Nov. 24 - Dec. 10

Tuesday, December 12, 2006

Today we went looking for a camping. It was really necessary to wash our clothes, since we weren't able to do that for a while. Trying to think smart, we went to an information centre and asked for a couple of cheap campings with the facilities we needed. Most of the campings with our needs were pretty far away, but there was one municipal camping about 30 km from the information centre. The location of the camping was actually on the other side of the water of Palm Beach, where we have stayed when we were in Sydney in the beginning. So we headed to the camping and noticed that the office was closed. The facilities were closed, and a key was only available at the office. We waited for two hours until it opened... but it didn't. No one was there. After another hour of waiting we decided to leave. There was nothing, and the persons who we asked didn't know about it either. So we left and went looking for other campings, but couldn't seem to find any. This was pretty crap, and we ended up in a rest area above Sydney.

Monday, December 11, 2006

The morning started with a touristic drive, called the Lakes Way. There was actually nothing to see. It was supposed to be a detour, going from the national highway to the beach and back to the national highway. But when we arrived at the beach, the touristic drive signs ended, which meant we had to find our own way back to the highway. After that we headed to Seal Rock, where there was a lighthouse which looked out on rocks where seals could be spotted. Unfortunately, it was necessary to bring a binocular to see them, but we didn't have that. The views were good though, but we couldn't make good photo's because it was pretty misty.

We also visited South West Rock, but this wasn't really interesting. It was almost the end of the day and we were almost in Newcastle. There we looked for an internet cafe but couldn't find it. But we have to admit we didn't really looked in the centre, because we didn't really feel like getting lost there. It was just a "quick" look.

Sunday, December 10, 2006

We continued the Waterfall Way and headed for the Ebor Falls at the Guy Fawkes river. This waterfall had an upper and a lower section and we made a little walk over the edge of the gorge to see them both. This waterfall was more impressing than yesterdays Dangar falls and the river itself was very beautiful too. We spent an hour or so admiring the environment and Yvonne really loved the wildflowers, which seemed to grow everywhere!



Then we made a little detour to visit Cathedral Rock National park. This park is named after its boulders, with the size of churches, well... we couldn't find them. Anyway we liked to drive through it, but it wasn't very special. On our way back our car got cleaned by a few horses which were standing on the road and wouldn't let us pass before they had licked our whole car. We did the same at New England National Park to visit Point Lookout where we looked over a huge tree valley. It was beautiful. It looked liked the Blue Mountains actually. Our last stop was at the Wollomombi Falls at Wild rivers national park. Ohh god those rivers were soooo wild, unfortunately there was no water in it. The gorges were amazing though. We decided to take a different way back to the coast, but it turned out to be unsealed. Therefore we took the same road back.

Saturday, December 9, 2006

From Cairns, we've been looking for a good location to go white water rafting. We were informed that the rivers near Coffs Harbour were very wild and that it should be an amazing rafting experience. Of course we wanted it to be as wild as possible. But everytime we saw a waterfall, there wasn't much water... This because it hasn't been raining very much lately. Because of that we weren't sure if this was the right moment to go, so we went to an information centre in Grafton. Unfortunately, there wasn't much water because of the lack of rain, as we predicted. There were a couple of spots though where it would be active, but it still costs a lot of money. So we probably forward it until we are in New Zealand.



We decided to move on and take a detour inland through New England. We took the 168 km Waterfall Way, which was really beautiful. It was quite a different landscape compared to what we have seen so far. Lots of hills, with farms all over them. Beautiful lookouts and of course some waterfalls. We ended up at Dorrigo near the Dangar Falls were we stayed for the night.

Friday, December 8, 2006

After staying in Byron Bay for almost a week, it was time to go do some sightseeing again. We headed to Angourie Point near Angourie to see the beaches there, and went to Yuraygir National Park afterwards. Here it was possible to do a 9 km walk along the beach. It started a bit in the bush, where the track was covered in spider webs with big spiders in it. To pass it, we had to crouch below the webs. This wasn't really fun, but after about 100 meters of "spider road", the webs stopped and the track started to follow the beach. After about 3 km, there was a the "Dirrangang" lookout where we could look along the coast, see a lake and the end of the track. Not very fascinating but a nice spot to stop for a few minutes and drink a bit. Then we continued and went to a spot where the sea had created little caves in the rocks. When the tide is low, it's possible to enter these caves but unfortunately it was high tide when we were there. The track didn't end here but we thought it wasn't worth the effort to continue. So we went back and skipped the part of the spider road by walking along the beach. We took dinner in Yamba and went to a rest area above Grafton.




Thursday, December 7, 2006

When we wanted to leave today, Yvonne noticed she was missing a part of her bikini. So we went back to Byron Bay looking at the places where we stopped to find it. We didn't find it, so we headed on to Byron Bay to look for a new one. Unfortunately we didn't have much luck there too. Yvonne found one, but it wasn't in the right size. When she finally thought she found one, it appeared to be very fragile and broke... It was designed very bad. We gave up and travelled further south and stopped at a rest area to stay for the night.

Wednesday, December 6, 2006

Not to early in the morning we left to go to Ballina. We went to a couple of places where we could get a green slip, to check the prices. They were all about the same. But to get a green slip, it was necessary to have an address in New South Wales. The cheapest place to get one was at a camping, where we booked for a night. After this we went to the office of the RTA. Here we got the exact price for the registration. It was about the same as the green slip! Yegh. But there were no other options available. We went back to get the green slip and returned to the RTA to extend the registration. Now we were finally done. Although most of our money was spend now, it gave us a good feeling to have it fixed. Afterwards, Jasper got his hair cut, which was very necessary and after that we went to the camping.

Tuesday, December 5, 2006

At the moment we were a bit tired of taking care of everything with the car, so we wanted to relax a bit. First we went shopping a bit and went to the beach afterwards. The beach we visited was Watego's Beach. Here we spend the most of the day. For the rest we didn't really do much interesting stuff. But tomorrow we would go to Ballina.

Monday, December 4, 2006

The pink slip was planned for today at 11.00 AM. It took about an hour to check the car. After the check, we received a white slip, describing a couple of things which were wrong. Two tires had to be replaced because the grip wasn't good enough (below 1.5 mm), the numberplate lights weren't working, just as the blowers, and there was a crack in one of the headlights. They told us the crack could redirect some light in the eye of a cyclist and could blind him... right.

Anyway, the problems had to be fixed. The blowers were already working, it's just that they only work when you turn the key back 1 mm when the car is started. So the first thing we were going to fix were the tires. The two tires were replaced for $80, which wasn't that bad. To make it a relaxed day, we got ourselves some fries and a couple of ice creams from the supermarket. We went back to the garage to show the new tires. They didn't check it. Next was the headlight. There was a store selling the headlight we needed for $60 dollars, and they could install it for $66 dollars an hour, which would be half an hour work. But the mechanic was already home. We asked if we could borrow some tools to do it ourselves, which wasn't a big problem. It took us an hour, but it saved us $33. Again we went back to the garage and again they didn't check it. Now only the numberplate lights needed to be fixed. A closer look told us that there weren't any bulbs present! No wonder it wouldn't work. After opening the back of the car it appeared that the lights were present, connected and working. They just weren't in place. So this didn't cost us anything.



Everything on the list was fixed so we go ourselves the pink slip! Now only the green slip needed to be done, and that would cost us $466... quite a lot of money! We decided we wanted to go to the RTA first to get the exact price for the new registration. There wasn't an RTA in Byron Bay, the closest one was in Ballina.

Sunday, December 3, 2006

Sunday and nothing on schedule. But there was a little market in town, so we wanted to take a look there. It's actually the first australian market we've seen so far. It was pretty small, but with a lot of different stalls. Most were pretty exotic. People were selling clothes, fruity drinks, sunglasses, books, funny creations and so on. A highlight was an artist doing a live act with five different instruments. It was a very good performance. We got ourselves a couple of books, and an ice cream with strawberries. Delicious! In the afternoon we went to one of the beaches, called Clarkes Beach. Here we spent a couple of hours relaxing. That was pretty much it for today.




Saturday, December 2, 2006

The end date of the registration of our car was getting closer and closer. To continue the registration, it is necessary to get a pink slip and a green slip. A pink slip is a piece of paper which proves that the car is roadworthy. A green slip is the insurance of the car. To get a pink slip, the car needs to be checked at a garage. If there's anything needed to be repaired, you get a white slip which shows what is wrong. After fixing it you get a pink slip. Today we went to a garage to set a date for acquiring a pink slip. It would be done on monday, but it could be cancelled if necessary. After that, we started gathering as much as information as we could. We called Travellers Auto Barn in Sydney, for information about registration in South Australia, and called the RTA (Road and Traffic Authority) for their side of the story. Both gave us different information, but as we looked at it, it was best to extend the registration in New South Wales.

After making this decision, we checked out Byron Bay. First we checked the beaches. Weird, but we didn't find it very special. Next, we visited the lighthouse. Here was a pretty good view on the beaches, which was nice. It's funny to know that this is the most eastern point of Australia! Of course we made some pictures. At the end of the day we took a quick look in a few of the stores, looking for some nice australian clothes.

Friday, December 1, 2006

Farewell Queensland and welcome back New South Wales! Yes, we left Queensland behind us. First thing on schedule is taking a look in Springbrook National Park. This park is on the border of New South Wales and Queensland and is supposed to be very beautiful, because it's in the top three of best national parks of Queensland. That's why we were going to pay it a visit. To get a good impression, we drove to a couple of lookouts first and went for a walk at one or two of the tracks. The views were nice, but not that special and it was a bit misty too. The environment wasn't very special either, so we decided to visit the lookouts only. One of the lookouts was the "Best of all" lookout. It looked out over a lot of mountains and it was possible to see the sea, and even Byron Bay, which was about a one and a half hour drive from where we were.



After visiting Springbrook National Park, we went a bit back to visit Surfers Paradise. Our first intention was to skip it but we decided it was better to use the rest of the day having fun there and go to Byron Bay afterwards. Surfers Paradise was much nicer than we expected, so it was a good decision to go there after all. It was a long and beautiful beach, with skyliners at the city side. Impressing! We went for a swim, but the waves were so powerful that it hurt. Maybe that's why it 's called Surfers Paradise after all. Around six o'clock we headed to Byron Bay. Tomorrow we would gather some information about the car's registration.

Thursday, November 30, 2006

Today we said goodbye to Ceciel and Dennis, because they wanted to move on to Sydney straight away. They were a bit tired of sight seeing and wanted to spend the rest of their holiday in Sydney visiting friends, selling their car and celebrating christmas and new years eve. We really hope to see them again overthere!



We spent the rest of the day in Brisbane where we did some shopping. It was almost time to extend the registration of our car, so we had to gain some information. That's why we visited Travellers Auto Barn, which has a location in Brisbane as well. We were still doubting in which state we wanted to continue the registration, because we heard that it was much cheaper in South Australia. They were not capable of giving us any useful information about it, so we decided to leave it for now and move on to New South Wales first. In the centre of Brisbane we did a 4 km walk through the best spots of the city, but it wasn’t really worth it. Perhaps it's just because we liked Sydney so much, Brisbane is crap compared to Sydney.

Wednesday, November 29, 2006

Today we continued our way to Brisbane and made a little detour, to visit Australian Zoo (Home of the Crocodile Hunter) and the Glasshouse Mountains National Park. Ceciel and Dennis just wanted to stop at the zoo to see if there were any flowers, in memorial of Steve Irwin. We had heard a lot of good things about the zoo from other travellers, but we were still doubting wether we wanted to go or not.. While standing in front of it, both of us really wanted to go in. It was a really nice zoo, with native australian animals only, except for the elephants and tigers. We spent four hours walking around and watching bird, snake and crocodile shows. It was nice to see, although we expected a bit more of the shows.



Afterwards, we drove through the Glasshouse Mountains, which are sixteen weird shaped volcanic mountains, based on a very flat landscape. The mountains were very beautiful, but the surrounding environment wasn't that great. In the evening we drove the remaining kilometers to Brisbane, to go to the same camping as where Ceciel and Dennis were staying. We had another very nice evening together.




Tuesday, November 28, 2006

We picked up Ditte and Glen at their hostel at nine o'oclock to go back to Aussie Tracks. As expected, it turned out to be a waste of time. They gave us a really bad invoice. There were just three lines on it saying:

Paint: $150
Labour: $200
Total: $350

We really admired their talents in mathematics! They wouldn't give us a more specialised one. For us it was done now. We knew we wouldn't get back anything, but Ditte really wanted to have a second opinion at another garage. Probably just to hear we weren't being ripped off or something. We went there with a mechanic of Aussie Tracks, which we weren't very happy about, since it had to be done independently. So we asked him to let us talk, but he didn't want that. As soon as we arrived he ran into their office and said "Hey, I wouldn't wast my time about it, but can you have a look at this car? I have got some people here who think they got ripped off." and gave them his three-lined invoice. So that didn't work either. It made everything much worse actually. We started feeling very angry about the way they were handling us. Yesterday we told them honestly what had happened. If we hadn't, they probably wouldn't have seen it. They didn't say one nice word in return, screamed at us all the time, wanted to get the money and get rid of us as fast as possible.



Because we weren't getting anywhere, we left and went with Glen and Ditte to their hostel to exchange some photo's. This made us feel much better, because the pictures reminded us about the great time we had on Fraser Island. For us it was time to leave Hervey Bay now, so we called Dennis and Ceciel to travel together and to hear about their Fraser Island experience. We drove towards Brisbane for our next stop and ended up in a rest area about 140 km above Brisbane. There we spent the evening playing games and eating Tim Tams (australian cookies) and had lots of fun.

Monday, November 27, 2006

It was already our last day on Fraser Island and there were still two lakes to visit. Lake Wabby, the island's deepest lake and Lake McKenzie, the most popular one. We took an inland track, which connected both. On our way we stopped at the Sandblow-lookout. It turned out to be a bad decision... we just parked the car and started to walk towards the lookout, when a very irritated busdriver asked us to move our car. We had parked it on an official parking spot, but he didn't have enough space to move his bus. Fine! So Glen and Ditte went back to the car to move it. Probably they weren't doing it fast enough, because the busdriver started to become more aggressive now, screaming "Move move move, or I will drive through your car!". Glen, who was driving started to stress and tried to make an impossible turn. Unfortunately he hit the wooden edge of the parking spot and made a big scratch on the left side of the car. The busdriver, who saw it happen, didn't care and just drove on. Glen was feeling really really sorry now, but there was nothing we could change about it anymore. So we agreed to pay for the damage together, whatever it would cost, and still make the best of this day.

We drove on to Lake Wabby where we parked the car and walked to the lake. It was a beautiful green lake. Three sides of it are surrounded by eucalyptus forest, while the fourth side is a massive pile of sand. We took a swim and relaxed in the sand. By the time we arrived at Lake McKenzie there wasn't much time left, because we had to be on the ferry at 4 o'clock. We had lost a lot of time because of the accident and stayed a bit too long at Lake Wabby. This was a pity, because this was the best lake we have ever seen! The water was crystal clear and blue. The white sand reflected the sunlight and you could see the sunlight underwater, which was very beautiful. It was so amazing, we wanted to stay here much longer, but it was time to go. On our way to the ferry we almost got lost. None of us knew the word "barge", which is some sort of boat. But the word was used on the signs... but we didn't follow these signs and almost ended up in the wrong place. And then we saw the word on our ticket for the ferry. We turned around and started driving as fast as was safe. It was getting really bumpy now! We managed to reach the ferry just in time.



Back at Aussie Trax, we decided to be honest and to tell them about the scratch on the car. Five of their people were walking around the car to examine the damage. One of them said to one of the others that it wasn't too serious. Probably not more than $120 dollars. We all started to feel relaxed when we walked back into the office. And then they told us we had to pay $350! We were really angry about this and we wanted to know why it was so expensive all of a sudden, while the other guy said it was nothing too serious. By the way, the plate of the car we damaged, was already damaged and had to be replaced anyway. They told us that their mechanic already went home so they didn't want to underrate it. One of us had to pay immediately, because they wanted to go home too. We could come back tomorrow to receive an invoice with the exact costs of all the parts required for repairing, together with the working hours. If it turned out to be less than $350 we would get the difference back. We didn't believe them and knew we wouldn't get anything back, but we still had to pay. It was the only thing we could do, they forced us to do it. We decided to stay in town for one more night and return tomorrow. Maybe it would benefit us, you never know. Besides, we wanted to do a second opinion at another garage anyway.

Sunday, November 26, 2006

Because we wanted to see the sun rise above the sea, we woke up at 4.00 AM. It was really worth doing it and we had to leave early anyway. This because we needed to do a 60 km beach drive to Indian Head today and we had to be there before the high tide started to come in. On our way we stopped at the Maheno shipwreck, which was a passenger liner that was blown ashore by a cyclone in 1935, while being towed to a scrap yard. Now it is lying on the beach and it was very cool to walk around it!



We parked the car near Indian Head, which is a lookout, and climbed to the top. From there we had an amazing view over the coastline. We looked down into the water and saw lots of marine life: sharks, dolphins, turtles, rays, and probably even a manta ray! Big sea eagles circled around us and we saw five dolphins working together to catch a whole school of fish. They circled around it and the school formed a ball. Then they pushed all the fish to the surface, where they started to jump out of the water. The dolphins could easily catch them now and afterwards there wasn't any fish left. It was such a cool place to be!



After spending a lot of time at Indian Head, we moved on to the nearby Champagne Pools, which is the only save place to swim in saltwater on the island. Rocks formed a natural wall around the pool and prevent marine life coming in. It was high tide now, so big waves crashed against the rocks and made the pool really bubbling. We stayed there a long time swimming and relaxing and swallowed lots of water!



