And just like that, we are into month 7...

After a very busy month 6, I have had a bit of transition to deal with.

My impeccably behaved house guest left these shores, presumably to go off and make snowmen. Now I have to re-adjust to doing my own washing up, and remembering where I put the iron.  On the plus side, I can get my diet back under control.  I have never eaten so many peas.

I recently blogged on my goals for 2013.  I should provide a little update.

Fitness and drinking:  I started off quite well, enjoying the mountain bike rather than a mountain of food.  I dusted the bike off and had a good few hours cycling from the North Shore, over the Harbour Bridge and around the inner city.  I'm sure the city didn't feel that hilly from the buses I'm usually on.  The last week I have lapsed a little, what with the bank holiday weekend, but am determined to get back to the gym again next week.  If I can remember where it is.

Hobart harbour

New places:  Booked a long weekend trip to Hobart, the capital of Tasmania.  Tasmania is an island south of the Australian continent, just across the Bass Strait, and is one of the last remaining Aussie outposts that I have not yet vsisited.  I’m really looking forward to rectifying this, especially after hearing and reading so many great things about it.  One thing I have been told to check out, although it is obviously not my thing, is the collection of 150 or so casts of vaginas, at the Museum of New and Old Art (MONA).  Don’t they all look the same anyway?

War & Peace:  I bit the bullet, and started this behemoth of a book.  Thankfully, besides the actual book, which is helping with my fitness as it’s so heavy, I also have a Kindle version for when my arms get tired.  My Kindle version kindly informs me that I am 13% complete.  We are currently in Austria, fighting the French.  I'll plod on.

After the success of the Spanish course last year, I have now started level 2.  Another 8 week course beckons, lesson 1 of which was last week.  A timely reminder of why I want to learn this beautiful language.  Nothing to do with the beautiful women that are Spanish speakers.  Nothing at all.

I had a particularly bad week in the the post.  And no, not because of postcards and letters I'm receiving, I enjoy those.  But I received a speeding ticket and $150 fine on day 1.  On day 2, I couldn’t believe my eyes when I received a further $50 fine, this time from the thieves at Thrifty car hire.  Apparently, it costs them this amount in “admin” for them to kindly pass on my name and address to the authorities for the aforementioned speeding ticket.

If I’m to be able to stick around in Australia beyond month 7 I think I better stick to the beloved scooter.

This weekend we had Australia Day on 26^th where the whole nation comes together and celebrates; read, drinks beer and waves flags.  I’ll not be complaining though, as we get Monday off as a public holiday so the long weekend will be greatly enjoyed, drinking beer and flag waving.

In other news, I have secured myself a new job.  My current role was only ever a 6 month contract but I have been offered, and accepted, a job at Rabobank in the meantime.  This is a 12 month contract, based in Darling Harbour and gives me an opportunity to work back in the private sector.  

Working at a university has been good experience but I don’t think it’s my natural habitat.  And before I hear you cynics pipe up, I don’t often get to see the students!  Moving to the new role will give me the comparison between 2 very different working environments, the public and private sector.  

Oh, and the view from the office aint all that bad.

That's all folks.  

Hunter Valley wine tour with Kangarrific Tours

Like wine?  Then come with me on a Hunter Valley wine tour with Kangarrific Tours.

Australia is a country blessed with good wine growing regions, a fact probably borne out by the amount of wine that gets exported, ending up in the supermarkets of the UK.  From the Margaret River in Western Australia, Barossa Valley in Adelaide, South Australia and the Hunter Valley, outside Sydney.

The Hunter was where we were visiting, and after a search on the internet we found Kangarrific Tours.  A relative newcomer to the tour scene, Sam of Kangarrific had already started to build up a solid reputation as somebody who provided an excellent day out.  We would see.

We got picked up in the Central Business District (CBD) of Sydney at around 8.00am, ready for the drive north, across the famous Harbour Bridge and up to the Hunter Valley region. 

First stop was at just after 9am, for morning coffee at the Australian Walkabout Wildlife Park, in Calga on the outskirts of the Central Coast.  Entrance fee being included in the very reasonable $99 full day trip price, we were able to get up very close and personal with some of our favourite Aussie wildlife.  Stroking the Koalas, petting the Kangaroos, and keeping a wary distance from the Emus.  This is the sort of place you could spend much longer at be we had somewhere to be and at around 11.15 we got to Lovedale, home of the Hunter Valley Chocolate factory.  A chocolate lovers dream.  Yet still not the highlight of my day.  My reason for coming today was just around the corner, the grapes.  Or more specifically, the stuff that comes from fermenting them.

