Helen and Randall on the road

Mainly about driving to Brisbane, dropping off the Campervan, and then flying from Brisbane to Sydney and Sydney to Auckland, however had a great drink and dinner with Nick Warren and Krissi Teague on the waterfront in Brisbane on Tuesday night, but were too rubbish to take photos (fail), and then lunch in Manly on Wednesday with Alex Johnston (fail again on the photo front).

Sadly for me I had to say goodbye to my fabulous straw hat which has accompanied me on various trips to Budapest, Novi Sad, Croatia, Malawi and Berlin as it was really getting a bit raggedy. Luckily I’d bought a new squashable hat in the fantastic hat shop in Noosa. Nice, but not the same…

Our flight from wet and windy Sydney was delayed by 3 hours which we whiled away in the Qantas lounge with free internet, breakfast and champagne (actually sparkling wine from the Seppeltsfield Winery that we visited in the Barossa valley) so it wasn’t all bad, and then on arrival in Auckland we were met by the lovely Gav, and old friend from Uni days. Dinner and a few glasses of wine soon polished us both off…

After another very average night’s sleep in the Waterfront Global Backpackers we picked up our slightly embarrassing Wicked Camper:

Pacman Camper (with wickedcampers trademark rude message on the back)

and headed north out of Cairns towards Cape Tribulation, ensuring we paid attention to the dire warnings:

and being a little alarmed by the temperature gauge being constantly well over half even when pootling along at 80 km/h.

The road along the coast was quite beautiful, with the deep forest on one side and the beach on the other:

and where the road did head inland it was criss-crossed by narrow-gauge railway tracks used for the sugar cane and fruit harvests.

At Daintree Village, the ‘frontier’ after which there is no mains electricity, we crossed the croc-infested river on the chain ferry:

After this point we were really in the rainforest, and the road signs and excessive speed bumps (cobbled!) reflected this!

Eventually we reached Cape Tribulation and checked in at PKs Jungle Village, a fantastic camp site with everything from tent pitches to ensuite cabins, plus a pool, a bar, wireless internet and fairly decent communal camp kitchen facilities, all set amongst winding paths through tropical gardens:

Our pitch

We were the last van pitch; number 10 right next to the beach:

and had an early night after our first camping dinner:

and the next morning we got up early for the sunrise at the beach just a 2 minute walk away down the rainforest boardwalk…

Later in the morning we headed to the Daintree Forest visitors centre, a really well curated information centre about the Daintree Rainforest (at it’s oldest point between 110 – 200 million years old, compared to the Amazon’s 7 million!) with an aerial walkway that takes you up into the forest canopy:

then we headed back to the camp site, failing to have ice cream as planned at the Daintree Ice Cream Company because they were cash only and we only had plastic (the two ATMs in Cape Trib being out of action) – big disappointment!

The road was interesting in terms of signage and this rather sweet but a little alarming wooden bridge:

Back at Cape Trib we did another rainforest boardwalk and spotted some fresh cassowary poo although no actual cassowaries (boo!) then sat on the beach with a bottle of fizzy wine, watching some backpackers play beach cricket, until who should come wandering along the beach but Phil and Enrico, two of the people who had been on the Vagabond with us…after a chat with them, we went off to make dinner, then ran into them again in PK’s bar so the evening was rounded off with too much beer.

After a dreadful night’s sleep at the Global Backpackers on the Waterfront, a conveniently located but badly run huge backpackers hostel on the Esplanade in Cairns, we made it to the Vagabond on time for an 8am sailing to the reef.

3 and a 1/2 hours later Randall and I were in the water for our first dive, before lunch; as the only two certified divers on the trip we got priority, so we were off with the dive instructor on a tour of Thetford reef, diving to a max depth of 14 metres as everything is so close to the surface.

We were looked after amazingly by skipper Paul, First Mate and hostess Belle, and Dive Instructor Dwayne who fed and watered us regularly as well as kitting us and breaking down all our diving gear for us…luxury!

After lunch we headed to another site on the same part of the reef, for more diving and snorkelling action – there were three people (Craig, Enrico and Jean) doing unqualified ‘training’ dives and another two (Deb and Phil) just snorkelling. On this dive, despite not exactly following the dive plan (Dwayne the guide was a stand-in who didn’t know this part of the reef as well as the3 usual instructor/guide) we did some amazing swim-throughs of coral canyons, and saw sea turtles close up, as well as all the incredible corals and brightly coloured fish.

