Zig Zagging our way up the East Coast

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We have spent the last couple of weeks zig zagging from the bush to the coast - it has been brilliant. From the Blue Mountains we had initially planned to go back to the coast, but we have seen so many beautiful beaches and know we will see more when we visit north Queensland, that we decided to go outback for a change of scenery - it was a decision we were pleased we made - the outback (countryside to us) is amazing. The Great Dividing Range meanders up the east coast in this part of New South Wales, so the views we were to witness over the next few days were incredible. We also wanted to see a little of the real Australia, rather than sticking to the tourist route.


Our journey from Katoomba to Dubbo, further inland, took us through lots of small towns including Bathurst, Orange and Malong - all with wonderful art deco architecture. It was difficult to keep our eyes on the road as we tried to spy a better example than the one before as we moved through.


Our next stop was Dubbo, a busy industrial town with a compact town centre. It's main claim to fame is the West Plains Zoo just 6 kms from the centre. We haven't been to a zoo since we took Matthew and Jo when they were very young and that was during a holiday in France one summer. Not lovers of caged animals, we were assured that this would be very different - it was. The animals are segregated by a series of moats, which gave the whole park a feeling of wide open space and all animals had plenty of room to roam. We spent most of the day there, but our interest was mainly held by the native animals - kangeroos, if you look very carefully at the picture you can see the legs of a little joey hanging out of the pouch of the smaller kangeroo, wallabies, wombats, kaola, dingoes and emus. But all the animals all looked very well cared for and quite happy in their surroundings - although I am still not convinced!


Not far from Dubbo we stopped at Coonabarabran. Because of its position Coonabarabran is an ideal place for observing the stars because of the dark and cloudfree skies. The obversatory is open to the public, so off we trotted to have a look. As we approached the building we ran into low cloud and by the time we reached the top of the hill and parked in the car park - we couldn't even see the observatory which was only a matter of metres away from us! But still, it was quite interesting to see the telescopes, and some of the pictures they had of solar happenings were amazing - the colours incredible.


From zoo to observatory - what next? Tamworth - the country and western capital of New South Wales. But in the three days we stayed here (bank holiday weekend - Queen's birthday) we couldn't find anywhere playing country and western music. Not a cowboy hat to be found. May I add it was a freezing weekend and I can't blame everyone for staying indoors. We did manage to walk the Kamilaroi Trail - a very rocky footpath to a mountain lookout - it's always great to be out of doors and the weather improved to give us some sunshine. The earth is beginning to become redder as we work our way inland and the colours here were lovely.


Driving from Tamworth to Dorrigo and then on to Bellingen offered us incredible scenery particularly towards the end of the drive - little villages (very English with roses up round the doors!) and small communities. We hadn't realised that we had been slowly driving uphill until we left Dorrigo and made our way to Bellingen - the road wound its way down the mountain side falling away to the valley below, the trees disappearing far into the distance. We had a full day of natural beauty here visiting the Dorrigo National Park - the Dangar Falls, the Skywalk, the rainforest walk (wow, these rainforests don't ever disappoint!), Yellow Carobeen trees that can grow to 55mts!, the Crystal Shower Falls and the Tristian Falls - all flowing quite well because of the recent heavy rains. What a beautiful part of the country.


From Bello we moved back to the coast to Byron Bay - well we couldn't miss out BB could we? The drive to Byron Bay was superb. We saw our first sugarcane and banana plantations, it just hadn't occurred to me that these crops would be grown here - I guess I just hadn't thought about it.


We spent just one day in Byron staying overnight at the YHA. There is no doubt it is absolutely beautiful. The beach is idyllic and in summer must be a magnet for all the trendy people who live in and visit Byron, it just goes on forever and the sea perfect for all the water sports you can think of. We walked up to the Cape Byron Lighthouse and joined the 'whale watchers' looking patiently out to sea. The Humpback Whales migrate from the Antartic at this time of the year swimming to the warmer waters of the Whitsundays, where they breed and give birth to their young and swim back south later in the year. So all eyes were focussed on the seas before us. We stayed a while, but only saw a few 'blows' and very little other activity. But we did see our first pod of dolphins!


