where is georgie?

Apols. for the short blog...

Thursday - The walk from Bondi to Coogee went ahead. Weather held off for us to spend an hour on the beach and put our feet in the sea before doing the long but picturesque walk back to Coogee where we had a lovelllly bbq and Gregg whipped out the bagpips for a tune (that's not a euphynism for anything, he's Scottish, he REALLY brought his bagpipes with him!)

Friday - Trip to the Blue Mountains. Except I didn't go cos I was sick. Looked lovely in pics though and very hard work (1000 or so steps? woah)

Saturday - had a chat to our 'leader' Benny who advised us not to stay in Sydney and flit away our money while waiting for work and to start travelling up the East Coast ASAP for work and to get to warmer weather. He had a point. So we booked our Greyhound passes and some activities along the way (Whitsundays sailing on a catamaran (spelling?!) that has a jaccuzzi on board hahah! 4x4 trip on Fraser Island, cruise around the reef in cairns) so we are aiming to leave Coogee midweek after hopefully a day trip to Summer Bay and a day of research about where to go and stay when we get to our different places!

Last night was also the pub crawl on the OzParty bus! Was originally dreading it but it was brilliant! Got away with free lemonades all night and only spent $7.10 on a Hungry Jacks (Burger King) at the end of the night. Like it.

Yesterday we went into Sydney to confirm our bank account details and pick up our bank cards/change our pins etc with the Commonwealth Bank of Australia. The main branch in Sydney is HUGE! it is the most mental thing I've ever seen... MASSIVE. And it was only as 'Chad' (the name even seems Australian to me) was confirming all my details etc, did I realise there was no glass between us or microphones or anything. Quite a revealation. And some nice friendly conversation as well. A+ CWBoA!

We then dropped our medicare details into the centre for them to process our medicare numbers and then went on to a Travellers at Work talk. Although I was feeling sick and wasn't really concentrating and therefore only half inspired. Looks like we may want to do the WWOOFing where we work for free for accommodation and food on a farm and it counts for the 88 days needed for a visa extention. Not sure what I'd do with regards to farm work but I'm sure we can ask these questions at our talk tomorrow.

After the bank/talks etc we went for some lunch at a cafe in Darling Harbour (hugeeee chicken sandwich and chips which went half uneaten :() and then onto the aquarium which was fun. Saw nemo fish and some scary looking sharks. Took a tonne of videos which I'll need to put online at some point when we have more time and a better connection..

In the evening, after a quick shower and touch up, we went to the local backpackers bar called The Gaff. I'm not really a pub/club person but the top of the bar played some good cheesey music that me and Sam enjoyed, and we have found a friend in (Little) Sam who also enjoys some pop so we had a good time. Bit confused with our VIP cards and tokens that OzIntro have kept throwing at us, as they only seem to work for 10 mins at the beginning of the night, which is a bit naff, but we made do until 1am when we took the party bus home to bed. Finally got into bed at 3am - not great when you have a 9am start.. eek.

Today was surfing. I'd already pretty much decided I wasn't going to do it (combination of things - plus size wetsuits are a no-no, scared of the sea and it's currents, when the glasses are off, I'm blind, water in the ear still gives me ear ache etc) and when we woke up this morning, it was raining quite heavily, making me feel a bit happier that I wasn't going to do it.

We took a drive 40 minutes to a secluded beach where everyone changed into wetsuits in a huge shipping container and took an off road drive 5 minutes to the beach. The ride was quite crazy - a lot of a rain, a lot of puddles, and a LOT of pot holes! We got to the beach and Anna and I stayed in the van on the beach and watched as everyone struggled (Chucklebrothers style) to get their boards into the water without the wind blowing them over.

From then on, I can't tell you exactly what happened after that as the rain was so bad, the windows were so obscured we couldn't see a thing! Surfing happened for about an hour and a half before the winds and rain got worse and the surf was abandoned.

So we returned early and have mainly gawped at the crazy winds that have blown our back door of our dorm open! Clearly the UK and Australia have temporarily swapped weather conditions - it's quite ridiculous at the moment.

