming and crying, definitely not enjoying it. When they eventually got to the gallows she waited outside so as not to disrupt everyone and when most people had left the room she went in with the tour guide to have a quick look. On entering, the baby quietened down for the first time that day and as she pushed the pram right in the baby even started smiling. It reached its little hand up towards the rope with a hangman's noose on the end and still smiling said its first ever words. "Bye bye, Bye bye."

Now that is probably the spookiest, most weird, scary story I've heard in a long time. Made even spookier by it being told to us whilst sitting in a darkened chapel with only torchlight around the place! All in all it was a fantastic tour. It wasn't just scary stories but also interesting historical facts about the prison, the convicts and the general area. They do other tours during the day but I'm glad that as we were only going to do one tour, we did this one.

Perth and "The Valley of Taste"

On Saturday we continued our westward journey and travelled another 3,725 km from Alice to Perth. This means that in the space of 4 days we travelled around 7,000 km by plane, coach and 4WD (plus about 15 km on foot!!). It's amazing to think that's all in one country, it's the equivalent of driving from London to Edinburgh and back 5 and a bit times!! It was the fourth day in a row that we'd been up before sunrise too, I thought this was meant to be a holiday?!!

The reception staff at the Heavitree Lodge had been pretty useless most of the time we were there and they proved in perfectly on Saturday morning. I had booked our airport shuttle bus through them on Friday evening but they forgot to send a fax through so the bus never arrived to pick us up, meaning we had to wait even longer for a taxi to turn up. Luckily we still arrived with enough time to get our flight and they paid for it for us which is fair enough because it was their fault. Our flight was nice and easy, we flew over Uluru which was really great to see from the only angle we hadn't already seen on our walk! We were even on the correct side of the plane to see it from.

When we arrived in Perth (in the rain!) we checked into our new hostel, the Perth City YHA. It is our first YHA experience and we were pleasantly surprised, it's very nice and not too expensive. We were pretty tired so didn't want to do anything major, instead finding the nearest cinema and crashing out in front of the newly released 'Indiana Jones'! A nice chilled start to Perth.

Sunday saw us head off on the 30 minute train ride to the local town of Fremantle, or Freo as the locals call it (why must the Australians shorten EVERYTHING? They don't even call the MCG its full name, they call it 'The G'!! Seriously, if anyone knows please let me in on that one!!), which is a harbour side town with lots of fishing boats still working from there. On the weekends they run markets here so we spent most of the day just wandering around enjoying the town, the stalls and the fresh local produce. When we were down by the waterfront there were lots of people standing by the waters edge obviously all watching something. Not being ones to turn down a free show we headed down to see what was going on and it turned out that there were a few dolphins just frolicking in the water a matter of metres from the shore!

Monday was a nice, sunny day which we enjoyed whilst not doing anything in particular. We strolled around the city and headed for King's Park, to get to it we had to climb 300 or so steps but it was worth it. From the top there is a great view of the city and the Swan River which was made even better by the sun being out. We spent a while in the park just relaxing, reading and chatting before heading to an outlet shopping centre, 'Harbour Town'. There were lots of shops here and quite a few sales, not wanting to miss out I ended up buying 3 polo shirts for $15, bargain!

One of the main things Western Australia is famous for is its superb wines and this was what we had in mind for Tuesday. We booked ourselves onto a cruise and Swan Valley tour. The day was beautiful , really warm and only a few clouds, perfect for a morning cruise up the river towards "The Valley of Taste". We left at 9.45 and started our day with tea, coffee, muffins and great views of the city before the wine was brought out at about 10.30. After 'modelling' one of the 4 bottles for everyone on the boat we got a short class in wine tasting, learning the 6 S's.

1. Size (what the wine looks like)
2. Swirl
3. Sniff
4. Sip
5. Swish (around in your mouth)
6. Swallow (you could spit if you want but where's the fun in that?)

Once we'd tried these 4 wines we were definitely getting into the spirit of things and ready to visit some wineries.

