DoktorSteve
Steven Young Joined: October 26th 2009
Logged in: January 20th 2012
Logged in: January 20th 2012
Wibble
Travel Blog Posts
Snowy Norfolk
The flight back went much like any other, uneventful but with not enough sleep. The area around Heathrow was blanketed in a fine layer of snow and once I had left the airport the -5 degree C temperatures were pretty painful for this warm acclimatised person. It was back to Twickenham for me to spend a day and a night with same people who put me up just before I left. The day was spent just sitting around on my own (turns out other people have proper jobs to go to during the day), slightly zoned out until the evening when we went out for a catch up session over beer and Italian food. I suspect I wasn't quite the sparkling socialite that I usually am, jet-lagged and yawning my way through most of the evening ... read more
Some famous landmarks
Hello, After the night bus debacle I finally rolled into Sydney mid-afternoon feeling exhausted after having had insufficient sleep on the coach. So despite being in Sydney at last, a place I had regarded as the 'Holy Grail' of the East Coast, after checking in to my hostel near to Bondi Beach, I just popped over to have a quick look at nearby Tamarama and Bronte Beaches whilst waiting for the laundry to finish then over to the string of restaurants overlooking Bondi Beach for food followed by an early bed time. The next morning I really didn't want to get up, despite having had a good ten hours in bed. Even that wasn't enough to recover from the sleep debt built up the previous day. Nevertheless, with only one full day to explore Australia's largest ... read more
Surfers
The surf camp was at a place called Woolgoolga, which was quite pleasing in a way since no-one seems to have heard of it. Finally, I was visiting a place on the East coast which wasn't a total cliche! It's just some small town out in the relative boondocks, fairly near to the more well known Coffs Harbour. I got off at the bus stop (marked by a telegraph pole opposite a building with a statue of an elephant. Well of course) and was whisked away by minibus to 'Spot X', the site of the surf camp. I was told this was a secret location by people in the Byron Bay office, which does beg the question 'how come I saw it marked on road signs?' but never mind about that. As I got to the ... read more
Lighthouse
After leaving Hervey Bay I didn't really have much time to get on with these blog entries for the rest of my trip, so this is the first entry that I am catching up with after getting back the UK. Oh well. So after sorting out the next day's surfing I found myself with a day at liberty to amble around Byron Bay, just pottering around and seeing the sights. This was a fairly laid back day. Byron Bay is mainly a beach and party town (though not quite so much as Airlie Beach, at least party-wise. I found it slightly ironic that Airlie Beach doesn't really have much of a beach, whilst Byron Bay has quite a large one). First off I took a long walk through a bit of a 'rainforest' (more just a ... read more
Track marks
My day in Hervey Bay was pretty uneventful, as there is nothing to do there at all. The next morning was time to go off to Fraser Island (the largest sand island in the world) on a self-drive tour. However, in the morning it was all rush rush so whilst the briefing for the drivers took place, four people out of a group of nine had to go and do food and alcohol shopping. Missing the briefing meant that you weren't allowed to be a driver- it seems the tour company has decided that instead of starting half an hour earlier, it is better to deny almost half the group the opportunity to get behind the wheel, a decision that has to be made almost immediately. Since I haven't driven much for the past couple of ... read more
Me underwater
Hello, The day after my last entry was the start of my second dive trip on the Great Barrier Reef, this time around the Whitsunday Islands. I boarded the vessel around midday, giving me a chance to have a quick look around Airlie Beach in the morning. This confirmed my initial impression- it basically has two streets, one all niceness and palm trees running along the waterfront and by a good sized swimming pool with it's own little fake beach, the other just a mass of backpacker hostels, clubs and cheap takeaways (often the same place). It must be weird to be a local- the place is basically a village, and yet with a massive transient population of backpackers. Anyway, onto the boat I went, and after some lunch, a couple of hours sailing and a ... read more
Strangler fig
I left off considering whether to go on a jungle night walk or not. I decided that since the rainforest allegedly comes alive more at night time that it would be interesting to see it then, and embarked on about an hour an a half long tramp around the jungle. Whilst the rainforest wasn't dead I didn't see the masses of snakes and giant spiders and wombats that I had hoped. However there were some frogs, a couple of dragons sleeping on trees and some fairly small spiders and a white tailed rat skipping about in the bushes. So it was good enough but didn't blow me away. I'm afraid that Lonely Planet lies- it wasn't a party place at all- it was utterly boring in the resort. I ended up going to bed almost as ... read more
Me and Mossman Gorge
Hello, This morning I left Cairns again, this time to go to see more rainforest. We drove north along the coast to Mossman Gorge. From the car park we walked along the plastic boardwalk (recycled, but still a bit of an unsightly gash through the rainforest. Apparently there are plans to do more to make it wheelchair accessible. Rainforest for all!) through some very nice scenery. The gorge was pretty enough and I started to take a lot of pictures of trees and water and I could see a few fish (jungle perch, or flagtails) in the clear water. After that there was a 20 minute stop at a tiny wildlife park with various parrots and some crocodiles and wallabies. I might just be getting jaded by now, but I've seen all of the above in ... read more
The reef
Hello monkeys, I'll try and be quick as I'm pretty tired right now and have, of course, an early start tomorrow. I'm back in Cairns after having two days and one night away diving on the Great Barrier Reef, about two hours boat ride out from the city. So yeah, two days diving, and do they like to pack it in! On the first day I got in three dives, starting around 11am and including a night dive, and on the second day got in another three dives, starting at 6am (grr) and finished before lunch. The dives themselves were all pretty good. I don't think it was as good as the Ningaloo Reef off Exmouth, but that was a pretty hard act to follow so doesn't reflect too badly on the Great Barrier Reef. The ... read more
Shark jaws
Hi, Today hasn't been too action packed I'm afraid. I shall be off for a couple of days on a liveaboard dive vessel and checking out of the hostel in the morning so I just need to get my stuff packed up and sorted again. I just popped into town, primarily to get a new memory card for my camera since I finished the first one yesterday. Whilst in town I stopped into the Cairns museum. This is much smaller than previous ones I've visited but for once I actually arrived at the right time to get the tour. This meant that I got to pose with tiger shark jaws, a crocodile skull and sawfish saw! The museum itself had what I am now thinking of as the typical array of exhibits- some bits about how ... read more
