Day 34- Snorkeling attempt #1

May 30, 2011- Day 34

Where: Town of 1770

Dinner: Gourmet “chorizo helper”

First attempt at snorkeling

        This morning I took my second warm shower in 15 hours. Very nice. We left the caravan park and went to a sporting goods store to get some snorkeling gear. We got kits with goggles, fins, and a snorkel. They aren't super high quality, but they should do. From there we went to the Bundaberg ginger beer brewing factory. The shop was inside a building that looked like a giant barrel turned on its side. We didn't take the tour, but we bought a 10 pack of ginger beer and a 6 pack of assorted sodas they make. Ginger beer is really popular here. It's not alcoholic, it's just a soda that tastes like real ginger. More so than ginger ale. Pat and I both really like ginger so we've been into trying different brands of ginger beer. Bundaberg makes a pretty tasty product. From there we went to the Bundaberg Rum distillery. It's one of the popular brands of rum in Australia and you can take tours of the factory. We got there and found out that is was $25 to take the tour, which we thought was a bit steep just for a factory tour. Instead of doing the tour we decided to go test out our new snorkeling equipment.

        A man at the info center (I love info centers!) told us about an area where you can swim right off the rocks and see coral. It was a ways out of town and it took a bit to find, but we finally made it. There were only a few other people there, which was good except that we didn't really know what we were doing so it probably would have been helpful to watch how other people did it. To start with, we chose the wrong are of the beach to get in the water. The whole beach was covered in rocks, both big and small. It was a sandy beach at all, which is why there was coral I suppose. So we walked for 10 minutes across all these rocks with little tiny pointy shells stuck to them. Once we finally got to the water we realized that the water was too shallow and that we would have to walk a long ways out to even have enough room to kick our feet. It really wasn't going to work. We noticed some people getting in the water from a different section of the rocks, so we ended up hiking back across all the rocks and up a grassy hill, which thankfully didn't have any snakes in it! We were wearing our rash guards so we were pretty warm after all this hiking around.

        After walking over some more rocks we got to an area that was deep enough that we could stand and put our fins on and then swim out. There were full waves at the beach, but the water was a big choppy. I have only snorkeled one other time many years ago in calm water, so at this point I got a bit nervous. I don't ever love swimming in choppy water, and this was basically my first time swimming in fins. Oh I forgot to mention, when we were sizing our goggles at the car I managed to break the piece that holds the snorkel to the goggles. Obviously not such a high quality product, but there may have been some user error involved there as well. Anyways, I knew I would be able to exchange it but I told Pat I probably wouldn't be able to snorkel for the day. Pat wasn't about to let me out of our first snorkel experience so he took my snorkel and I used his. What a nice guy :)

         Ok, so back to the water. I was nervous so Pat went in first, broken snorkel and all, in order to scope it out. Once he finally got his snorkel to work and he got out there, he yelled to me that he thought I would be fine. I just decided not to over think the situation and I got into the water. The little waves were pushing me around but I managed to get all my gear on and get out to Pat. He was so good to me, holding my hand and helping me to adjust my mask. He's the best person to be in the water with since the ocean is basically second nature to him. At first I was trying to paddle too much which was making me breath hard which is problematic when you're breathing through a small tube. I finally realized I just needed to lay with my head in the water and not exert much energy trying to swim hard.

         The water was a bit murky, but we did see some coral formations. We swam over one really big bed of pinkish coral that had some patches of white growing on it. Pat dove down a bit and apparently the water was clear further down, but I didn't feel like attempting to dive down on my first swim. I was having enough trouble keeping water out of my snorkel as it was! Unfortunately the water got choppier and after about 10 or 15 min I was getting pushed around by the water enough that is was starting to stress me out a bit. Pat decided to come in too since the water was cloudy. We managed to beach ourselves on the rocks with only minor injuries (a little cut to Pat on the ankle). We had to climb back over all the dumb spiky rocks, but we finally made it back to the car and the showers! It may not have been the most epic snorkeling experience ever, but I was so proud of myself for even getting out there! I think Pat was pretty surprised as well. Heck, I paid $60 for the gear, I have to get some use out of it. I think for my next swim I may try to find some calmer water to practice in before we get to the better reef areas.

        From Bundaberg we drove an hour and a half up to The Town of 1770. Yes, that's the name of the town. It's where Captain Cook first came on land when he discovered Australia in 1770. I hope that's right at least, or I may have just embarrassed myself with my lack of Aussie history. Anywhoo, it's a really small town about 45 minutes off the main road. All of the info center people have told us we have to come here because it's so beautiful, and we don't take much convincing to do anything so here we are. We arrived after dark though so we haven't really gotten to see all of its alleged beauty. We parked in a park parking lot (wow, can you believe how many times I used the work park in this sentence?!) and made up a chorizo dinner. I wanted pasta and Pat wanted to eat chorizo sausage because that's basically all he ever wants to eats, so we came to a compromise. We cooked the chorizo and then added corn and a bunch of spices. Then we cooked the noodles and combined it altogether. Pat thought it looked like hamburger helper so I named in gourmet chorizo helper. It's much classier that way. Then I did the dishes with our new eco friendly dish soap that will easily biodegrade once it gets flushed out the bottom of the van. I don't want to kill any little possums with soap, even though they are scary and have loud fights with each other in trees. They aren't as bad at the birds that make horrible screaming noises, however. Or as bad as stone fish which apparently live in the water at this beach. I guess they are bad since there is a warning sign about them. I may have to find out more. How come everything in Australia wants to hurt us?! I need to interview some Australians up north here to find out how they have all lived so long. Thankfully it isn't jellyfish season, but I guess they never all go away. Sheesh. Staying alive is going to become my new full time occupation.

Day 33- Bunda-what?

  May 29, 2011- Day 33

Where: Rainbow Beach to Bundaberg

Dinner: Roast meal from the “sports club”

        It didn't rain all night long, but this morning there were still big puddles all along the roads in the campground. I was a bit stressed about how we were going to get out, and I Pat and I ended up walking along all of the roads trying to figure out the best path out. It was funny to hear what advice people had to offer us along the way. Everyone said we'd be fine and to just gun it through the puddles. They also would offer to push us out if we got stuck. What a helpful camping community. We had some toast for breakfast and then made our grand departure. It actually ended up being quite easy to avoid the big puddles and we didn't have any problems at all. Phew! It was a relief to get out of there. We drove an hour to the town of Hervey Bay. It's a super popular place to go our and watch humpback whales, but unfortunately it's not the right season for that. We only stayed long enough to walk down the esplanade and get some fish and chips. There wasn't much else to do so we continued another hour and half to Bundaberg. There is a caravan park here that we can stay in for $5 which is a good deal, since we need to take showers and do laundry. We got here in the afternoon, too late to swim, so we're going to get snorkels tomorrow and hopefully do some snorkeling.

        A lady at the caravan park told us about a sports club down the road that has a roast dinner for $3.95 on Sundays. That's cheaper than McDonalds here, so we figured we'd go check it out. A sports club here is a place where older people hang out, with some restaurants in it, a casino area, and a bar. They usually have lawn bowling as well. Old people here love lawn bowling. Apparently roast dinner is a very popular night at the sports club and there was already a line when we arrived 20 minutes before it opened. I'll tell you what, this place was a display of the local color. We were probably the only people between the ages of 12-35 I the place. The food wasn't bad though and you can't beat the price. It as held in a huge auditorium like room with a bunch of long tables set up. It felt a bit like a church potluck. It felt so weird to even be there, but the people watching was pretty good. Downstairs on the way out there was a live singer guitar player and there was a dance floor where some people we dancing. I'm glad that the older folks are getting out and enjoying themselves, but I just found the place to be depressing. I'm not sure what the appeal is to the tacky Las Vegas décor is, but these people seemed to be digging it.

        After wards we went to the movie theater down the road to see the Hangover 2. The theater was packed but unfortunately I didn't think it was as good as the first movie. Oh well, it was still fun. Doing some laundry now before going to bed.

Day 32- Fraser Island!

May 28- Day 32

Where: Fraser Island

Dinner: Steak and sauteed mushrooms

Fraser Island in amazing!

        This morning we got picked up by a big 40 passenger 4WD bus. Fraser Island is an island completely made of sand, the only one in the world just a 5 minute barge ride from Instep Point, where we're camping. Because it's all sand you have to have a 4WD car to drive anywhere on it because there are no proper paved roads. There were only 9 other people on the bus, along with our great tour guide. It was overcast and rainy which was a bummer. Once we got onto the island we drove straight up the beach for 35 kilometers. It was so cool to drive on the beach. Mostly it was smooth, but some places the sand was really soft or we had to drive through littld creeks running down to the ocean. The waters around Fraser Island are full of sharks so you can't swim anywhere in the ocean. While we were driving we saw the big fin of a whale. It was playing in the water and we just seeing it's side flipper.

