Australia: Living the dream in 2006
Email Date: 28th Jan 2006
Subject: Ding Dang Do
Leading into 2006 we had our first hot Christmas and New Year and boy was it hot! Although we missed out on roast turkey we settled for a fried breakfast to ease our deadly Coogee Bay Hotel hangovers. NYD in Sydney reached a scorching 44 degrees (second warmest day in Sydney ever recorded)- fortunately it was dry heat but opening our flat door was like opening the door to a pre-heated oven; so this Christmas we felt we were the turkey's being roasted, cluck cluuuuuuuck!
Well, it's been a while since my last update but to be honest who wants to know about our settled lives down under - it's never going to be as exciting as the day to day adventures we've had around Australasia....well that's where you're wrong! Eastern Australia bodes an abundance of activities and adventures - all of which come for free, well almost!
But lets start with sport, a huge reason for us moving out here (I think?).
Admittedly the intensity of playing competitive sport had diminished but Kim
came to our rescue - she'd seen adverts for a triathlon competition in
Noosa, Queensland - so we went for it and why not!! This is the world's
second largest triathlon and was held in early November, consisting of the
olympic standard distances of 1.5km swim (in the sea!!), 40km bike ride and
10km run to finish off. Don't worry there wasn't even an incling that we'd
do this individualy! Luckily you could enter a team (mens, womens or
mixed!)...so we entered 3 mixed teams of our own - Magic Roundabouts (me,
Graham and lady V), The Crusaders (Meaghan, Kim and Barry) and Happy
Birthday (Anne, and Dan). So we now faced a physical challenge three months
down the line to get ourselves into true Aussie shape and hopefully not
disgrace ourselves. Of course two months down the line me and V had only run
for a bus and paddled in the sea so this only gave ourselves a 4 week time
frame to kick start our training....and boy did we struggle!!
With an empty 4 week calender mapped out on our fridge we noted down each day's training - it was lame to be begin with but gradually we were penning in solid daily workouts. I forgot to say there were no squabbles as to who was doing what leg. Me being named after a tropical fish and mum being a swimming teacher I knew I was born to do the swimming leg - you ripper! Training, for me, consisted of heading down to the olympic size swimming pool in Woolloomooloo (spelt sheep toilet cow toilet isn't it Clive!) at lunchtimes with only a 10 minute stroll through the Domain from work. It was perfect - well getting there was until I actually had to swim! Supposedly decending from a fish I certainly did not take to the waters (salty) too well - the first three visits were painful and consisted of me regularly being overtaken - this had never happened to me before - I was distraught - but with a few tips from mother fish and more training I was racing up and down the lanes...although still being overtaken! By the end of the fourth week I was ready for the 1.5km race in the sea around an island with another 1,000 swimmers - I'd decided that it was going to be more of a race for survival than for time! Lady V had also crammed in some good training, although from what she told me it consisted of running down to some rocks in Coogee, sitting down for 10 minutes and running back - taking a total time of 30 minutes, making it a 20 minute run - she believed in saving herself for the big day, good on ya!!
With all 3 teams prepared, body feeling the best it's felt since the day I fell in love with alcohol (joke!..sort of...), we flew up to Noosa where we had accommodation booked on the sunshine coast - it was a place we visited on our travels so was great to return. We had two days to settle in and prepare. We (well just me and Dan) had quite a few on the first night, starting at the surf club and finishing off on the beach downing half the slab of xxxx me and Dan bought from the bottle shop [see pic: thats.gold.jpg] - as a rule (well mine) whenever you're in Queensland you have to drink the Gold stuff. It's like drinking Gold p*ss water, beautiful maaaate!! Anyway this wasn't the best prep for the big day but we had Sat to recover and register.
