Back to the Northern Territory

So we made it through rainy Queensland, luck seemed to be on our side as roads re-opened and we seemed to be the one of first 2WD vehicles to make it through to the Outback Way, the Highway connecting Outback Queensland with the red centre of Northern Territory.

Pilosaur Fossil

The distances have been huge and since we last posted we have covered 5,000kms in Lola!  But there have been some interesting sights along the way.  We began the dinosaur trail at Hughenden, where they discovered the fossil of “Mutt” the Muttaburrasaurus, there was an amazing replica of the skeleton found on a nearby homestead – the original bones are now in America, where most Archaeology research and funding seems to be.  Impressed, we headed onto Richmond & their Kronosaurus Corner.  Millions of years ago Richmond would have been underwater as part of the Great Inland Sea, consequently the dinosaur bones on display here were mainly of ocean dinosaurs   The Kronosaurus is thought to be the T-Rex of the Ocean - think Jurassic Park 3 when the huge shark type dinosaurs attack the little boat!  And they have also discovered full Pilosaur skeletons, which look more like dolphin dinosaurs.  The incredible thing being, that these are generally discovered by farmers in the area, there is no real research, digs or teams looking for the fossils, who knows what else is out there waiting to be discovered!

As we passed over the border, the familiar bush land continued, vast and flat – not much to see, just straight road and expensive petrol – a bit of wildlife though, Eagles above us and snakes on the road!  The first larger place we got to was Tennant Creek, a fairly large, rough looking town, we passed through to get to the Devils Marbles.  These are huge red boulders, some sphere shaped like marbles.  They pop up from nowhere out of the flat bush, they are thought to be magma that millions of years ago was pushed up onto the Earth’s surface, over time the wind and rain has caused the shapes and now the erosion / splitting of some of the rocks.  They were very pretty to see and we could camp there and watch the sunset over the rocks. 

Alice Springs was the next stop off, for reasonably priced fuel, a Coles shop, a visit to the Reptile Centre (fell in love with a Bearded Dragon named Blossom) and to top-up our car rego.  All good jobs done, then it was off to the MacDonnell Ranges.  These are not far from Alice Springs and there are lots of gorges, water holes, viewpoints and walks amongst the beautiful scenery.  It was really lovely on the West and we stayed there overnight in the National Park with a huge gorge behind us.  The East Macs are much smaller and sadly we were foiled by a boggy road, so couldn’t get to many of the sights, instead we ended up rescuing a mother and baby whose car was stuck in the mud – at 40degrees they were very grateful for a lift to air-con and a telephone!

Chris at Kings Canyon

Our next stop was Kings Canyon.  This is a giant red rock canyon in the middle of nowhere; we walked up the steep gorge and were amazed at the sheer size of the canyon.  The walk was lovely as you went amongst big rock domes which eroded into different shapes over the years.  We also saw wild dingoes and monitor lizards whilst there.  After that is was down towards Uluru.  Ayres Rock is a real symbol of Australia and driving to it feels like a real pilgrimage as you can see it from quite far away slowly getting larger as you approach.  It’s the sheer scale of the red rock on the fairly flat bush landscape that is impressive.  A lesser known wonder is the Olgas nearby, it’s a similar formation of rock but looks like giant beehives.  The walk here was beautiful and you could get amongst the big rocks up a steep climb to a wonderful viewpoint.  The whole Red Centre experience was a good one, the distances are definitely worth it as the sights are so impressive.

We are now back in South Australia in opal mining town Coober Peddy – the flies are even worse here than the centre!  Lola is a bit poorly...again...we have fingers crossed for a minor blip and then we need to head south to source some fruit picking work as the piggy bank is getting a little low and there is Tasmania to visit next month!

Lots of love,

Kat & Chris xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Tropical North Queensland

The Great Barrier Reef was at first disappointing. I think the reason is because it gets so much hype you just expect it to be better than anything you have ever seen in the sea. The reason however it is so famous is because of the sheer size of it. Something you cannot quite appreciate without doing a helicopter tour or diving / snorkelling in multiple sites. We did have a great time though after this initial disappointment passed. The coral is spectacularly colourful and whilst the fish weren’t as plentiful as what we’ve seen previously we did see some monster wrasses, GIANT clams and a very large stingray relaxing on the ocean floor. Also we were dressed as giant florescent condoms in our stinger suits because of the deadly jelly fish and stingers that frequent the waters at this time of year. We could have died without them, but it was a tough choice...