Tomorrow is a walk from Coogee to Bondi (weather permitting!!!) and a BBQ. BBQ will aparently definitely going ahead, as there is shelter... not sure if this is from rain or wind or both but even that seems a bit touch and go at the moment. But we shall see. Pictures to come when I have some uploaded!

So today we moved rooms into our OzIntro special-room-with-a-view dorm which we are sharing with our fellow girly intro-ers for the next week after a false early start. Harsh.



After we chucked our crap in the new room, we were rounded up by our 'leader' guy called Ben (the only Aussie on OzIntro - go figure) and he drove us in the mini bus into Sydney, starting at the Botanical Gardens. We took a stroll around the gardens, out to the picture taking point for tourists in front of the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Opera House! WOO tourist moment! Was very cool and a bit weird to finally see them, and finally be here in Australia! Loved it though. Took about 12 versions of the same pic (with a few line up changes) before continuing.



Later on in the walk we saw a cockatoo parrot thing perched on a wooden carving and Ben magic-d up some bread to coax it down. Once he got hold of one, about 5 turned up out of nowhere! Also included were a few rainbow birds (I don't have a clue what the species names are of these birds, so you instead get descriptions such as 'rainbow bird') which took a shining to a guy in our group called Vlad.

As we moved on to the end of the gardens we also saw HUGE spiders and a shitload of bats. Nice. I could literally see their ginger hair and it was a bit... eesh. I've never really encountered bats but I'm still not particularly a fan..



After the gardens we walked through a LOT of joggers around to the Opera House which was cool and around to where we were taking a jet boat ride. I don't really know what I was expecting but whatever I thought I was expecting - this wasn't it! Ben said we wouldn't need the purple supplied ponchos (because we're hard, obv) and that we should leave our shoes and socks on the dock. Now, I LOVE sarcasm. But sometimes, I cannot read it on other people. But never-the-less, left the shoes on the dock and got into the boat. Well. Sam and I opted for a seat near the back of the boat, thinking we would get less splashed there but our plans were thwarted when we were moved to the SECOND row! and there are four seats in the second row and two in the first so we were pretty much as in the firing line as the front two passengers (Gregg and Louise).

The journey out from the dock was pretty peaceful and chilled out, enjoyable. And then. THE SPEED. The boat just started flying off around the place before heading STRAIGHT for the ripples left by another boat, braked hard and splashed us with an INSANE amount of water! At which point, my jeans had become 10 stone heavy jeggings and my hair resembling that of a drowned dog. Sexy.

Even though I was clinging on for dear life with one hand, and pushing my glasses to my face with another, I really enjoyed it! We were in the boat for a massive 45 mins, after 20 of which, although I was freezing, the passing air had almost dried me out and the splashing continued for the rest of the ride.

I have never been so cold but managed the drive home in the bus and a rinse in a hot shower before trudging over to the local hotel/restaurant places called The Palace for Schnitzel and chips. Yum. :)

Off to open our bank accounts and stuff before taking a trip to the aquarium tomorrow.

So we have arrived! After a humid, wet, sticky, 5 am wake up call and long bus ride from Wan Chai to the airport for our delayed 9.15 flight. The take off was a bit scarier this time, as took off through low lying cloud that was still there from the day before's mega storm (pretty impressed we lasted a week without rain), but once we got into the air, it was much better and I slept for 3 hours, unfortunatley missing the end of Precious, which I attempted to watch the ending of twice and failed both times. So please, someone let me know what happened hahah!

We landed a bit later than anticipated at about 10 pm and went through customs, where we saw the sniffer dogs run around the suitcases and a big ass sign saying they were filming Border Patrol (Nothing to Declare) there today! Sam and I are massive fans, so this was very exciting for us, before we realised it was quite late and they had packed up for the day. Lame. I didn't get asked for my visa papers, for proof of funds or asked ot unpack my bag to see what my polaroid camera was so it was nice and simple but a bit weird too. Anyway. Shouldn't really complain.

We got picked up by our OzIntro rep and his girlfriend and took a van journey 20 minutes across Sydney to Coogee Beach, our home for the next 8 days. Even though most of Coogee away from the beach area is all houses, which we wont investigate, it still looks like a nice place to live!

The hostel is literally across the road from the beach. As in... hostel, road, beach. If you crane your neck around the corner on our temporary balcony, you can see the sea view but apparently the view is amazing from the OzIntro rooms we'll be moving into on Monday :)

So today we slept in quite a bit (amazing, since we are basically in a bunk bed in a room with the couches and tv and slept through two visits from hostel workers coming to give a quick rinse of the bathroom) and later took a bus to Bondi Junction on the hunt for a new book that Sam has been counting down for, for weeks. Both missions were successful - Bondi Junction looks like a great place to shop with a HUGE Westfields that has a big Target in (good for work clothes) and other shopping bits, including a big Borders where we found the book. We then went back to Coogee and checked some emails in the OzIntro office and had some dinner at Five-O's, the cheap restaurant next door. Fish and Chips and a pineapple juice worked out to be about $8.50 (£4.90), so nice and cheap :)

Chilling out back at the hostel now, nicking some Maccy D's internet as they are right beneath the hostel, and awaiting home and away to come on - we have missed so much in the past two weeks! Another chill day tomorrow, going to investigate washing our clothes at the laundrette, actually maybe possibly walk on the beach, and pop back to ozintro to do more emailing. I also need to watch the latest episode of LOST. Can't believe I will probably miss the finale. BAH!!

Sam and I have had a lazy couple of days, both felt a bit out of sorts so took this slow and easy!

Yesterday we went to Causeway Bay to take a look around their shops. Went to Marc Jacobs to mooch around, pretend we may have actually had the moolah to buy anything ;) Well, Sam purchased some uber cute earrings and held her bag of dreams (and now one of my many bags of possible dreams!). On a quest for a possible replacement bag for myself as the handbag I bought before I flew out has already broken 2 internal zips and split down one side! But all the ones I like are designer or have designer price tags (obviously). Sigh. Haha!!

Today we went to Tsim Sha Tsui and walked about the shops at Kowloon there, although it's all stuff we have seen and so it was a bit tedious, especially since we are both being careful with our money until Australia haha! We looked around the Avenue of Stars which was quite underwhelming as we didn't have a chuffin' clue who anyone was apart from the obvious Bruce Lee. But even then, I don't think I've EVER seen a Bruce Lee movie bwhahah! Oh, but weirdly for us, on Avenue of Stars, about 10 different people came over to us, shoving their camera in their friend's hands and posing with us for photos! It was a BIT mental!! Sam's got really blonde hair and I'm really tall (in comparison to these people!) so maybe we looked quite the freak show to the Asian people haha! So that was odd - deffo don't think I like being famous haha.

Later, we took a quite ride on the Star Ferry over the water back to Hong Kong Island and had our most English dinner yet - MARKS AND SPENCERS! shameful really but hey, an almond plait pastry and some English thick cut crisps went down a treat :)

We sat around at the Golden Bauhinia Square looking out to Kowloon for a few hours, waiting for the Harbour lights show which was....a bit of a disappointment (I've seen more lasers at a Backstreet Boys concert!) but stil quite cool and good to say we did it!

Got to be up at 9 tomorrow to online check in to our flight to AUSTRALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLIA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! haha! Can't quite believe we are actually going still! even though we have been on route for a week now. Mental.

And tomorrow we also have to change rooms for one night (even though I don't count it as a full night, cos we have to be up at about 5 ish to get ready and catch our shuttle to the airport). It shall be a go go go day! eek! Crazy :) Off to count my cash to see how much I can spend tomorrow hehehe

So today we took our longest MTR journey yet to Lantau (Tung Chung station) to take a ride on the cable cars to Ngong Ping. I'd been a bit nervous about being suspended from a great height above Hong Kong but it was actually quite brilliant! We got fantastic views of the bay, the buildings around Lantau, the aiport (cool seeing the planes take off and land - it still amazes me how some huge metaln contraption like that makes it into the air) and surrounding mountains, one of which is home to a huge Budha statue. Very cool.



