Hello Boys and Girls

Thanks for being so patient over the next instalment of my journal. It has been over 3 weeks since we left Melbourne to hit the road and travel up the East Coast of Victoria and New South Wales. So please bare with me as some of my memories of it are quite fuzzy. We left Melbourne on another grey looking day, but very excited about our trip to the Great Ocean Road, which is where we went first. Although it was in the opposite direction of where we were heading, some guy the night before had bored the t*** off us all telling us we would be nuts to not go here, here, there, up here and here, if you are going to the Great Ocean Road. Although we sounded keen and really eager to do all the things he said, we were so excited about the prospect of getting to Sydney we decided to do the basic part of the Great Ocean Road and just go and see the 12 Apostles. Now, this is misleading, and I was most disgruntled when I got there, not due to the fact it was grey and spitting with rain occasionally, but there were only 9 Apostles (which are those giant stacks of land you can see in the middle of the sea in the journal photos). Despite their being 9 I could only see 8 but they were still an amazing sight, even though Australia lied to us all about there being 12! On our way down towards the 12 Apostles on the first day, we stopped in a few local little surfer towns, where people were holidaying. We didn?t choose the best of weeks to do this trip as it was the Easter Holidays and all the camp sites were packed because children and families were on their holidays, also I had a raging cough and a bad cold.

Just before we stopped for the day we drove up to and stopped at a monumental area of Australia for a lot of English people. Not knowing that it was a real place or that it was anywhere near where we were, we stumbled across the area where the program Around The Twist was made, and the lighthouse where the family lived. I was overjoyed and ran onto a nearby beach screaming and chasing seagulls, it was a good moment. Five minutes after we came of the beach, my camera decided to fill itself with sand and it broke. So I only have one picture of the lighthouse, but for anyone who knows what program I am on about, I have lots of film footage of the lighthouse, and the area around it, so don?t panic. We stayed at a camp site in Apollo Bay, which was nice and basic, what we were expecting on our road trip. With our new tent and our new camping equipment, we set up for the night. Unfortunately by nightfall there was nothing to do because we had no light, there was no pub in walkable distance, and some didn?t feel comfortable leaving their stuff in a campsite while we went out to a pub for the evening. So we were in bed by 8.30! The next day we packed up, and headed off to the Great Ocean Road to see the Apostles. After the EIGHT Apostles (not 12) we stopped at a place called London?s Bridge which is a huge cliff piece of land in the middle of the sea which has a little tunnel going through the bottom of it at the middle making it look like a bridge. After you see the picture you will see what I mean and thank me for my accurate description of it.We hopped back in the van with a full tank of petrol and set off, after about an hour we saw lots of cars pulled up and decided to see what all the commotion was about, and then after 2 seconds I noticed a Koala Bear sat up in a tree. This was the moment we saw our first wild Australia animal. I only have one picture but again, I have lots of cool footage of this baby Koala eating a leaf, which adds proof as to why this is the cutest animal on the planet. I will try and put some footage of it onto the journal at a later date.

I could write for another 6 hours about the places we stopped at and the things we did, but it was basic travelling stuff, stopping, seeing lots of beautiful little places, having lunch and moving on. The main places I enjoyed the most were the National Park we went to, which is the place where you can see photos of me throwing stones into the sea (Stuart got a very good action shot). So there, Wollongong, which is the main place I wanted to go to, and the place I will be going again for a bit longer, as it is such a nice place. The one place I didn?t enjoy too much was just outside of an area called Nowra, we decided to seriously do some mileage and drove well into the late hours of the evening. We eventually stopped at a campsite and were told it was 25 dollars per person, which is ridiculous, as the basic we were paying in other places was about 8 dollars. We decided to try the next campsite, and were unsuccessful as it was full because of the Easter Weekend. Struggling to find anywhere and it now being close to 11pm, we decided to stop as everyone was too tired to drive. We pulled up in a little car park and decided to just all sleep in the van. With all our bags, camping equipment and 5 fully grown men, it was just comfortable enough to seat 5 people for a day journey, certainly not comfortable enough for 5 grown men to sleep in. As everyone was trying to sleep I couldn't believe we were doing this and I just couldn't fall asleep. Also with my raging cough keeping everyone awake, and me constantly spitting out the window as I was just coughing up green goo, I decided to get out. I went for a little walk do the town road and heard lots of rowdy young people coming my way, so I turned around and walked back. A few meters behind where the van was parked I saw a little bay with a tree in it and covered in woodchip. I sat down and watched people walk past and look at me like I was homeless, then decided to do my best to get some shut eye, so led down and drifted off momentarily. Until I heard a buzzing/flapping noise near my ear, I looked up... Then jumped up... Then ran away like a little schoolgirl. The buzzing/flapping noise turned out to be a moff and for those of you who know me well, I do not do well with Moffs. I ended up running so far away my cough began to play up again and I spent another 10 minutes bring up phlegm and gatar! After another hour and half of walking around aimlessly watching all the saturday night drunk teenagers stumble up the road, I got back in the van. That night I got more sleep for that 15 minutes or so on the woodchip than I did in the van!

