Hello, I've noticed Mark's blog entries are moving towards the first person singular so I thought I'd pay a visit to show I'm still here. Here, at the moment, is in a quiet little hotel in Katoomba in the Blue Mountains a couple of hours west of Sydney. Last time I came here in 1992 we couldn't see the mountains for the mist, but today was beautiful and we walked the undercliff pass to the lovely Wentworth Falls. They're called the Blue Mountains because the eucalyptus trees that cover the area give off an oil which makes the air look really blue.
Australia........ I can see the attraction, it really is a beautiful country and incredibly different from one State to the next.
I loved being in Perth and south WA, its so easy and comfortable, and spending time with family and friends was a wonderful welcome to the country.
Flying into Darwin and the NT, I felt like we'd entered a different country. The heat smacked you in the face the minute you stepped off the plane, and then the next thing to hit me was the Very Short Shorts that everyone was wearing - mainly the men - Kevin Keegin style shorts, not a great look. The whole atmosphere of the place seemed more casual - I guess when it's that hot nobody feels like rushing around - we certainly didn't see as many joggers and keep fit fanatics as we have in the other States. I had some of my major holiday highlights up there - I just loved Lichfield national park with its natural spring pools, when we were boiling and sweaty after a walk through the trees or magical sandstone hillwalks we just plunged into these crystal clear waterfall pools to cool down.
Cairns felt different again - still very hot - but very rainy because of the cyclone kicking about just off the coast in the Coral Sea. The town is very geared up for tourism and that was fine as we were being tourists and enjoying the beautiful rain forests and coral reefs, we really relaxed there and had 8 nights in the same bed for the first time in over 2 months - bliss.
One thing I'm really into out here is the birds, I bought a bird book early on and I'm marking off all the the new birds I see - they are so gorgeous and colourful and noisy - I think I may be a twitcher in the making.
Sydney, well we were absolutely blown away with how beatiful the place is - it seems to be surrounded by water and harbours on all sides, I know that would make it an island but when you go up the Sydney Tower it certainly gives that impression. We could have stayed there much longer there's so much to do but Christmas is a'coming and we're Adelaide bound to see the lovely ex-pats.
We're pretty excited about this next part of the trip too, heading down to Melbourne to see Jo and Ole and my family from my dad's side who welcomed me with open arms last time I visited - I'm hoping there arms are a bit longer this time as I seemed to have gotten a bit wider since then, the food out here is good!
I spoke to my mum yesterday and she asked - does it feel too long to be away from home and I can honestly say no, it feels fine, but there is so much to do and see that every so often I just have to say STOP!!! we need to chill and just 'be' for a bit.
So we're just being in the mountains for a couple of days and then heading slowly down to Victoria via Canberra and maybe the Snowy Mountains.
Hope you're all doing well, take care and lots of love,
June
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