SHIT HAPPENS - Australia (part 3)

Here we goooo, third and last episode of the series. Yup, I know it took a whiiiile, but really wanted to make this part the best part. Although I f*ckin' h-a-t-e editing and I suck at it, I wanted to give you a new travel video. But first, let's jump into the last 9 days of this trip! Enjoy to the fullest!

Stay for day 16, 17 & 18

LOl, I don't find the picture of our hotel toilet anymore, so here is the toilet from the Ramen restaurant... :))

DAY 17

Good morning babes, or should I say sporty spices?

Jumped in an Uber, to the area where our bike tour started. We had breakfast in a French bakery. Where I, as smart as I am, ordered in French. Poor me, the people here do not speak French, even not in a French bakery!

After my awful moment, we went to the bike tour company. We got helmets, instructions and, of course, bikes. We started our tour with a view on the Sydney Opera House. Together with a guide, we biked along the city's most famous places. Had a drink in a local pub. I could say we saw the whole city, but no. Even if you drive 60km, you're still in Sydney, bitch! But I can say we saw a lot, like really a lot!

After our 18km long bike tour, we took the ferry to Manly Beach. Over there, we went for a little walk and chilled out while watching surfers (surf) at sunset. Magical! Just pure magic!

We went back to the city centre and headed to the Shangri La Hotel, for a drink with a view. After that we had dinner in a Japanese ramen restaurant that a local advised us. Great food!

DAY 18

Hi beach babes, I hope your butt doesn't hurt too much cause today is surf day! OMFG looked soooo forward to this. We took an Uber to Bondi Beach, one of the most famous beaches in Sydney. And had breakfast. Lol, I ate gozleme (Turkish pancakes), love that, but didn't expect to find that over there at all!

After my Turkish breakfast, we went to the surf club to book a course. Because we had to wait till the tide was right to surf again. We had to be back around 3 so we went for a walk. The walk took us along several beaches. And we saw whales (again)! They were swimming along with lil' boats. It was like they were giving us a show.

The walk took longer than expected, but it was so beautiful! When we finally arrived at our destination, we had lunch in a super cute, fisher style kinda restaurant. All the windows open, eating with sea-view. Just great. Meanwhile, it was about time to head back to Bondi Beach for our surf course, so we took an Uber again!

We arrived just on time. Got our wetsuits on and totally ready to defy the ocean waves. Lemme tell you, when I saw the waves from the beach, I literally thought 'Bruh how can this be THE best surf beach in the city, there're hardly big waves. But when you're lying down on your board, ready to catch a wave, you're like WTF, they're HUGE. This was certainly one of the best days ever! The kick was huge, I was smiling all the time. Even at the end, when I was getting tired, I was enjoying it to the full. I would go back just for the surf. I wish I lived near by a surf spot. I think the culture must be great, cause surfing isn't just a sport, it's a whole lifestyle. And I really want to get to know this one. I'm so jealous of these people, at the beach life is chill, everyone is relaxed although they work super hard. Here in Europe, everyone is stressed 24/24. We should all learn from these people.

After the surf we went back to town, cause we had a dinner with an ex-colleague of my dad, who lives in Sydney for a while. We had a great meal in great company! Really nice to hear about how it is, living in Sydney.

Stay for day 19, 20, 21, 22, 23

The toilet at Sigi & Jan's home :)

DAY 19

Oh no, time to say goodbye to Sydney and to ... daddy. He's going home for work ... :( .

We had our last breakfast together and just stumbled through town for the rest of our time in Sydney. Did a lil' bit of shopping of course!

We had to be at the airport at midday; mommy, brother and I for our flight to Melbourne and daddy for his flight back home. Bye dad, see you in 5 days!

I must say, Quantas Airways, is damn good! Brand new airplanes, good service, we even had our own tv-screens in our plane. Even though we only had to fly 1h30!

We arrived in Melbourne, our last stop, around 4 pm. Here, we were going to stay with our friends/family, who live in Melbourne (the same from the outback tour!). So we took a cab to Sigi, Jan and Cas' house, we had a very warm welcome! Yayyyy, Sigi made meatballs in tomato sauce, finally no restaurant food anymore, soooo tired of it! The day isn't over yet, cause we're going to see Australian football at the Melbourne Cricket ground. Soccer is nothing like this, this game is much more entertaining. There's always something happening. It was soooo much fun! The atmosphere is so nice, although we had to wear beanies and scarfs to protect us from the cold. But it was amazing anyway!