        We stopped for morning coffee and muffins before driving up to the remains of a ship that wrecked on the beach sometime in the 30's I think. During WW2 it was used for bombing practice by the military, so there isn't a ton left of what was a big boat. However, it was still the best shipwreck I've ever seen.

Only 2 other people followed us, but we had such a fun time that we all did it twice. I think the rain only added to the rainforest feel. My favorite part was laying on my back with the rain falling on my face as I floated backwards. It has so far been one of best Australian moments. The stream was the same temperature as the rain so it hardly felt cold. Afterward I got my camera and ran back in the pouring rain to take some pictures. It's fun to run around in the rain in your suit if it isn't cold outside.

         Our final sight before lunch was another colored sand formation. It was pretty impressive again, and the sun came out just as we parked. Perfect timing sun. After a quick viewing we went to have an all you can eat lunch at a small local resort, one of two on the island. There are a few small little towns on the island that were built back around the 50's. A while back, however, the island became a National Heritage Sight and a National Park so no new land can be sold or developed on. So there are some people who live there and there are also quite a few holiday rentals. At lunch we met a few Germans a Dutch couple. It's always fun to talk with fellow travelers and compare notes.

        After lunch we drove inland via come incredibly bumpy roads. Imagine a bad washboard road and then multiply that by 20 and that gives you an idea of some areas of the road. Holes, bumps, fallen trees and branches, everything you wouldn't want to see on the road. 4WD truly is mandatory and even still you could get into some trouble. We could have gone to the island with a group where you have 10 people and you take turns driving a 4WD car, but I'm glad we went with the tour. It was more expensive but it saved a lot of stress, I'm sure. Our driver had 20 years experience on Fraser Island. It felt like we were on the Indiana Jones ride at Disneyland.

        The center of the island is rainforest. We went to Lake McKenzie which is an incredibly beautiful blue lake. It's a shelf lake which means that it was formed in a low sand dune and is not connected to any other water source. The only water that goes in is rain and the only water that leaves is through condensation. It took hundreds of years to form, but it is really big now. Also, the sand surrounding the lake is completely striped of nutrients so it's the whitest, finest sand you'll ever see. It's great for exfoliating your skin, so we rubbed it all over ourselves. We were also told that you can ever brush your teeth with it, so obviously we all had to give it a go. Actually, Pat tried it first and then everyone else followed. I was proud of the guy :) I was too cold to swim but Pat went in quickly. The last was gorgeous and just so amazing in how it was formed. It was a wonderful thing to see.

        Our last stop of the day was at an old logging station that was set up in the rainforest. Areas of the island were logged in the early 1900s ( I think?) and later the island was used to do a great deal of sand mining. There isn't much left of the buildings that were there, but our guide did take us on a walk down in the rainforest. We walked on a boardwalk that is built along a perfectly clear, silent running stream. The stream is silent because it runs over sand instead of rock like most streams. There aren't even any fish in the stream because there isn't enough nutrients in the water to support them. You can drink the water from all the streams on the island because it's all drawn up from a water table under the sand. The way the whole island is just so interesting.

        After wards we drove back down along the beach for a while and then had to use a mining road to get the rest of the way back to the barge because the tide came in. Despite the rain, our time on the island was wonderful. Such a unique place and we were able to learn a lot about it from our guide. I would love to go back sometime in the sun!

        When we got back to the campsite it was pouring rain. We ended up spending the evening inside of the van, except when Pat got our to cook up some dinner while standing under the back hatch door. Despite the condition, he still managed to cook up some tasty steak and mushrooms. True talent! There are big puddles forming on the sand roads here in the campsite so I'm a bit concerned about driving out in the morning.

Day 31- Stuck in sandy Rainbow Beach

May 27, 2011- Day 31

Where: Rainbow Beach

Dinner: Cereal and hot dogs (not together)

Campfire friends

        Arrived at Rainbow Beach this morning after about an hours drive fro the highway. It's called Rainbow Beach because it has 72 different colors of sand on the beaches and up on the sandy hills. We got our campsite passes for the next two nights then we went to a travel agent to book our Fraser Island trip for tomorrow. The agent specializes in young travels and she was really helpful. We booked a good trip for a cheaper price than normal price. She also gave us lots of info about scuba diving further up north and told us about caravan parks that Jucy van renters can stay in for $5 each. No one ever told us about these!! Will come in handy later.

After our cheeseburger lunch we walked out along the beach to where you can see all the colored sand up the steep banks. It really was incredible, I've never seen sand like this. It was the perfect example of sedimentary rocks are formed because with so many colors of sand you can see each layer. The different colors are all mixed together in layers and in many areas the sand is quite solid. Like it almost looks like rock until you scratch it and you can scratch away the sand. You can ever break chunks off, which is how you see all the many layers. We walked quite a ways down the beach and each bank we came to was so different in colors and formation. We climbed up some of the banks and then kindof glided back down them.

You can drive on most of the beaches here if you have a 4 wheel drive vehicle. It's so new for us to see cars on the beach! It was even more strange to see a speed limit sign on the beach. As we were walking back the tide was coming in so sometimes we had to stop and wait for the ocean to recede in order to get around rocks. A wave got me unexpectedly and my jeans got soaked. Dern. It was a great walk though.

        Just before sunset we drove up to a National Park and did a quick walk up to a huge sand blow. It was incredible. I didn't realize what it was going to be so to walk through the trees into a huge expanse of sand was really amazing. A sand blow is an area where sand blows through sort of a ravine or low spot on a hill. Over time the sand builds up and overtakes any plant life that was there. I don't really know how to explain it because I don't completely understand it, but this basically looked like a a huge sand dune. It dipped down a ways and then there was a big sand hill. To our left down a ways was the ocean and to our right there was a valley down below and beyond that there was water and the setting sun. We got there in time to see the last 5 minutes of the sun before it dipped down below the horizon. We watched the sunset for a while and walked around the dunes. We got back to the van just as it got dark.

         We drove out to our campsite on Inskip Point, a narrow little peninsula about 15 minutes out of town. We were told that 2WD would be fine for the campsite, but that w should probably try to stay in the middle. When we got there it was dark and the campground was quite full so we had to drive around for a while. We found a circle area that looked like it might have a spot so Pat asked if he should pull into it. At first I said no, but then I said, “ya sure.” He pulled in and realized there was no one where to park so he out it into reverse. It was at this point that we realized the sand we had driven into was deep and that we were stuck. Our van certainly isn't the type of vehicle necessary for navigating these sorts of terrain. Pat got out to try and driect me on attempting to back out. There were a lot of people camped close by so I knew it would only take a minute for someone to come over and see if we needed help. Sure eough, about 30 seconds later a guy asked if we were stuck and then he came over with another 4 guys. Wow, helpful folks. It only too a few minutes for them to push us back enough that we could get traction and reverse out. They asked us where we were from and then showed us a free spot nearby. We were nervous about the sand so we just parked for the night

Today Pat found out that he might not be able to scuba dive because of his ashtma so h was bummed out. He was being funny and dramatic about it, even though he really is sad. So he was laying in the van wit his hood over his head “sulking” and I was washing my face in the sink when one of the guys walked over to takl to us. He was really funny and asked if we were despairing over getting stuck. He joked around for a while and told us that he and his wide had traveled through England in a van when they were young and they loved when people were friendly and helpful to them. He invited us over to their campsite to cook food on their stoves or just hang out at the camp fire with them. I figured we should at least go over to say hi and be nice, but it turned out they were an awesome, hilarious groups of guys. There were middle aged and were having a mans fishing weekend away from their fams. They were all from the Noosa are and where fairly wealthy from what we could gather. They loves that we were Americans and they were just so entertaining to talk with. One of the guy's dads was tehre and he was a 66 years old British guy who had lived in Oz for many years. He looked like Ian McKellen and had a great British sense of humor. They gave us beers, rain water from their tanks at home (supposedly the best water we'll taste in OZ) and even some fresh squeezed OJ. They also made us hotdogs. We hung our until around 11 when they all went to bed.

        Best people we've encountered so far. We really had a fun evening. And if we get stuck on the way out they all have 4WD vehicles at the ready.

Day 30- Noosa Heads

May 26, 2011- Day 30

Where: Noosa Heads

Dinner: Oatmeal with maple syrup

        Woke up early this morning to the sounds of traddies (construction guys) and loud equipment. Awesome, good morning to you as well. We left the lot at 6:45 because they were loud and we thought we might be in their way. Stopped by a store to buy some yogurt and then we drove up and parked in a forest area overlooking the water. I made us muesli, yogurt and honey parfaits with our kiwis and passion fruit. Wow, that might be the best breakfast item ever. After breakfast we went on a coastal walk up in the forest area, but overlooking the water. We took trails down to look at a couple different beaches just as it was starting to get warm. The walk was wonderful and such a good way to start the day.

