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Published: March 2nd 2010
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Hi guys, we are now in OZ, and it feels good. We arrive early morning but the temperature is scorching. Someone tells us it has been 40 degrees that week and we are not looking forward to working in that heat but we havnt got a job yet so we dont have to worry about that yet. We are dropped off at our hostel but it is under refurbishment so we are told to go to the Youth shack down the road. Here i am with my twenty bags and poeple start to congragate on the path which gets me annoyed until Craig points out there is a 15 foot alligator on the other side of the road. So i stop and take a look. Now dont panic because he wasnt wandering about but strapped to a long trailer as they were moving him from the The Crocosauraus Cove as he was too big to get through the door, hence the big crane that was parked beside him i thought.
The girl who check us into the hostel speaks in a familiar accent and we find out she is from our neck of the woods, Durham. She is very friendly
for stupid oclock in the morning and she puts us in a room with no one in so we can catch some zzzz. I forgot to mention it was the 2nd of February and my birthday. woop woop!!! We dont really do anything special apart from applyng for a tax file number and opening a bank account. oh.... we also went shopping and Craig and I cooked in the hostel a nice romantic dinner, cant remember what we had but im guessing beans on toast. lol No actually i have consulted my diary and it was actually spag bol. We met two nice guys in our room and they gave us some great advice about working in OZ. Thanks Joe and Sarah!!!!
The next day we spent alot of time on the internet looking for jobs and everyone i rang was so mean. Craig didnt do any phone work and it was starting to get me down. I know they must get a million phone calls but i didnt know they had filled their positions. We received a free meal at the vic hotel with a voucher Joe and Sarah gave us, and it wasnt half bad. It was
the first time i had mash potato in... well i cant remember and it was fab. It came with a crocodile sausage and a buffalo one. mmmmmmmm!!!! We decided to do some touristy things the next day and went to the oil tunnels and the USS Peary memorial. The sun was blazing and i must of lost half my body weight. Even when the showers came it did not ease the 38 degree heat.
It was Friday and our fourth day in Oz and we decided to move on as there was no jobs in the area. We had booked a relocation van from Apollo and we picked it up early that morning. But would you believe it that day someone wanted a couple to start work on their farm ASAP, i was Gutted but i guess it happened for a reason. When we walked into the lot of the camper place we saw a few different types of van and thought the little high top one was ours, boy were we wrong, we were given a huge long thing with a shower and toilet. I made Craig drive first as i was not comfortable. We headed along the
Stuart Highway out of town stopping at the aviation museum were we stood next to a B52. This was incrediable as we had seen peices of one in Vietnam but hadnt actully known the size of the beast til now.
So off we drove. We covered approx 400km that afternoon, stopping briefly in Katherine for food supplies. We stayed at a campsite in Mataranka that was the capital of the Never Never (any1 remember off Australia the movie??). We were told to visit a hot springs so decided to drive the 2 km. I was pretty good at driving Apollo Creed, our name for the camper. When we got there i wanted to go for a swim but Craig was paranoid about gators and convinced me not to go in. That night we had a swim in the pool and a dip in the jacuzzi. we saw peacocks and wallabies or baby kangaroos we couldnt tell.
Day 2 of our overland trip and we drove 750km and stayed at a campsite in the middle of nowhere called Barkly homestead. There was a million flies here and we spent most of our time in the van. I washed some
clothes and they dried in less than an hour, it was crazy hot. Day 3 and we drove to Richmond which was 890km. On our way we stopped at Mount Isa but it was like a ghost town and nothing was open. We presumed this was because it was a Sunday but im guessing thats what its like all the time. That night we stopped by a lake and it was nice to chill and watch the sun go down. When you are driving in the outback there are many signs showing pictures of kangaroos meaning watch out you dnt hit them and we saw many dead ones on the side of the road. So you must drive slowly and carefully. I however did hit and kill two birds and there was no avoiding them. So RIP little birdies. Craig and I both shared the driving, Craig probably did 70% and i did the rest, this was only becasue Craig is a terrible passenger. But he managed to keep his killing total to nil, i dont know how that happend. There was absolutly nothing when we were driving but would pass a car every now and again. We would wave
to everyone and see if they would return our greetings. Some poeple did and others were grumpy and didnt. The outback was a lovely shade of red and that would get greener as we got closer to the coast.
Day 4 and 760 km we were back to civilisation. We drove to townsville and picked up some shopping and headed to camp at mission beach. After setting up camp we headed to the beach and when we were waste deep in someone told us it was dangerous to swim due to jellyfish. ooopsey!!! Our last day and we only had 140km to go. We left at 10am and made our way to Cairns. We were slightly dissappointed that we had to part with Apollo Creed but happy to be staying put for more than one night.
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