I have been gone a year now and WOW!!! What a fucking year it’s been! It feels like just yesterday I said my goodbyes at Pearson Airport yet, at the same time it feels like it’s been a lifetime since I left. I can’t believe the year I have had, I look back and think WOW this has been my life the past year…have I really done all that, is that really me in those pictures?!?
There is no point in me writing a blog and rehashing the year and going over events that you guys have already read about…and to be honest, it would be too long to write so I am just going to let you know what has been going on.
Though I have been gone a year, I still have not reached my year mark in Australia though, that part of my travels is quickly coming to an end next month. There is still some of Australia I have not seen which I want to check out before I continue on my travels with Dan next month. I have been planning 5 weeks trip (on my own) for my last few weeks. With a sad goodbye to Dan yesterday (as we have never really been apart the 5 months we have been together) I hopped on the Greyhound for a long ass 22 hour bus ride to Alice Springs.
Allright we all know how I love Greyhound (sarcasm – remember my venture out to Vegas with Pauly for my 30th). Well to start off the bus was a half hour late, but the bus wasn’t full so I got to stretch out which is always a bonus. About two hours in we drove past Emerald Springs so I gave it the middle finger with a smile lol and about an hour after that we had our first stop in Katherine. There isn’t much to say about Katherine except never go there unless you absolutely have to it’s not the greatest town and it smells bad and so does the Greyhound Station where the toilets are infested with spiders and you can’t even eat a bag of crisps while you are waiting in the waiting area. We were only supposed to have an hour stop but because the bus coming from Perth was running an hour and a half late and there was one person on it transferring to our bus we ended up waiting around 2 hours instead of 1 hour and we were bothered by drunken aboriginals , I was never so happy to get back on a bus.
I was in and out of sleep all day as there is not much else to do on a lone bus trip and driving down the Stuart Hwy hour upon hour becomes menotenous. About midnight we stop off at Daly Waters which is this awesome pub in this out back town called Daly Waters. There is a pool table and peoples ID’s up on the wall as a collage, a decent sized bar where one side is a Takeaway. Out the back is this massive patio with a stage where live music plays few nights a weeks, I honestly wanted to spend the night. Anyways me and this older gentleman on the bus had to go to the toilet (the one on the bus was clogged with poo and we all know how I feel about poo these days). As I’m tinkling I hear something “no it’s a truck its alright” We get back out the front…THE BUS HAS LEFT US THERE!!! My heart sank. My phone, my money, my backpack everything was on that bus. I was panicking. “it’s ok they stop 7 km’s from here we will call the next place and tell them to let you know to wait for you. One of our bartenders will drive you.” Thank god! The older gentleman ( I never did get his name) was panicking too, I was so worried the bus wasn’t going to wait. This wasn’t the first time they had left someone behind apparently.
We pull up and the bus is there, my heart started to come out of my stomach and relax to it’s normal spot in my chest. We thank our driver and head to the bus. “Hey we are back” I said to the driver as we were climbing back on the bus “why would you get off the bus?” was his reply “I had to pee” “well that wasn’t a stop it was just a drop off. I am not Psychic how was I supposed to know.” “How are we supposed to know which ones are stops you are not announcing anything and the one before that you stopped for 10 minutes and the toilet on the bus is clogged and I had to pee. “ “Well it wasn’t a stop and you shouldn’t of gotten off” and he was being rude, he was almost yelling at me and the older guy. We both said to him “we were just telling you we were back there is no need to be rude we were just letting you know we were back” “I’m not being rude I am just telling you how it is” and being in Australia too long I replied “your being a cunt!” and got on the bus only to find out that someone on the bus had told him I wasn’t on the bus when he left and he said “It’s not a stop and it’s not my problem if she is not on the bus!” Fucking Greyhound.
We switched drivers at the next stop and then the stop after that was Tennant Creek where we had to switch busses and then wait around while the transferred all the mail around (the Greyhound is also the postal service here). As the mail we got moved around we all waited on the bus but there were a few people transferring to our bus and the driver wouldn’t let them on till he was done everything. He made them wait an hour with their bags so he could finish while we were all on the bus sleeping. Then we had to go through the mail drive through and pick up mail. After that as we were leaving Tennant Creek the driver realizes he has forgotten his log book so we have to go back to the bus station to look for it, where (lucky for them) to people had missed the bus because they fell asleep and were waiting.
It took another 7 hours after that to get to Alice Springs. At one point when I woke up we had pulled into the UFO Museum, through sleepy eyes I see green martian men. Apparantly this little place has the most UFO sightings, but it was closed. The rest of the trip I slept, or I tried to anyways. The driver (who was heaps nicer then the last) was listening to music with his headphones on and he sang all through the night. Though I don’t really know if you could really classify what he was doing as singing because he really wasn’t even singing words it was more gibberish then anything…and it was sooo annoying sleeping on a bus is hard enough.
I really wish Dan was with me. I miss him so much already. I mean, it feels really good to be travelling on my own again but it is so weird not having him with me…I feel like half of me is missing. Five weeks of us being apart is good for us though…we need the separation, and I need to know I am ok without him…which I am but I miss him like crazy. Though seeing him after five weeks is gonna be awesome and then we are off to Bali to get married!!! Yes that’s right…married!!! We got engaged two weeks ago and we are so happy and can’t wait. Some of you probably wondering what happened with Ryan. We are still amazing friends and are planning on seeing each other in two weeks…and we will always have a spot in our hearts for eachother…but our time is over (as a couple) and we both know that, though he knew that before I did ;)
So now here I am in Alice Springs in an 8 bed mixed dorm that consists of me and 7 other guys lol ya it’s really mixed. I have to be up at 5 am as I am doing a 3 day trip that I am so excited for. You will have to wait for my next blog for that one x
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