The journey was about 20 minutes and at the end we wandered around and grabbed some icecream while absorbing the sun. The sky was blue and a lot hotter up in Ngong Ping then it was down on the ground, you could really tell what a difference the smog
makes down in places like Wan Chai. Not sure if I burned. I slathered on some factor 50 this morning but my face has a pink tinge and my inner arms (I am hesistant to say arm pit but you know where your arm joins the body? there) are pink but I think I managed to avoid damage. After a walk around the shops and taking a lot of pics the closer we got to Budha, we turned back to the epic queue for the cable cars home.

At the bottom near the MTR station was a shopping outlet mall which we wandered around. We are still too poor for the good stuff to buy and still too boobilicious top buy any of the nice clothes so we had a little look around before grabbing some pizza for our meal of the day. Do you know how hard it is explaining we wanted a plain cheese and tomato pizza? Very. The pizza hut's here are bizzarre - cocktail juice drinks, 3 pages of STARTERS and pizzas with crab sticks and truffle oil! mental. If they had been small enough versions to have single, I may have been adventerous but we went for an equally tasty basic instead which was nice.

So another great day. Hong Kong is turning out to be a fun trip! Still left to do - Stanley Market, finding the Jumbo floating restaurant, the night market, the harbour Light Show, more Kowloon and Star ferry. Before we know it, it's going to be time to fly again! Eek!

Oh good lord, last night was such an epic fail. We were still awake and chatting and watching tv at 4am our time (9pm BST) and so this morning was a bit of a write off.

Got up and going to the Peake today. A short 2 stop trip on the beloved MTR and a walk up to the fountain there. A bargain $56HKD for a sky pass which is the 5/10 minute tram trip to the top of the mountain, back again at the end but pass to the highest view point at the tower for the best views. Well, we say best views, but the smog was pretty full on so some of the views were a bit restricted but it was awesome none the less.

The tram was brilliant. It travels up at something ridiculous like a 45 degree angle. You couldn't even stand up as it was on its way upwards! I was a bit apprehensive at first, as after the taking off on the plane, I've reaised I hate that bit, but the journey was great. At the top there were various shops to walk around and places to eat - including Bubba Gump! Now I know we should be eating more authentic stuff but we could not resist. So had our biggest meal of the trip so far including a great speckled lemonade which I've missed since I went to the NY branch 4 years ago haha! Sat next to some obnixiously loud Americans who were trying to convince their waiter one of them was 50 cent. As they left, one of the guys asked if we were American and when we said we were from England, he got quite excited and todl us God save the Queen, etc etc. Very good. But then his mate actually DID look like Fifty so.... either it was and that would be funny, or it wasn't and it would still be funny and an addition to our crap look-a-likes count.


After our meal we did more mooching around the plaza and Sam fufilled her long-time dream to own some Wayfarers and so she purchased an immense pair of black frames with light blue on the inside and a black to light blue/clear tint. Amazing. Wish I didn't have crappy broken eyeballs or I would have been tempted! Debated an Adidas fluro watch but decided I didn't actually need one. Go willpower.

We finished off our visit by wandering around the walkways and seeing the views, filming a video blog (which I must get editing at some point when I can be bothered) and took the tram back home. Got home at a much better time tonight (7/7.30) and am feeling quite tired now so going to force ourselves to stay up for a bit to get ourselves sleepy and go out to the cable cars in Lantau tomorrow. EEK!

Feeling better today - a nice lesiurely lie in and mooch about in the morning put us in a better mood before we ventured out. My jetlag wasn't too bad, although I did wake up at 4am (9pm BST) for an hour or so which was pretty horrendous, as all I could think about was home and it was getting me a bit upset. But I just had to remind myself, 10 months will fly by and there are people who have to leave their families to do much worse than 'travel the world' so I should suck it up and get happy! I think our sleep-deprived arrival in Hong Kong put a dampner on our spirits but that was yesterday and today I feel much more accomplished.

We wanted to go to Kowloon and so headed to the MTR. The fact we have mastered Hong Kong's version of the tube already makes me feel happy that we have accomplished something! After realising there are two stations with Kowloon in the name, and realising niether of us knew which to go to, we opted for Mong Kok on recommendation from my buddy Ed.

