SuperLuce

After a short flight from Brisbane and a night in Auckland we picked up our larger, better campervan and headed North to Tutkaka to snorkel in the Poor Knigths Island marine reserve. Recognised as one of the best dive spots on the planet, we spent a full day out at sea, snorkelling amongt some of the most spectacular underwater scenery and literally hundreds of fish (some of which were pretty big!). The water, however, was considerably colder than the quoted 20 degrees, but the sights more than made up for the chill. After the snorkelling, we sat back as we toured the islands of the reserve and entered some of the worlds largst sea caves. Heading back south, our next stop was Rotorua, the worlds most active geothermal area - you smell this place before you ... read more

After the hustle and bustle of Sydney, it was time for some sea and sunshine, so we headed to Australia's iconic surf spots (beaches!) in our newly acquired 'Hippie Camper'. En route we passed the resorts of Nambucca Heads and Coffs Harbour. Here we headed in land to the Dorrigo National Park for a rainforest walk where we saw some amazing waterfalls and had great views from the boardwalk lookout (see pics) and in a quiet picnic area at Nambucca Heads we encountered a 5 ft goanna - relaxing on the barbeque. Next up was Byron Bay - a chilled out, hippie kind of place and the campsite was right on the beach. With no 'boards' handy, we decided to try a spot of body surfing (consisting of being knocked over by wave after wave in ... read more

Time to rough it, the money wont last forever, we book into a hostel in St Kilda ('an up and coming' bohemian suburb) of Melbourne. We arrive by plane and decide to find St Kilda by tram. We get off at St Kilda station and walk around the corner, with all our luggage to find a group of derros and ferrals (Aus talk for drunks/scumbags etc) lining the streets. Not great, we thought (wheres the number for the melbourne ritz again?). Luckily we had got off the tram a few stops early and after a long and tiring walk we found beautiful St Kilda, right on the beach, with street cafes, restaurants and cool bars (one did bulmers!). Melbourne was a great city, transport was easy by tram (once you knew where you were going) and ... read more

You're back hopefully for Blog 2 of our adventures, to find out if its as exciting as the title read on... Next stop on our travels was a 1 night stop in Kuala Lumpur. We managed to cram in a few sights, we went up the KL Tower (after Shanghai and Toronto they get a bit samey) home of "the best view of the city" (except for the Petronas Towers) and then after a trip to the Hard Rock Cafe (sophisticated dining) we walked to the Towers (sort of). See photos. The next day was a flight to Sabah and the port/pirate town of Sandakan (imagine a smaller version of Portsmouth same crowd), we had a nice hotel but the range of nice looking restaurants was limited to say the least, we settled on the hotel's ... read more