another lazy day .... so hot and humid you just dont want to do anything, sat round the pooll most of the day and trying to sort out the barrier reef trip tomorrow... met a nz couple and trying to pick their brains about nz laters [View Full Entry]

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early start today as we were picked up at 7.10 am to take us to cairns port. we arrives their and booked in, a very busy place and we booked the trip where we start off at green island and lay on the beach and do a bit of swimming and swim out to the reef but we got told that they have marine stingers on the reef when they swore blind to me that they were only on the beaches, we didnt find this out until we saw aload of chinese entering the sea wearing light blue condoms head to [View Full Entry]

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cloudy when we got up this morning so went into cairns for the morning ... nice place with a nice feel to it, we are still working out what trips to do, barrier reef is a must and also rose wants to do the chairlift and steam train ride over the top of the rain forest ... i want to get a car and go to port douglas so we'll have to see. got talked out of driving down to brisbane as its a 24 hour solid boring drive so we've booked a flight on fri at 10 am and we'll [View Full Entry]

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we got up at 5.30 this morning for the 7am flight to cairns (31/2 hours away) we have had a worry over the luggage as we are allows 2 bags each of 25 kg on the world flights but only 20 kg on this flight EACH so i bought a holdall and packed everything with any weight in and took it through as hand luggage i now need another bag for my hernia. anyway we got to cairns and was in our room by 10.30 a lovely place right on the beach and its time to chill out a bit ... [View Full Entry]

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we stayed just outside ballarat where the gold boom started, fantastic old place with very old buildings, nice to see the gold wasnt wasted, we stayed in bunnyol just south of ballarat with a guy who was very theatrical, in fact he has built a 20 seat cinema next to his property and the house is full of posters and books on the theatre and film world. anyway still raining as we make our way to the airport. We have an early start so are trying to book something near the airport. rosebooks a hotel 10 minutes from the airport when [View Full Entry]

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just updating as we are about to leave for the airport, stayed just outside ballarat an old gold town, nice place ... been pissing down all night [View Full Entry]

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we decided to have a gentler day today so the plan was to drive the short distance to port fairy but on the way we visited tower hill which is a huge extinct volcano, we saw our first koala but where there is a huge rim right around the park there was a kind of wildlife park where everything was trapped inside so most of the native animals were there. we got to port fairy and booked into a quirky place overlooking the river, we had a 2 bed cabin but we could have stayed in a luxury train carriage, we [View Full Entry]

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good day today were were going to continue on the great ocean road but rose decided she wanted to go into the rainforest so we went to a place where you went up to the top of the tree tops, we went up about 150 feet and belive me with my head for heights it was terryfying, so much so that rose refused to go up the last tower which was another 50 feet up, being up there looking down at the forest floor was really unnerving. anyway we got down and got back on the ocean road, unfortunately 3/4 of [View Full Entry]

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got up this morning and had breakfast and got going .... we had a long journey ahead of us .... we drove towards melbourne and then went south towards sorrento where we caught the ferry to queenscliffe, a forty minute crossing, once we landed we headed to torquay and through to the great ocean road, we decided to crack on and get to Lorne which looked like the nicest place to stay on the first part of the road, the road was really spectacular, the sea crashing in on the left and towering forests on the right,and we booked into the [View Full Entry]

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after breakfast we helped clear up and went up the nsw coast through eden to where pauls caravan is parked ... his friend sam lives in a huge valley minutes from the beaches and paul leaves his van on his property at the top of the hill, that afternoon we took the kayaks down the river and walked across the dunes to the beach which was spectacular .... 10 miles of beach and we were the only ones on it, we decided to go into town for dinner which was about 40 minutes away, had dinner in a pub overlooking the [View Full Entry]

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