Merry Christmas!

We wish everyone at home a Merry Christmas !

Enjoy the festive days with the family, a good & rich dinner and many presents underneath the christmas tree!

Currently it is close to 40 degrees in Australia, so it is most likely that we are going to spend christmas at the beach this year! One thing is for sure - we won't have a white christmas.

We think of our families and friends at home.

We also want to wish everyone a Happy New Year! Start those rockets and crackers, because we won't be able to do so! It is absolutely forbidden to have any kind of firework due to the risk of a bushfire. So the festive season will be completely different for us this year!

We'll leave you with two new pictures of us, we thought they have a little bit of a christmas atmosphere to it...

Heading Down South!

We know it's been almost three weeks since our last entry, but one you start reading about our busy schedule, you'll find out that we merely had any time to update our blog!

Let's start with the day we left Swan Valley and Herne Hill. We had quite mixed feelings about it. On one side we left the save shelter we had for one month, on the other side we were excited about going away to see and experience new things. The hardest thing though was saying goodbye to the Geversfamily. They took great care of us and gave us the best start we could possibly have in Australia. We also had to say bye-bye to all of our new friends at the Black Swan. After many hugs and a promise that we'll visit them again next year, they let us go.

(Picture: Berrie and Paul in Rockingham)

Our car fully packed up to the roof, the first stop on our long but not too far journey was Rockingham, on the Scenic Ocean Drive along the coast to be specific. There was nothing major to it. We stopped at one beach to relax and stretch our bodies and enjoy the sun. After some hours of driving and taking several wrong roads and turns, we reached Mandurah. It was a nice city with a beautiful town centre. We didn't spend too much time there though, because most of the shops started to close down. It was getting pretty late so we started looking for a place to stay for the coming nights. We ended up setting up our tent on a camping area called Honeymoon Pool, which was located in the Wellington National Park. (See picture below) (Picture on the right: this reptile [about half a meter long] crossed the street in front of our car...)

We absolutely loved the place. We camped in between bushes, trees, animals and near the Collie River. The first night sleeping in a tent was a bit rough, but we managed to get some sleep at last.

The next day we went to visit Bunbury. It was one of our most favourite places to visit so far. At first we went into the Shopping Centre, followed by a lookout point with a beautiful view over the whole city. The city beach offered some great rock formations, which were originated out of lava. The huge waves and the rough sea gave us a spectacular sight. (Picture: Bunbury lookout)

(Picture: camping!)

We packed our stuff on the third day of camping. We decided it was time to go on to the next cities and areas of Australia. Since our campsite was located at Collie River, we went to see the town Collie itself. It turned out to be a rather sleepy town unfortunately. Except for a little shopping street, Collie didn't offer many things to see. (Picture: a last (night) impression of camping at Honeymoon Pool)

Neither did the cities we went to afterwards on our way to Busselton: Donnybrook and Capel. Even the lady at the tourist information centre in Donnybrook told us that there's pretty much nothing to do in this town. By the time we were on the road for three days now. Facing that, we were more than happy to discover a little lake on the way. We swam for a few minutes in the water, and as you can see on the picture on the right, Berrie enjoyed it very much.

Our next stop was in Busselton. We didn't have too much time left on that day, so instead of looking around in Busselton we went on to Dunsborough and then to Yallingup to find a place to stay. We soon found Sjaak de Jong's vinyard; Gunyulgup Estate. It was the next place we wanted to work. Our car just managed to drive over the gravel road on this huge property, but strangely there was no one to be found. We couldn't even find someone in the cottage belonging to the vinyard. Just as we decided to look for a campsite, we saw a man on a motorbike waiting outside the gate. It was Sjaak himself, wondering who passes the "Authorised Personnell Only"-sign. We explained our situation and he was more than willing to offer us a place for our tent on his vinyard. The same evening he introduced us to his wife Angie and his daughter Saskia. Angie and Sjaak welcomed us with open arms and even invited us to have pizza together on the first night.

But the next day we already started working! Not on the vinyard though: we carried kilos and kilos of soil around Sjaak and Angies house, decobwebbed the verandah and cleaned all of their windows. Did we mention that their house is rather big? It was quite some tough work, but we managed to do some things around their house. The next day we started working on the vinyard, which kept us busy on all of the weekdays since then.

