Touristy Queensland, Byron Bay and Sydney

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G’day everyone,

After almost 11 months (47,5 weeks to be exact) my work & travel trip to Australia has come to an end. It was a great experience and I’m happy that I decided to came here and do it. I visited all states and territories of Australia including their capital cities (except the Australian Capital Territory with the capital of the country, Canberra). I met many nice people, less nice people, and made good friends with a few of them. I’m going to leave the country with mixed feelings. On one hand I’d like to stay longer because I enjoyed being here, on the other hand I can’t wait to be in Asia where it’s so much cheaper to travel and there is more culture. “Are you coming to Australia once again in the future?” Many people asked me that and I always say: “Yes, I’d like to come back one day...maybe in 30 years..?!” The chances are very small that I’ll ever come back since it’s very far and not cheap at all...and if I come one next time, there won’t be a working holiday visa anymore because you only get it once in your life and only between the ages of 18 and 30. Beside that, I think I’ve seen (almost) everything I wanted to see in Australia. But I’ll miss it sometimes because it’s a good country to live and work in and the people are very relaxed and laid back.


I left Perth and flew to Cairns via Sydney. Both flights were delayed for about half an hour so I got to Cairns city centre around 7:00pm. Cairns was founded in the 1870’s. It used to be a small fisherman village, until tourism development came to the town, especially after the international airport was built in 1984. Today the city has around 125.000 people. Cairns is THE place to be for backpackers. Almost all backpackers end up here at one stage, I’d say about 98%!o(MISSING)f them do. For those who like to party and drink every single night, probably Cairns is a good place to be. Cairns is “very” touristy and that’s why I wasn’t very impressed with the place. As we drove in, all I saw was: souvenir shops, bars, clubs, restaurants, tour offices, internet cafe’s etc. Since Cairns doesn’t have good beaches and there is a risk of sting rays and crocodiles along the coast, a big lagoon has been built in the city....it’s a big, public pool. During the day there are always lifeguards on duty, but they leave at early evening but you’re still allowed to swim there the whole night if you want. I spent two nights in Cairns which was enough, or maybe just one extra night would have been good. I met four colleagues from The Vic in Darwin, just by coincidence...including one of my best colleagues, Morris. Since all backpackers at one stage end up in Cairns, it’s no surprise you’ll bump into someone you’ve already met elsewhere in Australia.

I took the bus, Premier Motors, and headed south to Airlie Beach. This is a little town of no more than 3.000 people.....and there is absolutely nothing particular about this place. I did not like it at all. It’s like a tiny Cairns; all you see are hostels, restaurants, bars, internet cafe’s, tour operators etc. etc. and there is a lagoon built here too. I spent one night here to go to the Whitsunday Islands the next day. When we came back I had to spend one whole day in Airlie Beach to catch the bus the next day. We spent 3 days on the boat called “Pride of Airlie” (actually two days, less than 48 hours: departing around 3pm and coming back two days later at 1pm). But they still advertise with 3 days, 2 nights. We spent the nights at an island called South Molle Island....absolutely nothing special on the island....the beach was crap. They have a tiny, amateur golf course on the island and I played golf there for the first time ever, together with Nick and Simon (UK) from our group. They’ve played golf a couple of times before already, so I started calling them “posh”, especially Simon. “Posh” in the UK means a person with money, rich, elite. The good beaches we visited were Whitehaven Beach, which is supposed to be among the best beaches in the world. It was indeed a very beautiful beach. Another beach we went to was one near Hayman Island, can’t remember the exact name . We snorkelled twice as well, at spots which are part of the inner reef of the Great Barrier Reef. Very very nice, too bad I don’t have an underwater camera. Usually the Pride of Airlie has big groups of more than 30 or 40 people, but our group was a small one; just 12 of us: 4 from USA, 1 from Ireland, 5 from UK, 1 from Finland and I. I must say it was a great group though, we had a good time as a group and after the trip we all went to dinner together in Airlie Beach (those who stayed an extra night there). The only thing that pissed me off a bit was, that two of the American guys (they were all around their 21, or 22 years) drunk too much one night and they both went to bed earlier than the rest. Back in the room I found one of them sleeping on my bed and he vomited on my bed!!! I had a t-shirt on the bed which got vomited just a little, nothing much, but still gross. So in the morning he had to make him put my shirt in the sink and wash the little vomit off.

