Australia – East Coast

After Sydney our first stop was Coffs Harbour, about 6 hours drive up the east coast. We stopped at the local tourist information office to find a good camp site for the night and they pointed us in the right direction as well as giving us some tips of places to see. We checked into the camp site and saw a number of other Wicked vans parked up for the night. As it was early evening we headed straight into town to find some food and grab a beer or two. Coffs is a small place which seemed to be loaded with tourists as it was still the Australian schools summer holiday at the time and the bars and restaurants were making the most of the trade they had. After a few beers and some food we headed back to the van keen to see how comfortable it would be to sleep in. All in all the van was comfortable although Al had initial troubles of keeping his feet from poking out the end of the sleeping area and into “the kitchen”. After a good nights sleep we headed to the Big Banana.  Most places in Australia want to be known as the capital of something and Coffs was the capital of banana growing in Australia and rounded this off by erecting a giant 40ft (13m) steel banana that you could walk through which detailed the growing cycle of a banana tree. The Big Banana also had a tour round the banana plantations which was interesting and threw in a free tasting session which was great for Claire but as Al doesn’t like them she got an extra portion. Next up was a treat especially for Claire !! In Coffs they have an old Dutch Clog Barn where they make “traditional” Dutch shoes even though they are made by an Aussie with a machine. Not sure how traditional that is but Claire resisted buying a pair preferring to keep her money safe for the shop next door, a Dutch café house. They sold many Dutch sweets and one in particular Claire could not resist. “Drop” is a liquorice sweet made only in Holland and these had been imported into Australia and Claire would make the most of finding them !!

We headed back to the camp site and checked out trying to see if we could live more like travellers and parking the van on a side street for the night. Later on we visited a Shearwater bird Colony on Mutton Bird Island which is just at the end of the harbour and up a steep hill. As we got to the top of the hill we couldn’t see any birds but did see their nests hollowed out into the ground. We think the reason they were hiding was it started to rain really hard and both of us had to hide behind an information sign to save getting soaked through. With a break in the clouds we headed back into town to get some food and again it was really busy but we waited for the crowds to die down before feeding ourselves. We headed back to the van and settled in for the night, this time picking up on all the sounds around us as people headed back from restaurants and bars. What we hadn’t realized was that we had parked close to a railway line that had trains coming through all through the night but thankfully not that frequently. As both of us had had a drink earlier in the night we couldn’t move the van from where we were and were stuck there. That night we also found out the amount of noise made whenever it rained. The heavens had opened and we had a huge drumming sound going non stop to make sure it wasn’t a peaceful sleep. Eventually we did get some sleep but when we woke up (at 6am) we decided to head away from Coffs to our next destination, Byron Bay.

Byron Bay is the capital of surfing in the area and when we arrived we could see it was just door to door of surf shops. Byron is also famous as the first place Captain Cook landed when he arrived in Australia although he did eventually stop in Sydney as it had the better natural harbour. As it was the summer school holidays we had real trouble finding a camp site with any vacancies and the ones that did were charging a fortune but as we were beginning to smell a bit we thought we’d bite the bullet and check in to one. Once settled we walked around Byron which had some nice shops and a great beach. The only thing about it was that if you didn’t surf it didn’t have anything else to do. Within a few hours we’d seen all it had to offer and decided to go and catch up with our emails. Needing a shower we headed back to our camp site to freshen up before heading out for the evening. Byron has some great restaurants and being away from the UK has made us appreciate the curry we have at home so we found a good curry restaurant to satisfy ourselves. That night England were playing Australia in a one day international and one of the local bars was showing it on the big screen. Quite a few English were in town which made for some great shows of national pride with lots of friendly banter and singing going on. Mid way through the game the whole of Byron was hit by a power cut and the whole place descended into blackness. Keen to get the cricket back on the locals were running around frantically to get generators running to power the TV’s and more importantly, the beer pumps. No power equaled no money. 30 minutes passed before the power was restored and in true English fashion we’d managed to lose most of our wickets to present an easy win for the Aussies and more ammunition to the locals to through at the English !! England capitulated, Al drank his sorrows away and we headed off back to the van for some much needed sleep. Byron was nice but we’d seen it all and decided to head to Surfer’s Paradise the next day.

