Chinese Garden, 29.01.2010

Initiated by the local Chinese community to share their rich cultural heritage and celebrate Australia's 1988 Bicentenary, the Chinese Garden is the result of a close bond of friendship and cooperation between the sister cities of Sydney and Guangzhou in Guangdong Province, China.

The garden was designed and built by Chinese landscape architects and gardeners. Similar to every classical Chinese garden, traditional principles govern the use of four key elements of water, plants, stone and architecture. Together, these four elements combine to create perfect balance.

The art of Chinese garden design began in imperial parks during the Zhang dynasty 3000 years ago. Later they flourished on a smaller scale in the private gardens of China's rich and powerful. The Chinese Garden of Friendship at Darling Harbour is a scaled-down version of a typical private garden from this era.

Chinese gardens differ from western-style gardens in that there are no planted flowerbeds or manicured lawns. Instead, wild aspects of nature are recreated in artfully designed landscapes that feature waterfalls, mountains, lakes and forests.

Australia day 26.01.2010

I thought I did a lot of walking in the city before, but this day topped everything! My bus gets of at the Queen Victoria Buildiung. From there I walked to the Rocks to meet Sabrina and another german girl Petra from Bavaria. From there we walked over to the Opera House.
Unfortunately Sabrina had to leave us at that point because she had to catch her train back home. So I walked with Petra through the Botanic Garden towards the Hyde Park to meet some of her friends she met at the G´day! Good old times, I miss that hostel…
In the afternoon we walked back to the Rocks to watch some of the live bands and to meet up with Hilary, Elizabeth and Michaela. Petra left us at a bar to catch her train back home to the blue mountains. The rest of us (some of Hilary`s friends waited there) had a few drinks. Michaela and Lizzo went back home after a while and I decided to walk (!!!) with Hilary and Rachael to Darling Harbour to watch the fireworks there. I don´t know how many kilometres I walked today, but it was a lot…

view from my window

my room

We left Avoca on Saturday morning at about 10am to arrive in Port Stephens at lunch time (approx. 12pm).
Annie`s friend Karen (she`s half german), her husband Tim and their kids Heidi and Hugo spent their summer holidays there. They have the most stunning beach house I´ve ever seen. It has 5 bedrooms a huge kitchen, dining and living room, a swimming pool and it´s in front of the beach. I could see and hear the ocean when I was lying in my bed (see pictures).

We stayed there for 3 days and I totally enjoyed it. I had to watch the kids a few times, like in the evening when the “adults” went out for dinner. On Monday I watched Inez for a few hours, while they went out with their boat for lunch. Yes, believe it or not, they also have a big motor-boat. I´ve been on it twice and its really “fast and furious!”
I also went scuba-diving with my host mom!! That was sooo much fun (see picture).
Tim managed to throw my host mom out twice and at one point I just couldn´t hold on any more so I fell out, too. The water was hard as a board and I lost my bikini bottom. Thankfully nobody realised that.

We also had Oysters and little Prawns everyday which I really enjoyed, because I love sea-food. It tastes so much fresher than in Germany, because it comes directly from the sea.
I could have stayed for a few more days, but we drove back to Sydney on Monday evening. But than i could at least go to the city on Tuesday for the "Australia Day".

Surfcamp Coffs Harbour 20.01.-23.01.2010

I decided to write my diary in English from now on! I apologise to my friends and family back in Germany, but i think you can still understand it. I´ve met a lot of lovely people here from all over the world and I also want, that they can read my blog :-)

I had to catch the bus on Wednesday at 5am!! I was pretty tired so I got a coffee in the city to help me wake up! Apropos, our bus started at my old hostel called “wake up” J

Our bus driver was a really good looking Surf guy but I figured that he knows that and is probably a “Casanova”! He had the “great” idea to play a game on the bus: Everybody had to say their names, where they from and they´re turn on`s and turn off`s! Mine were travelling and working :-)
Someone said a hairy bud, don´t know how you can think about that??

