Australia - Travels up the East Coast

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Australia - East Coast

So after a teary goodbye we waved off everyone at Manly Wharf and made our way to the airport to catch a short flight up the coast to Byron Bay. When we arrived the first thing we noticed was how green the area was as we expected it to be more sandy as it was generally hotter the further north you go.
We checked into our hostel - Nomads Odyssey, which is a chain of hostels throughout New Zealand and Oz that tends to have a reputation of being packed full of 18 year olds, constantly on the piss and trying to pull everyone in there! The only reason we booked this hostel was because it was brand new, located in the centre of Byron and was relatively cheap.
It was the first time back in a dormitory with random people for nearly 9 months, so was a bit weird at first and we felt quite old as the majority of the people there couldn’t have been above 20!
As it was getting dark we went for a quick walk around the town and were shocked at the number of hippies that were around the place. While we were there we had a competition to see who could spot the hippy with the longest dreadlocks, which Kim won spotting a strange looking guy who had ‘dreads’ down to his feet!! Early the following morning we were both rudely awaken by the sound of giggling from the bed behind Kim, and sure enough a random boy (we say boy, because he was very young) had sneaked into one of our roommates bed and was frolicking with the young Swedish girl. As this was only our first night back in dorms we wasn’t very happy and from there on we decided to pay a little extra for our own room :O)

The following day we took an epic walk along the beautiful beach and up to the famous lighthouse that is situated on the most Eastern peninsular of Australia. We didn’t stay long in Byron Bay, as our schedule up the East coast was pretty hectic but from our brief time there we can say it is a lovely little town and wish we could have spent a little longer there.

From Byron Bay we caught the Greyhound bus to Brisbane; where we were due to meet up with our friends Hui and Cheong who were kindly putting us up for a few days. On our first night they thoughtfully offered to take us out for dinner at a Japanese / Korean BBQ restaurant, which was superb and allowed us to sample such foods as Ox tongue, sting ray and a strange little dish that was made up of raw beef and raw egg……Unfortunately these new exotic foods didn’t exactly agree with Kim’s stomach causing her to have severe cramps throughout the next day when we caught a flight up to the Whitsunday Islands (Great Barrier Reef). When we landed the pain had got so bad that Kim was unable to walk and we both agreed that she should go to the hospital in case it was food poisoning. We hitched a lift with a random guy that kindly offered to drive us there and when we arrived we wasn’t sure whether or not the hospital was actually open as it was deserted. We managed to find A&E, which consisted of two nurses and a strange man who was talking to himself and assumed that as we were now in the country it must be like this the majority of the time and were happy when Kim got seen to straight away. After a quick consultation with the nurse and doctor they agreed that it was food poisoning and quickly produced a syringe (including huge needle) to take away the pain. Kim’s face simply turned white and looked at James in shocked, who couldn’t help but laugh as he went behind the curtain while Kim got a prick in the bum :O) Upon returning James noticed that Kim now had a pleasant smile on her face and we were advised we could leave once the pain had subsided.
When we told Hui and Cheong of our little adventure they felt very guilty and promised to never open our minds to new foods and instead take us to McDonalds next time.

So after our little hospital setback we went back to Airlie Beach where we checked into our hostel (called Beaches) and crashed out for the night. The following day Kim spent most of the day relaxing and getting over her ordeal from the night before and James went exploring. There wasn’t that much to see in Airlie beach apart from the beach and the man-made lagoon and the main reason why backpackers head up here is to sail around a group of islands on the Great Barrier Reef, known as the Whitsundays. So we booked ourselves on to a two day tour with the same company we used to sail around the Fiji Island (Awesome Adventures) which consist of one day relaxing on a pontoon located on the outer reef and another day sailing around the islands on a catamaran.

To get to the pontoon and outer reef required a picturesque 3 hour boat ride briefly sailing past the Whitsundays and out to sea. Unfortunately when we arrived at the Great Barrier Reef we didn’t feel it lived up to the hype as the water wasn’t a turquoise or as clear as we had expected. We later noticed the same about the coral and fish and was told that it tends not to look like the postcards as the photographers use ‘strobe lighting’ (bright light to illuminate) to bring out all the colours when taking photos.
We spent a fun 4 hours on the pontoon; swimming, snorkelling, diving, sunbathing and using the water slide but were left a little disappointed due to what we had expected the reef to look like. The highlight of the day was definitely spotting and swimming with the huge Mari Rass fish which is famous for being very friendly and allowing you to stroke him.

