Meeting blokes and Shielas in ‘Stralia

G’day from Sydney, Australia!  Good on ya’ for having a Captain Cook of our substack.

As you can tell, we are seamlessly blending in with the locals over here and have firmly tied our kangaroos bicycles down for a few days after cycling down the east coast to Sydney. And what a coast it has been.

Now, a cynical reader (we’re skeptical any exist) might allege that our coastal route to Sydney, which has been full of swimming, whale watching, beers, coffee, boat trips and beach days, is more of a holiday than a cycling adventure. And we don’t know what to tell you!

Making a coffee after showing the surfers at Byron Bay what a ‘wipe out’ is

But our route has given us more time with people we’ve met along the way.  Not only have we had the opportunity to absorb the coastal landscape around us, but we’ve also absorbed the lives of those characters we’ve stayed with.

• Linda and Phil, a retired American / Australian couple who spend their spare time creating glass art

• Nigel, a kiwi who, at the age of 55, decided to set off cycling around the world and came back 7 years later

• Lara and Kyle - a maths teacher and an engineer who will shortly be moving to Italy and are planning a cycle trip with their two young boys

• Debbie and Kevin who live in the wonderfully named Dondingalong

• Mitch who travels Australia by van and is a weapon on the surf board

• Elise and Ben who introduced us to a delicious local beer from Port Macquarie

• Eilidh, one of Harriet’s oldest and closest friends who is breaking ceilings in Australian football (or soccer as they call it over here)

Meeting so many interesting people has helped us fight through the early rain and winds which we were not expecting in Australia. People feel surprisingly sorry for you when look like a drowned rat on a pedalo. Thankfully that famous Aussie sunshine finally came out and we were able to put another shrimp on the barbie.

A wet weather brekki - not smashed avo on toast, but smashed peanuts in porridge

This week’s highlights:

• The first kangaroo sighting, of course.

• The long awaited return of the crisp sandwich for lunch.

• Having a crack at surfing. A highlight for us but it perhaps falls into the lowlights for the locals who had to watch what can only be described as a couple of walruses on wet marble.

• Soaking up some art and culture in Sydney after what feels like a long while in the wild.

• We celebrated Harriet’s birthday in style with a show at the Sydney Opera House and sunset harbour drinks. One to be remembered.

This week’s lowlights:

• Matt secretly sneaking off to wrap Harriet’s birthday presents only to discover he had bought clear wrapping paper. Yes, really. It looked silver, apparently.

• Harriet washing a cup in the sea at the pier when her bank card slipped out her pocket and slowly sunk out of sight.  She’s since been watching her account to make sure the fish haven’t been splashing out (boom, boom).

• Cycling down the east coast of Australia obviously means that we didn’t cycle across the outback. This is a source of regret but also jumps to the top of the list of adventures to return to.

We’re now getting to the business end of things; to get to New Zealand it’s over 600km by sea. We’ve dabbled in a few alternative options to flying (see below). As of yet we haven’t come up with anything suitable but we’ll keep you posted.

In the meantime, take it easy, ya little ripper.

High tides and good vibes

Restaurant quality.