G'day from the Sunshine Coast

For the last month we have been without regular access to a computer so that's our reason for not blogging more regularly. The computer is available now and it is raining so we will try to catch up with our travels.

On our return to Western Australia from Boxing Day in Melbourne and New Years in Sydney, we made Fremantle our home for almost 2 weeks; it's a wonderful place to experience all sorts of things that we don't see in Montana. The harbor there is busy 24/7 with all sorts of general cargo ships and the huge car carriers. There are restaurants and bars and wonderful pubs all close by. They have a prison built sometime in the 1800's that was used until 1991 for men and 1970's for females. The prison was really a brutal place. The Fremantle Maritime Museum covers the history of Western Australia, the shipwrecks, the America's cup races, the merchant trade, and the different boats that made history there. It was quite an important port for the US navy during WWII. When they had the America's Cup races there in the 1980's, it really revitalized the town - even though America won the races. Some new Fremantle friends, Ari and Wendy directed us to several great pubs. One is called Little Creatures, a brewery that has an eatery also. We enjoyed a kangaroo meat dinner there - it was really tender and tasty, great beer also. The other pub - Clancy's claim to fame is mango beer. It was a great place to eat and to bring the family. One of our greatest joys in finding the mango beer was that since we had heard about it from Patsy and Mike, they were able to join us the next night to test and confirm its authenticity; haven't been able to find that mango beer anywhere else, however, we are still looking!!!!

There is an island just off the coast where the are "little penguins". Also called fairy penguins, these little birds are only about a yard tall, really cute little things. On that island there are all sorts of other sea birds like albatross and terns. It is protected from the mainland by about 300 yards of ocean, very shallow so that you could walk across it, but enough to keep the cats and dogs away. It was a very nice day exploring the island and having a swim in the bay.

On the 17th of January we took a plane to Sydney and rented a car for the rest of our time in Australia. We have gotten lost the other times we have driven in Sydney and this time was no exception. We finally found our way south to the Woolongong area and a motel with an overlook that was amazing. It was perched on a cliff edge overlooking 4 or 5 towns and the ocean surf and coastline for about 30 km. The terminology for things is a little different here as the word college doesn't necessarily mean a school of higher learning; the term can apply to a highschool or a group of doctors also. We were going to Glengarry College which was in a beautiful valley completely surrounded by mountains. This is a school in the woods, grade 9, offering an outdoor enrichment program for a private highschool in Sydney. As school was out at this time we had a great time canoeing and fishing in the Kangaroo Valley with Helen and Dennis Nickel - longtime friends of Dan and Cary Heskett from Kalispell. We saw kangaroos, wallabees, echidnas and wombats, a beautiful star show that night, but no snakes, thank goodness; Australia is home to 8 or 10 of the most dangerous snakes in the world.

Our next trip took us around Sydney instead of through it. We have met numerous local people who also can't figure out how to drive through Sydney so we don't feel too badly. We are now headed to Brisbane in Queensland which is another story. Stay tuned. Russ and Rosie.

Happy New Year from Sydney, New South Wales

Happy New Year from Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. We were on a grassy knoll next to the Opera House with a great view of the bridge in all its glory on New Year's Eve. The reason we had such a great place to spread out our blanket is that we planted ourselves there by 11 AM that morning and were soon surrounded by more than a million of our closest friends. As the day progressed, it was obvious we had more space than needed for just the two of us and invited another couple to join us. John and Jane, from London, were of our generation and backpacking around AU for a month. This brief account is just to let you know we are still alive and will write more - filling in the details of this last week spent in Melbourne and Sydney - once we get back to Perth. Leaving Sydney in a few hours on Qantas - a wonderful airline when it comes to passenger service. Take care of you and yours, Russ and Rose