A very quick fly-by post from Darwin, Internet time is running out...It's been nice and warm here for the past week, though quite windy so not as bad as I expected. It's quite small so there isn't much to do, and I think that by the time one has been in every location mentioned in Lonely Planet's "Sights" section, it's time to move on...

Went to Kakadu National Park for a day tour last Saturday, it was very pretty. Pics will be somewhere at some point. Next stop is Cairns, flight goes at 5.20 tomorrow morning. Have to catch the airport shuttle at 2.45 am. Fun times. Will be interesting to see how much extra luggage Jetstar will let me take and how much I might have in the first place.

Must go...computer's kicking me out.

Ugh. If ever there was a place where I've felt completely an outsider, it would be Alice Springs. The Aboriginals here are scary and, quite frankly, weird. They freak me out. I don't want to even go to town, really. But I have to be here until Monday when I catch the train to Darwin, so...I'll just hang out at the hostel, mostly. Luckily there's wireless here as well...

Anyways. Just wanted to give you some pictures of my three-day tour of the famous Rock, Kata Tjuta (The Olgas) and Kings Canyon. Absolutely breathtaking, all three of them, but my favourite would have to be Kata Tjuta. Everyone, EVERYONE, should go do the Valley of the Winds walk over there. It's almost 8 kilometres and it has some rough climbing but the views, oh my God. Sadly they don't look anywhere near as amazing in the pictures, which is why you need to see it for yourself. Highly recommended.

We had a very good time. I was lucky as everyone in the group, as well as the tour guide, were great. Wonderful three days (and two nights, sleeping outside in the swags...)

( Pics and more stuff under the cut )

Hmm, so apparently McLeod's Daughters is filmed in Barossa Valley. Wouldn't have thought that, since when I watched it I never saw anything winery-related and the place is filled with them. But that's what our tour guide said: "It's filmed right over there." Pointing somewhere to the general direction of plenty of fields.

So, now I know how to taste wine correctly. That's exactly what we did on the tour, all day until everyone was a little tipsy-ish and more than a little happy. Jacob's Creek, Vine Crest, Richmond Grove and Bethany. Sparkling wine, white wine, red wine, port. Apparently one is not allowed to use the word champagne anymore, it's sparkling wine. Boohoo.

We also saw the world's biggest rocking horse (!) and the Whispering Wall, which was actually amazing - you can whisper something on one end and the people on the other end (about 100 metres away) will hear it crystal-clear. This was discovered a long time ago when the wall (or a dam) was built and a couple of workers were bitching about their boss, who was at the other side. Needless to say what happened to them...

I have pictures on Facebook, these links should be accessible also to people who don't have an account there. Barossa Valley is gorgeous but the bloody sunlight ruined some of my pictures, it's just too bright for them to come out right. Some other pictures can be found there as well, if anyone's interested. I haven't had the chance yet to put any descriptions to them so use your imagination...

Barossa Valley: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=22326&l=578d4&id=667542009
Adelaide & Glenelg: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=22152&l=727a0&id=667542009
Melbourne: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=21982&l=0eeab&id=667542009
Victoria coast (Geelong etc.): http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=21983&l=15814&id=667542009
Sydney (though most were already posted on LJ): http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=15056&l=972ec&id=667542009

Tomorrow's my last day in Adelaide *sniffle*. I really like it.

Ooh, Adelaide hostel has free wireless internet. I love Adelaide hostel (Backpack Oz on Wakefield Street). It's a great one in all other respects as well, with friendly, helpful staff, free breakfast, good beds etc. And it's not very busy right now, there's just one other girl in my room. It's great to have some privacy every once in a while.

