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Published: February 19th 2008
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The last 7 weeks have flown by and we have now handed back the camper van and are getting ready to fly to New Zealand for the next part of our adventure!! So far in Oz we have driven 6000kms from Melbourne to Cape Tribulation, held MASSIVE spiders and been swimming with jelly fish, it really has been one hell of an adventure!!
Since the last blog we have been really busy, when we were planning our trip we listed the things we really wanted to do in Oz and they have all happened in Queensland!! From leaving Brisbane we headed to Australia Zoo to see the crocs and pay homage to the late great Steve Irwin. The zoo was as good as they say, as you can imagine Steve Irwin is everywhere, there is even a Steve doll!! The highlights included the croc shows (those people don't get paid enough for getting that close!!) and the 6 month old baby tigers who were learning to swim... sooo cute!! The zoo is at the bottom of the Glass House mountain range and I don't know what came over us but Rich and I decided to stay the night in the
area and climb one the next day. I don't know what we were thinking, if you remember the hill tribe trek in Thailand nearly killed us but we decided to try the mountain anyway!! After a lot of huffing and puffing we made it to the top and were rewarded by some of the most amazing views across the whole mountain range!! It may have been the smallest mountain there but as least we can say we climbed a mountain on our own!!
On the way up the coast we spent a few nights recharging our batteries in Noosa and then it was on to Rainbow beach for our trip to Fraser Island! This was one of the things we had both been really looking forward to so I was gutted when we woke up and it was tipping it down! (this is supposed to be summer in Australia for goodness sake!!) However we shouldn't have worried, not only were we upgraded from our camping site to a resort but the island is gorgeous even when it rains!! As soon as we got to the island we thanked our lucky stars we had chosen to take the tour, you
could not get around the island without a 4x4, it was off roading to the extreme, the whole island is made of sand so there were no sealed roads just mud tracks, our driver was brilliant though and as we were in a private 4x4 we had an amazing time, however there were a few bruised cheeks by the end !!! The best bit of the whole trip (and there were so many good bits) was swimming in the lakes, all fresh water and all absolutley beautiful!! We even had a bit of sun for the last day!!
We could have spent ages on Fraser but we had arranged to meet Capricorn Dave in Rockhampton for our bush adventure!! Believe me when I say this man is either completly fearless or crazy, he took us out into the bush and proceded to hunt for snakes, spiders and all kinds of bugs while wearing no shoes!!! He shrugs off the time he was bitten by a red back spider saying he sat down to watch the Terminator on TV before going to hospital and is happy to put the heads of live snakes in his mouth!! Rich and I had
an amazing time, as you can see from the photos we got extremely close to some spiders and I overcame my fear of snakes to actually hold one. Rich also took part in whats known as the ant dance, basically crazy people stand on top of an ant hill with no shoes on while thousands of ants bite your feet!! Apparetnly its called bush socks?? Steveo from Jackass only managed 6 seconds while Rich was much braver and was there for 30!! Although his feet were extremely sore for days to come!!!!! Check out his website at www.capricorndave.com
Ever since Jo and Jonny sent him a postcard from White Haven beach Rich has wanted to visit the Whitsundays. All the way around the world that postcard has been our book mark in th rough guide so we were verrrry exicted when we arrived in Arlie beach to board the Enid and cruise around the islands for 3 days!! Again on the first morning it was raining and I really thought the whole trip would be ruined however Rich convinced me it would be fine and as much as I hate to admit it he was right, we had an
My impression of a kangeroo!
Can you tell which is which? amazing time. There were 16 other people on the boat and 3 crew and we all had a real laugh. The first day was taken up with sailing out to the islands and then some snorkling, Rich was quite scared at first as we could see loads of jelly fish floating past the boat but with the sting suits on we were fine, its just a shame we didn't have an underwater camera!! That night we dropped anchor in a bay but little did we know that we were about to experience the worst storm they had seen in that area for years!! Rich managed to sleep right through it thanks to the beer he had been drinking but the next morning you could see how bad it had been. One boat had gone up on to the rocks and we watched as all the passengers were air lifted to safety and in the harbour there were 47 boats that had crashed against the rocks. Our skipper was fantastic though and decided that although it was very choppy we would still go to Whitehaven beach. The journey there was not fun, one girl was extremely sea sick and I thought
Rich was going to join her at one point, bet we made it, in fact we were the only boat to make it there all week so we had teh whole place to our selves!! It was here that we got to see Sea Turtles in the wild and spotted manta rays off the beach!! It was a brilliant experience despite the gray clouds!!! It brightened up the next day so the rest of the trip was taken up with snorkling, sunbathing and sailing, it was all fantastic!! When we were back on dry land we all went for a few beers and lets just say that a good time was had by all, even if Rich felt like the ground was moving for days after!!!
So here we are in Cairns, we had one last drive in the van up to Cape Tribulation and then we handed it back. Rich celebrated his 28th birthday in the usual way with a few beers and I keep reminding him that he is now 2 years older than me!!!!!!! We have seen so many amazing things and had loads of fantastic experiences!! I think it's not going to be until we
lerave Oz that we'll apreciate how much of an amazing time we've had!!! We are both really looking forward to New Zealand and I'm sure there's going to plenty more adventures to come!!!!. Time has gone so quickly, we have got 6 weeks left but we intend on making the most of every single minute!!!!
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mom and dad coleman
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What a spider
Hi Rich and Karen.Can't believe you had that huntsman spider on your face. What an adventure you are having. Thoroughly enjoyed the blog. Looking forward to some beautiful scenery from NZ.All the family came around on Sun and we had a good laugh(mainly at Dan's expense) I blame Debs and Jim---hope they don't read this!!!!!!We miss you both and looking forward to April 8th!!!!Love mom and dadxx