So anyway, I left Airlie Beach in an overnight bus further south to Hervey Bay, which is just a little city along the coast with about 50.000 people. Most people visiting the place uses it as a hub to visit Fraser Island. Fraser Island is the largest sand island in the world. The island is quite big, about 1700 square kilometres. This means it’s more than 1,5 times bigger than Aruba, Bonaire and Curaçao together. The island literally consists just of sand: sand, sand and more sand...and a couple of rocks, gorgeous lakes and rainforests, all on sand. The roads all consist of sand too, not just dirt but real sand. That’s why the island is only accessible with a 4WD (four wheel drive) vehicle. We had a group of 11 people and we drove around the island. It was a “self-drive” tour, which means that the tour company provides us the 4WD, the tents, cooking stuff, torches etc., everything we need. And we as a group do the shopping before we go on the island, and of course the cooking too. A ferry took us from Hervey Bay to Fraser Island. The weather wasn’t nice the first day, which ruined it a little. The second day was better, and the third day the best but we didn’t have much time on the third day to drive around. Driving in sand goes very slow and sometimes it could take you an hour to drive just 10 to 15km. The most popular lake is Lake McKenzie, which is a natural fresh water lake in the middle of the island. It’s a good spot to swim, it looks like a normal beach with white sand. We also visited Lake Boomanjin. We drove a long way along the east coast of the island, where you find the wreck of a ship called Maheno, which was caught in a heavy storm in 1935 and was drifted to the island. On the east coast you drive on a beach, a long beach where you’ll see many other 4WD’s and even small aircrafts landing and taking off. It’s prohibited to swim in the ocean, or actually it’s not recommended. The ocean is quite rough, lot’s of waves and there are many sharks. Both nights we spent them at camping grounds located around the island, equipped with toilets, sinks etc. to do your dishes. Rests of food and garbage should never be left outside because there are many dingo’s on the island that are always looking for food. Dingo’s are animals like a mix of dogs and wolves you can say. Generally they are not very dangerous, but they can attack and cause serious injury. They like to attack especially kids younger than 12 years, short people. A couple of years ago a 9 or 10 year old boy died from an attack and his younger brother got severally injured. It’s not allowed to feed these animals otherwise they may stop looking for their own food and/or overpopulate the camping areas. Doing this you risk a fine, which the government established after several attacks on Fraser Island. Everywhere there are signs saying “stay dingo-safe”. “DO NOT feed them, on-the-spot fines apply”. Everywhere in Australia they put signs down warning you about fines for many different things: “Penalties apply”, “offenders will be prosecuted”, “maximum penalty exceeds $2000” etc. etc. Anyway, overall Fraser Island was a great experience, it’s a unique place and no wonder it’s on the UNESCO World Heritage List (same list on which the city of Willemstad, Curaçao is). The weather really made the experience a little bit less enjoyable. In the group we had two Dutchies, one Austrian, one German and six Israeli’s in the group. It wasn’t the first time I’ve met Israeli’s. I’ve met some before but never really interacted much with them, because I never met them in for example a tour group, a hostel etc. I had a lot of fun with them and they were teaching me some Hebrew....it’s a very difficult language but now at least I can count to 20 and say basics like: Hello how are you, that’s cool man, good morning etc. etc. and some other things I prefer not to mention 😉 . I really liked them...they were very nice and friendly, it “clicked” straight away with them. All of them did the army already and were travelling now (all girls must attend the army for 2 years, boys for 3 years when they’re 18 years old). Two of the guys were sent to Lebanon in the war back in summer 2006 and they tell you stories about things they’ve experienced there and also about the whole situation between the Palestinians and Israel which was very interesting to hear. The last night in Hervey Bay I stayed in their room, illegally....didn’t pay for a bed that night but just stayed in their room, nobody would notice anything. They’ve invited me to visit the country when I can and I’m really interested to go, especially Jerusalem I’d like to see. My sister is also crazy about going there so maybe we’ll go together one day. The other way around, they were also invited to Curaçao 😉. They were pleasantly surprised when I told them that we have the oldest synagogue in the Western Hemisphere on our tiny island, built in 1732.