Because it is the only safe saltwater swimming place on Fraser Island, it started to get really crowded. But we had to hang around until half past one, because of the tides. After an hour or two, we decided to go back to Indian Head, to spend the rest of our time there watching the marine life and having our lunch. At one particular time, six giant sea turtles came all up at the same time to take a breath! After lunch we headed back to the beach and visited the Pinnacles. This is a sandy rock-formation containing different colors of sand. Our last stop for today was at Eli Creek, a crystal clear waterway where we walked through and had a bit of a swim. Unfortunately there wasn't much water in it. Afterwards, we headed back to Eurong Resort for the night.

Saturday, November 25, 2006

Let's rock on Fraser Island!

Our adventure started at Aussie Trax where we received a two hour briefing about 4WD's. We also met our travel buddies for the next three days. They are a really nice danish couple of Jaspers age. Their names are Glen and Ditte and they seemed to have the same interests as we have. So we will have a great time together.

The briefing went too fast and the Aussie Trax people all told us different things about how to drive. It is very important to know a bit about this, since even very experienced drivers get stuck on Fraser Island's sandy tracks. According to the Lonely Planet, this island contains more sand than the Sahara desert! Unfortunately, by the time we really had to leave to catch our 11 o'clock ferry, we all understood different things. The car we hired was a big old Landrover with 8 seats, and Jasper drove the first part. We won't mention that the engine already stalled before we had left the terrain. Long time ago we drove a car with a clutch!



We arrived on Fraser Island at Kingfisher Bay. There we had a discussion about what to do with our tires. Yvonne had understood that we only had to deflate them as we were driving through very soft sand or get stuck all the time. Jasper thought we had to deflate them with 10 bars right away before we entered the sandy tracks. The danish couple wanted to deflate the front tires with 10 bar and the rear tires with 5 bars.

Anyway, we decided to try it without doing anything first. It didn't work, and got stuck twice in the first 300 meters. Because of that we deflated all the tires with 10 bars and that worked a lot better. We took the southern scenic driveway to visit some of the island's beautiful lakes: Lake Jennings, Lake Birrabeen and Lake Boomanjia. Especially lake Birrabeen had very clear blue water, so we took a swim and had our lunch over there. Just before dusk, we arrived at our resort "Eurong" where we would stay for the night. It's located near the beach and we got a very luxurious room with a big swimming pool! We really enjoyed the bumpy ride today, but we expected to see a lot of sand and dunes. For now we only saw a lot of forest and some lakes. Hopefully we see some really stunning things tomorrow!

Friday, November 24, 2006

Tomorrow we want to go to Fraser Island, so we left early to go to Hervey Bay. All the Fraser Island tours depart from here. Ceciel and Dennis had already booked their tour, but perhaps we could book the same one and go together. There are two types of trips. You can do a guided tour, or hire a 4WD and do it yourself. A guided tour is quite expensive and the number of people per group is very high. But if you hire a 4WD, you often end up with a big group as well and you never know who you are traveling with. Besides, you will be responsible for the car. Quite a lot of accidents happen on Fraser Island, and the tour Ceciel and Dennis were doing was already booked out. So it was quite a difficult decision! We gained some information at a bookings agency and decided to do a 3 day self drive tour. Aussie Trax was one of the few companies who send small groups to the island, so we booked the tour over there.

Nov. 13 - Nov. 23

Thursday, November 23, 2006

Agnes water is the most northern point of the east-coast, where surfing is possible again, since further up north the Great Barrier Reef protects the coast. Yvonne really wanted to surf again and so did Ceciel. So they decided to hire a board and went surfing for three hours. Jasper and Dennis relaxed on the beach and watched them. The waves were quite mellow, perfect for learning to surf. We both had a lot of fun, but we still suck at surfing.

In the afternoon we drove on together to Bundaberg, where we had booked for the Mon Repos Turtle Rookery. On this beach mainly loggerhead turtles come ashore to lay their eggs. Under supervision of rangers people are allowed to view the turtles while doing so. There were a lot of people, so we were divided in three groups. We were in the third group, which meant we had to wait until the third turtle came ashore. In the mean time we had to stay off the beach, as it had to be calm and dark over there. Rangers patrolled the beach and at the moment a turtle showed up and started to dig a nest one group was allowed to go to the beach. At 7 o’clock the first turtle arrived and within 15 minutes, the second one was there. Unfortunately the third one didn’t seem to be in a hurry and we had to wait until 11.15 pm until she finally showed up.



Meanwhile, the rangers gave us a lot of information about turtles and we watched some informative documentaries. On the beach our loggerhead made us wait again. She wasn’t satisfied with the nest she dug and moved on to make another one. And another one… Each of them on turtle speed. It wasn’t until half an hour past midnight she finally had laid her first pair of eggs. From this moment she seemed to be in some kind of trance and now we were finally allowed to she her. We formed a circle around her and saw the eggs drop. The rangers did some research on her and we were allowed to touch one of the eggs. It was amazing how soft and flexible they are. It was a very special moment for us, sitting there next to such a beautiful marine animal. After 20 minutes she was done and she started to cover her nest with sand. We escorted her on her way back to the sea and it was good to see her in the water, for she had been looking so hopelessly on solid ground. It was already 2.30 AM now, but it was really worth waiting for!

Wednesday, November 22, 2006

This morning we were the first to go into the tourist information centre to find out about the joyflight. Surprisingly they didn’t even know anything about it, but they really wanted to help us and started calling around. We have been there for two hours, but we left having a booked flight for this afternoon!



While we went to the supermarket we met Ceciel and Dennis again. They had booked their flight for today as well. There is only place for three people in the plane so Dennis was going with us, while Ceciel had to wait for the next flight. At half past one we arrived at the airstrip, nothing more than just a lane of grass in the middle of the forest. Kangaroos hopping around on it. After a very bumpy takeoff we had a really really beautiful view over the coast. We had a very cool pilot an did some awesome stunts in the air like sharp turns and the rollercoaster. For the last one we descent so fast that a lot of stuff was flying weightlessly through the airplane. It was terrific! During our flight we landed on a beach in a national park, where we went for a half an hour stroll over the beach. Back at the plane Yvonne had to climb on one of the wings to pose for a photo! On our way back we flew over the see and saw some turtles, a tiger shark and a dolphin swimming around. We made another quick descent and flew about one meter above the beach, which was quite scary. Back up in the air Yvonne had to steer the airplane for some time, which was so cool! This was definitely one of the best things we did so far!

Tuesday, November 21, 2006

In Rockhampton we went shopping a bit, because we needed a couple of things. Afterwards we headed on to Agnes Water, where we arrived in the evening. Not a really interesting day either. But tomorrow we would try to book the joyflight, hopefully on the same day.

Monday, November 20, 2006

Today wasn't very interesting. We met two other dutch people called Ceciel and Dennis. They told us it was possible to do a joyflight in Agnes Water and that it was very cheap. So we decided to go there, although it was still a long way ahead. Between Agnes Water and Airlie Beach wasn't much to do anyway. We left Airlie Beach pretty late, but still drove a couple of hours and stopped on rest area somewhere above Rockhampton.

Sunday, November 19, 2006

Luckily, breakfast was served a little bit later today. Probably because the cook had taken a couple of beers yesterday as well. Today might be the last day of the tour, but there was still one place to visit: "Blue Pearl Bay". Here we would go for a snorkel again. Jasper didn't go, because he didn't really feel like it, but Yvonne went. It was nice, but the previous spot was better. There wasn't as much coral as in Cateran Bay, but it was still alright. After snorkeling, course was set back to "Abel Point Marina", where the trip ended. It was definately worth the money, although we didn't see very many special things of the islands. The sailing itself however made up for this big time, especially because it was in a very nice environment. We really enjoyed it.



Saturday, November 18, 2006

Breakfast was served quite early in the morning, but we were already awake. Delicious fruit was served, together with corn flakes and milk, and of course there was bread. The first thing on schedule was to play around a bit on Whitehaven Beach. Because of the silica sand, it was very white. This was really, really nice.

After playing around a bit, we went back to the ship to head to 'Tongue Bay'. There was a lookout (Tongue Bay Lookout), which looked out over 'Hill Inlet'. Yes, you might have seen this one before, because it was posted in the first post on this blog! Below is one of our pictures. It isn't as good as the other one, because we were there at high tide, so it shows less sand. We really pitied this.



The last visit for today was on 'South Molle Island'. Here it was possible to take a fine shower and to spent some time at the pool, where also a couple of beautiful rainbow lorikeets were getting drunk of the remains from a cocktail left on a table. But it was actually time to get a couple of beers at the bar and enjoy a nice meal. The meal wasn't as nice as was promised, but it was still okay and very welcome. The beer was very okay of course, and after the meal some drinking games were started. It's better not to tell too much about this.

