Australia Part 1: Living in Luxury in Brisbane and Sydney

The first bit of entertainment on my next adventure came during the flight from New Zealand to Brisbane with the hilariously dramatic Air New Zealand flight safety video. If you haven't seen it, watch it. It is something else. They discuss "the greatest place ever created" in their "little corner of the world" - so theatrical. My inflight happiness continued as I sat with two lovely ladies and we discussed and compared our time in New Zealand along with them informing me that there was a tremor which was 3.5 on the richter scale in Christchurch at 5:36am that morning. So, as you can imagine and judging by my exaggeration skills, I was pretty happy to leave that place, as lovely as it had been.

I arrived in Brisbane and was met by my first lovely hosts headed back to the house and got stuck into a bottle of white. Lovely. Surprisingly, I wasn't feeling tired despite having gone back in time three hours so I should have begun flagging. Luckily I didn't though, making our spontaneous flee to a busy and young bar full of fresh eighteen year olds past midnight possible. We finally got to bed around 4am which should have felt like 7am in the current time zone that I was in, but my drunken state masked this.

The sun was out the following day so we headed straight to a bottlo to stock up on our bevvies for round 2. A typical Aussie day, drinking in the sunshine and finishing in the music room showing off our singing abilities...not. We ended the weekend with a delicious lunch accompanied by wine (of course) and an actual calmer evening. So yes, my time in Brisbane was heavily alcoholic but I wouldn't have wanted it any other way and I had a lovely time with my brilliant hosts.

The final day everybody was at work and school so I caught the bus into the city. I was instantly taken back three years to when my Dad and I were there and I ate where we first ate. This was followed by a walk around the beautiful botanical gardens and south bank, spotting a variety of creatures along the way which startled me being from the bubble that is England where only sheep and cows roam and the most interesting bird you see is a pheasant. It was a lovely atmosphere in the glorious sun and only one thing was calling - beer. So I sat, walked, read, drank, shopped and enjoyed my final day, topped off nicely by a tasty roast at the end. This included my first introduction to bread sauce, a very British thing that I'd never tried and it was scummy. I couldn't have asked for more from my first entertainers in Aus. 

Sydney was the next stop on my agenda which was an hour and a half flight from Brisbane (I still find this bizarre). Met by one of my lovely friends at Campbelltown, we went on a tour of their local area - the southern highlands. A beautiful expanse of land covered in trees and empty spaces, with a mass of kangaroos bouncing around which I was lucky enough to see. In fact, one day while eating our delicious curry there was the biggest kangaroo I've ever seen chilling right in the back garden. I quickly jumped to the photo opportunity and got some fantastic shots until its glaring stare scared me so I left it be. It looked like it wanted to jump at me through the window.

A particular day which stood out for me in Sydney was the Harbour Bridge Climb. We set off at 9:30am and had no problems at all getting into the city with the trusty app that is Google Maps. It was the parking that caused the first conundrum. The carpark we'd initially aimed for due to it being the cheapest around (which wasn't cheap at all) was eith full or reserved. I mean, it wasn't full at all just everybody had reserved spaces and weren't using them which frustrated us more. We'd passed a similar looking carpark down the road so headed for that. On entering we almost choked at the price list (especially me coming from the little old countryside in Britain where expensive is more than five pounds for a day) and instantly knew it was going to be pricey. Four hours later and $88 out of pocket, this was confirmed. 

The climb itself was fantastic, although a little scary at times. Some of the material we walked on didn't feel as strong as the guide tried to assure us and I was convinced I'd be the first climber in history to fall to my death. The ladders were by far the worst bit and once you'd passed them, you could practically run up to the top. We got some brilliant photos though and an embarrassingly cringe eight second video to take home with us having had a great experience that'll be remembered. 

What will also be remembered is our extremely traumatic drive home. Even with the sat nav we were getting stressed at busy city driving and people constantly jumping from lane to lane, beeping horns and such like. Then came the nightmare. Our phone which had the sat nav on it died. Its 2017, we rely on technology, I know at the age of twenty two I should be sufficient at map reading but I've grown up with google so my skills are poor. However, I took the plunge, went back fifty years and grabbed the conveniently placed paper map. It took me about fifteen minutes to find the road we were on and then another fifteen minutes to work out how to use the non-digital device but by some miracle we managed and it was only the second attempt which got us onto the correct motorway home. Accomplished, so so accomplished we felt.

A less traumatic day followed and my guests spoilt me taking me out for breakfast, lunch and dinner. We had a peaceful walk along Shellharbour where I saw my first pelicans and looked out into the open, blue, glistening sea. The weather was glorious and the temperature difference at the coast compared to up in the highlands was crazy. We then headed to Wollongong which was far bigger than I'd imagined, drove around there and got out at the beach where the temperature was even warmer. The sea couldn't have been too cool either as there were a few people swimming in it and we passed a group of school children just getting back from their surf lesson (as you do in school). After our visit to the coast, we headed back and went on my first Australian bush walk with two gorgeous dogs. Apart from my first sightings of Bull Ants, it was amazing to see entirely native land, numerous wombat holes and a large group of kangaroos.

I haven't even been in this country a week yet and I'm very impressed. I've stayed with two wonderful families, felt like royalty because I'm so used to backpacker life and explored so much already. Now to return to my old backpacker ways for one night and one night only where I head back into Sydney to catch up with friends from New Zealand and probably get more drunk than necessary, before my last stop catching up with friends in Adelaide.

Until next time...

Things I've learnt: 

-Robert Harris baked beans are better than Heinz

-Air New Zealand's safety video is ridiculous

-I have a face that looks desperate for wine

-it irritates me that people don't listen to instructions on flights (it's not hard)

-kangaroos are huge

-cockatoos make a right racket