We spent the night at this site, and after a glorious sunset:

Randall went on a night dive, while I had a couple of cold beers with the rest of the crew and company.

The next morning after breakfast Randall and I were in the water for our first dive at 8am, and we attempted – fairly unsuccessfully – to take photos with the underwater camera:

The colours from the camera *really* don’t do the subject matter justice sadly…we saw some of the ‘professional’ pics, and to get the colours underwater they needed huge lamps.

Then we moved to another spot closer to the edge of the reef where Randall dived again and I snorkelled, as there was loads of incredible coral and also whole families of parrot-fish really close to the surface.

Finally skipper Paul announced that ‘the pool is closed’ and we all packed up and ate lunch before the beautiful sail back to Cairns.

Spent the morning recovering and chilling out in the coolest hostel ever:

Desert Rose outside our caravan

A series of interesting rooms (ours was a caravan) set around an immaculately kept garden and courtyard, with pool:

Nice touches:

The delightful owner Wayne let us hang out there and leave our bags until our flight to Cairns late afternoon – recommend!!

6am pick up at Alice’s Secret by Katie the guide, and Snooty the ruffty-tuffty high-clearance 4WD truck and trailer:

Then a loooooong drive (660km) to our first camp near Uluru/Ayers Rock, with a morning tea break at a roadhouse where we met two guys doing the journey (they’d come from NSW) on Harleys:

Randall was jealous.

Then we had another stop for gathering firewood. Katie knew where to find some dead dry trees for firewood, and she definitely wanted trees not sticks!

From the firewood stop we could see Mount Conner, or ‘Fooluru’:

Camp was in the Uluru national park, in one of a series of semi-permanent camps with a one-room wooden and canvas enclosure with running water, a  sink and a table inside and outside. One electric light was powered by the truck battery (Randall had to get busy with the insulation tape and crocodile clips). We got lunch – DIY sandwiches – together, and we grabbed our ‘swags’ (canvas bedrolls containing a mattress and pillow) to lay them out by the fireplace, making them up with sheets and pillowcases and stuffing our pillowcases and a blanket in with them:

then hopped back in the truck for the short drive to the Uluru Cultural Centre (the most impressive thing about which was the fantastic wooden benches:

which I covet) and then the rock itself:

Our Leader. I mean, Fearless Leader. No, that’s BELOVED Fearless Leader. Katie.

We decided not to do ‘the climb’,

which is considered – like pretty much everything else in the area for one reason or another – culturally insensitive and frankly looked a bit on the wrong side of the scariness/interesting-ness ratio for my liking, being essentially a straight line up a blank sheet of rock. The photo doesn’t really give the perspective but the squiggly line is the wire you can hang on to on the extra-steep bit.

The other option was the 10km walk right around the base of the rock, with the first part lead by Katie who explained various things about the flora and fauna:

Next it was back to camp and a quick sprint up to the lookout for the sunset, with sparkling wine and cheese & biscuits. How very civilised!:

Dinner was cooked over the fire by the marvellous and-multi talented Katie, and interrupted from time to time by sightings of the resident hopping mice, after which we both managed to have a surprisingly good hot shower in the shared campsite facilities for the area, despite the local wildlife:

We even slept well by the campfire and under the stars (lots of shooting stars), snug in our swags, with apparently no incursions by insects or rodents…

Next morning we were up at 4.30 in time to breakfast and pack before driving to the spot to see sunrise over Uluru:

After which Katie noticed that we had a flat tyre, the changing of which was a bit of a team effort:

Then we headed to Kata Tjuta / The Olgas for a fantastic 3 hour circular hike:

After finishing the walk at 11am (after which it is already too hot to walk if not in the shade) we had a long drive to the next camp near Kings Canyon. Lunch break was at Kings Creek, a working cattle station making extra money from tourism with a campsite, chalets and a shop/pub. The resident emu was quite an attraction during lunch:

We also stopped off at a salt lake:

Then Camp was in the bush with a ‘loo with a view’…flushable but with only 3 walls of the wooden cubicle so you could sit on the loo and contemplate the fabulous vistas (if you could take your mind off the massive spider webs and various rustling noises in the undergrowth), however it was attached to a camp site, fuel station and shop so we had decent shower facilities and even a pool (unheated, although some of our group went for a brief and chilly dip).