To return to the ship, we had to form two groups, to be brought back in a motorboat. Halfway, the engine stalled and the guy transferring us was like 'Holy crap guys, we're out of fuel! I need a strong swimmer who can get some help!'. Too bad for him nobody fell for this, so he was going to restart the engine. But, because of a bit of a hard pull, the engine somehow broke down and we were stuck for real! Everyone agreed that he was the strongest swimmer anyway, so he swam back to get another motorboat. Now we finally could get back to the ship.

Friday, November 17, 2006

Early in the morning we left the hostel and headed to the 'Abel Point Marina', from where we entered the sailboat 'The Card'. There we met the crew of the ship: the captain and two others. 'The Card' is a very fast sailing ship which has participated in the 'Volvo Ocean Race', where it ended up 5th, even with a broken mast. Two other sailboats of the same type ended up first and second in that race. So we were on one of the worlds fastest sailboats!

It was really cool to go sailing. Everybody could help with raising and lowering the sails, and it was allowed to take the wheel as well. So there was quite a bit of interaction! When sailing against the wind, there's a high side and a low side. Everyone has to sit on the high side, which you can see on one of the pictures. Still, if you didn't want to get wet, it was best to sit on the back of the ship. But even that wasn't safe.



The ship headed to 'Scrub Hen Beach' first, where everyone could snorkel. But because there was too much wind, that had to be done somewhere else. Lunch was served instead, which we liked the idea of. After lunch, course was set to 'Cateran Bay'. This time it was possible to snorkel for sure. The coral was nice, but a bit high in the water, probably because of the tide. After snorkeling time was over, a new course was set to 'Whitehaven Beach' where we would sleep for the night. Tomorrow we would visit it.

Thursday, November 16, 2006

We both weren't tired enough yet, so we headed to our next stop in Airlie Beach, to book a trip to the Whitsundays. It was very warm, so we came to the conclusion we needed an ice cream. But, at the crucial moment of payment, the wrong price appeared on the checkout display. Because of this, we got the ice creams for free! After enjoying them double, we wanted to go to a bookings agency, but we couldn't start the car! Luckily for us, somebody had jumper cables so the problem was fixed again. But it was really weird, because we didn't left the lights on or something... Anyway, we drove for an hour to recharge it and check out the town a bit. When we thought it had to be charged again, we stopped near a bookings agency to book our trip to the Whitsundays. There wasn't really much choice, but luckily an extra trip was organized. This seemed like a really good choice so we decided to go with this one. Also a free night in a hostel was offered, really nice! Time to go back to the car... ohnoes, wouldn't start again! This time we called the RACQ for roadside assistance, which was free of charge because of us being members. A couple of screws were tightened, and we were on our way again. We checked in at the hostel and went to a briefing, which described the plans for tomorrow.

Wednesday, November 15, 2006

The alarm rang at 5.30 AM, as we needed to meet the Adrenalin Dive crew at 6.45 AM for a dive to the Yongala Wreck. The SS Yongala was a cruise ship which was very luxurious for the time being. On its way from Sydney to Cairns in 1912, it lost radio contact and hit a cyclone. The ship sank with all its passengers, whose remains are still in the ship. Since the ship is part of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, nobody is allowed to enter it. But because of the huge amount of marine life, it has become one of the most beautiful wreck diving spots of the world and the best of Australia. For now, we had to fit the supplied diving gear before we could go onboard. Yvonne had to try five different wetsuits, because none of them fitted really well. Soon after that, everyone could go onboard. It would become a pretty bumpy trip, as the sea conditions were rough! The transfer to the Yongala Wreck took about three hours, and a lot of people felt seasick at the arrival. It was time to put on our diving gear and dive the wreck!



Because there was a really strong current, the descent to the wreck had to be done using a rope. This was still pretty difficult, but a lot better than without. As we had only done nine dives so far, it was needed to go with a guide. This was actually pretty nice, because he would show us the better spots! He brought a little tablet with him, to describe what part of the ship we were. One of the first things we saw were the toilets. This was really, really cool to see. The toilets were covered in coral, so we saw coral with a dump hole! After that we swam around the rest of the wreck, saw some other amazing things, and did our ascent to the surface. When floating in the water we had to get back on board, also using a rope because otherwise we wouldn't make it. Now it was time for dinner!

Most of the people weren't be able to enjoy their dinner, because they were seasick. Jasper on the other hand, saw this as an advantage and ate their share. Although, this was how it must have looked like. Anyway, it was time for the second dive. The descent was being done using a rope again, and we swam around the ship another time. This time, we saw a gigantic loggerhead turtle. Absolutely amazing! Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to pet it. For the rest we saw a couple of seasnakes, a Napoleon Wrasse, and of course a lot of other fishes. Afterwards we logged our dives and headed back to Townsville. Although the dive wasn't as good as we expected, we still had a really good time.

Tuesday, November 14, 2006

Today we continued our way to Townsville, still finding out which company we would go dive with. After using all of our phone credit, our decision was to go with Pro Dive. We asked for their address, to complete the booking and pay for the trip. But when we arrived, it appeared that we were at the address of Adrenalin Dive... Then somebody explained Pro Dive and Adrenalin Dive were about the same. We were already wondering why they gave us the same information! The rest of the day we spent hanging out in Townsville, shopping and chilling a bit, like trying out the Australian Mc Donalds milkshakes. It was bedtime early, tomorrow we would go diving again so we needed to be rested.

Monday, November 13, 2006

Jasper was still ill today, that's why we decided to take it easy. There were still a couple of things which had to be taken care of anyway, like planning our next 'mission': diving near the Yongala Wreck. It was necessary to find a good company to go dive with. One other thing: the car was a complete mess, so it was time to clean that up as well. The rest of the day we didn't do that much. We started heading to Townsville, because the transfers to the Yongala wreck would depart there.

Oct 16. - Nov. 12

Monday, October 30, 2006 - Sunday, November 12, 2006

Last week we spent a lot of money on the diving courses, now it's time to work to get some money back! Using the Harvest Hotline we found out that there was work in Bowen. We drove there and could start picking tomatoes the next day. According to the guy who offered the job, we had to stay in his hostel to work there. Luck was on our side: during the preparation of our room, it appeared that our bed was stolen. This doesn't sound so great, but because of this we could stay in another hostel, which was very luxurious! There was a very nice living room, a good kitchen, two amazing bathrooms, but most important: an extremely comfortable bed. Too bad the alarm rang at 4:30 AM in the morning to prepare us for work.

Work started at 6.00 AM. The hostel owner told us that it should be possible to earn around $200 per day, because the fields were very rich, which meant easy picking. Of course we thought that would be beyond our skills, so it would be more like $150, but probably around $130. Seeing the buckets, we wondered what the wage per bucket would be. That would be around $1.30 after tax... whoops! That's 100 buckets for $130 dollar and a lot more for the $200... better start picking then!

Hour after hour, tomato after tomato, in the burning sun, around 40 degrees, we worked for 10 hours, with a half an hour lunch-break. There weren't even any toilets, but we sweat so much we didn't need them anyway. At the end of the day, we filled around 70 buckets... together! That's not even $50 each! As you might understand we weren't really happy with this. The people there told us that the fields weren't that rich at all and besides, the work has nothing to do with the accommodation. It was time to have a word with the master of disaster himself, after abusing the facilities of the hostel once more of course.

After telling him we weren't really happy with the situation, he really turned into a mad man, his face went from white to red (almost tomato style). A chameleon could learn from this, trust us on this! He charged us $14 dollars extra and almost called the police. We really tried to keep a normal conversation going, but it was better to stop and leave.

As we were in Bowen anyway, we had to look for another job, otherwise the trip would be a waste. We found a job in a shed where they packed capsicums. The wage would be $15,30 per hour, much better than the tomato picking! We could start the next friday. We used the two days to relax a bit and to explore the environment. Yeah yeah, in other words, check out the beaches! There was an awful smell, because of the eggs of the coral, which die within three days and drift ashore. But there were good spots where the smell wasn't so bad.



Friday we finally could start working for real! Capsicums entered the shed and had to be sorted into a couple of boxes. This was what Yvonne had to do. The boxes were put on a 'lopende band', while Jasper had to pick up these boxes at the end of the 'lopende band' and put them on different pallets. For both it was pretty hard work still. Yvonne had to stand still for a whole day, which hurts in the feet and in the lower back, especially on longer terms. Jasper had to stack the boxes on pallets. The boxes were about 8 kg heavy and had to be stacked 11 boxes high. To give an idea of this, it was almost impossible to put a box on the 9th line, and then the 11th had to be done as well. Of course there was a stool, but it was as high as one box. Another line with the same conditions so to speak. Pretty hard work for both of us, but easier than the tomato picking and a better wage. We did this work for exactly 10 days, including sundays.



The last day of work, we were finished around 2 o'clock. Afterwards we went to a camping to relax and more important, wash our clothes again. In the evening, Jasper started to feel a bit ill, so he went to bed early. A few hours later he woke up and didn't feel so well... he had to clear his stomach so he ran to a tree. After he was finished and sat down, he saw there was something crawling through his vomit... SNAKE! Pretty disgusting but he almost vomited over a snake! It was probably a python, but because it was very dark and the batteries of our torches were empty, we couldn't confirm this.