The big day was an early start - not happy with that. I'd not seen the wrong
side of 7.30 am for quite some time (only when I've rolled in from a 24 hour
pub!). The day was an absolute buzz. With over 7,000 competitors, everyone
was pumped, including the Guppy fish and lady Cat (new knickname for lady
V). I'd done a cheeky swim around 3/4 of the course the day before which
proved vital for the race - although I was aching the next day. With all the
swimmers going off in their allocated categories, we were all lucky to see
the elite (men & women) swim the course - amazing. Emma Snowsill, the
women's world number 1 triathlete was leaps ahead of her field. She ran out
of the water with ease (it's a dizzy experience when you've been horizontal
for a while and stand up quickly!!) - what an athlete. By 7.45am it was the
mixed team's turn - in fact myself and Anne nearly missed the start (I think
Meaghan didn't tell us so she could get a head start, ha ha!) - we were busy
warming up!....with a thousand odd bodies swimming for space the first 10
minutes were swim for your life dodging flying arms and legs but also to be
fast enough to avoid someone swimming over the top of you (yes it does
happen!!). The last 10 minutes of the course consisted of a straight swim
against the stream - I manged to pick a good racing line to the side of the
splashing field and had a clear run home - I raced out of the water through
the supporting crowd in my newly purchased speedos (yes I've returned to the
old favourites), although I don't think the crowd appreciated my koala ears
(if you know what I mean, ha ha, sorry had to get that line in) and tagged
Graham for his cycle leg. My time was 26m 37sec - I'd slashed my P.B by 3
minutes - so job well done - the fastest time was 18m 10s - ouch - but the
main thing was I'd beaten Meaghan and Anne (two Aussies) so another notch on
the British sporting victory against the world and the Aussies campaign -
you beauty!!!...[sorry I'm not attaching photos of me in my speedos, there'd
have to be a serious health warning to apply!].
Graham turned out to be a whizz on the bike and lady V ran a solid 50 minutes to complete a team time of 2hr 31m, beating the Crusaders and Happy Birthday and finishing 83 out of 190 mixed teams. Because of an early start to the triathlon we had the bulk of the day to enjoy - well get drunk and undo our months training in one night - superb! Heading back to our flats we had a sleep, bite to eat, a few beers and hit Noosa town. Being small there weren't too many options, but we ended up at the surf club - it was rockin'. Everyone was still charged from their triathlon day and the rock band were churning out some bangin' Aussie tunes. Apparently there wasn't a minute I didn't have a beer in my hand except for when I picked up lady cat near the end of the night - nearly dropping her from a great height, the bouncer was right behind us and was a little confused but a smile and a shake of hands from me and we were rock and rollin' again - boy what a great night!
The whole w/e was one to remember and the craving to do more triathlons was huge, but don't worry that's fizzled out now, although there's talk of doing one at Byron Bay this May! The highlight of the w/e though was Dan telling us he'd taken a short cut on his 10km run to finish it in an olympic time of 32m 14s - it meant he came second out of ALL the competitors - the organisers were probably scratching their heads wondering who this Dan was - think he even got a few sponsorship phone calls the next day!!......
Continuning along the lines of sport, cricket as well as tennis has topped the list. As you may have been getting some photos of me with old and new Australian cricketers don't be too concerned - it's all for a good cause! Obviously since England took the ashes last English summer (apparently you had one!) the furor of our victory still continued over here in Aus (well I made sure of it!). Working at the State Library has been a great insight into the Aussie sporting mentality - they love AFL, RFL, RFU (and football since gaining World cup qualification) but most of all love cricket and rightly so! They've dominated the cricket world just like the West Indies did in the 80's and early 90's so no wonder they love the game...but to stop all this cricket-mania, along came Dougal 'freddie' Down Under to make the Aussies remember how good a result it was for England to win - and what better way to do it but to tell it to the Aussie players themselves - McGrath, Slater (abrupt retirement) and Ponting (current captain)....even though I think this has had an adverse affect - ever since they wopped the world XI (which we saw one day of!), the Kiwi's, Sri Lanka and now South Africa! I'm hoping this'll fizzle out by Dec 2006 when England fly here to defend the ashes!....
The World XI match was soon after the ashes so with Flintoff, Harmison and
Pieterson included in the one day international (ODI) and the six day test
match there was plenty of excitement in Australia! The match was at the
Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) just a bus ride away from our flat - we'd
already seen AFL there and enjoyed the Swans' victory parade at the ground
so it was good to finally see some cricket! What an experience. Paul and
Julie had sorted out tickets so we were sat with them near the members
section (plus two friends called Wayne and Dwayne, ha ha good Aussie
names!). Freddie and Harmison opened the days bowling and destructed the
Aussie tail enders within the first hour - boy it was great to see them in
action - I can't wait till Christmas 2006!!...anyway the day wore on, the
beers were flowing al round the SCG but the barmy army end of the SCG was
mayhem! We had friends that side and said there fights braking out, beer
being thrown and a barrage of abuse being thrown all afternoon! The support
was more like football hooligans drinking strong beer all day - disastrous!
