Hello!

We have reached the end of our time with the campervan in Australia. We return the van tomorrow and have a few days in Sydney before we fly to New Zealand. The time has gone very quickly.

After staying in the Glasshouse Mountains, we made our way to Brisbane where we camped overnight in the (expensive) suburb of Aspley. In the morning we once again had trouble starting the campervan which meant we had to visit a mechanic. This actually turned out to be very convenient as parking in the city was extremely expensive and complicated. The city itself was fantastic. We were particularly impressed with the artificial beach in the city centre and are considering writing to Boris to suggest one for London! After spending the day in Brisbane we drove south for about an hour into the country and camped by the river in Canugra.

The following day we drove to Surfers Paradise where we were surprised to find a large city with many skyscrapers, all of which were luxury apartments. We continued down the Gold Coast and enjoyed an afternoon of body boarding and relaxing on the beach of Coolengatta. This was also our gateway into the state of New South Wales and from here we headed to Byron Bay. In the evening, whilst having a glass of wine, we met Terry, owner of Byron Bay's original surf school, and decided to sign up for a surf lesson the next morning. The weather was not fantastic but the surfing was great fun. Simon took to it like a duck to water and was soon catching some of the bigger waves. Olivia tried her best and, after a couple of nose dives, managed to get the hang of it towards the end of the lesson. That afternoon we headed to Wooli which was very isolated and we found a nice spot to camp. However, because of the incessant rain there was not a lot to do here so the next morning we headed to Coffs Harbour.

We arrived at Coffs in the late afternoon but drove past a scuba shop and decided to sign up for a dive trip the next morning, although Simon did not have the best of times trying on his extremely thick, tight fitting wetsuit. As it turns out, the wetsuit was definitly necessary as the water temperature at the bottom was a lot colder than we were used to. As there has been some considerable flooding on the mainland, the water visibility off Coffs Harbour wasn't fantastic but we were still able to see a large amount of Carpet Sharks and some big Blue Groupers that looked like something out of a cartoon.

After a long drive that took up pretty much all of the next day we finally came to Hunter Valley, wine country. Here, it is fair to say, we had another of our best days. There was glorious sunshine for the first time in a long while as we cruised around the various towns of Hunter Valley stopping for tastings at Wineries, Frommagaries (cheese makers) and Chocolatiers! We ended up buying 5 bottles of wine, 2 smelly cheeses and some chocolate orange and tiramisu flavoured fudge. Simon very generously volunteered to do the driving allowing Olivia to wet her palate on the numerous free cellar door wine tastings and getting happily sozzled as a result!

We have just arrived in Richmond, a suburb of Sydney, where, in order to stay at the local cheap campsite, Olivia had to sign up as a member of the "Richmond Rotary Club". The membership fee was a dizzying $4 and we think we will make the most of it by dining at the club tonight before retiring to the bar later in the evening for a few cleansing ales...