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Published: April 5th 2006
Sorry it's been a while since our last update. We've been enjoying the Aussie lifestyle too much. Anyway, we've attempted to summarise our hectic roadtrip from west to east coasts. In total, we clocked about 15,000 km's in about 80 days and were pleasantly surprised at the lack of stone chips, flat tyres, scrapes or bangs, cracked windscreens or the need to call the AA along the way (just the odd roof vent!). We were, however not so pleasantly surprised at the weather that accompanied us on the journey, in fact the split enz song "six months in a leaky boat" seemed rather apt as in fact we only managed four consecutive days of sun during this part of the trip. The sounds of "Oh you should have been here 5 days ago it was so hot and sunny" was all too frequently heard. But in between the showers we enjoyed fab sunny days that made it all worth the while.
So here's a recap of the journey, places and stories along the way......
(South) Western Australia
After a last look at Perth from Kings Park, we headed South towards the highly recommended Margaret River region, avoiding the
bush fires (unfortunately a common occurrence) and the Ross River mossies as we headed on our way.
Busselton was the first port of call (yes it was a port!) being highly recommended for great beaches, turquoise waters and a fantastic pier with underwater observatory. All of which we imagined looked great were it not chucking it down! The long walk to the observatory rewarded us with a great contrast from the dark choppy waters whipped up by the wind on the surface to the tranquil turquoise waters found ten metres below. The myriad of fish, coral, sea slugs and even scuba divers were great to view through the curved plexiglass and put on a rewarding show for us, outshining the dampness and grey that was on terra firma!
We wound our way along the Caves Road through spectacular scenery towards Margaret River famed for fine wines. Mags, lived up to its reputation and the Hamelin Bay winery that we visited provided us with a great overview of the whole process together with some fine wines to sample and a few (damn budget!) 'choice' bottles to take away for enjoyment with the home (read van) cooking for the onward
journey. We also took a bushtucker canoe safari where we paddled the local river and learnt about the history of the area, including how the Europeans 'integrated' with the aboriginals and more interesting, we found, how the aboriginals used the bushtucker for food and medicinal purposes. We had pretty good eating with Emu and Roo that lunch time. No widgery grubs thank god. We were so energised by the goodness and freshness of the meal that we won another bottle of the MR wine in the rowing contest on the journey home. Whilst the sights of Australia never failed to amaze us, the sounds were also fantastic and the cries of the galah that we had left further North were replaced by the interesting call of the Kookaburra, more amiably known as the laughing jackass. We thought it was hilarious and makes the British songbirds seem very tame in comparison.
Next, we headed down to where the Southern and Indian Oceans meet (you can actually see the point) at Cape Leuwin the most South Westerly point in Australia and funnily enough a rather windy place! We stopped at Warren National Park to climb the Bicentennial tree, one of 3
which was once used to spot fires. We say climb, more like posed for photos at 10m's and will let your imagination take you up the remaining 65m. We did climb it honest, we just forgot the camera. Ahem! We did however, remember it for the Valley of the Giants tree top walk which was a much more stable walk on a metal structure around these majestic beaudies!
Next up was the Nullabor plain which was the start of the journey East and the crossing of time zones and the beginning of the crossing of borders that would necessitate the disposal of our fruit and veg. Imagine as you travel from Surrey to Hampshire having to chuck out your apples so as to not bring in unwanted insect pests. In contrast to the journey accross Russia, the scenery either side of the desolate road of the Nullabor seemed to change on a frequent(ish) basis, with views ranging from twisted trees, rivers in flood, desert, bush and not forgetting the need to be ever vigilent of the slightly intrigued (or brave as hell) wildlife wanting to either hitch a lift or reshape the aerodynamics on the front of the van.
The journey of 3 rainy days through the plain (the time zones aren't condusive to a quick journey unless you are an insomniac) saw us stock up on over priced crap music tapes to accompany our drive. We noted that the Bee Gee's actually only wrote 4 good songs, and wondered how the hell they managed all those number one's? We passed through towns made up of one building comprising, petrol station, garage, hostel, campsite, supermarket, pool hall, restaurant and tyre shop. Judging by the hair styles, no hair salon!
The distance from Perth to Adelaide is like driving from London to Moscow with the petrol prices fluctuating wildly between stops (as if you were crossing USSR in the collapse). Prices ranged from promising the first born at some stops (60%+ more than towns) to those who mirrored the towns prices and the musical enjoyment was joined by the let's see how many MPG's we can get from the van game. Oh how the days flew by, but the time passed more speedily as we also started to notice and then search for the giant signs at the various rest points, such as The Giant Galah and Giant
Whale. They bore no real relation to the place in question, but South Australian towns took this to a whole different level where amongst others, the Giant Crab (in a fishing town) appeared. The Giant Fruits of Queensland and believe it or not Tropical Fruit World took it up a step again. It really exists: http://www.tropicalfruitworld.com.au/
Southern Australia
Southern Australia was never really on our map as we had planned to go East across the Northern Territory from Exmouth, but due to our lack of knowledge of the weather systems it was now definitely part of the plan. We decided to keep our stay to a minimum, but to stop off if we found places of interest such as the Great Ocean Road.
Wallaroo village on the Yorke peninsular proudly displayed its Cornish heritage based on the copper mining that had supported the area in the early part of the last Century. A lovely little town that seems to survive today on grain export and some tourism, although the recipe for the pasties may not have dreckly been passed to the local cafe where we tried this fare. Again great turquoise waters but poor weather sped us
ever onwards....
The backdrop to SA for us were the endless yellow rolling hills of arable farming and dust! No not a Little Britain moment, but massive dust (that's dust Marjorie) storms brought on by the wind and harvesting. We wondered how many of these crops had in previous years passed through AWB's naughty hands to supply Iraq in the oil for food programme? Rightly so, this was on the news a lot here breaking up the sounds of the radio adverts that reminded us of the UK back in the day with the buy local Australian theme and the many adverts to buy holden "ute's" (pick ups) or lumber and tiles from Dave's Lumber, your local lumber and tile merchant who had been servicing the local area for the past 20 years.
We passed straight through a few towns that bore strong resemblence to some of Britains more tourist holiday destinations and paused at some others where we rested to enjoy the beaches and some of the best sunsets that we have ever seen (Robe & Beachport). Hopefully the photos do them some justice.
To keep on budget, we were stopping in caravan parks only where
necessary (apparently you can be fined $200 if caught camping in non designated area) and by now were beginning to get the hang of this mobile life with Andrew taking great delight in helping Grace's morning shower by throwing cold water over her. There is a God! With all the great nature on their doorstep it was easy to see why so many Aussies don't venture out of the Country but take to the road with the well equipped caravan for their holidays (a real home from home). The family activity structure of those we met at the camp sites seemd to be pretty much as follows: The men fished, the kids played, and the women fished and cooked. Almost all seemed to drink beer (drink driving seemed a real problem in Aus) with differing names for the weights and measures as we crossed the Country. In general they were friendly and inquisitive about our van's WA plates (not too many Aussies contemplate this trip), 'pommy land', why the Brits weren't all in Oz and how we must be roughing it in our non air conditioned van. A very good point in the more tropical climates.
Victoria
Some
fruit may have crossed into Victoria with us, but that's only because the demarkation between SA and Victoria was not signposted too clearly, officer. Ahem.
Our first stop was to test the hiking boots at the Grampians National Park but nature seemed to be telling us to move on again as the area was in the midst of bush fires and pretty much all of the park was closed off. We managed to struggle up Mount Sturgeon a local hill but let's call it a small mountain as it knackered the hell out of us. We are blaming it on heat exhaustion from the midday sun but it might have had more to do with the more sedentary life we had been experiencing on the 'plush' seats of the van. Still, the summit afforded great views that made the climb worth the effort. Just.
Hoorah! The Great Ocean Road was next up and we enjoyed a break in the weather to photograph the twelve (or thereabouts) apostles, Bay of Islands and Martyrs etc. Great scenery as the sea does battle with the fragile limestone cliffs resulting in dramatically shaped islands, blow holes and arches and the associated tragedies
from late 19th century ships and their crew and passengers who perished on the closeby reefs so near to their destination and quest for fortune in the promised land. The remainder of the road to Melbourne proved to be just as spectacular with the rain forest seeming to grow from the hills down into the sea. How Andrew wanted to trade the van for a bike! As we came to Torquay the weather treated us to a few good days R&R to explore Torquay's finest and to visit the world famous Bells beach where the locals surfed and the kids tried to buy ice cream from our van. We took their money and ran. Maybe not.
Our arrival in Melbourne was pre commonwealth games as the City was in final stages of its preparation. As the height of the van prevented us from being able to park in the City's car parks, we decided to park on the outskirts near one of Grace's relatives and commute in to town, passing many suburbs named after British places (names that were repeated at several other Cities). The weather for our few day stopover in Melbourne was again, thankfully, great.
Despite
Coral on pile at Busselton Pier.
Busselton Underwater Observatory.having more history than some other parts of Oz we had visited, Melbourne felt like a really cool town, similar to parts of London in many aspects but on the sea. Wahey! We learnt the history of Australian immigration in the (funnily enough) immigration museum, watched the numerous wedding ceremonies in the botanical gardens, people watched at the bohemian St. Kilda (home of the sometimes bohemian DeMoor!), enjoyed the food in the Italian district and beers in some funky bars (mostly out of our budget), window shopped at the motorbike shops and whiled away the hours wandering the banks of the river and the city streets.
We caught up with Nunzio and his family who is Grace's second cousin. Nunzio treated us to a fantastic meal, the ingredients having all been grown in the garden. Even the wine had been made from grapes off the local vine. Compared to the food we had been eating in the van we felt like we had died and gone to culinary heaven. Given that we had never met previously, it did not feel too weird and we spent a great evening chatting about how the relative families had progressed since leaving the
old Southern Italian village, quite literally on the other side of the World and settling in different countries. There were many similarities and only a few differences, quite amazing given the distance and lack of direct contact.
As we were on a schedule, we decided to avoid the coastal route to Sydney, instead opting for the rather dull drive past Canberra to Sydney, via the Blue Mountains to the East of Sydney.
New South Wales
Our drive to the Blue Mountains took us through a couple of quaint rural towns and we enjoyed Valentine's Day in Yass with a romantic panini from the Country Kitchen. The weather closed in as we approached Katoomba in the Blue Mountains and stayed that way for two days. Given the need for good visibility to enjoy the scenery, we played many games of cards and cursed our bad luck. When the weather eventually broke, we were rewarded with some spectacular views over the unspoilt forest which were once scheduled to be culled to make way for a dam (if memory serves us right!) The area seemed to give off a blue haze, which was apparently not our eyesight failing us, but
the reason the mountains got their name - from the eucalyptus oil evaporating from the many gum trees. The carpet of trees, waterfalls and sounds of the birds was reminiscent of a Tarzan movie and we spent the next two days walking as many of the trails as our legs could muster. From the ever popular Three Sisters (no this is not an Australian girl band), to Evans Lookout, Govetts Leap, Echo Point, Perry's Lookdown, Wentworth Falls we walked them all, well some of them and also managed to see a couple of Wedge Tailed Eagles circling in the thermals (it must have been cold out there).
Satisfied that we'd seen everything clearly, we headed to Sydney where Stephanie, a friend of Mr Dellow's and skiing companion kindly agreed to let us crash in her spare room and show us the sights and sounds of the City during our brief visit from her fab pad in Mosman.
The chance to sleep in a proper bed was almost too much for us after about 30 days in the van since Liz kindly put us up in Perth and we rudely slept in, incapable of getting up to make our
hostess a cup of cha before going off to work. Our first glimpse of Sydney Harbour was from the Mosman ferry, a great introduction to the famous sight. The Bridge and Opera House were as spectacular as imagined although the Opera House felt somewhat smaller than expected and was off limits that day due to Mr Packer's funeral ceremony. We played like the tourists, visiting the Botanical Gardens (more joggers than Melbourne, but less weddings), Historic Rocks area, Mrs Macquarie's Chair and watched the QEII set sail.
