Monday 27th April 2009 - Cairns (after Cape Tribulation)
Hello one and all Thomas here with you to begin with. Well we've been busy once again after arriving in Cairns we headed up to Cape tribulation in the Daintree rainforest and Port Douglas. Before returning to Carins for a day of White Water Rafting and then a Great Barrier Reef trip yesterday. So let me start at the begining (usually the best place to start, unless your Quentin Tarantino of course where you'll start at the end.)
We got to Cairns late on the 19th showered and then bed. Spend a day sorting stuff out in Cairns before heading to Cape Tribulation on the 21st. Captain cook was the first westerneer to plot this north-east part of Australia and named Cape Tribulation (as the story goes) after spending 8 weeks in this area reparing his ship with terrible weather and luck. on our way up we had a river cruise pn tyhe Daintree river to look at the wildlife. As soon as we got on the guide showed us a tree snake coiled in the sun which Anna did not enjoy in the slightest! After that we had the main reason for our trip CROCODILES! Saw two on the back called Scar face and Fat Albert and boy they are huge around 5.5m long. Fat Albert had killed and dragged two cows into the river in the last 6 months alone. On our way back after experiencing the magnificant beasts we saw a parrot bird whioch was part bird part owl. Very strange looking, in fact they are excatly like bark in appearance and so seeing them is rather tricky.
After that we drove into the rainforest and stopped for a forest walk. CA and Steve found the rainforest humid but for Anna and I after being in the Amazon it was cool and refreshing. Anyway we found a few orb web spiders which it turns out are everywhere in the Daintree National Park (much to the girls horror when we checked into our hostel). They have gold orbs around their limbs and are the size of, and i quote "my head" according to Anna. Pretty disconcerting when you have to walk underneath them. The guide also showed us a few lizards on our way. We eventually arrived at the hostel deep in the rainforest. the hostel was made up of lodges with the communial toilets infested with bugs, spiders and lizards. Good Times. Had a few drinks with some cards and went to bed.
CA and Anna went horse riding the following morning which they really enjoyed. CA has always wanted to canter up the beach and now she has. Steve and I had a lazy morning by the pool sunning ourselves. After lunch we got picked up and taken to Port Douglas. En route we stopped Mossman gorge, a fresh water gorge, where we swam and were generally merry. The water was very cold so the girls decided against swimming and paddeled instead. We arrived in Port Douglas which is a fairly afluent area of Queensland and much to mine and steve's glee we found a table tennis table at the hostel. You can imagine how we occupied ourselves that evening.
We had a look around the shops and Marina in PD before we caught our bus back to Cairns feeling a bit tired but ready for our White Water Rafting the next day.
White water rafting was absolutely fantastic. Steve, Anna and I got very wet but had an amazing day and really felt stiff when we finally go to the end. There were 6 people and 1 instructor in our raft. The morning consisted of the hardest rapids but was very stop start as we had to wait for the other rafts to succesfully negociate the course. However after our BBQ lunch we had a free raft all the way to the end. In the morning Steve and another guy were at the front of the raft but after lunch Anna and I took up the mantle. Unfotunatly during our first rapid we both managed to loose our balance and ended up in the water. I was a bit more spectacular as i went over Anna's side of the raft. Needless to say Steve was delighted withthis and reminded us he never fell in. The rest of the day went without incident except for a few close calls but we ended around 4 after 4.5 hours of raft extremely tired and wet.
The next day was our Great Barrier Reef trip pon Ocean Freedom. Around 40 people on the cruise ship wit5h 5 staff and much to our delight lots of yummy food. we had breakfast, lunch, chesse and biscuits and cake so were either snorkeling or eating during the day. At our first snorkel site Anna and I paid for a scuba dive which was arounr 45 minutes long. The GBR is full of ocolour and the coral is amazing, we saw a few turtles and stingray and then the piece de resistance. THE CLOWN FISH (or Nemo as it's now know), they only live in a certain sea anemone with which the clown fish have a simbiotic relationship. We were also told that there is only one female in the shoal and when she dies the largest male become the female (isn't nature awesome). Whilst we were diving Steve and CA saw a reef shark around 1m long.
