STREWTH - WE'RE IN OZ

We touched down in Sydney at 6.30am having had no kip on the aeroplane as there was a woman sat next to me that seemed to think that she'd paid for half my seat also. As we were too early to check in, we crashed out in the TV lounge of our hostel until lunchtime then hauled ourselves into the shower and out into the most white and shimmering sunlight I've ever seen. It was so intense that within half an hour, I had a nose to rival Rudolph. The hostel was ideally located in the middle of the city and we wandered across to Darling Harbour, the Chinese Garden and of course, the piece de resistance - Port Jackson (Sydney Harbour) and the famous Harbour Bridge, or the Coathanger as its known here, and the Opera House.

The Harbour Bridge was far more imposing and impressive that we'd expected. We walked under it, then across it but didn't climb it as we decided that we could do quite a lot with the
400AUD it would have cost us to be breathalysed, take a sanity test, be togged-up like Bob the Builder and trussed like a turkey before climbing to the top and wishing that maybe we should have told the truth in the sanity test a couple of hours earlier. In contrast, the Opera House didn't have the wow factor that I'd expected and it looks better from a distance. Close-up, it's just a big (and dare I say it, teeny weeny bit shabby) tile job of millions of tiny white mosaic tiles that must have been murder to space evenly and grout. Bryn Terfel wasn't at home either which put the tin-hat on it. We ambled back to the hostel through the lovely Botanic Gardens, where the public are invited to walk all over the grass and to hug the trees, surrounded by exotic blooms and delicious scents. A lovely end to the day.

On our second day we took Jan's recommendation and caught a ferry to Manly beach. Black clouds were gathering as we boarded and by the time we got there, a nice steady drizzle was falling - the type that sticks and gets you really wet. We watched some beach volleyball in the rain (Marc was mesmerised by the volleyball/wet t-shirt combo) but it stopped raining long enough for us to join the other dozens of day-trippers eating fish and chips on the prom, which apparently is compulsory here. By now it was coming down in sheets and we were rained-off onto an early ferry back to the city. We decided that the best thing we could do for the rest of the afternoon was to use our public transport passes to see the city on the Sydney Explorer bus. This is a bus that tourists can hop-on and hop off freely during the day to visit the sights, but there was no hopping anywhere for us and we sat there for the whole 2 hour loop enjoying the trip, wacky commentary and seeing people like drowned rats outside.

Day three was a trip to another beach - the famous Bondi Beach which looked exactly like it does on the tin. It was glorious, except for the wind which whipped sand across the beach, exfoliating our ankles. We left our bag on the beach to go swimming and by the time I came out of the water 5 minutes later (bad experience on a surf beach many years ago which resulted in me being deposited, spreadeagled on the shore by a huge wave), our bag was part buried by the blowing sand. There were hundreds of surfers, swimmers and sun worshippers on Bondi when we arrived but they scattered and disappeared in an instant when it started to rain again. This time we used our travel pass to go on the Bondi Explorer which took in some other famous beaches around Sydney and some very expensive and exclusive residential areas, which I'm sure were delighted to have a great big bus full of gawping tourists driving through every hour.

Our last day in Sydney this time round was spent with two 'Aberinians', who we met for a 'pre-Christmas sherry'. Elfyn and Siwan have been globe-trotting for nearly two years and we had a great day - eating, drinking, catching up and chatting a lot. I'm afraid that this is the spot where we 'dob-in' Elfyn and Siw. Their travel blog says that they are still in Broome, but we now know different and there is no longer a hiding place. Get that blog going again - you can't pretend anymore. We'll see you guys in New Zealand in February.

Later that night, we boarded an overnight bus to Melbourne, where friends and 'rellies' that we'd never met before would put us up and put up with us over Christmas and New Year. The bus had a big metal mesh sheet covering the bottom part of the windscreen which protects the bus from poor old kangaroos that leap out in front of traffic in the night. This is such a common occurrence that they have patrol vans in the morning that scoop up the previous night's casualties off the road. We had the front two seats in the bus and I was really hoping that my first sighting of a kangaroo wouldn't be one that had been sieved through the mesh onto the windscreen in front of me. Thankfully it wasn't.

p.s. At 11.00am this morning, I loaded up the Greenwich Meantime webpage and counted in your New Year along with you.