The Gabba

We explored the Glasshouse mountains for a couple hours and set off for Brisbane. On the way I heard there was a Twenty 20 cricket game on at the Gabba that night. It's not quite test cricket, but i'll take whatever I can get. We went to the internet cafe in town and snapped up a pair of tickets, made some calls and headed to see an old friend of Celia's from home(Germiston).

What happened next i could've probably predicted. Celia & the girls got chatting and on the wine, so cricket for her was a non starter, I had to find a new cricket partner. Enter stage Bruce (Anne - Celia's old mates husband) and Piet (another wine and gossip widower) to head off to the cricket. I'm not going to bore you with all the highlights of the match, but Queensland thumped Tasmania with a solid, aggressive batting display quickly enough to allow us time to catch dinner when we got home.

Oh and I have to tell you about Celia's mate Iris who ended the evening with one of those sports breathing plasters on her nose while we were chatting at the dinner table. You have no idea, I nearly wet myself. Who does that? It could be the funniest moment on this trip to date. Apologies if she does actually have breathing difficulties, but please warn me next time so my beer doesn't actually come out of my nose.

Home of the croc hunter

Finally managed to get an Aussie adaptor for our electrics at the "Big W". Unforfortunately we had nowhere to charge it before our next great adventure at Australia Zoo, crikey!

All hyped up, I barely flinched at the "Out of Africa" priced entrance fee. It's for Steve I thought. Celia couldn't really shut up about the Koalas, but I don't blame her, when we did see them they were bloody cute.

I saw my forst Komodo Dragon ever. Pretty intimidating with its teeth and its size, i was thankful it was behind half an inch of glass.

Oh yes, back to the Koalas. We arrived in time for their performance about their habitat, diet and the whole spiel... They are just unbelievably cute and after the show you can give them a pat. Celia will never wash that hand i'm sure. I just can't wait to get my teeth into a Koala burger!(just for you Chris)

The rest of the zoo was pretty cool. Loved the wombats as I had never seen them before, they're huge. Went to see the croc show and birds of prey show but left them both wanting more. It might be the strict health and safety laws in Aus, but the shows in SA (not South Australia) are much more interactive and all rounf more interresting. Having said that, the facilities in Australia Zoo are second to none. The "Crocoseum" where they have the croc shows can seat about two thousand people, and the elephant enclosure has its own forest where they go after working hours. Maybe they goto make "trunk" calls?.... you see what I did there.. the elephants have trunks. I know that was a dreadful joke!!

We decided to camp out in the Glasshouse Mountains after the zoo, and oh yes my camera battery did die halfway through the zoo, but I did manage to get 300+ Koala pics and Celia feeding Kangaroo pics.

the mountains were amazing to see after so much coast and there is a whole story behind them which you can read on Wikipedia. Here we stayed at the worst campsite to date. It was basically a farmer that wanted a quick buck so he called his backyard a campsite. I did manage to hear my first Laughing Kookaburra though which sounds a lot like a monkey. Can't wait to actually see one.

To soften thr blow we went to the local villiage and bought some great Aussie lamb, beef sausages and pork ribs, you swear we were cooking for 10. To wash it down, some aweragely priced Aussie red (screwtop essential).

The rain that evening helped us to sleep and it was the forst good rain since we had camped. Our $39 tent passed the waterproof test with flying colours. Great success!!

Sunshine coast

Well the sunshine coast was living up to its name so far and Maroochyadore (I think thats how its spelled) looked spectacular. We manged to negotiate the traffic as it was starting to get busy here in the sunshine coast. did I tell you we have the lastest Renault Megane as a rental car. Doesn't even have a key, just a card and a start button. I could easily have one of those.

The campsite was great if not a little expensive, $32 for a a piece of grass we can put our tent on seems a bit off the mark. The campsite was right on the beach, so after the tent was up Celia and I went for a romantic stroll on the beach. The wind was howling , but it was still beautiful to be out there. We made a quick stop in town to try find an adaptor plug for the camera which had a battery that was fading faster than you can say 'Zuma'. No luck, Celia would have to show some restraint with the picture taking.

Met some well travelled Aussie men who gave us some pointers on where to go and where not to. Tehey said we should skip the entiregold coast and just pick some towns along the was like Noosa, Lennox Heads and Tweed Heads. Still loving the camping!

On the road again..

So with some tears and a couple big lumps in our throats Monika, Celia & I left Bundaberg. Monika for Spain, and us for wherever the sun will shine.

First stop, Hervey Bay. This is a great little place with beautiful beach and easy access to Frasier Island which has this massive Dingo colony on it. Unfortuately as they were asking over $160 each for a day trip there, it was a little out of our budget and we had to settle for a view of it from the bay.

We really struggled to find somewhere to stay that was affordable. No luck, so we enjoyed some cheese and crackers with leftover wine on our bed. The next day we took a drive down the bay to the Urangan pier which is by far the longest I have ever been on standing at close to 1km? This is a great spot for fishing as the locals were pulling in buckets of Breem while the Pelicans used their natural nets to pull some out themselves.

Now leaving Hervey Bay we saw an outdoor store (my favourite) so we stopped in to take a look and walked out after 20 min with a 3 man tent, 2 sleeping bags and some ground sheets. Job completed.