Adelaide is a lovely city overall, with lots of beautiful buildings, nice parks and plenty of restaurants to choose from. I could spend a week on Rundle Mall, which is the main shopping street, and it's nice to just walk around though I'm not supposed to buy anything. And North Terrace is awesome as well, with the University of Adelaide campus and all that. Now that's what a university is supposed to look like, with big old buildings. Pretty. The only less-that-nice thing is the shitty tap water which isn't really up for drinking, I tried and thought it wasn't too bad at first but...nah. Bring on Coles bottled water. I'm probably going to be here until Sunday, and on Friday I'm heading to a tour of Barossa Valley and some wineries. I've heard the tour is very good but they do give out a lot of free wine until everyone is somewhat nauseous...Maybe I'll even manage to put some pics up now that I have wireless. I definitely should be able to put some on Facebook as that's faster than LJ.

The train trip was mostly pleasant, with the exception of it there being not much space to stretch out as the train was almost full. I do have to say that Amtrak trains in the US win by a mile when it comes to leg room and overall amenities of the train, but this one was all right as well. The next one will be 19 hours to Alice Springs on The Ghan. Which I need to book soonish...

Holy mother. I probably should be used to the price of things in Australia by now, but still they shock me every single day. I don't know why. Maybe it's because before I came over, people were saying I would find it cheaper than back home. Yeah, that's the biggest lie of the century.

Maybe I'm just over-vigilant over spending money (which I know I am) but when I go to a shopping mall and the only places I can afford to buy clothes are Target and K-Mart, there is something wrong with the picture. And it's not just Sydney either, though I'm there right now, I've discovered the same thing consistently over the past four months. Even in bloody England I was able to afford more stuff than here, including clothes. It's madness. And don't even get me started about food...

Heading to Adelaide tomorrow, on a train romantically named The Indian Pacific. Australia's great train journeys...we'll see how great it is when it comes to trying to sleep in the train. As it takes 25 hours to get to Adelaide. I actually managed to sleep a little on the overnight train from Melbourne, though I was sick - my stomach's been a little funny ever since the accident and I spent a couple of hours in the beginning of the trip in the toilet throwing up. Feeling sick in the train when it's all shaky and jerky is the best thing in the world...not.

Anyone seen the new Indiana Jones movie yet? I might go see it in Adelaide, though ticket prices are not making it especially tempting.

OMG noodles place! OMG McDonalds! OMG Pizza Hut! OMG shops!!!!

Can you tell I've finally managed to get out of Hillston?:)

I'm currently in Mildura again, and damn, it looks like a proper big metropolitan city though it's not that big. We're at Oasis Backpackers, which is...well, allright, once we managed to buy lightbulbs (there was no light whatsoever in the dorm room) and get the room to warm up (it was freezing). Seriously, I did not think I'd be this cold in Australia. It is unbelievable. There is also a cat here, a grey one, a little like one of mine though this one is short haired.

I'm heading out on Wednesday, to Sydney and then hopefully to Adelaide soonish. I bought myself a train pass, which allows me 6 months of unlimited train travel so I think after Adelaide I will head up to Darwin and stop to see the big red rock on the way.

Also, thank you everyone for your kind comments on my last post *hugs*. Michael (the driver) is doing better, apparently, but whether he'll end up with any brain damage, we don't yet know. His family came over from Germany so he'll probably be taken back home for rehabilitation and all that stuff. What a horrible way to end an adventure like this.

Aarghbleurgh....*flops down on keypad*

Am sick-ish. Seems like the flu is doing rounds in our Big Brother house complex - yes, that's what it feels like when you've been living, working, eating, everything with the same 10 or so people for nearly five weeks. I seriously need to get out of here...

Might get out next weekend, if I'm lucky. There isn't much work left, and last week was crap anyway: Monday off because of the rain, Thursday off because frigging GPS (they use GPS to find out the exact location where the trees are to be planted, can you believe that?) wasn't working. Days off in a town of 1000 people are pure hell, I can tell you that. And today's another one...

I have no idea what's going on in the lives of my dear flist, I'm sincerely sorry about that. Please let me know. Hopefully I'll get back to a little more regular friends list reading once I get out of here. Maybe.

*sneeze* Back to the Big Brother house.

