Hello from East Coast Australia!!

You'll be pleased to hear that I finally managed to drag myself away from the bright lights of Sydney and have finally managed to get myself on the East Coast of Australia, and it was the best decision I ever made!! It is amazing here, totally amazing!! Every corner offers new beaches, beautiful rainforest walks, steep cliffs, blue/green waters, it really is amazing!

So I started my trip from Sydney (now travelling alone with my friend Sez deciding to stay in Sydney, but don't worry aunties, Ive survived so far and am quite capable of looking after myself.................. watch this space!!), and my first stop was Port Macquirie, a lovely small town about 5 hours North of Sydney. Had a nice few quiet nights here. Visited the local Koala hospital which was great, but whilst I was there I had the most terrifying moment of my life, yes, I ever shed tears!! Those of you who know me, will know that I am TERRIFIED, YES TERRIFIED of spiders!! Sure I saw spiders in Melbourne and Sydney but they were in trees, which is where they should be. Spiders live in trees, we live in houses, we don't climb into their trees, so they shouldn't climb into our houses right!? Its really not that hard to understand. Anyway, so although I was expecting to 'see' spiders up the East Coast, I wasn't expecting to see one on EVERY SINGLE TREE I walked past, really not good!! Anyway, this brings me onto my life-threatening story... I was sitting in the park outside the Koala Hospital engrossed in a good book waiting for koala feeding time and I felt something fall on me, so I looked up (still can't work out why I did that!?) AND THEN looked down, which I really shouldn't have done!! There was a turansula (no idea how you spell this, don't really care either, they're such pointless animals, sure they eat flys, who cares, I don't mind flys!) sitting on my chest! MAN did I scream!!! I screamed as loud as I could and within a split second whipped my top off (don't panic, had my bikini on underneath) and threw it on the floor (still screaming!) and kept screaming till someone came over to me to see if I was alright, actually a few people came over (I was suffering from a mild heart-attack here so it was important for me to attract attention etc), and when one person realised why I was screaming she goes 'well you are in Australia', stupid comment from a stupid girl! Anyway, I won't go on about this but just please beware that there are some big, BIG spiders here and most of them are Man Eaters (reference 'Sara's Experience of East Coast Aus', et al. 2007).

Ive seen lots of beautiful wild parrots in the trees here, some of them are so noisy though and skwark all night! From Port it was onto Coffs Harbour which is somewhere I had heard a lot about and was really keen on visiting, and I wasn't disapointed. Had a lovely time here walking up to Muttonbird Island, surfing at Sawtell and visiting the Big Banana! Went to Coffs Sealife Park where I got kissed by a Sealion and a Dolphin, was great! Lovely place, will definately go back there one day.

From Coffs it was up to Byron Bay which is where I am now! Byron is lovely and the walk up to the Lighthouse is a must (most Eastern part of Australia) but unfortunately Im not getting to see much more of the town because Ive been doing my PADI diving course all week, which has been fantastic!! I finish it tomorrow, assuming I pass my theory exam which is tomorrow afternoon (so fingers crossed please!) and still have 2 dives left to do tomorrow, can't wait! Saw 6 sharks today, about 10 turtles (one being over a meter in length, apx. 80-100 years old!!), a 2.5 meter sting-ray (watch out Steve Irwin, oh no, its too late!), and loads of beautiful fish which swim right next to you and some are quite happy for you to touch and pet them. Its been great fun and Im so pleased that Ive done it. Going to take the underwater camera with me tomorrow so will get the pics uploaded when I can.

Sorry for the delay in getting the latest pics to you, the East Coast doesn't seem to know what 'Uploading' or 'Blogs' are so its been a task!

Anyway, love to you all. Its only 5 days till my best friends join me, can't wait to see you Gaz and Cate, so my next blog will be with those guys!

 Much love, Sara xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx