Tuesday 8th August Today we went on the monorail around the city to see the main sites. We got off at Darling Harbour and had a wander about. The boat show is on at the moment so it's pretty busy. Had a pub lunch and then just relaxed in the sun on the grass with the view of the harbour before we went off to climb the harbour bridge. The climb was amazing, not too strenuous at all and I was only scared a tiny bit at the beginning! We climbed around 4ish so set off in daylight and came back down as the sun set. Was great! Had tea at the Star Bar (steak for $5.95 - 2.50pounds, bargain!) and then went to the cinema to see Sentinal. Wednesday 9th August We got a ferry to Manly beach this morning. At the dock we went to Max Brenners chocolate shop mmmmmmmmmmmmm!!! Rich and hels were fairly sensible and had cookies and waffles with chocolate sauce on them. I had a chocolate pizza which had different choc sauces, marshmallows, dark, white and milk chocolate shavings and buttons and a few cornflakes!! I felt so sick but it was amazing! Had a look around the shops in Manley and had a paddle on the beach. We got the afternoon ferry back and did the half hour walk back to the hostel to shower and change, eat tea and rushed the half hour walk back to the Opera House to see 'Honour Bound' in the playhouse bit. It was a physical theatre production about Guantanamo bay. Was kinda wierd but really good at the same time, lots of people spinning around from the roof and running around like mad! Was cleverly put together. After the show we went to the ice bar for a cocktail. As it says it's a bar completly made from ice! Tables, chairs, glasses and sculptures. You get woolley coats and boots to wear. The only place where you can eat the furniture if you wanted too! Some plonker the day before had drunk the waterfall which was actually anti-freeze!! We stayed up pretty late back near the hostel in Scruffy Murpheys and watched a band that was on and the three of us had a bit of a boogey!! Thursday 10th August We checked out of the Sydney hostel in the morning and went in the search of hangover food! Which came in the form of bacon butties and Lindt milshakes! We then got the Greyhound bus at 1pm to Newcaslte. We dropped our bags off at Ruth's work - Helenas dads cousins. Ruth and Steve were great and put the three of us up for 4 nights. We had a wander down to the harbour for a drink whilst we waited for Ruth to finish work. In the evening we watched t.v and chatted and got to know Ruth and Steve and Floss the cat! Helena has only met Ruth a couple of times before this, so it was good for her to get to know her dads cousin and also her mums good friend. We had an amazing tea and drank lots of wine, some of which Steve had made on his vinyard. Friday 11th August Today we got a ferry across to Stockport and got picked up for the 15min drive to Port Stephen where we went quad biking on the sand dunes. We had a practice drive and then got split into groups, Rich to go in the good group, apparantly we wern't as good and had to go in our own group boo! Think they were discriminating against us girls!! We had a wicked time and got to roll down this stupidly steep hill! They then told me I had to go first at going back up the stupidly steep hill, I thought they were joking at first! Anyway we all made it bak up in one piece! In the afternoon we had a good wander around Newcastle and it's beaches including Nobbys beach, Newcastle beach and it's rock pools. Had a yummy tea again back at Ruth and Steves and then Steve took us to see Newcastle Knights play Manly Sea Eagles which was cool, we had to leave just before the end to continue with our busy schedule! Ruth got us tickets to see a stand up comedian called Akmal, it was fab we were crying with laughter at certain points! Saturday 12th August Had a great lye in today and then had breakkie on the balcony in the sunshine. We went to Nobbysbeach for a surf lesson at midday. We were pretty crap at it! Helly managed to stand a couple of times tho but fell off pretty much straight away. Rich and I didn't even manage that it's soooooo difficult and frustrating cos it looks so easy! We went with Ruth and Steve to a lovely place in town for lunch and we all tried Oysters for the first time yummy! Ruth then took us to Black Butts nature reserve in the afternoon we saw emus, the male was sat on a nest of eggs, they sit there without moving for 60days! We also saw lots of cool birds, brown roos, wombats and koalas including a tiny baby soooo cute! In the evening we ate out a a lovely Thai resturant and then went back home and all fought for floss to sit in our laps! Sunday 13th August Had a late breakkie and then Ruth took us to Tuscany Vinyards in the Hunter Valley where Steve looks after the vinyards. (His day job is a vet). Steve had been there since early morning pruning and looking after the vines. We all had an amazing tapas lunch in the restuarant there. We went to lots of vinyards that afternoon some to just look around and some to taste, some of them you may recognise - Lindemans, Oakvale, Rothebury, Peppertree. Others in the area are Tyrells and Wyndhams. Ruth made us an amazing roast pork dinner later that evening. Thanks for having us it was fab! Monday 14th August Ruth dropped us off a the bus terminal in the morning via a trip to the vets to say goodbye to Steve. We had a 7hour journey to Coffs Harbour and decided to stay at Hoey Moey backpackers which offered us 3nights, free pizza, BBQ and bodyboard hire all for $22, our cheapest hostel yet! The place was 2mins from the beach so we had a wander down, later we sat in the bar (buy one get on free!) and ate our free pizza - fab!