When we got off the boat we were met by our jolly guide, Gerry who took us off to four family run wineries. First stop was 'Garbin Estate Wines' where we tried about 12 different wines. This was great as I now know which wines are my favourite. In the whites, Chenin Blanc and Verdelho were my favourite grapes and from the reds the Cabernet-Merlot was beautiful. At least in restaurants now I can have some idea of what to choose rather than just asking for 'House White'! Leaving here we walked through the vineyards to the largest producer of sparkling wine in Australia, 'Jane Brook Estate Wines' where we had a lovely lunch platter with cheeses, hams, veg and oven baked fresh bread. We had time to sample a couple more wines here including the unusual white port. After a brief visit to a nougat factory we went to 'Jarrah Ridge Wines' where we had some of the best Port I've ever tasted. We bought 2 bottles at a special cellar door price it was that good. Our last winery was the 'Edgecombe Bros Winery' where we tried a few more wines and had a cheese platter. This wasn't an amazingly special winery but I'm not going to complain! Our last stop was a brief one at the 'Margaret River Chocolate Company' with some free tastings here too.
The whole day was great fun and pretty good value at $120 each (around 60 pounds). I'm very glad we went and sampled the local produce and I even learnt a little bit about wine!

This morning we took ourselves off to Australias oldest working Mint, Perth Mint, and saw a gold pouring demonstration as well as lots of samples of gold nuggets, bars, bullions and coins! It was pretty cool to see all that gold, we even got to see what our weight in gold is at today's market price. Next time someone says that I'm "worth my weight in gold" (which doesn't happen very often!) I can tell them that is around $3,200,000, almost a million dollars more expensive than Megan. I was very happy with this until she said that she could just feed me up and trade me in for a nice little sum!!

Tomorrow we're off to Fremantle again for a 'nice seafood dinner' (that quote is for you Adam. . . . . ) and a night-time tour of the Fremantle Prison, Saturday we're going to a science exhibition and then after that we only have 2 days left in Australia!! NOOOOOOO!!!!

Uluru Kata-Tjuta National Park

Whilst in England we booked our outback tour through STA Travel so this is something that has been planned and we've been looking forward to for a long time. We chose to go on a 2 day Uluru and Kata-Tjuta Camping Safari. We were picked up yesterday morning at 6.30 from the hostel and we joined the 11 other people that were on our tour. Uluru is situated 440km south-west (ish) of Alice Springs so we were in for quite a drive. After a stop at a camel farm and a couple of roadhouses on the long straight desert roads we arrived at the permanent campsite at 'Yulara', the Ayers Rock Resort. From a distance we could see the mighty Uluru and the impressive Kata-Tjuta and we couldn't wait to get closer and have a proper look. (If you don't know Kata-Tjuta, it used to be called the 'Olgas', have a look on the net, its really something special).

We didn't have to wait long as after lunch we jumped back in our 4WD coach and drove the 50km to Kata-Tjuta. Kata-Tjuta means 'many heads' in the local language and we could see why, we got some great views of the 32 domed rocks as we drove around to a parking spot. From here we walked into the Walpa Gorge, formed between the largest dome, Mt. Olga and a neighbouring dome. We walked this with our tour guide, Nick, who gave us some informative little talks along the way about how it was formed, wildlife and aboriginal beliefs. It was a beautiful day with the temperature sitting at around 27C in the sun but dropping dramatically in the shade. This massive heat change is one of the reasons for the massive erosion, the rocks crack after such strains over long periods, eventually forming the incredible shapes and formations we see today. It was really great to be in amongst the huge rocks, all around you are just massive red walks and then looking out and seeing nothing but arid land as far as the eye could see was really strange. After coming out from the middle of the rocks we retreated to a lookout point to see the whole formation together. We left here at about 5.15pm and made our way to the Uluru sunset lookout point.

Here, some nibbles and wine were laid out for us ready to watch the amazing changing colour display on the massive rock. What we saw is difficult to put into words but it was an incredible sight. The colour changing from an ochre brown through to a red then bright orange. The sort of sight that most have seen in pictures but now having seen it for myself, those pictures don't do it justice! It was an incredible feeling to stand and watch something so famous across the world for myself. Once the sun had set and it actually got dark we went back to Yulara and had a BBQ under the stars and around the campfire. After a few glasses of wine and a really long chat with our tour guide (we've made ourselves a friend there!) it was definitely time for bed!!

This morning we were off to get close up to Uluru and see the sun rise. We were leaving camp at 6.20am so had to get up at around 5am (again!!) to make sure that everything was ready and we were all fed and watered. We had three options this morning;

1. Climb the rock
2. Watch the sunrise from the dedicated viewing area
3. Walk around the entire base of Uluru whilst the sun comes up.

