Disclosure - I've worked in Newcastle, once or twice in the Hunter, also Sydney and Darwin.
If you're happy to do anything and just need a bit of money you can find work. Are there many jobs? Well, not really but I haven't found that it's that much worse than Sydney.
Downside - a lot of the work you will find will be cashy type dodgy setups $13-15 per hour. Other downside - working with meth addicts. Most people will be native speakers of english though, which helps.
Flooding - most of it.
Activities - there is stuff around but like most of the country there are particular interests that keep people occupied. I.e. martial arts, dirt-biking, etc.