Goodbye Australia!

Byron Bay was lovely! Kirsten (one of our friends from NZ) came to spend some time exploring it with us and we had a great 3 days just chilling about and visiting the beaches, most eastern point of Oz and the Lighthouse... oh, and Bully and K did a lot of bead shopping and jewellery making.... :)

From Byron we headed down the coast to Coff's Harbour... and after spending a great day at 'The Big Pineapple' we were really excited when we stumbled across 'The Big Banana'. Whilst it was really nice and there was plenty of fruit action, the choc-dipped banana didn't quite live up to expectation and we were not as impressed as the Pineapple place...

Coff's Harbour was a lovely little town though and after enjoying a chippy tea we took Kirsten to the train station where she caught the night-train back to Sydney.

So, all alone again in big ole Oz, Bully and me headed further down the coast and found an amazing place called Port Macquarie. It was off the beaten track a little and so whilst the scenery and breakwater were beaut, it wasn't tourist-ridden at all. We spent a great day shopping in the town and then headed out for the cinema and a couple of drinks.

However, it was now unfortunately time to bring the Oz travels to an end and make the final stretch back to Sydney. The journey was great and really tranquil (except for the hoooge python we saw attacking cars and trucks!!) until we hit the metropolis of the big city! Having gotten used to driving in the outback and small beach towns it was a mighty big shock to be driving across the Harbour Bridge in rush hour with a gazillion cars coming from all directions and mass high rises all around! Very scary....

Still, we eventually managed to find our way to Kirsten and Alec's new flat (woohoo!), which is amazing! Its in the Glebe area in the centre of the city on a kind of Bohemian/ quirky stretch full of cafes, lovely shops and the like! We were in heaven, and have been for the last few days! Milling about, popping out for brekky and then just crashing at the flat.... I think Kirsten and Alec are a tad afraid we may never leave.... but who can blame us with Kirsten cooking roasts and vegi lasagnas.... mmmmmmm!

Oz has been a great place and with 11,000 kms under our belt we felt we have seen enough to feel like we really came and explored. The van life was great and we had some fab times with each other, people we met and folk we met up with from previous travels. 10 months in and we're loving it more each day and have made some great friends. We still miss everyone from home though.

But, tomorrow the Asia journey begins! We think we have got everything sorted and whilst we are mega excited, its a little scary as this is going to be the start of hardcore travelling..... Singapore here we come....