Disco Down Under

The Crossing - Getting Underway

2007-05-27T03:00:00.000+01:00

During The Trip back in February, a plan was hatched between us to work dilligently for a couple of months then purchase a sturdy Landrover to ferry us through the desert to Perth... This didn't happen. Mainly because not one of us was remotely capable of staying off The Goon long enough to save the bean for a tank of diesel, let alone a car.

This led to the Great Plan B: The Crossing. Essentially involving the relocation of a campervan from Cairns to Perth. Good things: New, reliable, luxury vehicle, with rental fees of a pittance ($40 for the whole trip)... Bad things: 19 day time limit, mileage limit, crippling loss of bond if some moron hits too many Roos....

It was so on.

We left Byron in our usual form - running for our bus heavily laden and myself still giggling from the previous night's antics (such a great story, not appropriate here sadly...). After the required carnage that was two nights in Brisvegas we flew up to Cairns and promptly went to bed. When Irish and Canada arrived, it was conveniently Mike's birthday(ish) so we concocted a lovely vat of Shambles for the occasion.

There were then mutterings of creating a Shambles Float. Ice Cream was purchased and we decided this was The Best Idea Ever.
Sufficiently intoxicated we departed to the casino - in theory a foolish idea but one should not underestimate the power of Shambles. After watching Mike lose the $100 of chips that was his birthday present we hit the BlackJack tables... after an hour or so I was pleased with being $80 up. Jer trumped this with $200. Bastard.
After being thrown out of the casino we repaired home, playing the fabulous game hedge on the way

Hedge is a dangerous game... Go Go first injury of The Crossing
We eventually collapsed at some point... shortly after, Muggins here had to go collect the hallowed van at 8am. I managed this (albeit slightly illegally) and successfully negotiated the ANZAC day parades by shouting "it's OK! I'm driving a white van!" at police.

I heroically rocked up at the hostel (to which we can never return) to be greeted with a hail of waterballoons.

This was when I realised I was travelling with utter bastards.

Back To Byron... yet again...

2007-05-26T06:22:00.001+01:00

It had to happen really, I'd done the entire East Coast, where else was I to go? So back to Byron, back in Main Beach, back at Hog's Breath. Not a lot changed.

Things I did:

Went to the first leg of the ASP pro tour with Mike - it was just up the road at Snapper Rocks
Caught up with Miriam - an ex-GreaseyJoer... much time was spent in The Balcony doing crosswords and drinking cider.
Experienced a rather epic thunderstorm - Miriam and I had been drinking most of the day for it was ThursdayFunday; the storm hit around 8 ish - we promptly got into the pool and watched the sky split open. Then I wandered the now flooded town...
Thieved Kat's shiny new waterproof camera and went bodysurfing...

Got Kat to draw a Miss Scarlet picture on my board. This looks awesome.

Caught up with the lovely Jacquie, Anna and Andrea - more ex-GreaseyJoers. This led to abundant drinking.
Worked a crapload at Hog's Breath, including a 64 hour week. Not that I minded - Maz, the new manger was practically in love with me - making work much less of a chore... plus the place ran better and almost all the new staff were my mates from the hostel.... On Friday the 13th we had to dress up in costume too... most fun...

Climbed Mount Warning with Kat in pitch darkness. The summit is the first place in the Australian mainland to see sunrise so we started the 3 hour climb at 3am... Kat's job was to obtain a torch for the climb... shame the foolish grotter forgot spare batteries! No matter - it was still a very worthwile climb, if a little treacherous - Kat managed to get bitten by an ant.

Played a LOT of gin rummy with Mike (our scores got up to about 17,000) - we had a routine of running and swimming on the beach at 7, followed by rummy and much trash talking over breakfast until I went to work and Mike went to sleep (he had to get up at 4am every morning to clean campsite toilets...)

Went to Nimbin with some Hoggies people and others, coming back via a rather awesome waterfall...

There was also, of course the requisite partying with randoms I seem to pick up...

Other things I did:
Sold my infernal car to some idiots who looked at it in the dark and didn't even look under the bonnet...

Snuck into the Blues and Roots Festival (Australia's Glastonbury) - managed to see Ben Harper play a blinding closing set after being forcibly ejected twice.

Lost a ridiculous amount of weight - no more gut, no more chin. I did have to buy new jeans and boardies and my old ones kept falling down...

Got my first barrel... ok, I was on a bodyboard, but the waves were about 12ft!

*sigh*
I'm sure there's more but I've most likely forgotten it...

The Trip: Chapter 6 - End of Days

2007-05-17T03:32:00.000+01:00

Waking up with the now ever present pain in my lower right side we somberly packed up and headed north once more. Fortunately it was a pleasingly short few hours to Townsville, a ridiculously hot place. Not much was done - we'd all managed to pretty much destroy ourselves chemically, mentally and physically in the last fortnight so we elected to float in the pool all afternoon. Next day we hopped over to Magnetic Island - a pretty yet quiet island a short ferry ride away. We made it less quiet by haring around the island on a Mini Moke we hired.

Within a few hours we'd exhausted all there was to do on the island, even after running in to heaps of folk from the Whitsundays boat. Returning to Townsville, Adam and Jeremy were still on "Detox" so sat in the pool complaining. Elz and I decided to go for a drink or seven. We forgot it was Valentines Day... Now most of you know the unbridled hatred I have for this day, but it was actually a funny night - everyone assumed we were a couple, netting us many free drinks and an eventual armful of roses for Elz.

End of the road was Cairns. Rainy rainy Cairns was where pretty much everyone from Fraser Island and the Whitsundays ended up. This meant of course the requisite partying...
...I was also pleased to catch up again with Emma, albeit briefly... We also did more wholesome things, including a trip up to the Rainforest (photos incoming). Also the required scuba diving on the barrier reef which was an err... interesting day...