In fact apparently now since more crows incidents during the New Zealand and
Sri Lankan games weaker beer is to be served and beer taps turned off at
3pm!...damn! Anyway Australia batting did crumble but not as bad as the
World XI. Brian Lara looked like he was going to score a fine total but the
third umpire put a stop to that! This test was allocated 6 days to play but
only half the time was needed for Australia to wop the star opponents ar*es
- not good because this gave the Aussies an opportunity to forget about the
ashes loss and gloat about being world number one for this reason...well
they're probably right...damn I didn't mean to write that!
Tennis has been going VERY well. The Wackers has proved to be an absolute gem of a find. Playing every Wednesday, night Tony (Wine barrel on legs) pairs us up with various other nicknamed wackers (as I said before in my previous email update my nickname is Mr.Yuppie). I've had some great battles against fellow wackers and myself and Paul (Davis Cup) are yet to lose overall. I have a close rivalry with Nick (Man Mountain) - he's 6ft 4" and has a temper like Mike Tyson - before every game he says he wants POMMY blood and he explodes around the court, but he's yet to have a big victory against me! Sam (Short Black) conjures up delightful Italian delicatessan's after the tennis whilst we endure a night filled with drink around a few tables and broken plastic chairs (mainly broken by Wine barrel on legs, ha ha!). So far there have been two doubles and singles tournament's organised and I've won them all. There has been some tough competition but I played my best game against a Russian coach (Sergi van coachalot) and clawed back from 5-1 to take it 7-6 - c'moooooon!!!
We celebrated Oktoberfest (something I've never celebrated before in the UK) where a "German consulate" supplied German beverages and Sam cooked up Bavarian suasges and sour kraut! [see pic" Oktoberfest.1 and Oktoberfest.2] To end the year the Wackers had a Christmas party which myself and V couldn't make till later (went to see Oasis in concert, mad fer it!) but when we did turn up it was a great night! Eddie supplied us with drink instantly at the bar we got amongst it! Tony had organised an award ceremony earlier in the night and I was handed a golden wacker award! There were quite a few categories which fellow wackers won, which included best forehand, best backhand, worst dressed, loudest grunt etc etc - I think I'd been nominated for quite a few (probably including worst dressed, ha ha, although not now since I've been bought new tennis gear for Christmas!). Tony came up with the new Golden Wacker award for me so I didn't sweep the board - the certtificate site pride of place on our glass shelves along with Larrisa...but she's another story!
Just last week me and V (plus a few wackers) managed to catch a day's tennis
at the Medibank International, pre-Australian Open competition. It was at
Olympic Park, which was our first trip to Homebush. It was like a ghost
town. The village was purposly built for the Olympics (er obviously!) but
to me it looked like lots of money had been spent building these complexes
but were not being utilised as much as they intended it to
be...mmm...perhaps our 2012 Olympic victory could create a sporting complex
ghost town in Stratford, but hey nobody goes there anyway, well unless
you've bought an over priced house to live in hell till the area
regenerates, ha ha, the things we do get on the property ladder hey! Anyway
I saw some strong tennis! Igor Andreev versus Tusonov (who beat Henman at
Wimbledon last year). Boy can these boys hit the ball! Andreev went on to
win, being the strongest player and actually went on to lose to James Blake
in the final! We also saw Justine Henine-Hardinne win and actually went on
to win the tournament (have tipped her to win the Aus Open). The highlight
of the day was to see the Aussie man himself - Lleyton Hewitt! C'mon! He
lost in three. It seems since being a father and having a new coach the lad
looked lost out there in the second and third set....it's good to see
Austrlalia have the same problem as the UK - lack of top flight tennis
players to follow, and in fact Lleyton has now been knocked out of the Aus
Open (second round)...I won't mention Tim Henman or Andrew Murray.
Well now I can finally sweep sport aside and tell you about our "life's a beach" (mostly on Coogee) down under. With race riots at Cronulla, Maroubra (and somewhere else) hitting the news worldwide the beaches were abruptly patrolled by police for a few days. They had blockades up to check all cars coming into all eastern Aus beaches from Newcastle down to Cronulla - it was the governments way of stampeding what little violence there was...and it worked. Now if the Aussies thought these were riots then they should have a night out in Essex on Saturday night - they'd be blocking off the M25 and checking every car into and out of Essex - hey that's not a bad idea!!
Being five minutes walk to the beach is heaven. The more time we spend there the more we love it. As Summer kicks in so do the backpackers but it gives the place a good holiday vibe - especially at the Coogee Bay Hotel - the main drinking hole! With a big concrete beer garden the locals (very few), travellers and the like spend their monopoly dollars on ice cold schooners of aussie beer - fantastic - oh and so do we and any of our visitors who come to see us, wahooo!!