The following day we were up nice and early to board the Camira catamaran for a full days sailing around the beautiful Whitsunday Islands. The day included stopping off at several spots to go snorkelling and dinner at Whitehaven beach; well-known for its sand being 98% silica. After a full day lazing around and drinking free beer we returned to the harbour at Airlie beach and witnessed a superb sunset, which James went crazy for and must have taken a hundred photos of the same thing.
The next day we returned to Brisbane for a brief stop over before getting the Greyhound bus up to Hervey Bay, the ferry port that links to Fraser Island.

Fraser Island is the biggest sand island in the world, and is literally a giant sand dune with a dense forest in the middle. The reason it attracts so many tourists and backpackers is for the notorious 4x4 driving, which unfortunately was in the news recently as two English people died because they flipped and rolled their jeep on the beach. However as always this never stopped James and he was quite insistent he wanted to give it a go; so to the dismay of Kim we booked the 2 day, 1 night self drive camping trip for his birthday.

After booking the trip we headed straight to the super market to purchase drink and birthday food for the following evening and then had an early night as we had to have a safety briefing and pick up our Suzuki jeep at 6am.

So we woke up bright and early on James’s birthday and sat through the safety briefing quite sleepy eyed, but didn’t mind as we got to watch our first sun rise for sometime. An hour later after being told the Do’s and Don’t of 4x4 driving along with high and low tide times we were off on our way to the catch the barge across to Fraser Island.
It was all very exciting up to the point that we were told we had to reverse up a very steep ramp on to the barge and as we had the smallest jeep we were told to go last to they could squeeze us into a small gap. James was already a little nervous, so it didn’t help with all the pressure of everyone watching, including about 100 school children cheering us on but we made it up on our first attempt…..how hard could this 4x4 driving be!?

One hour later we docked, James put the car into 4 wheeled drive mode and we were straight off (as we were last on, we were first off) having our first experience of off-road driving in sand. The first thing we noticed was it wasn’t as easy as we presumed. This was because the majority of the 4x4 jeeps were a lot bigger than our little Suzuki and therefore had a wider gap between the wheels. So when we tried to drive in the flatten sand that they had left, one side of our car would be on the track while the other sides wheels would be in deep sand causing us to drive at an obscure angle and regularly sliding all over the place. Even though it was quite challenging it was clear that James was enjoying himself a little more than Kim was. Along with the deep sand and constant sliding we had to negotiate our way over, around or even through huge roots protruding from the ground, deep craters in the road and of course the bumpy terrain whilst always on the look out for wild dingo’s.

Before we left we got given a suggested itinerary so that we could see as many of the tourist hotspots within the safety of the high & low tide times. But after an hour of driving and sliding over the rough terrain we soon realised we wasn’t where we were suppose to be….instead somehow we had managed to do a big loop and return back to the barge, so much for Kim’s navigational skills! Eventually we got back on track and headed off to see Lake Wabby, a large lake surrounded by huge sand dunes. After attempting some sand dune surfing we got back in the jeep and headed off towards the beach and en route we spotted our first wild dingo!

An hour behind schedule we eventually found the beach and soon realised that we better get a move on as the tide was quickly coming in and we had to cover about 10km’s to find our campsite. Now driving on the beach wasn’t as easy as we first thought and as we were struggling to find areas of hard sand to drive the jeep across and was tending to get stuck in the soft sand causing driving to be very difficult and a nasty burning smell (we assumed to be the clutch) to gas us out inside. Sure enough the little jeep couldn’t handle any more and got bogged down in the sand literally 2 meters away from the sea. This caused James to go into a state of extreme panic as he was sure we were going to get washed away with his credit card balance not far behind. Obviously this was all Kim’s fault as it was her dodgy navigating skills that caused us to be on the beach when the tide was coming in, but with James close to tears and running around shouting at her she kept her cool and kindly asked some fishermen to give us a hand manoeuvring the jeep out. Kim jumped out of the jeep as it was making some strange noises and after several attempts James managed to get the jeep moving again. Instead of stopping to pick Kim up he thought it best to drive about a mile down the beach where the sand was firmer and therefore forcing Kim to jog after him. Rather than continue down the beach for the remaining 7km’s in pursuit of the recommend campsite, we cut our losses and returned a few hundred meters to a sheltered area we thought would make a good campsite.
Once of the beach we had a brief argument about the best site to pitch our tent; Kim wanted to camp in the open and on the sand so that no creepy crawlies would wander into our tent from the forest, whereas James was auguring that the more sensible position would be on the higher-firmer ground behind the trees to avoid the wind and evade any potential flooding. Once we agreed that James spot was more logical he began putting the tent up while Kim went looking for a suitable toilet spot and shouting orders at James not to put the tent too close to the long grass. What James didn’t realise until later that night when we were trying to get some sleep that he had positioned the tent over hard humps of sand which were dotted on the ground in our area...obviously home to some large creature!

