I really have been getting quite bad at updating you all on our exploits recently and return to the blogger-sphere once again after being prompted by the parents that people keep asking what we’ve been up to. Last time my excuse was that I’d had Chris over and we had been on holiday to Vanuatu, and that this had kept me busy and I’d just not got around to sitting in front of the keyboard to inform all and sunder what we’d done over those weeks. This time my excuse reads as follows:
“I’ve not updated you all because we’ve been on holiday and had Tim over and therefore haven’t had time to sit in front of ... yah-di-dah-di-dah...” I think you can guess the rest.
December brought to us the second half of Emma’s Emergency Department (ED) term and one which although she was going through pretty well and not having much problem with, was one which she really didn’t want to be doing and thus came the request early in the placement that we should take as many opportunities as possible to go away during her days off. This was why we went to Vanuatu at the earliest chance, and why in December we decided to head off to Byron Bay. Byron Bay is one of the places that many people we’ve met both in the UK and over here have told us we should take time out to go and visit due to its range of independent shops and restaurants, the quality of the beaches, the sea and the surf. Byron is 750km north of Sydney and we’d picked the week before Christmas to go on our trip. During the weeks leading up to going we found out that lots of people all had time off and we all decided to go up together. One friend was going out with a multi-millionaire who owned a place up on the coast of Byron and had offered to let us stay there. This we were all ecstatic about as it was described to us as a little more that your ‘average’ holiday home. It backed onto the beach with its own beach access, had a large pool looking out to sea, and had 8 bedrooms and as many bathrooms, most with fantastic views. How lucky were we to be able to stay somewhere like that?
It turns out that we weren’t. The weekend before we went the guy who owned it went AWOL after having a christmas party with his work colleagues and as we were meant to be leaving on the Monday and had no idea where he was, what he was doing and whether he had suddenly decided he didn’t want 15 strangers staying in his mansion, we took the step of booking a sizeable, but nowhere near as big, apartment approximately 400m from the beach. The guy was finally tracked down that evening, but didn’t apologise for not being contactable and after saying he’d meet us at Byron on Tuesday, didn’t appear when we got there citing that he essentially didn’t like being ‘told off’ by his girlfriend when he was old enough to look after himself. Suffice to say, that although she’d been promised many lavish Christmas presents, including a Porsche 911 GT3 RS, she didn’t stay with him much longer!!
As it turns out the apartment we booked was of a decent enough size to sleep us all with a few people taking blow up beds and the sofas, but all in all I believe that it made for a more enjoyable break as we were actually in a better location for all the nightlife, even if we did have to drive to get to the better surf beach. Em and I drove up with Freyja on Tuesday and the other guys arrived in Byron on Wednesday after spending a couple of days driving up the coast and checking out a few surf spots on their way.
Byron is a town which, other than some commercialisation, looks like it hasn’t changed much from the 1970s. I saw more shops selling handmade clothing, beads and tie-dyed clothing than I’ve seen for many a year, and the number of men and women who look like they arrived in the town in the back of a camper in 1972 and hadn’t left was astonishing. I’ve never seen so many dreadlocks attached to the people in their 60s! It was this characteristic of being lost in time that made the town so friendly and welcoming.
Whilst in Byron, we went down to the beach on most days after having breakfast in one of the many cafes. Em discovered a lot of small boutique-style shops on the first day we were there, ably helped by Freyja who had lived in Byron for six months prior to moving to Avoca and working in Gosford with Emma, so when we weren’t on the beach you could generally find us going round shops hunting for Christmas presents (or at least that was Em’s excuse, even if she was buying most things for herself) or enjoying the restaurants and bars of the town. The surf seemed really impressive, although I didn’t go and try to catch any waves myself (as I was trying to rapidly get through a John Grisham book I’d picked up at the house), and the water was incredibly warm - like taking a warm bath!
After Byron we headed back to Terrigal to get ready for Christmas. A couple of days of manic shopping ensued and Freyja and I planned our big Christmas dinner epic. We had decided a few months back to do a Christmas day lunch for all the English doctors and Australians who were not going to be at home or with family for Christmas and by this point had got 17 people confirmed for the day. We spent a couple of days shopping for the food as we were doing two turkeys and a whole barramundi fish along with all the usual trimmings which were this year taken from Nigella.
Christmas day came and we started off with the good old present swapping. Em and I had got Iz a new guitar to take with her to Tasmania, and she got us a Wii Fit which I’m sure will get plenty of use. I started off cooking one of the turkeys and some of the veg then headed over with Em to Freyja’s where we were going to be eating and dropped her off with a load of crockery, cutlery and a large Tiramisu I’d made the day before. I then went home on my own to finish cooking the turkey and headed back once it was done with it in the footwell of the car and praying that it didn’t slop any of the juices over the side on the way. When I got back everyone was there and Bill had also brought some steaks to cook on the BBQ along with the fish. Freyja’s turkey had just come out and we were just waiting on the last of the potatoes to finish cooking. It took about 10 minutes to get everyone their food and then we finally got to eat :) It all went down well and I don’t think there was anything left other than a small bit of turkey. 18 hours later we finally stopped drinking and fell asleep (or should that be passed out??) - let me just say that it was a very good day!!
This long day of drinking knocked on to the following days plan - namely picking Tim up from the airport in the morning. Well that didn’t happen, but he wasn’t too fussed about getting the train over to Gosford, so I went and picked him up a few hours later once I’d recovered somewhat. Was great to see him and we were pretty impressed to hear after a few minutes that he really liked what he’d seen of Oz so far and was tempted to stay if he could. We would try and work on him more over the next few weeks!
Tim’s flight was, as you’ve probably figured, carried out over Christmas Eve and Christmas Day with him landing that morning - Boxing Day. Asked what it was like on the plane for Christmas he said that it wasn’t that different from a normal flight, except for the couple dressed in what looked like very uncomfortable polyester-looking father christmas outfits somewhere down the front of the plane!
We’d not made any specific plans for Tim’s visit as he was happy just to see what life was like in Terrigal so we just did quite a few things around the locality. We went surfing a couple of times down in Avoca with Sunny, we visited Palm Beach (Home and Away land), visited the Australian Reptile Park so that Tim could see some wildlife, saw the pelicans up at the entrance, and generally just went out for days around Terrigal.
A couple of highlights were New Years Eve celebrations in Sydney and a trip over to Melbourne to drive some of the Great Ocean Road.
New Year was pretty spectacular in that we went on a harbour cruise which had been arranged by Jenna, another of the English doctors, for a group of us. Em, Izzy, Tim and I went down as well as a number of friends so it was a good group and we all had a good laugh. Food and drink was included in the ticket price, so it was another, in Em’s terms, ‘messy night’! The fireworks were incredible and we had a fantastic view from the boat as we stopped in a location that allowed us to see the Opera House, Harbour Bridge and the CBD which all looked spectacular with the illumination from the 5 tonnes of explosives that were let off in those 15 minutes of extravagance to welcome in the new year. We got back to dock at about quarter to 1 and then wandered over to a house party at the home of one of Jenna’s friends. After another few hours we headed back to Central station and took a train back home at around 6am which got us home somewhere between 8 and 9. We then spent most of the day asleep before heading to the beach once more :)
Melbourne was one of my favourite bits of Tim’s visit. We’d been chatting about it and trying to figure out various ways of getting around once we were there. We both decided that we had to try and do it in style, so we looked initially at Harleys so that Tim could ride the road - that would have meant I had to ride pillion and once we saw the prices we figured that wasn’t such a great idea. We then thought V8s.
We’d seen loads of old Mustangs around the place so the next plan was to get one of those, but the only place I could find that hired them out had none in stock for the days that we wanted to go.