I took the bus early morning from Hervey Bay to arrive at midday in Brisbane, the capital city of Queensland. The city has about 1,8 million people and is the third largest in Australia and was founded in the 1820’s. The city is quite nice and not very busy. The city centre is compact and built along the shores of the Brisbane River, which makes an “S-bend” across the city. The most important shopping street is the Queen Street Mall. Most of the attractions/sites of interest are in walking distance from the city centre. Also in Brisbane they have built a man-made beach and lagoon, like in Cairns and Airlie Beach. Overall my impression on the city wasn’t negative but it wasn’t “great” either...just ok, above average. In Brisbane I met with Manuel who is an Italian backpacker I met in a hostel in Alice Springs and in Adelaide earlier this year. Since then he was talking about wanting to stay in Australia and look for a sponsorship-visa etc. In Brisbane he found a good job at an engineering company (that’s his degree). He’s been working there for 4 months already and has a company car which he can use privately.

I left Brisbane and continued south to Byron Bay which is already in New South Wales. This town has just over 5.000 people. It’s a nice little town, with a beach where you can find many surfers and a lighthouse on top of a hill which is the eastern most point of Australia. Byron Bay is a very popular place for backpackers. Why? There is a nice atmosphere there, good places to go out and a lot of girls! In Byron Bay I caught up with my German mate Moritz from Frankfurt, who I met in Melbourne earlier this year and I consider him as one of my best mates I made in Australia. I didn’t stay at his hostel because it was too expensive so I booked for another one but I literally only slept there. The rest of the day I was in town or at Moritz’s hostel, where I also met with many of his friends. Moritz stays on the camping ground of the hostel himself and works in the kitchen to get free accommodation. The hostel was good, when there we go for a swim, sit in the jacuzzi, play beach volleyball etc. The weather wasn’t very good during my stay in Byron Bay but yet I enjoyed it and I wanted to stay longer. A popular place to go out was Cheeky Monkey’s, the music is ok and there is a lot of people there. The other night we also went to a hotel where they had a live reggae band. Byron Bay has nothing much to offer in my opinion but somehow everyone wants to stay longer or end up staying longer than planned. I wanted to stay longer too.

Then after Byron Bay I went back to Sydney, Australia’s largest and best-known city. I’m staying here at Daniel Wallace’s place, who is Tim Wallace’s brother....my friend from Adelaide. Tim is travelling around the world at the moment (have no idea where he is now, but he spent a long time in Bulgaria recently). Daniel lives in Kings Cross, which is just east of the city centre. Kings Cross, together with the Oxford Street area, are the two main nightlife areas of Sydney. Both areas are very crowded the whole night on Fridays and Saturdays with dozens of clubs, pubs, bars etc....lot’s of people walking on the streets, lot’s of cars, lot’s of neon lights, pizza bas, kebab take away restaurants, 24 hour Mc Donald’s etc. etc. In Oxford Street there are a lot of gays and lesbians since most of their venues are located in this area. It’s a very normal thing here, no surprise that they have their world famous Mardi Grass in Sydney, which is basically like a gay carnival at the end of the summer.
Daniel took me to the horse races, which is a very big thing here in Australia. We went to the Royal Randwick Cup and on this day everyone comes to the races dressed up. Girls with their long dresses or gowns and often with a hat (like Queen Beatrix, lol) and the guys come with their smoking and tie. I went dressed just with my shorts and a t-shirt, so did Daniel and his colleagues. From work they all get free tickets to go, which was good. There were races in other parts of Australia too, and people bet on the horses. That’s what it’s all about basically. There is a LOT of money involved in this horse race betting. I bet twice, $5 on two different horses. One of them finished 3rd and I won $ 8,90 so I actually lost just $ 1,10. But people here bet hundreds of dollars sometimes, it’s crazy.
The next day, after a long sleep, we went to the famous Bondi Beach. The weather was good, so the beach was full of people. And in the summer it will get way busier. Summer is officially starting in two months but it has been 26 C already these days. We walked from Bondi Beach all the way to Coogee Beach, where Daniel’s girlfriend was with a friend. It was like a 5 km walk I think, along the coast and other smaller beaches. The beaches were nicer that I thought and the water is very clear. Along the whole walking path there were many sculptures and art work, which will be there for about 2 months starting this weekend. At Coogee Beach we all went for a swim, but after feeling the cold water temperature I stayed out of the water. We went to a bar nearby for a beer, and then I left Daniel with his girlfriend to go play some beach volleyball with a couple of people outside.

Tomorrow I’ll have a couple of paperwork and stuff to do: closing my Australian bank account, get my last mails (letters) from the Travellers Contact Point, print out some stuff for my superannuation (pension) funds so I can get a big part of that money back, change some Australian Dollars into US Dollars to take to Asia (1 AU$ = 0,70 US$ these days, it fell from 0,98 US$ in July).