We decided to go for option 3 and started the 8km walk at 7am. The sun rose at 7.20am and was absolutely spectacular. This was much better than sunset, partly because we were now so close to the rock, but also the way we went from darkness with stars, the moon and a big black rock to the brightest, most vivid orange imaginable in the space of just a few minutes. Once again, a very difficult thing to put into words, especially for someone so inarticulate as me, but in a word incredible. We continued our walk and loved it, we got to see that it isn't smooth at all, there are so many different features and different types of rock. We got to see that it is also nowhere near the uniform shape that we had imagined. There are massive gulleys and valleys present, it's not just round. We eventually completed our walk at 9am at the start of the climb. We took the decision not to climb as the Anangu (the local traditional owners) request that people don't. This site is sacred to them (and I can now really see why) and only certain initiated men are meant to climb and even then only on very special occasions. Over 35 people have died and many more have been injured on the climb yet people still do it. I think this is incredibly disrespectful. If you went to someones home and they asked you to take your shoes off before you came in you'd do it straight away as it is they're home, they're the boss and it's just polite. It is the same situation here. The Anangu own the rock officially (it was handed back by the government in the 80's), they ask people not to climb it yet some still do. After a few more stories about aboriginal beliefs of how the landscape was formed and a final short walk with Nick we headed to the cultural centre (which was really interesting) and then back to camp.

From here we had a 6 hour trip back to Alice but it went very quickly and easily. It is a shame that our trip here was so short but we did and saw everything we wanted to and had the best time. Also, our beds were comfy, all our food was sorted for us and it was brilliantly organised and guided by Nick. I'm glad we paid a little extra and went on a proper tour than a cheap, budget backpacker one. We didn't have to worry about anything but enjoying the amazing experience of exploring Uluru and Kata-Tjuta.

Melbourne to Alice Springs

For our last day in Melbourne we had decided that we had to do the incredibly 'english backpacker' thing of going on the 'Neighbours' tour. We didnt really know what to expect but thought it would probably be quite tacky. We were not mistaken, it was very cheesy and the most horribly touristy thing we've done so far on the trip! We aren't complaining though as it was actually quite fun. First off we went to 'Erinsborough High School' (otherwise known as Blackburn English Language School) which neither of us actually recognised at all. We then went on to 'Ramsay Street' (Pin Oak Court in real life) which was a lot smaller looking in real life! This is a real street with real people living in all the houses (most of the have been there since the start) and because of this there is a security guard posted there 24/7 to keep tourists off their private property. The official tour takes 35,000 people there every year and an estimated 10,000 or more people visit on their own too!
The final part of the tour was going to the studios and meeting a star. Unfortunately they were filming so we didn't get to see around the studios which could have been interesting. Instead we met Jackie Woodburne who plays Susan Kennedy, in the car park . . . . . . classy! After a short while taking photos and signing autographs it was the end of the tour. Quite a fun, but very cheesy afternoon and finish to our stay in Melbourne.

Today we got up nice and early and got to the airport for our 2,500 km journey into the centre of the country (almost exactly), Alice Springs. Only one piece of drama at the airport . . . . . . Megan got caught trying to smuggle a knife onto the plane! She had accidentally left a butter knife in the front pouch of her bag from the picnic we had way back in the Blue Mountains!! It was the first time she has taken that bag on a plane since Dubai so hadn't needed to check it for things like that before, unlucky!

After checking into the 'Heavitree Gap Outback Lodge' we went into town and had a look around. For a town with a population of almost 30,000 it still has a very small town feel and that is definitely a good thing. There is just one main mall here which doesn't take long to walk up, we spent most of our time in the traditional aboriginal art galleries (that's the art that is traditional, not the galleries!!) and even bought 3 original pieces.

Alice Springs sits surrounded by the Macdonnell Ranges and our hostel is right at the bottom of the ranges in the only gap through them (you guessed it, the 'Heavitree' Gap) with a great rocky outlook. One of the local animals is the Black-Footed Rock Wallaby and lots of these come out in the evening into the hostel car park. We bought a bag of wallaby food and went down and hand fed them. None of them were shy and within seconds we were surrounded by wallabies all trying to get the food! It was a really weird experience as they'd grab your hand and pull it towards them to get food. We also saw a few wallabies with Joey's sticking their little heads (and occasionally arms too!) out of the pouches. That was really cool to see and a good start to our few short days in the outback!