I then looked into Aussie V8s. This was either Holden or Ford, and as Ford is ... well ... Ford, we decided on Holden. I ended up at supercarrentals.com.au which showed us some pretty stonkingly powerful HSVs (Holden Specialist Vehicles) and the manufacturers of the Monaro and the R8 Clubsport which the Vauxhall VXR8 is based on. We dropped them a line and they had some in stock. Excellent!! Em realised that she could come with us as she got rid of a shift to Rhys and didn’t have to be back until the Wednesday night shift - so the plan was to let Em and Tim go on the insurance as Em wants to get herself a V8 Ute at some point in the future and I figured now was as good a time as any to let her try.
We also decided to book a Bridgeclimb for Tim and Em to do in the morning before we left for Melbourne, so booked them in for 7.50am on the Monday morning.
Now comes the fun part! Sunday.
We went to the beach (again :-)!!) and Tim and Sunny went for a surf. I didn’t feel like going in the day (can’t remember why) so sat and watched them for a bit. Em then decided to go for a swim late in the afternoon with Sunny. Sunny told Em that the easiest way to get through the breakers and into the quieter water is to run in and basically run and leap through the small breakers. This they did and they swam around for a bit - Em seemed to be having the most fun in the water I’ve seen her have since we moved out here - and all was good. Until she got out.
Em hobbled back as she’d bashed her little toe and figured she’d sprained it so just lay down with her foot up for a bit. Then it was time to go home and Em couldn’t put any weight through her foot ... problem. I asked if it was ok and she said it was probably just badly sprained and twisted, but it hadn’t really swollen at all. We went home and she iced it for a few hours. We then went out to a BBQ - I drove as Em obviously couldn’t walk very well and whilst there Sunny looked at it and told Em to go and get an X-Ray. What harm could it do as even if it wasn’t broken, she knew everyone in the department and would be in and out in a relatively short space of time. We figured we may as well go and on the way Em said she reckoned it was broken as it was painful in a specific spot (apparently one pretty good sign of being a break).
2 hours later we were driving home with a bunch of X-Rays showing a busted 5th metatarsel and a walking boot for Em to wear to keep it immobilised.
So to Monday. Em now couldn’t go on the Bridgeclimb and as she was immobile we figured the only thing we could do was leave her at a cafe in Sydney with all the bags and wait whilst I went with Tim. The original plan had been for me to turn up with the bags mid morning and meet up with the two of them post climb, but Em couldn’t manage one bag, let alone 2!! We went off - glad to say that our manic waving on the way up wasn’t wasted as Em did see a couple of people waving whilst she sat having her coffee. I’d watched all the other people and none had been waving so it must have been us :) I got a ‘climb-master’ certificate as it was my 3rd climb which entitled me to a free pic which I gave to Tim.
Once in Melbourne we found the guy from the hire car company and he showed us to our vehicle for the next couple of days. Mmmmmm.....
Lets just say that it sounded as good as, if not better than, it looked. Tim took the 1st stint and we headed into town - not the most pleasurable past-time as not only are there trams to look out for there are also the dreaded ‘hook junctions’. These are an invention only the people of Australia could come up with. Because of the trams taking priority in the centre of the street, certain junctions don’t allow you as a car driver to sit in the right hand lane to wait to turn right as you would get wiped out by passing trams. To get around this, you have to indicate right, but pull into the left hand lane and sit and wait by the pavement until the lights turn red. Once they turn red you have to floor it and pray that you make it across the junction before the oncoming traffic gets you. It isn’t too bad if you are the first car in the line, but when you are 3rd back ... it can make for a situation that requires a change of underwear as you see three lanes of traffic all accelerating toward you! I had always thought that I liked the idea of living in Melbourne more than Sydney, but after experiencing driving in that city, I’d much prefer Sydney any day! Lets just say that if it wasn’t for the fact I have sat-nav on my phone, we would probably still be there trying to navigate the one-way system and trying to avoid the toll-roads.
