Route: Sydney to Goulburn by way of the Hume Highway
Distance: 195 km (121 mi)
This morning started off in the luxury that my middle-class Marriott budget can afford. We wallowed a bit in our beds after the sun woke us with its bright rays reaching the 20th floor early in the morning. Then a quick trip to the gym, and an awesome buffet, and we were out to start our day.
Except that our day really had only one thing planned: a harbour cruise that started at 2.30p. And it was only 12. So Ruthie and I killed some time by walking a few blocks down the street to check out this “motorcycle superstore” we’d seen from the top of the hop-on bus yesterday. I tried on some jackets and a bunch of helmets, while Ruthie drooled over riding boots and bought some new gloves. I also picked up the oil and coolant necessary to get my motorbike running again once we get home.
After an easy trip on the free tourist bus down to the Circle Quay [pronounced “key”], we found our correct pier and started the wait for our boat.
Sure we saw the Opera House and the Coat Hanger [as they call their famous bridge] the first time we were in town, but it was kinda cool just to sit in between them for a while and relax. Then, of course, once the boat arrived, and we perched ourselves up top, we were treated to some killer views of both landmarks. We were also shown roughly where Mr. Crowe resides, where Ms. Kidman used to live with Tom Cruise, and quite a few other luxury properties. Of course, not to be outdone by the eight-figure properties were the stupid expensive yachts parked in all the various piers around the harbour.
Upon concluding our wonderful afternoon on the water, we hightailed it back to our car to rush out into Sydney traffic. Much like any other over populated city, we crawled along, going about 20km in an hour, as we started to feel our stomachs grumble again.
What turned into a random exit from the main road in order to fill up the gas tank ended up with an even more random trip to a Chinese place that had quite excellent food - and it didn’t even break the bank. Seriously, dinner was half the price of breakfast.
Today also marked the first time in this trip that we’ve actually done any driving at night. We have decided that we are tired of spending money and are ready to head home, so we’re making the straight shot via the inland route, Hume Highway, to Melbourne. Our goal was to reach Goulburn tonight, so that we had a mere 8 hours [longest actual driving stretch of the trip] ahead of us tomorrow.
Mission accomplished, and I even managed to talk Ruthie and Lorraine into ignoring their “sense of adventure“ and staying at someplace that wasn‘t called the Cockroach Motorlodge. Okay, maybe “cockroach“ wasn‘t in its name, but the way I looked at it, it might as well have been. Yet, at this point, I can still hear the music from the bar downstairs slightly through the window - so not perfect by any means.
So one more day, and then home, sweet, Melbourne. Although, now we have a new thing to worry about when we get there: the fuel gauge is acting quite bizarre. The random pull off to a petrol station was prompted by the fact that the trip odometer was only at 85km and yet the fuel meter was sitting at E. As we pulled into the station, the needle dropped past E and then moved up to about a quarter tank. Something’s fishy …
-EP
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