On the way to the Great Barrier Reef we sailed through some of the Whitsunday Islands which were nice to admire in passing but the next day was even better as we got to explore Hamilton Island as a freebie because of booking the Great Barrier Reef trip. We climbed Passage Peak the tallest point of the island to get an amazing vantage point across some of the close by Islands. This is where we could really appreciate the natural beauty of the Whitsundays. Hamilton Island felt a little bit like a theme park village with people whizzing all over the island in golf carts, pretty marina and lots of resort style accommodation. Very nice if you can afford it!

The next boat trip for us was Magnetic Island just off the coast from Townsville (recently hit by a mini cyclone!). What a beautiful island, with barely any people on it. We walked all over the island as there are walk trails to get you around nearly all of it. We saw black cockatoos enjoy limes from a lime tree, picnicked on a near deserted beach, photographed a Koala lazing about in a low branch and saw lots of amazing views at every turn. 20km of walking later we were knackered as we caught the ferry back to Townsville!

After Townsville we started to head further up the coast and it started raining a lot! Enough to create massive flood damage which luckily we’ve mostly avoided. We tried to find some fruit picking jobs (bananas) but it was too wet for most of the farms to keep working. So we carried on up the coast and visited Paronella Park which is a Spanish Castle built in the midst of the Queensland tropics in the 1920’s! As it had been abandoned before the current owners bought the place it has a lot of moss growing on it and it survived massive flooding and a cyclone making it look all the more atmospheric! The castle grounds feature two waterfalls, one which generates hydroelectric power, a lovely botanical garden, a swimming area, a tunnel of love (once an aquarium, then a mushroom farm and now a bat hideout) and it used to have 2 tennis courts as well as a cinema. It was a great place to explore and stop for the night.

We then headed up past Cairns through to Port Douglas which had a great windy rugged coastal drive. Walked along the usually celebrity filed four mile beach then headed back down the coast and into the tropical north’s hinterland where we saw a multitude of impressive waterfalls bursting with massive amounts of water because of the torrential downpours each day and a huge fig tree. Unfortunately we didn’t manage to spot the tree kangaroo (yes it’s a real thing!) that hangs about in only this part of Australia. One night however as we camped next to a gorge we did get to handfed cute little rock wallabies that had long eyelashes and very politely hold onto your hand whilst they eat! The next day we stopped in Mareeba for a caffeine fuelled morning of coffee and chocolate at Coffee World where we spent over 4 hours enjoying the brews and nibbles as well as the surprisingly interesting coffee machine collection.

Today we visited the Undara Lava tubes which are huge tunnels that have been formed from cooling lava millions of years ago. The sheer size, textures and colour of the tunnels were really impressive as well as the rainforest that surrounds them. Because of the flooding we got to wade in waters up to our knees as we explored one of the tunnels by torch light!

Floods have now stopped us from continuing inland towards the centre of the country as we had planned so we’re going to have to go back to the coast for an 800km diversion to avoid flooded rivers and try to head inland again.

Wish us luck!

Love Chris & Kat xxx

Exploring Queensland

We had a great 10 days with Dad & Chris; we got spoilt with BBQ food, beers, treats from home and stayed in nice camp sites with their own pool.  Lola led the way with our Sat Nav guiding us up the Sunshine Coast.  Beaches, Museums, Waterfalls, Dams and a National Park walk - all seen in our first couple of days and  then onto the Fraser Coast where we got out fix of wildlife.  We went to Tin Can Bay where dolphins come in each day for feeding, (like Monkey Mia but fair less publicised) it’s a fairly low key affair and it felt really special as we arrived at 7.30am and already Patch and Mystic were in the shallows waiting for their adoring public!  We were allowed to get in the water with them, they were only inches away; you can’t touch them but they can choose to touch you and Patch gave Chris’ leg a nudge and my hand a nuzzle.  Then you can feed the dolphins, which me & Chris did (such a lovely experience) and then I got an extra go along with Dad who had been given some fish for being in a football shirt!



