Hitchin' a ride...

Who would have thunk it..  I feel like an avid hitchhiker now.  Going from Sydney to Melbourne was easy... We went out of town a bit by train, held up a sign for about 10 minutes, and got picked up by a guy in an 22 year old truck that kept overheating... We had to stop every 20 minutes to pour water all over (and in) the radiator... twas very interesting.

He was a cool dude, huge into politics, and we chatted for a good many hours about Australia, world politics, and such stuff...  And, right before he had to drop us off, he started driving around to trucks at a truck stop to try and get us a ride down to Melbourne!  He saw a truck he recognized, drove us over to it, and got out, met the driver, saying: "Do you know Peter?"

The driver was thoroughly confused, and said... "No. Is he a driver?"  "No! He's the name on your truck!  I went to school with him!" 

The driver (named John), had no idea what this lunatic was talkilng about, but did offer to give us a ride to Melbourne.  He was a bit quiet/reserved, but when I bought him some energy drinks and started eating a pie with chopsticks (it was hot..), he warmed up...  Dude had internet in his truck (where my last post was from), and was a wealth of information about trucks and such stuff around Australia.  Interesting.  And there was a bed in the back!  Fabienne had it that ride, but I got to ride there on the next trip (which I will touch on later...)

We got to Melbourne, caught the last train into the city and went back to the squat.  Just like returning home!  It was good to see everyone, and we spent the next few days chilling, catching up with people, showing Fabienne the city (I was like a freaking local), and a full on swing dance night in a park!  Summer in Melbourne is pretty freaking cool...

Then we hitched to Adelaide... It was a bloody hot day, and I think that's why we got picked up from the highway.  A nice dude who just got in from a diving trip, but a very weird guy.  Kept talking about how all the women outside of cities were fat and ugly, and Australians were stupid, and generally just very anti-Australian...

Then again, he dropped us in a tiny town in the middle of nowhere, Victoria, where we tried to hitch for 9 hours before getting picked up by a truckie at 1:30AM... We went back and forth a billion times between the city center and the truck stop, and were really unmotivated to keep going when we got to Adelaide in the rain at 8AM, with a serious lack of sleep (It's hard to sleep in a bouncing truck, even if the bed is comfy)...  We tried until about 2PM, and every single truck was going east (towards Melbourne/Brisbane).  So we figured we'd try taking a bus to another city and keep trying...

And then we saw a hostel with internet, and just said screw it, booked a room/flight to Perth, and relaxed...

Adelaide isn't really that exciting a place.. it's either for business or for shopping... all of the restaurants closed early, there were a few clubs/bars, but the most exciting thing was the market two blocks away from our hostel... which was awesome.  We went there pretty much every day to get food for breakfast/lunch/dinner... good cheese, good bread, good produce... mmm... it was good.

The beach was nice as well, but nothing too exciting.  I burnt the backs of my knees, but oh well...

Waking up at 4AM was a bit tough though to catch the flight to Perth, but here we are.  Fremantle is where we are exactly.  We got a random ride from the airport to freo, as it's known, through the botanical gardens and the really nice area outside of Perth... Tour guides and a hitchhiking without having to stick out our thumbs... beautiful.

Now we're watiting to see if there is a room for us at the Old Firestation backpackers, an awesome hostel in Fremantle, which is a pretty cool old harbor town style place anyways...

I won't be on again probably until after Indonesia, so don't expect much here.. we're going into the jungle!  All the best to you guys, and pray that the diarrea isn't too bad... =)

Oh, and if you want to follow Fabienne's blog, which has much nicer pictures (and some of me, for those that like that sort of thing), here's the link:

fabienne-becker.blogspot.com