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Christmas in Aussie Land was very weird, lovely at Keith and Dorothy's place, nice to feel like part of a family on that day. Christmas Eve Gary and me had parcels from home to open, new pjs to wear, stockings to hang and presents to keep for Christmas morning and evening. We made sure we were tucked up in bed before 12 so Santa would come to us. We had a lovely morning opening our stocking, we didn't have a lot of time as Gary had work at 10am. We opened a couple and decided rather than rush through them, we would do them when he is back from work and had more time. Dorothy cooked us bacon and egg sandwiches and we exchanged parcels. They had wrapped up 2 parcels each under the tree I got a tee and galaxy selection box and Gary got a scarf and check shirt, very nice. We got them a Gentleman Jacks giftbox and also a Christmas plant and hamper was sent from home for Keith and Dorothy which they thoroughly enjoyed opening, really good things inside. While Gary was at work we chilled, Dorothy was busy in kitchen preparing the dinner which she wouldn't let me help with, Keith and I chilled outside, the weather was warm not as hot as usual around 25 degrees, it was so still, very weird. Surprisingly I didn't feel too sad away from home. We had some nibbles outside with some champagne. Then I was sent into the dining room with some wine and a book called Pinguo which Dorothy insisted I read. Before I knew it Gary was home and it was 4pm. We went into our room and enjoyed half hour or so of Christmas together opening the rest of our stocking and other parcels, Santa was very good to us thank you :) We sat and enjoyed dinner together, salmon pate starter, turkey and ham dinner and a chocolate type pavlova with some more champagne. Gary and me spoke to home for a while they had presents from us to open and we had a night time present to open, money to spend in Metrocentre when we come home yay!!! Was a lovely chat to home. When we finished I was gutted to find out that Dorothy and Keith had gone to bed already 9pm!! But Gary and me enjoyed the rest of the night together and it was a really nice Christmas. Boxing day and the rest of the week was busy busy at work. Kids finished school for their summer hols just before Christmas so Victor Harbor has really picked up now. On Boxing Day I felt more sad to be away from home than I did on Christmas Day, it was a good experience but I wouldn't like to be away from home on Christmas again, nothing is as good as home.
Saturday 29th December we were up nice and early and driven by Keith to Adelaide airport for our 5 day Sydney New Year trip so exciting!!!!! Our flight was at 10am we got to the airport in plenty of time enjoyed a Hungry Jacks breakie before flying to Sydney. Got the train from the airport in Sydney all the way to Thornleigh about an hour out of the city but a direct line from Central which was all good. Unfortunately, we got the wrong travel passes, paid more than we should have and didn't include all types of travel which was a bummer but still only $40 for the 5 days travel on all trains. When we arrived at Thornleigh, we passed a Woolworths on our way to the hotel so went in and grabbed some things for the room like bread, Nutella for breakie's and some biccys to have in. The hotel is an Ibis and only a 10 min walk from the train station and a McDonalds right outside much to Gary's happiness. Our room was lovely, typical holiday inn styled double room. We unpacked our bag and chilled in the room with a cuppa and biscuit ahhh. By this time it was 4pm so we were a bit shattered after the travelling around. Luckily we only had a little hold on bag which Gary managed to get free from work, a Heineken bag perfect for our getaway. We changed and headed back out to the train station to Central and walked down to Darling Harbor was so nice to be back in Sydney kind of like going home. We met up with Heidi, a friend from Gary's work and went to Hard Rock Cafe for tea and to enjoy the Saturday Darling Harbor fireworks yay!! Then we travelled back home to Thornleigh and our bed.
On the Sunday we had a spa day booked, it was a treat Gary bought for us a while back when living in Sydney. A deal he found on Scoop-on and we decided to keep it for our return to Sydney. So we enjoyed a lay in and breakfast in our room before heading out to Wynyard Station (near Circular Quay). We walked to the Radisson Hotel and enjoyed our spa :) only a little place but had a swimming pool, hot tub, sauna and steam room. We got dressing gowns and slippers and also a 45 minute treatment, I chose an all over massage it was very nice and relaxing, Gary had a back massage. Afterwards, we headed to Pizza Hut for tea. Gary has been having pizza withdrawals as there is no Domino's or Pizza Hut in Victor Harbor hahaha. We had a BBQ Meatlovers with a hot dog stuffed crust!!! We then got the train to Newtown just afew stops away from Central and went over to Amy's new house there, another friend from Gary's work. Newtown was really cool reminded me a little of Camden Town in London. Her new pad was really nice, her flatmate Jas also we enjoyed many glasses of wine catching up before getting train home to Thornleigh. Lovely relaxing day.
