A place to stay...

...for good?
I could really get used to this. Sitting on a big couch with a huge TV (Pay-TV), a kitchen, veranda, garden,a cat and a dog etc.
But I'll let you catch up with me. We came back to Sydney because Dylan's next door neighbors asked us if we wanted to look after their house while they were away. We thought that it would be great to have a house while we were selling the car so we could get all our stuff out and set it up for potential buyers to look at it without seeing a terrible mess, and so we moved in on Saturday the 1st of October. It was a lovely old house, overlooking the ocean with a big back yard (with a trampoline) and a beautiful living area which used to be a huge veranda and, even though it's inside now, kept its beach house flair and its airiness.
We realized the advantages of having a house that very night, as a thunderstorm hit Newport with rain and cold temperatures. But we sat inside,in front of a lit fire, dry, warm and not squashed together without any space to move.
We enjoyed that week a lot. We cooked big meals, baked bread and made ice cream, we spread out all our stuff, we bought food for a few days in advance, we did all our washing and so on and so on...
It was a bit tough to get used to having a dog and a cat because that meant we had to get the feeding times right, go for walks and put up with barking and whining, but they where cute little things and it got better every day.
We also loved the company of our great neighbors, the Barbers, who we had over for dinner one night which was great fun.
Mostly the weather was beautiful in the mornings and cold and rainy in the evenings and we didn't spend much time outside. I had one surf on a quite big day which was a lot of fun but it turned out that Bekki's board was broken too. With both our surfboards broken we didn't have too many reasons to leave the house, apart from walking the dog.
We tried to advertise the car through the internet without any major success ( the only inquiry came after the car was already sold) and decided, after a few nervous days of waiting, to advertise it in the backpacker scene of Sydney. We made flyers and took the bus into town to distribute them in the backpacker hostels around Kings Cross and the central station. I didn't think we would have any luck with that but already after the third hostel three German backpackers came running after us who were very interested. They visited us in Newport, took one look and a test drive and bought it. We agreed on a price that suited both parties and they left us, car-less and with a big whole in our hearts. Don't understand me wrong though. We were very happy to sell it but it had been a good companion and friend for all of us over here and I'm sure he will have a special place in our hearts forever.

At the end of the week I finally managed to catch up with a few of my friends which was great, I borrowed a longboard and we had a long surf and a beach day and went out for dinner that night. It was cool to hang out with them again, it feels so much as if I had never left, and it's always a lot of fun.

I really enjoyed that time Newport. Having a house all to ourselves gave a little insight into how life would be living there and I loved it. I feel very much at home there and can definitely see myself living in that area one day. It is almost sad to leave that place behind again and to give up our house without a fight...

On Tuesday the 11th we took the train/bus to Guyra where we planned spending our last days on Australian soil. With still a lot to organize and book the farm seemed to be the perfect place and it would be great to go back to my family to spend some more time with them. The trip took almost 12 hours and we were very exhausted when we arrived at the bus stop where we got picked up by Gran.
It is definitely a different way of traveling when you have all your stuff on your back but we'll get used to it. The hardest part though is to decide what you keep and what you through away because of all the luggage limitations of airlines, transports and of course your own carrying capacity.