          We decided to stick around Noosa for the day and enjoy the sun. We went to the “Main Beach” near the city center because it was the least windy. IT was actually warm enough to lay on the beach today!! I was excited. The ocean was also very calm at this beach, which Pat didn't love but I sure did. I bought a rash guard recently to wear while snorkeling and today was the first day I tried it. It made it so much easy to get into the water, even though the water isn't so cold here. We swam around probably for half an hour and as far out as we went the water never got deeper than we could touch. Pat was giving me swimming pointers so that I'll be in snorkeling shape when the time comes (which should be soon!). There were pretty decent size fish swimming all around us. Not tropical looking yet, but they were whitish which was cool. It made me excited to get up to the reef! After wards we took beach showers which we were in rather desperate need of. We opened up the van and hung all of wet stuff out to dry. It looked pretty funny with clothing hanging from the windows and doors. While we may look slightly homeless in some places, in Australia you just look one of the many camper van travelers. They are everywhere here! We have seen a particularly large of number of them in Noosa. I think the trip from Brisbane up to Cairns is one of the more popular trips.

        We stayed at a rest stop again tonight. Rainbow beach is an hours drive so we'll start it in the morning. We met a young German couple parked next to us who are doing a similar trip. There was also a friendly older guy in a trailer camper who came over and chatted for a while. We were feeling lazy so we just made oatmeal for dinner with maple syrup in it. We played Race for The Galaxy and I finally beat Pat so that was a pretty good finish to the day.

Day 29- Australia Zoo

May 24, 2011- Day 29

Where: The Australia Zoo

Dinner: Fresh snapper given to us by a stranger when we parked for the night

Held a koala!!!!!

         Overnight camping at the service station was a success! Got up early to check with the Lonely Planet book about what to do in the area. We're out of Brisbane a bit and we're nearing the Sunshine Coast. We recently read about the Australia Zoo which is the zoo that Steve Irwin and his wife started. Seeing it in the book, we found out that it was rather expensive. We looked it up online, however, and found that they have all sorts of “animal encounters” where you can hold and feed different critters. My dad has been requesting a photo of me holding a koala for a while now, and I've been telling him that you can't hold them because they aren't nice animals and they will claw your face off. At Healesville Sanctuary you could pay to stand next to a koala and get a photo, but at this zoo you could pay to actually hold one!! Well this was the tipping point for me, and Pat's quite an animal fan so we decided we'd go to the zoo for the day. Such a good decision!

          This zoo is said to be an interactive zoo and that's exactly what it was. The zoo keepers are all very hands on with the animals, helping raise many of them from birth. We went to quite a few of the zoo keeper talks about different animals and we saw the big show where they brought out birds of prey, elephants, snacks, and of course because it's Steve Irwin's zoo, crocodiles. For the show they just brought out one huge saltwater croc, the really dangerous ones. They got him to jump out of the water for meat and showed how they wait perfectly still while they stalk the prey then lung for them really quickly. It was pretty cool. They told us about easy it is to avoid crocs, which is good info to have before we head up to Darwin and into croc country. In the zoo there were many different croc ponds, as they were Irwin's favorite animals. There was also a lot of information about all the work Irwin did with animals in his life, and what his family is continuing to do.

         All of the animal habits were extremely well made, and the elephants has a particularly elaborate home made to look like SE Asia. They had 3 big Asian elephants which was get to feed in the afternoon. They gave us bits of apples, zucchini, and carrots and you held them out to the elephants. It felt funny to have their trucks reach out and grab it out of my hand. Two of them used the tip of their trunk more like fingers to pick up the food and the other one would wrap the tip of its trunk around the food and swipe it from you. Such incredibly smart animals.

         We watched a tiger exhibit where they had the tigers do some different displays with the trainers. They would use milk to get the tigers to stand up tall on their hind legs and they would even wrap their front paws around the trainers necks. So neat to see how well the animals can be trained, and to see what a bond can be made between tigers and humans. The zoo helps raise money to support different organizations in SE Asia that work to protect threatened animals like tigers and elephants.

         The highlight of my day, however, was my koala encounter. I was so, so excited going into it. Pat took a picture where I look like an excited 5 year old waiting in line. It was really was about as staged as you can get, but I didn't even care. These are my favorite animals ever. They have an animal photo area with a backdrop and they had a keeper bring in a koala. I went up and they showed me how to hold my arms and then they set him into them. I have the biggest smile in the picture because he's so cute and cuddly! He didn't do much but sit there, but they took my picture and I got to hold him for about a minute. Pat took a video of it and I got a great picture that they took. I was a happy lady :D

        Actually, before I even held the koala we were in a koala exhibit and the keeper showed us a ladder where we could go up and pet the back of the koala sitting low in the tree. This koala was very fluffy and soft and I spent more time petting this one than the one I got to hold. But holding it was just so cool! With it's little arms around you. Still gets me excited when I think about it.

          The other animals we spent a lot of time with were the kangaroos. They had a huge area covered in trees where they kept all the roos and wallabies. You could buy little bags of roo food (pellets and dried corn) and wander all over, feeding any of the roos you wanted. Early in the morning they were laying all over the place being super laze. Later in the afternoon they were a bit more active, but I think that zoo kangaroos are just lazy by nature. Heck, they don't even have to move and people will come bring food to them. We did get up close with many different ones who would come up and eat out of our hands. We even fed a couple roos who had a little joey in their pouch. First time I have seen this. Ridiculously cute. Oh man. Pat made friends with one roo and after feeding him for a while we eventually ran out of food. Pat held up his hands and was shaking them to show that he didn't have anymore food and the roos was using his stubby little hands to grasp at Pat's hands as he moved them. It was really funny, and I happened to be taking a video at the time so that was good timing.
          Overall it was just such a fun day. We were both in really good moods and it was nice to have a day where all we had to do was look at cute animals and not make decisions about where to drive or what to do. We agree on everything at the zoo! Except that Pat likes the red pandas the best and I like koalas the best. I had never seen red pandas before and they really are pretty amazing. They are beautiful, with fur coats that fade from reddish orange to dark red brown. They have cute little white faces and bushy striped tails. You should probably look them up if you haven't seen one before. They are pretty unusual to see, so Pat was in red panda heaven.

        I know I am rambling on about animals, but I have to mention that we saw wombats for the first time. Oh man, they are really cute! They are short and fat, which makes them like big rectangular fur balls. It makes me even more sad to think about then getting hit on the road because they are just so dang cute. They walk around eating grass all the time, and apparently they have a big bone plat in their butts so that they can sit down hard on predators to smash them. How funny is that?! Oh wombats, I love you. I even bought a little stuffed wombat to sit in the van. He's our mascot. He just needs a name now.

       We were tired after a long day walking in the sun (thankfully the rain is gone!) and we just drove to the coast for the night. We pulled into a boat launch to park and soon after an old guy walked up to the van with a fish. He asked if we were camping and if we wanted this whole snapper that he has just caught and cleaned. Ah, yes please! Pat was excited to fry it up whole. Fresh fish sure is a treat, especially for free with no work involved! I think I like Queensland.

       Oh yes, and after dinner we saw a dingo a little ways away but it ran off. Now Pat it peeking out the window doing a "dingo watch." He keeps talking about how he wants to find one and play with it. I think he's doing it to tease me because I keep talking about how he can't play with wild animals. It's ok, dingo watch 2011 seems to be rather uneventful at this point.

Day 28- Brisbane in the rain

May 23, 2011- Day 28

Where: Brisbane

Dinner: Um, we had a big late lunch. Then I ate a muffin tonight.

Rainy.

        Brisbane weather has been a bit of a bust. When we got up this morning it wasn't too bad. We recently bought all the ingredients for chorizo breakfast burritos, and since we had a whole camp kitchen available to us this morning we seized the opportunity to not cook in the van. Pat makes some tasty breakfast burritos and I provide valuable moral support :) I also do the dishes though, so I think that's fair. We ate our tasty burritos and hung around the lounge area for a while using our computers. It was nice to have some time to just hang out outside of the van. We parked the van in a commuter lot and got into the city around 1. There were massive black clouds rolling in while we were on the train and as soon as we reached the city it was pouring. Today we were in the area of town called Fortitude Valley, which is an area where younger people hang out, I guess. There is also a little China Town there. It was alright, not anything particularly cool. There were lots of awnings though which was helpful in the rain. We decided to get some lunch and guess what we got? Asian food! Got to stick with tradition. We found a place with some great lunch specials, and I had BBQ pork and dumpling soup. I'm really coming to like dumpling soup. At the end we even split some fried ice cream. Wow, that might be one of the best desserts ever.