A couple of days later we headed off to Wollongong, which is probably one of the reasons I liked it so much, it was absolute paradise compared to that night.After a really good end of afternoon/evening in Wollongong, playing silly jumping games on the beach, watching the huge waves crash into the sand, we went and made dinner. After that we went to a little local bar/club and played some pool and while the others drank beer I stuck with water and cough syrup! By the way, I hope at some point of this whole story about my cough I got some flippin' awwws or poor thing or anything like that, if not, one will not be happy. Just for your information, I got nothing like that at all from any of the other guys. To make things all the better, Ollie liked to complain about it most mornings saying he couldn?t take another night of me coughing. That sympathetic warmth always did me in good stead for the rest of the journey I can assure you.

The next morning we hit the road again, and after about an hour and a half we made it to Sydney and our new hostel. This hostel was owned by the same guy who owned the Nunnery in Melbourne, where we stayed for 6 weeks. After Jon used a bit of his gift of the gab, we managed to get the five of us in the 6 room all girl dorm for 20 dollars a night. This was mainly because the landlord liked us all so much when we were at the Nunnery, he gave us a special discount and a good room! No T.V in there though, so he must not love us that much. We parked Ducky up down a side street where the receptionist said it would be safe (Ducky being the name of our van, due to the registration plate DUC 308). After exploring the hostel and finding out the lounge and television room was closed for refurbishment for 8 weeks, were not best pleased. We wandered into the town and got some information about Sydney, the best way to get around, the best places to go, that sort of thing. We eventually had some food, and took a walk down to the harbour, where you could see the famous Harbour Bridge and the Sydney Opera House. Being English, this was one of the main things you come to Australia to see, but I think if we are being all honest we were all a little under whelmed by it. ?It isn?t as big as it looks on t.v izzit?? I said. ?No, dint fink it would be that dirrrty either, did you?? Jon replied. We took a walk around the harbour and sat under the bridge as the sun started to go down, and because we had just walked mileage! We watched all the Japanese people take their pictures. Oh and a quite interesting fact is all Chinese/Japanese people over the age of 40 do not smile in pictures as if their lives depended on it, and for some reason when the men are taking the pictures they like to crouch down, for every single picture. We watched as one Chinese man crouched or cooped down infront of us to take a picture of his frowning wife. As he did so he broke wind right infront of everyone of us, we all looked at eachother in astonishment, as he didn't seem to care at all, or apologise or even look embarrassed. After breaking out into fits of laughter, we gradually go the feeling they knew we were taking the micky out of them all, and decided to go get an ice-cream each.After a few days, we had done a lot of walking, and still hadn't done any of the things we had planned to do in Sydney. Which were to meet new people at the hostel and become as popular as we were at the Nunnery, and also to get jobs. Infact, none of us had made any effort to get a job, and we all took a disliking to many of the people at the hostel, as they all knew we were from the Nunnery, and they didn?t seem to like that. Mind you on our first night, we were very loud and boisterous as we were drinking goon and playing drinking games, and it got very loud. So that may of hindered people coming over to us and saying hello or trying to get to know us. It also didn't help that on our first night, I got blind drunk, and ended up be carried home after throwing up over a bench on the pavement just up the road from our hostel! I was fine the next morning though, and I think it played a massive part in me getting rid of my cold.

A few days down the line Stuart went for a walk to the local park and noticed that Ducky wasn't there. He raced back to tell us and Ollie went with him to check he wasn't going mad, when they came back, it was confirmed, our van had been stolen. The money we spent on it, the repairs, the registration, the camping, even our sleeping bags, it was all gone. I was very glum for the next few days, as a lot of my bonus from work had gone into paying for that van, and now I knew I was never going to see that money again!