Surfer’s Paradise was supposed to be a huge high rise complex of holiday apartments for people with suntans that George Hamilton would kill for. It was also described as the Las Vegas of Queensland with more casinos and amusement parks than anywhere else in Australia. When we drove up the coast to Surfers you could definitely see the high rise buildings but once we had parked up and had a look around it was nothing like the place painted in the guide books. After having a look around we decided to find a surf school to have some lessons at and see of we could finally stand up on a board for more than two seconds. We headed about a mile out of town to a small place called Broadbeach where one school was. We found the guy in charge and got the lessons set up but more than this, he also said that we could park up outside of the surf club overnight which also had public showers and changing rooms we could use after the surfing. Everywhere we went the locals were really friendly and would stop and chat to us in the morning as we would crawl out from our van. The first night we headed into Surfers to find some food and drink, discovering the ubiquitous Irish bar and bottles of Magner’s Irish Cider which are a favourite of both of us. Surfer’s was busy but was nowhere near of over the top as the guidebooks had suggested. The next morning we headed for the beach and our first surf lesson with a guy called Hodgy. When we got there he was nowhere to be seen and when we did see someone else he said that he’d be here at 9am. We said that it was 9am already but we soon were told that it was 8am and that we had not adjusted our clocks for daylight savings time which is used in New South Wales but not in Queensland. Feeling a little foolish we headed back to our van to kill an hour before Hodgy showed up. Once we did get started and he’d stopped laughing about the daylight savings time mishap he showed us how easy it was for us to surf. All we had to do was put it into practice. To make matters worse we had to practice with some young kids who we just knew would take to surfing without any problems and make us look like a couple of geriatrics. Surprisingly enough both of us did manage to stand up on the surf boards, even if it was for only a second. After the surfing we showered off before heading into Surfers to catch up on emails and other stuff. Later on during the day we went shopping as we were self sufficient with the van and then decided to go and play some golf. Not proper 18 hole golf on a proper course but 18 hole mini golf on a mini adventure course. Over the years we’ve played a few of these with contests being very close between the pair of us. This one was no different with Al holding his nerve to close out on the 18^th “green”. That night we again went into Surfers for some drinks and ending up watching a great street performance of somebody doing an Elvis show. He was really good which wasn’t that surprising when a local taxi driver told us that the council pays these guys to perform during the summer holidays to keep the tourists entertained.

In the morning we headed to the beach for our second surf lesson and managed to surpass our expectations by standing up quite a few times and riding the wave into the beach. As we were packing the surf gear up for the morning we walked into the sea to wash the boards down when Claire screamed out in pain. She ran back up onto the sand and said she’d been stung by a jellyfish down the back of her calf all the way down to her ankle. Within a minute we could see the red sting running the length of her lower leg and wrapping around her ankle. We still had to take the surf boards back, which we did at double quick pace before Al ran off to get hold of one of the life guards on duty. In the meantime Hodgy got Claire to wash the sting under some cold water before Al got back with the life guard. These guys have a vinegar spray to neutralize the sting although Claire was still in some pain for a few hours afterwards. Again, the locals made sure we were ok before we headed off to get showered (it would be over 2 weeks before the sting actually disappeared from Claire’s leg). In the evening we walked down the beach front walk where they have a regular market selling various crafts that are produced locally. This was our last night here before we set off for a pit stop at Brisbane followed by a short drive to Noosa. Despite what the guide books say, we think that Surfers and the surrounding area is nowhere how they describe it and the friendliest place we’ve stayed so far on our trip.

We drove further north from Surfers and into Brisbane where we were required to get the van checked out at the Wicked depot. We managed to find the depot after a short time and it was almost next door to the Gabba cricket ground although we didn’t have enough time to visit it. Once the van was checked we headed on to Noosa which the guide books say is the jewel in the crown of Australian beach locations. We drove north from Brisbane into Noosa which was a pretty little town with only a few streets making up the centre. We drove around for a while trying to find a campsite as all of the ones we tried were full. After a while we gave up looking for a camp site and decided to park up for the night in a car park which although it did not have any no camping signs was not to be used for camping. Al had seen some other vans in the car park and after chatting to other travelers found out that a ranger patrols the camp site in the mornings warning people not to stay there before handing out fines if he catches them again. We decided we’d stay and head out in the morning if it came to it. We decided to go walk down to the beach for a quick look around. The beach was lovely but at this time most people had gone home. We headed into the centre of Noosa and found everything really expensive and not built for a travelers budget but eventually we settled into a bar for a few beers whilst watching another England vs Australia one day cricket game. It seemed to us that Noosa was not the place where travelers were welcome unless they had lots of cash to go with it so we decided to carry on up the coast the next morning to Rainbow Beach and Hervey Bay.

Rainbow Beach and Hervey Bay are the main starting points for trips out to Fraser Island but are also very nice places in their own right. Our journey would take us for a short visit to Rainbow Beach, then onto Hervey Bay for a day before a 2 day trip to Fraser Island and finally returning to Hervey Bay for another night.