Rum Tasting in Bundaberg

From here we had a relaxing day in Hervey Bay and then had a busy couple of days in Bundaberg.  Our first evening we headed out to the turtle rookery and we were lucky that there were baby turtles hatching as soon as we arrived!  We headed out to the beach and on the higher banks over a hundred little turtles were emerging out of the sand!  The volunteers bundle the babies into a bucket and give them a hand by taking them a little closer to the shore before releasing them again, then the little turles fumble towards the surf and out to sea.  The poor little guys have to fend for themselves from day one, so survival rate is 1 in 1000 but I like to think all our turtles will make it.  Then another nest started hatching and we were lucky to see the process all over again, really special.  We had a lovely day visiting the Hinkler museum (dedicated to aviation master Bert Hinkler, very interesting) and then onto the Bundaberg rum distillary – huzzarh!  Never ones to exit a bar early, we got given a few extra freebies at the end of the tour and Chris picked himself up a bargin new shirt.

Our next destination was Cania National Park, lovely walks and Gorge views.  Then into Rockhampton, where Chris B found the wildlife a little too close for comfort with frogs in the loo, snakes in the laundry room and hairy grasshoppers in the plug holes!  In Rockhampton we passed through into the Tropic of Capricorn and it really was hot!  We managed to visit the zoo, the steam train museum and see the Singing Ship before we all needed to cool off in the pool.  Sadly this is where we had to part ways with Dad & Chris (– SO lovely to see you both J) and me & Chris went to a Crocodile farm.  It was brilliant!  We saw a baby croc hatch, saw the big guys (up to 5 metres) get fed and we held a little one.  They showed us pictures of a crocodile skull found in Texas – they think the full size of the crocodile would have to be over  18 metres – that is HUGE and not something I want to ever come across!

We have since been to Eugella National Park.  We stayed at the most beautiful campsite, basically on top of a mountain overlooking the valley, the view was spectacular.  Here we also went platypus spotting – we went twice at dusk to see the shy creatures, it’s fairly unrewarding as we averaged a glimpse of a platypus every hour!  But they are so darn cute when you do catch a look at them!

We are now in Airlie Beach – the gateway to the Whitsunday Islands & the Great Barrier Reef.  We have splashed out on a trip to the reef and we get a free trip to Hamilton Island the following day, so we’re very excited about it!  But Airlie Beach is a little spoilt due to the competitiveness of everyone trying to get you to book with them, there are LOADS of operators, some aggressively pushy and they all offer the same price and same deals – so why are there so many of them!?!   But hopefully we made the best choice for us and the touts will leave us alone now!  Bring on the coral and the fishes!

Lots of love & miss you all,

Kat & Chris xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Adventures Around Oz

Lola has now had her service, new tyres and surprise new brakes fitted. With a more responsive Lola at our fingertips we started looking for some fruit picking work along the Murray River in Victoria and New South Wales. We found a tomato picking job in Rochester so we thought we’d give that a go, we turned up and started that same day. Squelching rotten tomatoes, the amount of flies and the work being so low to the ground meant that it wasn’t all that fun. It paid $1.50 a bucket, each bucket weighing 20kgs. We did it for 6 hours and the most I managed to get was 8 in an hour ($12) and the most Kat managed to get was 6 in an hour ($9). The minimum wage in Australia is about $19 an hour so we quickly realised that this wasn’t for us! We collected our hard earned $90 from the reluctant to pay Turkish contractors and thought we’d head to Canberra to say happy birthday to a friend from school, Liam.

600kms later we arrived the next day just after lunch to Patey Street (party central) in Canberra. In the evening we played laser tag, hung out at an arcade, went to a Liam’s friend’s house party, drank too much and then when they received a noise complaint moved the party to Patey Street. The next day we recovered! The day after we walked into town to see some of Canberra’s sights, including the lake and parliament.

