Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
Hi everyone, here is the second part of our broken-up update, were currently in sunny port douglass but our updates are a bit out of date so were catching up a couple days at a time. Anyways - here goes!
Thursday 30th November - today we were in Noosaville and even though we were going to be here for a couple of days with the intention of having a last surf before the coast became riddled with stingers, we decided that we should start trying to sell my board incase it took a while to find a buyer. Our first approach was to visit the local hostels and put up advertisements to see if other backpackers would be interested. Then we visited the local surf shops to see if they were interested in a nearly new surfboard for cheap (as was reccomended by the shister who sold the board to us originally). After a while it became aparrent that no shop owners would be interested in parting $400 for a surfboard which they could buy from the factory for $150. The best offer which we got was from a guy who offered $400 but then quickly reduced his offer to $350 when he saw how eager we were - needless to say we didnt really want to sell it to him - fool. You may think that $400 is a lot to ask but when you consider that the board was $600 new and I was giving a $110 cover for free, both of which were unmarked, we thought we werent being unreasonable! We gave up for the day and retired to the hostel for tea. This was when we saw an advertisement in the kitchens which offered 2nd hand boards for sale. I called him up and explained my situation which he was sympathetic to and we arranged to meet up - he would be the old guy with a beard in a bright yellow mini moke - not too easy to miss. We met up and had a little chat then cut to the chase - I (alec) explained that I would take $450 for the board, cover and my wet suit and that was the lowest price for a quick deal, he said "ok" and the deal was done. He did make us promise that we would recommend all our friends look him up if they were after the board, but his card is in the back of the van somewhere so just look for the guy in the moke. It was a big relief to have sold the board, even though we do still occasionally have panic attacks when we look in the back and think we have driven off with the board on the roof again (a regular occurance before the sale!). Just a little more (today took a lot of explaining!), we then went to see the Borat film that night and wet ourselves with laughter, along with the rest of the cinema. Usually films that make you cringe so much shouldnt be so funny but this was hillarious, especially the Pamela Anderson bagging and the naked wrestling (if you havnt seen it, go and you will understand)
On Friday 1st December we decided to go for a swim in the morning at the beach where we saw lots of school kids on swimming lessons (aussie kids have the best P.E. lessons!) and then a family of dolphins playing in the surf. After this we left Noosa and headed to Hervey Bay which was going to be our gateway to Fraser Island. Travelling took up much of the day and we arrived in Hervey Bay with just enough time to pack our bags and enjoy some condensed vegetable soup (blurgh) before heading to bed.
On Saturday 2nd December we got up early for our briefing about the 4x4 trip we were about to take around Fraser Island. The video we were shown included tips on what to do incase of dingo attacks (cross your arms like youre a contestant in X-factor and back away slowly). We were introduced into our group for the next 3 days which included an irish couple, an english couple, two italian blokes and two french girls. We were shown to our vehicles (Modified 11 seater toyota land crusers for all the car fans out there) and Alec was the first person to drive (admittedly only to the supermarket but it was an honour all the same). After buying food and supplies for our group we got the ferry from the mainland onto the island. Fraser island is an all sand land mass with lots of beaches on the edges and jungle and dirt tracks in the middle and the only way to navigate around it is in a 4x4. Our suggested itinerary for the first day was to visit Lake McKenzie and the old Central Logging Station. All of the lakes on Fraser Island are fresh water and around 28 degrees centegrade so swimming in them is like being in a warm bath tub (ignoring all of the fish and australians in there too). This was probably one of the highlights of the trip and the photographs we took really didnt do the area justice. After this we made a brief stop at the central station which was as exciting as its name suggests and then we set up camp in a site on the beach. That night, the french and italian pairs and ourselves went for an amazing walk along the beach under the moonlight and it was only on the way back that we realised how far we had walked (it took us about 2 hours to get back!)