We headed down to Philip Island that evening after failing to get in on any Neighbours related tour/evening etc. as they were all booked out (obviously a lot of back packers had headed to Melbourne for New Year). This wasn’t a bad thing as it gave us a chance to see how fast the car could accelerate. We later found out that 0-60 takes just 4.5 seconds! We got to Philip Island around 6 and went down to the Philip Island race track which hosts the Moto GP championship each year. We were amazed at how small the venue is - not a massive amount of infrastructure and around an hour and a half from the centre of Melbourne, so not entirely accessible either. The gift shop was still open so we went round there for a bit before heading off to find the penguins.
Philip Island hosts the only colonies of the Little Penguin in Victoria and each night the adults return to the nests after a day of fishing out at sea. We hadn’t read anything about this but had heard a great deal about it, so after turning up at 7, we then found out that the penguins weren’t expected until 9. We hadn’t brought any particularly thick clothing with us, so as it began to hit dusk, and the wind picked up from the sea we soon began to wonder whether it was all worth it. We’d not spotted any food stalls on the way down to the view point, so I decided that I would stroll back to the main centre and have another look around to see if there was any food available (other than the pop corn stand we’d spotted) to give us some kind of sustenance as it was looking doubtful that we would actually be eating anything that evening. Thankfully, tucked around the corner from the massive gift shop selling everything from fluffy penguins and penguin chocolate drops, to penguin paperweights and penguin t-shirts, I discovered a small cafe that wouldn’t have looked out of place in one of the M6 Services. I rang Em to get an order from the guys and Tim came up to give me a hand with all the drinks and food. We got back to Em and all of us were really looking forward to the burger and chips, or pizza and chips that I’d bought and as we started to eat, we all looked at each other and asked if everyone else’s was cold? It was. After taking 3-5 minutes of walking outside with a sea breeze blowing and trying not to drop the hot-chocolate and coffee, the wind had managed to cool down all the food to a temperature bordering on stone cold.
Let me just say that even though we’d gone through all this, the sight of groups of 20 or so little penguins appearing on the beach in the dark and occasionally being scared off by seagulls and running back to the safety of the water was worth it. Once they plucked up the courage to make a dash for the safety of the heath, the sight of all those penguins waddling across the sand was one I’ll remember for a long time to come. After watching this for a good half hour or so, we headed back to the board walk which led to the visitor centre and joined the hundreds of people watching the final segment of the penguin’s journey back to their burrows. This was great as we were only a few feet away from the penguins which by now were finding their way back home with the help of the calls from their chicks. As we got back to the car park, we saw signs telling us to check under our cars for penguins before moving off. We didn’t think that the penguins would be that far from the beach, but as we were saying this, we spotted a penguin running along between the bushes just next to where our car was parked - so I got down for a quick look before starting on the drive to the hotel. Tim and Em were pretty shattered, and they soon fell asleep as I drove back. We got to the hotel around 11 - obviously the last to check in, and I guess the hotel staff were glad we’d got there as they could leave ... oops! The room was very nicely furnished, with two rooms - right in the heart of St Kilda. If we’d been up for some nightlife or restaurants there were plenty right on the doorstep, but as it was we just wanted to get some sleep. Tim complained of a slightly stiff foot, but we figured it had just swollen a bit after the flight in the morning and other than that we all just wanted to get some sleep.
