Lckiwis

Hi all The car and caravan are sold! We've had a wonderful two years exploring Australia with no time limits - free to stop where and for how long we wanted. Some of the places we enjoyed the most, were the lesser known, smaller, outback or coastal places. We've done most of the main attractions of each state (except Canberra), and met some interesting people, and made some good friends. We have some special people to thank very much for making this trip possible. Australian end: * Rowan - car purchase and insurance arranged for us for car and van * Snow and Zena - Brisbane "base camp", Queensland address for car and van registrations, rear car seat storage and accomodation, etc * Dave and Raemar - banking help and address * Sue D - Sydney ... read more

We are still enjoying our travels south with Linda and Denis. After Sapphire, we headed south and found lots of rivers in flood after all the rain. Some roads were closed, mainly side roads. We came accross a few places with water accross the road, especially around Rollerston. We ended up staying a night at Banana. From there we continued on to a favourite place of ours, Cania Gorge. We had a very large site, complete with our own fireplace. The many different birds were as friendly as ever, and we also had visits from kangaroos, buttons and possums at night while we were sitting around our fire. We did some walks, swam in the 3 pools, and enjoyed the wine tasting and wood fired pizza night. The second night there I cooked probably my last ... read more

Hi all We arrived back in Cairns last Wed 15th after a good flight and found our van back on site , all ready for us. Two lovely fine days followed. We spent them cleaningcar and van, getting provisions, and swimming in the pool. Days are 30 degrees and quite muggy now here. Linda and Denis arrived Saturday night to join us on the next leg. We had the tent up ready for them nearby. Then the rain came!!! We're not near a rainforest for nothing. At least the tent hasn't leaked - it's certainly been a good try out for it! Chris' cousin Donald and Patti Hargrave arrived from Noosa (where they're on holiday), on Sunday, to check out our rig. It poured with rain (in fact they were diverted to Townsville until the rain ... read more

Hi all We have enjoyed our 3 days in the Whitsundays, and will move north tomorrow to Bowen, where we plan to catch up with Mardi and Bap (last seen in W.A.) We explored Gladstone, going up several lookouts, (we counted 27 coal carriers waiting to come in to port to load), and drove around Tannum Sands and Boyne Island, where the aluminium smelter is. We also headed out to Lake Awoonga, where the high dam was full to the top of the spillway. The lake supplies water to Gladstone. From Gladstone, we headed north to Rockhampton, then out to Yeppoon on the coast. Our campsite was at nearby Mulambin Beach, where we'd got the last powered site when we rang ahead the day before. We drove to Emu Point and walked through the super golf ... read more

Hi all We are now back in Scarborough. We drove Allen and Marijke to the airport today at Brisbane. They have spent the last 8 days with us, exploring north as far as Bundaberg. We had 3 nights at Maroochydore, then 3 nights at Hervey Bay, with their 1st and last nights here at Scarborough. We have done almost 2000 km with them, and had a great time, although the weather could have been warmer and sunnier! We did a trip into Bribie Island on the way to the Sunshine Coast, and visited Jill and Phil on the way to Moochydore. After exploring the beaches , and looking at Phil's new yacht, we headed inland to the Hinterland, looking accross to the Glasshouse Mountains. We drove to Maleny and Mapleton, doing several walks including one to ... read more