Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
Hi Everyone, apologies for the lack of action on this Blog for the past 6 weeks! Yikes, but I've been on the road and that's the only excuse I have.
Loads of things have happened but I think due to my poor typing skills (where's Ruth when I need her?) I will have to precis as much as possible. So here goes...
Having left N.Z. I went to Melbourne and stayed with a friend who lives in the 'Burbs'. I stayed there for about 10 days and had the time to catch up from the Kiwi side and organise my photos etc. it also gave me the chance to plan out what I needed to do whilst in Australia and book flights, accommodation, vehicles etc. This I did with the aid of a great guy in STA travel Melbourne and I have to say that 6 weeks down the line he has been spot on regarding everything.
I managed to go round the National Gallery and see a couple of other main bits whilst in the City and was taken to an Aussie Rules football game at the MCG, a great evenings entertainment. I also got into the Rugby finals (its League here, not Union) which were going on at the start of my trip, this of course necessitated watching the games in a couple of bars and mixing with the locals, purely from a cultural side you understand, it didnt involve any drinking or naughtiness at all!!
Fortunately the Finals were played when I arrived in Sydney and found myself staying in Kings Cross, yes the same 'type' of thing as in London. The bars were good and filled to bursting for the semi-finals. One littel note. I had to laugh because some of the local 'girls' came into the bar to watch the game, sat down with us and were dressed to kill, you can imagine I'm sure, chatted merrily with us all and after the match had finished just went outside and worked the streets doing what they do. it was quite amusing really and showed a completely different side to what you might perceive. the area was quite good and actually a good place to be with most things in the City being within easy walking distance. I managed to do all the usual things and had a good time. I had booked a campervan through Travellers Auto-barn who had an outlet just down the road from where I was staying, having gone in there I was chatting with one of the guys who very kindly gave me all sorts of info and maps. I was writing furiously trying to get down as much info as possible. I eventually took his map and put it to good use visiting most of the places he had recommended and was not disappointed at all.
Most of you will know that Roz came out and we met at Sydney airport before flying up to Cairnes. We picked the camper up from Cairnes and drove immediately out towards Cape Tribulation. We camped the first night on Ellis Beach and I will eventually organize the photo albums so that you can follow the picture trail through on the journey all the way back to Sydney, some 2600K's. The company had supplied us with plenty of liturature regarding places to stay and just about all the sites in Queensland were brilliant with great facilities, clean and very well maintained, absolutely recommended.
We took the time to travel further North to Port Douglas, Daintree, and the Mosamon Gorge all of which were lovely albeit I thought Port Douglas a bit boring and just a sea side town. We did stop for coffee and a walk along the extensive beach whilst being exfoliated by the amount of sand being blown on shore by the howling wind! the coffee shop had dinner plate fixed to the ceiling signed by famous people. The only one i recognised was Ray Winstone who had put 'Up the Hammers' on his. Typical come all this way.......!
We travelled down the coast again past Cairnes towards Townsville and stopping to go to Magnetic Island, this is really worth doing and was beautiful. We had a great day there and had supper on the Island before taking the ferry in the evening back to the mainland. Again we met some interesting people and having been told that every restaraunt would be booked (there's only 2000 residents) we found a coffee shop which served up the best Malaysian food i have tasted yet. it was run by an Irish beach bum with beads in his beard and a pony tail but he was obviously a great cook and we had a lovely evening and a great meal.
We moved onto Airlie beach which is the gateway to The Whitsunday Islands, this is the Great Barrier Reef territory which of course you just have to see. We stopped in Airlie for several days and booked onto a trip out to the main islands. we had a great day and went to Whitsunday Island itself and Whitehaven Beach. The sand is made of crushed quartz and is so soft it is quite unreal. I have noted in my journal that the only way I can convey to you how smooth and soft it was is to liken it to putting your hand into a bag of flour. it just flows through your fingers and squeaks when you walk on it, not quite like flour, that bit! My travel companion found that it was so soft that even when wet you could not build a sand castle which was just as well as every other beach visited has been adorned with sand falices! there's something going on here and I'm unsure what! We went snorkling and saw the reef up close and personal, so many different varieties of fish and coral, really lovely and a totally different world. The sea was as you would expect, clear, blue, and reasonably warm, we just had a perfect time. We visited several Islands during the trip it was really amazing. Airlie Beach also saw me trying to play the Didgerridoo and meeting up with Paul who had been with me in NZ, purely by chance, really good to see him. The Didge shop was very interesting to me and I had a really good time, so much so that there is now an instrument waiting for me back in the UK. Oh dont worry, the neighbours will love it. I just have to get the circular breathing thing right so I can make that continuous sound for hours on end!!
