The rest of Australia

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Hi everyone, we have just landed in New Zealand today and the weather is similar to england - freezing in comparison to what we have been enjoying recently.
We left Brisbane and did a 4x4 3 day self drive camp on Fraser Island where the wild dingos come and visit you during the night, luckily for us they didnt come to our tent! We hired a tent, jeep and maps from a company and set out catching the ferry across to the island. unfortunately we forgot to hire a table and chairs and a lamp so we couldnt see anything after 6pm once the sun had gone down. The last night it started raining at 5pm and didnt stop til 6am, apart from that it was good fun, driving on the sandy dirt tracks and across the beach.
after Fraser island we then went to airlie beach for 3 days and did nothing but sunbathe, drink and sleep. We had decided once we arrived in Arilie beach not to go on a sailing trip around the WhitSundays as it seemed a bit expensive and the some of the boats were a bit like an 18-30 holiday.
leaving there we went to mission beach and stayed at a really nice hostel where the owners were really helpful. we took a day trip to a rainforest (part of a world heritage site) and joined a white water rafting group on the river Tully which had grade 4/5 rapids. there were about 10 boats in total and we had some great people on our boat (in fact 2 were from Rainworth) Kate was the only person to fall in on our boat (not when going down the rapids but when she was getting in) and she screamed all the way down. We were also allowed to swim down 1 of the grade 3 rapids and jump from a 4m rock into the water. It was one of our best days yet but we didnt get any photos of it tho cause it was too wet to take the camera.

After mission beach and went to Cairns, where we registered for a 5 day PADI Scuba diving course.
This was 2 days in a classroom and swimming pool doing traing and an exam (which we both passed), followed by 3 days of living on board on a 35man boat on the Great Barrier Reef which was great. We did 9 scuba dives including one night dive where we saw reef sharks which was a little bit scary.
the diving was good though and we saw all kinds, including turtles, lion fish and little fish just like nemo (this time real wild ones and not in an aquarium).
we went out with the diving group on Sunday which was good but we had to be up at 9am to get the plane to new zealand nursing hangovers AGAIN.

Australia was brilliant but we are now really looking forward to New Zealand and the change in scenary and weather.

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Photos

the reef in its true colour
we didnt quite capture the colours in our photos but this is what it really does look like

just after our first solo dive
we still got lost though and had to pop our heads out the water to check where the boat was - about 200m away ;)

giant clams
we didnt take a photo of these but saw them - they were about 2m long! wouldnt get many of these in a jar of cockles

Jaws
this is the shark we saw when diving but we were too scared to get the camera near it!!

anyone for a juicey piece of squid?
David is still desperate to catch a fish

Lake McKenzie - Fraser Island
How does this compare to Wollaton Park Lake?

Comments

[Uncle Elroy]

Looks like the booze cruise boat we went on in Tenerife, did anyone jump like Tom did and miss the rope!