Margaret River

The trip was a success.

They picked me up at the hostel at around 12:30pm.

I loaded my stuff in the van, and hopped in the back seat next to Bazz.

"You want a beer?"

Apparently, New Zealand, South Africa, and Australia, have no laws about open bottles in vehicles. You can drink as much as you want in a vehicle as long as your not the driver. If you get caught, all they do is breathalyze the driver to make sure he wasn't consuming anything, and then you are free to go.

The first part of the drive was good times. We were all giddy to get there and party.

We had to take quite a few stops on the way because we were drinking the beers like it was a Friday night. The first stop was to pick up more drinks, and camping supplies. Mostly drinks.

We stopped in Brumbley to watch the sunset. It was beautiful. We took some pictures, then hopped back in the van and continued on.When we got into the area of Margaret River all we needed to do was find a beach to camp on. We went into a gas station and asked them where the nearest beach was, and bingo, 10 minutes later we were on our way down some stairs to a beach. By this time it was already pitch black, and Bazz had fallen down twice, the second of which split open his knee.

We began collecting fire wood, and Bazz climbed in the van for bed.

We had ourselves a nice little fire, in the sand, 10 meters from the ocean. We drank, and chilled, and for the first time since I've been in Oz, I saw the Southern Cross. For those of you who don't know what that is, it's the group of stars that are located on the Australian flag. Once we began getting a little sleepy, we decided we best climb into the van, because we were getting picked up for the wine tour at 10:30am. We turned on Kierin's laptop and began watching 'Snatch'. After the battery died, we got in our sleeping bags and tried to sleep.

Well, the van was not big enough for all of us. Emma and Mick had the front seats, Bazz had the back seat, Kierin had the back floor, and me and Jen tried to sleep on the middle seat. We all swapped spots, switched around, but still I couldn't find a place where my legs could fit. After 2 leg cramps, I had had it. Me and Mick grabbed the tent and began setting it up in the cold ocean wind. It was freezing out. Not Australia freezing, like Canada freezing.

We got it up pretty fast, and climbed in. One of the worst sleeps ever. It was so cold.

We packed up in the morning and found a camp site for $5 a person. We set up our stuff, then waited for the bus to pick us up. We hopped on and met Salvino, the driver, and tour guide.

There was 14 of us on the tour. First stop, WaterGate Winery.

We were taught how to drink wine.

We tried 3 whites, and 3 reds. After the tasting, we went out back and saw the orchards, and landscape. I saw my first real life kangaroo. They're were four of them hanging out in the orchard.

We visited five winery's in all, and tasted 40 different wines. We also went cheese tasting, to a chocolate factory, and a brewery. One of the winery's was home to the second largest flag in the southern hemisphere. As you would guess, it was pretty damn big.One of the highlights was during lunchtime. When we were almost done our meal Salvano brought out 'his friend Henry'. Henry was a grub. A big grub. He needed 2 volunteers. Immediately my hand rose. He cut little Henry in half, and handed the upper body to me, and the other half to one of the girls.

Tasted sort of nutty, like really light peanut butter. The texture wasn't the coolest though, and his head was very crunchy. But, it was something I may not get to experience again, so I was very happy I did it.

When we got back from the tour, we grabbed some subs, 2 bottles of Canadian Club, and headed back to the campsite to start it up. We still had about 7 litres of goon, half a bottle of CC and 16 beers left as well. While we were out picking up the drinks, I had also purchased some ping pong balls, and some plastic cups. So we just sat in a circle with out cups in our laps, and played a game very similar to beer pong. We started to deteriorate fast. We had many laughs, and shared what might be one of our last big parties together.

In the morning we woke up to pouring rain. We quickly packed up the van and headed back Perth. When we got back we hung out at Emma's for a few hours then got a ride back into the city at around 4pm. I was at Mustang's, jug in hand, at around 8pm.

life is good.