        We walked over into the next district of town, called New Farm (where do they get these names?) It's a little bit wealthier area with more cafes and coffee shops. It was still raining though so it wasn't especially good wandering weather. We didn't stay too long, and in the end we just caught a bus to the train station and then went back to the van. We left the city this evening and continued north. We found a service station that actually allows overnight parking (as far as we can tell) we we're stopped here for the night. There are lots of very large trucks around so I'm not sure I'll sleep well with all the coming and going, but it's an easy place to stop for the night. Tomorrow he head into the Sunshine Coast and apparently the rain is supposed to stop. There is so much good stuff up north, I really hope it doesn't rain anymore!  

Day 27- Brisbane success

May 22, 2011- Day 27

Where: Mount Tamborine to Brisbane

Dinner: Chinese Food after a serious Yum Cha let down :(

Finally made it to the city

      After one failed attempt, we successfully arrived in Brisbane today! It rained on and off all night which is rather difficult to sleep through completely because the rain hitting the roof is loud. When we woke up with was raining, but I was able to make coffee while standing under the hatchback door. You do what you have to do to get the coffee!! I have realized that unless I eat as soon as I wake up, and quickly follow it with some coffee, then I become a very irritable and unhappy person. I'm so glad we have our aeropress coffee maker. Life saver.

        We waited for the rain to die down before we drove down the mountain. It was a quick drive into the city where we found some free street parking because it was Sunday. It only rained a little bit during the day so wandering around the city was fine. We went on a walk around the city and down along the river that winds through the city. There were a couple weekend markets going on, so we were able to get some street food and buy some curry paste from a little Indian woman. Brisbane isn't particularly large, or at least it is all centered in a downtown area. By the afternoon we has already seen most of downtown and stopped to have a cider at an outdoor bar.

        We saw an ad for cheap yum cha at a Chinese restaurant and we decided to get that for dinner. Yum cha is like dim sum, which just means that they bring around carts with lots of little dishes on it and you pick ones that you want. They didn't open until 5:30, and we were both really hungry by 4:30 so it was a stretch to wait that long. We made it, however, and at 5:30 we went to the restaurant only to find that the special was only available at lunch time. Noooo! Yum cha is usually pretty expensive so we had been so excited. Hopes crushed. Tummies empty. Sadness. We didn't want to pay for the dinner prices so we wandered the streets trying to forget about all the yummy foods we had been anticipating. It was a bit like last night at the pizza place, only worse. I know, if this is this is the biggest problem we have in our lives then we are doing very well. We ended up finding a cheap Chinese restaurant. I think every time we eat out it's Asian food.

        We are staying the night in a caravan park. Not like a campground, but like a place where lots of people live in trailers permanently. They also have a camping area though. The place is a little bit depressing, but the amenities are great. And one trailer had a nice boat parked next to it. So maybe some of these people live cheaply and then buy nice things like boats? We arrived after dark and played cards for a while. We roll up our bedding and keep it along one side of the van during the day, and last night for the first time I realized how comfortable it is to lay down on top of the pile of blankets and pillows. I laid down at was so snuggly that I fell asleep at like 10pm. Pat was awake a while longer, but he never woke me up. I woke up at 1am and realized that I hadn't gotten ready for bed. I hate doing to bed without brushing my teeth, so I got up to make a run to the bathrooms. Pat was angry that I woke him up, but he came too. Pat is hilarious when he's just woken up, so he was making angry jokes at me the whole time. It's actually a pretty awesome quality of his. Then we went back to bed. The end.

Day 26, Rain forest walk in Mount Tamborine

May 21, 2001- Day 26

Where: Tamborine, QLD

Dinner: Pizza eaten in the car as take away because the restaurant was full

        Day two in Tamborine! We got to take hot showers this morning and were able to charge the computer at the camp site which is always nice. After a bit of a late start we went on a rainforest walk. It was all under the mostly palm tree canopy which was so green and beautiful. I love looking up and seeing palm trees fanned out above you. There were also so many crazy vines growing. I think the ones that wind themselves up around the trunks of other trees are particularly cool. There were so many different vine designs though, and each one so different. We walked a short ways into a little waterfall which turned into a stream that ran along the rest of the walk. We checked out a map before we left and we were pretty sure we knew what we were doing. Because it's a rain forest and it has rained recently the trail got muddier as we went on. Instead of just walking to the falls and back we decided to continue along the trail, which is where is started to get quite muddy. At one point an arrow pointed us down to the stream, which was the muddiest part of all and thinking we needed to go that way in order to follow the trail, we did our best to carefully walk down to the water. Once down there, however, we realized that there was no further trail and we just had to turn around and walk back up the muddy track Awesome. Thanks for that sign. We figured a way to continue on, only to find that the trail was covered in small boulders that had obviously rolled down the hill. No worries, we can climb over those! After we did we saw a sign that said “Danger, falling rocks, do not stop walking. Closed in wet conditions.” Well technically it wasn't that wet, and we figured they were talking about the area we had just walked through. We were quite confident that we were on the right trail so we kept walking. After climbing over a few more boulders we finally reached a sign that said, “Dangerous conditions, trail closed.” Dead end. So we ended up turning around and walking back the way we came. It only took an hour ¼ in all, but our shoes were rather muddy by the end. Perhaps we should have showered after the rainforest walk. Well now we know!

        After a sandwich lunch in the van we went up to visit a local brewery with a cheese factory inside as well. We enjoyed some cheese sampling (man I love free food and wine samples!) and then went and had a glass of beer at the brewery. We realized that we spend more money on special food and drinks than on anything else. We both really love eating and drinking though, and it's fun to try things that you can't find anywhere else. And free samples really do work because in the end we have purchased quite a bit of wine, spirits, and cheese on this trip! But we enjoy them so much when we eat them that I really don't feel bad at all.

From there we drove up to a man made cave that is full of glow worms. We figured we shouldn't pass up an opportunity to see glow worms, considering the only other way to see them would be to wait until night and walk down to the creek we had been at earlier. Walking in a rainforest alone at night? No thank you. Because glow worms need a particularly wet and dark climate to live in, they are not found in many places around the world. In fact, the ones we saw only live in Australia and New Zealand. They built a big fake limestone cave (very much like the real caves we visited in Buchan) so that people would be able to see the glow worms during the say. The ceiling on the cave you walk through is covered in little tiny lights that look very much like a starry sky. It is only the larvae that glow, and once they turn into little mosquito like flies they only live for a couple of days before they die. They make little webs, kindof like spiders, and then they glow in order to attract other bugs to them which then get stuck in the webs and the worms get dinner! Ingenious really. Who knew I would have the opportunity to see and learn so much about glow worms!

        Tamborine is a wonderful little town, as I described yesterday, but unfortunately it is small and so after the glow worms there really wasn't much else left for us to do. We didn't want to head into Brisbane in the afternoon (because we already know how poorly that could turn out!) so we decided just to hang out for the rest of the afternoon and then leave for Brisbane early in the morning. We drove around for a while looking at all the cute little cottage-like houses around here. They really are so cute. Then we ended up back in the rainforest parking lot where we read and hing out in the van until 6 when the pizza place we wanted to go to opened. When 6 finally rolled around we went to the pizza place only to find out that they were booked for the evening. So much for out big evening outing. We decided just to get take away pizza and then pulled the van forward a block where we stopped and ate it. The back of the van turns from our living room into our bedroom and the front of the van turns from our driving seats into our dining room! Haha, it's really not so bad, except when food smells linger. That can be a bit nasty when you're laying around reading with the smell of onions hanging in the air.

        After dinner, such as it was, we came back to the parking lot where we're going to stay for the night. We have a couple of fun card games which are good for passing the time, and Pat has some obnoxious Nintendo DS game that he plays while I type that involves him blowing into the game sensor. So I just get to listen to him blowing away while he tries to explain that in the game his blowing “makes beautiful music.” Yes Pat, I'm sure it does. Tomorrow we head into Brisbane, this time with more of a plan. I'm expecting much better results this time around.

The Sydney Chronicles

I just realized that I never posted my Sydney entry after I finished it. It's a long one, so maybe grab a cup of tea or some popcorn or something. Travel back in time with me to approximately two weeks ago...

May 5th-8th, 2011- Days 10-13

Where: Sydney

Taking a break from the road trip lifestyle

        We made the mistake of leaving Wollongong early in the morning and we hit the morning commute headed into Sydney. After a rather disgusting breakfast at McDonalds (Pat was nice and went because I wanted to, but I think my craving for McDonald breakfast is gone and perhaps never to return after that meal) we finally made it to our campground northwest of the city. It's a great campground with all the amenities and we were even able to do our laundry while we were there. It was only a 10 minute walk to the train station and then a 25 min ride into downtown Sydney. So great not to have to deal with driving in the city.