Rainbow Beach is named so as it has cliffs that have multi-coloured layers of different rock types which look spectacular when the sun is shining on them. Luckily for us, the weather was behaving and we managed to see the cliffs at their best. The walk along the beach itself was great as we saw lots of people heading down for a swim although it was early morning. One person we did bump into was an oldish guy who had a dog that jumped on us when we got close. Claire was in her element playing around with the dog. Al found out that the dog, Roxy, was in fact a rescue dog that he had got from a rescue centre when Roxy had been left abandoned at a farm by her owners. Further along the beach we saw lots of people in parked up in their 4WD’s fishing from the beach front which also meant us keeping an eye out for any trucks coming up on us from behind on the beach while we walked along it. We later took the van to Murrawar Lookout which after a short walk from the car park brings you onto a huge sand dune above the cliffs that have spectacular views across Rainbow Beach. Whilst there we met 2 guys carrying hang glider pieces up to the top of the dune ready to assemble and push themselves off for a descent down to the beach. We didn’t hang around the watch them complete their hang glider meccano set but instead headed on towards Hervey Bay.

Al had booked some accommodation whilst in Noosa and the man that owned it had also got us a discount on a trip to Fraser Island that would mean we could store our van at his camp site for no charge. Once we got to the camp site the manager was really friendly and made sure we had everything we needed as well as giving us the information for our trip to Fraser. We parked up in our spot and freshened up before taking a walk along the beach which was only a 30 second walk from where the van was parked. We came back and headed out to do a bit of shopping for our dinner as well as picking up some essentials for the trip to Fraser. Although we had had the van for about a week tonight would be the first time we fired up the gas hob and really cooked a real meal on it. Although Al had to swap various pans and pots around he managed to knock up a pretty good pasta Bolognese dish with only a few swear words when turning the gas off instead of turning it down. We headed to bed early as we were being picked up at 7am the next day for our trip to Fraser.

The next day we rose early and grabbed a shower not knowing what the accommodation would be like on Fraser. We were met by our guide Robin who we didn’t know how to take at first as he was a bit rough around the edges although friendly enough but by the end of the trip Robin had shown he knew his stuff when it came to Fraser. Also on the trip we met some English couples, an Aussie and his Romanian wife plus a couple of German girls. Fraser is an island about a mile off the coast that is made entirely of sand which can only be traversed by 4WD vehicles as front and rear drive only vehicles get trapped in the sand within no time at all. As we found out later on, you have to know how to drive a 4WD vehicle to make it safely around the island.

We caught the ferry across to Fraser, which took about 30 minutes, and headed straight across the island to reach Lake Wabby which has crystal clear waters going to a depth of about 30 feet (10m). Lake Wabby is surrounded by forest on 3 sides and a huge sand dune on the other. It’s actually easier to walk 20 minutes through the forest to reach it than walk over the sand dune as you continually fall back on the dune and risk burning your feet as the sand is so hot (yes, Al did see how hot it was and needed to cool off his feet in the water afterwards). We left Lake Wabby and headed further up the beach called Seventy Five Mile Beach (can you guess why ?) to a shipwreck that is partly submerged in the beach. The ship is The Maheno that ran aground in the 1920’s and is slowly being eaten up by the beach as more sand is washed up onto the island. After a quick look around and some photos we set off again this time heading further up the beach to a place called Indian Head. It was named after Captain Cook passed it and saw native “Indians” or Aboriginals on top of the rocks. The rocks rise up to a spectacular point from where you can see a lot of the north side of the island. Whilst we were there we managed to see a few sharks patrolling the waters below hunting a school of fish as well as a huge manta ray. Darkness was beginning to set in and we’d yet to see the animal that Fraser was famous for, the Dingo. Dingoes are wild dogs that have been known to attack humans from time to time, probably due to people keep feeding them. As we set off to our overnight accommodation, we stopped and Robin pointed out a pack of Dingoes on the beach. As expected they didn’t run away from us but just stared at us before carrying on their way up the beach. As we started again we were flagged down by a man and his wife who were stuck in the sand on the beach and we were amazed he hadn’t seen the Dingoes on the beach. He’d realized that he was lucky that the Dingoes hadn’t come to investigate him as they may have attacked him in a pack. To make matters worse for him, Robin gave him a massive rebuke about getting stuck on the beach and not driving properly.

We reached our accommodation and got settled in before gave Robin a hand preparing dinner for the group. The tour company had also provided a crate of beer and some wine for the trip which went down very well with the steak dinner. The group stayed up for a while talking about the size of the insects in Australia with spiders being a nice topic as the room where we had dinner had a life size poster section of all the spiders that inhabit Australia. It wasn’t that late when everyone headed off to bed to catch up on some sleep after the early start.