We hit as many of Sydney's beaches as we could during our stay, including Chinaman's, Balmoral, and the town beaches of Manly, Bronte, Tamarama and Bondi, with the latter playing host to an old aged fella instructing male passers by to "be proud of your strength" and to the ladies declaring that it was "women like you that turned me from men!" A truly surreal experience and one we think will be repeated if you ever visit Bondi beach, a popular people watching spot. Our visit was topped off with a great night out with Stephanie and her friend Elaine enjoying drinks over the city in the revolving bar, Malayan cuisine and
some funky pier side bars, not forgetting a piano bar of dubious taste where thankfully Grace had the good manners not to sing-a-long. Yet another great stop and fab city. You could definitely see why people relocate here, although the property prices seemed to be even more out of reach to the masses than London.
We left Sydney eager for more beach and to experience everything we'd heard about the east coast. Unfortunately, the weather was against us until we reached Byron Bay, but we did manage to get close to nature or at least some roo's, emus and koalas at a sanctuary at Port Macquarie who allowed us to stroke and feed them like we were a couple of 6 year old's. Despite what people say about the east coast being a path too well trodden, we did manage to find some lovely quiet spots away from the masses by venturing off the beaten track a little. That said, we thoroughly enjoyed our stay in Byron Bay, staying at a quiet campsite on the outskirts of town and maximising the beaches during the day and the bars, restaurants and Cinema at night. We were beginning to feel too
tied to the van and had pretty much given up on the budget in the search of food, comfort (dry), entertainment. It was also at Byron Bay that Andrew realised he was not as young (read fit) as he once was, getting cramps and almost requiring the services of the chaps in yellow and red on the two occasions he tried to join the local body boarders.
Nature 1: Andrew 0. Next stop, Queensland.
Queensland
We rocked up at Hervey Bay, and wouldn't you bloody believe it, the heavens opened and did not stop for the next three days or show any sign of stopping in the foreseeable future, this being the wet season. We canned our plan for an independent multi-day visit to Fraser Island, a sand bank just off of the Queensland coast, and resigned ourselves to join a one-day tour of the island where our guide pointed out that we were very lucky and in the minority to see the Island in such rare and wet conditions! Thanks, mate. That said, the Island was beautiful and the supposedly turquoise sea off the south east coast where the wreck of the Maheno boat is
now permanently located, might have been a dull grey in colour but made up for it with its spectacular waves crashing on the beach in a force 5 gale. Even more fun was driving along this beach in our massive 4x4 coach avoiding the inbound waves and soft sand as we took this 'main road' (really) to visit some of the other sights on the Island which rises from sea level to 500m but has no soil being made up completely of sand which supports the entire eco-structure of the place. We will definitely be back to visit this special place, but on a drier day.
Conscious that our time in Oz was closing in on us, we limited our stops for the remainder of our trip focussing on finding sun as the first priority and finding our target destinations as a secondary. This strategy saw us drive through the banana plantations and many sugar cane farms, (figuratively speaking as we respected the local nature), which constitute the farming in this region before stopping in the very quiet and very beautiful Town of 1770 (more of a hamlet actually, no not a cigar) where we enjoyed the beach and
the waves for three days. At this point we were conscious of the box jellyfish given all the signs on the beaches and the fact that we'd been stung previously by a Portugese Man of War further south (nothing serious fortunately). Not knowing what one of these boys looked like, we cacked ourselves when we saw a jellyfish in the sea and made for shore like one of the best panic scenes in Jaws with limbs a flailing. However, we were somewhat embarrassed when the local kids picked it up and threw it at each others heads. Apparently it was somewhat less deadly than the gift wrapped fella.
The beautiful Whitsunday Islands were our next stop via the not so beautiful Airlie Beach where we opted against a multi-day sailing extravaganza as .. yep you guessed it .. the weather was mainly falling from the sky and we did not want to spend three days stuck in a leaky boat. Instead we opted for a powerboat cruise around the Islands, using its speed to avoid the rain clouds as we zoomed past glum looking souls in waterproofs sat on the decks of the yachts. We donned sexy stinger suits
(all-in-one lycra leotards - oh baby!) and snorkelled with the many amazing fish on a couple of the fringing reefs. How cool are the multi-coloured parrot fish? Andrew did his bit for international relations by 'politely instructing' some young Asian girls who clearly had not understood the snorkelling instructions and were not competent swimmers to refrain from standing (and killing) the live coral.
We followed this up with a seaplane tour which took off from land and landed in the water on the outer reef by Heart Reef (shaped as a heart). We hopped in a semi-submersible boat to view the coral and once again donned the sexy yoga gear to snorkel. Unlike the inner reef which had many different soft corals (v. colourful), the outer reef seemed to be solely hard coral, but had some massive fish that seemed to be as inquisitive of us as we were of them. We think they were potato cod. They must have been as when we approached them with salt and vinegar they scarpered. It was Grace's turn to stand up for the reef this time by dobbing a non-confident snorkeller into the pilot who had gotten out of his comfort
zone and went hugging the coral. It seems a shame that such a beautiful natural phenomenon as the reef is slowly being destroyed by tourists who clearly do not have the capability to enjoy the reef without causing damage. On a more positive note we finished the day off by stopping for a champagne lunch on Whitehaven Beach next to Hill Inlet where we paddled with the stingrays on the lovely silica sand. Oh how pampered we felt, a world away from our campervan.
Onwards to our final destination of Cairns where we hoped to cross over to Cape Tribulation for more rainforest and Barrier Reef. We stopped on the way at a Crocodile Farm hoping to encounter these magnificent beasts in a controlled environment rather than out of bad luck and stupidity out in the wild. We arrived at feeding time to witness boys and girls enjoying some of the Colonel's finest (chicken) and were taken aback by the lack of table manners as they instinctively snapped with great speed and power at the stick that the guide used to inform them that dinner was in fact served. Apparently these crocs were comparitively small, but seemed big to
us and were rescued from certain death having been captured being naughty nearby or to humans in the wild. On the less positive side of the farm was the shoe and handbag centre, sorry, breeding centre.
Wow! Can it rain in Cairns. If we recall correctly, 14 inches in one weekend. Even the ducks were confused. Our attempt to cross the river to Cape Tribulation was denied due to over a metre of flood water on the road the other side, so we were left to explore Cairns for a few days instead. We had hoped the weather would pick up to get some final snorkelling in, however, winds of 20 to 30 knots put a stop to that so we had to explore the restaurants, bars, shops and cinemas. Seeing as the weather was only going to get worse, we made the reluctant decision to move our flights to New Zealand forward by a couple of days. Looking back, we're glad we did given the Cyclone that came in and destroyed the area. Given the scale of the farming in this area, it will unfortunately affect the local population terribly, not just for the immediate rebuilding but in
the short to medium term for the farming industry which will take years to get back on its feet.
We have some great memories from our brief time in Australia. Having met locals who have spent a lifetime trying to see the place, we have barely scratched the surface but yet saw some of the unforgettable beauty of the country that has left us wanting to return in the future. Although no one tells you about the rain or flies it did nothing to detract from the beauty of the place. We know what we experienced in terms of rain wasn't necessarily the norm, but the fact that it does rain more than expected was reinforced by others who had commented on this fact independently. In fact, it has made us more resolute to return and spending less time on the road and more time focussing on the places of interest. "Whinging Poms." Whilst we sometimes heard the term Poms by the 'locals' we mostly enjoyed a positive encounter with those whom we met who were more interested in where we were from and headed and were really good hosts. It's not that they were keen to knock the
UK, it was more a sense of pride in Australia and their desire for others to share its enjoyment also. This pride in Australia is born out by their active lifestyle and sporting culture (swimming lessons for kids before school etc,) and is reflected in the disproportionate number of medals they won in the commonwealth games compared to the much larger populations of the UK and India etc..
Next stop New Zealand where we swap the Kookaburra for the Kiwi and the boomerang for the bungy rope.
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