The MTR is GREAT! Oh man, at first I laughed when I saw Boris Johnson talking about his dream for new tubes with one carriage and air conditioning but NOW I want that to happen! The stations are nice and clean, the ticket machines are awesome (touch the stop you want to go on the map! TOUCH SCREEN! AMAZING!), on the train itself, the map of stops has lights and an arrow showing you which direction you are travelling in (absolutely fab for newbie tourists like ourselves) and the lights go off at each station as you pass them. Genius. And then another little light indicating which side the doors will open. These things seem like such simple ideas but when they are all in one place, you realise how great they are! That coupled with air con made it the most pleasant tube journey I've undertaken in my life! I would probably enjoy my commute to work a lot more if this kind of train ran in London.

After a quick change of lines - across the platform from each other, another major selling point of the MTR! - we went four stops to Mong Kok. Lots more shops in Mong Kok that were appealing to us i.e. not food shops! Saw the familiar ESPIRIT store front pretty early on which was pretty comforting. Walked around for a while, window shopping and taking in everything. Found a Starbucks in which we had a spot of lunch (Sam had her Vanilla Chai tea latte and a blueberry scone, I had an amazing iced tea lemonade and ricotta and spinach pie. Lahvely) before continuing on. If I was naturally a size 8/10, I think Hong Kong would do a lot of damage to my credit card. A lot of the clothes are really cute but you need to be about 5 foot nothing with no boobs to wear anything! Ah well, saving me pennies I suppose hehe.

After a detour, we finally found the YWCA where my brother Drew and his girlfriend Emily stayed earlier in the year. Just around the corner is the fabulously named Man Fuk road where I of course got Sam to take a brilliantly touristy pic of me pointing at the sign. Pretty cool that somewhere as far away from home as Hong Kong has now had two of Team Heatley standing on the same bit of pavement! Only Joe to go now :P

Decided to head home after 5 hours of walking around as, unfortunately, 4/5 years in an office job means I am now hideously unfit and coupled with breaking in new shoes means my lower back and feet are postively throbbing from our non stop walking. But it's all good and in training for our Australian adventure where I want to see as much as I can :) just got to ease myself back in a bit I guess. Have been standing on our cool marble floor tiles in our room to try and sooth my feet! Plimsol trainers tomorrow, me thinks. On our way back, we popped into a great smelling bakery and picked up a ham and mushroom roll each and I also got an interesting looking green tea donut type roll with jam and cream in it! Looks a bit gross but excited to try it :P Going to definitely get my chinese on and find some dumplings to eat tomorrow. I'm determined to get Sam to try one, as I've not yet met someone who doesn't like dim sum hehe.

Back at the hotel now, contemplating where to go next (actually going to Kowloon tomorrow and thinking possibly a trip to Disneyland before we leave!!!), about to relax with an episode of Glee. Good times.



Amazing lemonade iced tea. I will be writing a letter to Starbucks upon my return to the UK, advising them to pull the UK stores out of the dark ages and lets us have green tea frapps and iced tea. Ok, green tea frapps are maybe a bit too exotic for grey England, but why the hell do we not have some iced tea action going on? Not impressed. /rant



The least hideous pic of me at Man Fuk Road! Must rememember to do some power-walk arms with all this walking...



View of the YWCA. Random.

My first proper entry! Hurrah!

After literally years of deciding I wanted to go to Australia, and months of planning with Sam, and weeks of disappointment after our trip to Thailand was cruelly postponed indefinitely, we have finally landed in Hong Kong.

Leaving mum was more than a tad emotional, and due to all the flight changing etc, dad wasn't around to drop me at the aiport, which is probably for the best as I suddenly decided the time to cry my eyes out about the whole going-away-thing was 2 days before I left, and I pretty much hadn't stopped. Oops.

Met Sam at the airport and was gutted to find my luggage was 3kg over but just about got away with it. This time. And quickly scooted through customs. As a long-time fan of Nothing To Declare, it was cool to see all the bag searching and swabbing in action - until not one but BOTH my bags set off the wailing alarm and I had the embarasment of going through all my bags, having to explain my Instax camera (as it had set off the scanner) and the dummy mistake of leaving small scissors in my first aid kit. Doh. Hopefully by our flight home, I'll have this aiport malarky sorted out.