The next day we headed for the showers which were pretty basic but you had to check for spiders and other insects first. Our first stop was back to the beach and a small stream that ran down to it. We were able to walk up the stream and swim back down to the beach. The water came from the middle of the island and was crystal clear but unlike the lake this water was absolutely freezing cold. Claire took the opportunity to keep her jellyfish sting in the cold water and calm it down (by this time the jellyfish sting on Claire’s leg had turned purple – Robin said that he had never seen anything like it) whilst Al headed upstream before swimming back down. It was incredibly bracing to begin with but you soon warmed up. Following the swim we headed inland to a huge lake called Lake Mackenzie which is quite shallow but has pristine white sand surrounding it. Again the water was crystal clear and not too cold either. Although a lake it was just like being on a tropical island beach. After a stint of sunbathing we toweled off and headed further inland to Central Station, which used to be the main living accommodation station on the island when the island was used for logging of the local hardwood trees that are common there. At central station we saw some of the old huts used back in the early 1900’s by the workers there. Following this we went to an Aboriginal camp on the island. The Aboriginal people actually own Fraser but lease the running of it back to the federal government and their presence allows them to keep an eye on proceedings so that no Aboriginal beliefs are interfered with. Whilst there we set up lunch, which today was hot dogs and salad. This time Al volunteered for cooking duty and managed not to poison anyone along the way. After lunch we went for a rainforest walk where Robin explained all the local fauna to us as well as some of the local insects. We finished the walk with a nice cup of tea and a biscuit before jumping back on our van to catch the ferry back to Hervey. One interesting sight we did see was a burnt out 4WD that had been stuck and through constant revving had managed to burn the clutch out and catch fire. Robin was absolutely correct in that most people that visit Fraser do not know how to handle a 4WD on this type of surface as we’d seen over 10 vehicles get stuck in the 2 days we were there. We caught the ferry and got dropped of at our camp site in Hervey. The one thing we both craved was a nice cup of coffee and although no Starbucks was at hand we soon found a café to satisfy our thirst and hunger. It was also at this café that we ran into a British family that had emigrated out to Hervey 6 months previously. They were loving the lifestyle out in Australia and we can understand why, with great weather and such friendly people. It also helped that they had a little Staffordshire Bull Terrier called Shakira with them. Guess who made a fuss of the dog !?!

The next morning we were on our way again, going further north to Mission Beach which was quite a long drive. We got into Mission in the early evening and the weather was not too good with frequent rain showers along the way. Driving around looking for a camp site we managed to drive through most of Mission which was only a few streets big and didn’t look at all lively. We finally checked into our camp site and promptly set off in search of food and a drink but trying to find the local bar we ended up on the main road that we’d entered the town on. Being slightly lost in a town of a few streets is not good but we managed to stop a jogger that was passing. It conspired that he was the local policeman, another Brit that had emigrated to Australia earlier in the year. He soon pointed us in the right direction and we headed on to get some food. There really wasn’t much going on in Mission and the beach was nothing more than that with no activities taking place that we could see. We decided that the best thing was to head onwards to our next stop, Mackay, on the morning.

The drive up to Mackay went smoothly and we managed to get there just before sunset. The whole reason for stopping in Mackay was to go to a Duck-Billed Platypus wildlife centre that was part of a camp site there. We managed to get a little lost after we passed a sign for the wildlife centre so did a u-turn to make sure we had gone the right way. The sign was next to a pub and when we got out to check the sign one of the locals asked us if we were looking for “Wazza’s Place”. We said that if that was the wildlife centre then we were. He gave us some directions and told us to say that Wayne had sent us. We found our way there with no problems and driving in to the wildlife centre realized that it was no more than a hippie camp next to a river that may have some platypus in it. We were greeted first by a guy named Gerry who said he’d take us to meet Wazza. Gerry was obviously pretty drunk and was keen to say that he was indeed pretty drunk. He was a friendly guy and took us to meet Wazza who look like a scrawny old hippie with a big white scruffy beard. Wazza was smoking away on something a little stronger than normal tobacco and was again keen to offer it around. We paid Wazza for the camp site when Wayne showed up and gave us a tour of the site, including a honeymoon suite which was a small open shack with a bed in it covered by a mosquito net. As much as we’d have loved to stay there the van was more luxurious than the honeymoon suite would ever be. Despite the fact this place was a small hippie commune the guys there were all nice blokes, if a little weird. After declining the honeymoon suite we went down to the river’s edge to see if we could spot the elusive duck billed platypus. We sat there for a good 90 minutes before retiring not seeing anything but a couple of small turtles. That night it again poured down with rain but by now we’d got used to it and could sleep right through. In the morning we woke early (5am) to see if we could see the duck billed platypus but left disappointed once more. It would turn out ultimately that we would not see once during our trip. We left early and luckily didn’t have to see Wazza before setting off for Port Douglas.