Meaning “hillside”, Warraroong winery was the first we visited.  A boutique winery giving us the opportunity to sample wines that you wouldn’t find in either the bottle shops, or the big supermarkets, in Australia or overseas.  However, for $10 they do ship to Sydney.  Hmm, hold that thought.

Whilst here we got to try some very good Semillon Sauvignon Blanc (2010 on the Tin Soldier label), Long Lunch white, a 2009 sparkling Moscato, a 2010 Merlot and a Shiraz, finishing with an exquisite Sticky Semillon dessert wine.  The day had officially started for me.

And so we were off to winery number 2.  Much more mainstream, Tempus Two is the sort of winery that does supply the places you are more likely to pick up a bottle of wine on the way home to have with the evening BBQ.  A very corporate affair, the winery incorporates the excellent “Smelly Cheese Shop”, where we had the opportunity to taste some delicious, locally made cheeses.  We were then set free in the deli/shop and I succumbed all too easily to the lure of parting with my dollars.  That said, the cheeses I had picked up would no doubt be perfectly complemented by the Tin Soldier Shiraz I had purchased earlier.

In the afternoon we had winery number three, Wynwood Estate.  Another boutique winery it was here that I tasted, and thoroughly enjoyed, a wine I hadn’t had before.  Originally grown to blend into Shiraz, Chambourcin was now being made and sold as a wine in its own right.  And a bloody good wine it is too, evidenced by my immediate purchase of a bottle.  We also sampled a 2012 Verdelho, a white wine that sits somewhere between a Semillon and a Sauvignon Blanc.  Another purchase was in the form of a Plum Blossom Shiraz, lighter in style than a usual full-bodied Shiraz, so much so that it can be lightly chilled.  Finishing at Wynwood with a dessert wine, an Old Jack Muscat, I was starting to feel the effects of lunch and the amount of wine we had imbibed.  Had there been a hammock knocking about, I could have happily had a snooze in the early afternoon sunshine.

However, we had somewhere else to be and off to the only brewery in the Hunter we went.

The Hunter Beer Company, located at Potters Hotel Brewery resort is open to the public between 10am and 5pm, seven days a week for tastings.  Sam, the amiable and very knowledgeable owner of Kangarrific Tours had arranged a special deal for us and we were able to get two tastings of the various beers for only $3.  I don’t think the lime and coriander infused beer is something that I will be drinking many schooners of.  After a final sour cherry beer it was time to call “last orders” on a very enjoyable day and jump in the bus for the ride back to Sydney.

So my verdict?  An excellent, reasonably priced day out, visiting the Hunter Valley in air conditioned comfort, with a friendly tour guide who obviously knows his beans when it comes to wines.

What are you waiting for?  Salud!

The expat's goals for 2013

I’ve recently been thinking of my goals for 2013.  I wonder why that is?  

And I have come up with a short list that I’m sure is achievable.  Well, at least 3 of them I’m sure of.  One of them I’m less sure but feel that by writing it down and sharing publicly with you, I’m more likely to commit to it.  I may even blog regular updates, until you tell me you are bored with them.

Anyway, here is the list.  Can you spot the one that fills me with trepidation?

-  Drink less.

Not abstinence, as I love (really love) drinking.  But definitely reduce my intake and frequency.  Perhaps tailoring my current philosophy of only having a drink on days with a “Y” in them.  And limit myself to spirits, less calorie laden than my usual Coopers Pale ale, or Dirty Granny cider.  This of course will have to wait until after Australia Day on 26^th January when it seems the whole country shuns sobriety.

-  Lose weight

This will no doubt be aided by the one above but also by reducing my intake of Tim Tams, Anzac biscuits, Lamingtons and Charlie Lovett’s banana bread.  I also have my bicycle now so have no excuse not to get out on it on a weekend, helping trim inches off the burgeoning waistline.  I don’t think Mosman, or indeed the rest of Sydney, is quite ready for my truffle shuffle just yet.

-  Travel to new places

This appears on my list every year, and will continue to do so whilst I am still breathing.  However, now I am based on the other side of the world, and am upside down, I should explore the opportunities now open to me.  Places like Vanuatu (which I had not previously heard of) immediately spring to mind.  And Tasmania, one of the only major places of Australia that I have yet to visit.  And what about all the gorgeous little coastal towns, with sun kissed beaches?  Friends of mine are going to Jervis Bay soon so I immediately checked it out on the internet.  It looks amazing.  And not far from home.  In a car, not on the aforementioned bicycle, or my beloved Besbi scooter.  I could spend the whole year exploring places like this.  Even better, fulfill a life’s ambition of travelling in a campervan.

