One week in Coogee

Well it has been an interesting first week in Sydney. Paul and I have begun learning the tricks of the trade of back packing. The sad thing is that we're doing "easy" backpacking right now. (sort of like cheater-camping). Everyone speaks english, we can find our way around easily and the hostels are relatively clean. We're over a McDonald's so we have free WiFi (although its a bit dodgy).

Thus far we've found it difficult to stay on budget. I guess we're adapting to being on a budget at all! We keep talking about how we used to use the saying, "we'll make it up in our next paycheck" a lot... well now our next paycheck won't be until 2012. Sheesh!

Here is a picture of our first backpacker hostel "surfside coogee beach"

Basic thoughts about hostels:

1. lockers are key. this hostel doesn't have them and we're both very weary of leaving anything out... its frustrating and difficult to have a good day when you're sweating if your stuff is going to be there when you get back.
2. hostel mattresses are rough. Its mostly just a piece of foam.
3. cock-roaches are normal. Okay so this is a bit over the top b/c we have them back stateside but we've seen a few of them so far. Those suckers can move FAST! Also, they crunch.
4. We are the only american backpackers we've met thus far. Most of the people we've been talking with are british (manchester), german, irish, kiwi & aussie (duh). It feels good to be an american in a hostel. Don't know why but the novelty is a bit nice. No one seems to have hard feelings about the US other than they all seem to have a few stereotypes that circle around. I'm apparently a mixture of all three!!

That should do it for now. I'll throw up a few more pictures. We've hit the blue mountains (three sisters), sydney harbour & bondi/coogee. Tomorrow we pack up and head down to see Lisa & Sam for a night in Cronulla. It will be good to get out of this hostel for a night or two and see a familiar BUTLER face!