Port Douglas is a lovely small harbour town right up on the north east coast of Australia and somewhere where Al has been before during his last trip in 2001. We’d booked a tour of the Daintree Rainforest for the day so we could enjoy a day off from driving. The twisty winding roads into Port Douglas were exactly as Al remembered them and the town had not changed much since he was last there. We’d agreed to meet the tour bus at one of the local back packer hostels which arrived on time and we were met by the tour guide, a young Kiwi, named Justin. It was obvious that this tour was for the more boisterous back packers as we had to introduce ourselves and finish with the answer to “whether we fold or scrunch our toilet paper”. I’m sure you are not that keen to find out our answers !! On with the tour – we headed out to the rainforest stopping for a welcome breakfast stop before taking a walk along a boardwalk through the middle of the forest where we met a few more insects keen on devouring as much of us as possible. We stopped for lunch at local camp site / back pack hostel just set back from the beach which was very nice. After lunch we drove to a local river that we could swim in and most people were up for it including an Irish girl who didn’t actually have a swimming costume but decided that her knickers and vest would do. She managed to get out of the river with a bunch of young lads looking on intently as she discovered that her wet white vest was showing off everything she had. Out of the river we discovered we’d lost one of the group and had to wait almost 30 minutes before he showed up and got lots of friendly abuse when he stepped back into the coach. The coach dropped us back in the centre of Port Douglas where Al showed Claire around the town, in particular to one bar called The Iron Bar. It was here we met the Irish girl again and her friend. We had a laugh about the wet vest and started chatting in general about various travels. Al had told them about the Iron Bar because it’s here that they have cane toad races every night. Cane toad races involve 6 cane toads being put in a bucket and tipped into the middle of a big round table. The toads have jockeys, members of the unsuspecting audience, picked out and given “whips” to encourage the cane toad to jump off the edge of the table. The whip is a party whistle that uncurls when you blow it and makes a loud noise. Al was picked out to go in the first race and was paired up with a cane toad called Aussie Aussie Aussie (all of them have comedy names and mine was named after the Aussie sporting chant) and had to give him a good luck kiss before the start of the race. All the toads went in the bucket and then were dropped onto the table – the race was on. Al started whipping his toad and Aussie Aussie Aussie didn’t disappoint by making to the edge of the table but then decided to jump next to the audience who freaked and almost stood on the poor soul. Al managed to grab him before he could make it any further and was first to get his toad back to the bucket and win the race. For his victory Al won a bottle of cane toad lager which was the foulest lager he’s drunk for a long time. Claire managed to get pulled up for the second race and was paired with a toad called Whopper. Now Whopper was, as his name suggests, a huge cane toad. Again, Claire needed to give Whopper a good luck kiss before the start of the race and she did manage it although it did take a bit of courage and several goes before Whopper got his kiss. The bucket was put on the table and despite a good whipping Whopper was not moving as fast as he should have been. He eventually came in fourth. Both of us had a great night that night and I’m sure that Whopper enjoyed his kiss. We headed back to our van for a good nights sleep before heading to Cairns in the morning and then onto Townsville and Magnetic Island.

The drive to Cairns didn’t take too long and we stopped here for a couple of hours to have a good look around. Cairns acts as the centre for the North West cost in Australia and you can use it as a base for exploring the area but we wanted to explore a bit further. After a wander around the shops we headed further South to Townsville. This would be our home for 2 days while we explored the Great Barrier Reef and Magnetic Island. We pulled into our camp site mid afternoon and headed for the shower block as soon as we checked in. Whilst there Al met a bunch of guys from France who had lived in Australia before and were back visiting the country. They were very friendly and kept themselves amused with plenty of music, beer and games. One even managed to strike up a conversation about the cricket which in turn soon turned to rugby and the rugby world cup in France later on in the year.

Later that night we headed into Townsville to see what it offered, which included the obligatory Irish pub, Italian restaurant and countless spit and sawdust Aussie pubs. After some home made food at the Irish pub (and several pints of Guinness) we back to the van to get some sleep ready for the early wake up call to go diving on the reef.

