The Big Trip...

Hey!

So i left Sydney on Saturday and was really glad to get out of the city. Spent my last day with my american friend Nicole, and we went up the Sydney sky tower for some great views and then we just chilled in Hyde Park before making our way back to bondi.

I got the night bus up to Byron Bay, and it took 14 hours!! It left Sydney at 7pm and the bus driver decided that he was going to stop the bus every 3 hours and make us all get off so he could clean it - i was really annoyed as it meant i couldnt really sleep. Also, the bus was full and my chair was broken, so it was an uncomfortable night anyway! The majority of people were heading up to Byron, and most people had not booked any accomodation (unlike me, who booked it weeks ago!) and were spending the journey phoning round hostels to find out that the whole of byron bay was fully booked and there was not a bed anywhere! So, that meant that a huge group of people had to get off at the stop before Byron to find some accomodation there - nightmare for them!

Anyway, we got into Byron at 9am on Sunday morning, and some guy from the hostel came and picked up me and another girl, Karen, from the bus stop which was nice (sick of carrying my backpack already!). The hostel is called Aquarius, and it is 100 times nicer than my hostel in sydney. Its all open air, with dorm rooms surrounding a courtyard. There is a swimming pool (luxury in hostels, believe me!), bar, travel agents, and every night they organise a meal that costs 8 dollars (3.50 pounds) and everyone sits down together to eat. Its so relaxing here.

Spent the day with Karen (girl from the bus) and we just went to the beach and sunbathed, went out for lunch, and then sat around the pool for a while. I met some really nice people..a guy from the Netherlands and 2 Swedish people. Last nite (sunday nite) i went out to the Byron Hotel with these people which was cool.

This morning i had booked a surf lesson. I though i'd pick it up really quickly, but seriously, i was the only person in our group of 10 people that couldnt stand up on the board! Its really not as easy as it looks....

I actually got up twice for a split second before completely wiping out. Its hard work and trying to drag a surfboard out to sea around 50 times really wears you out! Anyway, the surfing was for 3 hours and when they asked me if i wanted to book myself in for another lesson tomorro, i said thanks, but no thanks! It was a lot of fun, but too difficult!

Came back to the hostel and just chilled out by the pool and had a wander around byron bay. Its such a lovely little town, with loads of cafes and boutiques. (i've been good and so far i have only bought one dress the entire trip!)

Think tonight a group of us are going to Cheeky Monkeys which is a club which has big steel tables that you dance on cause there is no dance floor - sounds interesting!

At the moment i'm in a travel agents (you get free interenet here - its great!) and i've just booked myself onto trips for Fraser Island and for sailing the Whitsunday Islands.

Tomorrow i'm going on a tour to a place called Nimbin, which is a hippy village where they take a load of drugs and stuff. nut its apparantly a good sight to see!

Thanks for all the emails peeps!

Speak soon
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Yesterday i had to get up at the crack of dawn (well, 6am) to go on the blue mountains trip with the 2 americans who are staying in my room. They are lovely girls - one is really loud and chatty, and the other is so quiet i keep thinking there is something wrong with her. They are my age which is cool, and they work in the military and are on a weeks holiday from their services in korea...you definately meet some interesting people in these hostels!!

Anyway, off we went to get our bus at that god-early time. It was worth it though..had such a good day. We started off by going to a wildlife park about an hour out of sydney. Here we could feed the kangaroos and have our pictures taken with koalas etc. Also, you get a little animal passport, and around the park there are stamps that you can put in it for a souvenir. Very cool.

After the park we went to a village called Leura at teh blue mountains, which was very quaint. It was actually build to be like an english village and a lot of the trees and plants etc were imported in from england to make it that way.

After lunch we headed to the mountains where we took lots of pictures and rode on a monorail and a train around the area. It was really beautiful - so glad i went.

After the mountains we were back on the bus and we drove for another hour anda half to a winery where we got to sample loads of ausralian wine. Obviously i didnt buy any cause i'm a poor backpacker, but it was nice to have the free drinks!!!

From there we went to the Olympic Village - nothing special, but took some pictures before we got onto the ferry to take us back to Circular Quay.

At night a couple of us went and got some thai takeaway then settled down for an early night. There are new poeple in my dorm - 2 18 year old girls from Newton Mearns! small world! anyway, joelle, i was trying to find a common person that we might no and it turns out that they know george..one of them was in her modern studies class (jennifer, i think?) anyway, thought i'd let you know.

Moving onto today - 5th Jan

Got up early and decided to sort myself out. Worled out how to work the laundry system in the hostel so did some washing, and spent some time trying to find a hostel in Surfers Paradise to stay at.

Got a bus into the city and have been wandering out the shops and Darling Harbour and am in Chinatown at the moment. I leave sydney tomorro night for Byron Bay so the next time i update this i'll be out of the city.

Keep the messages and e-mails coming
Missing you all

xxx

Hey everyone!

Let me update you on the past couple of days.

