Advertisement
Published: September 23rd 2010
Edit Blog Post
G’day from Oz,
We’ve been here for almost 3 weeks now and we’ve been living in a campervan for the majority of the time, hence the drought in blog updates.
We left sunny Fiji on 5th September, flying to Brisbane airport. Australia is going to be our home for almost 4 months so we were both excited about finally arriving.
As far as intros to the wildlife of a country go, it doesn’t get much better than a reptile the size of a dog, sitting on the top of a bus shelter. This is the sight that greeted us as we strolled up to our hostel in Brisbane, after only an hour of being in Oz! Later that day we also got introduced to the resident wallaby, who has a habit of peeing from the top of the roof of the hostel onto anyone with the misfortune of being stood nearby!
We were staying in the Fortitude Valley area of Brisbane which seemed pretty cool, there was plenty of decent bars and cafes. Not that we got to see too much of it as it was only a flying visit. We were due to fly up to
Cairns 2 days later, to pick up our campervan which would be transporting us down to Sydney.
Cairns is in the tropical north of Queensland and is a bit of a party town - a bit like Newquay (but 10 times hotter). Every shop is either a surf shop, travel agents or backpacker pub, holding a wet T-shirt contest.
Unfortunately we’re also booked into a ‘party hostel’ for a couple of nights, which isn’t too ‘couple friendly’ (or even ‘over 25 years old’ friendly!). Don’t get me wrong, we’re up for a few beers and a laugh, but we decide to avoid the wet t-shirt comps and count down the days to get out on the road.
The real adventure begins when we pick up our ‘house on wheels’, a campervan by the name of ‘Lex Luther’! We chose a company called ‘Spaceship’ and their vehicles are modified Toyota vans, with all sorts of cool features like a fridge, gas stove, fold out bed and DVD player. They also give them a random name, so ‘Sexy Lexy’ it is! We’re both really excited with the van, which is good as we’re stuck with it for 5 weeks,
all the way down to Sydney!
On the recommendation of some helpful people we met in Brisbane, we’ve purchased a map with all the cheap campsites and we make the decision to do it without the help of the Lonely Planet Guide. Instead we have a piece of paper with a load of ideas for visits scrawled on it.
We set off aimlessly in ‘Lex’, before opting to drive North, stopping at a place called Palm Cove for our first night. We get used to cooking on the stove (with a delicious first meal of pasta, obviously) and after a VERY sweaty nights sleep we start the day with a morning dip in the sea which is brilliant - we decide that every day should start like this!
The previous night we’d tried to combat the heat in the van with the air conditioning and in true Poperson style, ran the battery down! We ask for help and within minutes we have 4 or 5 Ozzie blokes standing around the van, scratching their chins and talking about car battery voltage. Unfortunately, our dual battery has stumped them and we have to wait for the roadside assistance to
show up and give us a jump start.
Next up on the agenda is Cape Tribulation, home of the oldest rain forest in the world and right next to the Great Barrier Reef. The scenery around the coast is beautiful and we’re camping in a rain Forrest which is a novelty. This wears off when it gets dark and we don’t even have a torch…so it’s an early night
We’ve got to be in Airlie Beach in 4 days time so we start heading south the next day, travelling West to check out Lake Tinaroo and Atherton Tablelands. The lake has a 20k dirt track running around it and when we pull up at the first campsite, a guy approaches the van. We thought he was the manager, so we wind down the window to chat to him. It slowly dawns on us that he’s actually a tramp living in the campsite (the fact he’s got about 5 teeth is a giveaway. Terrified, we turn around and speed off down the dirt track to the next campsite with images of 'Wolf Creek' in our head!
Lake Tinaroo is really peaceful and scenic and we have a couple
of beers by the lake for sunset and enjoy another Kodak moment. The next morning we’re awoken by the sound of rain - suddenly I have flashbacks to camping trips in the Lake District! It’s actually quite cold and our morning of waterfall visit spotting is a washout (there’s about 6 falls knocking about Atherton Tablelands).
Our favourite place on the way to Airlie Beach is a place called Paranella Park, which we’ve been told is ‘amazing’ but we don’t know much about. Paranella Park was the dream of a Catalonian baker called Jose Paranella, who sailed to Queensland in the 1930’s and decided it was the perfect place to build his dream home. He turned a section of rain forest into his idea of paradise, with a scenic waterfall, tennis courts, movie theatre and quirky little areas, like a ‘Lovers Lane’. However, Jose didn’t have the best of luck and the park was hit by a logging accident which flooded the whole place. Sine Jose’s death in the 1950’s, the park has been hit by 2 cyclones and each time they’ve rebuilt it.
The park is still beautiful, but because it’s been damaged by floods, it has
a strange forgotten world feel to it, with moss growing on all the buildings and furniture. It’s a memorable visit and it’s great that the surviving Paranella family members are working hard to ‘keep the dream alive’.
So the road trip continues through Bingil Bay (where we have another morning swim and run down the battery again!) and Alligator Creek (where we see a family of kangaroos bounce past as we’re eating Breakfast!), before we rock up in
Airlie Beach to 30 degree heat.
The road trip has been great fun so far and the things we’ve learnt are:
- Don’t leave your air conditioning on when the engines off - ever!
- The birds in Australia make the weirdest noises
- The wildlife generally is bonkers round here
- Everywhere in Australia is at least 3 hours drive away!
- Jumping in the sea first thing in the morning is great
- Make sure you get to your campsite before 5pm or you’ll be making dinner and setting up your bed in the dark
- Avoid hostels with wet T-shirt contests
Until next time
Ali and Clio x
Advertisement
Tot: 0.068s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 9; qc: 45; dbt: 0.0396s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Trevor
non-member comment
compare
Just arrived back from Ibiza last night and had a chance to catch up with Ali's blog. Must say that Oz sounds very much like Ibiza, except for the roos and distances!