Tuesday I leave from Sydney airport with Cathay Pacific airways to Hong Kong, where I’ll catch another plane to Bangkok in Thailand. I’ll spend just two nights there and they fly with Air Asia to Hanoi, Vietnam. I’ll spend about two weeks in Vietnam, travelling southwards overland and then enter Cambodia where I’ll spend one week. From Siem Reap, Cambodia I’ll fly to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia to stay one night. The next day I’ll fly to Manila, Philippines and stay for about 12 days in the country. One of my Filipino managers at Mc Donald’s in Darwin gave me some good tips about places to visit in The Philippines and he taught me some basic Filipino words and sentences. On 27th of November I’ll be back in The Netherlands for two weeks.


Take care everyone, God bless.

Elton



PS: Reef Tax issue for Whitsunday Islands (only if you want to read a bit more 😉 )

One thing that really angered me in Airlie Beach was the reef tax issue. It’s also called the EMC (Environmental Management Charge). It’s a tax that everyone visiting the Great Barrier Reef area has to pay because the area is basically a national park. Our tour company, Koala Adventures, charged us AU$40 on reef tax. You pay a certain amount for the trip, as they say in their advertisements, and they you see that “reef tax is not included”....so that’s the only thing you need to pay extra before boarding the boat, just reef tax and nothing else. Their website says it’s AU$33 but the price is “subjected to change without prior notice”....so you might go there thinking it’s AU$33 and then they say “no, it went up to AU$40”. But obviously everyone pays whatever they say the reef tax is, no matter how much. I spoke to other guests in my room who did a similar kind of trip with other companies and they paid even more for the same reef tax. I found it all strange so the next day, before boarding the boat, I went on the internet to find out more. The website of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority (GBRMPA) says that the EMC (reef tax) is AU$5 per person per day, with a maximum of AU$15...which means that if you stay 4 or 5 days you still pay just AU$15. I found an article from the Queensland Government on the internet as well, warning tour companies about misleading advertisements regarding the reef tax. I called the GBRMPA and explained them what was going on and they told me to sent them an email, so did I. When I came back from the Whitsundays, I got an answer from them where they agreed with me that we should have been charged only AU$15 instead of AU$40 and that they would contact Koala Adventures regarding their advertisement for the reef tax. I printed this e-mail out and went to the office to complaint. The girls in the front started saying things like “did you know that we’re the cheapest on reef tax in town”? I demanded them to let me speak to someone with more authority within the company. I had about a third of our group behind me at this time. After waiting for about 5 minutes, an old, grey haired man came out and asked me to come in the office, which is located in the back of the reception. He was the manager. I explained him what I was thinking about the reef tax issue and that we all are being ripped off. He agreed with me that the reef tax is indeed AU$ 5 per person, per day. When I asked the rest of my AU$25 back he said that I’m not going to get it back. Then he started telling me a lot of bullshit. What he kept saying was: “The government wants us to collect this reef tax but it costs us money to actually do it, it’s a lot of administration work and we’re not happy at all with the fact that we have to collect this tax” Yes, it costs AU$25 to collect AU$15 in tax, the biggest bullshit I’ve ever heard....they’re not happy that they have to collect the tax, but those AU$25 that they charge extra, I’m sure they’re more than happy with it. I told him that my receipt clearly says: 1 X EMC = AU$ 40, just EMC....I couldn’t see administration costs etc. And it even said GST AU$ 1,89 (which is a tax which is included in everything you buy). So they charged me a tax over another tax, and the GBRMPA website clearly says that there is NO GST to be charged over the reef tax. Since when do you pay a tax over another tax? He remained quiet for a while, then he started saying that other tour companies in town charge even more etc. which to me means that they rip off people even more than Koala Adventure does...”so everyone should book with Koalas because they rip you off less than the others”. I told him that I’m going to contact the GBRMPA again and continue with this. They’re all ripping tourists off and tourists have no idea how much the reef tax really is. They robbed just AU$25 from me which is not a lot of money at all so you might think why I’m putting so much effort into this issue, but still it’s not fair and I HATE these kinds of injustice and lies and I think it has to stop. Tour companies risk high fines and even losing their license with these misleading advertisements about the amount of reef tax, and the Office of Fair Trading once published an article to warn tour operators about this. I sent a complaint to the Office of Fair Trading (a department of the Queensland Government) regarding this problem and I hope they will reply.

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