We are in Sydney...

We are in Sydney now getting ready to return the car in the morning. Unfortunately it looks like we have lived in it for a month (which we have) and I am hoping we can either (a) find a car wash or (b) get away with returning a car sorely in need of a vacuum cleaner. It has been wonderful to have our own transport around Australia. We had a bit of a scare last night when the fuel light went on in the middle of nowhere, but we managed to make it back to civilization on fumes. We were not far from Sydney at the Jenolan Caves. It has a REALLY windy road in and out. If we had actually run out of gas on that road we would have been really S.O.L. They actually close the road in one direction for two hours every day so the buses can come in. There is no way they could do it with oncoming traffic.

Catching up, for those of you who may care about what we are doing....

After Bendigo and "Australia's premier underground attraction"-- aka the Central Deborah Mine, we headed up to Echuca. It was going from the city of old trams to the city of old paddle steamers. In Echuca they have saved old paddle steamers from the 1800's and early 1900's and they run tours up and down the river on them. We went for a nice little ride. They kids got to try and steer. It was on the Murray river which is a really winding river. It must be 2-3 times as long as it would be as the crow flies because of all the twists and turns.

We camped about 6 km out of town at a free campground (from the Camp Australia book). It was really nice on the banks of the Murray river. Just as we were in the tents getting ready to go to sleep we heard an almighty crack and a branch fall to the ground. People from neighbouring campsites started wandering around with searchlights trying to see what had happened. I am really glad I didn't know then that it was only about 10meters from our tents. It was a branch that was probably about 8" across at the point where it had been attached to the trunk. It would have caused some serious damage to anyone's head it happened to fall on.....

After Echuca we headed toward the Kosciuszco National Park and the Yarrongabilly Caves. This was our fourth cave system of our trip so far. I am really glad we have done them in the order we have, because each on seems to be better than the last. We managed to camp overnight at another free campground just up the highway from the caves. It was a nice little place with a creek running through. The kids had a lot of fun collecting firewood before it went dark and had one of the campfires they have been dreaming about for ages. I am a little worried about the fire danger in this drought-ridden area, but there was a fire grate so it turned out OK. The news here is full of the lack of water issues facing this part of Australia.

The attractions of the next day included the "Marble Masterpiece" or just simply "the Masterpiece" as it is referred to by the locals of Gundegai. It is actually impressive. It is made up of more than 20,000 pieces of 20 different kinds of Australian marble by an Italian-trained craftsman. Just down the road is another attraction by the same artist called "dog on a tuckerbox". It is a really bizarre attraction. While we were there, we saw two groups taking pictures and one group in the wings with the mother combing her little girl's hair waiting for their turn.

Running out of time, more later