Should We Stay or Should We Goa?

Jamie Oliver stood on an elderly Italian bloke's shoulders and tried to dislodge a wild mushroom from a tree trunk using a knife on a pole. As we watched, we decided that it was time to invigorate our adventurous side, not by poking around in forests trying to find the perfect ingredients for a mushroom risotto, but by planning the next leg of a journey. On December the 28th we will be leaving for the land of perrenial diarrhoea, India. The fact that Home and Away and Neighbours are now off-air until 2008 may have had some influence in this decision.

Victoria's gall bladder also seems to want to pack up and leave her body, as an overnight admission to Camperdown hospital confirmed. ECG monitors and a half asleep girlfriend are an exellent source of fun. Whispering 'Brad Pitt' made the heart-rate jump a little, 'Tom Carter topless' made Victoria almost flatline.

On Saturday we headed into the bush, taking the train to Katoomba and the Blue Mountains, which are not particularly blue or mountainous. At Scenic World, a tourist trap in the Jamison Valley with cable cars and the world's steepest railway, we were able to view the mountain's most famous rock formation. The Three Sisters (Kat, Zoe and Little Mo) are hardly breathtaking but are important in Aboriginal legend. I'll come and tuck you in and tell you about it...what's with the Postman Pat jim jams?

The story, which sounds like a Welsh soap opera, tells of three sisters (suprisingly) who lived in the valley and were in love with three chaps from the neighbouring tribe. Forbidden to go to the cinema with women from outside of their own community, the young men decided to declare war on the people of the valley. The local 'Clever Man' wanted to protect the three sisters from being taken, so he decided to turn them into stone, which also cured thier gall bladder problems, but died in the ensuing battle before he had change to change them back (clearly not so clever then). Modern day attempts to bring them back to life using the smell of mashed egg sandwiches in a sun-baked rucksack were unsuccessful.

It is always nice to see different sides of a country, but if we wanted to be packed into tight spaces with Japanese people we should have just spent the day riding the Tokyo subway.

Sydney is obviously gearing up for the second most important birthday after Victoria's. Before the city had time to get excited about the birth of Christ, it had a week of frenzy as perfume salesman and occasional footballer, David Beckham, came to town. Unfortunately joining in the Beckham bonanza, we headed down to watch Sydney FC v Queensland Roar and caught a glimpse of the walking tattoo as the LA Galaxy team were paraded around the pitch at half-time. All of that was forgotten when I bumped into Leo Sayer, literally, on my lunch break at work.

Our unenviable habit of being in places during freak weather sytems continues, with this Summer being Sydney's wettest and stormiest in half a century. When the sun does come out it makes the festive season a strange spectacle; decorations seem out of place and the Aussies appear comfortable seeing santa wearing speedos and exposing his man-boobs.

Luckily, Jesus already wears sandals, so he's pretty set for the typical traveller option of Christmas Day at Bondi Beach. Seeing ourselves as the last bastion of a traditional Christmas, Victoria and I will be cosying up in 'The Sham' for a proper English day of drunken games, afternoon naps and the Vicar of Dibley.

We'll be back for one last festive blog before b*****ing off to India. Until then, you can amuse yourself by looking at the new photos we've added or you could strap a loved one up to a heart monitor and polygraph them whilst they sleep. We'll be enjoying Christmas and trying to avoid looking directly at Santa's nipples.

Have a good one,

Love Victoria and Tom xxx