I got up really early on Monday morning to go to Palm Beach which is where Home and Away is filmed (well, the beach scenes anyway) to find that the sky was grey and it was raining. Great. Decided that Home and Away was far too important too miss and a little bit of rain was not going to stop me, so off i went on a mammoth journey - bus from bondi into city, train to main bus station, bus to palm beach. I left the hostel at 8.30 and arrived at 12. Stupidly long journey! Anyway, by the time i reached palm beach (which is north of Sydney) the sun was shining once again . I latched myself onto a couple of people who were also home and away fans which was good cause meant i had someone to take pictures of me outside the surf club (H&A fans will understand). Very exciting. Spent a few hours on the beach then headed back to the city where i wandered around Darling Harbour again and had a walk around a shopping mall (but bought nothing - this backpacking thing is depressing - i hate being on a budget!)

At night, me, kate and kate decided we were going to get glammed up (as much as possible with limited clothing) and hit the bars. Met some really funny Aussies and randomly bumped into one of my college friends from London (Priya) which was freaky, but really nice. After a few too many gin and tonics we headed back to the hostel around 3am - was a great nite!

Today (wednesday) i woke up to 3 new people having had moved into our dorms. One of them was travelling on her own and decided that she was going to latch onto me for the day, which i was really not impressed about cause i quite like doing my own thing during the day, but i felt sorry for her, cause it is hard your first day travelling. As you can see, i'm getting quite into this whole 'travelling alone' thing.

We went to Manly beach today. To get there you have to take a ferry from Circular Quay (where the Opera house and sydney harbour bridge is) for about 30 mins. Found Manly to be a bit of a waste of time...just like Bondi beach but much tackier, but we did have nice fish and chips by the sea, which was a bonus. Think Manly is the first place in sydney i haven't been that impressed with, but the rest of the city is amazing.

Just chilling out tonight with kate and kate cause they are leaving tomorrow for Melbounre. I'm going to miss them, and its annoying cause they have a spare seat in their car and asked me along, but its in the opposite direction to which i'm travelling. C'est la vie.

Tomorrow i'm doing a whole day trip to a widlife centre, winery, the olympic stadium, and the famous Blue Mountains, which I am really excited about. Not looking forward to the 7am pick up from bondi though!

Until next time
xxx

Hey everyone!
HAPPY NEW YEAR!

What an amazing past few days - we got up early on sunday morning to head to Lady Macquaries Point for out lookout point for the fireworks. Had my first use for the roll of duck tape i brought as me and kate proceeded to strap bottles of vodka to our legs under our jeans to sneak them past secuirty as there was no BYOB! After queuing for 2 and a half hours to get into the park, we finally got a nice stretch of grass to settle down for teh next 12 hours!

There were a whole group of us - me, kate, kate (yes 2 of them in my hostel), steve (who kept going missing - i swear he got lost for 2 and a half hours which i dont understand!), liam, tom, sarah, richard and will. Had such a good day playing drinking games, cards and just sunbathing. The fireworks were incredible and the atmosphere electric. At our vantage point (and there are 14 around teh city) there were 25,000 people - so you can just imagine what it was like!! Got back to bondi beach around 2.30 am where basement jaxx was playing a gig on the beach, but the sitting around for 12 hours mixed with constant drinking for about 8 hours had left us exhausted, so we went to bed.

Woke up this morning feeling pretty fresh and decided to do teh coastal walk from bondi to bronte beach - this is about a half an hour walk each way by the cliffs and is absolutely stunning.
After some seaside fish and chips i spent the rest of the day sunbathing - so surreal to be lying on the beach on new years day!! Saw Paris Hilton again - she was jusging teh Mr Bondi competition. Unfortunately it was tickets only so couldnt get in to see the competition - lol.

Went to Chinatown tonight with a guy from my hostel for some food and a wander. We then went to Darling Harbour which is just beautiful...loads of restaurants and bars and the aquarium is also there.

Tomorrow i'm going to Palm Beach where Home and Away is filmed - probably the most exciting thing about sydney for me!

xxx

P.s. - trying to work out how to upload my photos, but so far no such luck..hopefully next time!

woke up after a blissful 12 hours of sleep and set off to Circular Quay to do some sightseeing

Circular Quay is the start of the city of Sydney and its where loads of cruises depart to other sites that i'll go to (eg/ the zoo, manly etc). kinda like fishermans wharf in san fransisco but much bigger and not as tacky.

first thing i did was walk across sydney harbour bridge and back which was amazing - it is just like a giant coathanger and you can see pretty amazing views of the Opera House from there.

Afterwards, I took a walk around The Rocks - this is the oldest area of sydney with really nice buildings, quirky shops and cobblestone streets. After that I took myself to the Opera House and splurged on a tour of the inside. One of the best tours i have done in ages - the inside of the builsing is actually incredible and made me want to sit through an opera, which is saying something!!! the only downside is that they wouldnt let us take pictures inside.

I left the quay after that and made my way back to the hostel. Went out for dinner with a couple of girls who are in my dorm. En route to buying food and alcohol for tomorrows new years eve festivities we saw Paris Hilton - no joke - in a shop trying on bikinis. There were hundreds of people surrounding the shop and she had 5 bodyguards! Anyway, thats my little claim to claim for today

Going to go to the harbout tomorro to get a good position for the fireworks nice and early.

Have a good new years eve, everyone!!!!
xxx