Sunday, October 29, 2006

Already our last day onboard, but there were still three dives left before our departure. So just after sunset we jumped with our group in a little motorboat to be transfered to a good spot to dive 30 meters deep. We were equiped with a much larger cylinder. The deeper you go, the more air you use per inhalation. At 30 meters you will use 4 times the amount of air as on the surface.



We were dropped off the boat and dived straight to 30 meters depth. There we settled down in a circle. Our instructor brought us a tomato. It was green, like everything at that depth, because most light frequencies are filtered by the water. He lighted it with a torch and it was bright red again! He also had two eggs which opened under water. Because of the pressure it stayed in its form. Not for long though, a very hungry empire king fish swallowed it at once. Then it was time to test the effect of the pressure on our bodies. At 30 meters depth, the amount of nitrogen in our blood had increased 4 times. This can cause some kind of narcoses. To test if we were 'narced' we had to make some easy calculations under water. Our instructor brought a tablet and we had to write our answers on it. None of us was really affected though.

On our way up we circled around a beautiful coral mountain and saw a moray eel. After breakfast it was time for another fun dive. We went together with another guy of group. We found ourselves a sea turtle and we spent some time petting it and following it. Around 10 AM we jumped into the water for the last time, to do our navigation dive. We all had a compass. Our instructor sat down at the bottom and was our starting point. We had to make a perfect square by counting fin kicks and making 90 degree turns. If we did it alright we would return to the instructor. Unfortunately it was far more difficult than we thought and messed it up a bit. Then we had to follow our instructor and he tried to get us lost. Every minute he asked us in what direction the boat was. This was a bit more easy so he didn't succeed.

On board again we had to log all our dives and pack our stuff. At 3.30 PM the transfer boat arrived again to bring us back to Cairns... These were the best 5 days of our Australian adventure so far! Can't wait to dive again!

Saturday, October 28, 2006

We woke up by a knock on our door: "Goodmorning guys, it's 5:30 AM, time for your morning dive!", so we all jumped in the water at 6 o'clock at sunrise. We were still at Milln Reef / Three Sisters and this time we decent at the first sister. Large schools of sleepy fish were floating above the reefs we cruised around and again we had to practise some skills to complete our open water course. After our dive, breakfast was served, but we didn't have much time. We had to prepare some funny stuff for our dive movie. We had to do one more dive to complete our open water and this one was filmed by the video guy, called Thomas. At 8 o'clock we decent again and did some funny stuff at 15 meter depth for the camera. We put sunglasses on, drank some beer and danced on the bottom of the ocean. Very enjoyable, and afterwards we watched the movie. It was very cool! Beside that, we received our open water diving certificate and... we had still five dives left for fun! Below is a group photo displayed.



While we were watching the movie, the boat moved to an other good diving spot called 'The Whale'. This spot is still on Milln Reef. At 1 o'clock we went for a snorkel to explore this beautiful part of the reef and at 4 o'clock it was time to go diving again. This time we were allowed to go in pairs, without an instructor. It was very cool, but we also noticed that it is very difficult to navigate underwater. After some time we didn't know anymore which way the boat was. Anyway, by the time we ran out of air, we found it back! It was very cool, but our instructor just brings us to the nicer places. Back on board we decided to exchange three of our remaining dives for an adventure course, including an 30 meter deep dive, a night dive and a navigation dive. This course is very useful for us, because we really want to see some shipwrecks. Since most of these are located at 30 meters depth, we really need this deep dive (with open water course we're just allowed to dive to a maximum of 18 meters). And as I said our navigation is crappy. So at 7 o'clock, just after sunset, we did our night dive. The water was an dark mass and even with the provided torch we couldn't see much. It was very exciting and we saw our first shark! It was a white tip reef shark, about two meters long.

Friday, October 27, 2006

It's time to go onboard of the 'Kangaroo Explorer' and dive the ocean! This cruise ship stays permanently on the reef, so we were brought to this ship with a little transfer boat. It took about 2 hours and we arrived at approximately 11 o' clock. Because of the perfect conditions we could visit the better reefs. We went to Milln Reef, which has some famous diving spots. We went to the spot called 'The Whale'. After a short introduction we could take a look in our cabin, which was very nice.



After lunch we prepared for our first open water dive and jumped in the beautiful clear water. We had a visibility of 25-30 meters and we saw beautiful coral gardens beneath us. Awesome colored fishes were circulating around us and we could almost touch them. We decent till 13,4 meters and cruised around for a bit to get used to diving in open water. We saw two giant turtles and a cuttlefish. Jasper was pretty excited and forgot to breath slowly. So all of a sudden he ran out of air and had to share air with the instructor during our accent.

At 4 o'clock we did our second training dive, and this time we had to do some exercises. The boat had moved to another diving spot called 'The Three Sisters' (still Milln reef.) We dived at the second sister this time. We explored the spot and settled down in a circle on the bottom. We were surrounded by beautiful coral walls. We saw a turtle swimming over us and a curious batfish circled around us, while we were sitting there. We had to remove our mask and regulator and practiced the 'out of air' procedure.

The rest of the day we spent relaxing on board at the sun deck, eating fish and chips and logging our dives in our diving logbook.

Thursday, October 26, 2006

When we arrived at the school today again, we noticed that everyone was tired. Yeah, that was quite a lot of homework! The first thing we did this morning was to continue with our theory lessons. This worked the same way as the day before. After two hours or so, the practical lessons would be continued, in the pool. There were a couple of exercises which had to be done. One of them was to do an out of air procedure underwater. You had to signal your diving buddy that you are out of air, and that you want to share air. After doing so, both have to ascent to the surface. This had to be done a couple of times so that everything went fluent. In the afternoon it was time to continue with the theory lessons. After the theory was finished, everybody had to do a test with fifty multiple choice questions. This was pretty easy so everyone passed.

In the evening we went to a Reef Teach. As described in the Lonely Planet, Mr 'talksveryfast' explains how to identify specific types of coral and fish and also how to treat the Reef with respect. This wasn't just a lesson from just another teacher, no, this was an extremely energetic show! Much different from what we expected. There was lots of humor in it, but very well explained information. Sometimes it was a bit hard to understand though, because of his extremely fast talking.

Wednesday, October 25, 2006

Back to school!

Today we started our open water course at Cairns Diving Center. We received a theory book and spent the morning in the classroom watching instruction videos and reading the book. Before we were allowed to dive we had to pass a few tests. First of all we were checked by a doctor. We were a bit worried for this part, since we both have asthma. In general people with asthma are not allowed to dive. Besides that we had to show that we were able to swim for 200 meters and tread water for 10 minutes. Anyway we passed them all!

We spent the afternoon in the pool learning everything about our diving equipment and how to use it. We dived to the bottom of the pool (4m) and set down for a few minutes and practiced some skills. At 4 o' clock we finished and drove to Ellis beach were we cooked and spent the evening doing our homework. Tomorrow we have to pass our exam so we spent 3.5 hours learning.

We had a great day. We are doing this course with 5 other people of our age and they are all very nice. Can't wait to dive again!

Tuesday, October 24, 2006

As we mentioned before, we wanted to go diving. We decided to get our diving certificate at Cairns Diving Centre. We could start tomorrow already, which was good of course. Since we were unable to wash our clothes for a while, we went to a hostel so we could wash them, and chill out a bit. After hanging our cloth to dry, we went to the library to get some information about the Great Barrier Reef, and its fishes. In the evening there was a free meal from the hostel. We had to go to some sort of bar where we could get a plate of spaghetti. This was very little, so we were done quite quickly. After hanging out a bit in the city we went to bed quite early, because tomorrow the diving lessons would start!

Monday, October 23, 2006

This morning Jasper felt like swimming, so we headed to Lake Eacham again. It was raining and very early, but quite funny to see the reaction of the people clearing the toilets. The brave feeling we had passed away when a local jumped in for his daily swim, but we had our fun. For our feeling we had explored Atherton Tableland well enough now, so we headed back to Cairns to get some information about diving at the Great Barrier Reef. We also went shopping a bit in Cairns Central, to get Jasper new sunglasses and some other stuff.



Sunday, October 22, 2006

Yesterday we drove to Kairi, where we found a place to sleep. Today we would go to Lake Eacham. We decided to take the tourist drive. This was a dirt road, so this was quite bumpy! We visited the Mobo Creek Crater, which was right on the road. Nothing too special, but nice to see none the less. A few kilometers further there was the "Cathedral Fig Tree". This tree is 46 meters high, and is a bit shaped like a cathedral, which explains its name.



The next place we visited was Lake Barinne. We did a short walk here, and saw a musky rat kangaroo. This animal is quite rare, but later on we saw a few more so we think they're a little bit better populated at that area. It was time for a swim, so we went to Lake Eacham, which was a few kilometers ahead. Lake Eacham and Lake Barinne are volcanic crater lakes, which belong to the Crater Lake National Park. The water of Lake Eacham was really crystal clear, beautiful! Although a bit cold, we both took a swim. There was a spot where you could see some saw shelled turtles, which we happen to have a couple of pictures from! The turtles, how strangely it may sound, can breath through their bottom and are pretty rare in Australia.

