Ashfield Motor Inn

... be leaving a $10 deposit. We were meant to have arrived by 7pm, the sign said so (how were we to know that?) so, chastised, we set up our home for the night and poached some chicken with spare **** (as Andrew fondly calls asparagus) and yet more stir fried veggies. Knowing we were only going to be there for maximum 12 hours, we made as much use of the facilities as possible, determined to get our money's worth, and each had 2 showers within 12 hours! It's feast or ...

... Quay, have a mosey around and get back in time to avoid a ticket. And again, more luck, I got to the ferry terminal just as a ferry was ready to leave, so I managed to get on and was there in 30 minutes. It feels weird being back again, but its nice in a kind of familiar way, and just emphasises that I like being in the cities more than on the beaches. But I basically had 30-45 minutes, so up to the opera house, take some photos, then round to the other side ...

... br>We have taken advantage of our Ferry tickets and buzzed across the water to Watson Bay. We walked miles looking for the famous Lady Hay nudist beach! We had no joy so therefore were unable to bare our toes in the sands or cross that experience off on our things to do list!
We joined in with a 'full moon and marking the end of the monsoon period festival' on Manly Beach and gave our offerings to ...

... away quick enough because know we had loads of it left over and the numbers were getting less and less. We had a good bit of banter with a guy called Bernie, who was in charge of the hose pipe and would happily soak all the girls in our team, passers by, a dog and the odd Marathon runner that was over-heating. It turns out that this Bernie had worked in Bridgend for a year and traveled to Thailand as well. I think it might have put us both off ...

... Wildlife World in Cockle Bay. Laura hadn't walked through Darling Harbour before, and I enjoyed its beauty again, for the third time. It was a lovely hot day. We chased some ibises; they really are peculiar little birds. There was a whole bunch of them in a tall palm tree looking suspiciously at passers-by...

We were quite hungry, so we stopped on the east side of the bay at a restaurant called Pontoon and had lunch- my burger was rather splendid. There were also ...

... woke up for sunrise ust before 6am and walked around the lighthouse taking in the view and scenery over the bays...

That afternoon we headed to a small village about 45mins away called 'Nimbin'. This is a village you have got to see to beleive! It's like stepping back in time to the 1960-70's and flower power! Everyone smokes pot and is high as a kite, there is no alcohol served here - only joints, pot and hash cookies!
The whole town is very chilled (obviously ...

... 14th June - Went to where the Blue Mountains Tour was beginning at 7.10am !! Had the weirdest and funniest tour guide ever! lol. Went to a camp site trying to find wild kangaroos. Then went to a beautiful viewpoint and walked for 2-3 hours on a relatively easy hike thing. Got a bit wet. Saw Wentworth Falls - BEAUTIFUL!! Went on a railway where you go up BACKWARDS and it's extremely steep as it was designed for coal trains. Went with our 2 new friends Ollie and Ralph who we'd met in the ...

... to wear a hat for most of the evening which was in the shape of, well this is a public website so let's just say, a female flower. needless to say i was rather scared to shout house again. to which, however, i won a female gnome in a bikini called kylie (well ok we named her that), a hat with some cork things round it and a bottle of wine. trudy also won a horde of chocolate. sadly, kylie was a bit hefty in weight so i´m sure she´s now the mascot ...

... and tune in each channel! this kitchen was wicked, complete with all the usual plates, cups, cutlery etc, tourist brochures hanging from the walls, even boxes of board games and puzzles, which kept us - well sad little me - thoroughly amused, especially when there was nothing on tv or we weren't able to tune in 'the bill' properly! just to mention, the aussies seem to love our tv world! we've had 'the bill' and 'dr who' and we keep seeing ads for 'the vicar of dibley' or ...

... streets, some begging for cigarettes, etc. It's not a nice sight and not safe either. I do not have enough insight into their culture to allow myself an opinion, but it's not hard to tell that the aborigines are clearly underprivileged. An indicator of this are the aboriginal integration laws that were only passed in the mid 80's (!). Aboriginals during settlement and creation of large ranches and farmland have been stuck into reserves similar to the American Indians. This ...