After lunch we went to another dive site where a natural island was coming out of the sea. The island only appears at low tide but the staff told us that in a few hundred years it will become an island with rainforet and everything. Anyway we made it back to Cairns and went out for dinner. We decided to be brave and try Kangaroo, Emu and crocodile all of which were actually very nice. For Anna the Emu was best but for me it was the crocodile. Kangaroo looks like steak although it doesn't have a stong taste. After that we retired for some serious shut eye.
Yesterday we messed around and then in the evening said goodbye to Steve and CA who started their mammoth 42 hour journey at 3.30 this morning. Well thats you guys all up to date, and now Anna and I move on to our last leg of the world tour, Asia. We'll be moving onto the Malaysia tab at the top so be sure to check it out. We fly out tomorrow morning. Take care and thanks for reading.
Love CAST
Sunday 19th April 2009 - Rockhampton, Airlie Beach and the Whitsundays!
Hi all, Steven here. We have all now returned from Whitsundays which I think we are all in agreement has been the best bit of Australia so far. In our 3 day trip we sampled the likes of white haven beach and snorkling with sea turtles.
Before Whitsundays we stayed in Rockhampton. This was an interesting place to say the least. The best way to describe it is the “Redneck” city of Australia, although the Aussies say its the “beef” capital of Australia and in fairness we all had a great steak one night, which was the highlight of the 2 days there. The girls had to suffer the likes of pretty much every single car beeping there horns at them when they were walking down the streets. I on the other hand had to put up with being scared half to death when a huge frog jumped onto my foot in the dark! !! Anyway, thats enough about Rockhampton, we all didn't like it and we have more important things to discuss, mainly the Whitsundays.
We arrived in Airlie Beach after a 7 hour bus journey from Rockhampton and found our interesting hostel. The hostel was nice, but is best described as situated in the middle of a food court. We had 2 nights here and one when we returned after our boat trip. The day before we left we sorted out ours bags for the boat, checked our bags into Peter Pans to be looked after, hired out some stinger suits and had an early night ready for our very early morning.
We walked down to the port at 8.00 to be there at 8.30. We got there early and waited until 8.30 for someone to show us to our boat. An hour later, at 9.30 someone finally turned up explaining that the boat had been broken into and they had been rushing around for the last hour getting all the spare equipment. This was a bad start to the trip but thankfully not a sign of things to come!!
There were 25 people plus 3 crew on the boat, the main guy was called Trent and he was a great laugh and kept us all entertained and amused with all sorts of stories and drinking games. We had a good bunch of people on the boat, all of about the same age. After a brief safety briefing and me taking my sea sickness pills we set sail about 10.30.
So Anna here now. We left Airlie beach and headed to hook island, aka romance island. Last year there were such bad winds a ship couldn't get back to the main land and got washed up on hook island – all feeling very glad we heard that story lol! This was our first stop for snorkelling and so we all got into our super sexy stinger suits. It is the end of the jellyfish so we were hoping not to see too many. The coral was absolutely amazing! So many different colours and loads of fish, again loads of colours. While we were in the water Trent threw in some bread and the fish went absolutely crazy. At one point the bread was by mine and Carrie-Anne's head and we got swarmed my millions of fish!!! The main attraction was the parrot fish – which is actually pretty big, multicoloured and has a nose that looks like a parrot beak. Luckily not too many jellies in sight, however I did managed to be stung on the hand by a sneaky one while jumping in the water. We jumped back on the boat for a spot of lunch. Now, we were all expecting some sandwiches or something like that, however, we had roast chicken with stuffing, coleslaw with sweet chilli and salad. Well...... it was absolutely delicious! How she made that for 28 people in the smallest kitchen to man i'll never know! We then had some serious sunbathing to do up on deck while we sailed to our night stop. We moored up just off South Mole island and had some din dins. Again amazing. We had Baramundi fish in a garlic lemon butter, potato gratin and stir fried veg. We then got our speed boat over to the island to go to the bar there. We were told that technically not allowed to take over our own alcohol but if we did our crew would turn a blind eye but try and be discrete. That went all a bit to pot as 28 of us strutted in, plonked ourselves on a table and miraculously all had drinks. The owner was impressed and confiscated mine and Carrie-Anne's as well as many other peoples. Thomas and Steve were a little more sneaky and managed to hide theirs and so got away with it. A little later Trent came over and joined us. He was such a bad influence and got us all doing drinking games – he also kindly got back all confiscated alcohol so we didn't have to spend a fortune. The resort where the bar was had a pool and we all decided to go for a midnight swim. There were some few hench guys on our boat and it got all a little silly with about 6 guys throwing people up in the air like when we were kids. I went absolutely flying!! They get you so high. Carrie-anne and I had to hold onto our bikinis to keep our modesty. We finally made it back to the boat and crashed out in our little cabins. Very good first day!