We woke early and headed off to the port in Townsville harbour and caught the boat that took about 100 people out to the reef. Most people were there to go snorkeling and we had a group of 12 that were going diving. We were given the usual safety talk and then headed out to the back of the boat to get our equipment ready and wetsuits on. Soon the boat stopped and we headed into the sea and down to the ocean floor which was only about 5 metres down. The guide took us around a few of the reefs which had some huge giant clams on the reef which have a magnificent cobalt blue centre to them. Sadly, apart from the giant clams there wasn’t a huge amount of colourful coral and fish to be seen. The coral appeared very white which usually means it’s dead and after talking to some people it may well be because the sea temperatures have raised here by a degree of two which is enough to kill them off. Whatever has caused this to happen, the reef looks so different to when Al was here in 2001. Disappointed by the dive we headed back to Townsville determined to enjoy a nice night out in town and we promptly made sure that plenty of drinks and a nice Italian meal sorted that out. The next day it was planned to go across to Magnetic Island where we’d arranged to hire 2 jet skis to circumnavigate to island. The weather that morning was horrific with the skies opening up and torrential rain flowing but, after a quick call to the jet ski operator, they confirmed all was ok. We set off to the harbour again and caught the ferry to the island before catching a connecting bus to Horse Shoe Bay. When we went into the shop the operator said that they’d made a mistake in saying that it was ok to take the jet skis out as we would not see anything in the current conditions. Although a bit annoyed we were on the island and decided to have a walk around the place as the rain had stopped but the cloud cover remained. There wasn’t too much to see so we decided to cut our losses and head back to the ferry port and to Townsville.

Arriving back we walked around the central shopping mall in Townsville and grabbed some lunch and a coffee before heading on to Airlie Beach and the Whitsunday Islands where we would set sail on a boat cruise for a few days.

Another longish drive done and we were in Airlie Beach, a resort basically built up on a small beach and huge numbers of people using it as a base to explore the Whitsundays on a massive number of cruise options. We’d pre-booked our cruise on a boat called the Southern Cross and had to check in the following day. The rain from Magnetic Island had followed us down to Airlie but stopped long enough for us to check into our camp site and catch a local bus into Airlie itself. After a few emails and a quick wander about we headed to the pub for a beer, the “local” Irish bar being the choice again. The barman recommended one of the bars special, a drink called “Nashes” that comprised of red bull, vodka and Irish cider, something that both of us loved although it only took a few of these to feel happy. A visit to the pizza house was required to soak up the beer before the bus ride back to the camp site and some sleep.

The next day started early as we’d booked a fishing trip with a local firm. They picked us up at the camp site and we had 6 others joining us. The sun was out for a change so Al thought this would be a good omen to catch some good fish and finally beat Claire in a fishing competition. We started the engines and breezed out of the harbour and then into what can only be described as some of the roughest waves we’ve encountered which wasn’t helped by the captain going full steam ahead catching every big hit. Both of us had to sit down inside and hold on as you had no chance of standing up. Several people were ill before we’d made it a mile off shore and the others on deck were more than a little wet from all the spray being kicked up. Once at our destination, everyone was able to get themselves together and actually start fishing. We were given hand reels as well as pieces of mackerel and small squid to use as bait which was completely new to Al (getting his excuses in early) but Claire had done this in the Maldives. We both managed to catch a number of fish as well as catching the line on coral and rocks at the bottom of the sea but at the end of the day Claire had managed to beat Al again by one fish. Still smelling of fish we headed back to freshen up before coming back into Airlie to check in for our cruise the following day. We did the check in and had to measure up for our stinger suits (during the summer months the seas around Australia are full of jellyfish including the deadly box jellyfish) for protection whilst snorkeling. We went back to the camp site and were a bit surprised to meet up with a couple from the Fraser Island trip who were parked up next to our van. We quickly caught up on where each of us had been and agreed to meet up in the Irish bar that night. A good night entailed but we had to be up early in the morning for our 7am pick up so we decided to stay off the Nashes that evening.

Sure enough 7am came and we were picked up to go down to the harbour again to join our crew and go aboard the boat. Our crew for the trip would be Kat, a young Kiwi girl, and Adam, an Aussie that didn’t really say any more than he needed to but both were friendly enough. The safety briefing was not so much about safety but more around the need to ensure that nothing other the the 3 P’s went down the boats toilet. The 3 P’s for those that really want to know are : Pee, Poo and Paper. Nothing else, no matter how much you want to flush it away, would be a cardinal sin. Any object that blocked the pump that got rid of the 3 P’s would have to be cleared by either Adam or Kat and they understandably did not want to carry out that task. Once that was done we set off and sailed out of the harbour. The weather was not at it’s best and was very overcast but at least not raining we thought. Well, that didn’t last long after we left the harbour as we could see a rain storm up ahead of us and we didn’t realize how quickly these things happen. We thought the shower was well away but before long the skipper was in his wet weather gear so everyone followed suit pretty quickly afterwards although Kat didn’t get chance to put hers on and she was soaked to the bone with a couple of minutes. On top of the rain we also had some pretty strong gusts of wind that had everyone holding onto the rails around the edge of the boat which at this point was sailing at a 45 degree angle. Several of the girls on board were getting a little panicked by this but Adam said it was normal in these types of conditions.  This was certainly a rough and wet way to introduce us to sailing. Most people had got wet from the spray and some from the rain, so everyone was a little bit damp but that was nothing compared to the inside of the boat when someone asked whether the galley should have a lot of water rolling about inside of it. It should be water tight but whether it was water from the rain or from a leak no one was sure but it wasn’t a good start. After we’d cleared the rain storm some people went below to check their gear and found that some of the mattresses had got wet from the rain which was not good as this was to be their bed for the next 2 nights. Rain coats were thrown across the mattresses later on and we headed behind one the many islands to take shelter and in fact anchored up for the night. Now everything was calm, everyone settled down and we prepared a rota for breakfast/lunch/dinner/washing up duties for the next few days. As part of the trip we could bring some beer along with us and we later found that the beer cooler also made a handy card table but trying to get 12 people around the card table was pretty tough. As you’re in very close proximity to each other it wasn’t long before everyone knew everybody else and we had a great bunch of people of board including a couple of guys from London, another English couple, a Swiss couple and a group of Irish girls plus one English girl in their group. The English girl in the group had a strong West Country accent and Alan soon found out she came from Stroud which is 10 miles away from his home town of Cirencester. More than this, she and one of the Irish girls worked for Cheltenham and Gloucester Building Society in Cirencester, which is the company that Alan once worked for. Small world indeed. The first night ended at about 2am after too many games of cards and a few too many beers but this didn’t help trying to get to sleep in the beds down below. The humidity, heat and the damp smell of the beds was too much for some, including Claire (who had the top bunks which was very claustrophobic), who headed up on deck to sleep in the fresh air.

