BBQ's, Kangaroos and lots of booze

So entering the vast land of dingos, didgeridoos, crocodiles and kangaroos has been like stepping into an old friends house; homely, friendly, familiar, almost like home but not quite home. (probably the sunshine)

On entering Australian soil (or should I say say red sand) we quickly exchanged a common breakfast consisting of noodle soup swimming in a bowl of beautiful spices for a breakfast of Kellogg's Cornflakes, 2 slices of toast with actual butter and a nice cup of tea. Although the spice and flavours of the food in Asia we have indulged in have been divine, there was something quite nice about getting back to a plain breakfast.  Like England, a whole array of worldwide cuisine are on offer to you in Australia but for us it was back to home cooking and the occasional indulgence of fish and chips (sadly with no vinegar). After 5 months I was actually desperate to start cooking up feasts, however due to the fact we were moving on a lot, my feasts had to be curbed a little as we only had a small cool bag to carry our ingredients around with us.

It is very true that the Australians love a BBQ and we wasted no time in getting involved with this. Nearly all the parks in Australia have public BBQ’s that anyone can cook on.  

There is a wide variety of meat available in the supermarkets Down under. You have a choice of anything from Kangaroo to Crocodile to chuck on the BBQ.

Kangaroo Kababs

After already sampling crocodile when we were in Cambodia and deciding it was much like chicken but tougher, we decided to try some kangaroo. Kangaroo was very gamey, quite a tough meat but very tasty and for once didn't taste like chicken! 

The tropical Northern Queensland has an abundance of fruit growing and we enjoyed cycling along by the white sand beaches to the nearest fruit farm to top up on our 5-a-day.

To cool off in the 30C heat, ice cream sampling was an essential exercise...

This ice cream parlour had some of the best and most unusual ice cream combinations that I have ever seen and they were all DELICIOUS!!!

Guinness Ice Cream

I finally settled on Guinness flavoured ice cream, it was a beautifully creamy, rich, smooth delight with a little back kick of alcohol. 

Our East Coast experience continued with BBQ's and Kangaroo's. I must say this time we didn't eat the  Kangaroo's! We helped bottle feed the Joeys and boy they were cute.

From the Outback to the White sand beaches we loved Australia.

next on the agenda was the home of Lord of the Rings- New Zealand.

Our trip couldn't have started better, a cool glass of sparking New Zealand wine whilst over looking the stunningly beautiful Bay of Islands. After 7 months of travelling we were celebrating the start of a lovely week travelling with my in-laws.

From then onwards New Zealand continued in much the same fashion touring some of the worlds best vineyards and sipping on their fine produce.

And indulging in the worlds finest lamb..

Following a week exploring the beauties of the North Island we took off in a campervan to see the South Island.

With a restaurant on wheels we dined in the heart of New Zealand's beautiful scenery. There was nothing better than pulling up to one of the many beautiful camping grounds in New Zealand, cracking out a cider or having a nice cool glass of wine and enjoying dinner whilst overlooking breathtaking scenery. 

This has been the perfect way to end 8 months of travels. After seeing some of the most breathtaking scenery the world has to offer and gaining an array of life long memories, it is back to Australia to once again get back into the working world.

We are heading to Melbourne to experience working life in Australia.