Another day off, this time due to it raining cats and dogs all day yesterday. Thus it is too wet over at the work site to do anything. It frigging never rains here, never, and during the time we've been here it's rained twice. And when it rains, it pours. We got another car last week (I have no idea what happened to the one that was crashed) so ended up missing just one day of work because of that stupid accident, luckily.

We have also moved. The motel owner lady got fed up with the constant partying and loudness so we had to come to these box-like self-contained apartments in the town centre. They are actually better, as we have a big fridge and better cooking facilities, the only problem is there are no pots or pans really to cook in and I'm not planning to buy any to carry around. Oh well. Still nicer than the motel was, and the same price too.

Yawn...brain not working today. There was a party last night. Too much wine. Sleepy.

Oops, two weeks since the latest entry...that must be a record.

So. Still in Hillston, for maybe a week and a half more. Was supposed to work today but some f***ing idiots decided to take the car out yesterday evening while drunk and ended up crashing it. The guys are fine, the car isn't, thus we have no transport to work. The boss has gone down to Mildura to try and get another car so I don't know if there's work tomorrow either. It pisses me off so badly, we were doing really well and making good money and then these childish people ruin it for everyone. I'm really hoping they'll get fired but knowing our boss, they won't. He's a complete loser when it comes to these things. I don't even know if they have to pay for the car to get fixed.

So yeah, it's interesting here. The boss keeps us well supplied with beer, every single day in fact. Which of course goes down well with the aforementioned idiots (these are new people by the way, who arrived last week and were not a part of the original group) who get drunk every day, are really loud and piss off the motel manager who's threatened to throw everyone out at least five times by now. It's not good since it affects people who haven't done anything like that. Argh.

But other than these people being a pain in our collective asses, we're still having a good time here, though starting to feel a little claustrophobic. I do not know how anyone could live here long term, and it's so completely landlocked as well...I need my beach!

Eek, library computer has a weird, twisted screen...

Finally got out of work early enough to come online - this town seems to be stuck somewhere in the 60s and everything closes at five or so. Including supermarket. Including pharmacy. Including everything. It is a little annoying, but we'll get by. There is an outback diner that stays open late, with good food. That's a plus. Basically, this town is kind of dead. The highlight of the social life is a Chinese buffet and a Superdraw every Thursday night. Yippee. The Chinese was pretty good last week though.

So yeah, the work is basically putting sticks into the ground. Well, sticks or plastic knives. One row to red marks, next row to blue marks and so on, thus the subject line. Then another group of people is working behind us planting almond trees to where the sticks are. Not too bad, even though there are about ten million flies and other bug thingies and it can get pretty hot in the afternoons. The days are going faster now than in the beginning and we have such a great group of people that I don't care what I have to do. And the motel is still cool as well, though we did have to move rooms and the new one isn't quite as luxurious as the old one. Still, a million times better than hostels.

And as a bonus, there are two cats living at the motel too - a mum and a kitten. So cute. They seem to be wanting to spend time in our room, not sure if we should let them as there is a big "no pets allowed" sign on the wall but...they were sleeping in our room for a while yesterday. Don't know their names but for some reason a couple of guys I work with named them Paris Hilton and Baby Hilton. Erm...yeah.

Got to go find roomies now and head to the supermarket before it closes...

Yeah, grape picking = no fun.

I lasted for two days - I probably would have done a week but then the hostel lady told me and a few others about this job in Hillston, NSW, which pays better with a cheaper accommodation. The actual picking work wasn't too bad but the wages kept plummeting so it eventually went down to $1 per bucket and the supervisors (one of them in particular) were complete assholes who treated the pickers like shit. So yesterday we ended up leaving Mildura very quickly and driving 6 hours or so to Hillston in the rain, mega winds and sandstorms. That was really fun actually, though at times the car was almost picked up by the wind and we were all exhausted after some very early mornings. But luckily we got here without anyone falling asleep at the wheel...