A Perfect Day in Melbourne

Yesterday was one of the best complete days we have had on the trip so far, we both really really enjoyed ourselves. Yes, the BridgeClimb was better but we didn't do anything in the morning and obviously watching turtles hatch was so unique and special but we spent all day waiting. Yesterday was about the whole day as an experience.

The hostel has been advertising a free walking tour of the city and we thought we might as well go along even though we've walked around a lot and if it was no good we would have just left, but it was great!! There was a group of 9 of us and the tour guide and she took us round town showing us all the main sights but also the little alleys and lanes, the hidden bars and shops, the graffiti and quirky artwork, and the free views of the city. There are so many hidden gems in the city, you just have to know where to look! If you are ever going to Melbourne, I would say that you HAVE to do a walking tour, it's got to be the only way to see the real city.

Our tour started in the dirty looking alleyway directly opposite our hostel which we've waked past several times and we were shown a piece of graffiti here by the famous graffiti artist, Banksy. It is one of the only pieces he's done in Australia and it was so close to us! (If you don't know who Banksy is then look him up, he's very interesting and a bit of a legend!!) The council are so proud of it and want to keep it so much that they have now added the building it is on into the National Trust, they have also added the alleyway to the National Trust! We were then taken down some more graffitied lanes that we would have usually walked past without a second thought. These are lanes that people are actually encouraged to graffiti on and there is some amazing art there! When there are special events in Melbourne the council goes to these lanes and whitewashes over all the graffiti then specially commissions graffiti artists to do some really good stuff as they know it is a tourist attraction and they want it to look good! I think this is a good idea, definitely better than trying to ban it altogether.

After this we saw some more great stuff including the smallest café in Melbourne and the smallest gallery in Melbourne. We also saw some fantastic old buildings displaying mosaic floors and ceilings painted with gold. We saw the largest and second largest mosaic floors in all of Australia, the first shopping mall in Melbourne and the most hidden bar in Melbourne. The last thing we were shown on the tour before we had to leave was the view from the 35th floor toilets in the Sofitel Hotel. The loo's have floor to ceiling glass walls and you can see all the sports stadiums and in the distance the 'Great Dividing Range'. The main room with a view is a members only area but the toilets are public, a great tip for a free view for backpackers!!

After our tour it was time for my special treat to Megan. Whilst in Tasmania I booked and paid for a special dinner on the 'Colonial Tramcar Restaurant'. This is a really fancy, nice meal on a modified tramcar, whilst travelling around the city. It was great food, all inclusive wine and drinks and all in all a very odd, but great experience! This left at 5.45pm and got back at about 7.15pm. We were dropped off right by the Crown Casino in South Melbourne and as Megan hadn't been in a casino before we thought we'd take a look. It was absolutely massive inside with 3 floors of casino, loads of bars and restaurants and hundreds of 'pokies' (slot machines). It was great to have a look round and what was even better was that we found and acoustic duo playing in one of the bars. They were great and were playing lots of songs that people requested so we decided to shout out a few ourselves. If one of them knew it they would play and the other one would just pick it up and strum along. After their second set they came over to us and thanked us for our good requesting, they seemed to enjoy playing what we kept shouting out, we were apparently their 'creative consultants' for the evening! We got chatting them for quite a while and they were really nice guys and great musicians. We had got there at about 8pm and didn't leave until about 11.15pm, if they were playing longer then we probably would have stayed! It was a really great end to one of the best days.

Sport and Video Games - A Mans Heaven?