Our working list goes from cleaning vines and trunks to wirelifting, nailclipping and mowing. That's by far not all of it, but it would just get too detailed. Just believe us when we say that it's pretty hard work. We both didn't do any manual labour, so it was quite a change. And oh oh oh... how much do we hate the alarm every morning at 6.30! On the vinyard we use three different vehicles to move around; a Kawasaki motorbike, a very old "ute" (Toyota Landcruiser) and a quad. Sjaak showed us how to handle all of these machines and we love driving them in mean time!

We also had to move our tent from the top of the hill to a more sheltered place close to the shed, as the wind did a pretty good job blowing all of our belongings including the tent itself through each other... Yes, we completely live in our tent now. No TV, no electricity, no computer. But we did want some entertainment for after work, so we bought the Australian version of Monopoly. After work we love to go to one of the breathtaking, lonely beaches (see picture below) in this area, and the ocean is also a nice substitute for a shower. Because even though we do have water here, having a shower is a bit hard with only having a waterboiler and a small bowl.

Angie and Sjaak are incredibly warm people; we've been at their place a couple of times now to enjoy their "barbies" (barbecues). Their sweet dalmatian dog Peeko loves us aswell, thanks to a big bag of Doggy Reward Treats. Angie gives us amazing advices about what to do in this region.

In our weekends, we've been to Ngilgi Cave (see picture below), discovered over a 100 years ago and the first cave in Australia to be open to the public. We walked down the stairs to a level of 32 meters below the surface and loved the spectacular formations of stalagmites, stalactites and shawls.

We visited Busselton quite recently, and were a bit disappointed. Except for a little secondhand market and our new lunchaddiction called Dome Cafe, there was nothing to see. The day we went there brightened up by our visit to Quindalup Fauna Park! We were the only visitors and got to talk to cockatoos, had exotic birds landing on our shoulders and backs, patted adult kangaroos (proof is on the pictures!) and fed the baby kangaroos! To be honest, we didn't expect much of it after seeing the empty parking space in front of the entrance, but it turned out to be something we wouldn't have liked to miss out on.

We also went to visit Margaret River. On the way there we stopped at a Chocolate-, a Cheese-, a Candy- and a Regional Product-Factory at a Winery. Tasting was possible at those places and so we did! We got a ridiculously big piece of chocolate mixed with marshmellows, nuts and fruit next to the most delicious coffee at the Chocolate Factory, which was our favourite tasting of the day. We also got to taste different Olive Oils, jams, spreads, smoked cheeses and all kinds of fudge you can imagine. "Yumm!!!", as the Australians would say. (Picture below: the Regional Product Factory)

Next on our to do-list is a whalewatching tour! We hope we made it clear now that we haven't been lazy for a minute over the last weeks. Time flies in Australia, but we make sure to enjoy every moment of it. Our plan is to keep working for a few more weeks and then we want to travel a huge distance all the way to Melbourne. For that trip we're going to take our time though, because we want to see as much of Australia as possible. As usual you're going to be able to join the fun on AussieUpdate! See ya!

(Picture: Margaret River beach)

NEW FEATURE! KILOMETERCOUNTER! From now on we'll let you know how many kilometers we drove in the Holden Apollo!

Distance travelled as of 15/12/2007: 3089km

Bye Bye, Swan Valley!

We know that you expect a long update from us now, but even though it's been so many days, we haven't been up to much. Actually, 80% of the time we spent working in the Black Swan. But before you start feeling sorry for us: we had our last day at work last wednesday.

(Picture: Us after the last day of work)

Yes, we had our last day at work. We are planning to leave Swan Valley and the area around Perth this weekend to head off to the south of Australia. Even though our boss tried to make us stay longer by offering a raise of our payment, we feel like it is time to move on and see new places and cities in Australia. But don't expect us to stay in fancy youth hostels, we're going to do it rough and wild: we are going to camp. We already bought a 4-person tent (just to have some comfort at least) and this weekend we are off to our new favourite shopping center in Morley to get the rest of our equipment, like a stove or plates and a lamp.

But surely we did not only work the last weeks, we had some days off to do some outdoor activities.

(Picture: Perth City and the Botanic Garden)

On two days, we decided to go back to Perth to make sure we really saw the major attractions and sights the city has to offer. We went on a CAT, which is a free bus service, taking people around the city, to go to places like the Botanic Garden, Swan Bells, Chinatown in Northbridge and Kings Park. Not to forget the huge shopping area just opposite the train station.