And we're living in a motel. OMG a motel! With great beds (mine is even a double), a lovely bathroom that I only have to share with two other people, a TV, microwave etc. And it's cheaper than any hostel I've been to thus far. I'm sharing with two very sweet Japanese girls while the guys are in the other room. Work hasn't started yet but maybe tomorrow...I'm not even sure of what we'll be doing, to be honest, but at least it's not grape picking. I don't care what it is, as long as I get to live in the motel. No bunk beds!!! And all the other people are so nice too.

I'm at the local library now, but I don't know how often I'll be able to use the Internet as the library closes at 5 and we might still be working at that time. So if you don't hear from me in a while, I'll be living in what is possibly the smallest town in Australia, doing who knows what but...a motel!!

Okay, Alicia wants me to post all my pictures here starting from Sydney...don't think that's going to happen, considering there's like 300 of them and this LJ/Photobucket union is not really working *grumbles*. I can't even remember everything we've done over the past few days, as there's been a lot. On Wednesday we took a drive along the coast to Geelong/Ocean Grove/Great Ocean Road and I can remember it was raining like crazy. We were supposed to take a walk on the beach but due to the gale force winds that didn't happen. Well, I've now probably seen the extremes of Melbourne weather: sunny +40 degrees when I was first here, rainy and windy +9 this time around.

Cookie has been surprisingly good even though I was expecting to be kept awake all night long. Last night I didn't hear him at all, actually. Now he's running around like a headless chicken...

I'm going to Mildura on Sunday to pick some grapes...that will be different. I'm also trying to decide whether to stay here for the whole year like I was planning to or to go back earlier - I'm again missing England like crazy and I really want to move there after this. Would be good if I was able to save money here for it but we'll see.

Anyway, this picture posting thing is not quite working for me...they've changed it or something. If anyone knows how to put pics in here from Photobucket without it taking 15 hours, please let me know!

So, back in Melbourne. Sorry for having disappeared for a week - I worked on a farm near Albury in NSW for five days. They needed some help as their regular worker had to go care for her mum who'd been in a car accident. She was supposed to be gone for up to a month but ended up coming back after just one week, so my job was cut shorter than originally thought. Oh well. It was good fun but damn, I was starting to feel the isolation already and this place wasn't even that isolated - only about 10 km from the nearest town. Maybe I'm not suited for a farm job after all...they asked me to come back in the spring for a longer while so I need to seriously think about whether I'm up for it.

I'm now trying to decide whether to try and find some casual job here in Melbourne or go fruit picking up in Mildura or Shepparton. City life, as much as I love it, demands more money and while I'm still doing pretty good, I don't want to spend all my savings. Can't believe I've only been in Australia for less than six weeks. Feels like six months at least.

Should go back to the hostel, which is right around the corner and do laundry. Am also in need of coffee as the hostel's free breakfast only had tea...I'm not the biggest fan of tea at all but that one wasn't too horrible.

Gosh, I'm tired. Lots of sightseeing today. Very hot today, though it didn't feel as bad as I thought it would. But Melbourne's pretty. I can now see why people are saying it's kind of European, because it has all these cool arcades and lots of artistic stuff. I like it. Tonight in the car Fi was asking (with a very hopeful tone LOL) whether I liked Melbourne better than Sydney, and to be honest, I think I might. It's not as insanely busy as Sydney, and it has more character. alyssa22 was taking me around the suburbs before dinner and there's so many different areas and different nationalities and, most importantly, not as many tourists. Although at the moment there probably is, with the Grand Prix.

So, in the morning we first went to the Eureka Tower and did The Edge. The Edge is this very cool thing that comes out the side of the tower and where you're on this platform straight above the city. Okay, bad explanation. Fi says to give a link, so here you go: http://www.eurekalookout.com.au/the-edge.asp. That was really cool.

