Quick journey up the coast

So what else have I been up to..?

Sydney was really good, I walked over the bridge and everything, the view is amazing from up there (see photos on flickr..). Also went to the museum of contemporary art which had a cool exhibition on of an Australian artist and lots of video art (including some wierd projections of faces onto a doll thing lying on the floor).  The botanical gardens were lovely too along the waters edge, and there are loads of fruit bats hanging in the trees, pretty cool!

So after Sydney I stayed in Port Stephens, just a bit north of Newcastle.  Going through Newcastle was wierd, the place names are the same as Newcastle in England, and they even have coal mines too. 

I had a very relaxing time in Port Stephens, I did some more body boarding at the beach, which I think may now be my new favorite thing, may require a wetsuit in England though...  I went out for a sail on a huge catamaran and went snorkelling and saw an enormous blue fish (technical description, yes) and then we saw a lot of dolphins.  This was awesome, they swam under the bows of the boat as we sailed along, it was great, finally got to see dolphins while sailing!

I also had an adventure on a bike that I borrowed to go to the supermaket on.  It was one of those ones where you pedal backwards to brake, I managed to get the hang of this bit, but starting off was a different matter, couldn't get the hang of that without being able to move the pedals independently of the wheels... hmm so this resulted in me getting stuck at most of the junctions along the way... nevermind, I got there and back in one piece!

New years eve was fun too, I went to the beach during the day and played in the sea (bodyboarding again) then I went to a festival on the point in Nelson Bay near where I was staying with another girl who was also staying there.  We got drunk, there were several lots of fireworks to watch and lots of music and we even managed to find other people over the age of 18 to talk to!  And I didn't even feel to bad on new years day, especially not after a dip in the pool!

So the other day I moved further up the coast to Coffs harbour. Theres not an awful lot there except beach and it was raining a fair bit... I did what I probably have done on any normal holiday in England...  I sat in a cafe and watched the rain with another girl who was staying in the same room and then we went to this giant banana thing which is a major tourist attraction.  Its just one of many big things around Oz apparently.  Theres a banana plantation there and we ate frozen bananas dipped in chocolate (really good!) and had banana smoothies.  After this we walked back along the beach as it had stopped raining.  So I still got to paddle in the sea at least..

So now I'm in Brisbane which I'm liking.  It has a cool mix of skyscrapers and older English looking builidings.  I accidentally did a bit of shopping... there are sales on, not my fault...  Then I went to the Gallery of Modern Art, which was really good too, some really interesting and beautiful stuff, including some cows built of of corn beef cans.  They had this massive exhibition of Asian - Pacific art too, including a room showing many clips of Jackie Chan films, random.  There was a really interesting video piece about helicoptors and Vietnam, how people associate them with the war and don't like them, but people want to build them because they can save lives not kill people, but not enough money, etc..

Very interesting!  Also walked along the river through parklands, Brisbane is nice!

Off to Hervey bay and frazer island tomorrow.