Hi there everybody.

Sorry for the long time since we last posted a blog, no excuses, we should have been better at keeping in touch. Someone who will remain anonymous (lets just call her Judith McFarlane for arguments sake) told us to get our fingers out (always thought that was a strange saying, what are you going to do walking around with your fingers stretched out infront of you) and get the next blog done. So here you go Miss Anon of Bridge of Allan here is the update of what Gav and Jess have been getting up to! Needless to say the following blog will contain beautiful pictures (not just of the wife) and at least one embarrassing story. So where did we leave you last time? Yeah we were just about to head to Jervis Bay for the weekend. Jervis bay is situated Between Sydney and Canberra, and is a coastal region that boasts beautiful bush walks and beaches, which are said to hold the guinness world record for the whitest sands in the world. On the Saturday morning we woke up and drove along the coast and stopped off at all the little beaches and walked along the white sand (take my word for it, it was certainly white!) and we even went for a swim in the sea (big thing for Jess with her phobia of sharks but having watched many Steve Irwin shows and Crocodile Dundee, one and two, i was sure that anything lurking in the sea wouldn't stand a chance).


We then went for a bush walk in Boodaree national park and we saw our first wild Kangaroo! We didn't realise how big they were and when we were walking through the bush we must have disturbed these two kangaroos and they lept up and bounced off. We got quite a shock when they jumped up and i think i even made my wildlife warning call, I thought that all these kangaroos were meant to be tied down (sport) and not jumping around all over the joint. After this we went to a local caravan park which is full of wild kangaroos to get some pictures, we even saw a mother kangaroo with a baby in her pouch.

On the Sunday on our way home to Sydney we drove back through a place called Kangaroo valley. This was really green and lush which reminded us of Scotland. We stopped off at Fitzroy falls which was a stunning waterfall.

Last weekend we drove to a place called Wiseman's Ferry, which is where the convicts built a road (The great old northern road)linking Sydney to Hunter's Valley. We had a beautiful walk up this road through the bush and gumtree forest. It was really interesting to read from the signs how they had built it and also to see the grafitti that the convicts etched into the stone as they worked their way along (i.e E.W 1871).

Apart from all that we have been working and continuing to meet new people. We have even met a guy called bruce! Its great when you can say G'day Bruce when you see him, makes you feel like a proper aussie. We must invite him to a BBQ where we are cooking shrimps, I think the combination of saying G'day Bruce throw another shrimp on the barbie would be one of the most memorable experiences we could ever have (in our whole lives).
The other thing that we have done is go to a poker night in the local pub. We were invited to go to this event which is a professionally arranged event, but as neither of us have ever played poker before, let alone competitively we were a little hestitant to go. But once it was pointed out that it was free we were there! Having never played poker we had a crash course from our friends what to do and the etiquette that had to be followed. This is probably the part of the blog where you might think something embarrasing happened, of course you would be right in thinking so. There were about 10 tables and you sat down and were given your chips and then play commenced on all tables, if you lost all your chips you were out simple as that and play went on until there was one person out of about 80 left. You were free to move around the tables as long as there was space, but we opted to go to a friendly looking table with people who might show us a bit of mercy. The cards were delt and Jess was really nervous and i was sitting there like i was cool hand look with my poker face on (i had practiced it for days) and i was looking around me trying to pick up tips. Then suddenly people started making bets and it was my turn i just did what everone else did and i quietly turned to my poker playing friend and asked when i was meant to look at my cards, to which he replied that i should have already looked at them. I didnt think i could look at them again so i just kept on nervously betting. Once the 5 cards in the middle were delt the people who hadnt folded had to turn their cards. There was only ever going to be one winner! Mr Mckinley on his first ever hand of poker won with a flush!!! I should have played it cool but i was so overcome by excitment that i announced that i had never played before and i didnt even look at my cards. Whilst i basked in my glory the table was divided between jealousy and disgust. All in all we had a great night and Mr Mckinley stayed in for over 2 hours, one guy even asked me was i taking the xxxx or had i never played before, i told him to decide for himself!
We have nothing planned for this weekend, i reckon we will have a much needed relaxing weekend (we do actually work when we are here, the alarm going off at 5.30am is not always a welcomed noise!) and plan what we want to do in the forthcoming weeks.