After an rather epic last night out for Elz...Dinner! Buckets of Beer $15!!!
...we rocked up a the jetty at 7am in more than a little pain, only to be warned it might not be the best day for a 2 hour trip ot to sea - the weather was pretty bad and expected to get worse... I didn't give a monkeys - I don't get seasick, Adam was leaving the next day so had to go, and Jeremy was still too drunk to argue...

Yeah that was dumb, Jeremy spent the whole trip attempting to chunder over the back of the boat where space was at a premium, Adam meanwhile was steadfastly staring at the horizon and not moving. I spent my time flitting between the two, mocking them savagely. Then all of a sudden I felt a bit iffy, seconds later it became clear there was a gastric explosion imminent. I managed to get to the side of the boat to rid myself of the Captn' Crunch I'd had a few hours previously. A big moment for me. First seasickness in about 20 years.

Suitably refreshed I returned to mocking the others, we eventually arrived at the reef, the phrase choppy-o'clock isn't enough. It was ridiculously rough, there were waves breaking on the reef. Cursing that I didn't bring my board I jumped in to snorkel, finding that the coral was actually a bit of a letdown. Turns out that with the tourism impact, agricultual runoff and the more acidic seawater caused by global warming, the Great Barrier Reef is pretty much dead.

Still pretty cool though - saw a few clownfish, (Nemo!) and lots of other bits n' bobs... then it was time for my scuba dive, I've done quite a few before but you just need to dive the GBR when you go to Oz... The instructor was far to occupied tending to some petrified Japanese girls to keep an eye on me so I just followed the photographer around who had found a sea turtle, go go epic photo...
A few days later we had another high spirited outing when we discovered that renting scooters for a day cost a measly $30... well, the others got their scooters, I got a HOG.

Adam and I also went on an unlimited bungee jumping day...

The rest of our days in Cairns were spent sleeping, drinking, and going to KFC. (Jeremy continued this behaviour for a further three weeks after I left.) I was also trying (barely) to sell my damn car, which would allow me to then leave Cairns and fly back to Byron to see Emma again and also my parents who were making their way through Oz. This didn't happen. Mainly due to the fact that I didn't put much effort into the sale and my car was a heap of shit. It came to the point where I gave up and drove back south to Aerlie Beach to meet the folks who were doing there own Whitsundays trip.

It took a different tack to our previous hedonistic debaucle, I was kindly brought along as well on a recondictioned wooden square rigged ketch (A pirate ship you ignorant pigs). Frankly it was a much needed break, no goon, no touch the cup, no "pull my finger!", just calm, refined sailing around some beautiful islands for 3 nights. I'd left my camera somewhere, so no photos, but it was great, and it was also really good to see the folks.

Mum and Dad then flew south to Brisbane, I drove there in 2 days - go go 140kmph puncture...
...stopping via 1770 for a surf attempt, sadly longboards only that day but a very nice spot. I caught up with the folks again for a night out in Brisbane before my inevitable return to my home in this blessed country: Byron Bay.

The Trip: Chapter 5 - The Whitsundays

2007-05-02T01:57:00.000+01:00

It's a sodding long way between Hervey bay and Aerlie beach and we did it in one go - we were on a time limit and there's nothing much worth seeing in between so the four of us hopped in the car with an extra Emma with us and set off.

There were mutterings Yeremy couldn't drive the near 1000km by himself, he immediately became hugely offended and proceeded to drive in the stupid heat for about 9 hours. Me and the girls spent the whole trip dozing in the back. Adam drove the rest. After 12 hours on the road we rocked up in Aerlie - gateway to the Whitsundays. Problem - we had nowhere to stay because Yeremey forgot to book us in with the hostel... Despite being tempted to ditch the others and crash with Emma, I eventually got us into a motel which after much bartering and cheeky smiling at the girl behind the bar we got for $90 for all 4 of us. Boom. I rule.

After checking in for the boat the others rented stinger suits... I happened to be already sorted thanks to a certain wetsuit..

A quick beer run and goodbye to Emma later we had the standard briefing and the thought struck us to perhaps purchase some captain hats. A few of the other lads did the same. This proved to be the best idea ever.

By the time we were on the boat we had already cracked into our somewhat impressive beer supply and were saluting the other captains constantly. This did not get old.

We then sailed for a few hours to south Molle island where we were to sleep and party for 2 nights. This we did. Excessively in the case of the latter.

Remember the wager? Yep. I wore that damn wetsuit for a whole night out at the island..

We were also invaded by impressively huge bugs on the first night. Certain swedish captains were embarrassed by this...

There was also a full monty inspred dance involved... Canada coreographed the whole thing...

As a cruel act of sadism - we had to be up by 7am every morning for breakfast. Then were on the water for 8. The second day was pretty windy in the morning - go go seasickness... we promptly decided that is was much better to be drunk on a boat than hungover on a boat so we started drinking appaulingly early while the others slept... what the hell? We were on holiday!

We eventually rocked up at Whitehaven beach - a beautiful sandy beach made of almost pure Parrot Fish poo. We did a bit of snorkelling there and saw an immense sea turtle and hit each other with swimming noodles. Setting off after lunch we sailed around the main island and headed back to the resort, just in time to have a round of golf and a bit of a skydive..

