Hip Hip Happy Birthday to Bex!

Having originally planned to be in Bali, my birthday celebrations turned out to be slightly different with the day spent in Gayndah instead. All was not lost though… after an amazing pancake breakfast courtesy of Carla; I spent the day lazing in front of the TV with the smell of chocolate birthday cake wafting through the house. Although the weather wasn’t that great – a quick dash to the supermarket left us a tad wet – it didn’t dampen the day. I was well and truly spoilt in the evening with one of my favourites, lasagne, on the menu teamed with lots of salad and wedges. Oh and not to forget a very scrummy chocolate birthday cake (see above)! Teamed with a table full of friends, the night went way too fast for my liking and was soon over  Although it was such a shame not to be able to spend time with family and friends at home, Carla put things in place to make sure I had an amazing day… a massive thank you to her.

I want to take you to the Gayndah, Gayndah....

Orchard adventures

Our fruit harvesting careers, (screw the planning master's) began in Bundaberg. Bundaberg is the home of Bundaberg rum and a lesser-spotted hairstyle known as 'The Mullet'. It really is Bogan-ville! (Bogan is Aussie slang meaning chav/scally etc.) We spent a week in the Bundaberg Backpacker's hostel. Carla did 1 day of zuccini (courgette) picking and Bex did mandarin picking for 2 days. We were paying a fortune to stay and making a pittance so we headed off again.

I want to take you to the Gayndah, Gayndah....

We drove pretty randomly and arrived in Gayndah. This little town is the Orange capital of Queensland. It is the oldest town in Queensland, and is about a 2 hour drive inland from Bundaberg. We were promised jobs the following week, packing mandarins in a packing shed. We were really excited not to have to do any more picking as its such hard work!

The Welcoming Giant Gayndah Orange

Well we've been in Gayndah a month now; its been a series of highs and lows if we're honest. There is nothing really in Gayndah but orchards, packing sheds and three pubs! We have spent our days working from 7-3.30ish, and then usually grabbing a case of lager from the bottle-o (drive through off-licences....only in Australia) and drowning our boredom in the campsite.

Just a few drinks with a few friends! (Find Bex and Carla....answers on a SAE)

We stayed for a month in our tent but have now moved up in the world and have a house complete with a pool! We have made heaps of lovely friends from all over the world here and the campsite has such a lovely neighbourhood feel. We still pop down to visit everyone, and we've only been in our house a week! The packing is pretty easy work, we get paid $20 an hour to grade oranges/mandarins picking out the rotten fruit and the marked ones but we're getting quite bored of watching them roll in from of our eyes for 8 hours a day. Yet again we have been really lucky to work with such lovely people, from the bosses, packers and floor-boys to the girls on the sorting table everyone is so friendly there. (pics to follow!)

So that's us up to date for now,
B & C xx

Melbourne to Bundaberg....

We flew (home?) to Australia on March 15th and spent a lovely few days again with the Bailey family. We then left for an epic drive on the 18th from Melbourne to Sydney. We drove the majority of the journey in one day, driving until we were about 2 hours outside of Sydney. We were getting very excited indeed because we were meeting Carla's friends Louise T and Louise B ( Lou x2) in Manly the following day!
The meeting nearly didn't happen, as Carla cleverly lost her phone (in the car) and so in the pouing rain we attempted to find the girls on the Manly Corso. It took about 30 seconds to see the girls emerging from a shop! It was so lovely to see them we all had a big cuddle and then went for a rather dubious breakfast where Carla ate pancakes with sour cream!

 

Lou B and Carla




Lou T and Bex



The girls stayed with us for a week. We travelled all the way from Sydney to Bundaberg with them in our stationwagon! We stopped off at Cardiff, Port Maquirie, Byron Bay, Nimbin, Brisbane, Australia Zoo, Noosa and Bundaberg along the way. (see pics) We had such a lovely time, but some unfortuently soggy weather meant they couldn't quite catch up with our lovely Aussie tans! In Byron bay Carla also caught up with Helen, an old Uni friend which was amazing as they hadn't seen eachother in a few years.

The Lou x2 left us in Bundaberg, they travelled further north to Cairns. They got to see a hell of a lot considering they were only in Aus for 3 weeks.

We heart NZ!

Hello all!

We have been terrible at keeping up to date with this! We're sorry! It’s been so manic these past three months but here follows a bumper-blog update...