(Picture: Us in front of the temporarily Perth/Hollywood-letters)

Another day we followed a misleading sign which had "Bassendean Town Center" written on it. Naive us thought of a fancy shopping mile, but instead we got around 20 real estate agencies, 3 book shops and a second-hand clothes shop. As you can imagine, our excitement level was rather low.
We also went to the Whiteman Park. It is full of attractions like a Wildlife Park or a Lollyshop, but we got there way too late, so basically everything was closed. We still had a nice time sitting in the huge, empty park with its old gigantic trees and mysterious ponds.

One day we tried to find some things to see close to our home, but all we could find was a playing ground, which Berrie seemed to enjoy very much. (See picture on the left)

Our most dangerous trip took us back to Bells Rapids, a nature park we went to see some weeks ago. This time we decided to swim in there, as the low waterlevel and the slowflowing river allowed us to enjoy the clear water. Adventurous us searched for a seemingly quiet place to swim to the other side. It went fine for Paul, but Berrie did have some difficulties reaching the other side. He felt some repulsing things in between his fingers and gave an Oscarworthy panic attack. Struggling for his life, he finally reached the lifesaving stones on the other side. Both shaking from this dramatic situation, we went back to grab our clothes and go back home. In the end it wasn't all that dramatic, as the repulsing things were just some plants floating in the water.

Another possibly dramatic situation you can experience here: going to the toilet at night and facing this right in front of you. It was the third time we saw a Huntsman in real life! And yes, we took the picture ourselves and no, the picture does not do justice to the actual size of the spider.

That was it for now from us and from Swan Valley. Next time we'll update the blog, you will get some pictures of new areas and cities in the beautiful south of Australia.

Us & The Apollo

OK, time for an update! We've been busy working last week, but we've also managed to drive to some places around this area.

Yes, we drove there with our car. We're having it for a week now, and we haven't been on our bikes ever since. We fall in love again and again, each time we see it. So far, we drove around 500km. We had some critical moments when it came to driving on the left side, but it's all fine now and we love driving here. Last week we played a driving game on the Playstation 2 and immediately caused an accident, because we started driving on the left! We really got into it now we guess... (Pictures left & below: our very own Holden Apollo SLX '93)

One of our first trips with our car took us to Midland Gate Ace Cinema! Yes, even though we should spend our time doing real Australian things like playing the didgeridoo or watching kangaroos, we like to spend our evenings in airconditioned, well seated, thick carpeted and dark cinemas! We went to see Resident Evil III, which we both liked a lot. And yes, it's in European cinemas too!

Walyunga National Park! That's the name of the first National Park we've seen in Australia. Our expectations were high and our raincoats were packed. It was indeed very nice but we hope to see more spectacular landscapes later in other National Parks. We took a walk along Swan River and walked Syd's Trail, a 2,5 km path up and down the river.

(Picture: an impression of Walyunga National Park)

Our first long trip took us to a place called Hillarys, a beautiful city on the westcoast of Australia. We first went to a beach and even though the sun was shining brightly, the wind was a bit cold so we decided not to go swimming. There were some nice colourful tiny little shells though, and the little box below our handbrake looks like a miniature beach now! Later that afternoon we went to Sorrento Quay Center, a nice shopping/eating/kitsch/boats/water combination in Hillarys. We had our coffee at Gloria Jeans (which is by the way our new favourite brand, Muffin Break is so yesterday!). Afterwards we went to another, more natural beach near Hillarys. (Picture: Paul enjoying Gloria Jeans and Berrie in front of Sorrento Quay)

(Picture: one of the beaches we went to see)

The day after reality hit us in the face again as we went back to work. We made a huge blooper at work some days ago. We had to start at 9.00am. Right. We set the alarm at 7.30am to be sure that we would be on time. Nothing wrong so far. But! The alarm didn't ring! Luckily, Paul woke up at 8.30, waking Berrie immediately with just the words "It's 8.30!". We hurried our arses off to be on time and indeed, we were at work just before 9! We were finishing our breakfast on the walk from our car to the Black Swan Restaurant, and entered the building totally confident and proud. We were all cool saying "Hi guys! How are you doinggg?" to our collegues. Then there was Kathryn, a loud but very cheery and nice cook, who came to us, accusing us for being late! "It is 10am guys! And I'm not joking! You're late!" Confused us. She then explained to us that due to Daylight Saving Time the clocks were set one hour ahead last night. So, it wasn't 9.00am as we thought, it was 10 already! We really were late! No one was mad at us though and one (native!) cook did the same. After work we made sure all our clocks were set 1 hour ahead. (Picture: Black Swan Restaurant seen from the back)

