Talk about getting settled quick....

We arrived in Melbourne on Friday and by Monday both Kat and I had jobs.... Kat working in a local shop called The Grotto, and me working in a Cafe/Bar called Greasy Joes - which I love...

...the cruisiest job ever - yeah it can get busy but then I'm usually urgently called over to the bar for tequila shots...

We spent a week in the hostel - snaffling the plentiful free food.

We also caught up again with Yeremy - where we celebrated me getting a job by beginning drinking at exactly noon.
6 hours and 2 crates later only Yeremy and I were left standing - after polishing off yet another crate we hit the town - after ditching two Canadians who according to Yeremy "Cut our grass" we somehow joined a street gang called "The BloodCrips" and went drinking with them.

We now have protection in Melbourne.

Go Go Second City!

Oh err.. yeah, so the plan was to stay in Sydney for xmas...

... yeah Sydney really sucked - even Manly where we stayed and I actually had the best surf of my life was cack...

..so we bolted - 2 nights in town and then we just did one - 12 hours solid driving in 42degrees heat...





and only very minor arguements (naturally about asking for directions... and Yes! I was right! ]9[8709 tom had to buy a map!!!@@!@! sod off Kat!213 1';;];= ....ahem.... )

we arrived happily at King St Backpackers. Cue arrival, sleep, moving the The Kernel to the back end of St Kilda, applying for one job each in St. Kilda (and later getting said jobs), returning, catching up with Adam, then sleeping more. In doing this I realised Melbourne rules. It's smaller, colder, further from the beach and less prettier than Sydney but good God is it better. I could live here for years.



The only downside is the huge bushfires - they're miles away so we're safe - but the whole state is clouded in smoke.
Victoria is the size of Britain.

After leaving Byron we headed for Sydney, wisely planning to stop at a few places along the way...

First stop was Port Macquarie - where we ran into Swedish Mike and went to a Koala Sanctuary. Koalas were patted. Kangaroos were fed...
...and yes one cheeky bastard deciced to eat my hair... well I can't help it if the do's the same colour as 'Roo food....
...On to Forster - after dinner in Hog's Breath I pissed off God somehow and he sent this gripper of a hoopy green thunderstorm our way... sadly no ace lighting photos... possibly because I was a)Drunk b) Taking photos of the first decent spider I'd seen in Oz..

...and c) Attempting to block out the repeated whitterings from the local hostel owner...

"Crikey! You wouldn't believe Australia was in a drought would ya?.... Hehehe...."
.........30 second pause.........

"Crikey! You wouldn't believe Australia was in a drought would ya?.... Hehehe...."
.........30 second pause.........

"Crikey! You wouldn't believe Australia was in a drought would ya?.... Hehehe...."

*Sound of Australian man being beaten with frozen quiche*

With the police on our tail we motored south, stopping at the famously out of the way Seal Rocks (yes, he does!) - a famous surf spot... shame there was no surf but it was indeed purdy...

Then on to Manly, Sydney...

My precious Byron Bay...

*Sigh *

I shall miss the place and shall definitely be coming back -

Aside from making our own Cluedo set...
.... we wandered around town taking pictures on our last day...




That's Hog's Breath in the trees up on the left there - the beach is behind that last building.

Byron Longboards and Byron Liquor - the 2 places where most of my cash went...


...and Brumby's pie shop.. I developed quite an addiction to those pies... hmmm might go find one now...

..oh and a random shop full of pink stuff for Suze.

Go Go Lucky Room 4

So after a fond few months of singledom and various shenanigans I have settled down again and found myself a lovely lovely new girlfriend - Kat.
She's ace, very polite
Good table manners
Stylish...
... and very mature.
But seriously - she's a goodun, I'm rather happy...

We're actually leaving Byron Bay now - we've both got itchy feet, and Kat's finished her shockingly intense Yoga Teaching course so we're heading to Sydney for Xmas to meet up with pretty much everyone I've met since I left London as EVERY BACKPACKER IN AUSTRALIA hits Sydney for Xmas....

So with our departure imminent we had a few more things to do in Byron - including go see the sunrise at the lighthouse...
... GoGo 4am wakeup...

We also went to a place called Killan's Falls where Kat posed for a Herbal Essences advert...
We aslo went to Lake Ainsworth - bordered by tea trees the water is a dark red colour - most theraputic...
And we also mocked the local fauna...

.... yeah make your own comedy caption for that last one...