Magnets and Koalas

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Saturday I went on my first trip in a Greyhound bus. For normal people it is a bit cramped - sometimes it is great to be so short. The journey was 7 hours and only 350 km, so there were quite a few stops. The bus driver chatted away to us all, we all ignored him - most people were asleep or listening to their music. It must be a soul destroying job for the drivers. By law they have to take a break every 4 hours, so we stopped for a lunch break at Cardwell. Cardwell was somewhere I had planned to go, so at least I got a chance to see the main street and the beach. In fact that is it, that is Cardwell. The beach was completely deserted, I felt a bit uneasy just standing there taking pictures - wondering if there was some crocodile lurking. As it turned out a croc had been sighted, but equally the beach was mostly deserted anyway. There are just so many beaches on the east coast most of them are empty.

Eventually the bus arrived at Townsville and I got the ferry to Magnetic Island. I was staying at Bungalow Village YHA. The bus service on Magnetic Island is efficient, fast and helpful - the driver calls out all the of the holiday hotels / hostels at each stop so you all know where to get off. The dorm at Bungalow was another A frame tent - this time with 4 sets of bunk beds. I was sharing with Jess from the UK, Anne from Germany - who was travelling with Jess, Silke from Germany and Renata who insisted she was from Australia - but her accent was definitely German, she seemed somewhat eccentric so it was easier not to pursue the subject. As I was shattered I went to bed really early - doing nothing is exhausting, believe me. Because I had slept so early I woke up at 3.30 a.m. As I was on the top bunk I had quite a good view outside and spent the next three hours watching possums scuffle around outside - they are very funny looking creatures, and listening to the koalas who grunt like pigs and the birds who screech from 4 until 6 in the morning every morning.

Sunday I hiked over to Radical Bay which is a pretty little bay 2 km over the hills. I went snorkelling but there was no coral and few fish, however I suddenly felt a really bad sting on my leg. This got me out of the water really really fast. My right leg was covered in trails of tiny blisters. It wasn't a bluey as it only stung for an hour or so and the blisters went right down - but I wasn't risking the water again there. Apparently I may have an allergic reaction to sea lice which are always in the water but only affect some people. Lucky me!

In the evening I met up with Anne Marie who I had met at Crocodyllus and we arranged to go on a bus tour of the island the next day - you just get on the normal bus and it drops you off at the various bays. In the middle of the night I was woken up by Silke who had returned from the 'party dorm' and was so drunk she didn't know which bed was hers, she just knew she had to climb a ladder. Silke was very tall, which I am not, and also very strong, which I am most definitely not, she was too drunk to understand me, and seemed determined to get in my bed and pass out and I was having little luck persuading her otherwise. Luckily Anne got up, spoke to her in German and guided her back to her own bed. Renata told us all off for being noisy - dorm prefect. Monday morning as usual I was up really early. Monday is my favourite day, I love the blue skys, the blue seas, the happy me - it is just so lovely not having to work your backside off 5 days a week so you can cook, clean and do laundry on the 6th, and maybe if you are very lucky relax on the 7th. I think that, having dropped out, I may never drop back in.

Anne Marie and I toured the island. There isn't a lot to it other than amazing views and beautiful little bays, so it didn't take long. We had lunch and wandered back to Horseshoe Bay - which has its own beautiful little bays and amazing views and a bit more life than the rest of the island. I went swimming in the bay. On advice from a local I had added vinegar to a small bottle of sunlotion which might provide some protection - I smelt like a fish & chip shop, but at least I didn't get stung as badly as the previous day, tiny little stings that only hurt for a nanosecond yes, strings of blisters and pain for an hour, no.

Anne Marie and I walked into the village for a few drinks. We went to one bar until it emptied (was it something we said?), then moved on to another bar at the end of the bay. We were soon joined by Tony from Sydney who asked if he could join us and, whilst we were still deciding to say yes or no, had inserted himself and a bar stool in between us. Tony was sailing in a catamaran with his friend Shane, or maybe it was Wayne or Kane. Anyway, he asked us if we would like to join them on a trip to the Whitsundays - we could work our passage by cooking. We declined, some passages just don't call for work, particularly when it involves men like Tony. Pleasant enough to chat to, but a bit full of himself and also, despite trying to convince us to 'work our passage' with him, still crept off to the bar for a drink without even offering us one. Despite the fact he was desperately chatting us up, neither of us was worthy of a $3.80 glass of wine! I was offended - the guy gave me the creeps, I would have declined the drink, but that isn't the point! Where have all the gentlemen gone? Shane, Wayne or Kane joined us and Tony then devoted himself to me whilst Shane chatted to AnneMarie. I get all the luck - stingers, Norman Bates and now Tony. We finished our wine, made our excuses and left.

Tuesday at breakfast I was chatting to a couple from Indiana who were very friendly and June from Texas. June is hilarious, an original 60's wildchild she is now travelling Australia and having a blast whilst her disapproving daughters demand she comes home and be a quaint old granny to their children. June told us the day before she had gone up to the Fort and seen koalas and then headed for the beaches. This sounded like a good plan so I set off - June had hired an electric bike, but they were all out, so I walked, I could do with the exercise. It was a beautiful walk up to the Fort and the views of the bays were really amazing. The couple from Indiana were taking the same trip, but I just wanted to be on my own. Sharing a dorm with up to 7 people, sometimes I just crave a little time on my own. The Fort was built in the 1940's when the Australians got word the Japanese were about to invade. It is probably the most visited attraction on the island - but not because of the Fort, because the koalas sleep out there in the eucalyptus trees. Bungalow village, where I was staying, has a 'sanctuary' where you can cuddle a koala, a baby crocodile with its poor mouth taped shut or a snake. When they say 'cuddle' they mean hold for 10 seconds so they can take a photo and sell it to you for $8, whilst they then grab the poor animal and pass it on to the next sucker. I really don't approve of animals in captivity, so it was fantastic to see the koalas in the wild. The first koala I saw was sleeping, and still looked amazingly cute - they sleep for 20 to 23 hours a day. It was so still I was beginning to wonder if it was stuffed, when a tiny little pooh pellet dropped out - it had obviously been asleep for quite a while, there was a regular collection of pellets beneath it. I finished the trip to the top of the Fort and stayed awhile before descending. On my way back down I passed Anne Marie so I showed her the sleeping koala and advised her not to stand right underneath it.

The next day I saw a mother and baby koala awake - but they aren't much more active when they are awake- they just eat and pooh instead of merely poohing. Their diet, which consists solely of eucalyptus leaves, is so poor they don't have the energy for much else, so I wondered how the ones at the sanctuary cope with their 'pass the parcel' lifestyle. After the Forts I hiked off to Florence Bay. For once I didn't get stung at all and the snorkelling was really good visibility, and I saw batfish, blue spotted rays, wrasse, angel fish, sergeant majors and loads of other fish whose names I can never remember.

Wednesday AnneMarie headed off for Airlie Beach for a trip to the Whitsundays. She warned me that next week there would be storms so if I wanted to sail to the Whitsundays I should get a trip that started Saturday at the latest, but I wanted to stay a few more days on Magnetic and to hire a car on the mainland and go and see Paluma and Jourama. In the morning I actually met up with Colette - who was also just leaving. She had been at Bungalow for 2 days and we hadn't even seen each other. Colette was going over to Picnic Bay to do the hike to West Point. I hadn't done that either so thought I might do it at sometime before I left. When she went to pack she discovered someone had nicked her food whilst she was eating breakfast. The same thing had also happened to me - we had foolishly used the top shelf - which is labelled 'communal'. We went through every bag in the fridge until we found our stuff, it was hilarious. Colette kept on saying 'fair play, it is my fault' whilst I used every swear word I could think of - I had literally only left it there for 10 minutes. An Irish couple in there cooking breakfast just looked on in horror. Later in the day I told Anne in my room - who looked mortified and said she had gone into breakfast and seen the stuff on the communal shelf thinking it was up for grabs and taken it. The funniest part of it was when she had put it all away in her bag, she came and sat outside with me to eat her food ... my food. We couldn't stop laughing.

In the afternoon I went snorkelling at Arthur Bay - not as pretty as Florence and the snorkelling visibility wasn't as good. I was pottering about in the water when I heard a woman screaming in terror - a real bloodcurdling scream. I stood up and looked over to her- as did everyone in the sea and on the beach. She was hysterical, completely hysterical "where is Sarah, where is Sarah'. A child a metre away from her popped her head out of the water and the woman said in a totally normal voice 'oh there you are' and the family carried on snorkelling. This made me so uneasy I got out of the water, particulary as the woman then started to harangue all her children for every tiny thing. Everyone else, apart from them, also seemed a bit freaked out and gave up - that screaming had been really scary. Back at Bungalow I chatted to Matt and Claire from Winchester. They had been fruit-picking and had been telling me how horrendous it was - really really tough, you can't even make the minimum wage and the farmers treat all the workers like dirt. I was glad that so far I hadn't had to work.

Thursday I got the bus to Picnic Bay really early - 7 a.m., and did the West Point walk. It wasn't much a walk. 5km each way, but very flat. I saw some incredibly beautiful butterflies and a couple of wallabies, but apart from that West Point is quite dull - sunset is meant to be the best time, but you can't take hire cars down there. I don't know why because it is an easy walk, so would not damage the cars, maybe so you book the overpriced tours. Who knows. In the evening I had a few drinks in the campsite bar with June from Texas and we arranged to hike over to Balding Bay the next day.

Friday we set off and walked through the forest - beautiful butterflies again and masses of fruit bats or flying foxes as they call them here. June said she had met a canadian at the koala-cuddling, torture-animal sanctuary who used to live on Mag Island and had suggested she go and chat to 'Crazy Bob' who lived in a blue houseboat at the end of the beach. I didn't really like the sound of the Canadian who, despite having lived here, bought into the cuddle a koala torture and Crazy Bob sounded even less inviting. Unfortunately we passed the house boat on our way to Balding Bay and some old guy was working on the top of the boat. June wandered up and said "Hi, would you be Crazy Bob?". My mouth dropped open, surely just plain Bob would have been more polite. Bob was in obvious agreement because we very swiftly found out just how crazy he was. He threatened to kill us both with a 9 iron golf club - why a 9 iron I don't know, but he said it time and time again. He called us dykes and said he was sick of dykes travelling together and we were sick and perverted. June said 'oh we're not together' - so clearly she was fine with the sick and perverted label, but sadly this didn't calm Bob down. I muttered to June that she shouldn't have called him 'crazy, so to remedy the situation she said to him 'Caroline and Steve suggested I should look up Crazy Bob and be sure to say hi'. She had actually said the word Crazy again. Bob went from crazy to ballistic and threatened us a bit more and also said he would kill Steve- I was quite pleased about that bit, but as June had used the word again I began to wonder who was crazier, her or Bob. We walked away quickly, Bob was mad as a cut snake, as they say around these parts, and best avoided. Steve, whoever he was, surely would have known this so it was a bit sick of him to tell a woman travelling on her own to even go near the guy.

Over at Balding Bay I got badly stung again - it only hurts for an hour, but it still hurts, so it put me off the beaches a bit, I was decided to leave Mag Island the next day. The stingers and Bob detracted somewhat from the beauty of the island. That night I had a few drinks in the bar with Anne and Jess - it was Jess's 20th birthday. I was wiped out and shuffled off to bed at about 10, but the girls went off downtown. They came back about 2 and took pictures of everything until we all woke up - they then jumped into my bed with their camera. They were really funny, but I couldn't help thinking of all the men I know who would pay their annual bonus to have Jess, Anne and a camera in bed with them. It was wasted on me who just wanted to get back to sleep. Linda and Marlies from Holland got off lightly, they just got woken, not jumped on.

Saturday I got the ferry over to Townsville with Linda and Marlies. The woman behind us on the ferry yelled at her poor children the whole journey - I turned around and it was Sarah's mother from the beach again, I bet she's a fun one to be on vacation with. I hadn't booked accommodation so I just followed Linda and Marlies and stayed at the nearest hostel to the bus station. I spent two days trying to hire a car, but it was holiday season and nothing small was available so I gave up. Whilst I was in Townsville I went to the beach and watched the rowing, went to the local market - fruit, veg and tourist tat, and followed the Rough Guide's advice and walked up to Castle Hill. For once I had no hat and no water - I had just been out to shop for some essentials and thought I would nip up Castle Hill. Farnham and Lincoln both have a Castle Hill - people wander up and down with their shopping, so this mislead me to believe it was a very short, easy walk. How wrong can you be. The walk actually started just past the catholic cathedral, which I had seen and mistakenly thought was the castle and the end of the walk. From there on it was a 2 mile hike straight up. At one point I dithered over whether to give up - I had no water and it was hot, but surely it couldn't be much further. When I got to the top I was gasping for water and shade. There was shade in abundance and, this being Australia, not just water but chilled water fountains for hikers to quench their thirst. They think of everything here. There were also loads of Australians who had run up the hill and were now doing press-ups and sit-ups - these people are barking mad. Truly. It was hotter than July and they were running around in the midday sun. There was also one young woman who sat at the viewing platform in some yoga position clearly trying to meditate - whilst the Japanese tourists and be clambered over her to get to the view. Very relaxing.

Whilst I was in Townsville I also followed Matt and Claire's advice and went to the internet cafe to upload my photos - it is a really odd little cafe and they are quite relaxed and vague about what you can do and how much they charge you, so I burned 400 photos onto disk and sorted out the few that were worthy of keeping to put on this blog.

Monday having failed to get a car I booked the bus for my next adventure - Airlie Beach and the Whitsundays. 2.5 weeks in Oz and still have seen virtually nothing, so time to move on.

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Photos

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There is something lazier than me

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Port Douglas

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Horseshoe Bay beach

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Horseshoe Bay Beach

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Shouldn't they be in a tank?

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The supermodel bird

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Parakeets

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Florence Bay

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Arthur Bay

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Ibis in tree with friends

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Butterfly

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Feeding time

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Jess and Anne

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With Linda and Malies going back to Townsville.