Adieu NSW, G'day Melbourne4.2.10

Checked out of The Outback Lodge and with a fist full of deposit money we made our way to the Manly Travel Centre. We were out of there on the first 12 hour bus to Melbourne.

It only took Maz an hour to lose all the tickets and paperwork. Thank God the Australian's really don't care about such things and let us on the bus and in the hostel anyway. Nothing like keeping us on our toes...

The bus didn't leave until 7pm so we made the most of our remaining 9 hours in New South Wales. This included sitting in cafés writing this very journal and waiting for a bus for an hour and then realising it had stopped running two hours earlier. It is very telling when occasions like these start to make you laugh rather than make you throw every insult in the book at the next unsuspecting bus driver and all the other passengers waiting at the bus stop. Looks like this prolonged holiday is taking effect already. Very 'Zen'.

At 7pm we settled into a very uncomfortable ride, made much easier by the hour of 70s and 80s classics which serenaded us out of Sydney and then the showing of 'The Last Air Bender'. Lines such as 'Where have all the benders gone?', 'When we found out you were a bender we were concerned for you safety' and 'Come on benders!' had us laughing our way to midnight.

The hilarity was soon cut short when we started reversing down the motorway when we missed a turning, when we hit a Wallaby head on which then went flying past Maz's window and when an ominous little alarm kept going off swiftly followed by extreme braking. We honestly expected Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves to come flying to the front of the bus to save the day.

We managed to get about an hour's sleep (20 minutes every 3 or 4 hours) with Amy and Lissie making the most of two seats each whilst Maz rolled around on the floor beneath their feet. Never again.