Can You Believe They Do It For Fun? (01-06/4/09)

WEDNESDAY 1ST APRIL

We’re leaving Brisbane today and going south to Coffs Harbour for a few days. Firstly though, we have a nine hour bus journey to contend with. Bus journeys do my head in more than I could possibly moan about. This was no different. I read a whole book from cover to cover, listened to the rain and a bit of I-pod and then heard the brilliant news over the radio: Coffs Harbour has had its worst rain in years and the entire town is flooded. This was no April fool’s joke. Wonderful. With this in mind we made the decision to stay on the bus and head to see our friends in Port Macquarie. The driver on the bus didn’t have a problem with us doing so, so that was that, another three hours on the bus.When we realised we were nearly at Port, we got our things ready and waited to get off. We passed the exit and thought nothing of it; surely there would be another one further on up the road. Five minutes passed and we still hadn’t turned off so Louise went to ask the driver when we’d be getting into town. Apparently the previous bus driver had told him no one was getting off at Port Macquarie so he was OK to go straight on to Sydney because they were an hour behind schedule. After we explained the situation, and he’d driven another fifteen minutes down the road, the bus turned around and headed back to Port Macquarie.We finally made it to the coach stop and were met by our friend Tony and his wife Rochelle (who was waiting in the car in her pyjamas as it was 01:15a.m). They took us to their house and then Louise, Tony and I sat up until 05:00a.m drinking and catching up.

THURSDAY 2ND APRIL

We awoke at lunch time to an empty house; no surprises there I suppose Tony and Rochelle both had to work. We got ourselves ready and walked out of the house, looked at each other and realised we didn’t know where we were or which way we should go to get into town. After wandering aimlessly for twenty minutes we stumbled upon the first sign of life we’d seen to ask directions (Port Macquarie has a population of around 60 000, so how did it take us twenty minutes to find signs of life?), an old woman who was either deaf as a post or stupid. I’m going to give her the benefit of the doubt and say she was deaf. She eventually explained to us where we supposed to go; it was another 25 minutes to town so no bother.We eventually met up with Tony around tea time and had a couple of drinks at an expensive wine bar, before Rochelle turned up and we went for a meal at a Mexican restaurant. By the time we’d finished eating Tony was a bit worse for wear; I’m not one to judge when it comes to getting pissed as I’m as big a culprit as anyone.

FRIDAY 3RD APRIL

Tony had a thick head all day, and Louise and I couldn’t be bothered and Rochelle was at work, so the three of us we ended up staying in all day watching The Sopranos and slobbing. It rained pretty much all day anyway.

SATURDAY 4TH APRIL

After wasting away in front of the TV yesterday, we went to town to get some money for a night out. It turned out the bank had refused to put through a bank transfer that I wanted to put in Louise’s bank account. It took me two hours to sort it out and I’ve still got to wait until tomorrow to see if it’s sorted. Meanwhile, Louise’s withdrawal limit had been reduced to £30 a day for some reason. Now we’ve only got about AU$20 between us and no money available to withdraw. It wouldn’t usually be a problem, but it’s Saturday and this has happened before. After talking to the most unhelpful people at the call centre and having had to borrow money of Louise’s mum because the bank won’t let us withdraw our own money; it’s not on credit it’s my money! There was another torrential downpour just as we were about to head out for the night, so we got a taxi into town. I got piss wet through walking to the cab, and when I got out I trod in a puddle that was about six inches deep; soaking the first pair of jeans I’ve worn in over six months.After a few drinks in the warm-up pubs we headed to the local night club. This is the only night club I’ve been in all of Australia that doesn’t bother with ID as it’s full of kids. There was also a limit to the amount of drinks you can buy in one go to three. So because there was four of us in the group two of us had to go to the bar to get four drinks!

SUNDAY 5TH APRIL

In Port Macquarie today there is an ‘Ironman Triathlon’ going on. It starts at 06:00a.m and you have until 23:00p.m to complete it. It involves a 3.8km (2.4miles) swim in the sea, a 180km (112.5miles) cycle and a 42.2km (26miles 385yds: a marathon) run. The people that are doing this are not Olympic athletes; they’re just normal fitness fanatics who want to do it! Shit, if I had to do this I’d need a month!While the tri-athletes were swimming, cycling and running the four of us went for a drive. At home if you go for a drive you probably only go twenty miles up the road. This is Australia though and you have to drive about 5o miles to get to another town. We went to Crescent Heads; I can’t remember where it is but I do remember there’s a big cliff. On the ocean side, it looks a little bit like the Giants Causeway in Northern Ireland. We also went somewhere else and had expensive fish and chips. I don’t remember the name of the town, but on the way through the countryside I saw a lot of cows, sheep and horses. One of the horses must have thought he was in fancy dress as he looked like the equine Zorro. Not much doing in the evening. We watched a bit of the triathlon. It was 18:00p.m and there was still one cyclist out. Afterwards we watched Mickey Rourke in The Wrestler.’ It’s pretty good; the soundtrack makes the film so much better as it’s all rock music. What else could you have on the soundtrack of a wrestling film? It wouldn’t work with jazz music would it?

MONDAY 6TH APRIL

It’s our final day in Port Macquarie before we head inland a bit to Taree. First of all we have a few errands to run. The bank is still fucking us about so we’ve got them to sort out. While we’re on the mooch in town, we see a hell of a lot of people who look like they’ve just done an ‘Ironman’ contest. If I’m not mistaken the ones in spandex leggings with shorts over the top (a la a half arsed Superman) probably have done, but the others I think are just OAP’s (Senior Citizens). After we bid farewell to Rochelle and Tony we wait on our new chauffeur Kel who arrives around 14:30p.m with Mackenzie his young daughter, but without his wife Shannon who is in hospital for the day.We head to Taree, which is about 50 miles away; it took us over an hour because there was a load of fucking road works. So contrary to popular belief, it’s not just England that has them everywhere.We arrive at our home for the next week in Wingham; not Taree as I thought (although it is the next town), and settle in to our new room. It’s got a real bed which is a bonus as Tony and Rochelle only had and airbed that didn’t pump up fully. Due to bad posture in my sleep I snored like a tractor and Louise didn’t sleep properly for the entire time we stayed.Later on in the day Kel went to pick up Shannon from the hospital. She’s a little bit tender and quite groggy, and in her own words ‘feels like utter shit.’