Then partytime which included lots of toga action.
Irish got the wrong end of the stick...
Up perilously early again we resumed our drinking and headed off to another snorkelling spot - the captains were by this point losing momentum - especially Yeremy who after shouting for and hour and promising to urinate on any poor soul who fell asleep on deck, promtly fell asleep himself. By this point I had made a policy of chucking a bucket of sea water over anyone who was asleep. This was done and Captain Canada didn't evn twitch. After another bucket of water just to make sure and checking he was sill alive we waited for him to dry out then drew on him. Obviously.
When we stopped at the snorkelling spot he eventually came to and applauded our efforts. We all skydived in for a snorkel apart from Captain Irish who had to be rescued from the water and is now included in the safety briefing for the boat.

After feeding time we pottered our way back to Aerlie. A nap later and we all had a few beers. This turned into me nearly killing Irish by teaching the Captains Touch the Cup - the most savage drinking game known to man.

Whitsundays hurt my liver.

The Crossing - Prologue

2007-05-01T05:01:00.000+01:00

Yet again I am behind in the blog.. about 3 months behind... oops...

This is what we're doing now Edit: Woo! fixed the slideshow! How sexy..

Create a Free Slideshow

The Trip: Chapter 4 - Fraser Island

2007-03-24T01:07:00.000Z

After picking up Elz and spending another few days in Byron watching her get burnt it was time to get underway again.

After 90 minutes in the car we decided it was time to surf again - we were in Surfer's Paradise so naturally the waves were pretty bad.. I tired of this and was seeing odd shapes under the water so came in after an hour or so. Yeremy soon followed and he to seemed to have seen wierd shapes. We turned around to see Adam paddling rather rapidly in and then running up the beach... "Dude there was definitely a shark down there!" we decided to let the lifeguards know and walked over, as we rocked up the guy was giggling to himself: "They're only Manta Rays Guys" he said, without us saying a word. We looked back out to sea to see two rather large black shadows slowly cruising along the shore. Bastard Fish.

Since we'd quickly made fools of ourselves we decided to leave, stopping overnight in Brisvegas then continuing North to Noosa via Australia Zoo again and getting up at 6am for Dawn Patrol - Noosa was our last surf, and my first ever cutback! Oh yes.

After passing a worrying amount of churches and evangelical retreats we rocked up into Hervey Bay - gateway to Fraser Island. After checking in and paying the exorbitant extra charges I was soon pleased to find out that the rather attractive girl in our room was also going to be in our car on the island...

...later in the bar we had a briefing about the island and met the rest of our group:

Tom and James - two Bristolian lads. Excellent drinkers and mayhem advocates.

Eric and Mo - German lads but legends all the same.

Vanessa and Laura - German girls, a little quiet except when there is an open bottle of Jim Beam nearby...

Emma - the aforementioned girl from our room, a marine biologist from Norfolk.
And then of course us gorgeous lot...

It was shaping up to be quite a good car... after a few beers and ordering our meat and alcohol supplies we purchased food and returned to the pub.
Waking at a cruel 6am we went to load up the cars... ours was identified by the joyously large pillar of beer in front of it.Car loaded and another annoying briefing later we were underway - go go signs that give me ideas...On the ferry we discovered that Tom had recently got a Tattoo in Byron Bay. A tattoo of James' lips. On his ass.
First thing on the island we headed to Lake McKenzie via a brief traffic jam

McKenzie's a beautiful, if a little overcrowded place - the water's so clean you can just swim and drink... we did both lots. Go Go group photo.

Then on to Lake Wabby, which is slowly disappearing thanks to that giant sand dune...we were really getting into our group photos....Then on to the Maheno - a random shipwreck on the beach halfway up the island

Then it was time to make camp... we ended up on the same part of the beach as everyone else - this meant party time. But we had to put on our makeup first...

We also came up with the brilliant game of "Wanker" - basically everyone sticks their hand through a hole on the plastic beer ring thingy and pulls. The one with it left on their arm is the wanker and has to keep it on for the rest of the trip. Soon we were all covered in them.
Partying on the beach, me and the girls needed a quick nap before sunrise...

We then spent a while wandering around looking at each other wandering what to do. (Turns out we excelled at this). We eventually got underway long after everyone else, just in time to be trapped by the tide as it covered the very driveable wet sand, forcing us on to the soft, dry sand. Curses. Ely Creek was the only option - an nice little river you can wade up and then just float your way down to the sea...

We soon tired of this so decided to bury then run over Yeremy...

With the tide finally out enough we could move on, not long before we saw a dead dolphin washed up... not nice...

We headed to a campsite for lunch, I kept finding interesting creatures to poke
The site was run by some resident aboriginies and they had removed the dolphin from the beach and buried it nearby. We were lucky enough to see part of the farewell ceremony for the dolphin spirit until we were asked to move on. Turns out it was more of a private thing.

Later on we made camp on the beach again, soon everyone else turned up. It was the girl's turn to cook. The guys just drank. Professionally. This culminated in an epic game of "Asses of Fire"...

.. and also the impossible situp game...
Germans can be so gullible...

Much drinking and shenanigans later it was daylight again and time to move on... there were more lakes to see!

...after the lads visited the salon we covered most of the south of the island before reconvening at the ferry port to head home, there was just enough time for one more group photo...
Back at the hostel we cooked the rest of our meat and had a good few beers while sifting though the 800 or so photos we took between us. (Hence the epic length of this entry). Most of us were to meet up again further up the coast, Emma and I had a bit of a thing going by the end of the trip which continued to Cairns and I'm definitely looking forward to seeing her when I'm home.

Some groups on Fraser Island just party. Some just want to see everything. We did both. To excess. This has been the best thing I've done out here so far and I think I mostly have to thank the group I was with for that. You're all legends and I hope to see you all again soon. I'll bring the toilet roll.

The Trip: Chapter 3 - The BillaGong Oddyessy

2007-03-11T00:01:00.000Z

Waking up in an utter state we had to pack.