        Our first day was spent down by the Harbor, you know, that one with the big oddly shaped building on it? We got off the train across the harbor from the Opera House and we walked over The Harbor Bridge into The Rocks district of the city. It's an older area that has the remains from some of the first houses built by prisoners. Now it has a lot of bars and shops and is generally a pretty fun area to hang out in. It's right near the harbor so we went over and explored the Opera House area. It's so fun to finally see it it for real after seeing so many pictures of it. It's huge and it really is gorgeous. It's covered in white tiles so the light hits it many different ways, making it look a bit different all the time. My mom have Pat and I some money to do something extra special while we're in Sydney and while we were at the Opera House we decided we would buy tickets to see a show. We chose the ballet “British Liaisons.” It was choreographed by a British woman to be performed by the Australian Ballet. We're going to see it tomorrow night! With our tickets we also got tickets to go on a tour of the House. We came back later in the afternoon for the tour where we got to go into the bigger Symphony Hall building, and the slightly smaller Opera House (where the ballet will be). They are incredibly impressive, especially the Symphony Hall which has the largest set of pipe organs in the world inside. It took something like 8 years for the guy to make them all and then 2 more years for him to install and tune them. Crazy, but so awesome! We stopped into an Aboriginal Art Gallery and got our first taste of this style of artwork. We really enjoyed it and have decided to look around and more galleries before possibly buying a couple of pieces.

        It's different to be out walking around for 10 hours a day after spending the last week in the car. Over our 4 days in the city we covered a pretty good chunk of it. We ventured into China Town where we we had glutinous black rice with coconut milk (um, YUM!) and super tasty freshly made custard filled crème puffs. Pat was so happy to be back in an area with street food. He's fun because he will seriously try anything, so I end up finding foods I like through him ordering them. Black rice is an example. We both really love Asian food and on our last day we looked up ramen houses and found one in China Town. I first had ramen in Tokyo and it's such a delicious cheap, filling food. The place we found was packed full and it was just as good as my favorite ramen in Tokyo. Our final meal in Sydney was on a recommendation from my friend who lives there and it was all you can eat Korean BBQ buffet. This is truly Pat's dream meal. You pick out all your raw meats and veggies and then you take them back to your table where you have a hot cast iron grill in the middle. You grill all your own food so it's fresh and delicious. I was impressed that Pat could even walk out of the place after all the food we (he) ate. It's taken me a little while to get into Korean food, but it really was a good meal and cooking food at your table is fun.

        Our evening at the ballet was a very special treat. We pulled out our “nicest” clothes that we have with us. Luckily the shows at the Opera House aren't really that fancy so a simple dress can be fine. We ended up in The Rocks area before the show so we had a quick pizza dinner at an Italian place. We considered going to a fancy dinner, but after cooking out of a van the past couple of weeks any meal out seems fancy. We walked down along the harbor where street performers were playing didgeridoos and violins and Spanish guitars. Lots going on down there! After passing all the outdoor diners and ice cream eaters we came around the bend to where you can see the Opera House in all its glory. It felt quite fancy to walk up the stairs with our tickets, feeling like we were so much more sophisticated than all the people just standing on the stairs for pictures (hehe, even though we were those people at least 3 other times during the visit.) Before the show I had a glass of bubbly, because that's what you do before the ballet! (I think?) The ballet was actually three short ballets with a 20 min break between each one. It was a beautiful show with lots of pretty outfits, crazy on point moves and great music by the orchestra. One of the ballets was even about a chess game and they were dressed like chess pieces. Neither Pat nor I have been to a ballet before so we certainly weren't a critical audience. We kept reading about “pas de deux,” so when discussing what we thought of the different pieces with each other we were sure to mention how lovely we thought the pas de deuxs were. The show was beautiful and we really did enjoy every minute that we got to spend in the famous building! Thanks for the treat mommy :)

        We ended up visiting at least 6 different Aboriginal Art Galleries while in Sydney. We became familiar with quite a few different artists work, and we also learned a lot about dot paintings. I really enjoyed looking at all the work and it was so hard to decide what to buy. I finally found one that was done in shades of pinks that I loved. I first found it at a street market, but then found it again later at a gallery where I ended up purchasing it. It was a little expensive, but it's something I think I'll enjoy having for the rest of my life. My first real art purchase! Pat also bought one for his mom and we shipped them both home for safe keeping.

        One afternoon we took a ferry from Sydney Harbor up to Manly, a town a little ways north of the city. It was a very beachy community, with huge houses and lots of surf shops. We stopped for dinner in cafe that had a earthy/hippie feel to it almost. It had a delicious anti pasta plate along with a pork roast and a warm sweet potato and spinach salad. There were two guys sitting next to us who we overheard talking and figured out that they lived in Sydney but were from LA. Kindof funny to hear them talking about areas where we used to live.

        On the 4^th day we had planned to leave the city, but we ended up going in for a half day, at which point we decided to stay the whole day and then just park near the campground to sleep. We had a great day walking around a huge park down near the Harbor, and then we had the ramen and BBQ. When we finally got back out to the car, we decided to stay just across the street from the campground which just happened to be a giant cemetery. So we spent the night a mere 20 feet or so from the closest head stone. There was a metal fence between us if that makes it any better? It didn't creep me out at all though and it's actually one of the best nights sleeps I've had. I did have to sneak into the campground to use their toilets a couple of time, however.

        On the side of our van there all this advertising comments about how the van comes with “a beach view,” “a mountain view,” and “a city view,” so we decided we should add “a graveyard view” to ours. Just to round out the advertisement.

Picture Time

Mount Tamborine
https://picasaweb.google.com/jdfigley/MountTamborine?authkey=Gv1sRgCPe90ZXOjNehsgE#

Crossing Into Queensland
https://picasaweb.google.com/jdfigley/CrossingIntoQueensland?authkey=Gv1sRgCJTxxZae0fDE2gE#

Byron Bay
https://picasaweb.google.com/jdfigley/ByronBay?authkey=Gv1sRgCO-GqcnnyZeLuQE

Day 25- Redemption!!

May 20, 2011- Day 25

Where: Tamborine Mountain, Hinterlands, QLD

Dinner: Chorizo sausages cooked over campfire with fire baked potatoes and broccoli.

What a redemptive day!

        After feeling disappointed with yesterday, today was wonderful and made yesterdays events feel like they were actually leading to something good. We've been setting the alarm for 7 am every morning lately to be sure that we get up early in order to make the most of our hours of sunlight. Today it looked like it was going to be a nice sunny day, so we drove do Surfers Paradise near where we slept on the Gold Coast. Pat made us really delicious meusli, yogurt, honey parfaits with some passion fruits that we bought. Why isn't passion fruit popular in the US?! Is it because not many people grow it there? It it the tastiest fruit ever!! I have been buying them every time we go to the store. Yum! So we had out parfaits on the beach, then we walked around the shopping area along the beach for a while, waiting for it to warm up. By the time we got back to the car, big gray clouds were rolling in and it was obvious that it was not going to be a nice day at the beach. We looked at all the brochures we had for the area and we didn't see anything we really wanted to do. We consulted the Lonely Planet, where we were reminded about how great the area inland from the Gold Coast is. They call the area in from the coast the “hinterland.” Less than an hour from the beach in Tamborine Mountain, which the book said was very pretty with a quaint little town nearby. We decided if it was going to rain we may as well be in a camping area so we could chill in the car. However, as we drove inland the sky started to clear up and by the time we finished driving way up all the steep hills on the mountain it was sunny. We reached the town of Tamborine and found that it is the most artsy, picturesque town ever! Such a great find!!

         There is a street called “Gallery Walk” that is filled with winery cellar doors, fudge shops, art galleries, and even a German cuckoo clocks shop. A lot of the area around the town is rainforest and there are apparently some great rainforest walks you can do. We're going to do one tomorrow. We found a vantage point to look out over the surrounding area. We really are quite high up on this mountain. We went to a liqueur distillery that was recommended to us. It is hard to describe how awesome the area was where this shop was at. You drove through a gold and black gate, through a bunch of flowers and plants, down a palm tree lined driveway and then you arrive at the houses (more like 3 houses, an estate?) that looked like a little medieval village. I don't know what ear the houses were from, but they were ornate and had black spades painted along the tops. It felt a bit like Alice and Wonderland. There was even an ornate fountain in the middle of it all. It was such a fun place to arrive at an walk around in. We looked into a garage where we saw a bunch of different liqueurs being distilled, and then finally made it into the tasting room/shop. There was a really nice lady working there and we paid $5 in order to taste 6 liqueurs. It was nearly impossible to choose what to try because there were at least 50 different flavors, all in beautifully hand painted colored glass bottles. They were all so flavorful and not artificial tasting at all, we wanted to buy one of each. We finally decided on a bottle of wattle toffee, an Australian specialty. We had a great time chatting with the lady and learning more about liqueur distilling. By this point, I had pretty much fallen in love with the town. Beautiful scenery, quaint shops and friendly people are about all I need to really enjoy a place I think. Nancy, I especially thought of you while we were walking down the Gallery Street. I think you would love it here.

