We have just spent three glorious days staying with George (an old friend of Roger's) and his wife Sue who live in a beautiful house on the side of a hill actually overlooking Sydney harbour, just a few minutes walk from the waterfront in Manly. They were brilliant and very kindly took us out on a spectacular tour of the north surf beaches and the Kuring-gai Chase National Park. On Friday we did the whole tourist thing and caught the ferry from Manly to Central Quay and around the harbour. We walked across the bridge, explored the historic Rocks area, Darling Harbour, Opera House and the Botanic Gardens before returning to Manly to ogle the Life guards and bikini beauties - not good for either of our blood pressures!

Today we picked up our hire car which is a Toyota Camry and drove up to the Blue Mountains which are stunning. We have spent the day walking to various vantage points to take in the incredible vistas dotted with tremendously high waterfalls. The place does really seem to be bathed in a blue haze which comes from the Eucalyptus trees which cover the valleys and mountain sides for as far as you can see.

We are beginning to catch on to the Aussie way of thinking - never use your imagination if you don't need to. When naming places they tend to work on the Roy Walker method of "Say what you see" so if you build a church next to the Bridge you call it "Church by the Bridge". If you come across a beach you call it "Sandy Beach" or if you already have a Sandy Beach you go mad and call the next one "Shelly Beach"! If there is a mountain range which gets snow - "Snowy Mountains" or covered in a blue haze - "Blue Mountains". Get the picture? We have also picked up a few new words - dustmen are called Garbos, toilets are dunnies and the best one is "latte decisions" to explain bureaucratic directives.