While being a fairly sizeable car, The Kernel has it's limits, and with the combined crap of Adam, Yeremy, Mike, Kat and myself, along with 5 surfboards and 4 hungover morons it was a bit of a squeeze.

Eventually using a spare boardrack to lash two bags to the boot-roof we were underway - next stop: Newcastle
I seemed to forget my camera for this leg of the trip so photos are few and far between - after surfing a pretty huge reefbreak in Newcasle we headed over to the rocking town of Forster, where there were no waves and very little to do. Food movie and sleep later we headed on to Port Macquarie after unsuccessfully hunting for waves on the way. Checked into the ultimate crack-motel ($60 for the four of us and the owner had no teeth!) and the headed out to hopefully find some waves. No real joy, but after a surprisingly fun afternoon messing with the mals in tiny onshore rubbish we retired back to the room armed with fried chicken and a crate for a night of poker and me getting very excited about 24...

Moving on the next day we headed north again looking for waves.

Nothing showed again! We checked everywhere! Alas we were almost going to get to Byron a day early! In the end we crashed in Yambla...where it was howling onshore and muggins here had to con a motel into giving us a cheap room for us all. Go Go Fish and Chips and poker. R n R for the next day....

Edit: I don't remember when or where this photo was but Mike reckons it's hilarious so it goes here:

Back on the road the next day we headed toward Byron, stopping rather foolishly on the way to surf Lennox Head - one of the most advanced and nastiest point breaks on the East Coast. It was a small day: 6' waves breaking onto a very rocky headland miles from help. I dove right in and had little trouble, after the others eventually got out we got our asses handed to us... Adam's legrope snapped and his brand new $600 board nearly got dashed on the rocks... on about 70% of my bailouts I was hitting a rock somewhere... and we were getting rapidly dragged away from the point by the rip. Foolish.

Getting back in was even more foolish. Tha waves were bigger and we were all getting smashed onto the rocks trying to get out. I was luckily nearer the point so wasn't too bad. The others were further down and were being smashed against sharper rocks and coral. Adam's foot was a mess:

photo incoming....

So we soaked his foot in HomeBrand disinfectant and pottered on to Byron. Checked in. Started drinking.

Memory is hazy but it involves cheeky monkeys, being foolish with Kat and shouting at Germans. I'd missed Byron Bay.

The Trip: Chapter 2 - Very Bad Wagers

2007-02-21T01:54:00.000Z

No time for breakfast we had Canberra to see!

This took 20 minutes.

Paliament House:

The ANZAC Memorial:
That's it - I think there was a museum somewhere but our heads were spinning from the megacity were were in and we thought it best to head to the sleepy little hamlet of Bondi Beach and pick up Yeremey.

With myself driving...
...and 2manyDJs educating the heathens we were well on the way fortified by only the finest KFC the A.C.T. had to offer. Rolling into Bondi:
... we quickly picked up Yeremy and his French housemate only referred to as "Oi Frog" and popped over to Maroumbra beach for a spot of surfing.

A 2.5 meter swell and my foolish use of the mal quickly taught me a lesson and after being hilariously and repeatedly wiped out we eventually retired back to Yermey's for his introduction into the world of Shambles.

Derived from the fleetingly popular cocktail AbsolutChamBulls we mix 2 bottles cheap sparkling white, one bottle nasty vodka (now referred to as NotWater) and 4 cans RedBull and eventually wake up in jail in East Timor.

Shambles and poker well underway we were accosted by a swedish housemate of Yeremy's who proceeded to sell me a hammock for $2, and a rather fetching flourescent 80's style wetsuit for $7.80. This would later come back to haunt me.

Winding up at a club in town The Wager was made - since all of us (barring Adam) were now single, the last of us to get a girl back to the sofa we were sitting on would have to wear the aforementioned wetsuit on the next night out. Unfortunately thanks to Shambles I had the people skills of a refrigerator and kept shouting at my own reflection - this led me and Mike to both give up allowing Yeremy to win with the classic drunk american yet there to be no actual loser.

This is not good logic or betting karma. My comeuppance eventually came....

The Trip: Chapter 1 - Fear and Loathing in Victoria

2007-02-21T01:36:00.000Z

The day came. After an immensely hungover last day's work on Australia day my last night out began in a relitavely normal way - drinking huge amounts of cider at the bar and dancing on the tables with the lovely Jacquie and Simone.

Eventually kicked out of there we made our way around St. Kilda dancing badly. Eventually ending up in Home number 3: Revolver. The club that never closes.

6:30 in the morning hit and I thought it might be a good idea to go home and actually pack as we were planning the leave an hour later, but of course we ended up going to Greasey's for breakfast...

Not much was eaten but a few Coronas were drunk, and scraps were fed to Mike... eventually home, packed, moved out and underway by 10am - very impressive considering the state I was in. With a sober Mike driving and a still superbly trashed Tom shouting at traffic we picked up Adam and headed for Canberra.
I tired of singing off key Johnny Cash songs at passing trucks by noon and promtly fell into a coma, waking hours later in some random tree filled town somewhere. Later I discovered this was the nation's capital. After wandering around for some time on a Saturday night in the most banging part of town we concluded that Canberra must actually be somewhere else and we'd been tricked by some little hick town. After a swift pint of Guinness my second wind never appeared. I quietly cursed the A.C.T and slipped into a much needed near-sober slumber.

Just a quick check in...

2007-02-19T08:27:00.000Z

Yeah, sorry I haven't posted in ages - I've barely stopped since I left Melbourne about 4 weeks ago!

The full story on the EPIC trip shall be posted soon, but here's what I did today for the time being:

Alas...