Our flight was the quickest boarding ever. It literally went onscreen and 5 minutes later, they were calling last boarders. Just made it (great start to the trip!) and found our seats, 73 J and K, at the back of the plane. Its been a while since I flew and so I couldn't remember if I liked or hated it. I have learnt something about myself this trip and that is I hate the taking off and landing of the plane. When it's in the air and I can only see clouds - that I can deal with.

The flight was a bit late taking off but made up the time in the air. Eleven. Hours. Y'all. Thankfully, Quantas seats are quite comfy (specially our twosie at the back with a bit of legroom and plenty of recliner space) and they fed us up well. I say fed us up well - food was provided but it was at odd times, in keeping with the time change. My lunchtime pork goulash had barely digested when I was being served crunchy fruit salad and museli for breakfast at 10pm BST. Urgh.

Although the flight at the time seemed long, I couldn't believe 11 hours had flown ('arf 'arf) by when we touched down in Hong Kong. After watching a couple of movies (Dear John - quite good. Channing Tatum = yum. And The Blind Side - loved this! will watch again), Sam and I busied ourselves star-spotting on the plane. We were sat across from a guy whom we have dubbed Justin 'Bloody Mary' Bobby from the Hills as he was asking for one every hour. Clearly, Sam and I weren't taking the full advantage of the food and drink that Quantas had to offer! 7 Bloody Marys later and they finally said they wouldn't be serving him one WITH HIS BREAKFAST. Obv. Other star favourites were an air stewardess who looked like an even more low budget Paris Hilton, goofy Harrisson Ford and greasy Taylor Hanson. Jam packed. Love it.

Their airport is the cleanest and quietest I've ever seen. No real problems goings through customs this end. Just one man looked at my passport and scanned it and passed it to his supervisor who, after a quick glance (and presumeably realising I'd aged 5 years since my pic and was now a full time specs wearer) let me through. I get a feeling I am going to be the pain-in-the-ass during this trip. Why is it always me?!

We took an 'Urban taxi' from the aiport into Wan Chai to our hotel. The taxi was great, the drivers customise them with all their lucky stuff etc and she could close our back passenger doors with click of a button, had a voice over telling us to do up our seatbelts etc. Very funny. We got to our hotel a mere six hours before checkin. Frustrating but can't be helped as thems the hotel rules. So we dumped our bags and went for a walk. A very. Long. Walk.

I knew that Hong Kong was going to be the place that worried me most, just because of the language etc, and how last minute it was/how little I know about it, but the culture shock was made that much more harsh by the fact we were now 24hours without sleep, my feet were, typically, blistering into oblivion in my new - very cute and Pochohantas inspired - sandals and poor Sam's epic head cold. We walked for AGES and although it's not hot, it's extremely muggy. So the sweat was coming on in buckets pretty early on.

In Wan Chai, its not very touristy. And there is only so much sightseeing around the immediate area you can do before you've seen all the noodles and meat stalls before you're over it. The smell of all the stalls and especially the meat selling places, is intensfied 10fold by the heat, so this is another big thing we are struggling to contend with today, although I'm sure by the end of our stay, it wont bother us nearly as much.

After chilling in a park for a while, we spent an extraordinary 40 minutes nibbling chips in a Macdonalds (yes, yes, caved already - but we cant read anything on restaurant shop fronts and it was 12pm) before heading back to the hotel to wait for our room. Where I promptly fell asleep over a map.

But now we're in our room, with our internet, parents contacted, bodies washed and drinks from next door's 7-11 purchased and getting ready to wind down for the evening. The rooms a good size and the bed is just... weird! I've never slept on such a hard bed but so far its quite comfy! The bathroom is ALL glass with two blinds (one works, one doesn't) so its interesting trying to use it. I feel like an animal at the zoo!

Tomorrow - making the trip over the water to Kowloon, which we think is going to be much better suited to us and our visit. Wish us luck! :P








(views of the buildings from our room)



(Sam, blogging)



(best iced tea I've ever had <3)