Our entire weekend was spent watching sport and playing video games, does it get any better? Saturday morning was horrible weather, grey and raining, and it didn't look like stopping. This obviously wasn't going to change our plans (we're British for goodness sake!!) but it did 'dampen' our spirits (see what i did there?!) slightly. By early afternoon it was still raining so we donned our warm clothes, took out the umbrella, readied ourselves with our 'emergency travelling ponchos' and off we went. It was definitely, without a doubt, the coldest weather we've been in since we left the UK in January. It was that cold that we could see our breath! We were very worried on our way to the MCG that we would be sitting in the rain but it seems we were very lucky as we were one of the few rows that was covered. All the people who were meant to be sitting in the rain ended up standing at the back undercover! The constant rain made the match interesting and quite amusing with both sides dropping the ball, falling over and sliding around the pitch. I started the match as a complete neutral, not supporting either Richmond Tigers or Geelong Cats, applauding all plays and generally enjoying the Aussie Rules. But by the second quarter I had chosen my allegiance. Not by who was playing better, not by which colour I liked best but because I had a really, really annoying Geelong Cats fan next to me!! She was the screechiest woman I've ever heard, screaming (literally, screaming) at everything and I decided; 'I don't want to be associated with her!'. From then on we supported the Richmond Tigers who, after a good start, got smashed by Geelong! I'm glad we went to a match again, it was a completely different experience to when we watched in Sydney, especially the weather! The MCG was great too, it looked really empty with fans scattered about everywhere but it turned out there were 35,000 people there! It is just odd as the stadium can hold over 100,000 so it is very difficult to make it look busy!

In the evening we headed off at about 10pm to the Turf Bar to get ourselves settled in and ready to watch the FA Cup Final, Pompey vs Cardiff. The closer it got to kick off the more nervous I got, sinking my drinks quicker and quicker to try and calm my nerves! By midnight (kick off time here) the pub was surprisingly full but most in there were supporting Cardiff. The game itself wasn't great, the goal was a bit crappy and we missed some good chances but I think that sums up our FA Cup run this year so it was only fitting that's how we won it! I was obviously very happy, slightly tipsy and definitely ready for bed by the time we got back at 2.30am!

After a lazy start on Sunday we eventually got ourselves up and out and went and explored a couple of Melbournes laneways in search of a café for brunch. This wasn't a hard challenge, there are loads of cafés, the challenge was finding one that wasn't heaving! We eventually found a nice little one still serving breakfast, just what we needed. The main attraction of the day was an exhibition at the ACMI, Australian Centre for the Moving Image, in Federation Square called 'Game On'. This was an exhibition charting the development and progression of video games and consoles through the years from 1951 when it first began up to the present day. This is in Lonely Planets Top 10 things to do in Melbourne and for good reason, it was really good fun and cheap too! Megan enjoyed it too and was in no way dragged along! They had over 125 playable games including classics like Pong, Pacman and Space Invaders and Megan shamed me by beating me on every single game we played (except Ms. Pacman!!)! We spent a good few hours here playing on every console imaginable. All of them were working, even the original space invaders machines that are older than both of us, the only console that wasn't working was the PS3, the newest and apparently best of the lot!!

Leaving Tassie

On Tuesday we visited the third oldest city in Australia, Launceston, and its surrounds. Just 10 minutes outside the city is the Cataract Gorge which is where two smaller rivers come together to form the larger Tamar River. Having been to Low Head and seen the end of the Tamar it was only fitting that we went to Cataract Gorge to see the start! It was a gorgeous day and the gorge looked beautiful, especially now as the leaves are all turning amazing colours and just about falling off. Autumn is definitely a good time of year here. We went for a walk around the gorge and across the very wobbly suspension bridge, an odd experience! We then took a chairlift ride across the water to see the view from on high. It was so nice, also really silent, a great way to see the Tasmanian nature. This chairlift is also the worlds longest single span chairlift, i.e: the longest gap between two supporting poles, so that's pretty cool too! When we left here we had a quick look around Launceston but there wasn't a great deal there to interest us, except Australia's oldest sweet shop! You can easily tell that the buildings are very old if you look up but down at street-level they've all been made into normal shops with no regard to the heritage of the building, a shame really.

On Wednesday and Thursday we just chilled out and packed our bags before our Thursday flight. Thursday was really foggy in the morning and it delayed a lot of flights, but luckily not ours! The flight that was meant to leave 2.5 hours before us ended up leaving after us instead!

Once we were back in Melbourne we made our way into the city and found the 'Greenhouse Backpackers' where we were booked. It is a pretty big hostel with good communal areas but the rooms are very basic. The only really bad thing is that the walls are really thin (earplugs essential!) and there is no window in our room meaning that you don't wake up slowly with the light coming in. If I left Megan she'd probably sleep all day its so dark! We spent Thursday afternoon getting our bearings and sorting ourselves out with food for the entire time we're here.

