Blogs from Mossman, Queensland, Australia, Oceania - page 2

We arrived at Ben's place suring the evening right after the Island trip. That was our first "long" trip with the van. It went well and we are now quite used to the left side drive. This guy is fifty years old and have done so much things. He is really rich in experience and good at meeting people. So he knows some people who could get us discount for scubadiving at the reef and skydiving ( which is our birthday gift :) !! ). Currently he takes care of luxutious houses and do temporary tattoos on markets. We get some and made some. That's pretty nice and social. We have a walk in Mossman's gorge and the rain forest!! Really different from european forests, huge, messy and lots of vegetation everywhere.... read more

Only spent one night in Mossman. (Not because of Mossman itself but because of the van park we were in.) The Gorge is beautifull like all the gorges we have so far seen. It's also great to be back in busy area where there are road signs, shops, decent priced fuel but for us there was only one place we could stay with the dog and we didn't like it. When you are an unpowered camper you are basically at the very bottom of the chain! So alot of the time you get put in the worst spot in the van park. Which was the case here. Not only where we almost in the carpark but almost on the main road aswell. Under the street light! Our neighbours were alocated an even smaller spot than us ... read more

We left you after two days of solid driving, but only a tiny proportion into our epic drive from Adelaide to Cairns. We were in the desert town of Coober Pedy. We had a quiet day or so there getting our affairs in order, as they say, before moving on to Ularu (Ayer's Rock). The problem, you think as you drive the 300km off the main road to Ularu (the proper name for Ayer's rock), is that you've already seen it a thousand times in pictures and on TV, it's expensive and a long long way from anything at all. By the time we arrived, and although we didn't admit it to one another until after, we were both expecting to be disappointed; after all it's just a great big stone in the desert in the ... read more

We arrived at Cairns at about lunch time. Ash and I wanted to go to the skate park. We found a massive one next the beach – the largest public skate park in Australia. It was during school hours so there were no kids there . Ash and I got stuck in a massive bowl which we eventually got out by pulling ourselves up. After the skate park I stacked just riding along the esplanade footpath. That night we Palm Cove, right beside the beach. We drove to Kuranda, up in the mountains and rainforest. We looked around the markets then went to ‘Birdworld’. I didn’t want to go in but then I did and then I didn’t want to leave. The birds sat on your shoulders and hands and flew all over the place. Ash ... read more

9pm Tuesday night told that our flight was cancelled but we should be ok to stay at our apartment. 10pm, another call- we need to Evacuate Wednesday morning to Mossman. 3am Wednesday morning, news looks bleak, mum and dad contemplate driving south but don't have enough fuel to get away from the cyclone so decided to stay. 7.30am loaded car and headed north. They were were talking of a 6-7m storm surge and as our apartment was beach front it was not a good idea to stay. Mossman was 12.5m above sea level. Evacuation centre at Mossman State High School was filling up but we managed to get a gym mattress to sleep on and there was los of other children to play with. We had to saty there all day but the weather ouside seemed ... read more