The town of Picton isn’t the bustling harbour you would imagine it to be when considering its home to the main ferry terminus on the South Island. Nestled in the shadows of tree covered mountains this tiny harbour town doesn’t seem to realise the amount of traffic it generates, as walking along the tranquil quayside with the sun slowly disappearing turning the static clouds to flecks of bright red there is barely a sound to be heard. If the north islands pace of life is slow then the South stopped the clocks 50 years ago. After a day driving around the [View Full Entry]

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Ben and Jamie had been telling us how much we would enjoy Rotorua as they had just spent a sun filled day ‘Zorbing’ and riding ‘the luge’ at one of the many tourist attractions scattered around the lake. Unfortunately we were welcomed to the sulphur city by low black clouds and heavy rain that forced us to retreat for lunch to an American style idiot factory precariously masquerading as KFC. It seemed that despite the abundance of bubbling mud pools, gurgling hot springs and gushing geysers, no amount of thermal activity would bring warmth to our soggy chicken and chips. The [View Full Entry]

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After driving nearly 3000 kilometers and not once hitting a single traffic jam, the lack of vehicles on the roads was one of the characteristics this country bares in complete contrast to home, where getting across town during rush hour will leave you regularly impeded by stressed parents in 4x4s trying desperately to get the kids to school on time. We navigated the mid-morning traffic in the centre of Auckland without once beeping the horn or encountering any commuters brimming with road rage and made our way east towards thames and the Coromandel coast. The Coromandel juts out into the South [View Full Entry]

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Slowly descending through the sparse cloud cover looking down on the lush green hilltops, our first glimpse of New Zealand was one of stark contrast from the dry, baron landscape of Australia. Auckland provided welcomed change from downtown Sydney, as it felt more like a large town compared to its unofficial capital status. Our first challenge was to establish a mode of transport to get us out of the city and off the beaten track. We looked at buying a car or van but most that we viewed were either vastly overpriced or dangerously under repaired, so having made the decision [View Full Entry]

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Honk, Honk “ Jesus Christ can you believe the way some people drive around here?!” We were thinking the same thing as our bus driver sped through the packed streets of Sydney on the way to the airport. His task it seemed was not driving us safely to our destination but was ‘driving without due care and attention’ as the police report would surely state. We were thankful to him though as our bus had failed to arrive in Newcastle and he arranged for us to board his bus that would drop us off at Sydney’s domestic terminal, on his way [View Full Entry]

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After discovering that we should have gone overland instead of flying to take in the scenery of the Great Ocean Road, we tried to book a trip to Tasmania in order to spend a week traveling the island. Unknown to us we were trying to book flights in the middle of the school holidays, so all the cheap flights were now expensive, and all the campervans were booked out to holidaying families. Our lack of forward planning was beginning to really bite us in the arse after further discovering that the Greyhound bus route would only take us to places that [View Full Entry]

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Our return to Cairns was filled with less scuffling than our previous encounter, this time our decision to seek out the local caravan park echoing a point Lucy had raised at the Parkview Guesthouse only a week earlier, ‘I’d rather sleep on the floor than in this s*#t hole!’ After pitching our tent we were shortly followed by Clare, Matt and James who were brandishing spanking new Didgeridoos that to the displeasure of the rest of the campsite were used to make an array of continuous noises synonymous with the outback. Dave’s valiant attempts that only managed to create noises synonymous [View Full Entry]

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Note: For some reason the previous journal was uploaded with only half the text. Im taking none of the blame as it couldn’t possibly be my fault, honest. The rest has now been added so if you want to conclude the story please read it again. After our adventures on Fraser Island all were in agreement that it would be difficult to beat the past few days activities, so arriving in Bundaberg welcomed by heavy cloud cover and the even heavier downpour that followed was not the best start. Unfortunately the bad weather was relentless for the full two days that [View Full Entry]

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Rainbow beach, one of the many 'gateways to Fraser' was our stop-over to meet the 8 other people we would be spending the next 3 days with packed neatly into a Toyota 4x4, as we drove around the largest sand island in the world. Our trip was planned as a self-drive exploration meaning no boring guides, plenty of freedom the do just about whatever the hell you want, and best of all we all get the chance to drive hell for leather along huge sandy beaches. Fraser Island stretches for over 123 kilometers along the east coast, and is the only [View Full Entry]

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After some disastrous attempts to stand up on a glorified ironing board, and a couple more nights at the pub watching the locals get trashed and fight each other, we were beginning to feel very much at home in Lennox. After realising our intended 2 nights had crept silently up to 4, the decision was made to move on as we needed to get our butts in gear to see all of the east coast highlights in a mere 3 weeks. We arrived in Brisbane and found ourselves checking into a very cheap dorm room. The reason for the cheapness of [View Full Entry]

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