El Syd

New Year was a lot better than Christmas. Emily and I spent it in a nice self-contained apartment way out in the sticks. Very relaxing and all that.

Since then we've done a fair bit of driving further South. We took an inland route over the Great Dividing Range (big hills) and over the Granite Tablelands area (large granite boulders everywhere). We did a bit of hiking in the Granite Tablelands up and over some alarmingly large granite hills. I started chickening out on the way back down when the slope started to approack 45 degrees. Emily was very patient as I edged my way down.

After that we stopped off in the Hunter Valley wine region, spending one day on a tour of various wineyards in the area. Very pleasant, though to be honest the best thing I tried was the sideline Olive Oil that one of the wineries was making.

We are now in Sydney, having now driven more than 4000 kilometres in Australia. The weather so far has been perfect - lots of sun and clear skies. This is a relief as they've had a bit of rain recently. The Opera House is larger and grander than I had ever imagined, and the harbour bridge is pretty impessive as well. Later in the week we're doing a roped climb over the top of the bridge - finally using the birthday present that Emily got off her Dad last year. Should be good.

We're going to be in Sydney for about a week. We have tickets for the Twenty20 cricket on the 9th (booked by Emily about six months ago!). That and the bridge climb are all we have booked so far (Apart from my Hepititus A & B imminusation next Thursday, but you're probably less interested in that...).

Last night we met up with Cissi and Simon. I know Cissi from Edinburgh about five years ago; she was in the scuba diving club. Her and Simon got married about six months ago and live in the very pleasant Sydney suburb of Manly. We're seeing them tonight for a beer tasting event of some description.

After Sydney we're planning to drive 1000 km West to Broken Hill, out in the Outback. Time to see some desert! Then we're heading South to Melbourne, and flying out on the 28th.

To Thailand. Might be changing our plans about that one...