Dear All, Hope the weather is as good there as it is here. Not much time has lapsed since we wrote last but have put a few miles under the belt so far. From melbourne we took to the road in a 75 year old station wagon. when we set out it had no air con the windows didnt work and as it had a 4 litre engine i was expecting to have to fill up with gas every 100 yards. We got the aircon fixed and that made the next day which was 42oC a bit more bearable. Basically we had to drive eat sleep and sh1t (no not really sh1t) in the car for 5 days from melbourne - south east to Phillip Island, then on the ferry west to start the Great Ocean Road. In 5 days we covered 1600 km and filled up with petrol about 5 times. The highlights were probably the little fairy penguins on Phillip Island, sleeping in a car we had been driving in for 12 hours in 90oF heat and the sights along the ocean. We went to Bells beach where they filmed Point Break which looked a bit scary to surf, luckily we did not have time, "damn" I exclaimed "I was really looking forward to catching those bloody big scary waves" Stayed in lots of little coastal towns along the way and with nothing to do in the car, spent most of the evenings down the pub trying to get away from the car. At bed time, the privacy was to say limited and on one side of the car we stuck up some newspaper in the window, but only one side as we ran out of sellotape. Rachel had this side and I was exposed for the world and any german hiker that chose to peer into the car when on their yodelling and sausage eating tours or whatever they do at 7am when normal backpakers are trying to sleep off the XXXX. We arrived in Adelaide and saw the city in about 2 hours, not much here (that was including an art gallery) and visited Glenelg which was very nice. We then took a 1600km round coach trip to Coober Pedy. Really nice place. The old Opal mining town. Mad Max 3 and Priscilla Queen of the Desert were filmed here amongst others. Apart from the Opals (Rachel found a couple of nice ones, but not big enough to retire and stay here). The only sights were part of the Dog Fence, a 5,300km long fence to keep the dingos out and our first sighting of the rarely seen inebriated indigenous people. Seriously, I thought it was all rubbish but they are all pissed at any hour. I think they should check Cathy Freeman's blood samples for Red Bull and Vodka if she wins anything else again. Coober Pedy was really good though, its a bit Deliverance, if you know what i mean but proper Outback and real australians with names like Kasprovitz and Oliakos. Well, we are back in Adelaide wondering what to do withourselves until we catch the train to Perth tomorrow evening. will probably have to beat Rachel at Table tennis again. Keep well and we will write soon, Photos to follow in a couple of weeks. Andy and Rachel