        Along the Gallery Walk we bought some awesome fudge, and stopped at a couple cellar doors to do a bit of wine tasting. All the shop keepers were so nice! We did one wine tasting with another couple and the guy that worked there was really enthusiastic and for every wine we tasted he would use his hands to describe detailed food dishes that he would drink the wines with. We continued to talk with him for a while after the tasting, and he told us about good food in the area, and traveling. Walking away from a good conversation with a stranger (who's not really a stranger anymore) makes me feel like traveling is really worthwhile. Not that I really need to be reminded that it's an enriching experience, but it always feels good to meet someone who is curious about your experiences and is willing to share their experiences with you. I will admit I don't engage in conversations as much as I sometimes wish I did, but I love when it happens. Another point for the town of Tambourine!

        On the recommendation of our wine store friend, we went to hang out at an Irish Pub once the sun set. It was a very cozy place with dark wood and a wood burning stove. We had some beer and charged the laptop, and discussed how much we would love to tack on a trip to Ireland after Asia. Ha, we'll see if that idea goes any further. If we work while we're in Cairns then we could probably earn enough money to do it! Fun thought anyways.

        We found a campsite we were told about and finally had the opportunity to burn the 15 pounds of firewood we've be lugging around with us for the past couple of weeks. Ya, don't know why we've hung on to it that long, but it was nice to have tonight. We we able to cook all our food over the fire which was fun, and I was very proud of us when we resisted the temptation to buy pub food for dinner. It's so much easier to just buy meals everywhere we are, but then we get out of the habit of cooking and that's an expensive road to head down. We made a great dinner though, and we were able to sit by the campfire for a few hours before heading to the van. It's colder up here on the mountain and I'm decked out in my long johns for the nice.

So while I was bummed that we did a lot of pointless driving yesterday, I'm so glad that we didn't stay in Brisbane because then we would never have discovered this wonderful town in the hinterlands. Who knows how many other gems we've missed as we've driven up the coast, but I am so glad that we found Tambourine. One of my favorite towns so far.

Day 24- Even worth writing about?

May 19, 2011- Day 24

Where: The Gold Coast (at The Spit)

Dinner: Roast beef sandwiches with blue cheese, honey and tomato. Side of broccoli.

Such a dumb day.

       I hate to admit what we did today because it really seriously ended up being a waste of a day and of gas. This morning we woke up and it was pouring rain. We needed to take showers and there were some good private ones at the beach where we were. Pat thought it would be fun to get in our swimsuits and walk down to the beach. He thought if we were already wet then it wouldn't seem cold to get into the water. It had pretty much stopped raining by the time we got our suits on and got to the water, so we didn't get very wet. The ocean really didn't feel too cold, but being in the ocean when it's all gray and cloudy kindof creeped me out. The waves weren't too big, they we were very crashy (if you can use that word as an adjective.) I only mustered up enough courage to get in up to my waist, while Pat ended up diving in. I wish I weren't as afraid of the ocean, but it's really hard not to be! I have gotten much better about swimming in it, but clearly not good enough to get in with choppy waves. How will I ever manage to surf with these fears! I really want to try at some point. We only stayed in the water for a short while before running back up to take our cold showers. The cold shower felt especially cold to me today (so much for our plan!) but it's always nice to be clean at the end. I'm looking forward to the days when showering will be enjoyable again and not a chore! The rain picked back up again and I ended up standing out the back, under the back hatch door making oatmeal and coffee while the rain poured down around me. Luckily it wasn't really cold, just wet. We have really good fresh roasted coffee from a little place in Bellingen, so that was a highlight of the morning.

        Because of the rain we felt like having an “around the house” sort of day, but we obviously don't have a house to kick around in for the day. I think it was at this point in the day that we made out first mistake which was not making a good plan. We decided to continue driving north towards Brisbane. Because it was raining we didn't end up stopping anywhere as we drove, as the most obvious activities in the area involve the beach. We ended up driving to the outskirts of Brisbane (about a 40 min drive I think) at which point we realized we didn't really have a plan. We didn't want to go into the city because we would have to pay to park and we wouldn't be able to sleep anywhere in the van in the city. We thought if we found a train station we could park in the lot, take the train into the city then come back out and find somewhere in the suburbs to sleep, like near a park or something. It was around 4 pm at this point which really is too late to be arriving in a new city. It was also pouring rain which make the idea of going into the city rather unappealing. I will admit that it was my insecurities about parking in random residential areas that ultimately doomed our evening. We spent too long driving around looking for somewhere good to sleep, while I looked online for cheap caravan parks to stay at. At this point we were both incredibly sick of sitting in the car driving aimlessly, and we were both getting really frustrated with each other and our inability to come to an agreement on what to do. For reasons which I'm not even sure we understand, we ended up leaving the Brisbane area and driving back south. Perhaps it was travels fatigue that lead us to this conclusion. We were searching for a rest stop to stay in, but the only thing we found was a “rest service station” with gas and food, but you could only stay for 2 hours. In an attempt to improve our morale I bought an oreo McFlurry from McDonalds. It made me feel better but it gave Pat a stomach ache. Is it only girls who use food to fix their emotions? Haha, whatever works.

        In an anti climactic finish to the day, we literally ended up back at a park that we had stopped at before leaving town in the morning. We stopped to make the tasty sandwiches that Pat had been imaging all day. Roast beef with blue cheese, honey, and tomatoes. As we were eating a City Council truck pulled up and informed up that the city code forbids us from sleeping in our car in any parks along the Gold Coast. Great, so much for our final resting spot for the night. Last night we slept in a park parking lot and no one said a thing to us. This is one thing that bothers me. There are lots of signs saying don't park overnight, but every night we see vans parked there and they are almost always still there in the morning. It makes it confusing if the laws are only occasionally enforced because how do you know if you need to follow them or not?! I know, you're always supposed to follow what the signs say, but that's pretty hard to believe when you know that people are disobeying them all the time and getting away with it. Anyways, we moved out to an extremely out of the way area called “The Spit”. It's like a beach peninsula or something. We certainly aren't disturbingly anyone, so hopefully they won't disturb us either! Oh yes, and Pat and I ended up feeling better with each other after we just decided on what we were going to do. I'm surprised we haven't had any other major disagreements yet, as we are together all the time. We're actually getting along pretty well I think. Tomorrow hopefully it's funny and we'll be able to enjoy the Gold Coast in the sun.

Day 23-Enter Queensland

May 18, 2011- Day 23

Where: Byron Bay to Benleigh, QLD

Dinner: Pasta from a shop

Third and final state!

        This morning we woke up and it was overcast. It was pretty early and we decided we wanted to find a coffee shop where we could charge the computer and catch up on some emails. Yesterday we saw pretty much all of Byron Bay and did a nice walk up to the lighthouse, so we decided to go to the town of Bangalow about 15 minutes from Byron. Byron Bay was really nice, but if it's not warm enough to be on the beach and you don't really want to spend a lot of money, it's not anything too extremely special. We left thinking we might go back and hit the beach again if it got warm.

        In Bangalow we found a great cafe with outlets available. We ended up ordering some really tasty breakfast, including croque madame and macadamia nut loaf with poached pears and ricotta. I also had a really good cappuccino, which is always a nice surprise. Maybe it's a bit strange, but coffee shops seriously just make me feel good. I remember being young and visiting my sister in Seattle where we would also go to her favorite coffee shops. I think maybe that's where I started associating coffee shops with feeling happy and comfortable. I do have a lot of fond memories in coffee shops, both ones I've worked in and visited :) Anyways, it felt great this morning just to hang around in this nice one we found. Now I have enough computer juice to keep up the “captain's log” for a few more days.

         It rained for a little while, and then it cleared up but didn't get warm. For this reason we decided to drive north instead of going back to Byron Bay. We made it all the way up to the Queensland border, and we crossed over to Coolongatta. New state!! Queensland is our final state, and according to the commercials “summertime is waiting for me here.” It was cloudy in NSW and we were joking about how when we crossed into QLD it would be perfectly sunny. What was crazy is that when we got to Captain Cook's Lookout, a lookout that is halfway in NSW and halfway in QLD, there were black clouds on one side (NSW) and blue skies on the other side (QLD). It really was quite strange, and pretty awesome we thought. Unfortunately the black clouds ended up crossing the border and it sprinkled a while this evening.

