Roos

After climbing in the Blueys, which was a spectacular week of weather and climbing alike, I stayed the night in a small town called Bulahdelah to wait for my Sydney peeps the next morning. I mingled with a few of the laid back country folk and even had a chat with the local policewoman about where would be a good place to "illegally" camp in my van without paying the price of a caravan park. She referred to me as "mate" and told me an awesome spot to stay which was basically their fairgrounds equiped with warm showers and all. The next morning we all met up and spent the next four days at a place called Seal Rocks. It was a beautiful beach and in between rain sessions we spent the weekend attempting to surf, bodyboarding, hiking, tossing the football, and celebrating my 29th birthday. Dave and Pav delivered me a card that Amanda sent me from home along with a card of their own, a cake with candles, and some sweet shorts with Australian colors. I set up my slackline, hammock, and gymnastic rings at the campsite. Owen has titled me with the nickname of Action Man that may stick with me as long as I know them which was earned basically because I'm not a city slicker like most of them to make a long story short. While setting up Dave's monstrosity of a tent that could house an Omish family, a giant Iguana looking lizard that was the size of a small crocodile came casually strolling out of the bushes and walked right past us. Even the Aussies weren't quite sure what to do and were a bit scared but he seemed to be well practiced in chilling around campers and he just wondered right on through. During my stay here I had been mentioning to Dave that I would like to eat kangaroo as I've seen in in grocery stores and some restaurants. They all kind of looked at me funny because being Australian natives none of them have ever tasted it. To my delight they brought some kangaroo kebabs along camping that were mutually agreed upon delicious. They basically reminded me of a nice elk steak with no game flavor at all. Speaking of which I have actually seen a few living kangaroos, but most of them I've seen have been splattered on the roadways much like deer at home. We saw a lot of other wildlife as possoms routinely came to visit during the night hours and a school of dolphins we saw were literally surfing waves by the beach. After camping my intentions were to continue up to Byron Bay and possibly Brisbane, but after a long conversation with Dave and a reality check with how big Australia actually is and how much time I have left, I've decided to put that on next times to do list and head south. Basically there is no rock climbing or mountains, just nice beaches which are abundant anywhere you travel in Australia. I'm a bit torn because I would like to dive the great barrier reef and see a friend of mine that lives up there but you can't do everything at once I guess. Anyway I headed back to Sydney to regroup for a day and do some bouldering on the local beaches. I've decided to come to Kosciusko National Park which is where I am now to hike the continents highest peak. I took the long way down to Kozy along the coast on the Grand Coast Drive, which is similar to taking HWY 101 at home along the oregon coast. Lots of neat little towns and beautiful coastline but lots of driving.