One of our toughest debates about our Australian trip was whether we would head up north to Cairns, Queensland to check out the Great Barrier Reef. In the end, we decided not to go for several reasons including cost, time, and most crucially, the merits of the visit to the reef. The Great Barrier Reef has suffered a lot from overexposure to tourists, so we thought it could use a rest from dealing with the likes of us. That left us with a little problem of how to fill a reef-sized hole in our schedule. Victoria state boasts Australia's Great Ocean Road, but we were struck by all the big green areas on our map in the central area and along the east coast of the state of New South Wales, so we decided to head
... read more