G'day.

Byron Bay review. We arrived on the 23rd for Christmas on the beach. Hmmm. Australian weather had other ideas. Not much sun to be honest and sunny days did seem to be accompanied by very strong winds making sitting on the beach very unpleasant being blasted with sand. The surfers seemed to like it.

We had booked some accomodation in a hostel very close to the beach and had to take a dorm as it's very busy at this time of year. All did not go well to start with. Our roomates seemed incapable of conversation and all we really saw of them is when they came in at 4am to wake us up and speculate about whether or not they would puke. The other people in the hostel seemed to be of similar interests. The average age was about 18 and I'm sure it was my grey hair putting everyone off when we found ourselves on the only empty table in a full blown party on our first night.

This is the point at which you consider the wisdom of your decision and then decide to pack up and leave. However, we were fortunately too lazy to go and the following evening we struck lucky. We met Michelle from England, now New Zealand. She was great fun and more our (well, Betty's) age. She introduced us to Jason and Paul (kite surf dudes from Melbourne) and Luc from Belgium and Johannes from Germany. All these guys were a bit older than most of the people around and were great fun (if apallingly attractive). We also met some crazy Ozzy/Italians from Sydney and threw ourselves energetically into quite a boozy Christmas (if you can't beat them..). Our roomates even started speaking to us. Have photos of these people but foolishly sent them home on disc before putting them here, ah well, they may appear at some point.

Good fun, great people, shame about the weather. Had a go at surfing and went purple with hypothermia. I would have caught more waves if the violent shivering had not unsettled me on my board.

Spent a night in Brisbane before jetting off to Sydney which was uneventful. Having a break from the partying sent us to bed early and left us only to wander around in search of cheap food. Very nice hostel at Palace Backpackers.

Off to Sydney on a domestic flight! We so posh.

Take care

love Paul and Betty.