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Published: March 5th 2009
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If you carefully read the previous article, you should know we have now been in Australia for the past 3 weeks. So here is the story of our trip so far.
Sydney, New South Wales
Sydney was the meeting point with Seb, Jems' brother, and Marco, another Minero, who were going to share our experience in Australia. We stayed in Bondi Beach, the "place to be" in Sydney, if not in Australia. Unfortunately we could not swim and enjoy the beach side for 2 reasons: first, the day we landed, there was a shark attack in Bondi Beach where a surfer lost his arm (ce qui nous a fait conclure que Bondi Beach, "ca coute un bras!" dans tous les sens du terme); secondly, rainy clouds deterred (dissuader) us from having a bath.
However, we enjoyed sightseeing the city with its famous Opera House, Botanic Gardens and Aquarium.
We celebrated our reunion in a bar where we showed our dancing skills under the rain in front of a quiet and surprised Aussie posh crowd. It was 9pm but we were partying like it was 4am: it's all about jet lag!
Port Stephens to Nimbin: our trip
in New South Wales
We picked up our car and were quite excited about discovering the Blue Mountains (west of Sydney), but how disappointed we were when we got there and were not able to see anything due to a really bad rainy fog. To keep a memory of them, we took a picture of a postcard (we promise it is the 1st and only one in this trip!). We had to quickly change our plan and head towards Port Stephens where we stayed in a very cosy hostel. Indeed, we played with a kangaroo and saw a koala (the only one so far). Alex, Marco's cousin, joined us for a week and we went with him to Lennox Head near Byron Bay as there was no room there for us. You must be organized when you are 6 people travelling in one single car...
On the way, the rain kept falling and we faced flooded roads! While we were stopping to take pictures of this moment, an impatient truck driver overtook us and from flooded roads, we then were confronted to a flooded car! Byron Bay is well known by surfers for its good waves so we also
tried to ride, but never achieved to do so. We were much better at playing football on the beach (and under the rain, but we still managed to get sunburnt).
From a surfers place, we went to a hippie place called Nimbin. The hostel was really chill out... It was a good opportunity to visit the Borders National Park but once again unexpected events prevented us from achieving our plan. This time, it was a tree blocking the road + leeches (sangsues) in the rainforest we wanted to explore. Luckily, the leeches did not bite us as they could have turned drunk!
Surfers Paradise to Noosa, South Queensland
Once again, Byron Bay did not want us, so we had to go to Surfers Paradise to improve our surfing skills but a rainy weather (the best time for sharks to hunt) deterred us from going into the water. We did not like Surfers Paradise as it is a town based on tourism only with high and ugly buildings. 12 days after our arrival in Australia, and only half day of sun: we had to do something!
So we headed to Manly, a quiet town south of Brisbane. We met
Laura a nice girl from Sydney who was really lucky as she was the only girl sharing a room with 6 French guys: her dream came true!
Back in our car now more spacious as we were only 4 left (as we dropped off Marco and Alex), we spent an afternoon in Brisbane with the sun shining! This city is very welcoming and the artificial beach resort on the river side looks much better than any Paris Plage!
Still trying to flee (fuir) from the bad weather, we went to Noosa, nicknamed "Nice" by the Lonely Planet. We rented a boat to enjoy the river but the trip got shortened by the rain again and a sandbank (banc de sable) where we got stuck.
Heron Island, Queensland
Time had come for us to make a major shift in our trip (and budget...). Enough bad weather, we decided to spend 3 days on a paradisiac isolated tropical island located on the Great Barrier Reef 70km offshore Gladstone, also known as a top diving destinations. It started with a very rough sea, making people sea sick on the boat, but not us! On the island, the first 2 days were
rainy but snorkelling (masque + tuba) and diving were still great experiences. We saw and dived with giant turtles, sharks, rays and plenty of magnificent fish & multi-colored corals. At night, we spotted endangered turtles nesting and baby turtles freshly born running to the sea, trying to escape the hunting sea gulls (mouettes). Luckily the last day was sunny and the island really became like heaven (that was when all the pictures were taken!)
Myella Farm, Baralaba, Inland of Queensland
But our trip was not only about sea, beach and sun! We wanted to experience another side of Australia (the Oz world as locals say). So we went straight to a 1000-hectare farm in the middle of the Queensland state (that is to say, in the middle of nowhere). We really appreciated our welcoming hosts (Lynn, Peter, Sharon) in these lovely countryside landscapes. We became real farmers for 2 days by milking the cows as well as driving them to the cowshed (etable), taking care & riding horses and helping out Peter, the 74 year old owner (still in good shape). We also enjoyed the pool and rode motorbikes in the bush to admire a superb Australian sunset.
Indeed, the sun shone all the time we stayed at the farm.
The last day we attended a teaching lesson of a typical Aussie farmer sport. The goal: by riding a horse whipless (sans fouet), achieving to drive a cow wherever you want it to go. Good news is that the students were all cowgirls (pictures are better than any comments).
After a trip in the Whitsundays Islands (cf. next article), we are now Mission Beach, 120km south of Cairns where our trip will end next Monday. So you will receive a last update next week. But do not hesitate to leave us your comments, we love hearing from you and reading your reactions.
As usual, you can find all the articles we have published since the beginning of the trip at the below link:
http://www.travelblog.org/bloggers/los mineros/
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Time to say goodbye....
Alors les mineros, je vois que pas trop de chance niveau temps...eh oui ca arrive a tout le monde, meme a vous! Le voyage touche a sa fin, j'espere que vous n'etes pas trop deg? Merci pour toutes les photos et recits, j'ai vu Marco flash eclair one night in Bangkok- Maxwell, trop con de se rater (t'as fais expres ou quoi?) - Jems will we see you again or not? Tu restes in Australia ou tu passes par ici on the return to France? Timo enjoy a fond les ballons L'Indonesie et tu le sais un stop par SAMRONG /SAMPHAWOOD - TONG PAI quand tu veux, je reponds a ton mail demain promis. Et surout la bise a Simon (vous lui avez fait ou pas?:-)) Gros bisous a vous 3 et pour finir en chanson a la Bocelli, je dirais "time to say goodbye..."