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So here we are, sitting waiting for the airport bus on our very last day of travelling! It feels very strange to be going home but we are really looking forward to seeing everyone and being reunited with our own bed! We have had the best 5 months we could ever have asked for and have thousands (no, really!) of photos to remember it!!!
After Coffs Harbour, we continued down the coast via McLean (a little town devoted to Scotland with different tartans painted on all the lamp posts!) and Newcastle (where they had copied all the local names from the UK Newcastle such as Hexham and Stockton). We stayed right by the beach in Stockton then did a little bit of illegal sand dune climbing . It really looked and felt like we were in the middle of the desert, complete with snake tracks!
We then went inland to the Blue Mountains, which were beautiful, though not actually mountains! We saw 'The Three Sisters' rock formation which was brilliant and took a scenic cableway and railway, down to the Jamison valley floor. The railway was admittedly a little hair raising, being the steepest railway in the world! We went to Wentworth Falls which had a rainbow crossing through the falling water. You couldn't have asked for a better photo opportunity, it looked amazing! We also visited a few of the small quaint little towns in the region including Leura with its many cafes and craft shops.
After that it was off for the final leg of our trip in Sydney. After what felt like a million toll roads to actually get anywhere near the city, It felt quite a relief to drop the van back. We were definitely looking forward to being van-free and being able to have the odd ( ) beer during the day! We checked in to 'Wake Up!', a mega hostel in a really good location in Sydney. It has 500 beds and is absolutely enormous, with its own bar and café and pretty much anything else you could possibly want. We are so glad we got a private room for over Christmas, as the place was just like being back at uni, with lots of people younger than us running around knocking on doors and screaming!! There were even tannoys in each room telling you what was going on all the time, which annoyingly started each time with "Wake up wake up wake up!!" It had a good atmosphere though and we took advantage of all the good bits like live music and happy hour in the bar!
After having some bubbly and tackling a Ferreo Rocher Pyramid that we had sellotaped together (!), Christmas day was spent at Bondi Beach, which was a lot colder than expected! Sydney's weather has been a bit crazy the last couple of weeks and it windy, overcast and the sea was freezing! We still enjoyed it though, wearing our santa hats to keep warm! Our Christmas dinner was in a local Thai restaurant and consisted of a 'traditional' thai green curry and chilli basil chicken! Mmmmmm!
While in Sydney we walked across the harbour bridge, saw the opera house, took a day trip to Manly where we enjoyed a day at the beach. We also went to Darling Harbour where Dave ate the most ridiculous amount of pancakes I have ever seen! We did a ghost tour of the Rocks, the most historical area of the city, which was really good! We all got characters and Dave and I were rats to represent the plague -nice! There was a tour guide that looked exactly like Heath Ledger and everyone was taking pictures of him- that was probably the spookiest thing of the evening!! We visited Paddy's and Paddington markets, where we bought our, ahem, additional suitcase *blush*!!
The most memorable part of our time in Sydney has to be the New Year fireworks, which were absolutely stunning and well worth the crazy wait we endured! After getting up at 6am, we queued for 4 hours to be admitted to Mrs Macquarie's Point, the best location for viewing the fireworks in the world! We then had another 12 hour wait, as you weren't allowed to leave once you went in! Thanks to an extremely large picnic, some beers and wine and meeting Becki and Gareth from Wales, the day actually went relatively quickly! The fireworks lit the whole sky up and we had an amazing view from our spot! It's definitely an experience we wouldn't have missed for anything!
We spent our final night last night down by the harbour front and enjoyed a lovely meal with the bridge right in front of us! We then went to the Opera Bar, attached to the Opera House, and had a few emotional final drinks, including some bubbly to celebrate our 5 months. We watched the 'Diamond Princess' cruise liner leave the harbour, which was a great feat in itself -the thing was absolutely enormous and everyone thought it was going to hit the bridge! It would have brought it down if it had!
So now we are the end and have had such an amazing time, we feel really lucky to have had the chance to experience all the wonderful things we have. Thank you to everyone at home who has helped us achieve it! See you all very soon! Hope its snowing when we get there! Wonder how long that will last!
Lots of love
Claire&Dave xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
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