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Published: September 28th 2009
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WELL..... HI! after a long period of silence we have returned! Du--Du--Doo!!!! (Imagine trumpets and fanfare...)
Let's see if we can successfully update y'all on our travels, amazing moments, and goofy times of the past few days since we left the Whitsundays.
Waking up early we got a jump start on the day, getting information from Tracy, our amazing travel agent, preparing for our long drive down the coast to a tiny town that we had heard of from fellow travelers- one that was not in our original plans. Apparently it's a super quiet town and really the only worthwhile place to stop within a good day's drive of Airlie Beach. While we are booking our hostel for the night we hear a cry of help from 2 fellow american travelers, and like the super friendly helpful midwestern folk we are we come to their aide. They are trying to hire a car and none are available, so since we were headed in the same direction we offer to give them a lift. Secretly I believe it is because we are trying to fill the void of the road trip dog we wanted to pick up along the way
but hadn't found yet... kidding. So off the 4 of us go, chatting and laughing our way 2 hours south to Mackay, complete with a stop at the mall for a new working phone among other goods. We actually felt bad dropping them off at the hostel there... nothing in that town was the remote bit exciting.
Down to 2 amigos to occupy the Tiida, we had to entertain ourselves somehow along the 5 hour drive to the Town of 1770. Somehow a roadkill checklist evolved. And somehow we became excited when a mound was spotted on the road ahead. IT's soooo WRONG. We know. Something unexplainable happens when you are in the outback for 5 hours... It can drive you crazy. The grand total for less than 5 hours was 44... It averaged out to be a roadkill sighting every 3.8 minutes. Ok, I feel bad just writing about it so moving on...
The Beachside Backpackers hostel in 1770 was pretty much brand new, with free laundry!!!! You have never seen girls more excited to do their chores than us that night. A few rowdy games of ping pong were played and we chilled with our roommates
and traded dive stories to round out the night.
The next morning we walk to the beach that the hostel backs. We find a lot of jellies on the beach and it kinda freaks us out- no way are we getting in that water to surf! We enjoyed the beach from the safety of the sand. Today we have a tad more interesting drive- we take a few back roads instead of the main highway... which is also just a road... A few times we had to make stops. One reason was to take pictures of funny, meaningful signs (these pertain to certain people- so some of you will get a special picture update from us, we don't want to bore everyone with a ton of inside jokes), and another to pet the horses that happened to be grazing close to the road. We should probably have a bumper sticker that says "Beware: stops suddenly for horses."
A drive through Bundaberg proves to be a great decision! Our original destination is the Turtle Rookery, even though the turtle season doesn't start till mid October. Along the way we run into the Bundaberg Ginger Beer tasting room/tour/factory building that
is shaped like a half barrel laying on it's side. I don't know if we have mentioned how much we loooooove ginger beer that Ursula introduced us to, but we will just say we freaked out a little... took the tour (which was quite entertaining and Jessa thought the environmental graphics were superb), tasted all the brands of Bundaberg soda-things, and picked out a sample six pack. And despite the name, it's not alcoholic- we even passed up the Bundaberg rum factory for this place! Believe us, it's delish. If you ever come across it try it out.
The turtle rookery was a bit of a disappointment- it was a ghost town. We saw the famous beach where the turtles come to lay their eggs, but the closest we got to a turtle were the fake ones behind the glass in the visitors center. We at least got to finally hear a kookaburra call! Which made us giggle. And get the kookaburra song stuck in our heads... "Kookaburra sits in an old gum tree...." The drive back to the highway was all through farm land. Which stunk. Literally. And the sun was mighty intense- we had to lather on
the sunscreen in the car and put towels over our shoulders to attempt to get some relief from Mr. Shine.
Hervey Beach was the stopping point for the night. We checked out the beach first thing- the sand is the softest we have felt! Softer than Whitehaven. But Whitehaven is still the prettiest. How we'd describe it is that Whitehaven is sugar scrub sand, and Hervey is powdered sugar. Dolphins were playing off of the pier, which was still exciting even though we see them all the time in LA. We passed a ginormous shark on the way in to town also, but forgot to go back and take a picture. Still regretting that! You are lucky Shannon... We drive and call around a bit to the hostels in the area and decide to stay at one called Fraser Rover. We cook dinner, relax, and enjoy the space and quiet of our room- there are 4 of us in a 14 bed room.
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Pam (Rabbit) Elj
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hi guys
Well your news is still pretty exciting (sharks-wow!) Heard about a dust storm there but I think it was around Sydney-so hopefully that's not by you guys. Love the horse pictures. Was the stinger a jelly fish? I'm still trying to learn about this neat place that I'll probably never get to see-so thanks for sharing!