As I said in my last email, it is very easy to do as little or as much as you want but the difference being to London is it's bl**dy easy - so we've done a lot! We hit two concerts in one week in November. First being Oasis at Horden Pavillion (just mentioned) and second being Jamiroquai (JK) at Centennial Park (outdoor event) - both were superb! Oasis were bangin'. We hooked up with John and Charmaine and sweated the night out, locked in by the jumping crowds. In fact Liam abused most of the crowd (no change there) but with a quality new album just released they had some great tunes to pump out. Obviously "wonderwall" and a few of other classics made the night, reminding us of the UK and especially Manchester. (I managed to film the whole of wonderwall but it's a bit big to attach to this email - it almost sounds as good as my rendition on the guitar!).
We hooked up with Kim to enjoy the JK gig [see photo: JK1 and JK2. He played outside aqnd had a few pre-warm up DJ acts on before - it was like a mini festival - once again he had a fab album out to back his tour (Dynamite). He was diving all round the stage in his spiked hat, but there enough space to dance. There were quite of few JK wannabe's in the crowd were immitating his dance moves..very badly! The festival ended quite late but we walked through Centennial park at night. There were loads of bats which was great to see (in fact can see hundres of bats around the harbour bridge, amazing). With a cheeky beer we headed home....a 15 minute bus ride, boy it's so cheap and easy to get around!
We paid a visit to Hunter Valley, north west Sydney, the land of Australian
Wineries, with lady V's parents. With a last minute booking by Father and
Mother Smith they flew over from the UK to stay with us for 12 days or so.
We booked a cottage in Hunter Valley and was perfect [see photo HV.1.jpg].
Arriving via a hired car we checked into our small house built on the
grounds of the owners vineyard (the owner who checked us in was stinking of
booze but hey wouldn't you if owned a vineyard!?). With a swimming pool, gas
bbq and wine in the fridge (had to pay for) and pre-bought bbq food we were
set up for a few days worth of wetting the pallets with fine wines, all
absorbed by consecutive bbq food - heaven! There was an option to cycle
between vineyards but firstly not being there before, secondly wanting to
"taste" as much as possible and not end up like all the dead fauna, we opted
for a bus tour (driving was obviously not an option either!). Australia
produces some of the finest wines in the world but only exports a fraction
(just like Essex!...speaking of Essex a cheese and pickle shop was selling
organic tomato ketchup made in Essex - small world hey!) - Rosemount and
Jacobs Creek (being the most popular) but the day we had tasting wine
certainly taught me a few wine tricks! Verdello, largely drank by the
Portuguese is in full distribution in and around Australia. The vineyards
were all saying that this will soon out sell Chardonnay (being the most
popular wine in the world)...it'll be the most popular here, especially
since I've been ordering the stuff by the case load since joining Lucy's run
cellar door wine club in the Hunter Valley! We came away with superior grape
knowledge but also ex-commander yoda Smith (lady V's dad) learnt how to
clean and strip down a bbq hot plate with beer and me introducing the
delicattessan - bbq'd baked beans with fried onions [see pic
HV.2.jpg].....eating and drinking the dream!!
Lady V's parents were with us for nearly 2 weeks and went very quickly. Once a few more verdellos were drunk, more early body surfing done by Clive and more weather preditions made by Barometer (Lynda!!) - oh and had the pleasure of doing a State Library tour (that's gold!) their trip was over and didn't want to leave...but they had to because Dave and Brindha were flying out to spend the whole of December with us and had to vacate our spare room!!
We booked a nice long weekend away with Dave and Brindha but this time we headed down the south coast to Gerroa! With me taking a risk in finding a suitable spot the pressure was on! Luckily with a little advice I was told Gerroa had a fantastic seven mile beach boding estuaries to canoe along, bushland to walk through and more importantly vineyards to visit! With a hired car we took just over 3 hours to get there! Even the drive down was another eye opener to Australia's fantastic coastline! After seeing much of Queensland it was good to pay a little attention to New South Wales (NSW)! The house I'd booked was big and made of timber only! We had to pick the keys up from a local store. The house was built on a steep hill so parking was a bit tough in the driveway (later found out there were instructions on how to park but only read this once we were ready to leave...nice one!). Inside the house it was a little tired and dark but had all the amenities to keep clean and fed, although me and V had to sleep in a bunkbed, ha ha!
