Okay so I don't always get it right, 4th Jan - tonnes of mistakes!! Ignore the following (in grey) and read Emma's account for the accurate story...

We headed out for a drive today, mainly down to some beaches. Australians love their beaches. On a weekend, or straight after work there will be a mass exedous out of Sydney in the direction of the water. There are a lot of beaches to choose from as well, each with it's own special characteristics. From the infamous Bondi - this is where all the 'Lily arsed Poms' ( a direct quote from a local radio station) hang out, to the famous Palm Beach, the last beach in sydney. Manly beach is a half-hour ferry trip from circular quay and is at the start of a stretch of eleven beaches that ends at Palm Beach.

We headed out North, past these to a completely different set of beaches alltogether ( I can't unfortunately remember any of their names - so you'll have to wait until I've found a map! we drove out through Terrigal to Avoca before relaxing from all that hectic sunbathing at Killcare beach). Needless to say, it being Australia, the scenery was stunning, the sun incredibly hot, the sea impossibly blue, the waves and surf perfectly formed, the people lazing around on the beach honed and tanned. The only thing that marred the picture was the ever present smog from the bush fires still raging around the state.

Drive mainly up to some beaches. Palm Beach is the last beach up north before you hit Pittwater which eventually turns into the Hawkesbury River. We headed up to the northern beaches, but to get there, we had to head a bit north-west and inland. Over the Harbour Bridge, then up the freeway via Chatswood (where there is a huge ugly shopping centre and another office working centre), then past some unusually named suburbs along the Pacific Highway- Pymble, Turramurra, Wahroonga where we turned right onto the freeway which took us to Gosford. This is the freeway which eventually heads up to Newcastle, and you can go all the way to Queensland (if you really want!).

We turned off the freeway to go to Gosford, drove through Gosford (which is the main town in this area), headed toward Terrigal, stopped off for a piccie, then drove to Avoca for lunch at a caff (cafe), then got lost between Avoca and MacMasters Beach, got back on track and drove along the road past Buddi National Park (couldn't get into the Park to do the walk to Maitland Bay as the park was closed from the fire bans), found a lookout point on the road just before we got to Killcare - then went down to the beach at Killcare for a swim.
Then we headed back the same way (although we took the short route back through Kincumber where there's basically nothing but shops and a big RSL club).

A view down onto Avoca beach

You can normally see back to Sydney from this look- out point at Killcare, but today you can only just make out the sea.

To tomorrow