On Sunday 3rd December we took down the tents and after a round of slapped wrists from the warden for camping in a protected spot (oops!) we headed towards our next destination, Eli Creek. This is the largest freshwater creek on the East of the Island and transports more than 80 million litres of water a day into the ocean. We arried at about 10am to find all the aussies playing cricket and enjoying an early drink of 4x lager. While at the creek you are meant to walk to the top of the boardwalk and 'float' back down letting the currents push you. This was a truly amazing experience, though Alec's journey kept getting interrupted by his bum touching the bottom! From Eli Creek we moved on to the Maheno Wreck, this is a ship that started its life in Glasgow and was on its way to be scrapped when it got grounded in a storm on Fraser Island. Check out the pics on the photo album. From Maheno Wreck we were minutes walk away from the 'coloured sands'. This comprised of sand mountains that were a mixture of amazing colours, with a great aboriginal story behind them, based on a young girl falling in love with a rainbow. And our stop was at 'Indian Head' this was a mountain overlooking the ocean. After a 15 minute climb to the top you could find a comfy spot on the top and do some shark and turtle spotting in the clear waters below. We were there for about 2 hours and were lucky enough to watch two turtles, some stingrays and a reef shark. It was a great spot, to just relax and enjoy the amazing view. From Indian head our next and final spot was the 'champagne pools'. However, to get to the pools involved some tough driving and we unfortunetly got stuck more than once....however with lots of pushing we were one of the two 4x4 groups that made it, the other 3 gave up (probably alot more sensible than us). The champagne pools were saltwater pools that filled with bubbles when the surf rose over into them. It was a great thing to see, although when we were there the pools were full of a weird brown algae, so not many people were keen on swimming! From this final spot on the intinerary we headed to our campsite, where everyone (well, certain members of the party..no Debbie's mum not Debbie) were pleased to see a proper toilet and showers - the rest of us were not that bothered roughing it. We then enjoyed some well deserved spag bol cooked by the two Italians...yummy.. and then some drinking games on the beach which unfortunetly had to be cut short due to a rain storm
On Monday 4th December, our final day on the Island. After ringing out all the sleeping bags and clothes that had got wet during the previous nights storm, we packed up and enjoyed a few hours of 4x4'ing round the Island ( a big high point for Alec). We then found a lake that wasnt on the suggested itinerary - with good reason, it wasnt very interesting and i cant even remember the name now! We then quickly moved on to Lake Wabbi, one of the largest lakes on the Island, a lake formed by sand dunes. This was an amazing sight, and was great to see people sand boarding down the dunes and into the lake. To swim in the lake was like being in a big bath, the water was very warm - and saw lots of v.big fishies including lots of catfish! This marked the end of our Fraser Island adventure and after Lake Wabbi a very exhausted group made its way back to the ferry. Back on the main land, Alec and I treated ourselves to some nice food in a nearby Irish bar, including some steak and ale pie and a lamb stew - some good wholesome food my mum would be pleased...though all washed down with lots of pints of guinness...not so wholesome.
On Tuesday 5th December we woke up surprisingly early and headed to the town of 1770. Named so because this was the year when Captain Cooked arrived here. The lonely planet guide describes the town as the next byron bay which is supposedly surprising since there was no mobile phone access there at the turn of the century (there still is no reception so I dont know why this is an interesting point). The highlights of this day were (in no order) lunch, laundry and seeing JIMMY from South Africa. Actually, the lunch was really nice and from a very pretty cafe on the beach, the other two highlights however were not so interesting (anyone who was in South Africa with us will appreaciate this). Our campsite that night was right on the beach and we were down there with some tins for the sunset which was beautiful. We then had tomato soup, another highlight (I dont think the 1770 tourist board will be hiring us too soon)
On Wednesday 6th December, after a tip from JIMMY we headed to the Kroombit cattle station. This was a working ranch where visitors can take part in a muster (like herding cattle), clay pigeon shooting and lasooing. Our first exercise was the muster where our group were all given horses to ride up into the hills to round up some well mustered goats. My (alec) horse was called Dozer and was a big black thoroughbred (well, two out of the three anyways) and Debbies was a chubby short horse called Rusty. Debbie insists that her horse was the Jim Royle of the equine world in that it was fat, slow and said arse alot (we presumed, were not fluent in horse). We mustered some goats and somehow, against our best attempts, we succeeded. I think the fact that the goats are released and re-mustered 4 times a day possibly gave them an incling about what we wanted out of them. Needless to say, we both think that were now sufficiently trained to open and operate our own mustering ranch. Next was the lasooing and after a bit of practice, debbie went first and managed to lasoo her goat in a very respectible 3 seconds (some other guy did it in 1 second but his mate was timing so.......he obviously cheated). When it was my turn, I selected my goat, spun the rope around my head and walked towards my target. It didnt move and by the time I was ready to throw, its nose was practically sniffing my waist so instead of throwing, I placed the loop over it's head and claimed my victory. There were some noises in the audience claiming that the goat was dead but I stand to the fact that it was alive in spirit if not mind. After this came the clay pigeon shooting. This was very exciting as it was debbies first time holding a gun and mine with anything bigger than a .22 air rifle trying to shoot the side of a house. I was up first and managed a respectible 4 out of 5. Debbie's result was more of a moral victory than an actual one. She was the only girl who took part and the (shot)gun was seriously under calibrated which conbined with the prevailing wind caused by the nearby flatulating goats unfortunatley resulted in 5 misses. We then had a lovely roast for tea finished off with some really awkward "observational party games
' which all seemed to involve a guy who looked like Wheres Wally crossing and uncrossing his legs whilst passing around a spatula (your guess is as good as ours). We also had a go on the groin destroying mechanical bull which caused possible permanent genital damage, but I can now reach octaves never before imaginable.
