Meanwhile back at the ranch............. The next stage of our journey is New Zealand. We fly tomorrow (1st December) and meet up with Nan again in Rotorua. We will write again in this blog from over there. Hope you are all well. It is lovely to see your comments. Keep them coming.

We also got taken to a place called Soverign Hill in Ballarat which is a reconstruction of an old mining town. We panned for gold and got about 4 cents worth.

There was an old fashioned bowling alley with wooden balls and skittles. Bit harder work than Fakenham Superbowl.

Steve got stuck in cooking in the kitchen and helping get the flowers ready to sell .

We then hired a car and drove down to Melbourne (see Christmas tree picture) We met another friend called Claire who used to live in Norfolk. She took us to see where `Neighbours` is filmed and they were filming as we watched. Saw a few members of the cast. That was fun. Claire then took us to her parents place in the countryside near somewhere called Bendigo about 2/3 hours from Melbourne. They run a flower farm. Claire and her family are SO NICE. We had a great time.

They took us on an old fashioned paddle steamer and someone took this romantic picture of me and Steve!

Tony and Judy run a great cafe and work really hard. They managed to take a bit of time off to show us around. Steve and Tony went in for a sailing race, Em, Judy and myself worked hard walking round museums and drinking coffee.

Obviously we are encouraging responsible drinking and Em is only drinking a small bottle of beer!

This is when we visited Canberra and stayed with Tony and Judy. We went for a sunset walk and saw `heaps of roos`(learning the Aussie lingo). Beautiful.

This picture is in wrong order, but I don`t know how to move it.
We met Nan in Melbourne. She is also travelling around OZ and NZ. It feels really strange to see Christmas trees and decorations when it`s sunny.

Evening Sail at Port Douglas

Went out for a sail last evening with a couple from the Yacht Club Had a great sail although not much wind and met some interesting folk including a queenslander who could spin a yarn or two and someone brought a guitar on board and sang some songs - Stayed on for dinner at the Club.

George the Groper

Went to a bar on the river today and their attraction as well as some music was feeding this 'groper' fish - tied a football sized fishead onto a rope and dangled it in the river - ready to be totally unimpressed but this thing was huge. Can't have had much in the way of teeth as it took loads of attempts before it had all the fish off the rope thrashing and splashing about.

4 mile beach

we went to 4 mile beach in port douglas today, i was so excited i couldnt wait to get down there.(Emily sarcastic voice)
the jelly nets are out, sea 28 degrees and the sand too hot to walk on in bare feet :)
dad is trying to get rid of his t-shirt tan, as you can see, its not really working!
still a bit nervous about swimming in case of the jellies, but there are nets out and we havent been told not to swim yet.

Rainforest Habitat

Went to the Rainforest zoo in Port Douglas - a big aviary and enclosure - the saltwater crocs are pretty scary. Loads of birds Roos, Ostrichs Koalas etc,

Emily got to hold a smelly koala!

3 days in Currumbin on the Gold Coast

Hey everyone, Emily again. We have been staying on the Gold Coast for three days since we flew in from Sydney on Friday afternoon. The house we are staying in is amazing, with balconies and fab views of the beach. The people we are staying with are also really nice, there is a picture of Andrew at Byron Bay, and we have had lots of hospitality and great food since we arrived, with Sophie's delicious salad making a constant appearance at the dinner table. We've all tried to surf, but now our muscles ache, my fingers and knees are rubbed raw, and only dad managed to stand up. I did sort of kneel up though, so I'm quite proud of myself! Luckily, we don't have any pics of surfing, but there are some of me and mum swimming at Byron Bay.
Emily xxxx

Monet and Impressionists

Went to the Monet and The Impressionists touring collection at the Art Gallery in Sydney - great to see the paintings close up - Emily would like to visit Monet's garden sometime.
Loads of other interesting stuff