One day we climbed over a closed fence somewhere in the hills surrounding Perth, and walked up the hills. It was extremely steep but the views were very nice. We saw the skyline of Perth in the distance, but unfortunately the camera didn't capture this. It did capture our faces though. Just imagine you see Perth Skyline somewhere behind us! We saw kangaroos hopping and stomping (they really are loud!) around us, which was nice and so close to where we actually live here!


We had one more big trip, which was yesterday. We drove into the Darling Range (the hills around Perth) and went to Mandurin, Mandurin Weir (the drinking water supplier for a huge area) and Kalamunda (a very neat and relaxed town with an idyllic shopping center). On the way back we did the scenic one way zig zag drive down the hills. We could've taken the most amazing pictures BUT we did not have our camera with us. Sorry mates, we'll spare you more details because we can't show you anyway. Believe us, it was a breathtaking view.

Some days ago we embarrassed ourselves in Sanity, the local CD store. We were out to buy Britney's new CD (which is amazing!) but then Pauls eye fell on (!) the cover of the Spice Girls Greatest Hits! He shouted Berries name and together we hurried to the desk, grabbing the CD case to find out that it was only a promotional item, stating it'll be out November 10. The shopkeepers gave us amused looks, and told us we should pre order a copy as "this one's gonna be huge". We couldn't help smiling.

That's about what we've done during the last days. Tomorrow we'll be working even harder than usually as we're having a wedding during the day and the restaurant will be open for dinner in the evening again. That means starting at 9.00am, having a little break in the afternoon and working again until the last guest leaves the restaurant and maybe even later. We expect to be home at 11.00pm.

Right, one of our sources at home told us that many of our readers would like to leave a comment for us but don't know how to do this. Understand us well, we don't complain about the big response we already get but we do want to give everyone the chance to share in this amazing experience. We'll explain it in English, German and Dutch.

English:
1. Click on "... Comments"
2. Write your comment in the box on the right.
3. You don't need to sign up, just tick the "Anonymous" box as your identity.
4. Click on "Publish your comment"

Deutsch:
1. Klick auf "... Kommentare" ("... Comments")
2. Schreibe deinen Kommentar in die Box auf der rechten Seite.
3. Du brauchst dich nicht anzumelden, klicke auf "Anonym" ("Anonymous") als Identitaet.
4. Klicke auf "Veroeffentliche Kommentar" ("Publish your comment").

Nederlands:
1. Klik op "... Comments" of "... reacties"
2. Schrijf je reactie in het veld dat nu rechts in beeld verschijnt.
3. Je hoeft je nergens voor aan te melden, klik op "Anonymous" of "Anoniem" als identiteit.
4. Klik op "Publish your comment"

Headlines (Friendship Never Ends)

Ok, we are just going to ignore that is has been 11 days since our last blogentry... We have been very busy though!

Let's start with "Spring in the Valley". As we've told you in our last entry, we went to see more wineries in Swan Valley. We were such an attraction on our bikes! People couldn't believe their eyes. The owners of the wineries were hugely disappointed, mainly because we couldn't carry any mass load of wine on our mountain bikes. We liked most of the wines, but our true favourite is 8 year old portwine! It comes with a sweet taste, a tempting smell and a deep brickred colour. We talked to a lot of people, the old lady from Entopia Wines thought it was 'neat to have us at their winery'. We spent the sunday evening at the neighbours' house, enjoying a great variety of XXL pizza's and the fantastic hospitality of Ruth and Tony (Josh' parents). (Pictures: impressions of Spring in the Valley)

(Picture: Berrie at Bells Rapid)

The day after "Spring in the Valley" Paula took us to Bells Rapid, a beautiful piece of country just 15 minutes from here! A flowing river, blooming flowers, bloody annoying flies surrounding our mouths and noses and a bright sun warming our topless bodies made our afternoon very enjoyable. We crossed the river in our undies and climbed the rocks with the danger of drowning any minute in the wild water of Upper Swan River. We spent 1,5 hours there, until Paula picked us up again. She showed us the area of Swan Valley, and took us to its most luxurious resort full of huge villas AND we saw our first kangaroos there!

