Sorrento

Day 265

"I used to dream
I used to glance beyond the stars
Now I don't know where I are
Although I know I've drifted far"

Last week, tuesday morning I was sitting in Melbourne domestic terminal in front of boarding gate. Clock was 5:45 and I was really tired and slightly annoyed that I had to go to Sydney, visit my consulate to apply for new passport. Suddenly I notice a sign in front of boarding gate:

"SORRY. NO HOT STUFF. (except for yourself of course)"

Hehe, immediately there was yet again smile on my face and I couldn't stop chuckling. I love this country! Impossible to feel miserable here. How can I ever return from here?

Yes, it's been looong time since last update. I was planning to write one in Sorrento about 4-5 days ago but Tom and Tess had some issues with Telstra and no internet in their house. So I had to wait until back in Melbourne to write next entry. So where was I when writing last entry...oh yea, in Launceston Tasmania so there has been quite a lot since then...or not.

When I got back to Melbourne from Tasmania little over week ago on sunday I had pretty hectic schedule. On monday I headed to Yarra Yarra Valley for some wine touring.

Yarra Yarra valley is the most famous wine region in Victoria so I had to see what it had to offer. Well, wines were really diverse there, no real pattern. First winery was horrible, second was good, third was crap and fourth was amazing. On tour we also got to see little bit of what the bushfires have done to local landscapes. Damage seemed just massive in there, lot of vineyards have been burned down.

On tuesday I went to Sydney. This was my third visit to that city and again, city just blew me away with it's beauty.

Sydney is just stunningly beautiful. When I was on ferry from Double Bay to Circular Quay views just gave me cold shivers, it is just that gorgeous. You just keep looking at the view and almost forgetting to breath. I still can't understand how man can build such beauty in one city.

Since passport application took only about 30 minutes I had couple of hours to kill in Sydney. Decided to head to Hotel Australia in The Rocks to eat something exotic...Saltwater Crocodile pizza. Wasn't really that good :-)

On flight back to Melbourne I REALLY got to see what scale the damage of the bushfires in Victoria actually is. It is just bloody massive! Entire forests and national parks have burned down and it was all too visible from plane. It will take decades until it is all healed.

So back in Melbourne and on wednesday I headed to Sorrento for rest of the week. Sorrento is little beach town at the end of Mornington Peninsula about 1.5h drive from Melbourne. Why there? Well, back in July in Broome I met Tom and Tessa, a couple from Sorrento and they told me to message them if I ever get to the area. So, 8 months later I sent them message asking to stay with them for few days and celebrate my birthday on process.

Tom and Tess were great hosts. I even had own room in their house right in middle of Sorrento town. Here are some pics of the beaches surrounding the town.


5 days there just flew by and had a great time. One day I went diving and had one of the better dives in my short career. On one single dive I got to see about 10 Sea Drgaons, 5 Sea Horses, Huge Maori Octopus, Stingray, Cuttlefish and many many other things. Even the divemaster said that out of the 100+ dives he had done on that location, it was propably the best so far.

Other day 3 of us went wine touring around Mornington Peninsula wineries. Hmmm, wines weren't really that great there, but that didn't stop the winemakers from trying to sell their stuff to us. Their method seemed to have been "get-them-drunk"-method since they just kept pouring us wines after wines and big glasses as well. No wonder Tess nearly passed out at the car on way back to Sorrento :-)

Now I'm back in cold and cloudy Melbourne trying to figure out how to spend next 3 days here. On thursday I'm heading to St Kilda suburb in Melbourne for 2 more days before embarking on Great Ocean Road tour on saturday morning. Have couple of surprise things planned on St Kilda, but we will see if they work out hehe

Last pic is for CSI enthusiastics...what the hell is this and what happened??