Moving on after Canberra we headed to the Warrumbungles National Park and did some stunning walks around the area. Following this we traversed the ‘Waterfall Way’ drive. As you would imagine it was full of waterfalls and national parks! A particular highlight was the Cathedral Rocks walk / climb that we did which cumulated in a 400m scramble up piles of balanced rocks for a stunning panoramic view of the area. This was made all the more special because the day before we has driven up to the very steep (1st gear most of the way steep) area called Point Lookout and at the viewing platform all we could see were the clouds!

With the ‘Waterfall Way’ behind us we started heading up the coast so we’d make it up to Brisbane in time for Kats dad and his wife Chris’ arrival. We saw the first ‘big thing’ that started the craze of ‘big things’ in Australia ‘The Big Banana’ near Coffs Harbour. We stopped at Byron Bay and enjoyed a brisk walk around Cape Byron to see the lighthouse and we also visited nearby Nimbin, a rough ‘hippy’ town that sounded better than it was in the Lonely Planet.

The Gold Coast section of Queensland meant that we visited a lot of beaches along the way including Surfers Paradise which sums up the area nicely with huge hi-rise buildings and big billboards running adjacent to a lovely long white sand beach. Another trip inland to the rainforest hinterland of Tamborine Mountain just outside Brisbane gave us more waterfalls and a man made glow worm cave created with concrete by the man who designed sections of the Australian Seaworld! We then headed to Brisbane, did a XXXX brewery tour as well as a walking tour of the city and a trip to the modern art museum all the while experiencing on and off torrential downpours.

Then in the dead of night and with the rain lashing down we picked up Phil and Chris from the airport! The next day after being smitten with Lola they picked up their own campervan named ‘Skip’ and now we’re all slowly travelling up the sunshine coast heading more and more into the tropical north.

Love Chris & Kat xxx

Wildlife & Wine

Kangaroo Island is a small island with a friendly community and a relaxed atmosphere.  The island views range from amazing white beaches to red cliffs to dense bush.  We had an amazing 4 days there, trying cheeses (sheep halloumi was amazing) visiting Lighthouses, walking through the National Park, sand boarding down the Little Sahara sand dunes (Chris boarding...me tobogganing!) and exploring the Kelly Hill Caves.  We free camped most nights and even stayed at a powered site for a mere $10!  I could probably write pages & pages about the trip, but I’ll just pick out a few of the best bits, most of which involve some of our many wildlife encounters on Kangaroo Island.



Guess Who Ate All the Fish!?

The Pelican Feeding.  As we were walking down to the feeding area I was saying to Chris “it might be like Kalbarri and there will be no pelicans to feed...” only to be greeted by 30 hungry birds lined up on the platform at the Kingscote jetty!  They, like us, where 20mins early so we got to watch them preen and take lots of photos!  Then a man came out to do a little presentation, they patiently waited, only occasionally making a dive into his fish bucket and once trying his hand but quickly spitting it out as they are very fussy eaters!  They are beautiful birds and very entertaining to watch as it is chaos when the fish is thrown to them – every bird for itself, wings fly everywhere, then when it’s thrown into the water bottoms are up in the air as they search for the fish!



Possum Eating Almonds

We also went to Paul’s Place.  This centre for rescued animals is the described as the “weirdest tourist attraction on K.I” and it is probably because of the array of animals all living together, Paul’s eccentric manner and the fact that Emu’s eat off your head (Chris) or that you hold and feed a fully sized kangaroo milk out of a Cooper’s beer bottle (Kat).  It was an incredible place, we climbed a ladder to feed a Koala and her baby (so small & soft) we had parrots on our heads, stroked Echidnas (anteaters) whilst they ate a termite nest, we had a python around our necks and cradled a possum wrapped in a pillow case whilst it snacked on almonds!  Random, yes.  Amazing, yes.  And a great cause, all these animals are rescued by Paul and all the animals adore him – baby emus run around in circles when they see him, the Roos run to him when he yells “KANGAS!” and Giggles the laughing Kookaburra lets off a huge belly laugh when he shouts at her!  It was just brilliant.

