We had a great week in Byron Bay, we stayed in a cabin at Belongil Beachouse mostly just relaxing and enjoying a week away. I went surfing every day with the last two being the best, and it was great to swap the 13′C water in Victoria to the 21′C waves in Byron. Our friends Tess and Nye came down from Brisbane and stayed Saturday night, and on Sunday we went up to Brisbane and watched Nye and the others in “Timbah” play an afternoon gig

Last week I handed in my last (hopefully) paperwork to Immigration to get my permanent visa here in Australia, so now I just have to wait until they get back to me. Hopefully we don’t get called in for an interview because I’ve had enough off all the work involved in all this visa business. It might take a while before I hear anything though as it stated on the paperwork I received that they aim to complete 75% off the applications within 6 months…

On Saturday I went down past Torquay with Tony (a mate from TAFE) for some surfing, it was a great day with heaps of waves around. We had our first surf at Point Addis with some nice 4ft+ waves and after some fish n chips we met up with Matt and tim who went down the night before, Tony and Matt had a good surf with me behind the camera catching them getting a few nice ones and getting pounded by a solid 6 wave set…

We have now had 5 Days around Perth in WA, and it looks like tomorrow we might finally have a bit of a cooler day as the forcast is “only” 31′C. Against all info I got before we left we haven’t had a single seabreeze yet but hopefully tonight I’ll be able to get out on my kiteboard after 5 days straight of NE (offshore) winds. Bec and I went down to Margaret River, about 2,5h south of Rockingham where our friends live, for three days, looking at a few caves and enjoying the really nice beaches. We are now back in Rockingham and just about to hit the beach. Tomorrow we’re off to Rottnest Island a 30 min boatride from Perth for a nice day of snorkelling and relaxing. Well we better head down to the beach before I die of a heat stroke…

I’m just back after having my bucks night before the wedding, it was actually a whole weekend where we went down the coast for a surf trip. Unfortunately I didn’t get to surf too much as a managed to dislocate my shoulder AGAIN! on the first day but we had lots of fun anyway. Check out the photo’s in my photo gallery .
I met up on Saturday morning in Geelong with Matt (my best man) and his housemate Matt, they had hired a car and we planned to go down the coast for some surf before meeting up with the rest of the guys to hit the town later. We stopped at the factory shops in Torquay on the way and had a quick not very good surf before getting down to Lorne and checking in to our surprisingly nice backpackers. After unloading some stuff we headed down to one off Matt’s favourite surf breakes and it looked quite alright even if it got fairly close to the rocks as it was low tide. We headed out with the other Matt staying on the rocks taking photos, Matt got the first two waves before I found my first one, I had a good ride but just as I pulled off I instinctively grabbed my board to get back out faster, unfortunately I grabbed it with my dodgy left arm and as I went down my arm was pulled up and that was it, off to the hospital with a dislocated shoulder. 3hours, $150 and some crazy drugs later I was back into action and we went to Lorne hotel to meet up with the rest of the guys who had now made it down. We had a nice dinner and continued the night downstairs at the Pub, the doctor had assured me that there was no problems for me to drink a bit after the drugs but that I would probably fall asleep after two beers. I proved him terribly wrong a lasted till 2am when the pub closed and then back to the backpackers to watch Swedens first depressing game of the world cup, 0-0 against Trinidad and Tobago (I have to admit that I fell asleep a while during second half though) and going to bed around 4am. The next day we went for a drive down the coast, Matt went for a surf and I took photos before heading back home. Even though not everything went as planned it was a good weekend and luckily it is a long weekend so I don’t go back to work until Wednesday so my shoulder should be sort of allright by then (I’m off buying a strap for it tomorrow…)

We just got back from a very nice and relaxing weekend in Daylesford “The Spa Capital of Australia” and Hepburn Springs. We stayed in “Eastern View 1″ a cosy little cottage with a large spa that we turned into a bubble frenzy the first night. We got there on Friday and had a cosy night in, making pizza and enjoying the spa while the rain was poring down outside. On Saturday we had booked in for a spa and Massage treatment at Peppers springs retreat, we got the white robes and flippers and cruised into the spa area where we had about an hour, it contained two 37′C bubble pooles with mineral spring water and three different saunas so after our hour we where quite relaxed. We then got called in to our 45min relaxation massage witch also was really good (Bec fell asleep). After a few hours on the couch at home we returned for a luxuary 3 course dinner which contained high class service and GREAT food. Today we just had a big sleep-in before driving back to “The big smoke” (Melbourne) and back to normal life again.
Thanks to everyone who gave us this great gift as our engagement present!