(Picture: Us and the selftimer at Bells Rapid)

During last week we wanted to go to Guildford, but on the first day we tried to get there we didn't manage to find it! On the second day, after miles and miles of cycling next to the highway we did find it! We went to the tourist information and the woman there gave us a map with 3 cycling routes through Guildford, which we all finished within 10 minutes. We ended up in Midland Gate shopping center once again. Yes, Guildford was very exciting. In the evening we cooked for our guest family. They enjoyed the vegetarian meal very much, at least they said they did...

We also managed to set up a bank account last week at Commonwealth bank! Their staff was very friendly; full of jokes and nice comments about Dutchmen (especially about their performance in bed: "Dutch men are good lovers!"). One of our trips to Midland ended up in Henry's Kitchen, a Chinese restaurant which Henk advised us to go to for dinner. And indeed, the food was very nice and not too expensive (we could write the Lonely Planet part for this area in mean time!). But we didn't realize that the dark night sets in so quick in Australia. We had dinner when it was bright outside, and just half an hour later it was dark, and that means very dark, pitch black dark. Remember, we went to Midland on our bikes, with only one having just a front light. So, as you can imagine, we were not too keen on getting back on the highway without any lights. We ended up cycling through the darkness, taking a new route to get home. Every time we heard a car approaching we got off the road, praying it would see us and we would still stand there after it passed us.

Last friday we went to Fremantle, a nice city on the coast of WA. We went to see the Shipwreck Museum with the wreck of the Batavia in it, and took a walk through the old town centre and had a nice lunch at Mill Bakery. Before we went home, we had an icecream and took a walk on the beach to get on the train again afterwards. New disaster! Berries bike had a flat tire! Which meant he couldn't cycle the 8 kilometers back from Midland Station! Drama! But since the Aussies are so nice, they didn't hesitate to take Berrie AND the bike on a bus to Herne Hill. Poor Paul had to cycle all the way back on his own, while Berrie enjoyed the comfort of being driven home for free ("That's alright mate, free this time!"). Well, we both found our way back home and the next day we learnt how to fix a tire four times (we kept on finding leaks!).

OK, we had a major change of our stay in Australia. We intended to be in Yallingup by this time, to work on a winery for Sjaak de Jong, which Jeffry and Bianca (friends in Holland) arranged for us. But, it didn't seem to work out. Since we had no car at this point it was impossible for us to live there as the distances to everything we need are too far to do on our bikes. We talked about the situation with Henk Jan and Paula and they offered us to stay here and look for work, which we did last saturday. Within an hour we found work in a very decent place. We now work in the restaurant of Black Swan Winery, being paid $18,- an hour each! Since that saturday we almost worked nonstop, trying to make as much money as we can (our new bankaccount loves us now already!). (Picture: Berrie ironing his shirt for work)

CAR CAR CAR! You won't believe it! Our very own car is very close to us now! This afternoon we're going to pick up our Holden Apollo (which is just a Toyota Camry with a Holden badge on it) with Henk Jan! Last monday Henk took us to Auto Europe to check it out, and we are in love! It's huge, it's white, it's automatic, it's from '93 and it'll be OUR car! Next time you'll be able to take a look at our car, if we survive driving on the left side of the road...

On the same day we had a major foodshopping trip! We spent nearly $100,- on canned food and coke. We are now completely living on our own in the cottage, making our own dinner and having breakfast together.

And finally, to close this entry, we would like to gossip about the new, amazing, stunning, timeless, beautiful, classic Spice Girls single "Headlines (Friendship Never Ends)". If you're not interested, this is where the entry ends for you. Scroll down and comment now. Thank you.

ISN'T IT AMAZING?! We heard it for the first time this morning, and are absolutely amazed by it. Our favourite Spice Girls have leading parts in the song and, well, what can we say, it's so Spice Girls! It's more than we expected it to be. We are currently on our 779234th listen and we love it more and more! Maybe you wondered why the Spice Girls are in the banner of this blog (or maybe not), but we still want to go to see the Spice Girls on tour in Sydney. But they keep on adding dates in the UK and USA, so we still don't know when the Sydney date will be. Oh well, enough about the Spice Girls (we love them and their new single).

