We landed in Melbourne on the 5th of March, and spend 3 days there before heading to Faulty Towers.
We hung around St Kilda, at Luna Park, the beach, the parks… where we met one penguin in the evening!
The penguin of St Kilda
The famous entrance to Luna Park
We then decided to hitch-hike to Wallington, to stay with Pam, Tony and Amy.
We started with a long walk through Melbourne and through the track of the Formula 1 Grand prix that was coming up the following week.
On the track…
We reached an access to the highway after about 2 hours walk. We got a lift to Werribee, where we had to walk a lot to the town because the exit we were dropped at did not have an entrance… so we walked, and walked and more… and eventually a person gave us a lift to the next entrance to the highway. We put our sign out again and after a few minutes, a police highway patrol car pulled over and the policeman told us it was illegal to hitch-hike in the state of Victoria and it could lead to a $1200 fine per person. Oops! And of course we were not near a train or bus station anymore… so we kept walking, with our sign in the hand hoping that someone passing us would see it… Which luckily happened! We were dropped at a fuel station on the highway, where we found another car to drive us to Geelong. From the center, we walked out of town for a while, and ended our hitch-hiking trip at the right address, in a big 4 wheel drive with a big dog on the back seat!
We worked with Tony, I learned a bit more about carpentry! I got more confident using the framing gun, I learned how to gently fix problems (with a hammer) and installed locks on doors… I also learned to use more swearing words, or to combine them! Haha… not that good though for my English.
Installing eaves
Cutting noggins
Leveling the ceiling
Installing the frame of a sliding door
Reading the drawings
Building the bath hob
Finishing the bath hob
Nailing architraves
Installing a towel rail
Sleeping in the car on the way to the site in the morning…
During our 5 weeks there, we also went around a little bit, thanks to the “old girl” which is the old family car that they kept for us to use!
We went to Bells beach, to Ocean Grove, Barwon heads, Queenscliff, Colac… hanging around on the beach, riding bikes, drinking beer, or having a nap…
Barwon Heads
Bells Beach
Sunset from Red Rock near Colac
On the beechy trail, on the way to the Prickly Moses brewery
Beer tasting paddles… all of them! Deserved after about 12 km on the bikes…
The way back… a bit tired!
Lake Colac
We also met a few spiders and a a snake.
One of my best friends…
Brown snake… gladly dead!
We ate tartiflette with reblochon from la cooperative du reblochon de Thônes!
Mmmmmmm…. Tartiflette!! Thanks for saving some Pam!
Feeling tired after the first month, let’s go for a little holiday, on our way to the outback! We flew to Cairns on the 12th of April, ready for more adventures!
Next stories to come soon when we are back to civilisation… (no we did not leave with the bikes…)
mes pensées étaient si fortes que tu les as entendues: je me languissais en effet de la suite en images de ta belle aventure, même si je sais que tu en es sinon à les dessiner du moins à compter les moutons au fin fond du désert. Dis donc, les autorités ne vous sont pas tombées dessus en sentant la tartiflette? ce n’est pas interdit, ça aussi?
Non non c’est pas interdit, si le fromage est commercialement emballé! c’était bien bon 🙂 plus d’images à venir bientôt sur le desert…
You guys worked really hard, wow!
Nice story again and also thanks for the lovely card you send me!
Xx
Suus
🙂 we always work hard, haha! did you doubt about that? 😉 Lots of love from down here for this special day today for you!
Vos communications passent mieux au milieu du désert qu’ici : j’ai retrouvé le chemin du blog (en anglais, par des manipulations compliquées…).
Comment faire pour survivre à 200 km de la côte, 600 km de Brisbanne, 60 km de Duaringa (je n’ai pas compté plus d’une centaine de maisons). Ce sont les kangourous qui viennent faire le plein à la station ? Une fois par semaine ?
Ici, nous mangeons aussi du Reblochon, bien sûr (qui a moins voyagé : il vient de la fruitière de St Eustache (6 km), de la Tome (des Bauges), du gruyère (des Bauges, aussi : Margeriaz), de l’Abondance, et j’en passe… Un régal ! Tu as du y penser en mangeant ta tartiflette Australienne !
Attention aux indigestions et aux coups de soleil.
Grosses bises.
François
C’est nul, ces trucs en anglais qui se permettent de bouziller mon texte consciencieusement écrit, sans faute au départ !
On va voir comment ils traduisent “bouziller”.
Re-grosses bises.
François
Ne t’inquiète pas pour la traduction de ton texte, sachant que je recois et que sur la page originale du blog c’est ton texte qui apparaît, sans modifications! Oui le fromage commence à manquer un peu… mais il y a tellement d’autres choses ici! Les courses sont en général 1 fois tous les 15 jours, il suffit d’avoir un bon congélateur! et oui, les kangourous sont par centaines/milliers par ici…
bisous!