Next morning was practically a lie-in as we only had to get up at 5.30 in order to have breakfast, strike camp and get on the road in time to start the hike while it was still cool enough.Today was all about King’s Canyon, and the circular hike started with ‘heart attack hill’, 350 steps up to the top of the ridge.

Felicia (Guy Pearce): “I’ve always wanted to travel to the center of Australia, climb Kings Canyon, as a queen, in a full-length Gaultier sequin, heels and a tiara.”

Bernadette (Terence Stamp): “That’s just what this country needs. A cock, in a frock, on a rock.”

    – Pricilla, Queen of the Desert

For anyone who doesn’t recall, they do in fact do the hike in drag, and to my great delight the narrow v-shaped entrance to the ridge is named ‘Priscilla’s Crevice’ in their honour:

The rest of the hike was incredibly spectacular, and the fabulous Katie gathered us together from time to time to give us info about the various fauna and flora  in the area:

At lunchtime it was time for those of us on the three day trip to head back to Alice Springs, so David the guide came to collect us (Marc, Julia, Eduoard, Celine and us) while the rest stayed on at the camel farm that was the rendezvous point, and where we bizarrely saw the Australian Camel Corps taking their animals out for a spin.

Bo’s Challenge

After a wander around Adelaide to find a decent coffee on a Sunday morning (impossible…everything is shut on Sundays!), we caught the free shuttle from the hostel to Adelaide Parklands Station to catch The Ghan:

We’d splashed out for the Gold Service so we had a private en-suite cabin:

and all meals included, served in the Queen Adelaide restaurant:

after our champagne reception in the ‘Outback Explorer Lounge’ (apparently they are all named after, well, outback explorers). They simply did not stop feeding us, with 3 courses for lunch, dinner, breakfast and lunch on the second day, all prepared fresh on board and served at our white-linen-tablecloth-covered tables. Handily the cheapest wine on the menu was a sparkling, so we made do with that :-).

The views from the train were mostly of the desert and outback:

After lunch on Monday we disembarked at Alice Springs (the train continues to Katherine and Darwin)…

…where we settled into our fantastic hostel (more about this later) then headed into town (it’s SMALL) where we dug into the $10 pitchers of NT draft and later the mixed grill of emu, kangaroo, camel, crocodile and buffalo:

before heading back for an early night in preparation for our 6am pickup the next morning.

Early start…all aboard the Calypso Star at 6.30am for Randall’s long awaited cage diving with Great White Sharks experience:

Two and a half hours out in very lumpy seas (popped my vomiting-at-sea cherry which is impressive given some of the experiences of sailing at school!) we reached the Neptune Islands, a seal breeding colony thus where the Great Whites like to hang out.

After chumming the water the Great Whites started to come and investigate:

Yum. Chum.

Heckling from the cheap seats!

Randall loved it!

Early night tonight as 8 hour drive (at the speed limit as we already have one speeding ticket for a…er…..’substantial’ amount of money…)!

Woke up just in time to catch Natasha squeaking out of the door to get to work, and then packed up the car, dropped it off at the rental office and took a taxi to Flinders St station where after a bit of to-ing and fro-ing and general misdirection we found the left luggage (it’s actually the customer information office, for future reference).

Breakfast of Kings (pint of lager and a ham, cheese and mustard toastie) at the Ponyfish Island cafe, a tiny cafe perched on one of the starlings of the footbridge…thanks for the recommendation, Wilson!:

Spotted some black swans and mused on the philosophical implications of this:

…before heading up the Eureka Tower Skydeck on the 88th floor to get a panoramic view of Melbourne…

and said ‘thanks but no thanks’ to ‘The Edge’, a glass drawer that suspends you 3 metres out, high over the city, so you can peer down through the glass floor. Erk.:

After a wander back over the river and through Fed Square:

we hopped on the free tram loop to see a bit of the city then hopped off again near Southern Cross station to collect our train tickets for the next leg of the journey. From there we took another tram to St Kilda where we grabbed a burger:

and just managed to catch the sun setting over the sea:

before perusing the cake shops on Acland Street: