Blogs from Mission Beach, Queensland, Australia, Oceania - page 10

Hi everyone, just to a quick one to say 'Hello' we are not ignoring you! We are in a really small place next to the beach, there is only one computer and it costs about 2pound for 20 mins, so impossible to get anything done! Everyone is great, just having a few relaxing days chilling at the beach (rather than the busy, stressfull, hetic time we have been have of late, NOT!) Finally pursuaded Steve to have a couple of nights in a chalet, because although the m/h is fantastic, I am fed up hearing other people on the toilet and having to queue for a shower! Nice to have a bit of space, and shave my legs in peace. Even Bella came out of the toliet and said, "finally, a poo in peace" !! ( ... read more

30th June - More sun, sea and sand.. An early start this morning, as we are moving on to.. Mission Beach! We caught the greyhound bus, the trip took about 3 hours, in which Lucy and myself spent the majority of the journey asleep. I discovered that I got really bad sunburn from the snorkelling trip the other day. Which is not fun, very itchy! And Lucy also discovered she had sprained her wrist from Kayaking in Cape Tribulation. The weather was beautiful when we arrived. The hostel ('Absolute Backpackers') is situated in Wongaling Beach, which is pretty much just a petrol station and a few stores. It is pretty remote, and a 45 minute walk from Mission Beach. We were going to stay at The Sanctuary, in a tree top hut in the rainforest. But ... read more

The bus picked us up today at 7:50 to go white water rafting. After a short stop at the companies offices to meet all the people who had come down from Cairns we were off. The venue was the Tully River. It was a perfect place as Tully, the town receives 4.5 metres of rain per year and also because there is a hydroelectric facility upstream which regulates the amount of water flowing making rafting possible 365 days a year. Because of all this rain Tully is also very productive agriculturally producing 60% of Australias bananas, part of which comes from the largest banana plantation in the southern hemisphere. After getting our gear on and meeting our groups we were off. The reafting was awesome. Our guide Mick who had been doing this for 8 years ... read more

Following the huge stress of snorkelling, swimming and generally being sailed around the Whitsundays, we moved northward to Townsville and caught a ferry to the adjacent "Magnetic Island" where we'd booked an $89 3-day/2-night package at Base Hostel. The hostel had small rooms and a dreadful kitchen, but a huge bar right on the beach-front which more than made up for it! We met spent the majority of our time there playing cricket with other travellers from our Greyhound Bus, and spent an hour of the second day kayaking out to the peninsula neighbouring our hostel, where we saw fish, crabs and a turtle! I cannot quite say how 'relaxing' this whole experience was, as about 4 weeks prior to this me (Ben) and Chris had booked (and paid for!) a 14,000ft Sky-Dive at our next ... read more

Mission beach was beautiful, very tropical so there was a lot of time to be on the beach! Ali and Gus did a sky dive which I opted out of and took photos instead! After a few days there we hit the road and headed south. Unfortuantely I really cant remeber half the places we stayed at I think it was Rockhampton and Townsville. Needless to say it was a lot of time on the road, beautiful countryside lots of mountains and very few cars! Stayed in a fair few campsites which all have outdoor eating areas and a few laybys (money saver!) We ended up in Airlie Beach gateway to the Whitsunday islands...74 islands on the Great barrier reef! Stayed at a campsite which had massive lizards and cockatoos!... read more