Sundowner Bathurst

... elsewhere, but do events every once in a while for the Gema Group. It was nice to see a familiar face, both he and his wife were definitely surprised to see me in the middle of Bathurst. I had joked about maybe running into them while traveling through Australia and if they recognized me, to say hi.

Well i spent the morning touring the different suites and kitchens with the operations manager, Astra, getting familiar with where everything was and meeting more people as ...

Took the train from Sydney to Bathurst to spend time with Mum for a few days. She's 90 next year but still going strong. The build up to the Bathurst car races was on while I was there so Bathurst was very busy and there were lots of police around. Went to Blayney one day (36 Kms away) and passed 13 police! However, this was only a taste of what it must have been like on Mount ...

... than half of adults living with HIV/AIDS. Young women living with HIV/AIDS is more than twice that of young men. 60% of new infections occur among the youth aged 15-24. Number of orphans due to AIDS is 1.1million. Many of the nations hardest hit by HIV/AIDS also suffer from malnutrition, food insecurity and famine. These challenges are interrelated with HIV/AIDS, each intensifying and complicating the ...

... and sheep that we saw. We also saw several mobs (the plural collective noun for kangaroos - no, I never did it in English language at school either!), grazing and moving around on the hillsides. The track was lined with trees, which were struggling on but supported different birds, especially parrots who flew up as we passed. After 18 miles we spotted a signpost which confirmed (at last) that we were heading in ...

... from the Park hotel who were doing their bi-annual Back to School night. Bathurst is abig university town and at least half of the students were in the Commercial with up. We drank Tooheys New at the bar. They swaggered aound playing table tennis (yes in the midle of the bar) and pool. They all drank the iced Sex On The Beach cocktail that sat in a huge Slush Puppy type container at the end of the bar. We acknowleged that Annabel was having a baptism of fire. She ...

... without us. So, we had takeaway in a park for lunch. We made it to the train station in time to see Diane, as the train went down the new tracks in the other direction, which was nice. The Zigzag railway is so called as it zigzags down the side of a gorge (type thing), the railway now goes through tunnels so it is just left as a tourist attraction. One of the rides is a Harry Potter one, so they had lots of Harry related signs up - so ...

... point Jen noticed we were at the end of the path, and with no obvious direction to travel other than back the way we came or over the edge she asked 'where to now, back up the 4 million (for she has a way of exaggerating) stairs?'. I think I mumbled something about maps not being to scale and dashed back up the steps as swiftly as I could. On a sunny day the Blue moutains look fabulous, rich in colour and scented with eucalyptus. Looking out ...

... of.the views from the top of the ridges were stunning and we would see way into the distance, rolling mountains carpeted with eucalypi forests. The blue haze of the koala drugging plant rising and occasionally there was a strong scent wafting in the air. How delightful. Unless of course it was a forest warden hiding in the bushes squirting olas oil as unsuspecting walkers tramped by.cynical? Me? After a lovely day we thought better of drinking in the red neck pub and ...

... guest at Suzanne and Shawn's engagement party. Of course I celebrated with them in my usual excitable style and would like to offer my thanks to Uncle Colin for keeping my champagne glass filled at all times! I also took the opportunity to 'cash in' some of my loyalty points and book into a hotel for the weekend - what was even better was when they upgraded me to an executive suite overlooking the Opera House ...

... but luckily he was on the train. It took me awhile to find him and he had been worried, had paged and got off at all the stops looking for me. It was an adventurous start to the day, but all worked out in the end. After getting to the hostel, we took a walk down through town to Echo Point where you can see the backdrop of the Blue Mountains which are called that because they have a blue haze ...