Our last visit was the Curtain Fig Tree in Yungaburra. This tree is an attraction similar to the Cathedral Fig Tree, but curtain shaped. It was already dark and getting late, so we slept here as well.

Saturday, October 21, 2006

We left Cairns for a while to explore the area west of it called 'Atherton Tableland'. Our first stop was at Granite Gorge. We went for a walk through the environment and had a nice swim halfway, There were lots of rock wallabies and they were very used to people. We had a great time feeding and petting them.



When we came back at the car we couldn' t start it because we forgot to shut the lights off so the battery was empty. Luckily people are very friendly and helpful here. We had the car parked near a camping. The boss called one of her neighbors who could help us start the car. While we were waiting we got a free drink and a old woman from Melbourne gave us her address. If we will be around somewhere later this year we have to call her and she will look after us.

Friday, October 20, 2006

The boat to the Green Island departed around 9.00 PM and the transfer took about one and a half hour. When we arrived we were directly free to do what we wanted to do, so we decided to go snorkeling right ahead. The reef wasn't very big there, but it was certainly very nice to see! There were about two spots where there was some reef. The first spot was right nearby the island, and the other spot was a bit further from the island, so a bit more swimming was required. We saw some beautiful things! There were a lot of fishes, but the coral wasn't very good. Fishes we saw include:

- Great Barrier Reef Anemone Fish (a clownfish, like "Nemo")
- Lionfish
- Sea-stars
- Stingray



Of course we also saw a lot of other beautiful fish we couldn't identify. We spent a lot of time in the water, exploring the reef. That's one of the reasons we missed the boat back to Cairns! Luckily for us there was a second boat which departed later, but arrived at the same time as 'our' boat. It wasn't a problem to return with this boat. You could say we explored the reef quite optimal! We had an incredible good time today!

Thursday, October 19, 2006

The lock would finally be fixed today. Around 12 o'clock it was fixed and we were ready to go. After we payed the bill of $149 dollar of course. We didn't want to spoil the day so we went to the Barron Gorge and to Wrights Lookout, where we followed a walking track. Nothing too special.



It was time to see something of the Great Barrier Reef, but we didn't know where to start! Unfortunately it isn't accesible from the shore so a transfer is needed. The reef is 2000 kilometers long, so there are a lot of organizations offering a trip to it. Because of this, we decided to take one of the cheapest transfers to take a look, so we could do a more expensive trip later. Our eyes fell on a transfer of $63 dollars to the Green Island, where we could snorkel for a full day. We booked this for tomorrow.

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

After waking up at the Mossman Gorge we took the swim we skipped yesterday. It was bloody cold! We stayed there and relaxed a bit for a couple of hours and drove to Cairns. On our way Jasper spotted some strange looking fins in the sea. We took a closer look and saw that it was a group of dolphins! This was very nice to see, unfortunately we couldn't get them on camera. A few kilometers ahead we took a swim and hoped we would see the dolphins again. We didn't see them but we enjoyed our swim very much.



We still had to visit the locksmith, so we continued our way to Cairns to visit him. He told us that he couldn't get the right part of the lock, because the lock wasn't genuine. There were two options, either get a lock from a second hand Ford Falcon of the same type or get a lock from a Ford Dealer. A new lock would cost $61 dollars, which would be there the next day.

Because we still wanted to do something today we visited an opal mine. This was the fakest crap we had ever seen. No mine at all! They just showed an 8-minute movie about mining, and there was a wall which faked a mine, with a bit of opal in it. After that, they expected us to buy something. We showed our interest but didn't buy anything.

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Today we didn't do very much. Because the days pass by so quickly, we decided to make some sort of travel-plan so we could see more in less time. The Lonely Planet was really useful for this! After we finished to plan "Far North Queensland" we left Daintree by ferry and went to the Mossman Gorge. Here are a couple of walking tracks and some waterfalls. It was allowed to take a swim there, but... we didn't. We spent the night there as well.




Monday, October 16, 2006

We really needed some good exercise so we took a 7 hour return walk to the top of mount Sorrow. It was a very tough walk because of the warm and wet climate, besides, it wasn't a really flat track you know! During our climb Yvonne saw her first snake, while she almost stepped on it. She really panicked (waaaaaaaahh snake!!!!) and jumped backwards and fell some meters downwards.





We settled down for an hour on the top to have a rest and to enjoy the great view. We could see the canopy of the rainforest, the beach and the sea. On our way back we were very tired and we were paying more attention to where to put our feet than to the environment. Unfortunately we almost ran into a 1,5 meter Southern Cassowarry. These animals have the reputation of being shy, but if they attack they can really hurt you. Unfortunately this one wasn't shy at all and he wasn't very happy with us either. So he started to chase us and we ran away, which, we know now, is not possible in the rainforest. Jasper fell and scrammed his knees and Yvonne ran into a very stinging plant and scrammed her face. For the Cassowarry we were no longer a threat so he started eating again. Luckily we were almost back so we could head back to the camping.

Oct. 03 - 15

Sunday, October 15, 2006

Yesterday we arrived at the camping in dusk, now we can finally see what the camping does look like. It's a pretty nice and a very small one in the middle of the rainforest. There are a lot of animals, like spectacled flying foxes, frogs, toads and rats. Cassowaries and pythons are sometimes seen as well. In the middle of the camping is a little kangaroo nursery. We really like it here and we are planning to stay here for another night.

We decided to drive through the Daintree National park and see a bit more of it. This park is World Heritage listed, because of its diversity. It's also one of the few places in the world where the coral see meets the rainforest. Our first stop was at Thornton beach where we walked around a bit and saw a huge Lace Monitor. We did the same at Myall Beach. Both beaches are very beautiful, but the seas are a bit brown here, which is a pity.

Our next stop was at the Dubuji Boardwalk, where you could walk through the rainforest. Sometimes there were signs with an explanation which told us something about the rainforest. It was a bit boring, but luckily it wasn't a really long walk so we still had some time to spend on the beach. We took a swim and relaxed a bit at Cow Beach. We heard that it was a good place to snorkle, unfortunately the water wasn't really clear so we couldn't see anything.

For the evening we booked a night walk through the rainforest in Cooper Creek, to see some wildlife. We were with a group of 9 people and a guide. Below is a list of animals we spotted.

- Tree frogs
- Wolf spiders
- Water dragon
- Forest dragon
- Tawly frogmouth (a night bird)
- Python
- Wallaby
- White tail rat
- Tree line leaf tail gecko
- Flying foxes
- Bandicoot

The walk through the forest was very dark. We had to walk single file because the forest was very narrow. We switched order every 10 minutes, so the guide had some personal time for everyone. It was a very special experience! In the middle of the rainforest we all put out our torches, this was extremely dark. Also a bit scary because there are noises everywhere.

Saturday, October 14, 2006

We spent the night at the same place. After waking up we took another swim and went to a Mangrove Boardwalk. This was pretty nice. Afterwards we went to Cape Tribulation. During the road Yvonne picked up some "wild" mango's which tasted pretty good. It's strange, but all the fruit is very expensive here so this was really welcome.

To get to Cape Tribulation you have to cross a river by ferry. When we reached the other side we came more the less in the middle of nowhere. Of course there was a road, a few campings and a couple of things to do, but there are very few people, no mobile network coverage and after about 20 km you could only proceed with a 4WD. It was already getting late and we decided to visit a camping. Now we could do our laundry, have a nice shower, and recharge our batteries from our phones, laptop and camera.

Friday, October 13, 2006

No one disturbed us this night so we slept pretty good. After we woke up we discovered that we stayed at a pretty nice spot, near a beautiful river. Too bad there was a sign that warned us for crocodiles. One of the locals told us that he had only seen two crocodiles there since he lived there, and that he often swam there as well. We decided to take the risk and jumped into the river!



After the cooling swim we had to get our lock from the trunk fixed, so we headed to a Ford dealer, but they redirected us to a locksmith. They couldn't fix it right away and they had to order some parts. This joke would cost us around AUS $140... pretty much for a lock, but we didn't have a choice.



There was still a bit of time left, so we went to the Crystal Cascades. It's a rain-forest where a waterfall could be seen. We found it very beautiful, you can see a couple of pictures above. There was also a stinging tree. This tree is pretty dangerous so we had to watch out!

Tuesday, October 10, 2006 - Thursday, October 12, 2006

At 5.00 AM we had to get out of bed and around 7.00 AM we stepped into the car to start the trip to Cairns. There were three swedish people who joined us (Carolina, Erik & Marion), so we could share some fuel costs. At approximately 8.00 PM we arrived in Brisbane and we started to look for a hostel to stay for the night. We looked for 3 hours but couldn't find a good place and after that everything was closed. Luckily one of the swedish people was a truck driver and he took over. Meanwhile, we could get some sleep. Around 2.00 AM we all took a nap in the car until around 5.00 AM. We continued the journey for another two hours. Then we stopped again to get breakfast. There was a male Magpie 'defending' it's nest. This was pretty hilarious, because he attacked several persons on the head when they weren't looking. We laughed so hard we hurt our stomach!



After the breakfast we continued our trip. At the end of the afternoon we dropped Carolina and Erik in a hostel in Proserpine and continued for another two hours. We stopped at a rest area and cooked some macaroni and went to sleep. This was much more comfortable with three persons instead of five!

The next day we drove all the way to Cairns. We arrived around 4.30 PM and dropped off Marion at a hostel. Our lock from the trunk was broken, so we searched for a Ford dealer, but they were already closed. Now we had to wait for tomorrow. We went to a supermarket and got us some good food. It was time to search for a place to sleep, but it was very difficult because everywhere there were 'no camping'-signs. One thing we did find was a barbecue by one of the beaches. It was for public use, so we could just turn it on and cook on it! Very useful! Our mission to find a place to stay continued, but we just couldn't find a place. I think we drove for another 3 hours to find a spot but it was prohibited everywhere... we both were very tired, we just parked the car and hoped that we wouldn't get caught by the police.

Monday, October 9, 2006

Around 7.00 AM we continued our way to Sydney where we dropped the car for a couple of repairs. We checked in again in the hostel "Mate's Place". Jasper went to an internet cafe to upload some photo's and take care of some business and Yvonne went looking for some cheap camping equipment. In the evening there was free pizza available in the hostel, something we couldn't miss! We went to bed early because we had to get up very early for our trip to Cairns.

Sunday, October 8, 2006

The next morning we drove to "Euroka" (it's in Glenbrook) where a few kangaroos were. We visited this spot earlier with the group trip, but we wanted to see it again for ourselves and spend a little more time there. One baby kangaroo was drinking milk from his mother. You can see it in the picture below. After we spend some time with the kangaroos we took a little walk through the forests. We spotted a few birds and took some pictures.



We continued the trip and drove to Blackheath where a couple of very nice views and walks were. The first view we went to was "Evan's Lookout" and looked out over the Blue Mountains. Very nice. The other view was called Govett's Leap and had a great view over the Blue Mountains as well. There were a few walks and we choose one which took about 3 hours. The path took us to Pulpit Rock and back.



It was almost dark again so we had to look for a new place to stay. Because there were a few things wrong with the car we wanted to be in Sydney the next morning for a free repair. Better use the guarantees as good as possible! We headed back to Sydney, but stopped at a rest area called Bull Camp.

Saturday, October 7, 2006

Since we still didn't see any whales, we wanted to try it one more time. Of course we couldn't resist the free trip so we had to do it. Today we were lucky. Quite quickly a mother and a calf whale were spotted just near the coast. We watched them for a while and tried to make some photo's. That was pretty difficult because the boat wasn't very stable on the sea. Besides, the whales are more under the water then above. They only show themselves every now and then when they need to breath, afterwards they go under the water again for 5 or 10 minutes. Later on we spotted a male whale and another mother and calf. So we spotted five whales today!



After we returned from the whale-watchingtrip, it was time to get some food. We both really wanted a nice cool glass of cola, so we went to the supermarket to get it. Too bad the cooled cola was far more expensive than the normal cola. We hid the uncooled cola somewhere in the freezer, went out for dinner, returned to the supermarket and bought it. Pretty cheap and cooled cola now!

We drank the cooled cola and drove to Glenbrook, which was on the way to the Blue Mountains. It was already getting late so we decided to look for a place to sleep. Jasper was driving, but because he was driving slowly to look for a good spot, he was being stopped by the police! He had to do an alcohol test and show his driving license.

Friday, October 6, 2006

This morning we took our breakfast on the beach, and Yvonne took a swim. After that we went to Manly to look for a surf board and a good internet cafe to upload some photo's. We noticed that a surf board would cost a lot more money that we wanted to spend. We didn't buy anything, but at least we got ourselves some information. It seems that if you're new to surfing, you need a board which is at least a 6,6. This means it has to be 6 foot and 6 inches tall. Those boards cost at least $400 dollar. We had bad luck finding a good internet cafe. They were all slow so we decided not to waste our time too much. We also looked for some cheap second hand camping equipment, but we only found a store which was pretty expensive. It was already getting late so it was time to head back to Palm Beach, to sleep there again.



By the way, we called the whale watchers to ask if they saw any whales today, and they did :P

Thursday, October 5, 2006

As mentioned yesterday, we could do another free whale-watching trip. Pretty strange, but this time we didn't see any whales either. It was probably a bad week. The sea was wilder which made the trip itself more fun. Too bad we didn't see any other really interesting animals. Another voucher was offered for a new trip.

Because we had a car now, we could spend the night in it as well. We left Sydney and drove to Palm Beach, a really beautiful place to spend the night. At the beaches there were showers, cold of course but at least we could wash ourselves. This saved us some money and we could try out the car.

Wednesday, October 4, 2006

Of course there are a lot of things we haven't seen yet. Whales are one of these things. So we decided to go whale-watching. For $80 AUS each we could join for a 4-hour boat-ride. A 99% guarantee was offered, so if we didn't see any whales, another free trip was offered. Probably the luck wasn't on our side, because we didn't see any whales. Luckily it was still fun, cruising with a catamaran on the sea. Besides, we did see some dolphins! That was cool.



Just after the trip we received a phone call that our car could be picked up!! We received a quick explanation about the differences between Dutch and Australian driving. You have to drive on the left side of the road, and if there are 'T2'-marks on the road, there have to be at least two persons in the car during rush hour. The reason for this is to reduce the amount of cars on the roads, it enforces car pooling. T4 is also possible. Another thing about the car: it's automatic, quite a difference, also because there's only a brake and a gas pedal. In the evening we took the car for a test drive. Eventually we got lost because we forgot to bring a map, but after an hour or something we could finally find our way back.

Tuesday, October 3, 2006

Because it was a while ago we updated the weblog, we needed to catch up with a lot of things. That's why we reserved a couple of hours to write our stories and post it on the web, together with some photo's. Another thing we did today was taking a walk from Bondi Beach to Coogee Beach. This is a really popular walk and is listed in the top 10 things to do when you visit Sydney. The walk took around two and a half hours and it was beautiful. During the walk we made some pictures, which we displayed below.

Sept. 25 - Oct 02

Monday, October 2, 2006

Today we walked through the Royal Botanic Garden, which is very beautiful. There are a lot of birds including flying foxes, lorikeets and ibises. We have been there for one hour or so and had our lunch overthere. The next thing we did was visiting the Sydney Aquarium, something we had planned a long time ago. It was very very interesting. We saw almost all the water-animals of whole Australia! Including seals, sharks, penguins, crocodiles and lots of tropical fish. We walked through underwater-tunnels of glass and saw big sharks, turtles and rays swim above us. We really enjoyed it and we can' t wait to go diving and see al those animals ourselves!






Sunday, October 1, 2006

We decided to buy the car! So we went to the barn and had another negotiation. We finally bought it for AUS $4000. It's a Ford Falcon station-wagon GL, so we can sleep in it and save a lot of money. We are very happy with it and we can' t wait to pick it up. First the car gets another mechanical check so we have to wait till thursday. We already made some pictures, go check it out!



We arranged a lot of things these days and we made some very important decisions, so we decided that it was time to relax a bit. We took the bus to Coogee Beach and spent the rest of the day lying in the sun and swimming in the ocean. It is a very nice place to be. It's actually found in the middle of Sydney, but it's still very clean and beautiful. A helicopter is flying over the sea to detect any sharks. Furthermore there are lifeguards on the beach who can save people in need.

Saturday, September 30, 2006

The hostel in which we we're staying is far to expensive (AUS $25 pp/nightt) so we checked out this morning and walked around to find a cheaper one. We are now staying in the 'Travellers Mate'-hostel (AUS $15 pp/night), which is also a very nice hostel. It offers us a lot more, but on the other hand we have to share a room with 6 other people.

After that it was time to buy a camera and if possible a car. This was the third day we wandered through the city to get lucky. First we went back to the 'Travellers Auto Barn'. We definitely want a trustworthy car, so the best chance to get one is to buy it there and pay a bit more for it. We found a good car, but it was too expensive. After we talked a bit we could change the price from AUS $5000 to AUS $4200. This was much better, but still more then we wanted to spend. We decided to reserve the car for one day, so we had some time to think about it.

There was just one hour left to walk to the centre to buy a camera. The next two days most of the shops are closed, so we needed to succeed today. And we did! We bought a Panasonic Lumix DMC FZ7.

Friday, September 29, 2006

Today we did a surfing trip, with a lot of guys from our "old" group. We went to the northern beaches, approximately a one-hour drive from Sydney. Our first stop was in Manly. In this little city surfing was founded, so we learned something about the history of surfing and about ocean awareness.

