Hello world! It looks like it's been a while since I wrote a story about my life in Australia. Well, well… It's just an excuse, but I just didn't have much to say, I'm always working! Of course a lot of stuff has happened since my last post, somewhere in February. I'll give some highlights in this blog. The biggest fact where I'm absolutely proud of, is that September 2013 is my 21st month in Australia!

So okay, back to February… I went back home for 2 weeks. Just 2 weeks, usually the perfect time for a holiday, but not really to visit family and friends again. But Holland is such a small country (compared to Australia), at least I was able to do everything I wanted to do, even though the weather was absolutely crap. Visiting my brother (in Jersey), almost everyone in my family, good friends and the best of all, visiting my old friends who I actually met in Australia! It's funny that they completely understand what I've been doing here, because they experienced the same in here. Even though Holland is my home country, I didn't feel like going back at all. I didn't miss my old life, more like I just found a new life which I enjoy more.

After 2 weeks it was time to go back to Australia. I just got back for 2 days, and I went off to Melbourne again to visiting the Formula 1 GP. Oh man, I don't think I ever experienced the weather in this way: Monday morning in Holland: SNOW at the time I took off, Tuesday evening in Adelaide: HOT, 38 degrees on arrival, Saturday in Melbourne: 12 degrees and all day RAIN. Sunday was about the same temperature, but thank god no rain during the race. But it wasn't enough, the next morning, just when I was heading back to Adelaide (to go to work), I caught the flu. I was supposed to go to work directly from the airport, but I went home to my bed.

During the next 2 weeks I didn't do much besides working during the day, but it was hard to get back to the fact that I couldn't make any future plans soon in travelling yet. Adelaide was still too new to me, too much 'city life', not much to see as a backpacker… So during the Eastern weekend, I went to the Flinders Ranges, to get out of Adelaide for a day. The Flinders Ranges National Park is about 4-5 hours driving from Adelaide. I calculated it completely wrong, I thought it was less than 3 hours, and I planned for one day only. Well ok, no biggy… If it was necessary, I can always sleep in the car as usual with travelling J I've seen plenty of things over there: beautiful landscapes, many many many kangaroo's everywhere, emu's sprinting around on the highway. Just when I was on my way back to Adelaide, I realised that I drive 900km already (and still had 400km to go!). And then it happened: just in a few seconds, engine overheated and it was broken… I got stuck in the desert again, no idea what to do! Thanks to a few people who stopped to help me, I was able to call the RAA (like the ANWB), they made me a member and send a mechanic to me. After half an hour, when he arrived, within a few seconds he already nodded: I'm sorry, your car is very sick. Fixing it would cost a lot of money which I didn't have (I was really broke!), so I was forced to keep my car over there, untouched. The guy helped me by taking me to a small motel in Hawker to spend the night (it was late in the evening already), and advised me to lift with someone back to Adelaide the next morning (since there were no busses going during Eastern). When I checked in the motel, in the small town with a population of 230 people, it hit me pretty hard: the very car I used to spend my best time of my life in Australia, is just gone! Moments later, after having a chat with a few locals over there, another fact just hit me: Hawker is the very town where they filmed Wolf Creek and Wolf Creek 2!! Good god I didn't want to get killed over there! Haha just kidding, it was pretty cool to be there! The next morning, the mechanic told me I can keep my car for a time in his backyard, as long as I let him know what I'm gonna do with it… Well, even till today, my car is still there… I'm going to sell it to him for a small amount, at least so I get rid of it. After a few hours waiting at the gas station in Hawker, I found a couple who were on their way to Adelaide, so they gave me a ride back home. When I told my colleagues about this the next day, they couldn't believe what I have done lol. I think that was also the day I was known as the crazy Dutch guy in the production room J. Since almost all of them are Australian, who don't travel the way I do.

Basically the 3 months after the car breakdown, I haven't done mayor things besides working, for both e3Learning and my own freelance work. Mostly because I wanted to save as quickly as possible some cash for a new car. Without a car, there's not much to do around here! Almost the whole month April, I was still living in my apartment like camping: sleeping on an air mattress. At the end of the month, I finally saved enough to at least buy a bed and a sofa. In May I invited my colleagues for a housewarming, to 'celebrate' that I was really no longer a backpacker: I finally had my own apartment, own bed and no car.

At the beginning of July, I felt jealous that 2 colleagues of mine were looking around for a new car. So, I went around to look for one as well! And after a week searching, I found one. The car, the Holden Commodore, is almost a copy of my old car, just younger, lower KM's on the counter and more features. In 3 months' time I saved enough to buy it, so I did! I was really happy to have a car again! Finally being able to get out of the city once in a while (but not the Flinders Ranges yet!!).

Since that day I took off every weekend to somewhere around the city. I climbed Mount Lofty (712m) a couple of times, drove and walked a couple of times through the Adelaide Hills, drove to Port Elliot to go whale watching (and yes, I've seen 4 of them together), and visited some other places I wasn't aware of before. I was also very happy to go shopping at any moment without spending hours in public transport.

Anyways, It's my 9th month in Adelaide now. I'm enjoying my work here very much. It may not always be challenging, but it's completely stress free and at least I can help the team by innovating to a higher level. Work is also happy with me, so I'm planning to stay for a while longer now. Summer is on its way, I'll find some new things to do here the next few months (beach, bbq's, weekends out!). But there will be a time that I will travel again.