Tuesday

Got up in time for free toast for breakfast for the first time, and in plenty time for a free ride to the airport - kindly the lady from the hostel is driving us over there (amusingly she said all the French boys had been talking about whether Nik was a UFC fighter hehe - famous much!). However, this did mean that we got to the airport super early, although Nik likes this. Another girl from our hostel also got a ride with us. She was very nice and had a shocking Trisha type story about her fiance cheating on her and how she'd just decided not to go home as a result. Honestly, the more of the story we heard the worse it got. Also, she had a knee reconstruction 9 months ago or something after she broke her knee on the auditions for total wipeout - another excellent story for passing the time in the check-in queue.

In good news, the box we sent home has done the trick, as Nik's bag weighed in at about 15kg, and Hannah's was under 12kg - no wonder our bags were no longer trying to kill us!

Hung around the airport for a bit. We had coffees and Hannah won a free mini pie with her next hot drink purchase - awesome. Hannah also bought a treat - a pen for each of us. It sounds lame but we have been using the same pencil for 3 months and wanted something inky for our puzzle book and forthcoming list making.

Got a Tiger Airways flight. It wasn't too bad. We were right up the front and had two sources of endless enjoyment. Firstly, the air hostesses who were hilarious. They were just having a right old day out and a chinwag the whole time talking about weddings and parties and shopping - literally one of them stopped mid sentence to make an announcement, and then carried on the gossip the moment she finished. The other source of fun was idiot people's inability to find the toilet. Ok, so you're on a tiny budget plane, the sign is at the front of the plane showing where the toilet is along with a door marked 'lavatory', and the only other things that are there are the door to the plane that you came through, and the pilot/hold, marked as no admittance - how is it possible to not find the loo?! One person getting confused, maybe I would understand, but we're talking A LOT of people here. And not even people that didn't speak English. Seriously, one dude spent ages trying to pull the door to the staff area open, and one woman actually went to the exit door (marked as such) and looked outside for it! We were worried we might die in the air when she seemed to be considering opening the door, but luckily she then asked someone.

Anyway, got to Sydney pretty stress free, although it was a bit bumpy on the way down and made Hannah feel queasy. Got bags, still intact (a miracle) and Nik met an old lady at the carousel after some man full on sneezed on her.

Bumped into Beth from the hostel outside the airport, and decided to split a cab into town (the train is $15 so it would be cheaper as there is 3 of us - bonus) which allowed us further stress-less journey as we got dropped right at our backpackers.

It's a pretty old school style backpackers, lots of long carpeted corridors, a rabbit warren layout, and small communal facilities, but it is a cheap double room and nice and clean. It is also near the 7-11 which is always handy, and hey, we're only here for one night. It is also under 5 minutes walk to the train station in the morning which was the whole purpose of the location - score! (you can never take a hostel's word for how great their location is until you see for yourself)

Had a cold drink and some chocolate (Hannah needed restoring due to post in flight air pressure nausea) and while we were sat on the deck of the hostel, we saw a giant spider come down the side of the building, lowering its enormous, sinister looking body down like it was abseiling. Shudder. Nik claims it might be a funnel web and went to shut our room window.

After we recovered, we then popped down to the railway station to get details for our train tomorrow. We are very much looking forward to our trip to the mountains, not least because it looks like its going to be lovely and sunny. Afterwards, we came back to read the guide books for Sydney, and with a better idea of scale, decide what we plan to do for the week we are back here. Nik also needed a little rest as he had belly ache (possibly due to the giant bag of chilli nuts consumed on the plane, but this is not proven).

In the evening, we went to Domino's pizza (about 4 doors up from the hostel) as it is cheap Tuesday and the large pizzas were about $5 each, so we came back and munched through those (leading to much bloating afterwards) and watched a True Blood, the first one we've seen in ages. A nice stress free day despite the travel element - well done to Nik for not going demonic at any stage during travel today (and only having one small rage moment when he read the map wrong and went up 3 flights of stairs in the wrong building at the hostel…).

Whilst relaxing in our room during the evening, we particularly enjoyed the sound of some bogan woman screaming her head off at someone in the street. For around 30 minutes without stopping. Nik had a good look.

