From Brissie over Syd to Mel

G’day!

Just a (more or less) small recap of the last days/weeks.
After we started from the big pinnaple we drove down the 100km to Brisbane.
We first had trouble to find an accomodation because the hostel we wanted to stay in (near “The Valley” – a great party place) was

completely booked. We found 2 free beds in a nice hostel in the city and just had some problems finding a car park, but luckily I have the

same ability as my mum: getting a car park wherever and at whatever time without searching longer than 5 mins.

We couldn’t really go out that night because of Jochen’s shoulder, so we just went to “The Valley” to have a look. Damn, I haven’t seen so

many crazy people for a long time
We left pretty early the next day to search a physio for Jochen in the city but they couldn’t help him and just gave us some contact

details for a few physios in Surfers Paradise where we wanted to be the next day.
After seeing the doctor we caught up with Darren who was my personal tour guide when I was in Brisbane for work the first time (4-5 weeks

before). I have good memories about this tour and the “aftershow” at darrens place playing guitarhero until 1 am (we both had to work

the next day)
We did a small walk around the city (of course it started raining), southbank and the botanical gardens before we had a coffee and then

left for Surfers Paradise.

Southbank – they just built a small rainforest there.

Mangroves at the bontaical gardens

On the way to Surfers Paradies

I had to get my camera from the backseat while driving to take this picture and almost had a crash (not really) – it was worth it

(lol@dave – you love this picture don’t u? )

In Surfers it was – of course – raining. The whole day, the whole night. As usual we wanted to stay near the beach but a nice police

officer reminded us that we are not allowed to stay there. “I’ll be back in a couple of hours and you shouldn’t be here any more then.

*whispering* I hate these fucking wild campers…”
So we looked up the address of one of the physios and just stayed the night on their car park to go there straight away on the next

morning.
The Physio tied Jochen’s shoulders back (with normal tape) so that they were more stabalised. She was a really nice lady and charged only

20 bucks for that. Normally you would probably pay 60-80$ just to SEE the doctor.

Bins in surfer outfit

After a short walk through the rainy city of Surfers we decided to drive down to Byron Bay, the most eastern point of Australia.

Bye bye Surfers…

We picked up a hitchhiker on the way. A guy called Val (Valentine) who was working in a hostel in Byron Bay. We dropped him off and booked

two beds in the same hostel in a funny teepee (2$ cheaper) . Imagine a big teepee with an oven in the middle and 10 beds around it. The

hostel “Art Factory” was really cool. They had a cafe and cinema next door where we got free wlan – something special here in Australia

. The main “living room” in the hostel had a big fireplace, 2 pool tables and heaps of comfy tables where everybody was playing games

like poker, monopoly, etc…

Massive waves at the beach of byron bay. Probably the biggest we’ve seen on the whole trip.

The day after we drove (I drove – Jochen was sleeping ) almost 800 km (12-14 hours) down from Byron Bay to Newcastle. Newcastle is a

little city 100 km north of Sydney where the huge tanker was stranded on the beach a few month ago. We arrived late at night and just

stayed somewhere near the beach on a car park. Luckily it was exactly the same beach where the tanker stranded. The next day we made yummy

pancakes, went to the city to get a 80$ parking fee (we parked 15 mins too long!) and then caught up with one of the Siemens sales guys I

got to know in Sydney. He’s a damn funny guy

The beach…

Mine?

Compare this…

…and this picture a few month ago.

Sunrise…

The next day we drove down to Sydney where we had booked two nights in a hostel called “Wake up”. Jochen once saw a ‘documentation’ about

this hostel on Vox tours, a german tv show.
We first drove to the Blue Mountains in the west of Sydney and had a few nice walks. Unfortunately it was raining and Jochen had pain

again so we left in the early afternoon for Sydney.

Blue Mountains

Sydney…

We searched a car park in the city of Sydney and at this point a good advice: Never, NEVER try to park in Sydney . The parking fares are

around 18-25 $ a day plus another 20$ if you want to stay overnight. We found a hidden car park in a little alley only a few hundret

meters away from our hostel and just left our van there. You just had to press a button to get in and the guy on the intercom (nobody else

was protecting the car park) said that we had to buy a token to get out again. Our idea was to just go there (after the 2 days) and say

that we just stayed a few hours .

The hostel was pretty nice. Clean, big and a bit anonymous but really cool people and a nice bar downstairs . We got to know a few

really nice people in our room the second night. Chandler, a crazy canadian who also broke his collar bone a few weeks ago boarding in NZ

and Katy a really nice german girl.
That was probably one of the coolest nights I had here in Australia. We went to the bottle shop and got some stuff and just spent a few

hours in our room and then went out first to the bar and then to kings cross (where we left 30 mins later…). Kings cross is a funny

area. I have never seen so many prostitutes in such a short time. The average is probably one every five meters and you can’t miss

them!

Hostel in Syd

Katy tieing Jochen’s shoes

The next day we had to get up early to check out and put all our stuff in the van. Oh shit… the van. We totally forgot about that. We

didnt even have a look during the 2 days if it’s still there.
We really thought that it has been towed away or something but when we arrived at the car park everything was fine. Still nobody there who

was paying attention and so we just left the car park. (I’m not sure if it’s relevant that we didn’t buy a token but just followed a car

leaving the car park and probably saved 100$ for parking )

Anyway… we drove to Wicked campers to drop out van off and took a cab back to the city where we walked the whooooole day around, climbed

on of the pylons of the habour bridge, said “hi” to the opera house and got locked into the botanical gardens next to the opera house

because we didnt leave when they told us to leave

More Wicked campers – ours was definitely the best

Jochen cleaning (as good as you can clean with only one arm)

Our bed for the last 4 weeks

I found the sheet the nurse from the hospital in Nambour gave to Jochen. lol

We “found” the yellow sign somewhere on the way between Brissie and Syd. It was standing “near” a McDonalds
We left it in the wicked camper office because te guy liked it

Sydney Tower

Blondie

Nice contrast – old houses in the foreground and the skyline in the background…

On the habour bridge

City…

Habour bridge from the Pylon

On the way to the opera house

Here it is…

The skyline is probably the best thing about Sydney

As I said… we were locked in the botanical gardens with some other guys and had to call a Walker Texas Ranger to open the door for us.

At around 7 pm we left with the probably craziest airport shuttle driver I’ve ever met (he used constanstly 2 lanes, sometimes the wrong

one and crashed almost with 3 cars ) from our hostel to the Airport.
After almost a whole month of awesome fun, crazy trips, smelling vans, powernaps on the highway, the probably best selfcooked food since a

few month, wildcamping on the esplanades of australias eastcoast, sign-steeling-actions, “drug delicts”, alcohol abuses, won or loss competitions and really profund conversations, our great trip had an end.
We flew back to Melbourne and Jochen left a few days later (1 week ago) back to Germany…

I messaged him the other day and he replied: “Its weird to sleep alone – I kinda miss you “
Don’t worry I’ll be back soon

Ben