2007-01-30T10:36:00.000Z

All good things must come to an end and all spiky heathens must be near the surf so the time has come to leave Melbourne behind...

So back I go to Byron - but we're taking our time this way back; Adam, Yeremy and I shall potter our way up the east coast in The Kernel, surfing our way north, picking up Elz in Byron and continuing on to the delights of Fraser Island and the Whitsundays.

So what have I been doing the last 2 months?

Greasey's. I work there about 30 hours a week and if I'm not working I'll probably be in the bar next door. I easily spend more of my concious hours there than anywhere else and I love it. Such good people.
Xmas honestly sucked. It was cold, rainy and about 9 degrees. It was warmer in London. It even snowed upstate. We did very little as my planned gloat-fest of a beach barbecue was not going to happen, plus we were insanely hungover from xmas eve at the Espy, my home away from Greasey Joes.

New year was spot on though. Much alcohol on the beach
Followed by a nude swim with a random Canadian...
...you know it's a good night when you wake up with the number of "Naked Chris" in your phone.

Tom and Dee's day at the tennis

2007-01-19T11:04:00.000Z

Product of a drunken night as usual after work at Greasey's, I found myself cold and hungover rolling down the hill to meet Dee at 10am to go to the Australian Open at the last minute.

We had entertainment while we queued for tickets

however none while we queued another hour to get into the arena since we hadn't heard of anyone in the outside courts. We got in in time to see Andy Murray play a storming close game and then Sharapova play too. Which was hilarious.

We were of course quite drunk by this point, and in addition to giggling at Sharipova we had a game of Where's Wally to play.
We decided to leave before we were kicked out and retired to a tennis themed bar in town...

..complete with lawn furniture, fake grass, tennis gear clad staff.... and a pool.
We met Anna and Rosie there before retiring back to good ol' Greasey's bar for a couple more to find a very drunken manager Steve there.

2007-01-06T04:27:00.000Z

I FUNKING HATE CRICKET! With little persuasion I purchased Day 4 Melbourne Test tickets with a plan of turning up pissed let alone just getting drunk there. Oh and then guess what? WE LOSE BY AN INNINGS.

So we spent out ticket money on beer. Lots. Ended up in the Neighbours pub. I wept.

2006-12-20T01:08:00.000Z

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!

2006-12-12T10:45:00.000Z

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.

2006-12-12T01:39:00.000Z

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...

2006-12-11T04:17:00.000Z

*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

2006-11-26T00:15:00.000Z

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...

Infadels in Brisvegas

2006-11-25T23:37:00.000Z

So I returned to Brisbane, wary of my antics last time and on a good behaviour promise...

With Felicity in tow we pointed The Kernel north and floored it.
Felicity has a camera permanently orbiting above her head at the much coveted "MySpace Angle" - there are many photos...
Before the gig we wandered the shops of Brisbane - I saw my first Australian Xmas tree. The temperature was around 29 degrees - I completely forgot it was Xmas time...
I also puchased the MOST EMO SHIRT EVER.
Thankyou GeneralPantsCompany.

After a beer or 7 I met Jillykins in a pub I hadn't previously been asked to leave and we wandered into the Zoo - a great local venue. True to form, Richie was quickly found inside - hyper excited as usual.
He told me his secret recipie for scones.
Jilly bought Balloons - a mate of hers was happy to look after them
The gig was seriously one of their best - they went mental, the crowd went mental. If they played even half as good for the rest of that tour they'll have won over Austraila in 3 short days.

Then a few photos and drinkies with the guys afterwards - going out on the razz was suggested, but fresh off a 23 hour flight and with a 6am promo start the next day those wusses wigged out. Tsk Tsk.

Upon our return the next day we saw another Big Thing.
Job done.

2006-11-15T02:50:00.000Z

Haven't updated in a while... well I have been distracted and busy...

Matt left the other day taking Mike with him - they're both off up to do the Fraser Island/Whitsundays trip... then I think Mike's off to Melbourne to frolic in the rain.

Naturally we sent them off by getting wasted for a few days - evidence follows:

Headed to a gig at the Northern - a band called Something With Numbers
We caught Mike playing BlockBreaker on his phone - it's like the most awesome version of breakout ever... Mike has a problem though, he doesn't just play the game, he is the game.
We also got bored between sets:

The girl in the photos is Felicity - I work with her at Hog's Breath - she caught blonde from me.

I bought a tshirt professing my love of maths...
Then we headed to Play - a local club where Frankie works (another Hog's Breather)

Being a good lad Frankie supplied us with free alcohol while we posed for photos for Felicity's MySpace..
Matt and Mike on the other hand had a nap.

This got us kicked out (yet again) so we tried to rejuvinate Matt and Mike with Kebab.
This failed.

So we left them asleep in the kebab shop and hit Cheeky's as usual.
Upon our return we covered Mike in newspaper as I thought it was hilarious.

I ended up passing out from giggling at some point... thanks for the photo Matt...
So after waking up still rather tipsy - a mug of goon was in order to stave off the dreaded goon hangover...
We left Mike to it...

Oh and in case you're wandering what goon is... read this:
My liver seems to gurgle at the sight of it... I take it to mean she's hungry....

2006-11-09T05:46:00.000Z

It's been a good few weeks lately - I took on a cleaning job at the hostel for free accomodation and quit a week later as they wanted me to move into a staff only room. This room is now a glorified rabbit hutch in the carpark.

No chance. If i did I'd have never met this lot:
From left: Me, Felicity (who I work with), Ann-Marie (the swedish lifeguard), Matt (a yank obsessed with beards and sleeping girls), Yeremy (Canadian owning the best T-shirts in the world)Fritz (odd german who now hates me...), and the lovely Kat (trainee yoga teacher).

