Sydney to Melbourne Express

The time had come to surrender our car and camping ways. I must say I was a little sad to give it up after five thousand some kilometers. Our little white Toyota had gone all this way without a scratch, until well, the minute before we were to hand it in. I managed an embarrassing pop of the curb right in front of the rental garage door, almost worthy of a Mr. Bean episode.

Relieved to get off with out a fine, we met some of our only Sydneysider friends who happened to be brunching around the corner. Sue and Peter Kenaly insisted on treating us to a pie and were eager to hear about our travel up the coast which all started from their encouragement nearly a month ago. It's a shame that we could not have spent more time with their family this time around in Sydney.

That evening we finally splashed out on our first hostel in Australia. Steph and I made a joint decision to keep the tent, blankets and air mattress. Even though we had to give up the car, there might be room for a little more camping in Victoria.

But this meant we were overloded with too much camping gear to move more than a block in Sydney and thus needed a place to plop it all down a stone's throw from the station. And so what we found was a hostel INSIDE central station. The YHA Railway Square was built in the renovated loading docks, and the rooms occupy revamped carriges on 'platform #0' of the station. It was the coolest concept hostel I've been to, and the extroadrinry facilities made it well worth the money.

We shared a train car that night with six other Dutch backpackers who were attending a surfing school at Bondi beach. It turned out that our 8:05 overnight train to Melbourne left from track #1, right accross the platform from our bed. We were happy to be in a proper bead that doesn't inflate with crisp clean sheets.

From one night train to another.

The next day we completed many errands before catching our real train departure that night. We sold our excess gear, deposited checks at the bank, napped in the park, spent our first paycheck dollar one of Sydney's oldest pubs, before cooking up our surplus camping food. Funnily enough, we bumped into a friend while washing up in the hostel kitchen. Becca was a fellow backpacker from the boat in Halong Bay, Vietna, and it was great catching up on where our paths had split and converged again. We rudely had to scarf down our dinner in front of Becca before dragging our body boards, backpacks and camping gear (in a clown bag) down the platform to the Melbourne train - not sure if it was a comedy or drama for passangers who saw this from the train.

Exhausted, the second half of Australia begins tomorrow from Southern Cross Station.