Travelling In A Fried Out Combi...
...Or not. After all the driving in New Zealand we'll be flying anywhere that's more than 10 minutes walk away. Or at least taking the bus.
So we're in Oz, and have been for the last three weeks. Arrived in Sydney to some unexpectedly cool and cloudy weather - having wanted to come to Australia for years this was not what I'd been hoping for. We had a little look around anyway. They've got a bridge...
And a theatre thing...
That was a bit unexpected, looks different on the telly. They let you climb the bridge - one of the "must do" attractions they say. THEY also charge you $165 dollars for the privilege....or, you can pay $8 to go up one of the big concrete pylons, see a museum of how it was built, and get a similar view. $165 or $8?? Here's a view from the top of the bridge, see if you can guess the price...
That's better, more like what we were expecting. But look at that grey sky! Not good, time to go somewhere hotter. We went to Cairns.
Arrived in Carins at 10pm. It was warm - a good sign. Then it rained, and while it was nice and warm during the day, and extremely hot when the cloud cleared, there was altogether too much rain happening. Still, it was nice to be able to stay somewhere for more than a day at a time, so we did. Cairns is a quiet little town, with it's souvenir shops and bars you could be anywhere - except all the souvenir shops sell boomerangs and didgeridoos, and most of the other shops sell opals.
After a few days lazing around Cairns we headed up to Port Douglas and spent a week at Dougies. Dougies is a hostel/campground with a pool, big screen TV (where I saw Australia beat Greece at "soccer" - Greece being so bad they made the Aussies look good, when actually, they're a bit crap) and, more importantly, hammocks. With the weather improving all the time and some serious tanning to be done, this was my view for most of the week...
We took a cycle ride up to the Wildlife Sanctuary one morning for "Breakfast with the Birds"....
That's a Pied Heron trying to 'alf inch my bacon. A well aimed fork ensured he didn't try again. We ended up spending most of the day looking round - they had a huge wetlands enclosure with all sorts of water birds and parrots, a rainforest enclosure with even more parrots (including lorikeets, cockatoos and whatever) and too many other birds to mention, and finally a grasslands section with crocodiles and kangaroos. We spent most of our time feeding the wallabies and kangaroos. I'll let Jen demonstrate...
I haven't showed you the local beach yet, Four Mile Beach it's called...
Pretty good. And notice the blue sky. If you're gonna have hosepipe bans, you wouldn't mind so much if you had a little of that.
We also took a trip up to Cape Tribulation and the Daintree River. Cape Trib is where the rainforest meets the sea. Lots of mangrove trees and golden sandy beaches, and, while the Daintree River looks very inviting, you do have to watch out for these little fellas...
Christ on a bike it's a bloody crocodile!! Just a little female apparently, only about 3 metres long so that's OK, and as everybody keeps saying, it's the ones you can't see that are the most dangerous. Yeah right, and I suppose she's more scared of us than we are of her. Thankfully they'd recently killed a cow so everyone was feeling nice and relaxed - everyone except the cow anyway, which was slowly rotting on a nearby sand bank. Sometimes a poor sense of smell is a blessing.
And just before we head back to Cairns, here's a Kookaburra. He was having a little snack just above my hammock as I slowly toasted...
Actually, before we leave I wanted to show you a picture of Snapper Island which is up near the Daintree. Is it just me, or would Hippo Island be a more appropriate name...
Anyway, back in Cairns we did a little more sitting in the sun and then took a trip out to the Great Barrier Reef. The reef looks something like this from above...
It's a slightly better view from below the water, although you'll have to use your imagination (or your browser - you're at work remember, and you're clearly not very busy) in this case to fully appreciate the diversity of marine life that inhabit on the reef. Two somewhat graceless creatures that briefly called the reef home can be seen below...
And before we fly down to Brisbane I'd just like to introduce you to our latest celebrity friend. OK, so she's no Dave Gorman, but say hello to Karen. At the time the picture was taken, Karen was the latest evictee from the Aussie Big Brother house. I know, you deserve better...
