TravelStream™ news feed for member peteandjayne on TravelPod's free travel blogs service http://www.travelpod.com/syndication/rss/peteandjayne en-us Copyright ©2010 TravelPod.com Sun, 24 Aug 2008 11:53:57 -0400 http://www.travelpod.com http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/peteandjayne/offatlast/1141189980/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/peteandjayne/offatlast/1141189980/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/peteandjayne/offatlast/1141189980/tpod.html Sun, 24 Aug 2008 11:53:57 -0400 Our adventures around the globe, a journey through space and time...

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Loung Prabang, Lao Peoples Dem Rep

What a long day - 10 hours on this boat! We had to get there early as there were many germans on the boat who we knew would get there early - we were and hour early and yes, they were already on there and settled in! (sorry about the stereotyping!)

Again beautiful mountain scenery, bamboo hut villages and an elephant getting a wash!

Got to LP about 6pm. Stayed at Visara GH - ok, pretty clean.
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Melbourne, Australia

Its been a long time since our last entry. We are still in Melbourne but now there are three of us, we now have a little boy called Thomas. So the only comment is that the public health system is pretty good here.
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Melbourne, Australia

Well, its been over a year since out last entry. Basically we decided the stay in Oz for a while. Got sponsored to stay here and work and settled down in Melbourne. Melbourne is a great place, we live live near the sea but work in the city and you can't beat the trams! If you're planning to come to Australia I would recommend this city - so much more diverse than Sydney (controversial I know), the best coffee, art galleries, grafitti, coastline........
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/peteandjayne/offatlast/1160107020/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/peteandjayne/offatlast/1160107020/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/peteandjayne/offatlast/1160107020/tpod.html Mon, 06 Nov 2006 00:59:47 -0500 Our adventures around the globe, a journey through space and time...

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Melbourne, Australia

Helen and Bil arrive in Melbourne after a trip up the East Coast and luckily the weather is good (when does spring start here??!).

Visit to St Kilda Sunday markets - ideal for tourists but not for your fruit and veg. The Espy and the Greyhound - yes, we were treating them to the real important sights in Melbourne.....the pubs. Trip to the Local in Balaclava where we entered the pub quiz, with a very entertaining quiz master, as the Pomtastic Four! After many beers and laughs we finally came.....last! But this at least meant that we won a prize and also a prize for the best name. It's funny because at times Australia can seem so much like England but we didn't know any of the answers on Australia!

Nice wander around the city centre, sitting outside eating our sarnies next to the giant plastic Christmas tree - Bil even wearing his sunnies! How's that for Autumn. And then a stroll along Chapel Street, Prahran.

H&B staying at a furnished apartment which is great! Right by the sea and the shops with everything included even a tv and washing machine. Nice home made meal from Helen too.

Trip to Phillip Island to see the little penguins - it was very good day out and included wine tasting, a visit to an animal sanctuary where we were accosted by excited kangaroos! But the little penguins were great - and there were loads of them. It's really funny to watch them gather and then run up along the beach.

One last meal at Soul Mamas - an excellent veggie restaurant with floor to ceiling windows overlooking the sea - brill. For once me and Helen could pick whatever we wanted from the menu - and the wine list! A really good night.

Our last day together and a sad farewell to H&B who are off back to the UK. So then its back to reality for me and Pete starting work and saving up again....................
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Sydney, Australia