Waking up the next morning everyone was extremely pleased to see the Sun was back in the sky and it looked to be a beautiful day ahead. Sure enough it was as we pulled up the anchor and headed for Whitehaven Island, which is renowned for having the purest white silicon sand anywhere. Indeed, Whitehaven was fantastic and we managed to get some sunbathing in on the pure white sands. We stopped at another beach on the island and to our surprise we ran into the Australian/Romanian couple that we met on our Fraser Island trip. They were aboard a big old fashioned tall ship that was moored up next to our boat and they were happy that they had all been safely inside when sailing through the storms the previous day. We bid them farewell on the beach and headed back to our ship where we had lunch before we sat laughing as the tall ship ran aground on a sand bank just off the island. The tall ship had to get 3 small boats to pull it off the sand bank before it could continue on its journey. We anchored up for the night in another small inlet on one of the islands and the same recipe of beer and cards worked well again on the second night with new card games being introduced by the various people on board. Again we retired at 2am happier that the damp smell had gone after Kat had dried the mattresses in the days sunshine. The next day was sunny again and we continued around the islands helping Kat hoist the sails and then collapsing them back down again. It takes plenty of hard work to get this done as well as plenty of co-ordination otherwise the end result is the mail sail’s boom knocking you sideways off the boat. On our last day we sailed to another one of the islands and put on our stinger suits to go snorkeling. The reefs here were teeming with fish and the corals were a mixture of reds, blues, greens and yellows which more than made up for the disappointment of the diving off Townsville. We had to finish off the beer we had left after lunch on the 3^rd day which meant a quick snooze on deck before heading back to Airlie. On the way back Al managed to get a chance to steer the boat for half an hour or so. Despite it looking quite easy Al said that the currents and waves push the boat all over the place and you need to keep re-adjusting to keep it going in a straight line. Others were not so sure that it was the beer he had earlier that had something to do with the wayward driving !!

Back in Airlie again, we got dropped off at the camp site and headed straight for the showers after having 3 days of 5 minute cold showers. The warm showers were bliss and with little sleep for several days we soon went to sleep for an hour or two. We had agreed to meet up with the whole group that night in one of the bars in Airlie and nearly all the group made it except for one of the guys from London who was feeling ill. Claire was also feeling a little ill and after a few drinks and a bit to eat, we retired as well, needing some more sleep.