The trip continued South down to Gladstone, not because there was much to see but because to complete the journey in 3 weeks we had to make some days longer than otheres to give enough time to see what we wanted. Now this was a considerable drive and we arrived late only to be parked next to an Ice Cream van! We were chatting to the occupants, a Kiwi guy who had married a Phillipino girl and was planning a venture out there. It was really amusing to get both sides of the story, he looked a lot older than his 45 years (I kept quiet, for a change!) and she was quite a lot younger but clearly wanted to stay in N.Z. so everytime he went away we got a bit more of the story from her. She was saying that he didnt understand the difference in culture and how it all worked etc etc but I'm sure something will work out for them. She was very nice and spoke expectional english with no trace of any real accent and was obviously very switched on. He was a bit dull but he did have an Ice Cream van! Two 99's please!!
The site was immaculate and in the morning we viewed the nearby beach to take in the vista. Well I can only describe it as a cross between Canvey Island and Corryton. quite amusing actually because I've been on a few sites on Canvey, but nothing like we had, it was exceptional. Quick, move on, and we did....
Hervey Bay is another must see. It is not the prettiest of places but it does have the advantage of being on a beautiful stretch of coastline, has a fabulous beach and provideds a spring board for trips out to Fraser Island and whale watching in the bay. Due to hitting this place during the school holidays a lot of activities were fully booked but as has been the experience so far, the travel desks at the sites have been exceptionally helpful and always given the best advice on trips to take. Again we booked a sea trip and were blessed with about 3 hours of watching different pods of Hump back whales, fluking and splashing around, breaching and flapping their massive arms in and out of the water. it was an early start in the morning but very worth while and we felt that we had deffinately benefitted from more good advice. I took many photos but have had to really edit them down so hopefully they will do the great beasts justice.
Over the following days we continued down the coast watched more whales swimming just off the coast and generally made our way to Brisbane where we stayed with a Phil and Stef a friend of Roz's. We spend the evening in Brisbane before moving onto the Gold Coast. We walked from Main Beach to Surfers Paradise and back again which is actually a fair hike but was recommended to us as Surfers Paradise is a bit like Blackpool but with Sun and higher temperatures. We arrived, we saw and left, not my cup of tea but great for the younger generation I'm sure. We continued onto Hat head, a site on a headland, funnily enough! Again it was really busy with school holidays but we did a walk to the headland and spent some great time watching the Hump backs just off the coast as the sun went down, it was just amazing, Luckily a group of friends bought me some brill binoculars before I left (thanks guys) which made it easy to observe these magnificent creatures and we watched them for ages.
The next major step was to reach the Hunter Valley before we had to return to Sydney. We did so over the next couple of days and finally arrived at a good but basic site in the south of the wine region. We busied ourselves with planning which vineyards to visit but in the end only managed 3 as the tasting sessions were a bit heavy! it was very interesting but the best time to visit is January when the vines are full and there is a lot more activity. It is a lovely area, very peaceful and picturesque. The wines are excellent, well most of them, you do have to try a few of course and we cooked on the site BBQ with fresh fish, good quality chicken and a few good bottles of quaffable plonk, Marvellous. A couple of days is all we had and actually it was enough because one tour is much the same as the other, most people only do the tours in order that they can then taste about a dozen or so wines for between 3 and 5 dollars, good value by anyones calculation. The Hunter Valley gardens are a good stop over and there are some interesting places to look at around the area and discover the history and traditions behind the industry.
It was sadly onto Sydney from here and apart from a little hickup with the handover of the vehicle everything had gone well. I am sorry that I have not had time to recount all the stories in this Blog entry but I have writen them down so at some point in the future I will pass them onto you and bore you silly over dinner one evening or another. Of course a lot has happened and I needed to resettle myelf in readiness for the next stage which I am currently on. We said our goodbyes at Sydney airport with R returning back to the UK and me flying up to Darwin but not before I had my haircut by a chinese gentleman who absolutely crucified me, Chopped the fringe off and has made me look more like a monk! Aweful, but never mind it will grow again. Okay that's your lot for now, I hope I have not bored you. I will catch you up with my Outback adventures in the next few days hopefully, in the meantime, I'm going to an art gallery this afternoon, a concert tonight, and then to the pub with my travel buddies who are another great crew. I'm really having a great time out here, the East coast was good, I enjoyed it, but you can keep your Cities, I love the adventure of the Outback, the heat (its 36 - 38 everyday) the culture, the geology, the wildlife and most of all the art and history, its a real education and something I never expected to experience here. There is an enormous amount to learnt about and I am trying my best.
Until next time, keep well and take care,
Chris
- comments