On Thursday 7th December we left the ranch for Airly Beach, the mainland gateway to the Whitsunday Islands. After a long drive, we organised some of our tickets for the next few days, had tea in the hogsbreath pub and then got an early night for the 6:00 start the next morning.
On Friday 8th December we had our first excursion around the whitsundays. . After a 90 minute boat journey where we were introduced to our helpers for the day, we docked on a floating pontoon on the Great Barrier Reef. From here we took part in snorkling around the reef and then an introductury scuba dive from the pontoon. It was the first time that either of us had done any scuba diving but we both took to it like a scuba diving duck to water. We were guided around the reef by our Albino German helper Hans (I dont know if that was his real name, or if he wasnt just very fair haired but thats how I remember him) and we saw some amazing examples of all of the reef marine life which were clear as day on the bottom of the sea. We even went down to 14m to see some which supposedly is very cheeky (we were both lucky not to get the bends im sure!). After this, Debbie went for a 30 minute peaceful massage overlooking the reef whilst I opted for a secondary dive, this time without the guidance of our pale pal. This was great fun and even with the antics of some of the perverted instructors who were down there too (a long story), it realy was an amazing experience. After this, we made our way back to the mainland on the boat. That night we went out into Airly Beach to the central bar and found ourselves spending the rest of the night with and australian couple and their extremely camp (but very fun) gay friends. We danced and minced our way through a couple of bars and ended up dancing in a big circle to such greats as The Proclaimers, Dexys Midnight Runnyers and Wham.
The next day, Saturday 9th December, we had another early start and after 5 hours sleep and a hangover to deal with, we made our way to our transport onto the Whitsunday Islands - the Camira Catamaran. We spent the day on Camira mostly in a half sleep whilst visiting some scenic landscapes and snorkling points. We also visited the beautiful whithaven beach where the white sands are so pure that only NASA are allowed to take any away and this is to build hyper precise lenses. Unfortunately it rained whilst we were there but it was that nice that we decided to return over the next few days. We also met a group of very drunken american girls who were celebrating Australia's less strict alcohol laws by raiding the free bar to the point where they had to close it until the girls got off the boat. Our sensitivity caused by the last nights partying meant that we werent quite as festive, but we did fill our backpacks to the equivalent amount, which we felt only fair (sorry mums and dads!). We then arrived on Long Island, the nearest to the mainland with two beautiful resorts. We were staying in the slightly budget dorm accomodation out of the back of the resort but with full access to all facilities and we would find that the room would be kept to ourselves for the duration. ----- That night we were entertained by what was possibly Australia's worse cover band (so bad their names escape us) who treated us to overly complex piano renditions of Robbie Williams and Ronan Keating tracks which sounded like they had been practiced that morning (several cats were known to have died during the performance). This did have something to do with our early retirement that evening.
On Sunday 10th December we got up and accustomed ourselves with the surroundings. The weather was unfortunately poor so we made up by enjoying the sauna, gym, jakuzzi, tennis courts, mini golf course and bar (one of those "isnt backpacking supposed to be hard??" moments). --- That nights entertainment was casino night who's lack of advertising implied that it would be enjoyed by approximately 3 people, one of which was possibly still there from the night before in a musicley induced coma caused by the band.
On Monday 11th December the weather was much nicer so we spent most of the day sunbathing, with some excursions to the other (more exclusive) resort on the island, via the aptly named "Humpy Point" viewpoint with a breathtaking view of the other islands. --- That night's entertainment was Karaoke night which was probably the best so far. After several drinks, I (alec) decided to put my name down for a rendition of the massive "Africa" by Toto. The entertainment was started by a very friendly group of Russians who slaughtered such hits as REM's "losing my religion", Bryan Adam's "Everything I Do" (no harm done there), Madonna's "Like A Virgin" and the hillarious "Relax" by Frankie goes to Hollywood. After some other comedy numbers performed (though some people were trying a little too hard to be funny) my turn came up much quicker than expected and as I made my walk of shame to the stage, I turned round to see that my lovely girlfriend was right behind me and she had built up the courage to die on stage alongside me. So we did a beautiful duet with some harmonies which may have been the cause of the feline mortalities return from the grave like a musical exorcism. That night and everyone really did feel the rain down in Africa. Once we had popped our social cherries there was no stopping us and we returned on stage alongside the russians for S Club 7's "Reach" (they later confessed that they liked the song but none of them had ever heard it before in their lives!) and MJ's "Billy Jean".
