ARRIVING IN SYDNEY

14th November 2015

So our road trip is over for the time being and we plan to stay in Sydney for a while, working to save up some money and exploring this new city. Thanks for following our adventure this far. We plan to write about all the amazing things Sydney has to see and do, but we will be a little less regular with our blogging.

On our first full day in Sydney, we woke up at 7am to find that the quiet area we had parked yesterday in the rain was now swarming with people out for the weekend sunshine. Even getting out the van unseen proved tricky as a full on work-out was taking place just metres away in the park. When there was a lull, Will rushed out and shut the door straight away, as the spandexed instructor was returning, leaving me trapped!! I lay back down, willing sleep to come but it was rather hot in the metal box we call home, and so I just sort of waited, sweating profusely. When the next opportunity came, he opened the side door to release me. We had a FaceTime chat with Anna, and back in the UK it was Friday night and Winter was in the air.

Our job for today was to open an Australian bank account. We went into the Freshwater branch of Bendigo (as it was the closest to the van) and opened an account no problem. It was here that we learnt of the terrible events that were unfolding in Paris. Our thoughts go out to everyone who lost loved ones and the people of Paris.

The French Tricolore was flying alongside the Australian flag above the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House was lit up.

I went to a shopping centre in the van to buy some interview clothes. After a pretty successful trip I walked back to Vanwell, only to find I had left the lights on (I turned them on in the rain and forgot to turn them off again) and had completely run down the car battery. I waited for about an hour for the AA guy (or the Australian equivalent) to arrive and to jump start Vanny. Then I had to drive around for an hour to recharge the battery. I collected Will who had been over in Manly for the day and we went for a drive further north to the even more northern, northern beaches. By the time we were done it was pretty late, we headed to a pizza place and went to bed. It rained heavily in the night and we didn't sleep well because of the hammering of the rain on the van roof, tomorrow the spot under the tree will be ours!

The following day we had a lovely day in Manly. The rain had stopped, the sun was out and so were the 'little nippers'. In most coastal towns in Australia they have a little nippers group as part of the Surf Life Saving Club, it's a kids club where they learn swimming and life saving in the sea. They all have to wear a bright pink top, presumably so they can be seen easily in the sea, but which looks pretty awkward for the teenage boys. We watched for a while as they completed the mornings activities, paddling out on a kneel board around a buoy, running around a track on the sand then swimming out around the buoy. The sea was pretty choppy - I'm not sure I'd have wanted to swim out as far as they did!

In Manly we both went to the library to do some research on the companies we were interviewing with that week. Will shaved his beard in the library toilets as it had grown to be rather massive and the hobo look might not go down well in an office environment. Dad had given me the number for Jess, the daughter of his cousin Susan, who lived in Sydney. I gave Jess a call to see if they were free to meet up and try to gain some Sydney knowledge about where we should try and live etc, and she immediately said we could come stay at theirs so that we had hot showers and an iron for our interviews!! How lovely of them.

We met up with a guy called Olly and his partner Gosia at a bar in Manly. Will had literally bumped into Olly the day before on the beach, after not seeing him for years since his cousin George's wedding. He had also gone to Falmouth Uni and was living and working in Sydney as a graphic designer. The bar had live music on, cold beers and it had stopped raining. What more could one ask for! Later on we drove across the city over to Jess and Steve's in the inner west suburb called Petersham. To get there we had to drive over the Sydney harbour bridge which was amazing. We met a few of their friends as they had people round for a BBQ... So Aussie. They have two daughters, energetic Sophie who is two and a half, and chilled out baby Emily who is 4 months old.

On the Monday (our first weekday in Sydney) Will had three interviews lined up at various branding agencies. And all three were keen to get him in freelancing! Our money worries were over! My only job was to find some shoes for my interview the next day, and trusty old Topshop sorted me out. Heading into the city and seeing this view felt completely surreal, we had to keep pinching ourselves to believe we were here.

On the Tuesday was my interview at Cue at 8.30am. I felt rather strange in my smart new 'interview clothes' and not wearing the Birkenstocks that have been surgically attached to my feet for the last eight months. Melinda the pattern room manager instantly put me at ease and went through how things work at Cue. The time from design sketch to shop floor is much shorter than at KM, meaning less chance to get things perfect as they make less samples before production. The price point is lower than KM too, so construction methods are different. The office was swish and the product is good so let's see what happens...

I headed back home after the interview and changed into some normal clothes, before heading out to meet Will at Sydney's infamous Bondi beach. As it was a gorgeous day, the beach was full of gorgeous people. They were tanned, toned and good looking, and boy did they know it! From here we did the coastal walk over to Bronte beach, passing Mackenzies Bay And Tamarama. On the way, Will accepted a freelance offer from Interbrand and will be starting there tomorrow. Talk about fast work!

Wednesday was Will's first day back in the studio and I had an interview with a fashion job agency. Although the lady I was meeting was almost one hour late and had clearly not even opened my CV, the meeting took a promising turn when one her colleagues came in and said she'd just had a short term pattern cutting contract come through! What are the chances.

The next few weeks followed the same pattern, with me hanging out at Jess's house in the days looking for jobs online, going to interviews with job agencies, attending a trial day at Cue and an interview at another company. When I wasn't on the job hunt, I was hanging out with Jess and the kids or exploring Sydney. We went to the outdoor swimming pool one day, played in the paddling pool in the garden and hung out in the house on the super hot days when leaving the house meant certain death.

The first weekend after we'd arrived in Sydney, the family were heading away for the weekend and convinced us to stay at theirs even though we felt we had outstayed our welcome! On the Saturday morning, we sat in front of the tv and watched the final 4 episodes of Game of Thrones season 5. We were in tv heaven. That's probably the only tv series we were gutted to have missed since leaving home and now we'd gotten it out the way, we could go and explore Sydney!