Hey Carrie-Anne here: On the second day all woke up to a nice breakfast of fruit salad, toast and cereal. The boat then headed to another snorkling place called cateran bay, where some of the group saw a turtle. We then started at one point along the beach and floated down snorkling and seeing amazing coral on the way. When we got to the end point Trent came and picked us up in the Sherminator. I.e a small decrepied boat attached to the main boat.
We then headed to Whitehaven beach (rated top 10 beaches in the world). We first walked up to a look out where we got to see an amazing view if the whitehaven beach and the surrownding area. We then had a short walk to the beach where the sand was 98% silica, aka very soft and white. The boys played cricket and ruby on the beach and anna and I sunbathed. Anna and I also saw a shark, it was only a foot long but still definitley a shark!
In the evening we then stayed on the boat and had carbonara and garlic bread. The captin then busted out his guitar and we had a little sing along including a rendition of 'shes electric' by Oasis which all the boat knew the words to.
Hi Thomas here, our third and final day started with a sail to a new snorkling spot. It was by far the best snorkelling of the trip. As soon as I jumped in (looking like borat in my stinger suit) I swam with two fairly large turtles. It was absolutely amazing! They were so relaxed and laid back. Some other turtles seemed content to sit at the bottom of the sea bed looking back at 20 of us all staring at him. Soon after we encountered a lot of jellyfish so we headed to the sand spit we were swimming around. Having walked up and down the spit someone spotted a reef shark so we quickly entered the water to check it out. They were only about a meter long but very impressive swimming around the shallows. Then we had lunch back on the boat consisting of BBQ sausages which was lovely. Then we had a 3 or 4 hour sail back to Airlie beach where everyone just slept and sun bathed. It was easily the best part of Auz so far and would recommend it to anyone.
We got to the hostel at 6 and had a well deserved shower (and shave for some of us!) before cooking dinner and hitting the sack. The next day was a brilliant 11 hour greyhound, even though it was a long time I did sleep about 6 hours of it so it pasted in a flash. So thats brings us up to the present in Cairns. Tomorrow we head to Cape tribulation for a sport of rainforest treking. Well thats all from me and I hand you over to Steve for a few final words.
Hi again, I'm not totally sure what Tom has said, but I just wanted to add a little bit about my “turtle” encounter. On the third day when we saw the other turtles, my mask decided it would start leaking every time I put my head in the water so I went to the shallow water where I could stand up and waited for Trent to bring me a new mask. I looked to my right and saw a big shadow wondering what it was, I looked underwater and to my suprise it was a turtle. I was so pleased since all the others had been watching a turtle while my mask was broken. The turtle came within touching distance to me and by the time I got my mask on the turtle was swimming away into the distance. I was so pleased having seen the turtles and it was my highlight of the 3 days, and also definitely one of the top parts of my whole trip.
Right thats all for now from the 4 of us, love CAST!
Wednesday 15th April 2009 - Airlie Beach
Hi all thomas here. Just a quick one to say we're leaving tomorrow morning on a boat going round the Whitsunday Islands. These are about 70 or so islands around the Great Barrier Reef, we'll be gone for 3 days so u'll be filled in upon our return. Take care and thanks for all the messages. We're off to buy Easter eggs, as they're cheap now, (How stingy us travellers really are!).
