Occult Armidale?
My whole three road-trips this year were based around certain Cronulla Sharks games, and meeting up with my youngest son who was living in Canberra and going to Sharks games with him, as we are big Sharks fans.
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| Watching the Sharks play the Cowboys in June 2016 from my seat |
I had met my son in Sydney and seen the Sharks play the Cowboys at the Sharks home ground and then I went down to Tasmania for a week, then came back through Melbourne and back up the east coast of Australia and then took the inland highway before staying in Armidale for two days.
But here is the weird thing, the Sharks would be playing the Parramatta Eels that coming weekend in Sydney and while I thought it was amusing and at the same time a bit worrying to a Sharks supporter like me to come across a closed (as in out of business) fish & chip shop named 'Sharkys' while walking the streets of Armidale, it was even more amusing to look right across the road to a sports store flying a Parramatta Eels flag out front.
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| 67?! |
I had to cross the road and find out more, only to find another coincidence.
The car parked near the Eels flag had a 67 in the middle of the numberplate and 1967 is the year the Sharks entered the NRL competition.
67 is kind of a significant number at the Sharks, as a lot of merchandise is stamped with that number.
I went in and had a chat to the guy behind the counter, and yes he was a big Parramatta supporter and I told him I was a Sharks supporter and told him how funny it was that our teams were playing each other that weekend and you have the flag on this side of the street and Sharkys fish & chip shop on the other side of the street.
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| Best Seats in the house, or what?-) |
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| My seat at the Melbourne Storm/ West Tigers match in June 2016 |
I showed him my photos of the Sharks/Cowboys game and the Storm/Tigers game I saw in Melbourne, telling him how
Cooper Cronk just missed me when he attempted a field goal in that game.
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| The roadside memorial in Guyra with the Parramatta Eels flag on top |
Also on a sadder note, when I was driving through the town of Guyra on my way out of Armidale and heading for Goondiwindi, I came across a roadside memorial where someone who was obviously a Parramatta fan from the flag flying off the top of the memorial must have died on that spot.
I watched the game on my Goondiwindi motel room TV that Saturday night and the Sharks looked for all money that Parramatta had them beat, but we came back from an 18 point gap to win the game.
The ironic thing was that on my last road-trip on the way back from seeing the Sharks win their first ever NRL grand final at Sydney's Olympic Stadium, I stopped in Armidale again and the same sport shop was full of Shark's gear in the window.
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| Me (white shoulders) and my son at the 2016 NRL Grand Final |
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| From my seat at the stadium this looked like heaven to me:-) |
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| 'Sharkys' was still closed on my last trip to Armidale:-( |
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| The East Port Motel in Port Macquarie |
I said that's weird, because when I went on my first road-trip and stayed at the East Port Motel in Port Macquarie the guy who ran that motel came from the same suburb I did and not only that his roommate was a guy I worked with at IKEA.
Then the guy at the 'City Centre' motel who I was talking to said,"that was me".
424s Again
I looked at him blankly bewildered and asked him what he was doing here then.
He said because we sold that and bought this one.
I said how long have you been here then and he told me that he took over last week.
Sometimes I think my road-trips all took place in the Twilight Zone.
On a sad note I just saw this story on the news about former Parramatta player Chad Robinson -
Chad Robinson's body found in search for missing former NRL player
I said how long have you been here then and he told me that he took over last week.
Sometimes I think my road-trips all took place in the Twilight Zone.
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