After a few geeky posts here on my blog it’s now back to reality! Bec and I went down to Jan Juc for two nights, staying at our old house as we had a few days off together, it was great being back, relaxing and meeting friends. We went surfing both days, I had more fun the first day because the waves where a bit bigger but Bec liked the second day better because it was sunny and the waves where nicer and cleaner. Bec’s really improving in her surfing so now she’s sometimes the one suggesting a surf, both days we ended up at Torquay Surf beach, not really the favourite for any of us but you can’t controll the waves. I went and said hi to all the soccer guys and also met up with Nick, a good friend I met at the surf school who I haven’t really seen since I got back. Bec spent one night in Geelong with Meg fixing up the wedding invites so they are almost done. The weather is still pretty warm for this time of the year so it was great getting out of the city, even if we live in a very green part of the city and close to the beach it’s still so much nicer down the coast.

We are now back in the city after experiencing almost every weather possible (except for snowstorm) in three days. We got to the campground late on Friday and had to set up the tent in the dark which didn’t go too bad, the next morning we got up to a chilly cloudy day. We spent the first day on the beach which was just next to the campground, Bec did really well with her surfing but the waves where a bit small for me so I just played around, it cleared up to a really nice day with a little bit of a sea breeze and maybe 25′C. Sunday (my birthday, I’m now one year away from the big 3 0) was scorching hot, we spent most of the day in the water even if there was hardly any surf, but around 3.30 we couldn’t take the sun any more and spent the rest of the day looking like lobsters in the shade on our campsite. I didn’t get a cake but celebrated with fish n chips for dinner. After leaving all doors and windows open in the tent to be able to fall asleep we woke up in the middle of the night from tiny water drops from the sky, I just had time to close up the tent before the terrential rain started and kept going until it was time to pack up the next morning. It didn’t rain too badly when we packed up but it was fairly muddy which made it all so much more fun, we have now cleaned and packed up the tent and also cleaned the car and will just have a relaxing night together. Tomorrow I start working like a madman again but I’ll try not to think about that tonight…

Today we have spent the whole day on the beach at Koh Chang. We are staying at Siam Hut just at the beach at “Lonely beach” and it’s really nice here. Bec had a luxury day with a massage on the beach and tomorrow we have booked in a 2h elephant tour in the jungle. Unfortunately we only have two days here before heading back to Bangkok for some more cheap shopping and then Australia.

We are in Bangkok after almost making AU$ 950 in Helsinki by giving up our seat on the plane and get a free night at a hotel and arrive in Thailand 24h later but with only 15 min till the plane left we got tickets and now we are here just as poor as before We’ve checked in a a guesthouse and bought tickets to go to the island Koh Chang in the morning, the afternoon we have spend shopping a few things on khao chang road. I’ve also got my dreads fixed, it was an unusual experience, except for the fact that I was sitting on the side of a busy street with people walking past and looking and smiling at me I had three people working on my dreads at the same time which made it even more painful than usual. To top the whole thing one of the hairdressers where a man with tits acting like a girl occasionally rubbing his groin against my shoulders. The things you do to look good. Now I’m off to bed, the buss leaves at 07.30 tomorrow morning…

Bec and I have now spent 2 days with Mikael och Nettan in Södertälje outside of Stockholm. Both days we have went into the city to see the castle (which unfortunately was closed) and other things. It’s been snowing a fair bit and Bec has called these days “the coldest I’ve ever experienced”. We just got home after watching Extreme at the IMAX dome movie theatre Cosmonova. Tomorrow is our last day here and we’ll have dinner with Caroline (a mutual friend that went to the same uni as me and Nettan) and her boyfriend Albin.

Yesterday Bec and I came home after a 5 day ski holiday in Åre. We took the night train both ways which meant that we had a little bed each so we could sleep most of the way (even if Bec had trouble sleeping on the way up due to some loud people next door). We had lots of fun and stayed in a nice little apartment close to the lifts. The first two days we had great weather with clear skies and not too cold, Bec was struggling a bit on the slopes the first day but got a lot better and the last day went down the red runs no problems without snowplowing. On the third day we went to “after ski” a fun tradition to go straight from the slopes in your ski gear to the pub and party and listen to live bands. We a fun time and afterwords had to ski down the slope to the town in the dark which went quite well, unfortunately I tried to do some silly thing on my board on the walk to our apartment and ended up in hospital with a dislocated shoulder again. The last two days I had to strap my arm close to my body while snowboarding which resulted in a weird look and a slight loss of balance but it went alright. The last day we woke up and it had snowed about 10cm during the night, my friend Anna had come over from Östersund about an hour away to ski with us and brought her friend Erik. The day was pretty windy but we had lots of fun before Bec and I caught the train back to Gothenburg again that night.