A Reunion

After we forced ourselves to leave Sydney, we drove inland to Bathurst...why you ask? Because my beautiful friend Megan is currently living there. I met Megan when she was an au-pair in Zurich back in the days when I was still babysitting there and my lifes been better with her in it. We used to get together and drink juicebox wine by the lake or the river and she even came with us to Biel once for the braderie (oohhh what a fun night).



The good old days by the lake :)



 Basically Megan is just a great person and I was NOT going to leave Australia until I could see her again!!

There isn't much in Bathurst, but I did get to drive Megans car on the famous race track there (at the lightening speed of 50km/hr) and after her boyfriend Luke showed and proceeded to steal my husband we had a good old wine-and-chat-thon which resulted in us almost burning down her house...but only just almost (thank goodness for the arrival of Rachel and Andrew! :-))

We also got to go to the 2nd "biggest" night of the year in Bathurst....the horse races, I've never been before so it was cool to see, I didn't place any bets though since I don't know the first thing about it, but I loved watching how instense the people were (I guess you would be with hundreds or thousands of dollars on the line eh?). Basically though I just enjoyed seeing my friend again and meeting new ones!! And already I can't wait to see her again...somewhere, someday!!

Luke and Megz



I miss you and wish we lived closer but I am so happy to have you in my life!!!



In a Land Down Under

englisch version below:

Nachdem wir nun über einen Monat hier in Down Under sind, wird es auch mal Zeit, ein wenig darüber zu berichten. Obwohl man Australier und Neuseeländer immer gerne miteinander vergleicht, sind es doch 2 total unterschiedliche Menschenarten. Der Neuseeländer ist oftmals offener und freundlicher gewesen, während die Australier schon fast ein wenig Europäisch sind. Trotzdem haben wir auch hier wundervolle Menschen kennengelernt und hoffen, dass diese Freundschaft noch lange anhalten wird.

Meinen Geburtstag konnte ich mit einem alten Schulkollegen feiern, was wie immer im Jägermeister geendet hat.. Zum Geburtstag habe ich mir noch ein richtiges Fondue Chinoise und ein Raclette gegönnt. Lecker!!!

Danach ging es mit unserem neuen Camper Richtung Great Ocean Road

 und danach Richtung Sydney. Wie ein Wunder, ist zudem auch das Packet angekommen, welches unsere Freunde uns von der Schweiz aus geschickt haben....im November... Da möchte ich nicht unterlassen zu erwähnen, dass das Packet von TNT-Express zugestellt wurde...Wenn Ihr also mal ein Packet verschicken solltet, zahlt ein wenig mehr und nehmt Fed Ex oder DHL, nicht damit diese Drecksfirma euer Packet verliert!

  Auf dem Weg nach Sydney haben wir an einem Strand noch ein paar Australier kennengelernt. Dies endete auch mit viel Bier und tollen 3 Tagen mit denen.

Das schöne an Australien ist zudem, dass man hier wirklich noch wilde Tiere sieht und diese auch Zahlreich erscheinen. Darum haben wir im ersten Monat schon Kangoroos und Wambats gesehen und auch die Koalas konnten wir beobachten.

In Sydney selbst konnten wir bei Bekannten Übernachten, welche uns ihre Wohnung ueberliesen und für 2 Wochen nach Bali gingen. Ich sollte hier vielleicht noch erwähnen, dass die Wohnung direkt am Strand war und einen direkten Strandzugang hatte. Yep es gibt sicher schlimmeres als das :-)

So nun sind wir bereits auf dem Weg Richtung Norden. Auch hier gibt es sicherlich viel Interessantes zu erzählen. Aber von dem gibt’s ein anderes mal etwas. Bis dann, Tschüssiiiii




Australia, the country Andi has looked forward to the most, the country that you always hear people talking about, and the country that is on almost everyones "bucket list". It hasn't disappointed so far!


We've been here a month now and although we do (or I should say, Andi does..) get tired of driving, and eventually all the beaches look the same our first month here has been really great!

We arrived in Melbourne where we stayed for one week since we cancelled the planned trip to Tasmania, and the first thing we did was the hospital run around for Andi's follow up ultra sound....2 days and many doctors and hospitals later we were back to where we started...but thats a long story. Melbourne was great, we both really love that city and we met up with an old school friend of Andi's who lives there with his lovely Aussie wife and their beautiful son Ben. They joined us for a traditional fondue Chinoise for Andi's birthday and even had us over for a raclette dinner the next night (after hanging out with us and touring us around all day!). Ohhhh how I miss raclette!!!

After Melbourne it was off to do the Great Ocean Road. The first few days were ok....we understood that it was really beautiful but nothing that we hadn't seen in New Zealand or Tahiti (spoiled traveller alert!) until we got to the 12 Apostles and everything between until the Bay of Islands...WOW!

 

And then it was back to Melbourne to pick up the package from our "Hasis". THANK YOU GUYS SO MUCH!! before we headed north. We picked a spot on 90 mile beach called Paradise beach which was a free campsite and spent 2 nights there largely because we met some really great people, and maybe the beautiful beach had something to do with it. Next to our campsite was a group of Aussies who we decided to latch onto for 2 days and what a great decision it was. Jaime and his fiance Abbie were especially nice to us, taking Andi with them fishing and even sharing their roast dinner on our second night!

Andi's mouth practically fell off he was so happy to have meat again!

On our way up to Sydney to meet up with Ryans cousin Cailey and her fiance Josh we stopped in Kangaroo valley at a free campsite where we had our first glimpse of kanagroos and even saw a Wombat!

Once we arrived at Cailey and Josh's apartment in Cronulla (a suburb of Sydney) we set down our bags to stay...forever... haha no, but they have an UNBEATABLE view!!

 and even though they were leaving for Bali 2 days after we arrived they were nice enough to let us stay at their place, for which we will be forever grateful since we were both feeling a bit tired of travelling!!!!! Thank you guys soo soo sooooo very much!!!! We didnt do much besides spend wayy too many hours on the internet, stare at the ocean that was right outside the window and watch lots of tv.....excatly what we needed to do to feel ready to hit the road once again....