The journey is over

We spent 5 nights in our BigW tent in the Blue Mountains. Our tent was set up on a free campground in Megalongvalley, only 5km away from Blackheath and many of the cliffs. After the increasing heat in Sydney it was great to be back at an elevation of 1000+ meters, providing fresher air.

Our van is the smallest ...

We did not stress ourselfes to much, but enjoyed the last days few of our journey a lot. In the mornings we would start late, after having a good breakfast and a few Cappuccinos and hanging out in the sun for a bit.

Manu and Finja having fun

Middays we went climbing. I did a bunsh of easier routes up to 26 and Katinka almost sent "White Linen", 27 at Centennial Glen. Manu managed to climb his hardest route yet: "Jack High", 19 and I climbed up the neighbour route to take some photos of him.

Manu in "Jack High", 19 - Upper Shippley, Blue Mountains

The evenings we usually sat around the big campfire, drinking wine and cooking dinner while getting rid of all our leftovers. On Monday evening we had to celebrate Manu's 26th birthday. Up to 16 persons were sitting around the fire and enjoying his 12 bottles of wine.

Campfire

On wednesday, two days before our flight back home we returned to Sydney. We returned our tent to a BigW store for a full refund exchanged our van sale cash from AUD $ into EUR € and started packing our luggagae at James Place in Sandringham where we would spend the last two nights.

We did one last bouldering session at the Wing Cave where I had tried "Groove Terminator", V11 four months ago. It took me quiet some body tension and shoulder power to do, but I finished the session topping it out. Great present for the last climbing day in australia!

Sending "Groove Terminator", V11 - Wing Cave, Sydney

 On friday we returned our rental car at the airport and checked in without any problems. This time we only had 65kg of checked luggagae and only a few carry-on bags (Camera + Notebook + Backpack). The flight was long ... 30h ... but more or less ok and in Frankfurt we were picked up by Katinkas Grandpa.

Last day in Sydney

It was a nice evening with good wine, delicous dinner and family.

Now we will start the next mission:
I have to choose which Master Programm I will attend from mid october. I got accepted for a Computer Science Master in Stuttgart, Freiburg and Innsbruck. Time for a decision ... Every location has it's advantages and disadvantages, but we already canceled the idea of Innsbruck for now.

Stuttgart would be comfortable, as Katinka could go back into her old job, we know many people who could look after Finja when we need some time for ourselfes or when we train in the gym and we have a couple of places where we can stay until we have found a proper apartment.

Freiburg seems to be a really nice city to life in as well, but would meen a loss in comfort and maybe a lot of boredom for Katinka while not having a proper job opportunity yet.

Anyway, there's a lot to organize within the next three weeks and we still need to meet up with Finjas godfather Moritz for a one week trip to Fontainebleau, France (Maybe next week??)

read back soon on
www.chalkonrock.com