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Australia - Sydney

There were lots of people in the waiting room at the airport, but Rose Weatheral managed to see me walk through the door and walked up to me and introduced herself. I had never met Rose before, I had only talked to her on ICQ and when I mentioned that I was going to Australia and arrive to Sydney, she offered

The Operahouse in Sydney.

herself to meet me at the airport. She had also been kind to book me into a hostel in Katoomba, to which she took me to.

I was scared to death all the way to Katoomba, not because Rose was a bad driver, she wasn't, but people were driving on the left side down here. It was very hard to change the way of thinking and not be afraid as soon as an oncoming car came "on the wrong side". Katoomba was supposed to be in Sydney, but it was 110 kilometres outside Sydney centre. Sydney is huge!

I got some guided help the first days, the parents to a friend of Rose's took me to a zoo where I got to pet a koala and feed kangaros and see lots of other Australian animals. They also took me into the city centre and showed me the Operahouse and The Harbour Bridge etc.

Three Sisters

Katoomba is just at the edge to the Blue Mountains, which is a wonderfully nice place. I walked around on walking paths there and looked at one of the biggest tourist thing, The Three Sisters, and checked out the town itself.

I went into Sydney centre a couple of times on my own, once only to walk around there and look, and another time to have a look at the place where the Olympics were to be held in about a year. Many things were finished, but there were lots of work left to be done until it all was finished for the Olympics. It took the train about 2 hours one way to go from Katoomba to Sydney.

I spent almost 2 weeks in Katoomba before I bought a ticket to a touring bus which would take me to Canberra, but first via some sights like Jenolan Caves. I spent one night at some kind of a pub before I finally came to Canberra at the end of Mars 1999, on the 26th to be exact.

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