Oh, I do like to be beside the seaside!

Toreet?

Man, it's been absolutely freezing these past couple of days! Probably not what you lot back home would call freezing, but it's been between 15 and 20C. Cold! And, just as luck would have it, the day that we leave Lorne (today), the good old weather has decided to brighten up. Typical!

Anyway, so what have we been up to. Well on Tuesday when we arrived (I'm not sure I mentioned this in my last post) I was feeling totally rotten with a migraine. We strolled down the main street in Lorne after blogging, and the little shops on the front are mainly trinketty, clothes, cafes and souvenirs. It's a cute little town and really reminds me of places like Tenby, Beer or that other place in Devon with a funny name that I can't remember. We stopped at the supermarket, and decided that while we're here we're going to have nice teas. So we bought some skewered kebabs and some mushrooms, peppers (which, by the way, are HUGE over here - mammoth capsicums!), an onion and a couple of small potatoes. We had grilled kebabs and stirfry veg for tea and it was lovely. I sat and watched The O.C. (a rare treat for the backpacker!) then went straight to bed cos I felt really ill! Then when I got up to go to the loo, feeling very groggy, I stood on something that felt really odd, then when the light came on I saw this GIANT spider running off - about 2 inches across! That certainly woke me up.

On Wednesday morning I had an almost perfect lie-in, but it was tainted by being woken up between 7 and 8am by a profusion of loud, foul-mouthed Brazilian teenagers in the room next to us. They were international students travelling with a school that was staying the one night, so they were checking out, and very noisily too. I've never heard such foul language so early in the morning in my whole life (despite going to Rivi!). I actually got up and hammered on the wall for them to shut the hell up, not that it made the slightest ounce of difference. When the teacher turned up I nearly got up again and demanded the address of the school so I could send a complaint letter, I was that riled. But I just couldn't be bothered getting out of bed again cos it was so cold! Anyway, despite the whole fracas, I managed to sleep in til about 11:45am. Hee hee.

After breakfast we walked down the main street and then along the coastal path to the pier, where you got a good view of the whole of Lorne. It was extremely windy there though, we nearly got blown off! Then we walked back into town, copied Claire's photos and sent them home, and browsed the shops. We stopped in a trendy-looking cafe called Reifs, and sat outside in the cold with our hot chocolates, refusing to sit inside, and bitching about how with this weather we might as well be at home. At about 3:30pm we trekked on back to the hostel for some dinner of cheese and salami toasties! Our hostel has this toastie machine that is two hotplates on a hinge (so I've forbidden Claire from using it) and we've been making good use of the novelty!

That afternoon we just chilled out (literally!) and read. I've nearly finished Dan Brown's Deception Point, and I must say don't believe people when they tell you his other books aren't as good as The Da Vinci Code. This one is just as good. We also spent the afternoon attracting the plethora of birdlife with some seeds out of the kitchen. The forest around our hostel is home to dozens of Sulphur-Crested Cockatoos (the white parrot-looking bird with a yellow fan atop it's head) and Crimson Rosellas (a beautiful red and blue parakeet). The Cockatoos are like scavengers! They swarm you as soon as you even walk out of the kitchen with the seed jar, and push the Rosellas out of feeding time. They're well mean!

Anyway, by teatime our room was freezing cos the German couple we were sharing with had left the door open all day, so we tried to get the air conditioner to work on a hot setting but with no joy. So we hid out in the kitchen with the TV. We had a lovely tea of Indian Veggie Burgers and Broccoli/Cauliflower Cheese. Yum! Then we had strawberries and cream for afters while we watched American Idol. See, this is what backpacking Australia is all about!

The next day, everyone we were sharing a dorm with left - the cold-loving German couple, the English guy and the Brazilian skater dudes, so the night that we couldn't have a lie-in we had the room to ourselves! Typical. Anyway, we got up, had a breakfast of coco pops and cheese toasties, then set off walking to Teddy's Lookout, a walk recommended to us buy a German girl in our room on the first night here. I reluctantly dropped off 5 of my 9 films that needed developing in the pharmacy on the way, convinced I would never see them again!