Met Helen and Bil (rellies from home) - went out to the pubs til late. Staying at both YHAs - both pretty cool. Central has a cool '70s area though. And a pool rooms and a juke box with a pretty good selection (shame about the annoying boy that kept wandering in....)
Walked to Sydney harbour Bridge and the Opera house, through the Botanical Gardens where we saw hundreds and hundreds of bats - really exciting. It feels like the end of the world is coming when there are bats (well, flying foxes) flying around in the middle of the day.
Ferry to over to sunny Manly - beautiful to sit on the ferry watching the famous landmarks and different yachts sail by. Manly was windy but me and Helen living up to British tradition went paddling - it was bloomin cold - but really nice. Went for a warm up in the local pub before heading home. Caught a taxi up to the hostel but Sydney's traffic is terrible even at 9pm! Had to get and walk the last few feet (bah).
Ferry to Taronga Zoo - really worth a visit. There are loads of animals in pretty good living conditions with excellent views back across the bay to Sydney. Unfortunately the big cats were just as lazy as little cats and we only got to see the head (or maybe the foot) of the snow leopard. There was one tiger that looked Helen straight in the eye which was a bit scary - luckily this was through one way glass. The best bit was at the end of the day when the animals realised it was 5pm and that everyone was leaving them in peace so they decide to actually do something.... the koalas woke up and started jumping from tree to tree - hilarious! They looked rubbish at it!
Our tickets included the ferry, bus trip to the zoo, and a cable car ride back down to the ferry - pretty good day out. But just like England we heard lots of the children saying "that monkey's picking it's nose...........AND eating it!!!", "that one's having a poo" etc etc or may be that was us saying that???
China town for dinner - ok, pub at end of street, and another and I think another! Its great the 24 hour drinking!
Helen and Bil did the OzTrek tower walk - the highest in the Southern hemisphere and really enjoyed it. (Funny how Helen didn't get round to showing us the photos of them wearing the lovely bright blue and yellow parachute suits that they make you wear!)
Helen cooked for us in the YHA - good clean kitchen and plenty of space to sit down and eat. (Great pool on the roof too).
Goodbyes then all round as Helen and Bil head off up to the Gold Coast and we go back to Melbourne.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/peteandjayne/offatlast/1160256960/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/peteandjayne/offatlast/1160256960/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/peteandjayne/offatlast/1160256960/tpod.html Thu, 02 Nov 2006 17:36:42 -0500 Our adventures around the globe, a journey through space and time...

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Port Campbell, Australia

Great Ocean Road

Hired a car (only 20 quid a day) and headed off. Anyone that tells you it is a day trip is trippin themselves. It's miles and miles away from Melbourne. We passed through some pretty industrial areas on the way there, scenery appearing more like the outskirts of Luton that anywhere in Australia. Interestingly (especially for my mum) there are road signs by VicRoads that say 'Tired? Powernap now', 'Powernaps save lives' (and you though it was Pete making it up, what with his 8 hour ones!). Obviously they don't want you to powernap in the road - pull over first.
The Great Ocean Road is really well signposted from the highway but we took a little detour firstly to see Bells Beach. Famous for Patrick Swayze surfing fiend movie 'Point Break'. It was pretty cool - there were strong winds forecast so only I was brave enough climb the steps down to the beach because boy was it windy. The waves were HUGE. Very invigorating. (Not as good as the 'Boneyard' probably Amanda!)
Pete then drove us along the very windy road along the coast and it was spectacular. Forest on the right hand side and sea on the left - for miles! And miles! Nice little villages to stop off at along the way etc etc but a very long day.
We made it all the way to Port Campbell before nightfall and this 'town' was actually one street! We stayed at a motel (Jackie Chan video provided) overlooking the sea and hit the pub, Lochard Hotel, named after one of the rock formations in the sea. It was rammed, we had a tab - it was great. Forgot to mention the most famous bit of the day - the 12 Apostles. Pillars of rock that have formed from thousands of year's worth of the sea washing against them. Really amazing. You think that it probably wont be that good until you get over the breach and wow, it really is! Next day, more rocks at sea (can't remember the names) but equally as impressive as the Apostles and a lot fewer tourists too. Definitely worth making it a 2 or even 3 day trip along the road as there is so much to see. Last stop was the Otway Fly - a walk through the treetops of the rainforest on steel platforms (a bit like Ant and Dec have on 'I'm a celebrity....'). Only 17 dollars and you can walk through the rainforest at ground level and gradually make you way up to about 45 metres - pretty high. But you are still really close to the trees and watching them sway makes you feel like falling over. Anyway we both got a bit wobbly from the height so I'm not sure you can say we enjoyed it or not! Worth a visit though if you're going that way though.
Anyway, our last days out before we head back to Sydney to meet my sister............
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/peteandjayne/offatlast/1159000140/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/peteandjayne/offatlast/1159000140/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/peteandjayne/offatlast/1159000140/tpod.html Sat, 14 Oct 2006 04:39:43 -0400 Our adventures around the globe, a journey through space and time...

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Melbourne, Australia

Park Life Festival in Melbourne, right next to the city with a backdrop of skyscrapers. Pretty cool location. Pete and I in jeans and t-shirts the Melburnians in brand new trendy outfits and huge designer sunglasses (it felt like we were walking through a top shop window!). Anyway, this is a dance music festival just from 12 noon to about 10pm. Lots of people were there....Cut Chemist, Cold Cut, erm people I cant remember really oh and Mark Farina - playing at 3 o'clock in the arvo!

