Sydney is a good location to get out to the iconic Blue Mountains (2 hours train ride) for a couple of days. They feature on the front cover of our Lonely Planet guide book so we thought we ought to go and see them. Well, we went there this morning, and the mist was so thick and white, you could literally not see anything in front of you. It was slient and eerie, with hardly anyone around. But as the day went on, the mist cleared more or less, and the views wer...

After Hunter Valley we drove through Newcastle, a city not dissimilar to the UK Newcastle! It is quite industrial and not the prettiest, but we gave it a bit of time to check it out. We then hit Sydney, which was a good feeling, as it is such an iconic city and it meant we had hit our last stop in Australia before heading to New Zealand. We dropped the car off and got over to Bondi, to stay with Carl's friend Kelly. Bondi has been made famous by Bondi Rescue wh...

We went inland a bit to check out the Hunter Valley Wine region, which is about two hours before Sydney. There was a really pretty scenic drive past lots of vineyards and through the landscape called Mount View, where we caught a nice sunset. x

The next stop was Byron Bay, a young hip surfer beach town, which also has a lighthouse that marks mainland Australia's most Easterly point. We stayed there one night and then drove to Nimbin the next day, a town that is like a hangover from the seventies - it hasnt changed since then! it is tiny and full of ageing hippies with flower power and hemp clothing . It relies solely on tourism, bus loads of backpackers everywherevisiting to have a photo taken next to t...

after setting foot on dry land after Moreton Island was to hire a car and then drive down the coast to Sydney, which is roughly 920kms, with stop offs along the way. It had to be done - the first stop was Surfers Paradise. A mini vegas on the beach. The waves are high, and the surfers are a plenty! To get some orientation we went up to the top of the observation deck, which is apparently higher than the Eiffel Tower. It gave great panoramic views of the strip an...