It was a perfect break. For me and V it was a holiday and for Dave & Brind it was a holiday within a holiday! The seven mile beach was spectacular [see pic: seven.mile.jpg (view from balcony)]. Being quite large it was exposed to the wind but this didn't stop us. The beach was very quiet, much to the surprise of Dave & Brind - after seeing the eastern surburban beaches (Bondi down to Coogee) they were expecting crowds of people....but Australia being so big with so many coastal beaches this was near enough empty. With lots of beach walking, running and body surfing we made full use of it for the three nights we were there. We drove around surrounding villages, in fact we drove to Kangeroo Valley in search of live hopping kangeroos but to no avail! (I later found out they didn't really live around there....why on earth would you call it Kangeroo Valley then...think this was a ploy to fool us POMS, grrrr!!!!!)
We were attacked by Christmas beatles the first two nights when we fired up the bbq @ dusk. In fact they came out in mass!! Being so heavy their wings couldn't cope and flew without any conviction! They just crashed into everything!...the problem was our first meal time, ha ha. Dave was on operation beetle bashing!...we made the mistake of leaving our lounge door open when we were cooking, so loads of them clumsily crash landed in. When we got the food out on the dining table it was BEETLE-MANIA! With over twenty beetle's dead we were ready to sit down for our dinner, unbelievable!!....With 6 bottles of newly purchased wine from the seven mile vineyard and plenty of beer to drink, our nights were spent drunk, playing games including.....scrabble and cards coupled with a few heated debates on...well that I can't remember!
Dave & Brindha headed up north to Queensland for over a week and by the time
they returned it was nearly Christmas time, wahoo jingle bells! In the mean time
we caught up with Sylwia and Cam who were passing through Syndey on a brief
around parts of Aus. We met up for Sywlia's sisters birthday (Ewa) for a fab
meal @ Nick's along Darling Harbour another great harbour in Sydney! Cam
mentioned my previous epic emails and said how much he'd enjoyed 'em so this
ones for you mate!....we heeaded back to Ewa's plush flat near
town, ate some tasty cake and Sylwia fell asleep!...
I also had my State Library Christmas party to get over and done with before D&B returned. Just on cue, in flew Loggins. Staying with us for a few nights he timed his brief trip just right and was lucky enough to join me at the State Library Christmas party, ha ha - wow what a night!! It was held on the Mitchell building roof with an Australian Idol competition - boy was this...er..entertaining?! ha ha. Loggins will not forget this night for a long time to come! With acts consisting of Kath and Kim, poetry reading and singing. Whilst Kath and Kim was quite amusing the poetry reading and singing wasn't. I've never seen anyone sing a rock song consisting of four lines have to continually refer to the lyrics they'd written down and as for the poetry - it was poetry not in motion...err yeh! Next Christmas party, (if I'm still at the library or even in Aus) I'll be entering the Aus idol comp to do 10 minutes of drinking flammin sambuca's and doing my legendary body popping at the same time - the panel will be sure to vote me the act of the night - I think that tells you how bad the competition was! Anyway after lots of drink, dancing with old polish librarians and continually being harassed by a fruit bat (don't ask) we left at 11pm (shows the night wasn't that bad..I suppose!) to show Loggins the delights of the Coogee Bay Hotel. I think it was a refreshing change of venue for the lad! With a huge beer garden out the front it bodes a dark school hall esque dance room, where we remained till the early hours. With a cheeky kebab to end the night we stumbled home singing for England (well I was)....
As Loggins left for New Zealand to milk some cows for Christmas and New Year and
being told to keep away from Coogee beach by the life savers due to race riots,
bluebottles and torrential thunder storms so did Dave and Brindha arrive
back from their Queensland travels - good timing! With a few nights out to
warm ourselves up we decided to have a huge one on Christmas Eve.
Heading down to Coogee Bay Hotel (yes again) it was almost our last! [see pic: xmas.girls].
Sitting in the beer garden we were joined by a dude from Cronulla -
he entertained us with his quick witted humour for an hour (ha ha, joke!).
By 11pm myself and V were escorted out by a bouncer (for having a water fight - I mean c'mon!)
Dave was left on his own for over an hour on his own. The gilrs decided
to stumble home but I sneaked back in to find Dave where we remained for another
3 hours, listening to a live band sing..."wonderwall" and other Manchester tunes....you
little ripper!....