Anyway, after a 6 hour drive we finally arrived at the surf camp. It was really close to the beach, only about a 5min. walk, but trust me, it feels forever if you have to carry a surfboard.
After a nice BBQ Lunch and tons of sunscreen we headed down to the beach.
Of course, the practice on the beach was much easier than in the water. I already had a one day surf curse, but it seemed that didn´t help me much. For some reason i just couldn´t stand up on the surfboard.
I got caught from the waves a lot. It`s awful, to swallow salt water all the time.
So, actually I was glad when our 3 hour lesson was over and we walked back (of course, carrying our surfboards) to the camp.
We had time to take a shower and relax before our dinner.
I spent the evening with a guy from England, one from Germany and a girl and a boy from Holland playing drinking games. The last one we played was flip-cup (@ my german-friends: I´ll teach you that game when I`m back, it`s really funny).

We had 2 surf lessons on Thursday. Three hours in the morning and 3 hours again in the afternoon. And guess what, this time it worked out pretty good! When our surf teacher helped me and told me at what time I had to stand up it was much easier.
If your to early standing up, the wave is gonna brake over you and you get drowned, if your to late, the wave is gonna brake after you.
But I still catched a few waves today and it was really fun. Yeahhh, Schakawaka…

The other good thing was, that the waves didn´t come all the time, so we had some brakes in between to relax in the water.
But I got a bit injured, because the surf board fins hit me on my leg and also a jelly fish touched me in the water which really burned. I also realised at dinner time that my ankle really was sore, because I cracked it in the water. But I still walked with my group to a campfire at the beach. First I thought I had to turn around but after a few minutes it felt much better. I guess I just overstretched my muscles.
We played some drinking games at the camp fire and I got really drunk. The walk back home on the beach was sooo beautiful. I´ve never seen so many stars in my life and we could hear the sound of the waves.

In the morning a really funny thing happened. We forgot one guy at the camp ground. Our bus driver had to wait for our surf teacher to bring him. He said, that he was in the bathroom and when he came out we were already gone. At the next brake, we had a big laugh, when someone asked if he was on the bus. Could have been me.

My host family was still in Avoca, so my host dad picked me up at a Caltex Station.
I met Sabrina in the evening again and we had ice cream at the beach.
My hostfamily and me left Avoca Beach on Saturday morning to head north to Port Stephens.

Avoca Beach 16.01.-19.01.2010

Am Sa. Morgen fuhr ich mit meiner Gastfamilie nach Avoca. Sie hatten dort für 1 Woche ein Strandhaus gemietet.
Avoca liegt an der Ostküste und ist ca. 1 ½h nördlich von Sydney entfernt.
Das Haus war total niedlich und erinnerte mich an ein Fischerhaus an der Nordsee (siehe Fotos).

Am ersten Abend erhielt ich eine sms von einer Sabrina aus Deutschland. Sie schrieb mir, dass sie meine Nummer von unserer Au-Pair Agentur bekommen hat und ihre Gastfamilie in Avoca (!!) wohnt. Hab ihr sofort zurück geschrieben, dass ich gerade mit meiner Gastfamilie in Avoca Urlaub mache!! Fands total krass, dass sie mir an dem Tag geschrieben hat an dem ich angekommen bin und wir grad dort im Urlaub waren wo sie wohnt!
Die Welt ist ein Dorf :-)
Wir haben uns dann am nächsten Abend auf einen Drink getroffen! War total schön, mal wieder mit jemandem “persönlich” deutsch zu sprechen! Sie war mir gleich total sympathisch und wir werden uns jetzt öfters mal in der City treffen..

Ansonsten verbrachte ich 3 schöne, sonnige Tage mit chillen am Strand, spielen mit den Kids und leckerem Essen (an einem Abend gabs Fisch “Snapper” genannt).
Am Di. Mittag fuhr mich mein Gastvater nach Gosford, von wo ich mit dem Zug zurück nach Sydney fuhr, weil ich für die nächsten 3 Tage einen Surfkurs gebucht hatte.