-  Read “War & Peace”

In literary circles, widely regarded as one of the THE best books ever written, this is one of Tolstoy’s that I have yet to tackle.  At over 1400 pages long, it is not an undertaking to accept lightly.  Having completed the 1079 pages of “Infinite Jest” (David Foster Wallace) last year I know tomes of this size are possible, but how many other books would have to be sacrificed?  I suppose there is only one way to find out.

So there we are, my (potential) goals for 2013.  Now, do I commit to them???

Happy New Year, and all that

If you are reading this, the zombies didn’t come and get you either.  Or you had a very effective anti-zombie kit stashed under your bed.  Whichever, it’s good to speak to you again.  Zombies and Mayans have been avoided, at least for 2012.  <<breathes a sigh of relief>>.  Then again, the Mayans were notoriously bad at calendar management so the threat from those chaps may come around again this year.

It’s been a while since my last blog, and I know that I split December up because of so much happening over the festive period.  In fact, I think too much has happened, or the copious amounts of mince pies, Tim Tams and Freddos, washed down with litres (quite literally on Christmas Day!) of wine, have addled my brain to the point where writing something coherent for you to read will be a challenge into itself.

How did 2012 end?  I had recounted the two Christmas parties I had and all that was left was a few quiet drinks with mates on the final Thursday before breaking up.  Did I say quiet drinks?  These boys just don’t know when they are beat, and just as I was saying adios, another round was procured, of Coopers Red ale.  Yes, the bloody strong stuff.  Salud gents!

One sausage, or two?

Christmas Day rolled around, along with my big birthday plans to spend it on the beach, in our Santa hats, getting slowly inebriated.  And what happened?  We had the wettest Christmas Day in Sydney since 1942.  I kid you not.  That is an official stat.  I just about managed to cook up the breakfast on the BBQ, sipping Bucks Fizz, and the heavens opened.  And they stayed open all day.  All day.  Plan B wasn’t too bad, setting a challenge to drink 4 litres of goon (cheap Aussie wine) whilst watching “It’s a Wonderful Life”.  And we completed the challenge, worryingly rather too easily.

Typically, and thankfully, that was the only real bad day of weather and normal service was resumed on Boxing Day.  We waved off the boats in the annual Sydney to Hobart race from Georges Head lookout.  One of the city’s finest vantage points in my opinion.  With sweeping views across the whole harbour, and out to the sea between the North and South Heads.  Watching the start of the race is a bit of a tradition for Sydney-siders, one that I can easily see me adopting.

Waiting for the starter's gun

The evening saw my first ever visit to the SCG (Sydney cricket ground) for the 20/20 match between Sydney Sixers and Hobart Hurricanes.  We were fortunate enough to see two Australian cricket legends face off against each other, Brett Lee and Ricky Ponting.  The 20/20 is all a bit razz-ma-tazz, with cheerleaders and loud music, but it was great fun.

The rest of the Christmas holidays have been filled up doing great tourist things.  A meal up the Sydney Tower in the revolving restaurant with amazing 360 views of this stunning city.  A visit to Taronga Zoo, where the giraffes surely have the best view of any captive animal in the world.  The Aquarium and the Wildlife centre were great.  Once again seeing my favourites such as the sharks, wombats, koalas and Tasmanian Devils up close and personal.

Finally, we had the coup de grace.  New Year’s Eve.  Knowing there would be a few of us, with a number coming from the UK, I had been very prepared and bought tickets for the party in Luna Park (affectionately renamed La Luna Park in reference the excellent restaurant in Halifax run by Tony).  And what a night it turned out to be.  Starting off at Cormack HQ, we had a couple of bottles of Prosecco just to get warmed up.  We then went to Barton/Hannon-Dalby HQ for further beers.  Although not sure everybody in our party needed much more at this stage.  No, she hasn’t had a stroke, it’s her “wine face”.

A short time later we were in Luna Park, drinking, and working out which of the rides to go on first.  Yes, it may have been an adults only party, but all the rides were open.  I’m not sure us all going on the pirate ship that swung us upside down was our best idea.  But what fun.  In a nefarious attempt to make me sick (I believe), we went on something that just span us around, very fast.  Queasily, I gingerly stepped off, to get my land feet back.  A cold Tooheys helped.

The evening passed by so fast, with surprisingly short queues for drinks and more space than I imagined for a party beneath the Harbour Bridge.  And finally, the end of 2012 drew to a close, and we kicked off 2013 in style, with one of the world’s greatest fireworks shows.  Kylie Minogue’s lips lighting up the Bridge and a coordinated fireworks display across the whole Harbour. 

Breathtaking.

And now, into 2013, and time to look at what my personal goals for the year will be.