This fuelled my ambition for getting a job, I was so annoyed, and it also hit home that I was rapidly running out of money. Over the next couple of days, Luke and I went around lots of little shops, and practically every internet cafe asking if they had vacancies. Most of them being ran by Chinese people, I really started to lose my rag at their inability to speak any English. I climbed about 5 levels of stairs in one internet cafe to ask the lady behind the counter, who was Chinese by the way, "Excuse me, I was just calling in, to ask if you had any Job Vacancies at all?" She met this question with a bewildered look in her eye and said "Job Vacancies, uhhhhh I not sure, Is it a sort of game or a piece of software?" I tried to explain to her and the conversation ended in me just walking off. I went to another one a bit further down the road, and I was met with the same sort of Chinese thicko as the last place, who had no idea that if he came to a country like Australia where 98% of the population speak English, he might actually have to learn it. I asked him the same question as he shoved a computer card in my face... "You go to computer number 4"... "No, sorry (why I was apologising I have no idea), I am actually calling in to see if you had any openings for a job?" He and his gibbon like friend stared at eachother, and pointed towards computer number 4 and shouted "Over there, you go there!"... "No no listen. Do you have any jobs available, you know, to work here as a member of staff" In a very slow and exadurated manner. "I don't know what you mean, its over there" was his reply, again pointing to computer number bloody 4! "Just forget it lads yeah?" and I walked out mumbling obscenities under my breath towards Luke who looked worried about why I had a extremely agitated look on my face. I won?t repeat it, but there was lots of swear words and general bashing of the Chinese nation going on in my conversation with Luke after that. We started making our way home, and I saw one more, and I was tempted not to bother, but I went in, and hooray the guy was Australian, he knew what I asked straight away, gave me an application and told me that a position had just come available. I walked out feeling much better, and without feeling the need to take a hammer to someone! To end the story short, I got a call in the morning when we were in Coogee and Bondi looking at what apparently was the best beaches Sydney have to offer, saying I had an interview that afternoon. Two days later I got the job, and was told my start date. After an overwhelming first say I wasn't liking it at all, it brought back horrible memories of Burtons and the crap I had to put up with from customers. Plus the guy training me was a moron! That night after work I got an invite to a leaving party for someone who was leaving the company, after my horrible first day I really didn't want to go, but I made the effort anyway and went. The next day I had to be in at 7.30am and I was opening and working with the area manager for the morning. He was great, everything the k*** who taught me the day before taught me was re-done and explained a lot better. He was from the UK and had lived in Australia for 7 years, we had all the same interests, football, music, playstation, everything. After that day I felt a lot better and was chuffed to be working there. Then the next morning I was working with moron face again, and he was even worse than the day before, and he even told me off when I accidently clicked on home page and it took me to msn homepage. "Your not allowed to go on the internet on these computers, its monitored and you can be given a written warning, just so you know not to do it, okay?" I explained it was an accident and I was trying to get to the intranet. Ten minutes later he is calling me over to show me a website on the same computer called www.fatchicksinpartyhats.com and www.catsthatlooklikehitler.com. I mean what do you say to a guy like this? Then later he told me off for not trying to sell phone cards and cd burning enough. I felt like saying, mate its my 3rd day, let me learn the basics first. So the next day I realised it wasn?t worth being that unhappy and depressed about going back. So Jon offered to ring up and pretend to be me and explain I wasn?t coming back. Since then I have just been sight seeing and walking around lots, I plan to go to the Blue Mountains on my own in a couple of days though, and after that coming back to Sydney for a week to see a friend from the UK. Once I have seen him, done the bridge climb, seen and opera at the sydney opera house.

I will be going off on my own for the final month of my travels. Hopefully to see Wollongong again, Byron Bay, Fraiser Island, Cairns and then back down to Brisbane. I have changed my flights now, and will be flying home on the 13th of June, landing in Heathrow on I think the 15th of June. Hope you are all looking forward to seeing me. Don't forget to check out my new journal pictures of our travels up the East Coast and all the ones I have taken here in Sydney. Also see below for a list of people I have met and decided that I like.

Rhiana and Emily - These are two Dutch girls that were at the Nunnery and that we weren't too fond of when we met them here in Sydney, but after getting to know them both, we realised they are really nice girls and a lot of fun to be around. Rhiana and I have a very similar sense of humour and I got on quite well with her. The other night they called us to tell us Emily's mum who is originally from Essex has arrived and would like to meet us. So they came to our hostel and we played drinking games, was a lot of fun, and her mum is a very nice lady, and doesn't portray your typical Essex girl stereotype. I maybe meeting up with them all in the Blue Mountains.

Matt my Manager - My manager at the internet cafe I worked called Global Gossip, was a great guy with the same interest in music as me, and believe it or not was addicted to playing the same computer game I play at home online, just like I do. He even invited me round his house to play a few nights a week with him, shame I never got to do that because Jon quit for me. Could of cured my addiction of playing computer games for another couple of months. He also loved football, and we got on extremely well, feel a little bit bad for letting him down, but nevermind eh?

Jason and Jim - You can see photos of them, Jim is a very cherpy cockney lad and Jason is a Canadian cool man. They seem to have become really good friends with eachother, and the last few nights I have been hanging out with them as they are a good bunch of guys. Jim is also in the Magic Circle which is a special club for magicians, he is unbelievable at card tricks and is more entertaining than David Blaine. Anyway, thats all folks, sorry again if it was a bit long, and not that interesting, but I am trying my best so get off my backs okay!!!! Only kidding, appreciate anyone who read it all the way through, and always very pleased to see anyone who leaves a message. Thanks guys see you soon.

Cristoph of Oz