blogz0r ___ version fifty seven

Well that’s me back in my home town, folks. Good old sunny Harrogate in lovely North Yorkshire beckoned with a hint of sunshine and a bit of cold wind. I think I’ve successfully missed the brunt of the UK winter which went according to plan!

Stepping off the plane on Sunday was a strangely surreal experience. I was glad to get out of the thing after having my legs cramped into a space not even suitable for a child-dwarf, glad to be back on British soil and very glad to see my beaming girlfriend at the arrivals gate

So, Australia then?

I arrived in Adelaide, the capital of South Australia in November with the intention of staying there for a couple of weeks before moving on to pastures new. Unfortunately, this time was kind of extended to the point of rediculousness as Lee and me drunk lots of beer and generally monkeyed around before I decided to up and go in search of the bright lights.

Adelaide is a lovely place, the climate is the best out of all of the places I visited (hot and dry) but the fact it’s a big farming town has its limitations. Granted, it has some great bars and restaurants, but it all feels a bit “meh” after a while (for me anyway) and I ended up craving the buzz I get from big cities so decided to get off to Sydney sans my monkeying partner.

I ended up in Sydney with a tenuous offer of a place to stay in Newtown (south west of the city), and luckily this turned out to be peachy as a base to look for somewhere closer to the CBD. I ended up crashing at a house with a lady called Christine who was a yoga teacher with a bit of a wacky side. We had some bizarre chats while I was there, and I ended up befriending a little stray kitty who she’d named Marquis II or something (I think his brother was Marquis). I found a place to stay in Surry Hills fairly easily after I’d arrived and moved into a shared house the following week.

Surry Hills is around 10-20 mins walk into the town centre (depending which end you’re in) and was buzzing! Sydney is a very gay city and this lends itself to giving the place a really good vibe – people seem really happy, and the streets feel really safe which is generally not expected with cities of this size. The suburbs can be pretty grubby in places though, and if you’re on the train system you could just as easily be travelling through any part of London.

In fact, walk through certain parts of Sydney (Bondi for example) you’ll think you are in London from the amount of grating southern accents you’ll hear from all the posh boys hanging around.

Enough of that though.

Bondi is like the most famous beach in Sydney, but is apparantly not that nice, so I went along to be an official myth buster. MYTH BUSTED. I really liked the beach – the sand was all soft and not coarse between your toes, and there weren’t too many Germans on it either (there were a shit load of Portugues Man ‘0 War washed up on the beach though, and they’re worse than Germans). I didn’t go surfing (mainly because I don’t know one end of the board from the other) so I can’t comment on that kind of thing. Soz.

So, erm yeah – Sydney rocked. The bars are great (in particular The Loft, the city really modern, the buildings big and shiny, the restaurants absolutely quality (prawns prawns prawns prawns!) and the vibe of the place is very pleasing.

Would I live there for an extended amount of time?

Maybe:

The problem I have with Australia as a whole is the lack of creativity. I know this is a sweeping statement, but everything from TV, music, bands and art seems to be lacking something, and I think that something is originality. I was really dissapointed by the contemporary art museum in Sydney (to the point where I thought they were taking the piss), really dissapointed in the original music coming out (how many times do you guys want to rehash the same tossy rock songs that every other band in the world has ever written, and still get it wrong?), really dissapointed by TV (the only original TV seemed to be shitty soaps and quite possibly the worst cringe-worthy comedy shows I’ve ever witnessed).

That said, Cut Copy are OK… and Pendulum are just awesome

All in all though, the trip was totally wicked. My time spent over my birthday in Cairns were just awesome, and chilling in Sydney with Han ranks up there amongst some of the happiest memories ever

Here’s passing on the baton to Lee to keep us all updated on his travels…

Dogger.

It’s been an absolute freaking blast

Yesterday we took a trip on the ferry over to Taronga Zoo on the Northern side of the harbour. I was in MONKEYSMONKEYSMONKEYSMONKEYSMONKEYS mode, but managed to keep my cool with some sedatives and soft words from Han who was brandishing a straight jacket. Unfortunately the monkeys weren’t upto any tricks and were quite happy to sit in a tree and mock me.

Stupid monkeys.

We saw the bird show though, and that was really cool. I’ve never seen one so just assumed some dude would come out with a knackered looking old owl and show us its knackered old beak or something, but these birds were really well trained and could pluck coins out of people’s hands, undo knots and pilot rocket ships. I was impressed!

Here’s a giraffe with the Opera House in the background – a photo I never thought I’d take:

This is a koala in a tree. He didn’t move for the 3+ hours we were there:

Two monkeys grooming each other. Yay monkeys:

A mating pair of pretty birdies:

For my birthday we shot out on a boat a few miles out from Cairns to the Great Barrier Reef – it was our first times diving but after the initial “I’m breathing normally under the blooody water” feeling was overcome, it was all ok! There was allsorts of beautiful stuff down there, but I was in such awe of it all it’s hard to recount it now. Overall, an absolutely fantastic day

Me and Nemo (he’s at the bottom!) chilling under the sea:

Han and me with our pet sea cucumber. I think his name was Rollo from when I introduced myself, but under the sea it could have been mumbled a bit.

Han and Rollo:

On our second day in Cairns we shot up into the rainforests on the cablecar system that goes right over the forest to a town called Kuranda. The cable car stopped off twice on the way to allow passengers to get off and wander around the forests. I wanted to see monkeys but there weren’t any, just trees. They were cool trees though. Once at the top of the cablecar we had a wander around the tat-town that Kuranda was while witing for the scenic train to take us back down. The train goes by the other side of the gulley that the cable car passes, and offered some great views.

Unfortunately I destroyed my poor camera that day and in my genius didn’t have a backup, so these pics are stolen. Here’s the waterfall on the way up:

The train:

Han and I took a trip up to tropical Cairns in Queensland for a few days and my birthday, and had a great time! The climate is very different to Sydney’s and due to the rainy season was pretty clammy with odd low clouds coming down off the rain forest. Of course, we didn’t care since we’d booked in to a proper posh place on the cheap, and had AC in the rooms. The place was amazing! We had a spa bath in the bathroom, living, dining and bedrooms, plus all the other stuff that comes with being spoilt, including 4 pools.

Here’s one of ‘em:

I totally rooted my dear camera with a leaky bottle of Lipton’s Ice Tea. I got away with it once (an incident with water that time) but this time it proved to be the end of my trusty sidekick.

What this means is no more pics on the blog ater I put up the remaining ones I took before it died

We went along to the Mardi Gras at the weekend to take a look at the fabulous frenzy. Buttocks galore.

Here’s the gay cops:

Assorted PVC short-wearing float:

Gay unicorns:

Lee would have loved it.

We went for a walk around the Botanical Gardens yesterday which turned out to be bigger than I imagined. There’s allsorts of plants, trees and other assorted stuff there all against the backdrop of the CBD – it’s quite cool to be walking through a “rain forest” area with modern buildings in the background. Pics:

A tree:

Opera House from Mrs Macquarie’s Point:

We witnessed a giant spider attack on two buildings. I don’t think anyone made it out alive:

Han and Me:

I took a walk through town on my way to Paddington (a seemingly swish area of town with loads of expensive looking boutiques and shops tailored for women – looked like there were some nice pubs though, and one was even serving Tetleys!). Anyway, I passed the cathedral in town and took this pic for my dear fans.

It’s been a grey day today following a night of big storms – my windows were rattling like a good ‘un all night! The lightening was awsome and illuminated the planes descending through the clouds to the airport.