The walk was all uphill through the houses that lined the hills behind the coast, and we were amazed by the view of the coast that some of these houses had - jammy things! We passed one house with a very bizaare garden - the type of situation where you don't want to look but you can't tear your eyes away. They had models of cows, bulls, giant ostriches, and mannequins oddly arranged around the garden. Strange. Could've been artists.

By the time we got to the lookout, we spotted an Aussie couple who'd been at our hostel, and they had driven up! In a car! How lazy! The lookout was minutely disappointing, only because I thought you would get a view of both Lorne and the Great Ocean Road, but it was only of a bay and part of the road. But it was still good, you could see miles out to sea. If only it wasn't so cloudy and windy and cold! I got Claire to take a picture of me in my full attire so we could portray to the folks back home just how cold we were compared to the heat of the outback - I was wearing a t-shirt, long sleeved top over that, rain-proof jacket over that, long trousers, hiking boots and socks. And my hair was blustering about all over the place!

Anyway, after walking back down we did a bit of shopping in the town and went back to the hostel for dinner. Then I came down to the town again, very apprehensively, to pick up my photos, which actually all came out fine, except for a thin black line on the top edge of them all. Frankly, I was just glad to be clutching them! That afternoon the Crimson Rosella came and sat on the railing outside our room, where we were sat reading. I went downstairs to the kitchen to get some seeds, and it ate them out of my hand! It was well cool - well, for about a minute or so. Then dozens of Cockatoos swooped in, squarking, wanting the same treatment, and we had to run and take cover in our room. The poor Crimson Rosella was probably wondering what it had done wrong! That afternoon we also saw a couple of Kookaburras, which was a first in the wild. Don't worry, we'll be emailing details of our upcoming ornothology course shortly!

For tea that night, we went all out, and I must say I'm so proud of our culinary expertise! We saved some broccoli and cauliflower from the night before, bought a roast chicken, carrots, potatoes and a packet of gravy mix from the supermarket, and had us a roast dinner! It was great - we only managed mashed spuds and carrots instead of roast spuds, but we were extremely proud. Our first roast dinner in three months! We even got a tinned plum pudding and a sachet of custard to have for afters. Delish! Then it started raining, so after phoning home we settled in the kitchen and, since we had it to ourselves, watched Medical Investigation. We had planned to go out to the pub and drink loads of Guiness and dance a jig or two, but there was nothing going on for St Patricks Day in the whole of Lorne! How disappointing!

The plan for today isn't too taxing, we leave for Melbourne on the good old Adventure Tours bus in about 2 hours, so we'll just browse the shops for last minute buys and have some dinner of roast chicken and cheese toasties before then! We'll be going to Melbourne via Torquay, I think, which is the home of the first Rip Curl Surf Shop, and where we may be able to pick up some surfwear bargains!

I'm excited about getting into Melbourne, but it's so scary to think that we've come this far, and we'll be back in Sydney in less than two weeks. I am looking forward to coming home, but it seems that our time here has just whizzed by. At least we've made the most of it here in Lorne, doing absolutely nothing! But seriously, it is scary to think we'll be home in no time. I'm excited about the prospect of seeing everyone again, being able to drive and seeing my family's new caravan! But I know that after a week or so I'll wish I was back here, doing whatever the hell I please everyday! But I guess we can't have it all.

Tis all for now, I'll post again from Melbourne. We'll be pretty busy as we've got loads of exciting things planned, including a day out to Phillip Island to watch the parade of fairy penguins at sunset, a day out to the Mornington Peninsula if the weather's nice, and hopefully an Aussie Rules Football Game at the MCG, if we can get tickets as they've only got pre-season matches on at the moment.

So it's all go from now on! Take care all.