The next day (Tuesday 12th December) we did a two island boat trip to Hamilton Island and back to Whithaven Beach. Hamilton is a very exclusive island with lots of expensive apartments and golf buggies as the main form of transport (it was a little like being on a massive movie set). We did some sunbathing and sneaked into a pool by a fancy hotel for a cooling off. We then went to whitehaven beach and this time the weather did not let us down. The beach on a sunny day was awe inspiring and we stayed there for a good 3 hours taking photos, sunbathing and playing a bit of beach cricket (I blamed the english ashes team for being the inspiration of my poor performance). The entertainment that night was some Hypergames (!?) and more karaoke.
On Wednesday 13th December whilst waiting for the breakfast bar to open (it's fluctuating opening times possibly due to the fact that management preferred people to use the $30 per meal restaurant which was open longer) we went on a walking tour of the island which though was mostly under jungle canopy, was lots of fun all the same. We found the resort's tree hammocks and you can guess what the rest of the day consisted of. After we had topped up our tans and squeesed our moneys worth out of the jakuzzi and gym, we spent the evening raiding our loot from the Camira and taking part in a quiz night where if it wasn't for our irish friend John's general knowledge we would have been a poor representation of british intellegence (though I did get a question right about Britney Spears so it wasnt all him!)
On Thursday 14th December we said goodbye to long island and found our van in one piece where we left it at Airlie Beach. We had a quick breakfast and then drove to Townsville where we considered going to Magnetic Island. After looking into the activities available on the island and the price of getting / sleping there we decided that there was no way it could beat our experience in the Whitsundays so we decided to skip it and move on up the coast to Mission Beach.
On Friday 15th December we woke up to a beautifully sunny day in the quaint Mission Beach and so we had a little look about to see the area. We then decided that though it was a lovely day, it wasnt the most exciting place it was a good opportunity to get on with some necessary work so Debbie filled out some job application forms and I worked on my CV (yawnsville I know but they both needed to be done before xmas). We then made tea on the beach and had a little picnic followed by Debbies favourite gazing at the stars whilst I tell her facts about their origins and the history of the world, all of which she has to pretend not to have heard before even though she has (but we both enjoy it so much that neither ever complains). After this we found ourselves in a small bar / club which looked a little too much like the DJ's front room where we were served with Margharita slush puppies and enjoyed the very cool music.
On Saturday 16th December we left mission beach and started on the last stretch of our journey up the eastern coast. We passed through Cairns (our final stop) and had lunch in the beautiful Port Douglas and then carried on up to Cape Tribulation. Cape Trib is a beautiful area where rainforest meets sandy beaches and warm (if a bit jelly fish infested) seas. You have to get a ferry over a river to reach the area and after a point the roads turn to dirt track (where we stopped) for the remainder of the route up to Cape of Good Hope at the northern peak of the east coast. We stayed in a campsite / hostel called PK's and made yummy spag bol for tea. Whilst cooking we met two girls who had been travelling up the middle of Australia's outback and were now on their way down the east coast. They joined us in putting a dent in the large amount of alocohol we had accumulated on our travels which needed drinking before the van is returned to Cairns on the 23rd. Somehow, we would find the next morning that we had drunken it all! (oops!)
On Sunday 17th December, we both woke very hot in our tin oven of a camper van (we are now some 4000kms nearer to the Equator than we were in Melbourne!). Debbie felt a tad bit sensitive this morning due to last night's excessive consumption and so her view of the day was mostly the inside roof of the van. I went on a walk around the cape and along some of the beaches before returning to the van to start our drive back towards Cairns. We returned to Port Douglas and put ourselves up in the back garden of a backpacker's hostel. Debbie made a lovely lentil dahl for tea and we retired to bed at the respectible hour of 7pm!
Today (Monday 18th December) we started the day bright and early and went on a bike ride around port douglas and saw some of the parks and beaches in the area before lunch. After lunch we found this internet cafe and started writing this update! (We really should do this more frequently!!) its now 6:40 and were both very hungry!! Lets hope weve learnt our lesson this time (we probably havn't - speak to you all in a month!)
We hope that you are all brilliantly well and have amazing christmasses! We plan to be on bondi beach in Sydney along with all of the other orphans enjoying some sun, beer and kangaroo burgers! Take care, all our love,
Alec and Debbie.
- comments