The next day and we had to move on to Bundaberg, a town famous for its Bundaberg Rum distillery and not much else. Our visit was not for the rum though as Bundy (as the locals know it) was home to colonies of Green, Flatback and Loggerhead turtles that nest at Mon Repos beach. We arranged to park up at a small back packer hostel who’s owner would take us out to the turtles via the local ranger station at the beach. This was not something we could do at any time, as the turtles along come ashore at night time, which could mean us staying up from 8pm through to 4am depending on how keen we were. The ranger station was bigger than we’d imagined and was well run with an intuitive education centre for both children and adults. Claire was still feeling ill and was determined to see the turtles despite being sick several times whilst waiting for the call to say turtles had come ashore. We got a call almost an hour after arriving to say that the rangers had found some turtles hatching and we could come down and see them go from their nest site on the beach all the way down to the waters edge. The rangers got the children to line up with the legs apart creating a walkway for the turtles. Each child had a light to shine onto the sand between their feet as the turtles will follow a light if they see it. Soon we had a group of 27 turtles marching down the beach through the archways created by the children and on into the waves at the seas edge. It was a fantastic sight to see although sad to know that only 1 out of every hundred turtles will mature into a fully grown adult. With Claire still being sick we were going to call it a night but before we did we got another call to say a female turtle had made it onto the beach and was digging a nest. We quickly made our way down to the beach again and found a loggerhead laying about 70+ eggs in the sand. We watched as she went about her business on digging the nest, then laying the golf ball sized eggs and finally covering the nest with sand before she slowly edged her way back into the sea. At this point we thought that was it but we were told by the ranger that the nest was too shallow to be considered safe as the sea would soon expose the nest and the eggs would be destroyed or eaten by predators. The ranger led the digging of a new nest further away from the sea and at a depth suitable not to be uncovered. We each were allowed to move 2 eggs from the original nest and then put them into the new nest site in the hope that maybe one of these turtles would survive to make it back to this beach at some point in the future. Finally we managed to make it back to our van for about 2am and went straight off to sleep. Our next day was back to Brisbane to finish our last leg of the Australian trip.

We drove back into the centre of Brisbane and managed to find the Wicked van centre after a couple of tries so that we could hand over the keys to the van. The van had been a great experience and had coped well considering the changeable weather. With the van handed back we caught a cab to the central Brisbane YHA, checked in and headed out to explore Brisbane. At this stage Claire had still not managed to keep any liquids, let alone food, down, which continued for another 24 hours or so, before Alan persuaded her to go to the hospital as she was becoming very dehydrated. Reluctantly Claire agreed. When we arrived at the A&E of the Royal Brisbane Hospital Claire saw a triage nurse within a few minutes. Initially Claire got the “you’re not an emergency, so what are you doing here” treatment, however, when Claire mentioned she had not been able to keep anything down for the last few days including her blood pressure medication, things changed. The nurse took her blood pressure, which was too high and moved her to trolley to hook her up to a drip and gave her something to settle her stomach. 2 Bags of fluids later, Claire was allowed to leave the hospital, although it still took another week or so to fully recover. The next day, to get our bearings we followed a city walk in our Lonely Planet guide that took us past some of the historic buildings around the city centre. The next day we headed out of town to meet up with one of Claire’s Dutch friends from a hotel they both worked at back in London, Patti Dutton, who had met an Aussie over here when touring and had now got married and also had 2 children as well. Patti picked us up at the YHA and drove us to her house in Zillemere, a little bit to the north of city centre and here we met her husband, Ben, and his father, a pommie (an Englishman) that emigrated to Australia during the 1960’s. We spent the morning there watching Ben and his dad struggle to fit a new patio door and gave them an excuse to down tools for a while and enjoy a cup of tea and a cold drink. Claire and Patti caught up on old times and who was doing what from the days back when they both lived in London. Afterwards, Patti dropped us off in the city centre where we did some window shopping. The next day we headed to Australia Zoo, which is the zoo owned by Steve Irwin just outside Brisbane. The news of Steve’s death had just been released when we left on our trip back in Sept 06 so it would be weird to see how the whole place ran without him about. The zoo was absolutely huge in size taking up over 10 square miles and with a huge crocodile centre, or crocodilium as they called it, a huge kangaroo and wallaby centre plus numerous other attractions. The highlight was a visit to the animal hospital, which Al had bought especially for Claire. There we had a guided walk around the veterinary centre, seeing a number of Koalas that had been brought in with injuries resulting from being hit with a car, snakes that had been run over, birds that had various skin infections resulting in huge areas of skin with no feathers and turtles that had swallowed plastic containers of bags and couldn’t submerge in water properly. You name any injury and animal and this centre had seen one in the last few months. They did a great job here and receive funding from Australia Zoo to keep up there good work. I think Claire would have stayed if she had the chance.

Whilst we had been in Brisbane Al had contacted one of his old colleagues from Sky, Marion Sheerman, who was now living in Brisbane. He got a text from her that day at the Zoo and on the way back to Brisbane rang her to arrange to meet up that night. Al was really happy to catch up with Marion as she’d had some awful luck (a huge understatement) with her health over the last couple of years. She’s been incredibly brave in fighting illness so it was really great to see Marion in good form and looking as good as ever. She moved here with her family and it was good to finally meet her husband Mick after hearing Marion talk about him so much. We caught up on what everyone was doing and plans for the future over some drinks a bit to eat. Although we were late in meeting up it was good to do so and we know Marion will be in London at Xmas so we can catch up again. Sadly, that was the last night of our 2 months in Australia It really is a magnificent country and the people are the friendliest that we’ve met anywhere on our journey so we’ll be sad to leave.