Tamworth Country Music Festival 17th-18th January

We never thought we'd find ourselves getting into the old country music but the Tamworth festival is awesome! The whole place gets taken over by musicians, from the buskers on the streets to huge stars of country music. It has such a great atmosphere and every corner you turn around there is a different band or artist playing. We had a fantastic weekend, hanging out in the local club "Diggers" watching lots of different bands, checking out the buskers (of variable standards and ages) and of course camping again!

Wyong Rodeo

Why would you do this? Madness.....

A great spectators sport all the same!

Blue Mountains

We headed up to the Blue Mountains for the weekend and had a bit of drama when we locked the car keys inside the car at a very remote spot 8km down a dirt road!! Kate was panicing as memories of the film "Wolf Creek" came flooding back but her hero Bandey saved the day. Like all men, he never leaves the car without his wallet and his phone in his pocket - a quick call to the Aussie equivalent of the AA and we were sorted. It did however end up being the most beautiful spot to set up our tent for the night for another spot of camping...

We did the most incredible (and very steep!) walk down into the blue-gum tree forest at the bottom of the gorge. It took a good few hours but was really worth the effort. It got us away from all the other tourist that flock to see the iconic "Three Sisters" - we had to go and see it to get the photo but there were way too many people there for our liking!

New Years Day, 1st January 2009

A good camping breakfast, a swim in the ocean and a few more beers set us right the next morning!

New Years Eve 2008

We were torn between a crowded night in Sydney watching the world famous fire works go off with zillions of other people or a camping trip to the beach with some friends - after much deliberation and everyone we spoke to telling us we were mad not going to Sydney, we opted for the camping. After all we love camping!

Setting up our camp on Saunton Sands - 20 miles of white sandy beach and sand dunes just north of Newcastle. It is quite a spectacular place to camp!

We didn't miss out on the fire works either, they were going off all around us and we had a truly authentic Australian camping experience! Lots and lots of fun. Martin and Liz even managed to time their call to perfection and ring us on the dot of midnight which was incredibly thoughtful and very much appreciated (even if we were a bit tipsy!).

The partying carried on until the early hours with us both doing our usual trick of falling asleep at some point during the evening.....

Some things never change!!

Boxing Day weekend

We went to Newcastle races on boxing day as Kim and Mark Waugh in disguise which meant we pretended to be owners/trainer of their three runners. It meant that we got to avoid the enormous crowds and enjoy the slightly more civilised members bar. Had a pretty good day on the betting front although our $5 bets didn't amount to much! After that we headed up to the Myall Lakes for the weekend and found this beautiful spot to camp....

Totally illegal camping but the campsites were way too full for our liking! This is first thing in the morning - by 3pm in the afternoon this lake becomes an ace windsurfing play-pen.

Just a stones throw away on the other side of the spit of land is the coast and beautiful white sandy beaches like this one at Bluey's. We attempted to surf, although fairly unscucessfully - i thinhk a lesson could be a good idea!

We love camping!

I bet you never thought you would hear me say this but... I love camping! We go pretty much every free weekend and its so much fun.

Christmas Day

This is us at Forest Hill Stud which is where we live. Our lovely landlady took this photo outside her house after we popped in for a Christmas drink but the view from our balcony is pretty much identical to this. It is really gorgeous!

Happy Christmas from the beach

Happy Christmas from the beach

Christmas morning on the beach. These hats were a present from Kate's boss so not our doing! A little different from British Christmas Day.

What we've been up to so far....

Its hard to believe that we've already been here for 3 months! We only have one more to go before moving on and the travels really begin.