3 days, and 20 pre-packed meals later!

Well, Gday!

In a strange twist it's 2006 here and not there, if you're reading this from back in blighty, we'll wherever you happen to be happy New Year!
God, there not kidding when they call it Long Haul. Eleven and 1/2 hours to get to the Neon capital of the world Hong Kong(sorry Vegas), 9 hours eating noodles and then back on the plane for another dose of 9 hours flying. We'll that's all over now and we're here, and not to disappoint anyone it's very very sunny and very very hot, aroung 32 degrees to be slightly inexact. I must admit for the dredge that is flying to the other side of the world, you can do much worse than the nice people at Cathay Pacific, always there with a friendly smile, an interesting choice of meal and god aren't they so well turned out.
Given that we, for the best part hadn't slept in 2 days, we slightly annoyingly arrive in Sydney at 12.00 noon, immediately causing the the problem, do we go to bed because we can't physically move with exhaustion or do we try to beat the jet lag and stay up for another 12 hours. We choose the later and what a mistake that turns out to be. Given the time frame we're dealing with here, arrive - next day new year fireworks - next day 12 hour rave, there wasn't much room for things to go wrong. Inevitably in true Gary fashion, what happens, yes I manage to get a bad bought of food poisoning from a dodgy Dim Sum. Yes give me 12 hours in any foreign country and I'll find away to inflict myself to the worst possible torture I can. Seeping head in Equador, altitude sickness in Peru, and now add to the list intense vomitting and stomach cramps in Sydney. So new Years eve was to be spent wandering this lovely city, sampling the culture and soaking the atmosphere, what I got was wandereing the space between our room and the toilet, sampling the taste of toothpaste to mask other tastes, and soaking up both sweat and vomit with my towel. Jules to her credit did a brilliant impression of florence and almost hand fed me fruit and bread.
Well not to be beaten by this inconvenience(imagine coming to Sydney for New Year and not seeing New Year, morale was a bit low for a while) and with aid of some nursing, I dragged myself up and by the time the evening came around I could just about move without puking, and we got ourselves down to the harbour to witness a fantastic firwork display(really good co-ordination), and mark our first real day in Sydney with a New Year, how lucky was that.
Tomorrow(well today for us, trying to compinsate for the time difference) we're off to a rave festival, that should be good for my tender stomach!
I will in the next couple of days fill in more details of our experiences in the city, but for now they have been mostly the inside of a hostel dorm with a slightly broken fan.
Never fear we have arrived and we are safe and we are ready to start having a fantastic time.

Cheese

The leaving do (early) | Barquing

A little late these, given that G&J are off to sunnier climates this evening - here are some grotesquely low resolution snaps taken from inside Far From The Madding Crowd illustrating what nice, sober people they are. Lovely, huh?
Given that there's snow on the ground as I type this (admittedly a paltry amount by anyone's standards, but this being Britain, it seems to have brought the country to a standstill - although that might just be me...) it couldn't be a better time to hop on a plane and nip off half-way round the globe, so bully for them. Me? I'm off to find another pair of socks - darn, it's nippy.

So, here we go again.

With tonight being the evening of Gary and Julia’s “big leaving do” – in actual fact a few pints in Far From The Madding Crowd, but who’s counting? – It seems appropriate to finally kick off the new blog, the title of which has been a little inaccurate for going on two years now.

While I’m staying put for another few months, Gary and Julia will be off on the 28th December and should – planes willing – be arriving in Sydney in time to combine severe jetlag with the New Year celebrations.

With travels being less structured this time around, and the fact that the paths of Gary and I are diverging from the outset (not permanently, I hope!), this blog has had something of an overhaul. For one thing, it’s a lot prettier – which might come as some respite when reading the gory details about Gary’s latest health issues (expect blood, puss and all kinds of unexpected excretions in his future updates) there are also a few handy bits and bobs which we may or may not get round to keeping up to date. For simplicity’s sake, these generally take the form of specific Blogger posts accessed directly from the links at the side, so – yes, that’s them hiding beneath this post – but don’t worry about that for the time being, things will hopefully straighten themselves out in due course.

Oh, and this time we have pictures! Hopefully not of blood, puss and excreta of course – I’m thinking beautiful landscapes, sunsets, cute kittens etcetera. If you’re squeamish, I’d check the picture title before clicking through to Flickr – generally headings like “Look what’s oozing out of my ears” should set off warning bells. There’s also the ability to comment this time round, so expect lots of spam along the lines of “Hey! Love your blog, I have a blog too – it’s all about cement! Click HERE” or maybe “you sux” or something like that. I’m not really fussy, all feedback is good feedback, right?

Given that I’m not going anywhere until April or so, I’ll probably be relatively quiet over the next few months (a good thing you say? Why you… I oughta…) I’m saying this just in case someone is reading this sometime in April having arrived at the blog from a list of “Top Ten Most Gross Weblogs EVAH” and are trying to work out why I suddenly turned up with a long post about beautiful landscapes and cute kittens.

Why am I cruelly going on an on about Gary’s propensity to post about bodily functions? Jealousy, obviously. No, not about the bodily functions part – although I have a huge admiration for his use of the words “seeping” and “moist” without resorting to pornography. No, I’m irrationally and completely unfairly jealous that he’ll be in Sydney by the end of the year, the lucky bastard, while I’m still here for another three months. Damn his fortunate seeping scalp.

*sigh*