Enchindas

Flinders Chase National Park was also great for wildlife. We saw an Echidna in the wild when walking along the Rocky River to Snake’s Lagoon.  There where kangaroos & wallabies along the walk too.  We also saw the fur seal colony at Admiral’s Arch and there were very mischievous seal pups playing on the rocks and a very nosey sealion who seemed to pose for Chris’ photos!  Then we headed to Hanson Bay where there is a koala walk, the koala spotting turned quite competitive, but Chris scraped the win finding 7 to my 6 (I was robbed!).  It was just lovely to see so many of them and a couple were in low branches so good for watching and taking photos of.  On the last day we went for another Sealion fix at Seal Bay Conservation Bay where we watched them frolic on the beach.  It was a really special few days.

Back on the mainland and Lola has been pampered with a service and new tyres.  As ever, its not been quite as smooth sailing as we hoped and she needs some work doing on her brakes after the weekend, as brakes are fairly important we thought it wise to get it done sooner rather than later!



Kat Wine Tasting



So to fill our weekend we headed to McLaren Vale, one of South Australia’s many wine regions.  We were a little nervous about going wine tasting as we weren’t sure how much we’d be expected to buy...!  But it turned out to be a great day.  Armed with Lianne’s winery advice list we headed to Hardys’ Cellar Door and after trying most their menu we bought a very nice Sparkling Chardonnay.  Next we went to 90 Mile wines at the Visitor’s Centre and then to Alpha Box & Dice.  We then went to Red Heads which was a brand that consists of 6 different individuals that make their own brands of wine.  We met Adam, maker of La Curio Wines (which you can buy at home via those Direct Wine leaflets that always fall out of the paper!)  We spent a good hour chatting about vans, travels and wine whilst tasting most of the Red Heads range and when we asked to buy a bottle of the beautiful Primitivo Adam insisted we take it as a gift!  So with some spare cash in our pockets we headed to Ekhidna for more wine tasting, a ginger ale beer and a ploughman’s platter.  We swayed all the way home, scrumping some grapes as we went!

Our plans are a little uncertain at the moment whilst waiting for the van work to be done.  We have possible grape picking here or possible tomato in Victoria or perhaps just travelling as we definitely must be in Brisbane for meeting Dad in the wee hours of the 25^th Feb.

Lots of love Kat & Chris xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

South Australia! Where the Only Wine we’ve Drank so far is a Cheap 4 Litre Box of Goon!

Superpit

Hello from sunny South Australia! What have we been up to since Kat’s last blog post? Well Kalgoorie-Boulder was certainly a taste of an Australia from a bygone time where men were mining for gold and women were, well quite often prostitutes as it turns out! We did a brothel tour (Kalgoories oldest!) where the madam showed us around and told us the history of the brothels in town. Had a drink at a ‘skimpies’ bar where the bar staff wear underwear whilst pouring you a pint (Kat was the only girl besides the bar staff). Visited the Flying Doctors service that provides much needed medical support to outback locations and also drove up to the ‘Super-Pit lookout’ where the miners drive massive trucks which look like toys from the lookout because the pit is so large at 500 metres deep and 3.8 kilometres wide.

After all that excitement we then had the Nullabor or as the Australians call it the ‘Nullaboring’. Over 1000 kilometres of road with the only real highlights being a sign proclaiming Australia’s longest straight stretch of road at 90 miles, a giant kangaroo and some pretty coastal lookouts. Dull, dull, dull days doing nothing but driving and buying extremely expensive petrol.

Giant Galah Midway Across Australia

Then we got to South Australia and remembered what it is to have fun again by going down the coast of the Eyre Peninsula seeing dolphins, sea lions, a wave rock (great big rock that looks like a wave in the ocean), and a giant statue of a galah. We have also rediscovered beer and wine from bottle shops. Good times!

We travelled up to the Southern Flinders Ranges and saw spectacular scenery as well as hundreds of kangaroos, wallabies and Emus at the side of the road. One brave kangaroo nearly tried to get into Lola when we had set up camp for the night! Unfortunately due to bush fires in the region we couldn’t do any walks.

Fearless 'Roo

We’ve been heading south after the Flinders Ranges through some of the very hilly but picturesque wine regions and now we’re just outside of Adelaide. So far we’ve had no luck finding fruit picking work as we seem to be ahead of the fruit by a few weeks in every place we visit. Fruit seems to be slowly ripening according to the Gumtree adverts so fingers crossed we’ll be picking some kind of fruit or vegetable in the next week or so after we get back from Lola’s first overseas trip all of 15km’s on a ferry to Kangaroo Island which is planned to depart on Sunday for four nights.