We camped our first night in Tin Can Bay which was like lying in a sauna. We first had a braai and a few VB's which went down a treat in that weather. When we were done there it was time for dominos and I gave Celia a right whipping which left her sweating and begging for mercy. I swear it was about 60deg in there.

We were awoken by the blinding sunshine which was perfectly timed to get us up to go and feed the dolphins. Oh yes, I forgot to mention that is why were were staying here. They have these estuarine dolphins which come most mornings for an easy feed. It was really fantastic standing there in the water with this dolphin handing him a snack. It was a great experience although this particular dolphin that we fed had been attacked by a bull shark a few weeks earlier and had a huge chunk out of its tail and dorsal fin as well as teeth marks all over its body.

One to never forget

I know it happens every year for about 3 months in many countries of the world, and no I am not talking about the Super 14, but the turtles laying eggs and hatching at Mon Repos turtle rookery near Bundaberg. It is truly amazing to have the opportunity to see this in action and to all that have not experienced it, I am about to give you a running commentary.

If you are lucky enough to have some turtles come to lay eggs on the evening you are there, they (the staff, not the turtles) call you down to the beach in groups keeping well away from the turtle which has by now started to dig the hole for its eggs. We now crept up behind it and watch it dig with its hand like rear legs trying to be careful not to scare it. When the hole is deep enough, the turtle lays up to 120 eggs which are about the size of a Titleist golf ball, but worth heaps more. Once it has laid about 20 eggs you can move around the turtle and watch it from any angle as they get so relaxed and into the whole laying thing that they'll hardly ever stop.

When it was done it covered up the hole so well that if we never marked it, we would have never known it was there. Fortunately for us we got an extra bonus that night as the turtle had layed the eggs too close to the shore line and due to the storms they were scared it would be washed away so we had to carefully excavate the hole again and move the eggs to a safer position. They asked us to all help in this moving operation, but what they never saw was that I slipped two eggs into my pocket. What a steal - real Loggerhead turtle eggs. I had them for breakfast the next morning fried on toast and they tasted okay, I still prefer chicken eggs and they aren't that big so you need more than two for a meal. It's just something I can now tick off my things to do in life list.

Really people I am joking, turtle eggs... you are meant to have them boiled, not fried on toast. No seriously - they were placed safely back in the hole with their siblings so they could be eaten by foxes and dingos.

As luck would have it, my memory card crapped out, so I don't have any pics of us with the turtles... aaaarrrrggghhhhhhh

Man down

So the next 5 days in Bundaberg were a bit of a blur, loads of rain broken by sections of sun and some XXXX. That's not four kisses or quadruple x as Celia calls it, but four x, the great Australian beer. By now i was horribly sick and house bound, the infections on my mosquito bites permeating my entire body resulting in high high fever and the sorest throat in the world bar none. I'm not overreacting, promise! Fortunately this Austrian girl we met in in India gave us some anti-biotics and i started double dosage. My parents convinced I have malaria, begging me to go to the hospital at the same time or i will die.

Well I didn't die and my fever went and I felt strong again for the first time in a long time, just in time as the sun made an appearance for us so we headed down to the beach for some fish and chips. Have a taste of the Australian sun, it's a killer and not to be messed with. Dunno how they killed the ozone here, but it makes a huge difference and getting burnt in 5 minutes is a simple task which Monika can profess too achieving on one of these days.

Spending time at home with Mon and Jeremy also gave us chance to see how things work in Bundaberg. Jeremy showed me round his Chevy that he built up with some mates which Monika enjoys revving the hell out of. He is also busy altering a car and controls so that he can drive it, it really is fantastic and a super ingenious plan which will give him loads of freedom he doesn't have at the moment. We also went to see the venue that Monika and Jeremy went to book for their impending wedding, Fairymead house. It's a smashing place and the cheapest venue hire ever. The guy reckons the price has stayed the same for 12 years. That's commitment!

Our final night had to come and Celia and I had booked a very special outing to go see the Turtles at Mon Repos turtle rookery, seriously can't wait!

Bundaberg here we come

Really disappointed that there was no New Year celebration on the plane, so Celia and I had a couple Singapore Sling's, some Baileys(for Celia), red wine and a beer or two and our own little new year party was well under way. It sadly only lasted about 15 minutes as I was coming down with something so I curled up under my comfy Singapore Airlines blanket and dozed off.

We were now in Brisbane on Australian soil for the first time, well sort off.. We had to get through customs first. They managed to single Celia and I out somehow, and put our bags through the biggest x-ray machine i have ever seen. From there we were escorted to bag checking area where they probed us with questions about what we were carrying to such an extent that i became completely paranoid. They swabbed our bags for drugs and had the sniffer dogs all over us for about a half hour. What an experience. When they were done they sent us off on our way with a smile on their face... unbelievable!!

We jumped in our hire car and sped off to Bundaberg to see Monika and Jeremy on his birthday. The storm of all storms had hit Queensland, tropical low pressure systems that they had not seen in 15 years, great!! We made it there though and had an awesome day getting to know Jeremy and his friends. Bundaberg seems like the town that time forgot and reminds me of my earliest memories of going to coastal towns in SA.

Oh yes, they also have a great rum distillery which would be making a fair bit of money from me and surprisingly Celia over the next few weeks i'm sure.