Jan 2007

alright, so sorry that the posts have been so piss poor and sparatic over the holidays. Not only was the lack of internet access a big issue, it was sort of the same stuff over and over again and nothing really new happened to update. Christmas was spent at a camp site cabin in wologong, south of sydney and we pretty much stayed there the entire time just hanging out with eachother at the cabin and the camp site facilities the whole time, didn't really take any pictures even (although I'm starting to regret that more now that the whole group is split up.) For New years we moved a bit close to Sydney but still south of it in Rockdale which was close enough to train into the city for days and evenings. That was much more fun although the late night bus rides and public transportation (especially around New Years) got a bit interesting. You have no idea how smelly an underground train can get with thousands of drunks on it for 5 or so hours (perhaps some of you do). I actaully had a prety early New Years (compared to the rest of the city) although I woke up around 7 to claim us a spot for the fireworks show so... We ended up running into the girls agian before we left Syndey yesterday, turns out there's no work in Hunter Valley so they stuck around still looking and got to see "Muff" one last time before Tom sold it for $ 2800 which is awesome. He bought it for 2000 so its pretty nice I think. The day before I left Sydney I spent the day with one of my old camp counsilors from Arrowhead and he took me to the Sydney Olympic Whitewater Stadium out in Perinth (about an hour west of the city). I got to use one of his boats to paddle the short class three man made rapids and managed to get my roll down before heading in. Even so I wasn't quite up to par with the olympic course and spent most of the morning swimming the course trying not to drown as I dragged the boat to shore. IT amazing what they can get the water to do without the rocks and stuff. They pump it up from this massive lake that flows down around in a U shape so that you end up about where you started (just bellow it obvisouly) then you paddle onto this converbelt ramp thing that brings you up to the top again. If your not me you can run it about 4 tims in an hour without ever getting out of you boat, I managed to to complete it once and got out of my boat about 5 times. In the afternoon Jex got us an inflatable 2 man raft which turned out to be just as easy to flip but easier to get back into which is half the fun. He is quite a regular there (a damn good paddler) and knows the staff well so all the saftry precaustions and stuff that you would normally have to follow we didn't and we would chase the boat upstream into class 3 wholes (which, suprisingly enough, can still hold you down pretty good manmade or not.) Anway it is usually about 60 bucks and hour not including renting boats and stuff and Jex got me in for 25 for the day so it was soo cool. ON the way back to Rockdale he took me to the rest of the Sydney Olympic park which was really cool too. The aquatic facility was amazing.
Tom and I are in Melbourne now, flew here this morning on the 6 am flight after spending the night in the international terminal in Sydney. That makes the 4th Airport I've slept in on this trip and it was definatly the worst. (good ones are John Lennon international in Liverpool and Auckland International, you know, just in case you need the info at some point) The Greyhound busses which we looked into at first were about 80-90 bucks and wern't gonna leave Sydney till Sunday and the train was about 120 and the same for the dates. We got the flight online for 79 bucks and got a free night of accomodation with it, its good to know you got the best deal. We rented a car for the drive form here to Adalaid where we're staying with another mate from Scotland and seeing some vinyards and wineries. From adelaid we are relocating a camper van to Perth over a course of 5 days which puts us there on the 18th. Fly out to Bangkok on the 21st (hopefully) so we get to spend a couple days there. As I'm sure you heard there were some bombings in bangkok on New Years Eve that killed several tourists so I can tell you at least one person that is at least a bit timid about that next destination, but we're checking with the Embassies and stuff to make sure that its still ok to ga and plan on getting out of the capital pretty quickly. Sorry no pictures yet but soon we'll be drving the great Ovean road which is supposed to be some of the most beautiful coastlines in australia, hopefully New Zealand won't have ruined it for me, or for you. We may ahve gotten a bit picture spoiled

It was a sad day today, except for Tom and I the group has broken up. Nick is off to New Zealand with a friend from Airlie beach and this was out actual goodbye as I won't see him till we're both back in the states. Brittany and Kelly headed North to Hunter Valley to try their hands again at some more fruit picking, this time grapes. Hunter Valley is pretty famous for its wine but not as famous as is South Australia and the Adelaid region which is where we are heading after Melbourne. We aren't sure how we're gonna get to Melbourne yet but exploring the options, we want to leave tonight if possible. As soon as I get to Melbourne I'll have a much better update.