Yesterday, Friday, saw us get stuck into what Melbourne is good for, shopping!! We walked a long way round the city, taking in big department stores, small independent stores and other in between before eventually getting to a Melbourne institution, the Queen Victoria Markets. These were massive and had pretty much everything you could imagine. There were all varieties of cooked foods and deli goods through to amazing fruit and veg stalls ending up with the rows upon rows of general retail. They were selling everything from tacky souvenirs to designer goods. This kept us out of trouble for a couple of hours before we carried on our trek of the city to go to the DFO which is the Direct Factory Outlet to continue our Melbourne shopping experience! We walked a fair few miles around town which definitely can't be bad for us.

Today is our day of sport, we are going to the famous MCG to watch some AFL and then going to the 'Turf Bar' (where we have actually been the last 2 nights) to watch Portsmouth vs Cardiff in the FA Cup Final which kicks off at midnight! Unfortunately I've just looked outside and its grey, horrible and hacking down with rain, not good to be sitting outside and watching sport!!

STA Explorer

I have been approached by a new STA Travel website, www.STAtravelbuzz.com, to become an STA Explorer. Basically its a site which is great for getting to hear other peoples travel stories and what places are really like and they want to feature my blog so that other people can see what we're getting up to. It's great for me because now I feel like I'm helping people along with enjoying myself!

So if you are reading this blog for the first time and you've been redirected from the new STA site, welcome!! Enjoy reading about our experiences and I hope that you find some of our information enjoyable as well as useful. Use the tools on the right to search for specific places or dates or just scroll through the site and browse away.

Enjoy!

Tassie Devils and Glowing Caves

After the foggy start to Saturday, the weather cleared up nicely and we were told that we were being taken to Mole Creek to see some Tasmanian Devils. We had only seen one before at Australia Zoo and that was only for a short while before it decided that it was time for another nap. This time we saw lots, they are very strange animals, a weird cross between dogs, cats and bears! They're also nothing at all like the cartoon character, I have no idea where they got that from! The wildlife park we were in was actually very poor and in shocking condition. Happily the animals were all fine and looked very healthy, active and well fed but the place itself looked pretty run-down and disorganised.

On leaving here we went to the incredible Marakoopa Caves, in the shadow of the famous Cradle Mountain. There are 2 cave tours here and the one we went on was a 45-minute tour of the lower chamber featuring 2 underground rivers, reflecting pools of crystals and thousands upon thousands of stalactites and stalagmites. The final part of the tour involved switching off all the lights in the main chamber. Pretty cool in itself as it was pitch black (I mean, cant see your hand in front of your face, real darkness!) but also because after a few seconds you could start to see hundreds of glow-worms on the ceiling! The glow comes from their abdomen to attract food, the more hungry they are, the brighter they are. Megan reckoned that if she was a glow-worm then she'd be the brightest in the cave, always hungry! The whole cave experience was really incredible, the sort of thing that we wouldn't have generally thought of doing by ourselves but we're really glad that it was suggested to us. It was also the first time that Anna-Marie and Des had been there so a good experience all round. Driving back home we passed through lots of English-sounding places; Sheffield, Exeter, Launceston and many others taken straight from an A-to-Z of Britain, very weird!

On Sunday we had a nice lazy start to the day but eventually kicked ourselves into gear and went for a long drive to discover the Tasmanian landscape. We went across the Tamar River (another British one!) and went to one of the most northerly parts of Tasmania, Low Head, where the Tamar River opens out into the sea. From here, the next land is Melbourne! Later in the afternoon we went to the point directly opposite Low Head on the other side of the river mouth, Greens Beach. I'm glad we managed to get out and see some of the fantastic landscape here. It really is a beautiful island which is very sparsely populated giving it a very rugged and natural feel to it. There are only about 493,000 people living here, the same number of people living in all of Tasmania (26,410 sq miles) as live in Portsmouth in the UK (about 30-60 sq miles). That sort of statistic really brings it home how crowded our country really is!

Today, after a morning swim in the spa (attached to the ceiling by a rope so I could swim without going anywhere, weird!) we went out and saw the view from a place called Brady's Lookout. From here we could see lots of the huge Tamar River, rugged landscape, surrounding small towns and vineyards too. Luckily the sun decided to make an appearance for us meaning that although it was cold (we're very far south now, I have realised!) it was at least nice weather!

St. Kilda

We left the house with all our stuff at 6.20am on Monday morning and we eventually got to our next hostel at about 8pm! A long day spent on the train made bearable by the fact that I had a really good book! When we arrived in Melbourne we grabbed a taxi and headed down to St. Kilda. I think I had slightly overestimated St.Kilda, I had read that it was the 'beach part of Melbourne' and that there were great shops and cafes. With this in mind we booked to stay for 3 days before heading to Tasmania. Unfortunately there wasn't a great deal to do here and once we'd walked along the beach, the pier and the main shopping street we had done pretty much everything St. Kilda had to offer! This wasn't too much of a problem as we wanted to relax anyway which was easy to do in the hostel/guesthouse we stayed in. 'Olembia' was brilliant and very cosy with a 'drawing room' full of big armchairs, a fire, lots of magazines and books and a cat called Alex! It was easy to sit inside (away from the cloud and drizzle) and relax, reading, chatting and doing crosswords (not necessarily finishing them, but trying!!)

I think it was a mistake to stay so long as it would have been a nice day trip away from the city but not to worry. Yesterday morning we got the airport bus and got ourselves checked in for our flight to Launceston. Our bags were literally full to bursting point and this was shown in the fact that they were all overweight! We were only allowed 20kg for this flight but we're allowed more for the rest so I think we'll be ok.

The flight was nice and easy, once we'd been at cruising altitude for about 10 minutes we started to come down again, it's not very far at all! On arrival we were met by Anna-Marie (my friend Dan's mum) and taken to her new home. It really is a lovely place, and huge too. 3 double bedroom, a gym, a spa, massive open plan kitchen/lounge/dining room, a study, front and back verandas and 3 acres of land with 7 alpacas, 3 dogs and a load of chickens! There are also beautiful views of the hills and the Tamar River from the front (although not as I'm writing this, there is a nice thick covering of fog!!). I'm sure we'll easily be able to pass our short stay here, going round and seeing the beautiful countryside that Tasmania has to offer.

Sydney Summary

For our final day in Sydney we went and did something we've wanted to do since we were in Surfers Paradise, we saw a live AFL game! Zahra kindly got us some tickets to watch the Sydney Swans (our new team to follow) vs the Western Bulldogs at the Sydney Cricket Ground. We met up at about midday at Central Station and all went together to the ground. We got to our seats about 5 seconds after the first bounce (we're pros now, know all the technical terms!!) so pretty good timing. The sun was out, the footy was in full flow and there were 29,000 people all enjoying it along with us making for a great afternoon. The Swans were playing pretty poorly, missing lots of chances and seemed to have completely lost any will to win by the third quarter. In the final quarter, however, after a lucky goal their heads came up and they realised they were still in with a chance. This made the final few minutes really exciting and fast paced, with the Swans only needing 2 goals in 4 minutes to tie it up. Unfortunately, due to all the Swans players being in attack, as soon as they lost possession there was no defence at all. The Bulldogs scored and easy goal in the dying minutes to seal up a 112-97 victory. Even though our new team lost we had a great time and watching AFL live is definitely better than on TV. The pitch is so big (cricket oval size) that on TV you can't really get the gist of the game as you can't see the options or who they're kicking to.

So, our time in Sydney is up, what did we think of it? We both absolutely loved it. I'm glad we stayed for a month too as we got to do all the touristy things we wanted to but also got to do the family thing too. If we were only in Sydney for a week or two we wouldn't have been able to go out into the suburbs as much or explore as freely as we've been able to.

Sydney is a really massive city and not just in Australian terms but in comparison to other cities across the world. It is also made of so many different areas and none would survive without the others. The CBD (Central Business District) is obviously the main hub where all the shops are and where the most famous landmarks are. This is also where most people work. If you were in Sydney for just a short while it would be in the CBD that you would probably spend most of your time. The outskirts and the suburbs, however, are just as great to spend time in, if you have a chance. Newtown is a prime example, so different from what we had found in central Sydney but it was still a part of the city, part of what makes Sydney unique. The other thing that makes Sydney so special is the beaches. There are so many beaches and all offering different things. There are beaches within the harbour offering swimming and sailing and then there are those on the ocean coast offering great surfing. We only managed to go to the most famous beaches like Manly and Bondi but there were so many more great ones that we drove past within only a few hundred metres of the really famous ones. We were in Sydney for a month and still only scraped the surface of what was out there.

So, a few of our 'favourites' from Sydney.

