Thursday 4th February 2016

After another lovely nights sleep in Lisa' house, we made the most of our new found luxury, a shower and booked our taxi via Uber to take us to the depot to collect our camper van. The weather was terrible, very England like, grey sky's and raining, not how we imagined starting our road trip.

We reached the depot and booked in with the receptionist. We explained what the police officer had said and she agreed to allow me to drive, which was such a relief. Can't imagine Isla driving the East Coast on her own. We went through a small briefing and then got handed the keys to our new home for a month. We loaded our stuff on board and headed to the nearest shop. We brought a weeks worth of food, loaded it into the cupboards and small fridge on board and headed to our first destination on this long road trip, The Blue Mountains.

The Blue Mountains were about 1 and a half hours drive west from Sydney. The journey was fun, getting used to the car and how the Aussies drive. Basically the same as at home only that the lorries are bigger and faster. We reached The Blue Mountains at about 1600 and paid $30 for our first powered site. The drive was very scenic, vast forests on either side of the road. Looking at the map it immediately showed how long this journey was going to be.

We had a quick cup of tea in our camper which we had now Christened Kylie and walked towards a scenic lookout. The walk was only 5 minutes away from the campsite and the view was very surprising. A massive drop down into a gauge, about 100 meters. The drive did not indicate we were this high up. The view was stunning with a waterfall just below us. We went for a walk into the forest and found a smaller waterfall. As we were taking photos a black Cockatoo flew over us and landed on a tree in front. What a moment. We headed back to Kylie feeling very happy with ourselves and excited for the journey ahead. We cooked dinner on the stove inside the camper and then collapsed the table down to make our bed. What a start to the road trip, so excited about the places we want to visit.

Friday 5th February 2016

First night sleep in Kylie was a good one, we had breakfast and then headed of for the 3hr journey to Hunter Valley which is the first and largest wine region in Australia. Isla did the first stint of driving and then I took over at half way. The scenery was very diverse as we travelled, thick forest to mountains. We took a very scenic route which went through The Blue Mountain nature reserve. The area was absolutely massive. More and more this country drops hints on how big it is. We eventually arrived in a town called Cessnock and did some quick trip advisor searching before choosing a vineyard to sample some wine. We chose one called Echo Hills which was a small family run vineyard rather than a large corporate one. The lovely lady guided us through her 8 different wines, 3 whites, 3 reds and 2 dessert wines. Telling us about them and what food they go with. The tasting was $5 dollars or free if you purchased wine. We obviously purchased some wine, 2 bottles in fact, 1 red and 1 white. We pictured where in our road trip we would crack them open. Probably a lush beach somewhere.

We then drove for an hour out of Cessnock to reach our first free campsite, it was a small area on the river bank near a town called Bulahdelah. It was lovely actually. We cooked a quick dinner and then went to bed listening to the sounds of birds and crickets.