Hope all is well at home.

Chris & Kat xxx

2 Weeks in Southern Western Australia...

We’ve been a little slack on the blogging since New Years, mostly because finding internet has proven more difficult and more expensive than when in Asia!  It’s been a jam packed 2 weeks since Lola was fixed in Lancelin, so I’ll do my best to summarise and not babble too much!

We began our journey to Perth with a stop in Yanchep to see the sleepy Koalas.  They were lovely, they looked like chunky balls of fur up in the trees, their wispy ears and narrowed eyes giving them a look of Yoda!  Perth was a nice city, although very quiet, their rush hour was lovely free flowing traffic, very laid back.  We enjoyed the botanical gardens and views of the city then moved onto Rockingham the next day.  Penguin Island just off Rockingham has been one of the best days of our trip so far.  We got the boat over and were almost instantly greeted by little fluffy penguins under the boardwalks.  We were really lucky to see the wild penguins as normally they’d be out fishing during the day, but it was moulting season so they stay on land for 3 weeks whilst they get their new coats, we saw lots of them around the island and enjoyed being entertained by the noisy rescued penguins who we watched get fed.  There were also pelicans and loads of other birds flying around the island, and we were lucky enough to see a sea lion who decided to rest up on the beach – just amazing!

We spent an afternoon in Freemantle.  Lovely old colonial buildings, harbour side with coffee shops and microbreweries – kind of reminded me of being in Bristol!  Had two huge slabs of cake too – first in months and they were goooood!  From here we had a quaint day viewing a giant orange and a woodland full of gnomes!  We then stopped into Bunbury to the dolphin centre, we saw them frolicking in the bay, but they didn’t come into shore which was a shame, but we did see baby turtles and octopuses being fed!  After hoping down the scenic coastal towns we arrived in Margaret River, another coffee & cake, a steam engine named Kate, kangaroos around the campsite and we got to hold a Kite (Bird of Prey) at the Eagle Heritage Centre – another fab day.

We headed onto Augusta and got our first glimpse of the Karri Forests.  The Forests in the South are SO tall and really beautiful, a lovely change from beaches.  We climbed a Karri tree, 52metres tall, it used to be a bush fire lookout and you climb up the outside of the tree on metal pegs which wind around it; tiring but a great experience and lovely view at the top.  We did a drive through the forests, got all arty doing the sculpture forest walk, visited a Tingle tree 24metres wide and then did the treetop walk in the Valley of the Giants – a 40metre high walkway through the Tingle trees.

Back to the coast we headed to the beautiful almost deserted Windy Harbour, stopping at Mount Chudalup for a look, then ended up climbing it!  As ever the views were worth it.  William Bay National Park had some of the clearest turquoise waters I’ve ever seen, and the big elephant rocks were great to see.  Albany had lovely old buildings to look at and a pretty coastal drive then we headed inland to the National Parks.  We stopped in Porongroup National Park and did a brilliant walk up to Castle Rock, the last 30 metres being a rock scramble then a 7metre ladder up to a viewing platform.  It was a stunning view and one of the best walks we’ve done recently – and so poorly advertised that we were the only ones there!  We headed through Stirling Range National Park and saw some very small, very fluffy baby emus – very cute!

The long drive to Esperence was well worth it.  We stayed in Cape Le Grand National Park which has the whitest of white sand and the bluest ocean, just beautiful.  The kangaroos are super tame and we got very close to a baby roo who was scavenging for food near the beach.  Another uphill climb up Frenchman’s Peak and another amazing view.  Then we met the resident wild Sealion – Sammy – at the tanker jetty and his mate who was swimming about hoping to be fed by their adoring public!  Then we did Western Australia’s Great Ocean Drive, for more stunning scenery.

We are currently diverting slightly and are heading north to Kalgoorie-Boulder for a bit of the Outback / mining scene.  Then it is back to the coast to head across to Southern Australia, where maybe we’ll get around to finding some work!

Lots of love,

Kat & Chris xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx