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Published: February 2nd 2011
Thump! We had arrived at our accommodation and hit the bed. Urrgh!! Cough! Huh! Zzzz! Urrgh!! Cough! Huh! Zzzz! Uuugh!! It went like this for about 48hrs or more and then we heard the tropical parrots, saw the light streaming through the curtains and felt the tropical heat drifting towards us and life slowly began to return to normal so we began to tentatively explore Cairns. By this time we had already cancelled our Barrier reef tour twice and had rebooked it for a 3rd time. Cairns is in tropical North Queensland and boy was it hot and steamy not a good place to be in when you’re recovering from a fever.
Cairns town centre or CBD (Central business district) as the Australians like to call it was old fashioned and outdated and even the local newspaper had a campaign to improve the area. The water front however was ideal for outdoor living with BBQ’s, parks and massive lagoon swimming pools and loads of outdoor fun for kids. The summer time in North Queensland brings with it stingers which are otherwise known as life threateningly dangerous jelly fish. There are 2 main kinds which when stung can quickly attack the
nervous system and because of this swimming is not recommended at all. We finally got on our barrier reef tour and had excellent weather. On the tour we were given stinger suits to wear which to me they seem as if they would be very ineffective but what do I know. I was a little anxious about snorkelling because of the stingers and other general sea creatures but I snorkelled at 2 different sights and enjoyed it but wouldn’t wish to do it for too long.
In the meantime I (Jacks) signed up for a beginner’s scuba diving session whilst on the boat something I had always wanted to do and there was no better place to give it a go than the beautiful great Barrier Reef. I was in group A and so was first up not much time to think about what I was doing. After jumping in we had to hold onto a rope and practice equalising which is clearing the pressure from the ears. Next I had to master breathing whilst underwater which in itself was scary, trusting that this thing in your mouth is going to help you breath when you’re so many metres
deep in the water, also whilst doing that we had to practice clearing our leaky masks, but still remembering to breathe. Before too long I was being taken down to the next rope. The fact that you are 5 metres deep with all these beautiful fish swimming in front of you was amazing, but I still had to remember to breathe normally… In groups of 3 and 4 we left the rope and moved around the sea bed. I must admit it was a fantastic experience but it was probably not the best idea to be scuba diving whilst recovering from a terrible chest infection and before long a coughing fit followed and I returned to the surface to breathe the natural way. It was a great experience and minus chest infection I will l do it again. We saw some amazing coral and fantastic fish in the bluest clearest water. The boat was great and the people fab. It was a great day which was definitely needed.
We picked up our camper van and quickly got used to how it all worked. It wasn’t particularly large but it was much bigger than some of the tiny vans that
others had. We could stand up in ours. Believe it or not that is a luxury in camper van terms. We had a fridge, sink, gas rings, microwave, drawers, storage and table area which turned into a bed at night. We also hired a awning which was basically plastic that was threaded through a side runner on the van and then poles were used to prop up the other end and this turned out to be invaluable during those long rainy days that we had ahead of us. The drivers cab was spacious and had a radio which we were able to play the Ipod from and listen to The Ashes on. The cab was air conditioned too but not in the living area.
Our trip was to take us from Cairns to Sydney and we ended up travelling about 4000km plus in 30 days. I won’t bore you with the details of every day but a shortened version of the trip goes something like this:
Rain, Rain, driving, listening to cricket, drinking Macdonald’s takeaway cappuccinos (seriously the McCafe idea is the best!) setting up camp, sleeping, packing up camp, rain, more rain, driving and so on. The weather
got us down quickly and so more often than not we opted to drive on instead of stay in places. The day we arrived at Airlie Beach, the access point for the Whitsunday islands, it rained so much that the campsite were sandbagging the grounds. We quickly made the decision to leave early after our 1st night because we had been told that if the local roads flooded, which they frequently did in this area, then we would be stuck here and the roads would be impassable. We moved on and stopped for a McCafe cappuccino in Rockhampton. The rain was hammering down and gushing through the streets so much so that I took off my thongs (flip flops) and crossed the road ankle deep in water. Since then Rockhampton has been hit by serious flooding twice.
We stopped in Hervey Bay which is famous for 2 things; 1) Fraser Island, 2) Whale watching. We were too late in the year for the latter but we did book a trip to Fraser Island. Fraser Island is the largest sand island in the world and a UNESCO world heritage site. It stretches 123 kilometres in length and 22 kilometres at
its widest point. The highest dune is 244 metres and the island is only accessible only by 4WD. It is so diverse that it is made up of coloured sand cliffs, dune blowouts, rainforests, mangroves and perched dune lakes including both clear white water lakes and dark black water lakes. The Butchulla aboriginal tribes also used to inhabit the island. Along with this it has the purest strain of wild Dingo. In short it is a beautiful and diverse place to visit. It rained in the morning but in the afternoon the sun finally came out and we enjoyed swimming in the crystal clear perched dune lake. I was worried/scared about the Dingo’s whilst at the Lake. (There were signs everywhere about not feeding them and not leaving children unattended as the Dingo would attack them. The famous “A dingo stole my baby” was here on Fraser Island.) Tourist feed them and they then become playful/aggressive and have to be shot)
Another favourite place of ours was Noosa heads. The Noosa area is very popular and has multimillion dollar houses lining the river bank all with their own private jetty and boat dock. We rented a small self drive
boat (very small) and with it came fishing gear and bait. Well we managed to feed the fish very successfully but we never caught a single one. We docked the boat just off of a large sand bank/island and enjoyed swimming in the clear waterx just before the river entered the sea. A fab lunch followed by a bottle of wine on the edge of the river at our camp site finished the day off nicely.
On our way to Brisbane we stopped off at Australia Zoo which was of course made famous by Steve Irwin the crocodile hunter. All around the Zoo there were references and photos of him and it felt a little sad being there. I should imagine it’s incredibly hard for his family to see his face everywhere. We had seen his biography which was written by his wife in the zoo shop but didn’t get it. Jacks subsequently spend the next week or two searching books shops to buy it for me for Xmas. She found it and I finished it not long after Christmas. In the book she writes about how he always knew he would die young and how he lived his
life in a whirlwind so as to make sure he made the most of every moment.
We carried on down the coast hitting both the sunshine coast and the gold coast. One of the camp sites was really festive and all of the caravans had Christmas lights and decorations. The caravan next to ours had an inflatable Santa which moved up and down the Chimney pot. The kids came from all over the campsite to look at him. A little girl opposite us was skating back and forwards slowly becoming obsessed by it and when her parents called her inside she had one last skate past him and shouted “I love you Santa” We couldn’t stop laughing. The beaches here were miles long and the sea was great with fantastic waves. We even watched a children’s surf competition. It was as we shifted into New South Wales that the weather became less wet, don’t get me wrong we still had our fair share of rain but it was less than we were used to. We stayed at the bohemian Byron Bay which can only be described as the place where long term hippie travellers hang out. Dreadlock wearing, bongo
playing hippies adorned the streets. During a thunderstorm we managed to find a great pub and watch the cricket with a small crowd of other English supporters. Safety in numbers meant that we all cheered loudly every time England got a wicket.
We planned to get to Sydney about a week before Christmas and stay with a friend of Jacks. Our last night before we arrived in the outskirts of Sydney was spent gambling with an entire Australian village. After driving for the majority of the day we set up camp and strolled to the nearest busy looking pub. To be truthful busy was an understatement it seemed to us to be unnaturally busy. We soon realised that something was going on. People were buying raffle tickets by the bucket full. There were both yellow and blue tickets. As the night progressed the pub became full beyond capacity and we finally asked somebody what was going on. The blue tickets were for trays of meat. The Aussies are addicted to BBQ’s and so this was in itself quite popular but the real draw was the yellow tickets. On the wall was a large locked picture frame with 48 playing
cards displayed inside. 42 of them had the picture face up whilst 6 were still faced down. For 42 weeks they had been selling tickets and then each week if your ticket was called out you would get to turn over a card. If you turned over the only Joker in the pack you would win the jackpot. Well for 42 weeks nobody had won therefore the jackpot was huge and that night the remaining cards would be turned over until the Joker was uncovered. People were buying $50 dollars worth of tickets. Each strip was $5. The jackpot was $31,000. We bought one strip and waited in anticipation with the entire local population. The meat went quickly and then a yellow coloured ticket was drawn. The owner of the ticket squeezed to the front and the frame was unlocked. Then people began cheering. It was not the joker. The 2nd yellow ticket was drawn and again the card was turned and the cheering began. A third chance presented itself for everybody. The number was called, it wasn’t ours but the person who owned the ticket was lucky enough to turn over the joker. It was a fun night and
a great fundraising idea.
