http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Kate and Blu in Oz/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Kate and Blu in Oz en-us Thu, 21 Aug 2008 15:44:37 BST Thu, 21 Aug 2008 15:44:37 BST 1st July been on the road for 5 months today Left Coffs Harbour a tad reluctantly itrsquos the kind of place where you could easily stay a while and drove up the coast to the Clarence River area. Stopped en route at Maclean the Scottish town where all the lampposts wear kilts well the bottom part of each post is painted in a different tartan making them look like they are. The t http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Queensland/blog-309709.html Itrsquos been raining all day here on the ldquoSunshine Coastrdquo a good time to do some catching up. So to continue with our travels through inland NSW left Coonabarabran on June 25th and drove through pleasant countryside to Tamworth which was a bit of a surprise really. It was a much bigger place than we expected I think the population is over 50000 but it had a nice country http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/blog-303500.html Here's one for the petrolheads among you so if you are not into motor racing then log off now Must say I am not a great fan but I did enjoy checking out Mt Panorama. Surprisingly the track is a public road with private homes restaurants even a vineyard So it is open 247 but with a speed restriction of 60kph and this is enforced quite frequently by the NSW police We were told by the http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/Bathurst/blog-300511.html June 18 left our lovely Sydney caravan park and drove up to Lithgow which is at the western end of the Blue Mountains we chose this route as we had been to Katoomba the most popular area of the Blue Mountains before. The drive to Lithgow was rather a challenge we took the road out from Windsor with the interesting name of Bells Line of Road a great scenic drive but very hilly There http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/blog-300483.html May 26 a warm sunny 25 degree day we were on the road by 8 a big drive ahead of us Wilpena Pound to Broken Hill 450 kms. Stopped at Peterborough to visit Steamworld. Prior to standard gauge rail there were different size rail tracks in each state of Australia and Peterborough being central to 3 states has a turntable with 3 different size gauges fascinating stuff for train buffs http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/New-South-Wales/blog-294800.html 22 May after completing the Oodnadatta Track we were back on the bitumen again but not for long After a night at Copley where we washed a large load of dusty clothes and cleaned up the worst of the Oodna dust from the caravan we headed onto another gravel road about 130km to Arkaroola in the northern Flinders Ranges. Arkaroola is an aweinspiring place it was an outback station until http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/South-Australia/Flinders-Ranges-National-Park/blog-293486.html Sunday 18 May we head out of Coober Pedy for the first real taste of Australian outback since the Nullarbor. Heading down the gravel road towards the Painted Desert we encounter the South Australian police coming the other way at 100kph and bingo a broken windscreen from a loose stone thanks First stop the Painted Desert which was spectacular even though the corrugations on the road t http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/South-Australia/Outback/blog-289546.html No these are not the names of our new friends just new places we visited on the next leg of our journey around Oz We have developed a special interest in the Murray River not sure quite why but it is an Australian icon really it flows from the Snowy mountains to the coast of South Australia and impacts on such a lot of Australian lives past and present. Anyway from Adelaide we headed out http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/South-Australia/blog-287518.html Sunday 27 April arrived in Adelaide and felt right at home such a nice graceful city with the feel of a large country town rather than a capital city. You can drive into the city in 20 minutes and find a park 5 minutes walk from the centre of the city Not many capital cities left in the world where you can still do this We also felt some emotional attachment to Adelaide as most of Blu http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/South-Australia/Adelaide/blog-281383.html Well itrsquos been a while since our last blog We finally left Melbourne for the third and final time on 22 April a beautiful sunny day and drove to Ballarat where we visited the Eureka Centre. Decided to skip the premier Ballarat tourist attraction Sovereign Hill as it is very expensive. The Eureka Centre was a really great and well priced exhibition of the famous Eureka stockade http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Victoria/blog-280312.html Well summer is over the weather is noticeably cooler and we have lost our long evenings with the end of daylight saving. On the other hand the leaves are all turning yellow and red the grass is finally becoming green again and autumn is a nice time of year to be in this part of Australia. Back in Melbourne we got the Landcruiser damage assessed rather surprised to find it would take over http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Victoria/Great-Ocean-Road/blog-272444.html On arrival in Hobart March 30th we checked into the Youth Hostel for 2 nights. Had an interesting conversation with the YHA receptionist about Tasmanians and their shortcomings according to her the gene pool is far too small we thought she was rather prejudiced but on our next outing to a local shopping mall we noted that there were quite a few interesting characters around We didnr http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Tasmania/blog-268273.html The West Coast of Tassie is different itrsquos commonly known as the west coast wilderness and some parts of the region particularly the southwest corner have never been explored to date. Interesting We noticed the change as we drove from the North Coast through the tall forests to the mining towns of Rosebery and Zeehan and beyond. The drive was interesting thick native beech trees th http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Tasmania/West-Coast/blog-267700.html After saying farewell to Alister and putting our caravan into storage we were ready to head off to Tassie We took the Spirit of Tasmania ferry across on Easter Thursday 20 March a day trip of 10 hours plus it is a long way from the mainland something we weren't really aware of before now. Day trips are only during summer weekends and peak times so we were quite lucky to get the chance http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Tasmania/blog-266316.html Forgot to post some photos of our 4 wheel drive course onto the web Some of you may find them interesting.... we certainly found it an interesting day and did things we never dreamed we could do in a car driving I mean... Didn't get photos of our sand mud and water crossings which were also great fun http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Victoria/Melbourne/blog-259938.html Back in Melbourne again we set up the caravan annexe for Alisterrsquos visit and collected him from the airport. Had a great week in Melbourne the Moombah festival was on when we arrived so we went down to Southbank on the river Yarra to see the fireworks and wander around the festival sideshows. Visited the Queen Vic market and Alister did a tour of the T elstra Dome. Wednesday we did a d http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Victoria/Melbourne/blog-259588.html Well here we are in Tasmania and I have finally sat down to update our travelblog After our first stay in Melbourne we headed down to Gippsland for 9 days then returned to meet Alister on March 9th. He came over for the Grand Prix car racing more on this later Anyway Gippsland is really south east Victoria and probably best known is Lakes Entrance but therersquos lots moreFirst stop http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/Victoria/Gippsland/blog-259188.html Well we have been on the road for 5 weeks today and have covered a lot of miles since we left Perth on Feb 1st over 6000 kilometres in fact Our rather speedy trip from Perth to Melbourne was mainly due to our decision to go to the Santana concert on the 26th and Alister arriving in Melbourne for the Grand Prix car race this coming Sunday. So after leaving the tip of the Eyre Peninsula we http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/South-Australia/Riverland/blog-253686.html Well it has warmed up a bit since our last blog in fact I think it hit 40 degrees yesterday a bit too hot for us Wellingtonians We enjoyed our last port of call Streaky Bay very much had 5 days there until the wind drove us onwards And they say Wellington is windyhellip. Streaky Bay was named by the explorer Matthew Flinders because of the colours of the water. We spend some time http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/South-Australia/Eyre-Peninsula/blog-247792.html Since our last blog we have been having fun finding out more about how our caravan works we have crossed the Nullarbor and we are now in South Australia We ended up spending 4 nights in Kalgoorlie loved it itrsquos a real frontier outback town and the centre of the Goldfields. There is a lot of history there from the Gold Rush and we spent some time trying to find out what happened t http://www.travelblog.org/Oceania/Australia/South-Australia/blog-245094.html