South New South Wales coast

We started our journey today from Eden which is the most southerly town in New South Wales. If you take the coast road to, Pambula, Merimbula, Tura Beach and Tathra, rather than continuing on the Princess highway, it will take a little longer but you will be rewarded by the most spectacular scenery it is a must. Continue up to Bermagui then rejoin the highway and even the main road has sights for sore eyes right up to Narooma. You are constantly crossing little bridges over rivers, travelling by the beautiful coastline or alongside lakes. For me it has far exceeded the Great Ocean Road regarding the views. What a shame we couldn’t get any decent photos along the way; even when we could stop and take a quick snap, the outcome is very disappointing. You will just have to come and see it for yourselves. It reminds me when I took a helicopter ride over the Grand Canyon in 1980 and was so blow away with the views that I shot 6 films of 36 exposures and was disappointed with them all. Photos just can’t seem to capture the most spectacular of views yet; if they ever will. Perhaps film is better at it but I can’t ever imagine that it will be as good as seeing it for yourself.
We continued along the coast through Bateman’s Bay, Norwa, and Berry but finally settled on Kiama where I had set the sat nav for. For the first time since we left I switched the sat nav on, reset it and it booted up first time. It worked. Usually I have to press the damn reset button continuously for at least 10 minutes before it starts without sounding like an alarm clock. We had been looking for accommodation in earlier towns without success but there are plenty of suitable places in Kiama; trouble is the first four we tried didn’t have wi-fi so we kept trying. Here we are in our lovely tree house room in a place called The Sebel Harbour side which is part of the group www.mirvachotels.com . It’s not our usual choice as it’s a little more expensive at $169 a night for the two of us, but it does include breakfast. We have to pay extra for the Wi-Fi and you have to use it continuously so we won’t be making the phone calls until the morning. The word, “wi-fi” was underlined to show I had spelt it wrong so thinking maybe there should be some capitals I Right clicked and all it offered as an alternative was, “wife”. I told Claire because I thought it was funny and she said, “It is your wife”! Anyway, it’s a fabulous room, maybe even nicer than the Crowne Plaza that we stayed at in Melbourne. There is a 4 story underground car park, breakfast rooms, bars, even a Thai restaurant which Claire wants to go to tonight but I don’t feel hungry.
We stopped for lunch in Bateman’s bay at a place called “Hogs Breath Café” which I took a photo of and decided not to put it in because it wasn’t up to much. Overpriced, rubbish service and average bland food. Having said that I enjoyed mine, that’s why Claire is hungry and I’m not. Claire had the chicken Caesar salad and only ate the chicken. I think I’ve finally got my old knack back of choosing the right dish after reading the menu and getting the vibes from the place. I didn’t get this size for nothing.
We have a little fairground at the bottom of our road by the bay and some people were dressing up getting in the Christmas spirit. Can’t say it feels like Christmas here yet, especially when the sun shines. You need snow and a white Christmas, just like we have at home at the moment; what a shame we came away! I’m sure we have had a white Christmas in my time but I can’t remember when the last one was. It did seem to snow every year but never before Christmas; and the sun always shone when it was the school holidays, except for when it rained but you don’t seem to remember those days somehow.

Georgina managed to get home after allot of messing around and all the girls are tired but fine. Hopefully, I will talk to her tomorrow on Christmas day. I think the girls got more of an adventure than they bargained for at Euro Disney.

We have the standard Australian Queens bed, a lovely bathroom with nice towels and a little balcony that looks like it is perched in a large tree directly outside. We can even see the sea if you hold onto the rail on one leg and lean over; glad we didn’t pay the extra $50 for a sea view now. Claire is very happy here and doesn’t want to go out; except for a Thai meal later and she has noticed that we don’t have to check out until 11am so we might just use that. We originally wanted to stay quite close to Sydney for our last night so we had an easy run in and could settle into our apartment ready for Christmas over the next 4 nights but its such a shame to waste such a nice room. If we had had free wi-fi it would have been perfect but we have to pay just as you always have to in the better places. They want $10 for one hour and $15 for 12 hours, but it’s continuous so we can’t use a bit now and more in the morning. It is important to us to have wi-fi to do the blog and also so we can call home using Skype; especially today as it’s my dad’s birthday, HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!!!!! XXXXXX OOOOO XXXXX