After the tower, we did some walking, saw the arcades, the state library, Melbourne Central, a pretty flower clock thingy and Southgate. Somewhere in between (yeah, I'm falling asleep so my memory fails me) we had yummy lunch at the Pancake Parlour before heading to the Royal Botanical Gardens where the best thing was a fountain at the children's garden. Completely soaked us, bringing some relief from the 39,5 degrees. And I could hear the Formula 1 cars going around. That was kind of cool, though I will be deaf after Sunday.

Then we drove ourselves to the very pretty Williamstown, almost got attacked by black swans and went to the beach. Walking in the water was absolutely fantastic, though at one point it got strangely deep and suddenly we were in there up to our waists. Which didn't really matter because in this heat, we were dry again in five minutes. Had a drink on the beach (am liking lemon lime and bitters) before driving to Alicia's place where I got to meet very cute Cookie. Aww, cat therapy. I was surprised he didn't hiss at me and run under the bed like we were both expecting, but he let me pat him and even rubbed his head against my hand. Cute boy.

We had dinner with Fi and her friend Ant (very good pizza and tiramisu at Carlton) and Fi and I went on a drive to Chapel Street, St. Kilda and the very expensive-looking suburb of Toorak. Massive houses. What do people need that many rooms for? We also tried to get into Albert Park to drive around the racetrack but the damn thing was totally blocked.

I have pictures but I'm way too tired to upload and post them now. Maybe tomorrow, or today actually. I think we're going to Phillip Island to see penguins. And to a beach.

*goes to bed*

So, Melbourne is going to be 40 degrees (Celsius) tomorrow. That's about 104 degrees Fahrenheit. Today was 38 or so and it didn't actually feel that bad...except after coming out of air-conditioned buildings. Air-conditioning is my best friend.

I start work on Monday on the farm near Culcairn, which is probably going to be really hot. The guy running the farm seems really nice (at least on phone) and hopefully either he or his wife will pick me up from the station on Monday. Then we're going to bull sales. That might be interesting...I still haven't made up my mind on whether to get Telstra or just cross my fingers that Vodafone might work at least a little bit on the farm. Getting Telstra would probably mean getting yet another phone, which means I'd have three. I honestly have no idea why I got Vodafone in the first place when I hated it in England and ended up switching to Virgin Mobile.

I'm also a complete idiot and somehow managed to leave my "cowgirl" hat in the Sydney hostel. I didn't even remember the hat at all until last night in the bus when I suddenly realized I hadn't seen the thing at all since Monday. So I texted my friend Sarah who's in Sydney and she went to get my hat from Wakeup. And now the hat is going to a surf camp up the East Coast with Sarah while I'm down here. I suppose she could post it to me or something...Gah, I'm so annoyed at myself.

So, it's going to be 25 degrees tonight. I doubt we'll be sleeping much. Tomorrow sightseeing with alyssa22. Must bring lots of sunscreen...

I can't believe I've only been away from Sydney for a week...feels like a few months. I decided yesterday, totally randomly, to go down to Melbourne for the Formula 1 Grand Prix next weekend. As a Finn I kind of couldn't skip that one...just bought my ticket and all I'm saying is that if the Finnish drivers don't perform well I'll be claiming the money back from them. So now I'm in Sydney until Wednesday, then catching Greyhound overnight to Melbourne where I should arrive at 8 on Thursday morning.

I'm staying at Wake Up! which apparently is the best hostel in Oceania. Yeah, sure. Well, it does look more like a hotel than a hostel and it is right next to the train/bus station which is a good thing. My backpack is killing me and I can't understand how it's so heavy when I haven't bought anything damn it!! I'm considering maybe buying another small bag, to get the weight of the backpack down. They seem pretty strict about the 20kg limit on buses and trains here and I think my bag is over that. Bummer. I'm in talks about a possible job as well, on a farm situated between Melbourne and Canberra. It sounds pretty good, so we'll see.

I know I was supposed to write stuff about what we did on the farm course but I'm too tired...anyone who's interested, check out www.leconfield.com. I think they have the itinerary etc. in there.