Best act was Peter Hook the old dude from Joy Division doing a dj set (well actually it looked like he was just twiddling the bass knob for the whole set....). He started off by mixing Joy Division ' love will tear us apart' with the disco classic 'love will keep us together' - a nice start. But basically he played any old music including the Killers, Happy Mondays, New Order (when this was on he mouthed 'this is one of mine'!!). He was hilarious and we'd definitley recommend seeing him if you get the chance.

We watched Ian Pooley for a couple of hours and he was pretty good. I'd actually spoken to him earlier in another tent without knowing who he was but he couldn't understand what I said! Que sera.

Good day out then just nipped on the tram home. Cool.
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Uluru, Australia

Up at 5am - very cold. Watched the sun rise behind Uluru and light up the Olgas - another huge rock in the desert. The Olgas is another sacred place for the Aboriginies and we took a 7.5km walk around and through them. Really amazing. Really curved hills and crazy trees, evidence of bush fires (the trees actually need burning at some point to open the seed pods). A few hills though so bit tiring - very hot too. But stopping in a cattle station for beers either Curtin SPrings or Kings Canyon.

We also drove along a desert track for over 100 miles - wow! We all came out of seats a few times, pretty cool.

Saw wild kangaroos - big reds - as well as wild camels, dingos and eagles. If we saw an animal our guide could just drive off the roads so we could get a closer look.

2 nights bush camping - I mean really bush camping - no running water or loos. The boys on the trip enjoyed talking about their hole digging techniques for toilet use. Lots of huge fires, stars, beer and food. Not many insects thank heavens.

What else?...Glen Helen - a beautiful gorge and a happy hour. A few beers before setting up camp - made getting the camp set up in the dark and actually finding a camping spot very funny. Did a bit of off roading that night through a dry river bed.

Palm Valley - where there are rare palm trees that don't grow anywhere else.Hermannsberg - an aboriginal town where the Lutherians came to convert them all to Christianity and succeeded. Really interesting to find out about the Aboriginal culture.

Oh and Kings Canyon - another 8 km hike up what felt like a mountain but worth it. Famous as being one of the top places to see in Australia but also where they filmed Guy Pearce in Priscilla Queen of the Deseert in his drag outfit.

It really was an amazing trip and the people we travelled with were really good mix too - every one mucked in doing the dishes etc. Anyway its not worth me trying to describe it because I cant - it was just great.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/peteandjayne/offatlast/1155977040/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/peteandjayne/offatlast/1155977040/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/peteandjayne/offatlast/1155977040/tpod.html Sat, 07 Oct 2006 09:15:45 -0400 Our adventures around the globe, a journey through space and time...

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Uluru, Australia

Started our 5 day safari with Wayoutback tours in a 4WD with our luggage on trailer behind. Ulura quite far from ALice so a lot of driving but the scenery was amazing. Our guide Luke had a decent selection on his ipod and we stopped at a roadside cafe owned by Aboriginies which is now worth 5 million dollars! Didn't look like it though.

Arrived Uluru and walked around the base - about 9.5km. Really amazing, fantastic colours - can't really describe it....didn't walk up it as they Aboriginies prefer you not too as its a sacrad place.

Our first night in a swag under the stars at the Ulura resort in the camping section. Built a huge fire (we'd got out in the bush to collect it earlier), cooking over a fire, watched the sunset over Uluru - sparkling wine provided!

Swags - well like big waterproof sleeping bags that you put your own sleeping bag in. I was freezing but most people were ok - and it was soo dark that you couldn't believe the number of stars visible in the sky. You could even see the milky way - really amazing. Early night though because up for the sunrise at 5am tomorrow....
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Alice Springs, Australia

Our outback adventure...staying at Alice's Secret - really laid back, hippy-fied hostel with free breakfast (not that we've got early enough yet).

English pub Firkin and Hound a good 'un. Malanka party nightclub bar...well does what it says on the tin. Free pool on the wonky tables before 8.30pm. All drink served in plastic glasses. Well classy.

Not sure what to make of Alice so far...bit like you'd imagine a town in a western. But, very hot and sunny.
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