With the tent successfully up we settled in for the evening and cracked open a few bottles of wine to celebrate James’s Birthday. As night dawned we began to prepare dinner which consisted of mushroom soup for starter, pasta in sauce for main course and of course birthday cake for dessert. After dinner James opened all his birthday cards and consumed the remainder of the wine before going to bed as there wasn’t much else to do. Shortly after it started to rain and progressively got heavier as the night went on and just as we were drifting off to sleep around midnight James had to wake Kim up saying “Babes don’t panic but the tent is flooding”……As we were trying to scoop water out and desperately trying not to touch the sides of the tent, the heavens suddenly opened and the water started pouring through and soaking everything. We briefly discussed our options and decided to put all our stuff in the jeep to keep dry and pray that the rain passes. Unfortunately our hopes were flattened as the rain was just getting heavier and the tent was looking like it might collapse. Once again James was on the verge of a breakdown and was running around in his wet boxer shorts shivering and muttering some explicit language therefore Kim leapt into action and ordered a delirious James into the car to dry off. It was soon becoming clear we wouldn’t be returning to the tent and would be forced to spend the night in the car. So with our legs more or less around our neck we tried to get comfortable and get some shut eye which was proving quite difficult due to the noise of the rain.

Several hours later the sun starts to creep up and unfortunately the weather is no better. Cold and sleep deprived we agree that there is no point continuing driving around the island as the visibility is very poor and the driving conditions were getting worse by the hour, so we agreed that we should make our way back to the barge and head back to the main land to get some rest. Under the cover of our umbrella we packed up the tent and headed off on the 3 hour treacherous drive back to the barge. Back on the main land we dropped off the jeep and gave a sigh of relief as it had been a pretty epic camping trip and a very memorable birthday for James. We were particularly annoyed when one of the staff told us that the tents were not waterproof as they couldn’t afford the costs…a bit late for us!

After Fraser Island we caught the Greyhound bus down to Noosa, an affluent area surrounded by holiday villas, posh restaurants and parks. It was here that James saw his first wild possum shouting “Crikey…it’s a wild possum” taken the mick out of the Australian accent…he was particularly embarrassed when he turned around to found an Australian family stood right behind him laughing! We only spent a few days in Noosa and used it as a base to visit Australia Zoo which is owned and managed by the late Steve Irwin and his family.

We were both really excited about visiting the Zoo and had been looking forward to it for a long time as we are both big fans of Steve Irwin and his program - The Crocodile Hunter. As soon as we arrived James couldn’t contain himself and went running off shouting ‘Crikey!!!!’ in an Australian accent leaving Kim cringing and apologising to an ozzy couple. The zoo was very impressive and it was quite moving to see the number of tributes that had been paid to Steve. His passion for wildlife was clearly reflected in the staff around the zoo as they were all very enthusiastic and cared a lot for the animal’s well-being. Obviously there was a large number of croc’s and the crocodile show was really good, but our highlight was watching the tiger show where the keepers spent the whole session playing and swimming with 6 juvenile tigers.

After Noosa we were back on the bus heading back to Brisbane to stay with Hui and Cheong again and use the opportunity to visit family who live in Brisbane. James has a great aunty and a second cousin who he has never met before and Kim an aunty who all lived within an hour of each other around north Brisbane. James was slightly nervous prior to meeting his family, but had no need to be as Brenda (great aunty), Cathy (second cousin) and her family were all lovely and it was a great experience to meet them. It felt a little like ‘Surprise Surprise’ meeting up with long lost family. The following day we visited Kim’s Aunty Linda and Uncle John and stayed with her for the night before returning once again to Brisbane to stay with Hui and Cheong.
That weekend we celebrated Hui’s 29th birthday by joining her and her friends for a night of crazy drinking games, fancy dress and of course strong cocktails made by the bar-steward Cheong, whose signature cocktails was the ‘Sex on Cheong. We didn’t know what was in it, and thought it best not to ask and they seemed to get us merrily drunk!!

Our time in Australia had finally come to an end, and after 8 months of living the Ozzy lifestyle in Sydney and several weeks travelling around we waved goodbye to Australia and were quite teary eyed as it had been our home for so long and had given us the chance to make new friends, catch up with old ones and even meet new family. We have so many great memories and some amazing photos that we will no doubt look back on and smile.
So we leave the familiar sights, sounds and smells of the ‘western’ world and head over the equator to South East Asia to explore the jungles, mountains and huge cities that it has to offer. To prepare Kim has been busy practicing her squatting technique as James has warned her about the ‘hole in the ground’ toilets while James is eagerly preparation a detailed itinerary of volcanoes to conquer and islands to visit.

Out for now!!

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Photos

James
Kim is taking this from the under water viewinig deck

This is the tide coming in!!
James was on the verve of passing out at this stage.