Yeah, just a song I heard in a pub last night. Somehow it was extremely funny for our little jillaroo/jackaroo group...I think we were all over-exhausted.

So, I'm back in Tamworth. Back to civilization after five days of no phone coverage or Internet. I can barely type anymore, it seems my brain has re-wired and can't find the correct letters after such a long break. I desperately need to do laundry as all my clothes smell of horses and campfire and God knows what else and I'm pretty sure at least 20 different substances can be found in my jeans.

But I had such an awesome week. And now everyone's leaving and it makes me sad. I e-mailed some people about possible farm jobs and if that doesn't work out, I think I'll head back to Sydney or maybe Brisbane. I find myself longing for a big city even though I couldn't wait to leave one a week ago. How strange.

I'll make a longer post about the course and stuff at some point later. Got to go do that laundry now.

I miss my horse. His name was Booligul and he was beautiful. Though he kept biting everyone.

Ouch. Ouch. Ouch.

Legs hurt. I don't ever want to see stairs in my life again. I don't ever want to walk up or down stairs again.

The Blue Mountains trip was fantastic. It's really gorgeous up there (I'll try to get pictures up at some point...within the next few months...) but it involved so many stairs/steps/whatever. I love exploring things by walking and I consider myself to be decently fit, but yesterday's walk up the stairs along a mountainside almost killed me. Then again, it seemed to kill everyone else as well except for our guide. He has apparently mastered this weird breathing technique where you breathe in through the nose and out through the mouth at the same time. Or something. So he was up the frigging stairs in a flash while the normally breathing people employed all sorts of methods, including nearly crawling. Ugh. And the guide does this tour five times a week...

After the horrible stairs came lunch and another hike, this time 900 steps but luckily down this time. 900! I'm completely amazed my knees didn't give up on me because these steps were steep! It's not for anyone with a fear of heights, that's for sure. We couldn't take the world's steepest railway back up (bummer!) but we did take world's steepest cable car. Good stuff. The guide was amazing and had so much information and stories. For wildlife, I saw kangaroos and a funnelweb spider's fangs, apparently. The rest of the spider was hidden in it's hole...nest...whatever and peeking into it, there were the fangs. Good God. I hope I never have to encounter that devil again.

Can't believe it's my last day in Sydney for now. I always grow really fond of places right before I have to leave, and this time is no exception. I suppose we'll go to Bondi for the day as it's reasonably sunny. Then there's the Mardi Gras parade in the evening.

I should really be packing...

It's chilly. It's only 20 C and cloudy *sniffle*. I realize it's not actually chilly at all but damn, you can really feel the drop in the temperature. We're so used to the heat by now that we've gone from "ooh, sun!" to "ooh, shade!" With the temperature drop came cool thunderstorms (or maybe the other way around), which then again aren't so cool when one is stuck mid-Kings Cross in the hurricane winds, rain, flashing and banging, trying to cross the street. Have I mentioned Australia has the slowest traffic lights in the world? Or maybe it's just Sydney...

So I haven't really done anything worth mentioning over the last few days. In fact, I can't remember what I've done. It feels like I've been here forever, and I keep reading Lonely Planet with hopes of finding something I haven't yet seen in Sydney but I think I've pretty much done it all. Tomorrow we go to the Blue Mountains. That'll be something new. I bought myself a pair of good walking shoes that will hopefully get me through whatever hikes I might end up doing here. 12 dollars at Target. Now that's a bargain, even if they break down on me at some point. They feel really good to walk in, so I'm happy.

The Norwegian girls in our room left for their new place in Manly and in came two Swedish girls. The Scandinavian invasion continues...

I'll try to update before I go to Tamworth on Sunday, but in case I don't manage it, you might not hear from me in a week. I don't know if they have Internet on the farm. If they don't, I'll report back after the course - unless I've fallen from a horse and broken my arms...

And it just started to rain like crazy. Yippee.