Nimbin - here we come! A recommendation brought us to this very hippy wacky place. This was to be an education. Stuck in a time warp Nimbin still retains the hippyness of the 70's, psychodelic shopfronts and psychodelic people. However, Nimbin is not only well known for its hippy funky lifestyle, but for the 'hash' cookies that can be bought in the High Street - it is very popular with young tourists travelling around the country and a bunch of tours are organised to include a visit to the town. Mike and I sat in total absorbtion as we 'people watched'. Although drugs are illegal, the police have to almost turn a blind eye to it. However anything 'hard' is definitely not ok.


Our main reason for staying at Nimbin was its closeness to Mount Warning and its national park. The walk to the summit of Mount Warning was recommended to us by a number of people, so we decided it was one we had to do. Because of its location the summit is the first point in Australia to have the sun strike it each day and therefore has a significance in the aboriginal culture as a sacred site. We made the ascent - beautiful views, but didn't quite reach the top - the last part is accessed by pulling yourself up on chains. its very steep and rocky. We began to climb up, but turned round part way - only to find young children happily making their way to the top! Oh well you can't win then all! At the hostel we got to know the resident dog very well - Charlie Bananas - a Labradooble - we'd never seen one before and he was wonderful, so friendly and full of fun.


Now, are you still with us - where next - well Brisbane ofcourse. Our drive from Nimbin to Brisbane took us to the Gold Coast. Our hearts sank to our feet - highrisers - 20+ stories high working their way along the coast. It really was quite a shock after all the lovely bays that we had seen - this was serious tourism.


We had only one full day in Brisbane, so we bought ourselves ferry tickets and rod the ferries up and down the river hopping on and off at different points. It's a real mix of old and new. The central squares are quite spectacular particularly at night when they are all lit up. A very clean and compact city to explore. We really didn't do is justice, but we need to spend some time planning a trip we wanted to do and this was the ideal location to do so.


From the city back to the beach, moving up to the Sunshine coast. We crossed from New South Wales into Queensland where the motto is 'One day beautiful, the next day Perfect'. It was freezing - the coldest weather since records began and we didn't get to see the sun for a number of days (but compared to the weather you are currently suffering (30th June) we were having it pretty good!). We stopped at Noosa - wow - now that's what you call a beach (we did manage to get a sunset - see photo, but unfortunately not one surfer to be found). Very upmarket, very nice and in the summer must be absolutely heaven. So time to put the walking boots on again and spend a bit of time wandering the tracks of Noosa National Park. It's quite strange really because when we were in NZ people told us that walking in Australia wasn't really all that good. But we have found so many National Parks and the walks have been wonderful - you just have to look that little bit further afield and there they are!


So our last port of call for this report is Hervey Bay. A very flat sprawling mass of residential properties interspersed with small groups of shops. The 15km Esplanade Track followed the beach and we walked to the end of the Urangan Pier - all of 1.5km long! But the reason for coming to Hervey Bay is that it is the launching point for Fraser Island and we had booked ourselves on a day trip to this World Heritage site.


Picked up at 6.25 and taken to the ferry for our crossing to the island, we were clad in thick jumpers, hats and gloves! The island is made up completely of sand and measures 120km x 15km. The island is beautifully lush and much of it is rainforest. Our Ranger Guide and 4 wheel drive bus was awaiting our arrival. Tracks throughout the island are hard work for all vehicles and definitely not suitable for a basic 2 wheel drive. Anyone can take their vehicle over and spend time on the island. There are plenty of camp sites (permits needed) and a holiday resort too with top class accommodation. We leart about the fauna, the birds, the rainforests, dingoes (although we didn't get to see any), dunes and sandblows, coloured sands, the wreck of the Mahino, a luxury cruise liner that came ashore in 1935 and is still there, but the highlight of the day was Lake McKenzie - a freshwater lake of beautiful blue with white sands. We also managed to see some Humpback Whales - this time raising the whole of their body weight (up to 40 tonnes out of the water) - majestic! It was a wonderful opportunity to see the island and we had to keep reminding ourselves that everything grew in the sand base.


Snakes, this one is a carpet python about 3m in length - not the first one we've come across, but hopefully there won't be too many more .........


Back soon - so keep looking out for us .......

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