Well, moving onto Sydney, my time went something like this..

16th - The train from Brisbane. It was set to leave at 6.30am. No worries. Half an hour walk to the station in the morning sun, carrying all my gear, nice and sweaty by the time I got to the station. Only to find out we were delayed by an hour. Not so bad I thought, well I have spent quite a few years commuting on the Central Line. 14 hours on the train seemed rather sensible price wise too. But because of all the recent rainfall (drought my arse), the train couldn't travel anywhere near its top speed, so another couple of hours were added to the journey. The journey itself wasn't that inspiring scenery-wise, but I did get to see some wild kanagroos. Hmmm. Eventually made it into Syndey and into the hostel at about 11.30pm. Just in time for sleep.

17th - Up reasonably early! And it was still raining. Ah well, new town to explore, so off for a meander around Darling Harbour, very nice, bit pricey, and a look around the Sydney Wildlife World. Ok, should have expected this, but really just another collection of Australian critters. Although I did get to see some redback and funnelweb spiders, so now I know what to avoid (like I didn't in the first place!). SPent the afternoon with an old buddy from New Zealand, who just happened to be drinking in the YHA round the corner from my hostel. Ok at first, as we had beer, but being backpackers (myself not included here, I still have some cash and a sense of taste) we moved onto goon. 10 dollars get you 4 litres of what cannot be described as cheap wine, as for some reason it contains fish and dairy products. Ok, it gets you drunk, but you're not happy drinking it. Maybe thats why a couple of us went old school and had a game of raps.. All eventually going home with bleeding knuckles. A strange way to finish off my 20's, granted.

18th - Woke up thinking I should do something different for my birthday. So I washed my skants amd had a nap. Got chatting to a nice Irish lass in my dorm who decided we should go out and celebrate the birthday and all that, and well, she did have a job lot of bogof vouchers for the bar under the hostel so I could'nt really say no. Some time in the early hours I realised I probably should have said no while I was blowing chunks, having forgotten to eat anything since breakfast. Another classic birthday out of the way then.

19th - Woke up about 2ish, had some sushi, went back to bed. Woke up about 7ish, had a subway, went back to bed. Probably for the best.

20th - Finally stopped raining!!! So found my way to the Sydney Tower to get the now compulsory panoramic pictures of the city. Then took a walk to the harbour to check out the Opera House and Harbour Bridge. Then abck to the hostel for a nap. I think I'm turning into dad.

21st - More touristy things to do, so spent a few hours checking out the National Maritime Museum (I really am turning into dad!), which was actually one of the better museums I've been in on my travels. Well, the museum was a tad dull, but I did have a jolly wander around a life-sized, fully working replica of HMB Endeavour (Captain Cook's ship), an old destroyer, the HMAS Vampire, and a submarine, the HMAS Onslow. Lots of photos for father there. The back to the hostel to book a couple of trips, and got chatting to the Irish lassy again who seemed to think I should have some jabs before going to Thailand. This got me worried, so made an appointment at the local travel docs, and then just happened to run into another ex-STB emplyee, Danny Coleman (resigned the month after myself), so there was nothing else for it but to go to a bar for the evening ad swap travel stories from the last 6 months (and obviously say how much we both missed the bank...).

22nd - Another 6.30am start (no wonder the bags under my eyes are getting bigger), for a day trip to the Blue Mountains. About an hour outside of Sydney. We passed the olympic park on route, and spent half an hour looking at more wild roos and cockatoos in a nearby national park. Then we hit the mountains for a 3 hour walk to find the Wentworth falls. Check out the photos, amazing place. Our guide also pointed out what the Sydney Funnel Web (world's most poisonous spider) nests look like, which made me a bit paranoid, as they were absolutely everywhere! And apparently it was mating season so if we happened to see one, they would probably be more vicious than usual. I'm glad we didn't see any. We also had a bit of a go at playing digeridoos at lunch, and had another walk in the afternoon out to see more mountains called the tHree Sisters, which were pretty stunning. Oh, and we saw a Lyar bird, very cool.

23rd - Went to the docs. He looked a bit worried when I said I hadn't had any jabs before leaving England. Ended up being inocculated from Typhoid and Hepatitis A, and got Maleria Pills for Thailand. Now theres no excuse not to see the jungle while I'm there! Went to chill out for the afternoon at the hostel, got chatting to an Irish fella who had moved into the dorm, and decided we should find a local bolwing alley. I can't believe he won the first game by 3 points! Still won the next 8 games, and got home sometime around half seven for a quick nap (well bowlings not the same if you're not drinking, right boys?).

24th - Woke up. Had missed another night. Well its a good way of saving money I suppose. Walkded to the aquarium, which I had been told was amazing. Apart from the sharks and big old Sea Turtles, it wasn't. Another quiet afternoon followed by just a couple of beers in the bar with Declan (Irish chap from bowling) and Rachael (new girl in room, English for a change), and highlight of the day... My first Kangaroo Burger! Skippy tastes good.

25th - Did nowt, read Porno by Irvine Welsh, follow up to Trainspotting.

26th - Australia Day! Something to do with all the Europeans getting together a couple of hundred years ago. Whatever. Free music by the harbour (saw a band called Evermore, they were poo), and a bit of a pub crawl with Declan and some of his chums, but it all went a tad wrong while drinking yet more goon (gawd, bring back the white russian days), had to have a macsh*t, and went to bed feeling a bit of a mess.

27th - Just chilled for the day, finished the book, packed my bag ready for Canberra.