Favourite Experience: BridgeClimb. Absolutely amazing, being on top of one of the most recognisable structures in Sydney. Fabulous weather, great sunset and a great view of Blue Mountains one way and ocean the other.

Favourite Snack Place: Circular Quay, Wharf 5 Cafe. Muesli and Yoghurt......amazing!

Favourite Lunchtime Restaurant: Guzman y Gomez, Newtown. Best Mexican ever, and cheap too! Alternatively, The Elephant Boy Cafe in Bowral (Blue Mountains) for the best pies ever!

Favourite Restaurant: Aria. Best restaurant I've ever eaten in, best food I've ever eaten!

Favourite View: On any ferry going East from Circular Quay when the sun is just going down, you can see the bridge and the opera house, nice!

Favourite Beach: Manly, not as busy as Bondi but still amazing, great waves too.

Favourite Drinking Hole: "The Fortune of War", the Rocks. A real pub with live music all weekend evening.

Biggest Surprise: The Opera House was a lot smaller than I expected when I first saw it, it wasn't as bright white as I had expected (probably to do with all the bloody cloud!) and it's actually 3 buildings, not just 1!

All in all, we had a great time in Sydney and a month was only just enough to do everything we wanted, wouldn't have experienced it quite as well if we had stayed any less!

Saying Goodbye in Style!

Although we aren't leaving until Monday, Thursday was the only day Ben and Fahm could get a babysitter and was therefore the day that we all went out for a 'goodbye' meal. This was very generously funded by Ruth and Andrew, not often they get to take Ben and Fahm out for dinner and this gave them an opportunity! We headed over on the ferry at about 6ish, just after dark, and as we rounded the corner of Cremorne Point to see the most famous part of the harbour lots of fireworks started. It was as if they were there especially for us to send us off. They were fabulous and you can see how New Years Eve would be so beautiful here. They carried on until we were just about to turn so we couldn't see them and then they stopped. They were made just for us!!

To continue our fancy evening (we were dressed up all posh too!) we went to the ECQ bar in Circular Quay and drank bubbly whilst overlooking the bridge. At 8pm we found our way to one of Sydney's best restaurants, Aria, where the others were waiting. As you walk through to the tables you are greeted with an amazing view of the harbour through the floor to ceiling glass windows. The menu here was excellent and among some of the best food we have ever tasted. The portion sizes were not so small that you could hardly see them but not so big that you feel horrible afterwards, perfect!

On Friday, we had decided to have a late lunch/early dinner at the Phillips Foote restaurant. This was recommended to us by someone telling Dad. I don't know who it was but it was a great call. Here you can cook your own steak on the BBQ, however you like it. All the steaks looked fabulous and were all local, we both had 'Sydney Cut' steaks which were tasty and cooked to near perfection (if I do say so myself!). After lunch we went to the 'Pylon Lookout' on the Harbour Bridge and used free vouchers we got when we did the BridgeClimb. There was a lot of history of the bridge and lots of info about building it too which was really interesting. There were lots of random facts dotted about the place and I thought the best and most accurate one was how much it cost to build; 10,057,170 pounds, 7 shillings and 9 pence! From the top there are some good views but unfortunately a load of clouds came over just as we got to the top!


We then walked across the bridge (quite a good experience in itself) across to 'Luna Park', the amusement park in North Sydney. This was fun and fairly immature, we got an unlimited rides pass and went on pretty much everything there including the carousel (which we had to go on separately so we could take photos of each other!).


Early this morning Zeena took us kayaking on the Harbour, leaving from the Spit we paddled all the way down to Balmoral and back. It was a great morning for it, nice and sunny, and good exercise! Megan and I were in separate single kayaks and it was quite lucky as if we were in a double whoever was at the back would have got pretty wet! We weren't that great and kept splashing, I managed to get pretty wet just by myself, the technique definitely needs improvement!

The afternoon saw us go to Taronga Zoo, the zoo with a view, from which you can see across the harbour and into the city. This was nice but not as good as Australia Zoo and definitely not worth the $39 admission price (luckily we got in as students for $23!). We saw lots of animals but I was happy to stroke an Echidna and see a Duck-Billed Platypus. These are two animals in the most unique group of animals in the world. Found only in Australia, the monotremes are the only mammals to lay eggs. There really are some amazing animals that come from being so isolated for so long!