        We're staying in Burleigh tonight in a parking lot near the beach. Once again there are a lot of no overnight parking signs, but we'll test our luck. I think we're in an OK spot, and I'm not sure how highly they enforce those rules in the off season. We don't really have plans from here. It's about halfway through the trip now and we're over halfway to Cairns. We planned on having more time up north than down south because it will be warmer, but if we get more rainy days like today I'm not sure what we'll do. If you aren't into shopping all the time, it's a bit hard to find ways to fill the day if it's too cold to be on the beach. We'll just see what we find, but we should be able to occupy ourselves for a while here on the Gold Coast. I do hope we get to enjoy these world famous beaches though!

Day 22- Byron Bay

May 17, 2011- Day 22

Where: Byron Bay

Dinner: Chinese food

First ocean swim!

        Made it Byron Bay, and it really is quite beautiful. It really is a very touristy area though, which I don't love, and I've even noticed that the shop keepers here aren't as friendly. Probably because most of their clientele is a transient population. It was warm enough that I got to swim in the ocean for the first time! The water was turquoise and perfectly clear. Even when the waves (which were perfect swimming size) crashed you could see straight through to the sand. The water was pretty warm and the only problem was the breeze. The wind is everywhere! After swimming and laying on the beach for a while we used the beach showers. This one didn't even have spiders in it! It was outside and was surrounded by palm trees, so it looked like were taking wonderful showers in a beautiful tropical location. That was mostly true, except that the water was cold. Oh well, gotta take what we can get! We washed all of our dirty laundry, which had actually accumulated into quite a pile. While we waited we went across the street for some happy hour sangria, then has chinese food. Byron Bay has lots of “No Parking between 1am-5am” signs around, so we had a bit of a harder time finding somewhere to park for the night. We ended up back at the beach where we spent the day, and we were parking crazy close to the ocean again. It's warm enough to ocean some windows in the van at night, and the ocean was really loud last night. I loved it! Things are great here.

Day 21- Three weeks in

May 16, 2011- Day 21

Where: Hat Head to just outside of Byron Bay

Dinner: Leftover pork burgers

Three weeks in

        Today marks three weeks on the road which seems pretty unreal. We were told you could easily take a whole two months to do the drive from Melbourne to Cairns and at first that seemed like it would be difficult to fill. But now, after stopping and staying in so many small towns I realize that you could easily spend more than two months doing the trip if you really hit all the towns. It's hard to know exactly how quickly to move, especially since we don't know what the north is like, but from what we hear it's only going to get cooler, and warmer as we move north. So today we drove all the way up to just outside of Byron Bay, about 3 hours of driving. I think it's the most driving we've done in a day so far.

         On our way we stopped at Southwest Rocks, just north of Hat Head. There isn't really much there, except that is a cool old prison you can tour. It was built in the mid 1800s as a work prison, and they were meant to build some sort of ocean retaining wall. The prison is literally at the edge of a hill with the ocean down below. The view is gorgeous, but the prisoners wouldn't have seen it over the wall that surrounded the gaol. It's called a “gaol” and at first we thought that's how the Australians spell jail. We asked someone though and that's just the old English word for jail, the Australians spell it the same as us. They jail was in operation for 17 years and in that time they weren't able to finish building the whole wall, and what they did built was mostly washed away in a huge storm. The jail was closed and later it was became a relocation camp for suspected German spies during WW1. They pretty much just hung out there, swam, fished, and played music. The jailed closed after the war and now you can tour it. It was pretty interesting to see all the empty cells, and the view surrounding it was great.

        Further north we stopped in a little town called Belligen. In my mind this town is what Colville could be if it decided to class itself up a bit. Yet, it's still a super hippie town, although apparently it's only half as hippie as it used to be. It really was tiny, with only a few blocks on the main street, but it had some great little shops, with cool antique looking storefronts. We also saw, really for the first time in Australia, some coffee shops with comfy cozy little areas where you could sit around for a few hours on your computer, or with friends. It felt really laid back and friendly, like people just want you to enjoy yourself. We went into a neat antique store (with a lovely well lit coffee shop area) and there were good looking clothing stores and a couple bakeries. We were walking by a house turned into a store with a sign up the stairs for fresh roasted coffee. We went upstairs there was a friendly young guy who made us coffee, and we talked for a while about different roasts and grinds and such. There was a big porch outside to sit on and again, it felt like such a good place to just hang out. We ended up buying some beans from the place to use in our aeropress. It's really fun to buy food from local little places, and it's even better when you get a chance to talk with the storekeepers.

        Not only does today mark three weeks, but it also marks the dirtiest we've been on the trip. Hooray! :P Our last showers were 2 ½ days ago, which means I'm feeling pretty nasty. It was a perfect day to be in Belligen though because there were a lot of “earthy” people there who looked like they hasn't showered in a while either. I think we fit in better this way in fact. We went into didgeridoo store and there were two young hippie looking guys there, complete with dreadlocks, bandanas, dirty clothes, bracelets, and no shoes. Not in a negative way (because I don't have anything against them at all!) but they were the perfect stereotype backpacking hippies. Another week without a shower and I'll probably look quite similar! No, I'm really hoping to find a shower tomorrow because in Byron Bay I'm not sure the dirty traveler look will fit in quite as well. Although it has strong hippie roots as well, so who knows.

        There is quite a bit of hype about Byron Bay, and apparently it's one of the biggest tourist destinations in Australia, so I am looking forward to seeing what it's like. Tonight we're sleeping at a rest stop, which is really like the greatest idea yet! We passed one this evening and there were about 8 camper vans and trailers parked there, so instead of finding some street in Byron Bay we're at a stop with a 24 hour open bathroom! Us about about 10 other vans even though it says no overnight parking. Perfect.

Day 20- Hat Head (like Pat Head, hehe)

May 15, 2011- Day 20

Where: Port Macquarie to Hat Head, NSW

Dinner: Pork hamburgers with coleslaw and pineapple relish

        Finally decided to leave Port Macquarie this morning after waking up in our super sweet parking spot. When we got up there were already a group of surfers out in the water and the sun was blasting in our front window, despite the curtains hanging there. We didn't try to use the butane stove in the wind this morning (we're learning) but the result was that I got a coffee headache a couple hours later. So I'm a coffee addict, OK, I admit it. We stopped at a funny little market on the way out of town which really felt more like a big town garage sale. We did get some cheaper bananas, but they still cost $5 a kilo. Better than the $10 a kilo they cost in the store right now. So expensive. We also bought some scones made by a woman who had a baked goods booth. Pat was super set on the idea of having a proper “devinshire tea” this afternoon, so we had to have scones. He also found a cheap fishing book so he can learn more about baits and hooks and such.

        Once we got out of town we drove up to a small town called Crescent Head. It was recommended to us by a guy we talked to at a winery. Apparently it's where the long board got really popular in Australia and that's still what most people surf with there. It's Sunday so I think most of the town (all 1200 of it) was down by the water. There was a little market going on and there were a lot of people out surfing. There were a lot more people sitting along the grassy area overlooking the beach watching, and it felt like a big community event. I think this beach was a big inlet and the waves came in in huge swells. You could walk out along the beach up a hill out on a point so that you were looking back in at the inlet where all the surfers were. It was a really cool vantage point because you could see the swells coming from a long ways away, and then you could watch as the long boarders caught the waves far out and rode them all the way back into shore. A different way to watch the ocean for sure.

        In the parking lot we made our Irish Breakfast tea and ate our scones with jam. It was funny how into Pat was, and it was a delicious midday snack. I can see the appeal. The town was really small and there wasn't much to do since it was too windy to lay on the beach, so we stopped to split a plate of calamari and then we hit the road again.

        We just went a bit further north through Hat Head National Park to the small town we're staying in now. It's super tiny actually. We're parked down in a little parking lot by the beach. Pat thought up a great dinner using ground pork to make hamburgers, and we also made a garlic mayo which we used to make coleslaw and then used some left over pineapple to make a pineapple chilli relish. I would have been impressed with the idea anywhere, but was especially impressed that he wanted to make it out of the van. I was happy to make coleslaw for the first time myself. It all turned out really well, and we were eating just as the sun set. Perfect timing. Pat wanted to do some night fishing but with the wind it's just too cold. Instead we used the little DVD played hooked to the wall in the van to watch a movie. First time we have done that, but it was sort of a nice change. Don't know what the plan is for tomorrow, but since it's been a bit cooler I know we're thinking we'd like to move north somewhat quickly. And we're getting to close to Byron Bay which sound like is should be fun. Good times on the road.