New Zealand

We flew to Auckland from Melbourne on February 15th. We spent a few days in Auckland, getting to see lots of the lovely sights of the city. We took the ferry to Rangitoto Island which is a volcano formed in Auckland's bay only six hundred years ago, we hiked an hour to the top and saw incredible views over Auckland. The coolest part of it was that the volcano was so young that the ground was still quite hot from the lava underfoot!!

This is the lush view of Auckland from the top of Rangitoto

We saw the QE2 cruise ship docked in Auckland harbour which was massive, and really pretty to watch over cocktails in the night! We spotted the USA edition of 'Biggest Loser' being filmed in the bay too which was really funny! We visited the museums and botanical gardens which overlooked the city.

We had a couple of nice nights out in the bay and on K Street. Then it was time to pick up our CAMPERVAN!!! :) We'd so wanted to buy one when we first got to Australia and though we love our station wagon Brucie, we were super excited!

Getting creative in the sands of Pakiri

Our home for our Kiwi Adventure!

We headed north out of Auckland and into the Northland. It was absolutely beautiful as soon as you drove out of the city. We headed to Goat Island Marine reserve where we borrowed snorkels and got in the sea! We were some of the only ones without wetsuits, but it wasn't too cold! The kelp and the waves interrupted our sea-viewing and as it was Bex's first time snorkeling it wasn't the longest trip out, but felt great to not have to worry about sharks for once!! We then went to Pikiri beach where we saw yet another film being shot which was cool, a German Romeo and Juliet!

We headed to The Bay of Islands next which was super pretty but didn't have much nightlife! We tried (and failed) to have a night out and treated ourselves to a bed for the night!

We then headed even further north visiting lots of beautiful beaches and eventually coming to the northern most point of New Zealand: Cape Reinga. This beautiful place felt really spiritual; the Maori believe that this is the site where spirits enter the afterlife. We sat and watched the Tasman Sea merging with the Pacific Ocean and the views (see pics) were incredible!

Cape Reinga

A long way from home....

Next we travelled south and visited the Waitomo Caves where we saw millions of glow-worms illuminating the ceilings of the caves like a beautiful cathedral. We couldn't take pictures unfortunately. Then we headed to Rotorua. This was a completely incredible place. It was like something on the moon! Bubbling sulphurous geysers dotted everywhere, and thermal baths, unfortunately the place absolutely stunk!! This was the day of the earthquake in Christchurch; it was unreal to see the devastation unfold on the news.

Cave Stalagtites(check us geographers out!)

We went zorbing here which was so much fun! We then headed to Lake Taupo where we again enjoyed the thermal baths. We then headed to Napier which was a pretty but boring place. We did get to visit the wineries which were amazing and we found the world’s longest place name! (See pic)

Epic longest place name in the world!

Geyser at Rotorua

We then headed south to catch our ferry! We spent a couple of days in Picton and Blenheim visiting about 9 wineries including Cloudy Bay and Villa Maria! Carla was in her element with all the free Pinot Noir on offer but even the best Sauv Blanc in the world couldn't convince her to enjoy it!

We then drove to Nelson which was a really nice town and on towards the Abel Tasman National park. We did a 26km hike along the coast of the national park. It was incredibly beautiful, though we did get a peppering of rain at times!

View from our 26km trek along Abel Tasman

We then travelled along the west coast of the South Island stopping off at Greymouth and arrived at Franz Josef the day before Carla's Birthday. We had a hilarious night out here where we played a game called ' Three Pegs'. Though we had misunderstood the Kiwi accent and had originally thought we were playing 'Three pigs'!!

Carla celebrated her birthday with a pancake breakfast followed by a day of hiking on the Franz Josef glacier. It was such an incredible day and veritable geographical porn for us two geographers! We had a lovely dinner and night in the pub too to console Carla for getting very old indeed!!

Carla's 24th spent on the Franz Josef Glacier!

We then travelled across the thawed ski-fields to Wanaka and Queenstown. The journey was absolutely beautiful and we had the best burgers in the world at Red Star in Wanaka. We had a really great time in Queenstown. It was a beautiful little town, though it was really cold!!





Milford Sounds

We took a trip to see Milford Sound. The fiords with hanging glaciers, waterfalls, basking seals and soaring albatrosses were incredible.

We saw Top Gear being filmed on the way home! We also took the Skyline Gondola for awesome views of Queenstown and the mountains we had the most incredible buffet lunch at the top which set us back around $60 each! It was incredibly opulent!!

We then headed up past Christchurch and towards Kaikoura where we spent the day whale watching! (See pics) we spotted four Sperm Whales, lots of seals and albatrosses.

One of the four sperm (chuckle) Whales we saw at Kaikoura showing off!

We headed back up to Blenheim and to Queen Charlotte Sound, in the Marlborough sounds. We had a lovely couple of peaceful days exploring the sounds. We then had a manic trip back up north to get our flight back home!



View of Queen Charlotte Sound



We stopped off at the Coromandel Peninsula and visited the famous Hot water beach where you dig a hole in the sand and can sit in warm spring water! We spent a very confortable night in the Grand Chancellor (flash packing!) Before heading back to Australia!

Early February....

As our time grew to a close in Sorrento we realised what amazing friends we had made in the town. Especially our lovely work-mates in Stringers! We had a lovely leaving do-thrown for us by our bosses of Stringers (We'd quit the Koonya in Jan when we couldn't cope with the double shifts anymore!)

Our leaving meal in the Continental Hotel, Sorrento

We had soooo much to sort out with the car before we left. We had the arduous task of getting a road-worthy certificate....we needed 2 new tyres, a new windscreen, a new side-mirror and ball joints (we don't know what these are either!) and various other little jobs. Then we needed to get it transferred from Andrew's name into our names, and get a rego (which is the Aussie MOT and Tax and Insurance all in one!) Needless to say its been crazy trying to get this done but a few grand later we're all set and have shiny new Victoria plates to show for our toil! Carla looked completely blank when at the DVLA she was handed a screwdriver and had to remove our NSW plates...

so...Bex got on the case!

Before we left our gorgeous friends Jessy and Camille took us out for an amazing meal of tapas in Dromana and then for a spin up Arthur's seat, a winding road up to the highest point on the Mornington peninsula. Que a whole lot of leather!

Bex's turn to don the leather!

and then over to Carla! (Jessy's on the right!)

That's all for Sorrento...we sailed (well caught the ferry) away the next morning!!


B and C xxx

January in Sorrento!

No we've not forgotten to include our NYE exploits on here! They weren't that exciting if we're honest! We had two back-to-back 18-hour shifts to do so we weren't feeling particularly festive! Though Carla did get in trouble for doing a tequilla shot in work! At the stroke of midnight I believe we were pulling pints! They don't sing Auld Lang Syne here so we got some odd looks when we joined arms to dance after we were done with our pint-pulling!! :P Didn't get off til about 2.30am and we were back in at 8am!

Enough whining-Happy New Year from the both of us!!!

 We pretty much worked the entirety of January but did manage to steal a day away to watch the Australian Open Tennis Championship! We met Mrs Williams (Venus and Serena's mummy) and watched Venus, Andy Roddick and Justine Hennin all win their second round matches! It was a lovely sunny day and our seats in the Rod Laver were melting in the afternoon sun!!

Queuing for the tennis!

Here's a pic of Andy Roddick and Igor Kunitsyn!

As sad as this is that's probably all the info needed for January!


B & C xx

Christmas and the Boxing Day Test

Forget today's date...here is our much awaited blog post! We've been busy girls!!

Xmas Morning in our Santa Hats!!

Christmas was spent with the lovely Bailey Family in Melbourne. We had a nice day of food (not your average British Christmas of turkey and the trimmings! The Aussies have a more weather appropriate- baring in mind its summer- approach to Christmas with lots of salads, meats etc, etc) Very enjoyable none-the-less! :)

Christmas food!

We opened Christmas pressies from our parents that had made the journey with us (and were thin on wrapping paper at this point!!). We had some pressies from the Baileys which was lovely including a lovely Myer's gift card! :)

We watched films etc with everyone and had a few drinkies which made for a merry day!!

The real fun was to be had on Boxing Day!!!

We got up, made sarnies and headed down to the mighty MCG to watch the 4th Ashes Test (Cricket-Australia Vs England for all you non-sports fans!)

Us as the MCG before play! (taken by a man from Cardiff!!)

It was such a brilliant day! We haven't got our Aus Vs Eng Tee shirts on here and you can't see our Welsh flag so you'll just have to imagine how patriotic we were!! We went with Arthur and Jessy and their daughter Nicole and her boyf came along too!

We were sat in the 'dry area' so no booze in the stands but we managed a cheeky cider and some chips so were very happy indeed!!

As you all know, we thrashed the Aussies it was the lowest total Australia has made against England in 54 Tests between the two countries at the MCG! So we witnessed history in the making! :) Poor Nicole and Boyf Taz went home shortly after lunch! Didn't really enjoy their first ashes test as much as we did!! :P

That's all for now!


B and C x