After stumbling home in the early hours of Christmas Day we had four hours sleep so we could do a family web cam back to the UK - if you've ever done web cam's they are never short! With stinking hangovers and Christmas hats on me and lady V were ready for more sleep....but our Christmas day was not gonna be spent asleep! With our presents open and fried breakfast eaten by 11am we headed down to Bondi beach for our first warm sandy Christmas - fantastic! [see pic xmas.day.bondi.jpg] We had tickets for the Bondi Pavillion with DJ's spinning tunes from 10am till 10pm. After entry rejection by the bouncers (incidentally my rejection rate into pubs is a mammouth 80% in Sydney!) for not having ID and Dave's numerous Transport For London work passes not working, myself and Dave had to get a taxi back to Coogee to our passports, so second time round we got in! Drinks were expensive and it was full of English and Irish but it was good to have a dance under the blazing sun on Christmas Day!...[see pic dance.crowd.jpg and ave.it!.jpg]
With going back to work in between Christmas and New Year it was the first time
ever for me but it was great lady V could enjoy her first Christmas and NY off in
nearly over a decade (well nearly)! NY was a night to remember. With Andrew,
Julia (got engaged in NZ before they flew to Sydney - congratulations again!)
Nick, Vicky (#2), Dave, Brindha, lady V and of course me, we'd paid for a boat
cruise around the harbour and enjoy the fireworks at 9pm and midnight up close and
personal - with booze and food thrown in for the price the night was laid up to be
fantastic...and it was. [see pic NY.1.jpg, NY.2.jpg and NY.3.jpg] We weren't the
only boat on the harbour, that's for sure, but with the pulsating heart lighting
up on the bridge at 9pm and all the other boats lighting hearts to match the theme,
along with fireworks all within the best city in the world (except for Manchester,
I don't mean the fireworks I mean the city) it summed up, for us, what has been one
memorable night but more importantly with our year. During 2005 we covered
so much new land absorbing new places, cultures and new languages
(like...er...G'day, ha ha) we really have been so lucky to carry out a
trip of a lifetime. It will come to an end at some point but we know we
have at least another year ahead to explore other countries but mainly to
see more of Australia - a golden country but shame it's so bl**dy far away!
With NY over we had NY's day to enjoy too and boy was this a hot one! As I wrote at the start of this email, temperatures reached a mamouth 44 degrees! Luckily humidity was a mere 25% so heading outside was like opening a door to a scorching oven! Your face and eyes were dried out in seconds. Myself and Dave hit Coogee beach whilst V and Brindha sat in an air condition bar. The waves were fantastic so it was great to do some body surfing, bringing back memories not only of our recent trip to Gerroa but the waves we endured in Queensland on our travels with some superb Big A "backdoor" action! Later on we rejoined the crew from the night before at Opera bar in Circular Quay (Sydney Harbour) to have some more drinks - 'cause we obviously hadn't drunk enough the night before! Drinking my favourite beer - "red back" a wheat beer from Western Australia - we had a table for the whole afternoon and night - the bar hangs below the Opera house and the seating overlooks the harbour with a great view of the bridge. It's a great spot!
With Christmas and NY been and gone (along with Dave & Brind after their 4 week stay) - as I said before it draws the curtain to a memorable 2005. It's been an expensive trip but worth every penny. We're settled into our Aussie lifestyles, but realistically wouldn't live here forever (although never say never!) - but there's way too much to miss out in the UK, plus it would be good to see more of mainland Europe and visit our travel buddies! The plan so far is to aim for residency which requires one of us to be working for 2 years for me and 18 months once lady V has been sponsored, but with this plan in action we're trying to book a flight back to the UK for June/July! With prices being quite high we've now found out there's a travel exhibition in early Feb where you can book international flights cheaper than going through a travel agent....so fingers crossed we'll be back to see England win the world cup, become an Uncle for the second time, catch up with three of four generations of family and enjoy the old drinking holes we got to know and love in London with every man, woman and his dog (that's me).
I had my first farewell drinks for a good friend, Paul Reidy. He's heading back to Ireland (Kerry) after an 8 year (or so) stint (on and off) living in Australia but 15 years since he lived back to Ireland. After picking up his citizenship for Aus he can now come back and forth as he pleases - lucky man. Anyway after tasting the last few pints of Guiness @ Durty Nelly's (fantastic Irish pub) and enduring the most amount of farewell drinks he was off like a dirty sock! (Aussie phrase)...I guess this is something you experience living abroad and amongst fellow worldly travellers...
Anyway that's enough from me and that's enough from him (Ronnie Barker r.i.p 2005)
Best wishes for 2006.
The Dougal Dog Down Under.
p.s - website with photos is soon to follow.
p.p.s Other zipped photos to follow!