We arrived at Jacks friends’ house in Gosford, which is about 35 minutes outside of Sydney and situated near a beautiful lake, only to discover that she had 3 dogs. Now I had realised she had a dog but had no idea she had 3 dogs and so was somewhat shocked at the thought of being in a house with them. As they were very well trained dogs I soon began to learn to coexist with them. We had Christmas lunch/picnic on the river side in the sun and later spent the afternoon on the beach and swimming in the sea. The beach was busy with families and groups of people and had a great atmosphere. I would describe Christmas as feeling more like a bank holiday Monday than Christmas day because it falls during the Australian summer holidays and so the shop are more focused on summer products than Xmas products and obviously it’s hot so the usual Xmas food is too heavy and the decorations etc seem too wintery for summer. Many Australians go on holiday for Christmas. Gosford was located perfectly for travel into Sydney and on Boxing Day we headed into
Sydney on the train. We took a ferry around the quay and under the harbour bridge also we walked around the trendy Rocks area and up to Sydney Opera House. We had intended to see the start of the Sydney to Hobart Yacht race but left the house too late to catch it. Nevertheless we had a great day strolling around the city. We also visited the Blue Mountains which do indeed look blue due to the fine haze coming from the Eucalyptus trees. We took a cable car and sky train through the forests. We visited both of Sydney’s main beaches Manly and Bondi. We had, by this time returned our camper van back totally unscathed and therefore had our $7500 bond returned to us, and now we had a rental car for a week or so. We were driving into Bondi beach main street minding our business when a man began shouting at us whilst we were in the car. He was getting angry and pointing and shouting and then next he mouthed something and stuck his middle finger up at us and walked off. We burst out laughing looked at each other and said “Welcome to Bondi”.
That basically summed it up. Bondi was full of posing men and women in swim wear either drugged up or hung over and all completely in love with themselves. At the side of the beach was an outdoor park/gym and it was full of men doing one handed pull-ups bare chested.
We had cut down our Australian travels at least by half as it was costing so much to travel there that we had to cut our losses and leave earlier rather than later. We had planned to be in Sydney for the New Year fireworks and so we coincided our departure with this date. The plan was to drive towards the city early in the day and park in the suburbs and then catch the train into the centre where we would wait all day to watch the fireworks and then after midnight we would catch the train back to the car and drive to the airport and wait until morning when we had to hand the car back at 6am and catch a our plane to New Zealand at 9am. We decided to watch it in an official viewing area right on the water front by both
the opera house and Harbour Bridge. Once full the area gets closed off so we got there early and it happened to be the hottest day we had had in Australia since arriving. We set up camp on the floor with the other folks and waited. In hindsight we needn’t have got there quiet so early. It soon became soooo hot that we bought umbrellas to shade us from the sun. As the day progressed the area became full and so was closed off to any new entrants. I can’t begin to describe how busy it had become and the tiny gaps people were squeezing into just to get close the railings even though the fireworks were going to in the air. Soon nobody could move at all and it seems that only the English have issues with personal space. People forced their way forwards and sat on our toes, shared our blanket and annoyed us greatly. Jacks was unhappy with some Norwegians for sitting on our blanket and I disgusted politely with some drunken German girls the purpose of queuing all day versus pushing in at 9 o clock at night. Anyway first there was the 9 0’clock fireworks
which are aimed at families so that they don’t have to stay up late and then the big ones at midnight. They were defiantly the best fireworks we had ever seen and the ones that came off of the bridge were particularly spectacular and even the boats in the docks were all lit up. The crush afterwards moved quickly and we arrived at the car smoothly. We drove on the empty roads to the airport and sat trying to sleep for a couple of hours before handing the keys in.
In short we had some good days in Australia and many wet days too, the cost of living was high and soon we were spending a lot of money and not having the best of times in the rain and so we decided it was time to head to pastures new and boy were we excited.
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Julie
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Well done Kate + Jacks! Cant wait for the next installment.