New Years Day, we got to a VERY slow start. Our plan was to pack up and start our road trip in the morning, but well, everyone slept in after the NYE party and even once awake, we were pretty sloth-like while getting ready. Finally, just after 6pm that evening, the great Dutch-Canadian Australian road trip began. Three cars and ten people rolled out of Sydney and headed west. Our modest destination for the night was Katoomba, just 2 hours outside of Sydney. We managed to arrive just as the sun was setting. We hadn't made any reservations, so finding room for 10 people proved to be a bit of a challenge. The hostel we were hoping to stay in was full, as were 3 other motels we popped into in the area - the last of which suggested our best bet might be a family room at the pub. Sure enough, the family motel above the pub had 2 family rooms open that both fit 5 people. Perfect! And hilarious that we were going to be sleeping over the pub!

Katoomba was a pretty little town. We had one drink in our pub and one in a pub down the road before heading to bed. Everything was closing by then because it was a public holiday. So John, Mark, Julia, Shane and I headed to our room in the pub with a double bed, a single bed and one set of bunk beds.

In the morning, we had a huge breakfast at a small cafe on the main road in Katoomba. Then we headed out to see the surrounding Blue Mountains. Just on the edge of town, there are some pretty neat rock formations and we walked to the one called 'The Three Sisters", 3 sharp stoney peaks. Apparently, half of Sydney had the same idea and the lookouts and trails were packed. We also checked out a nice waterfall in town before we decided we had our fill of the crowds and headed out of town. We dropped Julia at the train station on our way out so she could head back to Sydney for some beach time. Since Shane had left first thing in the morning, we were now down to two cars and eight people.

We continued heading west and took a detour in the afternoon to head down a steep, winding road into the Megalong Valley. It was a nice drive through a lush, green forest. We did a really short 600m hike and then had a picnic lunch in the valley.

We spent the rest of the afternoon driving to Forbes, a small town seemingly in the middle of nowhere. You could tell we were getting further from the coast and closer to the outback by how much hotter it became, and also how much drier. The fields were now dried and sandy. We found a cheap motel on the edge of town that had a pool and gave us a huge apartment-style room with a nice kitchen. After a swim to cool down, we cooked a great pasta dinner.

Tuesday morning, we continued our trek, now heading southwest. Due to time restrictions, we decided not to go all the way into full-on Outback, but where we were driving was remote enough to be on the edge of it. We drove some pretty deserted roads to have a lunch break in Young, and on route finally saw our first kangaroo hoping along the road! (Well, it was pretty small, so it was either a young kangaroo or a wallaby). Just outside of Young, we stopped at a winery that made cherry wine and had a peach orchard. I suppose a convoy of 8 can be a bit overwhelming, but the guy at the winery did not seem at all happy to see us. He informed us that they haven`t had fruit to pick in 2 months and weren`t even open. Yet we did talk him into doing a tasting for us, since his sign was still up saying he was open.

We continued as far as Canberra, the capital of Australia, then stopped for the night. Again, we found a great motel with room for 8 and nice kitchens. And a pool - so very necessary with the hot Australian sun cooking us all day. After another refreshing swim, we made a mexican dinner, then headed for some drinks on a patio in town.

Canberra is a very interesting city. According to our history lesson from John, when Australia became a nation independent from England, there was dispute as to whether the capital sould be Sydney or Melbourne. Unable to make a fair decision, they decided to make a capital city geographically between the two, and hence, Canberra was born. Since there was nothing there before, it is a completely manufactured city - very well laid out, but really in the middle of nowhere.

Wednesday morning, we headed to Parliament Hill and toured around inside and out. It has a great location on a hill overlooking the city, but the building itself leaves a bit to be desired. It was built in the 80s so (in my opinion) lacks a bit of history and culture. But who am I to judge, I haven't even been to Canada's capital yet.

Before leaving Canberra, we wandered around the Australian War Memorial for a couple hours, which is a huge museum dedicated to the memory of Australian soldiers. Anything war-related is not usally my thing, but the museum told the story well, had good displays and was well laid out. Everyone was pretty sombre after this tour.

We drove south towards the Snowy Mountains. In Australia, and only in the winter, you can go to "The Snow", it never comes to you! In the summer, the small ski towns are quieter and instead of skiing, hiking trails are abound. We found a spot to stay at a holiday park just outside of Jindabyne, with the 5 Dutchies in a small cabin, and Mark, John and I camping in the tent area. We had another home cooked dinner and walked around Lake Jindabyne at dusk, hoping to see some of the platypus' that live in the area. No luck. We did see some type of swimming animal, though the jury is out as to whether it was an otter, a big rat, or some kind of hairy lizard.

Thursday morning, packed up camp and drove to Kosciuszko National Park, just outside of Jindabyne. This park is home to the best (and only) skiing in Australia (June to October) and Mt. Kosciuszko, the highest peak in Australia at (2228m). In January, the hike to the top of Mt Kosci is a fairly gentle 18km loop through green, grassy valleys with spectacular views of the surrounding Main Range.

Once the crew was done the climb, we hopped into the cars and set out for the coast. The GPS route we followed took us through some fairly empty prairies and avoided any sort of town that might be able to feed us dinner. Finally, around 9pm we rolled into Narooma and found dinner at a local pub. We were all starved! It was a bit overpriced but I swear, chicken fingers and fries has never tasted so good! Unfortunately, because it is still the holiday season here, every hotel, hostel, and campground was booked solid in this smallish town. We found a dorm room about 30km back down the coast in Bermagui and jumped at the chance. We didn't arrive until after 11pm, all 8 of us had to share a dorm room with bunk beds, but man we were happy to have a place to lay our heads that night.

Friday morning we grabbed some breakfast food from the grocery store and headed to the gorgeous beach in Bermagui for a meal by the surf. After eating, we set up on Camel Rock beach to do some sunning and swimming. It was heaven. The beach was spectacular, the sky was a perfect blue and the surf was huge. Swimming here was a lot easier than our Christmas beach spot at Bronte - the beach was much flatter. The waves were giant and it was fun getting knocked around a bit but there was a pretty strong rip current so we didn't stay in too long. The good thing is most public beaches have a swimming area marked between 2 flags that is patrolled by a lifeguard.

Once we had enough sun, we again hit the road. We split from the other car; they wanted more time on the beach and to try a hand at surfing. We headed instead inland a bit to a small conservation area outside of a tiny town called Kangaroo Valley where we would camp for the night. The free campground lines a kangaroo reserve so it is a great place to go to spot kangaroos as well as wombats. After setting up camp, we took a walk to find some wildlife. Again, because it is the holiday season, the normally quiet camp was quite full and louder than usual with big groups and lots of kids running around. Despite this, as the sun started to set, we came upon a giant wombat eating grass along the treeline. He let us get pretty close, taking pictures and inching towards him to see how close we could get. Never having heard much about wombats before, it was great to get so close to one in the wild, kind of like seeing a giant, furry guinea pig. And, once you get a bit too close for his confort, the wombat is surprising fast on his chubby little legs. Fun times.

Once the sun was set, we did see a couple of small kangaroos grazing in the middle of one of the fields. Again, they let us get pretty close before they hopped away. We saw a bunch of wombats throughout the night but the roos kept mostly to themselves. Such a cool place to camp - not only a great place to see the wildlife but the park was nestled in a beautiful rocky valley.

Saturday, we packed up to head back to Sydney. We stopped briefly in Kiama to see a giant rocked formation that causes a big blowhole, but the surf was pretty calm so the water only made a small spray, not a giant geyser. We stopped at the beach in Wollongong for lunch and then took the ocean road back into the city.

We met back up with Julia and since Saturday was her last night in Oz, we treated ourselves to sushi and a night out in the Local pub.

Today, Mark was over the moon excited that both a Lions and Leafs game were being played and he was around to watch them. It is a rainy day in Sydney today so we're keeping pretty close to home. Mark and I will be flying to Brisbane early Tuesday morning to check out the sunshine coast and make it up to the Great Barrier Reef.