So down to Brisbane we went (Tyson and Jenna - if you're reading this, we will be back. I'm still counting on those surf lessons and Jen is in bad need of a fully stocked kitchen and some cats to cuddle. If you don't have cats of your own, is there any chance you can borrow some from friends or relatives??). Brisbane was chillier than expected. Lovely and hot in the sun, but not permanent shorts and t-shirt weather like Cairns. It was Jen's birthday while we were in Brisbane so we treated ourselves to a nice big fry-up for breakfast and a trip to a local theatre in the evening (not as dull as I'd expected - anything with knob AND fart jokes can't be all bad). During the day we had us a little culture and followed a walking tour round the city. So here's a picture of a church taken from the City Hall bell tower....
and a walkway on the South Bank...
Having been spoilt by the Cairns sun we decided to head north again, although only as far as Maroochydore on the Sunshine Coast, which is a short drive from Australia Zoo. We could hardly visit Oz without seeing if Steve Irwin was home. Unfortunatley we were out of luck, he was out on one of the other properties, but having spent a day there we feel like he's a personal friend. His picture is everywhere and on everything. It's a great zoo, everybody is very cheerful and enthusiastic, and the animals are treated more like pets. Jen got to stroke a koala...
and feed an elephant, and we went to the Crocoseum (there's crocs and you'll see 'um) to see the shows - snakes, birds, tigers and of course crocs...
And that pretty much brings you all up to date.
So what did I miss Jen????
I think that about covers it. Did we mention the ferry trip to a place called Manly, where Col got a 'manly haircut'? or the huge amount of fun you can have looking for beer tokens in a massive arena of foam - i've never BEEN so clean! Anyway, let's just take another look at that last picture, in the foreground is what looks like a massive scratching post. Thats because it IS a massive scratching post.
(If I'm allowed to pet koalas, elephants, a wombat, kangaroos and even a black headed python - surely I should be allowed a quick cuddle from a very big cat. The keeper guy got one. Not fair)
Thats all for now folks, we're off to Fraser Island tomorrow. Paradise apparently. See you there.
So we're in Oz, and have been for the last three weeks. Arrived in Sydney to some unexpectedly cool and cloudy weather - having wanted to come to Australia for years this was not what I'd been hoping for. We had a little look around anyway. They've got a bridge...
And a theatre thing...
That was a bit unexpected, looks different on the telly. They let you climb the bridge - one of the "must do" attractions they say. THEY also charge you $165 dollars for the privilege....or, you can pay $8 to go up one of the big concrete pylons, see a museum of how it was built, and get a similar view. $165 or $8?? Here's a view from the top of the bridge, see if you can guess the price...
That's better, more like what we were expecting. But look at that grey sky! Not good, time to go somewhere hotter. We went to Cairns.
Arrived in Carins at 10pm. It was warm - a good sign. Then it rained, and while it was nice and warm during the day, and extremely hot when the cloud cleared, there was altogether too much rain happening. Still, it was nice to be able to stay somewhere for more than a day at a time, so we did. Cairns is a quiet little town, with it's souvenir shops and bars you could be anywhere - except all the souvenir shops sell boomerangs and didgeridoos, and most of the other shops sell opals.
After a few days lazing around Cairns we headed up to Port Douglas and spent a week at Dougies. Dougies is a hostel/campground with a pool, big screen TV (where I saw Australia beat Greece at "soccer" - Greece being so bad they made the Aussies look good, when actually, they're a bit crap) and, more importantly, hammocks. With the weather improving all the time and some serious tanning to be done, this was my view for most of the week...
We took a cycle ride up to the Wildlife Sanctuary one morning for "Breakfast with the Birds"....
That's a Pied Heron trying to 'alf inch my bacon. A well aimed fork ensured he didn't try again. We ended up spending most of the day looking round - they had a huge wetlands enclosure with all sorts of water birds and parrots, a rainforest enclosure with even more parrots (including lorikeets, cockatoos and whatever) and too many other birds to mention, and finally a grasslands section with crocodiles and kangaroos. We spent most of our time feeding the wallabies and kangaroos. I'll let Jen demonstrate...