Some of the following photos are Matt's - as I mentioned he has a thing for sleeping girls...
We've been out drinking a lot... and pre-gaming in the room...

We also wisely invested in a drinking chess set - needless to say I am awesome and kick Mike's arse.

Remember how I said Matt had a thing for beards? We found these three all in the same bar...

We also trundle over to Tallow Beach - a short drive away with excellent surf and the fact that it's huge and on the other side of a protected forest means it's pretty quiet...

Those two boards in the back are my new orange one - a 7" gunned Island shortboard and Mike's deathtrap - both bargainous as they were pretty dinged - all fixed now thanks to my aweseome repair skills.
And this is little Byron Bay from the drive in - tiny innit?

2006-11-04T05:15:00.000Z

We found Osama Bin Laden in out hostel.

I made him some pasta.

2006-10-29T05:17:00.000Z

Just had a few rather insane days in Brisbane - Mike was back from fruit picking and I fancied a drive so I met him there.

I do not remember this photo but these damn machines are in every pub and usually being used by a fat person. Known as Pokies and they are even more boring and confusing than fruit machines. I think the top prize is a dolphin or something.
I won 20 cents.
My new found wealth caused the local women to fall asleep on me after singing kareoke.
Upon our escape I channeled Edwin Starr. I mean what else was I supposed to do?

My excuse: I was excited as we were heading to Wet n' Wild. Yes I am a child.

P.S. Cats in Brisbane are seriously screwed up

2006-10-25T02:55:00.000+01:00

Woo Woo look what I did the other day!
Yeah it's the worst photo in the world - I'll post a better one soon....

I bloody love it.

2006-10-20T09:00:00.000+01:00

Woke up with this photo in the camera this morning - I bought it in Japan as it was shiny.
Just haven't shown it off yet...

2006-10-18T07:42:00.000+01:00

Eughhhh... big night out last night - never made it to bed...

These are the aforementioned deathtrap benches at Cheeky Monkeys. The bruises indicate I fell off them last night too...
....so after talking nonsense for hours, daylight appeared. The Scouser fled for he fears the light. For some reason I fancied a swim so headed to the beach just as the sun was rising over the cape.

Go go purdy photos. Impressive given the state I was in.

2006-10-18T06:54:00.000+01:00

Hurrah! My eyes are better!

Things are looking up now - I've got a job at the brilliant Hogs Breath Cafe, which is very much like the Hard Rock Cafe really - good steaks and very chilled out, I can wear sneakers and shorts to work! The pay's pretty good so if I take things vaguely easy I should actually save some money while I 'm here!

I've also gone and bought a car - it's a Ford Fairmont 4 litre automatic, really comfy, good stereo, it's going to be ideal for getting around Oz. Only $1500 too - I'm pretty certain I can get more cash for it when I sell it in Sydney too!
Check out that exhaust.... makes a good racket...
So the plan is to stay here until december time then head down to Sydney for xmas. Mike went off up to Bunderburg about a week ago as he seemed to think he could make his fortune picking fruit. I'm not bothering with all that nonsense, and I've met some far more intellectual people at the hostel.
I'm also booked in for a trip of 3 days 4x4ing on Fraser island and 3 days catamaran sailing in the Whitsundays. Mike's probably doing all that with Adam in the next few weeks, whereas I'm waiting until February when the lovely Elz is coming to visit so we're both going then! Yay!

2006-10-12T01:56:00.000+01:00

I think glasses are my Kyrptonite.

Been in them for 4 days now thanks to an eye infection and I'm going mental. I can do nothing.

No surfing as I can't see the waves.

No going out as smoke kills my eyes, and I am far too vain and I simply hate walking around wearing glasses as it makes me dizzy.

So I read a lot - Breaking Vegas and Bringing Down the House most recently - both ace. I want to go play blackjack till I get threatened with guns...

Oh and saw Thankyou for Smoking - acetastic

Ho Hum - eyes might be fixed tomorrow.

2006-10-10T07:57:00.000+01:00

Ok, I think I broke the YouTube thingy by leaving jam in the case... Should be fixed now though.. it cut out early before...

Oh and I found even more pictures from Tokyo but photobucket has decided to ignore me... I never promised I'd call or anything... *sigh*

Oh no - got it working! Woo! I can't be arsed to explain them - they are from Tokyo, most taken by Mike one is the aforementioned hooker

2006-10-07T05:33:00.000+01:00

So... Byron Bay...

I love the place, been here 2 weeks now and I'm getting worried I might never leave...

Surf, Sun, Good bars, Good people, no Pandas. - It's ideal!

We're about 300 feet from the sea, which is beautifully warm and often has waves for me to play in.

Things I do most days:
Get up 8ish, wander over to the beach and check out surf.
If hungover, combat it with coffee, if not go for run or swim. Lunch: Subway next door. Afternoon: Surf in beautifully warm water complete with occasional humpback whales and the odd dolphin :)

Evening: Poker in the hostel

Followed by heading to one of the local bars - usually Cheeky Monkeys which stands out for it's dancefloor containing metal tables bolted to the floor that one is supposed to dance on. I just seem to fall off a lot.

Other things we have done:
Saw a Big Thing - namely a prawn
Hired a car and somehow ended up in Surfer's Paradise
... where we were also kicked out of a casino.
Went to Australia's most easterly point as it was just round the corner..

and so on and so on.

The only problem so far is that I am yet to find a job - there doesn't seem to be much going but then again I'm not spending much as thankfully surfing all day is free.

Mehehehe

2006-10-06T06:04:00.000+01:00

Remember how nice train conductors are? Telling jokes and giving advice on where to go and bringing you freshly cooked lasagne to your seat? No? Try doing the overnight to Brisbane...

after 16 hours of Zoo Magazine obsessed aussies, mental conductors and the obligatory poker playing swedish girls we chugged happily into Brisbane and wandered up to our hostel - Bananna Benders Backpackers... this gave mike's quote of the day:

"It might be a gay place. Let's only stay for a day"

So first things first we set out to the biggest tourist attraction in Bisbane, (or Brizzle as I call it, much to the annoyance of the locals) - the Castlemaine brewery! Lured by the promise of 4 free drinks we did the tour. Which rocked. As did the free beers. Yum.
The hostel was sodding boring though - people reading books and bed at 10. Tut tut.

Headed off to Australia Zoo the next day - home of the late great Steve Irwin. There was a pretty odd atmosphere about that place as they'd held his memorial only 2 days before. There were shrines everywhere for him.
The zoo was brilliant - much more relaxed than others I've been to. So low-fived an elephant as one does in those situations.
Then after watching the snake, bird and croc show we saw kangaroos wandering around...

Tom: "Crikey mate - there's a flaming Kangaroo"

Mike: "Let's fuck him up!" (sorry parents!)

Instead Mike underthechinned him.
Whereas I was busy pointing out shiny things to his wife
Then yes, of course Suze, I found a Koala who was completely battered on Eucalyptus Barbituates as most Koalas commonly are. Good Lad.
I did try to low-five a kangaroo - but the silly bint didn't quite get it...
Oh and you know how London has Squirrels wandering about the place? - Placating tourists and scoring crack? - Well Australia has lizards. Two foot long ones. This one had a heroin habit.
He's called Gary.

2006-10-05T03:00:00.000+01:00

Not drinking for a full 26 hours has caused some more memories to stir. I managed to track down evidence of this.

7am. Trashed on Sake. Pestered by hookers. Throats raw from glorious kareoke. We invented a new sport. We invented a new life.

Plus Mike's a coward

2006-10-03T06:13:00.000+01:00

Not got time to get more stuff up today - just wanted to gloat a little...

We're pretty much on the edge of the beach on the far-right. Notice the perfect sets of waves near the rocks.

They are my friends.

2006-10-02T01:42:00.000+01:00

Note: The ibooks thrown a strop at me and has decided not to work - in doing so the little sod has trapped a fair few of my photos on it so there will be some gaps... damm them all!

UPDATE: ibook fixed! - Amazing what peanut butter can do...

Much time in Sydney was spent doing err... "Backpacker admin" - so apart from further familiarising ourselves with the mighty VB there were extortionate Citibank accounts to open and forwarding addresses to arrange...

So we raced through that and hit Bondi Beach. Reminded me of Newquay but more of and elbow than the armpit or Cornwall... if you get my drift.

Bondi was cool though - Mike and I went for a quick swim and of course quickly got caught in a nasty rip tide... tsk tsk - at least in Cornwall rips have the common decency to let you know they're there - not here! The bastard things just remove you from your innocent bodysufing and gleefully deposit you slap bang in the middle of the surf area full of fast moving and unforgiving local surfers...

I found this hilarious as I often do when I am about to face serious injury/death. Mike didn't see the funny side nor did he appreciate my constant laughing or High-fiving. We eventually got back to shore without a violent death and while Mike proceeded to sit on the beach I quickly got back in the water with a rented board and fellow Cornwall escapee Adam (whom we met at the hostel) in tow.

Didn't die! Although I got lots of funny looks for just wearing a rashvest - apparently 18 degrees is cold for australians! Pah!

We also went to Manly at some point to get some surfing in there. Wisely we fortified ourselves with a 1.5 litre mug of Mango beer first of course.
Sadly it was crappy blownout surf but I like the place - I'd be happy to come back at some point.

Had quite a few nights out in the hostel bar of all places and basically went out with the collected members of our room and a canadian I caught...
Unfortunatelty after one of these nights we had an RSA (Responsible Service of Alcohol) course to do - quite an irony hearing about how one must not serve intoxicated people when one is still a bit tipsy from the night before... but at least I can work in a bar now...

Oh we also saw "An Inconvenient Truth" in Sydney - it's an amazing film. Go see it. All of you.

Go Go Night train To Brisbane

2006-09-30T03:14:00.000+01:00

As some of you may have guessed this blog's around a week delayed... I've been in Byron Bay for a week now and I'm still writing about Sydney. There are three reasons for this.

1. I'm generally surfing or far too drunk to write anything... (oh, and too busy jobhunting, mum)

2. It takes me a week to dredge up a memory of any single night, and about as long to extract anything useful from Mike.

3. Court ordered silences.

But too proud and excited to wait to post this - I bought a new surfboard!
So a red, and incredibly pretty locally shaped 7'6" board for 250quid with a decent travel bag. That's awesome. The board rides really well and more importantly matches my boardies and is really good for hitting Mike with.

Go Go Uneccessary Violence

2006-09-26T01:01:00.000+01:00

Ok, after flying 10 hours straight on both BA and Quantas I can categorically state that BA SUCKS. Quantas is the don - better food, huge legroom even in economy, hotter, friendlier cabin crew and as much Victoria Bitter as you can drink. Those of you that promised/threatened to come visit me in the new year - FLY QUANTAS.

So fortified with a Krispy Kreme I arranged transport into town to our hostel. I say hostel, I mean UBER hostel - that place was huge.

Quickly dumped stuff and had a wander through town... wasn't too impressed at first really, our hostel was naturally in a crappier part of town and we had just come from Tokyo. Ended up at Circular Quay which despite being a tourist bucket it is pretty special - the harbour is an astonishing sight and it turns out that giant cruise ship The World was there...

Cue a fine Aussie steak and Schooner of VB by the seafront and we wandered round the corner to the Opera House... and the first thing Mike said:

"Yeah, whatever"
I thought it was ace - it's a pretty mental building.. the only downside was this:
We come all this way and what's on at the Opera House? Pirates of Bloody Penzance. Where I grew up. I contemplated setting fire to something before having a little sleepie in the (very pretty) Botanical Gardens instead.

I'd like to say I woke up with a Kangaroo licking my face but in actual truth it was a stray page of the local paper blowing over causing me to wake up in an embarrasing panic as I thought it was an unfeasably big spider. Or Russel Crowe. Yeah, whatever.

Sydney's alright.

2006-09-24T06:57:00.000+01:00

Hmmm, where to start where to start... well believe it or not we did actually do things other than drink in Tokyo - upon arrival it was full on Cornish style rain, and it stayed that way for 2 days.

To make matters worse, my hectic week of goodbye drinking had taken it's toll and I manged to pick up a minor cold which kicked in at the airport, so after almost missing the plane by naturally being in the pub too long I was sniffling and blowing my nose all the way there. Little did I know until just before we landed that blowing one's nose is EXTREMELY rude in Japan. So half the plane hated me and I kept having to go to the toilet to blow my nose.

Mike also manged to seriously offend the owners at out first restaurant - after a tasty Ramen bowl he tried to tip them (300 yen - cheapskate) this is also VERY offensive in Japan. So we just did one before they could shout at us.

Had a quick wander down to Ginza - a very classy part of town where our route was determined by what shiny things tempted me down the road.... Early bedtime in the hostel (which we couldn't find thanks to the crazy Japanese address system) - 8 hour jetlag after foolishly not sleeping on the flight sucks.

So next day was tourist day - a quick visit to the Imperial palace where this is about as close as you can get:
Then on to the paliament buliding (cops here have LightSabres!)
Then to Roppongi - very sohoish and mad - with a trendy bit with a giant spider:
and oddly enough a smoking cell - you can't smoke in the streets in Japan so they stick you in these... they were not amused by me tapping on the windows like they were in a zoo.. oh well
Wandered for ages toward Minoai temple in the west, saw an amusing shop in the way:

... again, they were not amused by me tapping on the windows like they were in a zoo.. some people...

So we made it to the temple - beautiful place - you have to purify your soul at the font before you enter..

of course I needed purifing...

Under a tree there was a bank of prayer tablets - anyone can write them, check out the one bottom right.

Then on to Ashzuka - the crazy electronics area... we splashed out well on those new 8gig iPod nanos.. only 130quid! - score!

Had a few bevvies on the terrace with some of the other people staying there... I say a few... I think I got to be at about 5am...
Big hangover cured by tasty Ramen breakfast at a place down the road that I'm sure was the family's front room - ace.

On to the Sumo which we were lucky to catch - dragged a couple of girls from the hostel along with us too. Sumo is rather engrossing - there's a huge ritual around the whole thing with lots of bowing and singing and salt throwing. We got the cheapo seats and quickly wandered down to the pricey bit with the requisite Japanese style sitting on the floor cushions.

Back via dinner and procurement of Jap version of special brew and sake from a carton... decided to go out in Roppongi with Phil and Jhonny from the hostel - most of that trainwreck of a night is documented below. But I've found a few more foters..

.. you can't drink alcohol in the street so decanting Sake into a vimto can seemed like the best idea
and there was much kissing of mr. incredible

And of course the requisite gurning too
So yeah, got in at some stupid time.. 8am or something - after a nap we had to check out. Cue a guilty KFC as we had appauling hangovers and I couldn't taste anything anyway.

Naturally we almost missed the plane to Sydney despite horrendous amounts of running through the airport with a still diminishing hangover but we got there in the end.

I have to say Tokyo was amazing - the food, the customs - I love it. I want to go back. It's also not as expensive as I feared... yes beer is slightly pricier than London but everything else, especially food is far cheaper, even the tube.

A quick photo montage from Japan...

2006-09-19T09:47:00.000+01:00

Our hostel "bar" (or patio where we drink... ahem)

Mr Incredible needs cash for big night of Ho'in

Making an exhibition of ourselves in Roppongi

I found some unbelieveably stupid american girls... well you can guess where we went from there...

Yes of course we did Kareoke - the rason for my slightly diseveled appearance is that it's about 4am and I've been power drinking Sambuca since 10. Americans take note: YOU WILL NEVER OUT-DRINK ME! (i think the other guy ended up in hospital...)

I love this girl. I want to marry this girl. She was our biggest fan.

Or she was our waitress... I forget.

That guy was our minder.. or something.

Got out of the club in daylight - of course we were surpised.

Picture taken by a hooker who was after my ass. FACT

Oh and then we went to a fish market... not sure how or why...

Pub now - I promise a more coherent post later.

Big Love
T xx

P.S. Izzy's just left Ramsay St and is preggers with Karl's baby... MWhahahah!!!
xx

Aha! I seem to have got it working!

2006-09-17T01:43:00.000+01:00

Ok, I thought I'd broken this thing... told you I had no idea how to use it!

Tra la la.. anyway - apologies for not posting yet - Tokyo was far far far to insane to sleep let alone watse time here.

Stories and photos are coming soon but for the meantime my mobile over here is +61four4 8 65 oh- 493

Beach Time!
x

2006-08-14T21:52:00.000+01:00

Just seeing if I can post pictures properly.... if it works you should see the legend that is Tim.

Look at him go, he's having a whale of a time.

Go Go Snow Dog

Test Godammit!

2006-08-14T21:48:00.000+01:00

Go Go Initial Blasphemy...