DAY 20

This day is a chill day, not too much to do. Just chilling and enjoying the sun ... in other words the rain. -_- We just had a nice breakfast at home.

Afterwards, we went to Cas' basketball match. Which was a lot of fun cause we met a couple of their local friends!

After the match Sigi, mommy & I went to a local grocery store to get our lunch. Did a little shopping in the local stores. Went back home and had lunch. After the lunch, Sigi and Cas had to go for the first time to the puppy school with their new family member, Sky. So we just chilled out and watched Netflix. When they got back home, we went to the supermarket.

In the evening we went to see the penguins at the St. Kilda pier. Afterwards we went to a restaurant to have dinner.

DAY 21

For breakfast, we went to a local breakfast restaurant or something, can't really remember what it's called but it was pretty good.

BUT, in the afternoon we went shopping in the biggest shopping mall of the Southern hemisphere. Chadstone Shopping Centre. You literally got everything in there, from the most expensive brands like Gucci, Dior & Burberry to even a Target! Suddenly, Sigi had the amazing idea to go eat churros. That was the best idea ever! After the delicious churros we had another amazing idea, the good ideas just kept coming, we went to have a massage. A-m-a-z-i-n-g.

Relaxed and well, we ended our shopping trip because I had to meet the boys at the cinema. We were going to see 'The Meg'. A movie about a Megalogon, a HUGE shark. But we weren't just going to see a movie, we booked a super de luxe one. So before we had to go in, we could wait in the lounge and order the food we wanted during the movie. Plus, you could say when exactly you wanted to get your food served. The cinema was super small, there was only place for maximum thirty people or something. We had big recliner seats and there was already a box of popcorn waiting for each of us. During the movie I got my salade, witch was not a very smart food choice, to eat in a dark room... Anyway it was delicious. We had another great night!

DAY 22

Monday, is for once 'mon day', cause we're going downtown for the first time! The first line of our schedule reads 'guided tour'. So we had to hurry cause we got to be on time! By chance, the guide's name was also Astrid! It was the fist time she met a namesake! Definitely her lucky day! Lucky for us, she was the best guide ever! We walked around town, she showed us all her favorite spots, coffee shops and so on. After 3hours of walking, the tour was finished and we finally got food! In a Belgian beer cafe! Great!

Unfortunately, it was raining like hell. So my brother decided to go home together with Sigi & Cas. Mommy and I stayed and did some shopping, cause I was still looking for a Ripcurl hoodie. Thus we went to a mall and enjoyed the rest of the day. After a while we too went back home cause dinner was waiting for us!

DAY 23

The toilets with skyline view @ the Sofitel

Cas has to go to school, so we make use of the opportunity to go take a look in his school! Exciting! To start off, over there everyone has to wear a school uniform. Some are cooler than the others but it's still pretty nice. His school was huge. It made me feel a lil' like Harry Potter; everyone wearing uniforms and the school with the different houses that compete each other in sports and so on every year. Your whole school career you stay in the same house. So damn cool! His school also has his very own pool, the pool was as big as our public swimming pool at home. Like WTF. Furthermore they had tennis courts, basketball courts, Australian football courts, you name it and they have it. But a small minus, boys and girls are separated, also on the playground.

After our school visit, we went to the beach to watch the typical Melbourne strand cabines. Because of the bad weather, our beach visit wasn't very extended. However, we saw a giant jellyfish on the beach!

With our feet full of sand, we went back to downtown Melbourne, today our goal was to get to the top floor of the Eureka tower, the highest building in Melbourne. This was a not-to-miss part of the city, because of my brother's obsession with big buildings. But I can't blame him, seeing the city from another point of view, literally, is a lot of fun!

The rest of the morning we spent in Fitzroy, a part of Melbourne with lots of street art. So we just strolled through the streets, watching the beautiful wall art and had lunch in a hippie bar. Cosy!

We continued the walk to the Melbourne museum, where we spent more than an hour learning which animals you can find in the sea here in Melbourne. Saw bigggggggg spiders and lots of other big insects. Luckily, most of them weren't alive anymore. But the part of the museum that I liked the most was definitely the museum shop. We laughed our asses off when Axel suddenly showed up with a koala head. Genius!

From all that learning in the museum, we started to get hungry. So we got to the most famous pastry shop. I don't know if the idea was that good this time, we queued for a freaking hour to get in this bakery. FML. But can't complain about the pastries at all, they were goddess! Oh btw on our way to the bakery, we stopped at a hotel to go to the toilet. It were not just toilets, the toilets had a skyline view! How amazing is that! Had the best toilet visit ever, up there!

Meanwhile at home, Sigi was preparing a local dish... SHARK. Yup yup, it's the world in reverse. This time I eat the shark, not the other way around! Sigi did a good job, the food was again delicious!

The other day in town we bought a little present for our hosts. A game that they wanted very badly. It's called 'Card of Humanity'. So we gave it and we immediately played it. Damn that was soooo much fun! That game is sooo funny! If you're looking for a nice game to play with grown ups, this is perfect!

And so our last night in Melbourne slowly ended...

DAY 24

Ohhhh nooooo already the last day.

To end our vacation in a great way we went out to have breakfast, our last pancake breakfast for this vacay. Sadddd :(((((. We did a little more souvenir shopping in the local stores and went back home to pack our bags. When the Uber picked us up, we said goodbye to everyone and started our way to the airport.

Once there, we got some struggles with baggage drop, because you had to do it all by yourself. Probably they just didn't want us to leave... I wouldn't mind! It's okay I'll stay here, I'll sacrifice myself. No problem at all!

Everything worked out and we got on the plane. The first flight was from Melbourne to Hong Kong, a 9hours flight. The airplane was great! There was a lot of space for your legs and the tv-screens were brand new. I think the whole plane was brand new. The food, on the other hand, was not that good. I can't remember what I ate but I do remember that I did not like it. I had the intention to stay this flight out without sleeping. Otherwise it was going to get hard for the transit. But that plan didn't really work out. I couldn't withstand the sleep anymore the last hour.

We arrived in Hong Kong around 9PM local time. We had 3hours to switch to the other plane. Once there, we found out that our flight was delayed with an hour. Damn. That was hardcore. We got something to eat but really just wanted to sleep. As soon as we got on the plane, I fell asleep. Apparently we waited in the plane another hour before take off. But don't ask me, I was already sleeping. I didn't see any food either. Luckily I wasn't hungry at all. I slept for almost 7hours, I think. But we still had to fly another 6hours. Fml. So I just watched some movies and documentaries that I downloaded on Netflix. I think I watched about 5 movies or something. This plane was sadly not as good as the other one. Anyway we made it!

After a total of 21 hours flying, we made it to Frankfurt! Now it's time to drive homeeeee. After a 2 hours drive, we were finally really home! Pffff already missing Australia...

I LOVED IT. It was definitely one of the best travel experiences ever. 25 days can look quite long but I swear you, time flies when you're having fun. It's wasn't enough time to see all the beauties of this country. But we all made memories for life. Memories that'll last forever. Everything was an experience, literally everything. Every little moment is a moment to remember, from waking up in the middle of nowhere to BBQing in our house in Mission Beach. And yes, I will definitely go back. I really want to visit the Gold Coast, surfing is LIT in the area of Brisbane. Also high on the bucket list is Darwin, Adelaide & Perth, just the whole West Coast in general. And of course New Zealand, Tasmania and Fiji cannot be missing on the list.

To finish I really want to thank Sigi, Jan & Cas for everything. The amazing food you guys made and of course for the stay! Getting to know how life is there, what it is like, was really amazing. Maybe once I'll be moving there, just like you guys did! Also a big thanks for being the best company. It was very nice to share this experience with you. Hopefully we can come over again when we come back to Australia!

A big thanks for everything!

Not only the vacation is over but also this series. Perhaps there'll come a follow up in a couple of years... Anyway, I hope you liked it as much as I did! If you ever think about traveling there, please do it, you will definitely not regret it. To the contrary, you will loveeee it. If you're looking for a travel partner, no problem, I will sacrifice myself. Really! No problem at all! Enjoy the little compilation video!

Hong Kong

Australia

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Big love!

Kisses Astrid

xxx