Griffith to Sydney

So we headed back out in the van, setting the Kenny Sat Nav to Sydney! Stopping on the way to see an old goldmine..............

..........A dog on a tucker box (still no idea why)........

.............. a wine cellar ..............

........ with a wonderful cafe attached..............

.............. a very tall tower in Canberra................

............ which we went up............

............ to see Canberra!

Stopped for a rest and a cup of tea..................... (Errr... think you'll find that cup contained wine! - K)

............. and an Irish pub to watch the band.

Camped on the hill............... had to move a few hours later as we discovered it was a meeting point for single males. Wonder what they could have been up to?!!

Saw another sign for Roos.................still saw no Roos.........

.................. went to the War Memorial, great place, lots of planes for Kenny................

............... and a mock battleship bridge for me!

Watched the daily closing ceremony of the War Memorial..................

.............. bye bye to Canberra...................

................ hello open road...............

.............. discovered a fantastic place to camp.........

............... made chocolate rice crispies .................

.................. watched the sunset...................

............ ate a crispy...............

............... had breakfast at a lovely town called Braidwood.

Later we stopped by the sea at Ulladulla and bought some fresh king prawns for later, oh and got kindly moved on by the police later for trying to camp at another male meeting place!

Found a wonderful town called 'Kangaroo Valley' still no Roos but some wonderful fudge......

............. and an old bridge................

............. with a fabulous old style shop.

Wine tasting in the Kangaroo Valley (highly recommended). Camping in the Valley (not recommended) we were moved on from our site this time by a gay man as we were parked in the local meeting site! We later wondered if the slogan on our van had anything to do with this unexpected attention!
(Anyone sensing a theme here? Taking the term "Camping" to a whole new level! - K)

Ah, the Blue Mountains.

Not a bad view.

Finally a good place to camp............

............ and cook tea ..................

................. well, watch Kenny cook a tea...............

................. of wine and more chocolate rice crispies!

Finally we arrived in Sydney.

Walking through the Botanical Gardens we became aware that there were bats everywhere - seriously BATS (of the fruit variety) everywhere. (As opposed to the cricket type. Much more tricky to spot, them! - K)

At the top end of the gardens the classic Sydney shot appears.

Where, of course, we took lots of photos.

Some comical ..............

Some cheesy!

We enjoyed the street performers along the bay - here a tiny lady fitted into an even tinier box!

That night, in a truly fitting tribute to the last few weeks camping in OZ, we happened to be in Sydney at the same time as the Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras!

It was brilliant!!!! The floats were fantastic, gay men are such good eye candy!

Especially the Life Guard Society. Great night full of colour, music and love.

Before we left Sydney we wanted to take some arty shots around this iconic city.

Our favorite picnic spot.

The place were all the convicts went upon docking to be registered, I guess.

The mint. (Monetary, not extra strong - K)

The hospital with a hog outside (who knows???) (Hog's on the left, by the way - K)

The fabulous harbour full of bars and restaurants.

We loved Australia, even though we saw it in its rare state of having rained lots! We did not see wild Roos but we have driven through many wonderful towns and cities (4 of the 8 states!) and stayed with some amazing people who all looked after us far better than we ever expected.
Next stop Singapore!!!

Melbourne to Griffith

Before leaving Melbourne we headed up to Yarra Valley with some friends (Gill, Ross & Claire) to do some wine tasting. By the end of the day they all tasted pretty similar to me! (Or maybe this was due to the amount I tasted?)
(They were all very, very good. And this was winery 2 out of 3 for the day! - K)

How could we go to Oz and not visit Ramsey Street? Recognise it?

Back to Wicked to collect our camper van that would take us from Melbourne to Griffith (to visit my Uncle and his family out there) and onto Sydney. The van we rented from Melbourne was a much more basic model than that in New Zealand! A lot more basic!
I apologise for the next photo it is 'inappropriate' and the only reason I have included it in here, is as this is what we had to take to my Uncle (who is in his 70's) & Aunty's, who I have not seen since I was 6 yrs old, and drive across the country for 2 weeks to Sydney!

My Uncle found it hilarious.
We were asked many times on our route by passers by if they could take photos, and we often hid in corners of car parks until the groups of people around it had moved on.

The road to Griffith - flat - yet green? Due to the rainfall of late, the red dirt is no more and has been replaced by lush meadows.

We arrived at my Auntie & Uncles in Griffith, famous for its vineyards and illegal drug culture (growing, trafficking, dealing, the whole 9 yrds). However the original settlers (less than 100 years ago) moved to the area for farming, once the less-than-fertile land had had an enopurmous network of ditches dug for irrigation. We visited a museum that is a collection of those early years.
(If you want to know more about the drugs thing, read "Undercover" by Damien Marrett. All true! - K)

On a very hot day!

Various buildings had been laid out as they once were.

The bar.

The Tango bar often had a sign outside stating 'Free Beer Tomorrow' to entice trade (of course tomorrow never arrives).

The typical married quarters. (I must state that this is better than our camper!!!)

The view of Griffith from the hill top.

The most outstanding feature is how flat it is.

The hermit's cave.

Much of the area is mile after mile of arable land, all of which has to be harvested and driven from one end of Australia to the other. Both my Uncle & cousin here are lorry drivers (That's Aussie Road Trains! - K) and think nothing of travelling for hours. The only breaks from the agriculture are found in local watering holes for the thirsty workers. Here is the one which my cousin frequents.

Famous for having the tallest bar in Australia!

We drove out to Hay to visit one of my cousins, Marie, who I have never met. She lives out on the edge of the 'Outback' which was also unseasonably green.

Our last day here and I was desperate to see some Roos. We had to drive out to a nearby lake with an adjoining animal park. Boy those Roos are lazy.

The lake.

Near Griffith lives My Auntie Jan's sister, Nita and her husband Ken. (Uncle John, Auntie Jan, Me, Ken, Nita). One of the oddest things about visiting my family out here is that they have lots of old photos of me and my family. So the next few shots are in mainly to embarrass.

Check out my nightie and the brown decor of the 70's. I know for a fact that our kitchen was orange! Wasn't everyones'?

My Mum & Dad. Here Mum is probably about the same age as I am now. Lovin' the low maintenance hair do's! (I believe the bowl cut was fashionable at this time)

The Wall family straight out of the early 80's with the trendy yellow Ford Capri parked next to us. Mum loved this car as she though she looked good in it. Me and my brother were not so keen due to the summer temperature of the black plastic seats when you got in with shorts on!

An old photo of my Grandad & Nana. My Nana died when I was very young. My Grandad was a very direct chap never one shy to voice his opinion and if something needed to be done he wanted it done yesterday - traits which seem to have managed to filter themselves down through the generations to some of his current descendants (i.e. Me & Mum!)

My other cousin, also John, but more commonly known as 'The Bear' a wonderful, gentle chap who unfortunately, due to a car accident, had spent most of the last few weeks in hospital.

My Uncle was very keen for us to come along with him to his club for the Friday night meat raffle.

There were also some veggie boxes but around 30 HUGE packs of meat to be raffled off, it had to be seen to be believed.

Ticket after ticket was read out by the compere (none were mine) as people rather calmly went up to collect their arm fulls of meat as if they win every week (which I later found out they probably do).

We had a wonderful time getting to know my Australian arm of the family and exchanging different memories. There were many laughs and lots of stories.

Soon we were back on the road again. Here's to the next MegaMoon adventure!!!