I haven't showed you the local beach yet, Four Mile Beach it's called...
Pretty good. And notice the blue sky. If you're gonna have hosepipe bans, you wouldn't mind so much if you had a little of that.
We also took a trip up to Cape Tribulation and the Daintree River. Cape Trib is where the rainforest meets the sea. Lots of mangrove trees and golden sandy beaches, and, while the Daintree River looks very inviting, you do have to watch out for these little fellas...
Christ on a bike it's a bloody crocodile!! Just a little female apparently, only about 3 metres long so that's OK, and as everybody keeps saying, it's the ones you can't see that are the most dangerous. Yeah right, and I suppose she's more scared of us than we are of her. Thankfully they'd recently killed a cow so everyone was feeling nice and relaxed - everyone except the cow anyway, which was slowly rotting on a nearby sand bank. Sometimes a poor sense of smell is a blessing.
And just before we head back to Cairns, here's a Kookaburra. He was having a little snack just above my hammock as I slowly toasted...
Actually, before we leave I wanted to show you a picture of Snapper Island which is up near the Daintree. Is it just me, or would Hippo Island be a more appropriate name...
Anyway, back in Cairns we did a little more sitting in the sun and then took a trip out to the Great Barrier Reef. The reef looks something like this from above...
It's a slightly better view from below the water, although you'll have to use your imagination (or your browser - you're at work remember, and you're clearly not very busy) in this case to fully appreciate the diversity of marine life that inhabit on the reef. Two somewhat graceless creatures that briefly called the reef home can be seen below...
And before we fly down to Brisbane I'd just like to introduce you to our latest celebrity friend. OK, so she's no Dave Gorman, but say hello to Karen. At the time the picture was taken, Karen was the latest evictee from the Aussie Big Brother house. I know, you deserve better...
So down to Brisbane we went (Tyson and Jenna - if you're reading this, we will be back. I'm still counting on those surf lessons and Jen is in bad need of a fully stocked kitchen and some cats to cuddle. If you don't have cats of your own, is there any chance you can borrow some from friends or relatives??). Brisbane was chillier than expected. Lovely and hot in the sun, but not permanent shorts and t-shirt weather like Cairns. It was Jen's birthday while we were in Brisbane so we treated ourselves to a nice big fry-up for breakfast and a trip to a local theatre in the evening (not as dull as I'd expected - anything with knob AND fart jokes can't be all bad). During the day we had us a little culture and followed a walking tour round the city. So here's a picture of a church taken from the City Hall bell tower....
and a walkway on the South Bank...
Having been spoilt by the Cairns sun we decided to head north again, although only as far as Maroochydore on the Sunshine Coast, which is a short drive from Australia Zoo. We could hardly visit Oz without seeing if Steve Irwin was home. Unfortunatley we were out of luck, he was out on one of the other properties, but having spent a day there we feel like he's a personal friend. His picture is everywhere and on everything. It's a great zoo, everybody is very cheerful and enthusiastic, and the animals are treated more like pets. Jen got to stroke a koala...
and feed an elephant, and we went to the Crocoseum (there's crocs and you'll see 'um) to see the shows - snakes, birds, tigers and of course crocs...
And that pretty much brings you all up to date.
So what did I miss Jen????
I think that about covers it. Did we mention the ferry trip to a place called Manly, where Col got a 'manly haircut'? or the huge amount of fun you can have looking for beer tokens in a massive arena of foam - i've never BEEN so clean! Anyway, let's just take another look at that last picture, in the foreground is what looks like a massive scratching post. Thats because it IS a massive scratching post.
(If I'm allowed to pet koalas, elephants, a wombat, kangaroos and even a black headed python - surely I should be allowed a quick cuddle from a very big cat. The keeper guy got one. Not fair)
Thats all for now folks, we're off to Fraser Island tomorrow. Paradise apparently. See you there.
posted by Jen & Col at
10:09 am
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