It's getting a bit too warm in here now, we'll wait outside until Henk comes back from work to take us to our car which has airconditioning by the way. We promise you won't have to wait that long for the next entry. Greetings to everyone at home in Europe who is reading this! We think of you a lot.

(PS. Ik wil heel graag iedereen die iets in het boek heeft geschreven op mijn afscheidsfeest heel erg bedanken! Het was heel fijn om de berichtjes te lezen, en hartverwarmend om te vernemen dat sommige mensen me echt gaan missen! Bedankt! Berrie)

Where to start...

(Picture: Henk Jan and Paula's house)

Even though it's only been a few days since our last update, those days are starting to feel like a right blur already! We've been up to quite some things and will try to stay a bit structural during the following lines!

We've been to Perth!
Josh picked us up the day right after he told us he would, and he took us to the University of Western Australia first. We walked the campus and were stunned by the way it looked. We felt like we were in a zoo, surrounded by exotic gardens, colourful birds and little ponds. Then we went back to Josh' car where his girlfriend, Renee, was waiting for us already. They were both very nice and first took us to China Town, where we had dinner in the Vietnamesian (?) restaurant Saigon. The waitresses sucked, they didn't bother where they dropped our plates as long as they were on the correct table. After this we went to King's Park, with a panoramic view over Perth. (Picture: Josh and Renee)

Us and Perth Skyline

The same afternoon we lived a historical moment: we did our first Aussie shopping trip on our own at Woolworth's (even though we only got chips and coke).

The day after we had a look at Henk Jans work. He is making antennas. It looked well confusing but he explained it very nicely and gave us a good impression of how Aussie people work. The following night made us realize exactly where we are: in a country full of big ass motherf*cking spiders! At the top of our bed, in the corner, t here was a Huntsman spider watching us with his horrible eight eyes and clicking his megajaw. Ok, one guess who caught it! Wrong! It was Berrie! Paul stood there with shaky knees but Berrie got a beer jug and placed it right over the spider, moving it to the table, closed safely with the heavy Lonely Planet on top of it.

In mean time we've been to Midland Shopping Gate twice. It's a huge mall with over 120 stores where we already have our favourite lunchroom (Muffin Break). Other i nteresting purchases: an Aeroguard anti-insect roll-on thing, a huuuuge bottle of sunlotion (it IS hot here! Here it is) anddddd Jennifer Lopez latest effort on singing - Brave (Paul wants to point out very clearly that it was Berrie who bought this)! (Picture: Berrie at Muffin Break)



This weekend we're experiencing a traditional and local fest: Spring in the Valley. It's a two day celebration of the wineries, and you can hop on and off busses from winery to winery to taste different wines. We've been filling our glasses quite a lot, and finished the first day of it with a nice barbecue at Josh' parents place. Today we'll enjoy some more exclusive wines (a bottle costs $20.-). (Picture: Spring in the Valley at Windy Creek winery)



Now we're off to lay in the garden, enjoying the sun. We hope the weather's nice in Europe aswell. See ya mates!

The garden. Jealous? Oh and the yellow cottage is the place where we live.

Tennisballs, Dogtoys, the locals and Premium Pilsener

We made it!

The stay at the Singapore Airport was interesting in many different ways. Starting with posh and exclusive fancy designer stores with no customers at all and three shopkeepers to an old dutch woman who totally fascinated by a high-tech asian invention. It was a projection of loads of tennisballs on the floor, and when you stepped on them, they were moving! WOW! She kept on pushing us to give it a try and she was all happy when we finally did it. To excuse her enthusiasm, she cried out loud: "Everyone loves doing this!" Even tho nobody else seemed to care.... Well we didnt do anything else apart from walking through the airport. We expected some exotic plants and colours, and no - they did not disappoint us at all! (Picture: Berrie discovering the lavish jungle of Singapore Airport)

Well after half an hour of checking the airport and refreshing in the toilets, we sat down on luxurious leather couches surrounded by oase-ish plants. We loved the clean airport, but one woman just took it too far. She was cleaning the carpet (always with a smily face of course), even when there was no dirt! Amazing! Oh well, the boarding went very well up until the point, where we had to fill out a dramatic declaration form that we are not importing something dangerous! But Berrie freaked out because of a few questions as he carried hiking shoes (including soil(with potential diseases)) and animal equipment (dog toys), which were (according to the declaration thing) not allowed to be brought to Australia. The flight itself then went very well. It took another 5 hours. In the end, all the drama about the hiking shoes and toys were for nothing, because the things went through the scan without a problem and we only got asked who was the owner of some very dangerous chocolate balls. We soon then found Henk Jan in the waiting crowd. Well we then carried our luggage onto his Pick-up car and drove on the left side to Gevers mansion.

Even though we felt exhausted we were overwhelmed by new impressions: Australia smells different, Australia looks different, Australia feels different - Australia is different! But in a good way! The place where Henk Jan, Paula, Jonathan, Annelies and their 3 dogs live is amazing, and we even have our own, little separate cottage! Henk Jan guaranteed us we don't have to worry about spiders, yet we still had a hard time closing the curtains in the evening: potential spider places everywhere. We experienced Henk Jans amazing cooking skills when we had dinner, but it was hard to keep our eyes opened much longer so we went to bed pretty early. 17 hours of sleep followed! Yes, seventeen that is. Afterwards we heard Jonathan had been waiting all day and even rang his mum to ask whether he should wake us; he wanted to do something with us. (Picture: Paul in the garden of Henk Jans house)

The day was pretty much over by now, we had our nice little Spice Girl posing time on the trampoline and took a little walk around the place, it was then when we met Josh. He's living in the same street and offered to drive us through Perth and show all the nice places later on, which we'd love to obviously! After we came back from the walk we had dinner, watched some TV and had some german beer. Paul felt like home drinking the best imported Pilsener that you can get in Australia. At least the label said so. But indeed it was very good. We also had a nice chat with the family and then decided to update the blog for everyone at home. Now everyone went to bed (it's nearly 11pm) and we're still sitting at the computer. (Picture: An impression of the scenery, taken during our walk)

We hope you did get a nice impression of our first day, we enjoyed the first hours down-under very much. We are going to bed now, too, Bye Bye!

Singapore!

We are in Singapore!! After ... countless hours of flying with amazing Singapur Airlines, we finally put our feet on asian ground. We are exhausted, but happy of course at the same time.
We had a pleasant flight with nice meals and a great crew. There were no problems during the flight, everything went well. Now we've got two hours before our next plane flies us directly to Perth. Until then - Bye Bye!

*****

Wir sind in Singapur! Nach unzaehligen Stunden Fliegens mit der super Singapur Airline betraten wir vor ein paar Minuten asiatischen Boden. Wir sind erschoepft, aber auch gluecklich das es erstmal vorbei ist. Der Flug an sich verlief ohne Probleme, das Essen und die Crew waren sehr gut. Der naechste Flug nach Perth geht in zwei Stunden. Bis dahin - Tschuess!

*****

We zijn in Singapore! Hoera! Na zo het leek ontelbare uren in het vliegtuig met de royaltywaardige Singapore Airlines staan we nu sinds een paar minuten voor het eerst in onze prille leventjes op Aziatische grond! De landing ging gepaard met jengelige pingelmuziek, wat toch niet kon verhullen dat we totaal uitgeput zijn inmiddels maar ook blij dat het achter de rug is. De vlucht ging helemaal goed, zonder problemen, we hebben lekker spicy Indiaas gegeten aan boord en de crew in kimono's deed het goed. Over twee uurtjes moeten we weer paraat staan bij de volgende gate om dan in 1 keer naar Perth te vliegen! Wij gaan ons even wentelen tussen de orchideen en palmen hier, tot dan - Bye bye!

October 8!

On October 8, Paul Petermann and Berrie van der Molen will start the journey of their lifes! The German/Dutch couple's going to spend 9 months in Australia, working to fund their journey, travelling to see all the amazing things Australia has to offer and... hopefully to see the Spice Girls perform in Sydney during their Reunion World Tour!

We will update our profile very soon, telling you everything about our plans!

For now, we're leaving you with the Dutch AussieUpdate promotion card, which Berrie will hand out to his guests on his goodbyeparty!

You'll hear from us in no time, watch this space and please join us on our lifechanging journey!

Paul & Berrie