After that we drove to Palm Beach, where we had our first surfing lesson. And we were very good at it, especially Yvonne. We had to run into the waves with our boards, jump on it and peddle till we found ourselves beyond the undertow. There we had to catch a big wave and on the moment our board was lifted we had to try to stand on it. Sounds easy doesn't it? So Yvonne ran into the sea on the wrong moment and found herself directly thrown back onto the beach by an huge wave. Jasper wasn't doing much better, nor the rest of the group. It was very difficult and very tough. Because of the strong flow you had to peddle for 15 minutes to get beyond the undertow, while getting back to the beach only took a minute. We had a lot of fun, and we definitely want to do it again someday. I think we need a lot of practicing to learn this, because after today we still couldn't stand on our boards for just one second.

Thursday, September 28, 2006

Our time with Aussie Backpackers is over. They did a lot for us and we really enjoyed our first week, but we are also happy we are on our own now. We didn't have any spare time until now, so we used this day to arrange a lot of things. First of all we had to decide how to travel to Cairns, because that is where we want to go next. We want to travel as fast as possible to the north (2634 km) and then the same way back, very slowly down again. This may sound weird to you, but in November the rain-season starts and the surroundings of Cairns will not be reachable anymore without a 4WD. The Great Barrier Reef is most beautiful in the north so we definitely want to go there.

We went back to the 'Travellers Auto Barn' and the car market to gain some information about having a car in Australia (registration and stuff is very different here and every state has its own rules). We discovered that if you want to buy a car, the best place to do it is in Sydney. The problem is we haven' t got any knowledge about cars. We saw some nice cars, but we didn't dare to buy them.

There was another problem: now we're on our own again we can' t keep copying pictures from people of our group trip. Therefor we went looking for a new camera, but we couldn't find a nice one. We spent a lot of time, but went home with nothing, except for a little wildlife guide. We learned a lot about cars, but we didn't feel very satisfied.

Wednesday, September 27, 2006

Today was officially our last day with Australian Backpackers. To "celebrate" this, a farewell party was started at Coogee Beach, with a contest to dress up like a pirate. Some people spent AUS $50 for an outfit, while you could only win a t-shirt or something. We decided to spare our money ;-) Also some other prizes were given away, like a surftrip, an outback tour and a car. Unfortunately we didn't win any of it.



After the party was over, Yvonne took her first swim in one of the oceans of Australia, the Tasman Sea. This is what I was looking forward to: beautiful clear water, not to cold and a lot of waves. The sun had already gone down, so Jasper decided to take his first swim a few days later. We would go surfing on friday anyway. For dinner we had to take care of ourselves this time.

Tuesday, September 26, 2006

Today was a bit of a boring day, but we got a lot of things accomplished. First we went to the embassy to get our visa. We got it very quickly and without any problems, so we could proceed to our next task: getting a (free) Medicare insurance. This took a bit longer but luckily enough it was in the middle of a shopping-mall so people who had to wait could take a look there in the meantime. The next thing on our schedule was to take a look in the "Travellers Contact Point"-office. At a TCP we can receive mail. If we travel to Cairns, the mail will be forwarded to a TCP in Cairns. Letters are forwarded free of charge, but to forward packets, it will cost us money. In the TCP you can also visit the internet and find advertisements from other backpackers or from people offering jobs. After we paid the TCP a visit, we set up our own bank account at a bank called Westpac.

In the afternoon we paid the "Travellers Auto Barn" a visit. These guys sell trustworthy cars, but you can see that in the price. They do offer a lot of guarantees which makes it worth the effort to take a look. We also went to a car market, where other backpackers sell their cars. The prices are much lower, but you take a risk if you buy one. When you buy a car from another backpacker, you also get the history of the car. So if someone drove too fast in the last two months, you have to pay the fine.



At 6.30 PM it was time to get some food. We met the other backpackers in front of our hostel to go for a barbecue in suburb "The Rocks". There were huge pieces of meat where we could choose from, and some fish for the vegetarian people. The food was incredibly good. We all received two free drinks as well, pretty nice!

Monday, September 25, 2006

After a short night of sleep it was time to go to the Blue Mountains. We had to get up around 6.30 AM for breakfast and a quick shower. We left at 8.00 AM by bus. Our first stop was at the beginning of the Blue Mountains where a lot of grey kangaroos live. They were very used to people, so you could come very close.

After the lunch we went somewhere deeper into the forests were we did two short walks through the cold rain-forest. It was nice, but far too short for this beautiful environment. We saw the "three sisters" and the blue damp of the eucalyptus trees where this national park is named after.



In the evening we went to a place called "The Gaff", a place where a lot of backpackers go. We got a free meal which was delicious! They gave away the meals because most of the backpackers would stay and drink anyway.

Sept. 19 - 24

Sunday, September 24, 2006

The morning started with pancakes for breakfast. It was already very warm weather, so we ate on the roof of our hostel. At ten o' clock we left with the whole group to one of the very beautiful city parks to relax and to fill in some important papers for a bank-account and a medicare pass. We walked through the park to the Opera House. We saw a lot of beautiful birds, including some parrots, ibises and a lot of flying foxes hanging up side down in the trees. From the Opera House we started a cruise with a catamaran boat, which was hired for our group for 4 hours. We really enjoyed it, for we had a very good view on the skyline of sydney and we relaxed lying in the sun. Inside the boat a big party was going on.

We ended in Darling Harbour and walked home. Not for long because at 7.00 PM we already left to a restaurant. It was delicious. Unfortunately our photo-camera broke down, so we will show some pictures later.

Saturday, September 23, 2006

At 10.40 AM we finally arrived at Sydney airport: our home for at least the next 5 days. Our first impression of the city was obvious, this was the opposite of Bangkok. Sydney is a very clean city with very modern buildings. Also there are a lot of parks, with tropical plants and birds. We saw the Opera House and the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Unfortunately we haven't been on the top of the bridge yet, maybe we'll do that later. We spend the first 5 nights in the Harbour City Hostel. It's a pretty nice place and we sleep with two other persons on a room. At the evening we went to some sort of barbeque restaurant in Darling Harbour. Beside some common salads they also served the flesh of crodocodiles, kangaroos and emu's. Jasper really liked it. Afterwards we decided to walk back to the hostel via the Sydney Harbour Bridge. It was already dark and we wanted to have view on the enlighted city. But unfortunately we forgot how to come back to the hostel, so we wandered around for about two hours.




Friday, September 22, 2006

Today we flew from Bangkok to Taipei and from Taipei we headed to Sydney after 4 hours of waiting on the dull airport of Taipei. So we left right after breakfast at half past nine to the airport to check in. Our plane left at half past one and 3.5 hours later we arrived at Taipei. We really enjoyed this flight, for we had a beautiful view on Thailand for several times. Our plane to Sydney left at 10.10 PM, so right after the take off we had an amazing view over the enlighted city. it was extremely impressive.




Thursday, September 21, 2006

At 1.45 AM dutch time (6.45 AM thais time) we arrived at the airport of Bangkok. We went straight away to our hotel, which was very nice and comfortable: 4 stars, a swimming pool on the tenth floor, a big room looking out over bangkok and delicious (thais) food. We checked in and took a swim right after. After the lunch we left for a one hour boot-trip on the rivers (Kalahari river?) through Bangkok. It was hard to understand what our guide was talking about, but the trip was beautiful.



After that we walked through the centre of Bangkok and discovered some crowded shopping-streets. Everywhere people were negotiating about the prizes, salesman were trying to sell the most useless things and taxidrivers were trying to get us in their cars. There was a journalist who asked us some questions about the coup in Bangkok. We walked around for some time and went home with a tuktuk (a sort taxi) for 130 Bath instant of 300 bath, after some negotiation. It was a very though ride... We went to bed very early to catch up some sleep.

Wednesyday, September 20, 2006: Departure

Yes we're going!! It doesn't seem to be such a problem, it's still peaceful in Bangkok.

Around 8:30 (dutch time) we gathered with the cars next to the highway in Marum, to drive to Schiphol together. When we arrived there we had to park the cars, which was a bit of a problem since it was very crowded. Inside we met the other "Australian Backpackers" and we received a briefing on what to do. The tickets were handed out, so we could finally check in. The plane left at 15.15 which was half an hour later than intended.


Our seats in the plane were seperated from the other backpackers, but luckily there were a few chairs available so we still could sit together. The night was very short because we flew towards the night, it was dark for only five hours. During the flight we experienced some turbulence, which -of course- occured when we received our meals. Every now and then some statistics were shown on the televisions. This included the estimated time of arrival, the temperature outside the airplane and some other information. Maybe it's interesting to note that the speed of the plane was almost up to 1000 KM/H and we flew 10 KM above the earth. The temperature outside was around -47 degrees Celsius.

Wednesday, September 19, 2006

There is a coup in Bangkok:
Coup in Thailand
Are we still going?!

Timezones

The time in Australia is now:

- (Sydney)
- (Alice Springs)
- (Perth)

In Holland the time is: