NEWCASTLE, AUSTRALIA

The train pulled into the station at the end of its line about noon. I jumped off and started walking around town. Since it was Monday I thought I would have a very good chance of finding an apartment that day so I didn’t bother with a hotel. I asked about the local tourist info office and it turned out to be about a mile back in the other direction. When I arrived there they gave me a list of places that rent out by the week. On the list was a real estate agent located back near the train station so I walked back there even though my backpack was getting pretty heavy at that point. The agent wasn’t in the office so I decided to go to a building just around the corner that offered places by the week according to list.

To make a long story short, the place was almost perfect. Actually it was perfect except for the fact that the smallest units they offer were all taken so I had to get a larger one and it wasn’t as affordable as I had hoped it would be. It was $AU420 for the week, but the apartment was a huge one-bedroom with a balcony and sea view and a washer/dryer and fully equipped kitchen. I checked in and put my stuff away. It was a great feeling knowing I would be in the same place for at least a week with no maid service to work around and no real distractions.

After 4 months of traveling I decided that not only is it necessary to stop in one place for a while just to catch your breath, but it’s far better to stop in a place that isn’t loaded with attractions. Even if I had found the identical apartment for the same money in Sydney it would have been very difficult to concentrate of the few things I really needed to concentrate on. There is always the feeling that you should be out seeing the sights and I wanted to just go running and do my writing work.

I also was looking forward to watching things on television other than CNN International or BBC World. I was disappointed to find that the television in the apartment only receives five channels, but as the trip went on I discovered that cable or satellite TV in Australia is extremely rare in hotels and such. I was delighted to find that the hostel just down the block had a large and affordable internet café in its basement and I could hook up my laptop there with no problems. This would be ideal since I had to download and upload files every day.

Describing the following week would even put me to sleep so I won’t bother, but I will say that I had a very, very nice time just walking around the historic city center and seeing how life might be for an Australian rather than a tourist. I went running every other day, four times in all, and built my duration up to 35 minutes on my final run out to the lighthouse nearby. I bought quite a few items at a large suburban type grocery store about a mile away, but it was too far to go every day so I sampled some of the smaller places closer to the apartment.

I caught up on all my writing and journal work and didn’t really do too much else. It was somewhat depressing to have come to the point on this trip where I actually had to make travel arrangements back to the United States, but that time had come. I looked on the internet and asked at a few local travel agencies and discovered that there were no great bargains on one-way fares to Los Angeles. I went to a large chain called the Flight Centre and found they had a flight from Sydney to Los Angeles via Vietnam for about $AU1,050. That was about the same price I found everywhere else, but the deal got sweeter when they said for a few dollars more I could go on Air Tahiti Nui and they stop in New Zealand and Tahiti on the way. By paying the airport tax at both of those places I could also stay in those countries for a few days on the way and that sounded like a worthwhile plan. I really wanted to go to New Zealand, but it’s actually over 1,000 miles from Australia so it’s not like you can just go there and back cheaply.

I worked on a plan to figure out a schedule for another couple of weeks in Australia and some time in New Zealand and Tahiti on the way back to L.A. Since those flights only go 3 days per week it was quite a puzzle, but by the morning I was leaving Newcastle I had booked and paid for my ticket. It turned out that my first choices weren’t available so I made a snap decision to spend 9 days in New Zealand instead of 4 or so like I had wanted. Right after I left the travel agency and boarded the Sydney-bound train I got buyer’s remorse. What had I done? Nine days in New Zealand? I’m not going bungy jumping and this is late autumn there so what could I do for 9 days? I actually considered calling the travel agency when I got off the train in Sydney and trying to change the plan again, even though I knew that would probably mean a big penalty.

While I was on the train I was going through a glossy New Zealand brochure they gave me at the travel agency and I got an incredible sense of relief. What I discovered was that I could rent a small motorhome (locally known as a campervan) for a very good price. During summer those same campervans rent for about $US120 per day, but they are less than a third of that during the off-season and I was just at the beginning of the off-season. As I rode the train I was thrilled as I figured out that I could stay one night in Auckland and then rent a campervan and drive all over New Zealand for a very reasonable price.

I still had about two weeks left in Australia though and I had only just begun seeing Sydney before I went off for a rest period. The train pulled into the Central Station in Sydney and I walked down to the subway for a ride to Circular Quay where I would catch a ferry for Manly. I thought it would be nice to see a different part of the Sydney area this time so I reserved a room at a guesthouse in Manly Beach, which is a 30-minute ferry ride across the harbor to the northern edge where the harbor meets the ocean.