Day 19- Port Macquarie

May 14, 2011- Day 19

Where: Port Macquarie

Dinner: KFC. yes, like the chicken

        May I first begin with saying that tonight we are in the best parking lot yet. We are literally down at the ocean. Like if I take 6 steps from the car I will be on the beach, and because the tide is in right now there is very little beach. We're laying in the van looking out the front window watching the waves. So, so good.

Today we didn't really make any plans of what we were going to do. We drove around the town, then walked around, then went to a koala hospital. It goes out and rescues injured or orphaned koalas and keeps them in the ICU until they are better at which point them move them outside into the different fenced off enclosures they have. There was even a truck that said Koala Ambulance on it. We could watched the different koalas outside as they ate and climbed trees and slept, mainly. I got to see some joeys for the first time. They were curled up sleeping in trees, but they were very small and cute. Their moms had been killed so they were being raised at the hospital until they got big enough to be on their own. Still my favorite animals so far.

        Later as we were driving around, Pat spotted a koala walking across a driveway in a wooded area. I pulled over and jumped out of the car to get a closer look. He was a quick moving koala and he only stopped walking for a minute. They look kindof strange when they walk, it reminded me of how a gorilla walks for some reason. It was funny to see one on the ground, but before I could even get a good look at him he was all the way up around the corner of the drive way. I guess they are serious about the koala crossing signs on the road. May I never see one on the road while I'm driving!

        Pat bought a fishing pole today from a very friendly shop owner who wanted to talk extensively with us about Australian weather. He kept assuring us it would get warmer the further north we got. I'll be thankful when that temperature change takes place. It was sunny today, but still very windy which made it fairly chilly. The salesman very helpful with recommending places to fish around here as well as telling us which bait to use. He even threw in some hooks for free. I love nice shop keepers. Pat went online to get his fishing license and now he's good to go.

        We found a nice beach that was blocked a little from the wind where we got out and laid for a while. There were lots of people with boogie boards out in the water and Pat ended up going out and body surfing for a while. Apparently the water isn't too cold, it's just the wind that's bad. Today I decided that I was just going to have to suck it up and use the cold beach showers. After laying on the beach I got all my shower stuff together and headed into the showers. The cold water isn't really SO horrible, in this case what ended up being the worst part was that there were spiders around the shower area. I saw the first one up in the corner of the ceiling a couple minutes after I got in. This creeped me out, but then it climbed back up into the ceiling. When I turned around I saw another spider up near the corner of the door (which didn't have a lock so I have to hold it closed with my leg while I showered). This spider had a web in the corner and he wasn't going to go hide anywhere. He wasn't huge, but he wasn't small either. Earlier I looked at a chart of harmless and dangerous spiders, but I certainly didn't know what category this one fell into. So not only did I have to use one hand to keep the shower water on the whole time, use my leg to keep the door closed, and use my other hand to wash my hair, but I also had to keep an eye on the spider to make sure that he didn't crawl too close to me. These elements all worked to distract me from the cold water, but they also made for a rather unpleasant experience. I'm probably going to have to get more used to cold showers because they are frequently at beaches and they are free, but hopefully I won't have to deal with any more spiders in the shower.

        This evening just before sunset Pat put together his fishing pole and we went out on a small wharf to try it out. We bought some little shrimp to use as bait. The fish loved the bait and our first 10 casts or so resulting in stolen bait and no fish. We eventually did catch some different small fish, but none that were big enough to keep. We stayed until after the sunset, but then it just got too cold. We're hoping to be able to catch some fish big enough to eat. That would be a welcome change from tuna rice noodles. Speaking of cooking, our silly little butane stove that pulls out of the back on the van is virtually useless in the windy conditions we've been having lately. The flame blows around too much to boil water. We were finally able to boil enough water for oatmeal and coffee this morning, but that was an extremely frustrating experience. Tonight after fishing we went to KFC and had chicken. People love KFC here and we always see them eating it, so tonight we caved and went there.

        We're back at the beach we were at earlier, in our waterfront location. There are a couple other camp vans here with us, all young people. We see a lot of different types of people traveling in camper vans. Older couples, young couples, and even families. It seems to be a popular way to travel here. Right now as I watch the waves from the van I certainly understand the appeal. If only this thing had a bathroom in it. Who decided to close all public restrooms at 7pm?!

Day 18- Return of the spider!

Where: Nelson Bay to Port Macquarie, NSW

Dinner: Rice noodles with tuna fish, curry and egg. Yes, quite random.

Such a good day!

        Woke up to our beautiful ocean overlook this morning thinking about how people pay millions of dollars so that they can have views like this when they wake up. I'll take it for free this time around, thanks. From Nelson Bay we drove back south to get off of the peninsula (they pronounce this word peninshula here). Then we turne east to get back on a coast highway and from there we ended up at Seal Beach, the most beautiful beach we've been to yet. It was the most brilliant turquoise near the (white) beach and then turned into a bright blue further out. It looked seriously tropical. We were able to climb out on some rocks and check out some tide pools. I just couldn't get over how beautiful the water was. We talked to a couple who had been out kayaking on the calm water and they said that even further up north, while it does get warmer, it didn't get too much bluer than the water was today at Seal Beach. It was sunny today and fairly warm so we decided to put out suits on and give the water a try. The wind proved to be the main problem, but the water was just a little too cold for me too. I got in to about my waist, and the water was really clear. We watched as a school of fish came up near the shore and stuck their mouths up out of the water. We also watched as a couple of birds swooped down to the water to grab fish. As usual, there was some wildlife to observe. I went back to lay on the beach while Pat took the full plunge in the water. He didn't last too long though. He's been researching spear fishing because he really wants to do that, and today there was a guy out spear fishing with all the proper gear so Pat enjoyed watching that. We have seen a lot of people fishing along the coast so Pat is going to get his fishing license online and maybe he can catch us some dinners! Tomorrow I guess we're going to look at spears and some sort of wetsuit. He's pretty excited about it. We laid on the beach for a while in the sun before showering off and heading up to a nearby lighthouse.

        After parking the car and walking up to the lighthouse I discovered what I think it my new dream vacation spot (for now at least). The lighthouse is the most picture perfect lighthouse ever. Bright white with painted trim and a huge rotating light at the top. Right below the lighthouse there are three different little house that they rent out for guests to stay in. It's all so idyllic! Not only that, but the beach views from the hill are absolutely incredible. The perfect blue water and long white sandy beaches, as well as some mountains nearby and more off in the distance. And the hill is really high so you can see a long ways down the coast. Oh man, I would love to stay there for a few days! I really enjoyed our time up there. We finally had to climb back down the hill and continue our drive northwards.

        We stopped at a park along an inlet, which I guess is a popular fishing area. There were lots of people sitting along a wall fishing and we saw a few people catch some large fish. This got Pat more excited :) We haven't been shopping recently so we used items we had to put together an odd concoction of ride noodles, tuna fish, curry powder and fried eggs for dinner. It's actually turned out pretty well, and we were just happy that we remembered to stop and cook in the daylight instead of trying to do it later in the dark. We drove another hour north in the dark until we reached the bigger town of Port Macquarie, where we're staying tonight. We found a spot down by the ocean to park, and then we went to a bar to get a drink instead of spending the whole evening cooped up in the van. We've decided that going out and doing something in the evening is a better way to pass the time, especially when we're in a city and there are actually things going on at night. As we were parking a car came racing down the street pulled into a parking space near us then turned about and raced back out of the parking lot. I'm pretty sure we were disrupting their drug deal or something. Oh well.

        Tonight as we were scoping out our sleeping possibilities I saw the same horrible huge spider as last night crawl onto the windshield. This time I was able to stop the car and Patrick became my absolute hero when we got out of the car and found a stick to move the spider with. I couldn't watch any of it because I literally had my sweatshirt hood covering my whole face, but I could hear him talking to the spider trying nicely to get him to move. It's pretty sweet actually, he's so nice to them! Had I had the guts to even look at the massive thing I would have just swatted it on the ground with a stick and then ran back to the car. Pat got a leafy branch and carefully brushed it on the ground then got it to climb on the branch so that he could relocate it into a grassy area. What an animal friendly man I'm dating :D Meanwhile I was huddling in the car with the doors locked (because that's going to make a difference!?) I will admit, I was pretty useless on this one. May I never see another one of those spiders in my life!

        Seeing our first really beautiful tropical looking beach today got be more excited for what we'll find up north. Apparently Port Macquarie is considered the entrance to the subtropical environment, so we'll see if that seems to be true. It's been really the cold the past few days, but hopefully we're actually starting to get northern enough that the weather will get warmer. It's a good think we left Melbourne when we did because apparently it's been really cold down there. Life in a camper van is not as enjoyable if it's really cold out. Luckily tonight isn't bad, so I'm off to read!