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Published: April 28th 2007
Hi everybody!
Yes, we know it's been a long long time.. Time flies when you're having fun and the time we had in Oz sure was amazing! There's a lot to talk about since our previous writing.
The drive from Adelaide to Melbourne brought us on the famous Great Ocean Road. This windy road along the coast line is not only impressive for the landscapes, there are also many interesting stops. We admired the 12 apostles rock cliffs, Loch Ard Gorge ship wreck beach, koalas in the eucalyptus trees and lots more.
Finding a camping ground in Melbourne proved to be quite difficult so we had to stay about 10 kilometers out of the city center. Melbourne is a truly amazing place for young people: it's big enough to discover new things everyday but still has the small city's relaxed touch to it. And there's always lots of stuff going on: the food & wine festival at the riverside, live bands playing at Federation square, the Melbourne comedy festival, kite surfing on Saint Kilda beach, shopping at the Queen Victoria market and of course you'll find bars and restaurants all over the place. But you can also
lay low and chill out in the botanical gardens or enjoy the view from the Rialto observation tower. No wonder we spent quite some time here.
Next up was Tasmania, sounds exotic, doesn't it? We took our dream machine on the ferry to Ozy's biggest island and were ready to enjoy what everybody calls 'mini New Zealand'. We kicked off in style with an 8 hour hike to the top of Cradle mountain. On the way to the top you just forget to catch a breath because you're too busy enjoying the view on all the mountain lakes at different levels. The last part to the top involves some steap rock climbing, which makes the satisfaction even greater when you finally get there. Then we drove on to Coles Bay peninsula, a little heaven on earth. The Hazards mountain peaks rise out of the water and from the top you get a stunning view on the perfectly curved Wineglass bay. Our final stop in Tassie was the capital Hobart where we stayed with Vasheya and her family, who we met in Vietnam. We are endlessly greatfull for the Australian hospitality because we had an amazing time there getting pampered
around the clock. After one week on the Australian 'holiday island' it was time to get back to the mainland and head on to Sydney. A shame we had to leave Tasmania without seeing a Tasmanian devil, a bad-tempered rat-looking animal that's facing extinction nowadays.
Back in Melbourne we needed a couple of days to get some nice people together again to join us for the ride to Sydney and up the east coast. Once more it was proven that there are a lot of Germans in the world, since we ended up with 3 Deutsche Mädchen: Sabine, Katja und Helene. On the way to Sydney, we drove through the capital of Australia: Canberra. No wonder nobody knows this place because there's hardly anything to see.. The city was created to serve as the new capital because of the endless discussions between Melbourne and Sydney. It looks very artificial, no wonder if you realize that the entire place was designed at one point in time by an architect.
Sydney of course is the place to be in Australia. Home of the famous opera house and harbour bridge, you can spend hours just sitting down and gazing at the
waterfront. Of course we went to an opera show here, but it wasn't easy to get in. For 2 hours we waited for the ticket office to open so we would be the first ones to be able to buy a couple of the only 10 available standing spots in the theater. These are the only affordable tickets for us and the only ones that weren't sold out days in advance. The show we saw was Don Quixote and it turned out to be a great and very unique experience. Sydney has of course more to offer than just the famous opera house: there are several bays where you can surf, Kings Cross is the nightlife area with all the bars, the Rocks is the oldest neighbourhood with nice architecture and of course there is a China Town here too. We didn't have too much time too enjoy Sydney though because we were running out of time and still had to see a lot of things at the east coast before catching our flight in the beginning of May.
In Sydney we restored the nationalities balance and had two Dutch girls, Daphne & Anne, to travel with us from
Bay of islands
One of the many stops on the Great Ocean Roadthen on. 2 Belgians, 2 Dutchies and 2 Germans makes 6 people in our van, which is spacious but still not a limo so it was getting very cozy at that time! Fitting all the people and bags in the car was like a big human jigsaw puzzle. With the new crew we moved on to hippie paradise Byron Bay, a little laid back town at the beach where surfing is the only thing that matters. We joined in, rented a board and tried some wave surfing ourselves. The waves are a lot bigger than at home so getting up on the board is pretty difficult. Definitely when the sea is crowded and boards are flying at your head from all over the place. The scary part is that you'll see some people with a leg or arm missing, which makes you remember that sharks live in this area and they like a little snack every now and then.
We left Byron Bay and headed further up the east coast towards Brisbane, another typical Australian city so we didn't bother spending a lot of time here. We hurried on towards Hervey Bay, from where you can embark on a
trip to Fraser Island. This is the biggest sand island in the world (even has more sand than the Sahara) and you won't find any concrete roads here. So we painfully said goodbye to our van for 3 days and rented a big 4 wheel drive to cruise around on Fraser. This was definitely one of the highlights of Australia: driving on the beach near the waves, on the bumpy roads through the rain forest and of course getting stuck in the loose sand. We camped on the beach with no other living soul around and enjoyed the sunset and starlight with a nice glass of classy goon (cheap australian wine in a cardboard box). The main landmark on this island is an old rusty shipwreck on the beach with a mysterious touch to it. The down side is that you can not swim in any part of the ocean here because it's a main breeding area for tiger sharks. But when driving inland, you encounter the most amazing fresh water lakes. Lake McKenzie has perfect white sand and clear blue water with a rain forest background, makes the Lilse Bergen look like a dump hole. At the end of
the third day we were attacked by sand flies, very tiny but painful, so we were happy to be back on safer ground in Hervey Bay again.
After 5 months of travelling, we've also become real experts in getting as much as possible for free. The sport in Australia was to sneak in camping grounds after dark when the office was already closed and then leave the next morning without getting spotted. We are proud of our unbeaten record, we never got caught allthough once we cut it very close. We had to throw all our stuff over the fence, jump in the car and flee away. Still better than paying 20 bucks each night for a hostel. And of course it's always great fun to barbeque at night on the campfire or the gas stove.
The next stop after Fraser was Airlie Beach, the gateway for the Whitsundays. We booked a trip on a sail boat to sail through this group of islands for 3 days. We were 24 youngsters on this boat, all there to have a great time so it turned out to be big fun. Sailing and snorkling in the Great Barrier Reef during
the day, barbeque dinner and music with drinks at night. The highlight on this trip was whitehaven beach, apparently the most photographed beach in the world. At low tide you see the white sand mixed with parts of water, surreal as in an aquarelle painting. Again, we couldn't fully enjoy the perfect beauty of this beach because you can only swim here with a so called 'stinger suit'. This is a suit that covers your complete body as a protection against deadly jellyfish which live here.
Our drive along the east coast ended in Cairns. We planned to sell our car here, do some more snorkling, dive at the Great Barrier Reef and then fly to New Zealand. Unfortunately, our car had other plans... The dream machine became the nightmare machine when it decided to break down exactly the day before we wanted to do test drives with interested buyers. Not enough time to get it fixed in a garage and no way we could sell a broken car, great timing! We ended up selling it to a second hand car dealer for practically nothing. No worries mate, as Australians always say and we tried to forget about it.
About Australians, there is of course a lot more to say.. They are western but still very different from Europeans. Hospitality is very big here (lucky us!), we've been invited for dinner a couple of times by people we just met on a camping ground for example. We don't say no to that of course, a great opportunity to get to know some locals and eat food that doesn't come out of a can. Australians also talk a bit funny: they eat brekky in the morning, don't play soccer but footie and love barbies (not the doll, but barbeque).
As they say, all good things come to an end, and so does our money. After these two fantastic months in Australia, we leave to another paradise on earth, New Zealand. Isn't that what is often thought to be the most beautiful country on earth? We'll check it out for you!
Have fun,
Nick and Steven
PS: When you look at the pictures, make sure you look at all of them by clicking on the button to the next page. There are many this time!
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Michelle
non-member comment
Jealous ballerina
Hey how are you Nick? Long time no speak You seem to be having so much fun. I am a bit jealous about the don quixote session you guys had. Anyway saw bob sinclair in zurich on easter day was awesome and had one day in belgium on my way to there. Hope to see you soon Take care XXX