Wednesday

Attempted to have breakfast at the hostel, but the 'breakfast included' was actually just dry toast and black tea, so we opted out. Trotted along to the central station which took just a few minutes, and with our new light bags was tooo easy. Within five minutes we also had our bus and train tickets - so efficient with service when its people, just the machines here that are really backwards. Got refreshments and got on the train with no fuss whatsoever - amazing. The trains here are pretty good actually, due to having no history they are able to have double decker trains, which is clever. They also have adjustable seats so you can either be facing someone or have them in a seat behind you. The seats were also fairly comfortable.

Journey was good, a high point being the ridiculous place names en route, and we passed the time playing with our new pens and the puzzle book until we got towards the mountains which entertained us with its amazing scenery for the last stretch.

Arrived at Katoomba and while we were getting our bags together, Nik dropped one of his crutches on Hannah's thumb and it hurt like hitting it with a hammer - the force of the blow transferred Hannah's nail polish onto the crutch. In the hoo-ha, seeing that we had many bags and crutches, a really nice man offered to drive us to our accommodation, but we are staying in a pub that is literally next to the station so there was no need.

Stumbled about 30 seconds to the pub, which is owned by an Australian actor called Jack Thompson (we don't know who he is but apparently he was in Star Wars?), and after some confusion by the overworked and tired looking staff, checked into our room. The pub is a beautiful old deco building that they have been restoring and looks great outside, with some beautiful features inside too. Being an old building though, it is cold in the wintertime, although with the heating on our room was toasty. We also exploited the tea and coffee room for some free rejuvenating beverages.

Next up, we took a walk around Katoomba which is a cool little town and stunning to be in on a sunny and hot day. Its funny that this is the tourist heart of the Blue Mountains, yet it is tiny! There are lots of lovely old style buildings here, and the main business seems to be vintage shops and antiques or serving amazing coffees. We had a good poke around in all the shops before stopping for a hot beverage and watching the world go by. Hannah had an excellent Chai Latte and Nik was jealous. However, we then got the hunger on, so figured that as we haven't long left here, that we better sample the Aussie staple of a pie. From a lovely patisserie, Hannah had a chicken and vegetable and Nik had a beef and mushroom, and both were excellent.

After that, we were a bit stumped as to what to do, but as we have three day tour bus passes as part of our train tickets, we decided to hop on over to a local attraction for a bit and see some mountain. We went to Echo Point and saw the Three Sisters, three big rocks that legend has it were girls that were turned into stone to protect them from some naughty boys, but the wizard man died before he changed them back. The views were excellent and fairly blue, although apparently not half as blue as in the summer because there is more eucalyptus in the air then (that is what makes the mountains appear in a blue haze). We had a good walk about and took lots of photos (Nik had been having withdrawal) and heard nature and birds for the first time in ages - been too long since we've experienced any proper Australia!

We then took the bus back, which gave us a good overview of the area, and leisurely prepared for an evening in the pub. Hannah trimmed her fringe (had to buy new scissors as my other blunt ones had to be disposed of at the airport due to some bad packing choices), it came out a bit too short, and Nik went to experience the shower. The shower turned out to not have any hot water in it, but Nik showered anyway and as a result had chattering teeth for about half an hour. Hannah used the ladies shower, which had some hot water after running for five minutes, but the floor was so cold that her feet went dead.

Went for dinner in the pub as they have two for one specials, although it was a bit of a shambles as of their 40 wines on the list, they had five, and the fryer was broken so much of the menu was off limits. However, Nik had chorizo sausage and mash with bushman chutney and Hannah had a lentil curry with poppadoms and raita and we both had a Jack Thompson Shiraz (the man is a brand!). The food came and was delicious, but the barmaid had stuffed up our order so two chorizos came and we had been charged for them both. However, we got our money back on one of them, and Nik ate one of the spare sausages anyway, so it all ended extra well. We then went for a glass of wine in the main bar (lamentably the fire wasn't on) and relaxed before retiring for the evening - it was an excellent way to while away the last few hours of the day as it was howling a gale and pouring with rain outside.