Next day we decided to head over to ‘Ramsay Street’ otherwise known as Pin Oak Court as we hadn’t been able to get on the tour. Tim drove over there and we were there in about 40 mins. A few photos later, we headed back into the car to drive over to the Great Ocean Road - about a 2 hour drive in the opposite direction. We got to the start of the road about 2 o’clock and stopped for some sandwiches. Tim handed the keys over and I started the drive down the Great Ocean Road headed for the twelve apostles - a rocky outcrop a little bit like the needles off the Isle of Wight. I stopped every now and then for either view points or to let Em walk around as the pain killers she was on were making her feel pretty rough. On one occasion Em got out and saw her first snake - Tim and I both went out to look at it, but it had slithered off into the undergrowth. At around 5pm we got to the twelve apostles and got out. It was at this point we realised how good the air conditioning was as throughout the day the temperature had been steadily climbing towards 40 degrees. We stepped out of our 17 degree car into what the car was saying was 38 degrees! It was like stepping into a oven!! Tim took the keys for the run home and we stopped in a small town for some food - as it was getting late we figured that a meal wouldn’t be a great idea as we’d be back to the hotel late again, so we just stopped at subway as they did a vegie meal for Em. We got back to Melbourne around half 9 and realised we were passing Albert Park so we turned around and headed into the park and onto the F1 circuit. We got out and had a wander around the Pit lane complex which in the off season is used for sporting events. It was still 33 degrees outside so again it was like stepping into an oven as we exited the car. A number of games of football/basket ball and badminton appeared to be going on upstairs with the odd pit garage being used as meeting places for the organisers of touch rugby, netball and other organisations. Took a number of pictures and then headed on a drive around the track. You can drive all of the track bar one corner which has a gate on it, so we had to drive out of the park and then back in to rejoin the track on the other side of the gate. It was great to see the circuit and to see how narrow one of the sections of the track was as it passed between the trees and a large building neither Tim or I remembered ever seeing on the TV coverage.
Headed back to the hotel and got some kip. Took the car back to the rental company in the morning then got a taxi back to the airport. Turned out it cost 4 dollars more for the taxi than it did to get the car picked up from the airport, so we missed out there. Back in Sydney we left Tim to go round the city once more and I took Em back. We decided when we got to Gosford to go and speak to the HR people to see if Em could take the day off as her foot was still hurting. They said she should take the week off and go back on Monday if she felt up to it, so it was definitely worth the trip.
Picked Tim up in the evening and then headed over to meet Em at a BBQ. When we got there Tim told Em his foot had really swollen up as he couldn’t get a shoe on when he got back. To quote Tim “If I was going to get ill there’s no better place than at a BBQ full of doctors”. After much prodding, poking and people going “oo, that doesn’t look good”, it was down to one of two things; either really bad sunburn or cellulitis caused by something biting his foot. Em was on the cellulitis camp and wanted to take Tim to hospital there and then, but one of the docs was a registrar and she thought it was bad sunburn so the plan was to mark Tim’s foot and see if the redness spread overnight. It did, and the following night we headed off to Emergency as Tim was going on his flight home the next day. They agreed with the probable diagnosis of cellulitis, so Em took his blood and got him ready for one of her friends to come along and give her diagnosis and prescribe drugs. He had a course of antibiotics and was given a couple of injections to thin his blood for the flight in case the swelling was related to a possible DVT. So with Em’s toe and Tim’s foot we were just waiting for something to happen to me next!
Took Tim to Gosford the next day and I’m glad to say that although he had a bit of pain on his last flight, he got back safely and the antibiotics worked and the last I heard the swelling had gone down and his GP was happy that it was all ok. In fact the GP was quite pleased to be able to write in his notes that he’d had cellulitis caused by a possible spider bite (we think may be a white tail had got him in his sleep) as we have seen the odd spider around the house.
Current status is Em is trying to reduce the amount of time she has to wear her boot. As we are in the middle of a warm spell on the east coast (and a heat wave in the south) it is getting pretty uncomfortable wearing a boot all day.
I’ve also applied to various companies for a job as we are now currently in Australia until Jan 2010 and maybe longer if Emma gets onto a training program over here. Had a call back on Friday and one job sounds very similar to what I was doing back home, but it turns out it is north of Newcastle and therefore around a 3 hour round trip each day, so unless the pay is VERY good, I will probably be turning that one down. Waiting to see what comes from the other agents I got in touch with.
Apologies for the extensive posting, but I guess it is my own fault for not updating it for a long time!
Tootle pip,