New Year's Eve it was the fireworks day yay the day we had been waiting for woop woop. We enjoyed the morning in our room again before setting off. Was very hot we noticed walking to the train station stopping at Woolworths to grab our picnic and alcohol for the day and night. We got off at Wynyard station and walked up to the Botanical Gardens, it was so busy everywhere. We joined a queue to get into the Maquaries Chair in the Botanical Gardens which is the spot we had chosen. The hotel was pretty cool actually and gave us a leaflet of all the areas you could go to, to see the fireworks and whether alcohol was allowed, toilets available and food and all of that info, handy. Unfortunately, we had read the leaflet wrong though because there was an wine bottle sign not
crossed on the spot we were heading we thought we were able to bring in our own alcohol but oh no we couldn't so we had to say goodbye to 3 bottles of wine and a mini champagne bottle all of $40 like that gone :( Gary was very upset about this but it is just one of those things. We couldn't have drank it all before we got in and they only let a certain amount like 17,000 people in anyway so we couldn't chance it. We went in and it was so full we finally managed to find a spot, not the best view of the Harbour Bridge but for now it was good, Gary went in search for drinks we were so hot and dehydrated it was hard. The next 4 hours was hot hot hot just sitting in 35 degrees sunshine exhausting, but we drank lots of water, enjoyed our picnic we had bought a whole cooked chicken to munch throughout the day, BBQ and bread, crisps for snacks it was good. Gorgeous sunset behind the city's skyscrapers and the evening was very nice, calm and clear skies. At 9pm the first set of fireworks went off and they were amazing and got everyone in the mood. We had glowsticks and sparklers ourselves which was fun and had moved to a better spot nearer the water edge with better view of the Bridge. Over next couple of hours on the hour a few fireworks would go off, the boats on the water were all lit up with lights, the theme this year was 'Embrace' and the boats were great so pretty on the water and decorated according to the theme. Gary and me chilled and watched a movie on my ipod to kill some time as the last couple of hours went slowly by. Finally 11.30pm it was nearly time we were so excited we didn't know what to do with ourselves, another few fireworks went off every 5 mins from 11.30pm little teasers for us. Countdown began and the fireworks blew us away, all along the water was fireworks some right in front of us to the left was the bridge glowing with fireworks and to the right more fireworks. So clever there were coming out of the water, coming from inside and outside, on top of the bridge, stunning, awesome, amazing!!!! Best 15 minutes ever!! Well worth the 9 hour wait from 3pm sitting in the hot sunshine to that moment was definitely a day to remember. As soon as the fireworks had stopped it was time to leave took us a while to get out with all the people but when we did we headed down to Circular Quay to see the Bridge closer and just go for a walk around. The amount of rubbish everywhere was disgusting, so much crap everywhere I would not want to have the job of clearing all of that. The bridge was really cool there was big lips on which did the countdown and then changed to the theme of embrace such a spectacular night. We tried for a little while to get into a bar so we could have a New Year drink but had no luck either way too expensive to get in or weren't dressed enough so we got a train home straight away which was a good job as it was 3am when we got back to hotel. The transport was so good, the trains ran regularly all night so we didn't have to worry about time.
The 1st of January 2013 wow how time flies!!! We had a lovely chill in the room before heading out to Bondi for the afternoon took us about an hour and a half to get to Bondi, 2 trains and a bus but it was worth it. We had a Hurricanes (Gary's favourite rib place, or well one of his favourites) as a picnic on the green overlooking Bondi beach and the sea. It was so busy you could barely see the sand on the beach for the people. When we arrived everyone was out of the water and there was 2 helicopters and about 5 lifeguard boats out which was worrying I thought it was someone missing but after about 10 minutes of searching people started rushing into the water!! Later on we found out on the news that there had been a shark sighting. Hmmm it was really hot but not sure I would have been rushing into the water like some people so quickly!! We walked down to the beach after we finished eating, Gary bought us a coconut to drink while we walked along, amazed at how many people and how different it seemed down there to how it was in the winter. There was a market on up in the streets so we went for a walk around I got some jewellery and then we started the journey home. We were hoping to met up with Rory a friend from my work but we didn't spend a lot of time down in Bondi and he was really hungover haha so that was a shame. It was nice to get back to the hotel earlyish though, we snuggled up in bed and watched the first Bridget Jones on the telly and had an early night.
Wednesday it was time to go back to Adelaide, we checked out for 10am and travelled into the city. Gary needed to pick up his Canadian passport which he had renewed over here and we also got a quick catch up with another friend of Gary's from uni who works in a hotel nearby. We walked down Circular Quay and got the train to Central, had our dinner before getting train to airport. It was very sad to leave Sydney this time as we knew it was the last time. We had an amazing time though so pleased we got to come for New Year. Best New Year's ever but did miss the family. Our flight from Sydney was 3pm was so busy in the airport took us ages to check in and neither of the flights we got to sit together which was a shame. The flight time was only about an hour and 15 minutes and Keith was there for us in the car when we arrived back in Adelaide. It was great he offered to take us and pick us up. We paid him $60 so $30 each way but that saved us a lot more money than the airport shuttle option from Victor which would have cost around $100 each. Although it was sad to leave Sydney we were pleased to be back in Victor and be staying there until the end of the month and experience the full season. We had a little New Year party together that night all got pretty drunk haha seems they had missed us, their little drinking buddies.
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