Love CAST
Saturday 11th April 2009 - Noosa, Fraser Island and Now at Hervey Bay
Hi all, Steven here. Sorry for the lack of a blog for the last couple of days, but we have been busy getting sand in pretty much every orraphis (I don't know how to spell that word and for some reason its also not on spellcheck!) on Fraser Island but we'll come onto that later.
The 3 nights prior to arriving in Rainbow Beach for our Fraser Island we stayed in a little town called Noosa. We were originally going to be doing a 2 day 2 night camping trip up the Noosa River but both the girls thought it would hurt their arms to much so didn't want to do it! The first day in Noosa we decided we were going to walk to Alexander Bay which took us through the national park. The walk was about 3 hours return and it was very pleasant walking through the trees trying to spot wildlife and looking at some of the amazing views over many different little beaches. We arrived at Alexander Bay only for it to start raining which was a bit of a pain in the bum but such as life. We stuck it out and had our sandwiches in the rain and chatted about random bits and bobs including if we could have any super power what would it be and why (feel free to discuss this with the nearest person to you and email us your answers!)
On our way back we saw our first wild Koala which was amazing, seeing them in real life is totally different to seeing them in a zoo and we all were very excited when we saw it and went a bit trigger happy with our cameras! In the evening we all got an early night after our many late nights with the guys in Brisbane.
The next day we walked up to a lookout keeping our eyes peeled for more koalas after the one we had seen the day before had really wet our appetite and left us wanting to see more! Unfortunately though we didn't see any. When we got up to the lookout we had a fabulous view over Noosa which was great. We also saw 3 kookaboroughs sitting in a gum tree, like the song. The strange thing is, we have now seen a fair few kookaboroughs and every time they have been in a gum tree!
In the afternoon we played in the pool making up games to keep ourselves amused. In the evening Tom and Anna left Carrie-Anne and I and went out for a meal which I'll now let Tom tell you about. Bye from me.
Thomas here, Anna and I headed down for dinner stopping off for a drink along the main street which had a lovely atmosphere. Dinner was a rather expensive affair but we thought we deserved it, so had the nice wine as well. Anna's seafood risotto was especially delicious crammed full of shrimp, muscles, squid and fish.
Next morning we set off for Rainbow beach and our briefing for Fraser Island. After arrival we were shepherded in the main communal room along with the other 50 or so trippers. Then we were briefed about the Island from probably the most enthusiastic man ever, who also liked to provide rhymes all the time. His favourite was 'Let's leave with a smile on that dial', It actually got rather mesmerising after a while. Fraser Island is the largest sand Island in the entire world and also home to the most 'pure' dingo's (an auzzie wild dog). The trip was 3 days/2nights and it was self drive, so 11 people in a heavy duty 4x4 fully equipped with camping gear. To give you an idea of size the eastern beach runs for a little over 74 km.
With buckets of info taken on board we had miss mash dinner to use up everything before Fraser, before retiring. Wednesday morning started early but pleasantly at 6.30 with free pancakes (of which I managed to stuff 6 in!) Up until midday we were preped on how to load the 4x4, drive the 4x4 (very exciting) and fit all 11 people with bags and alcohol. In our group we had 5 drivers including the four of us and I was first to drive. Our first 'experience' of the trip came as we embarked the barge which shoots us over to the Isle.
Now 4x4 are very different to drive from cars as you'd imagine and these also have an extra heavy duty gear box and clutch. So i'm driving onto the barge and pull behind one of the other groups and the steward motions me to stop so I brake but the 4x4 does seem to respond. So I try again to no avail, at this point the guys in the back notice i'm too close and everyone is shouting 'Stop! Stop!'. Needless to say I went straight into the back of the other 4x4 resulting in the other group jumping and staring at me. Very embarrassing, but luckily no damage. Although I did spend the rest of the trip taking stick off the group, rightly so.
We got on the Island without anymore mishaps and headed for Lake Mackenzie, a beautifully warm clear blue natural lake set in the centre of the Island surrounded by forest. A truly stunning sight. So we all jumped in and spend a good hour swimming around and mucking about. By 4.30 we had reached our camp sight for the evening where we unpacked pretty much everything and set up the tents. Now I have some experience sleeping on sand and it's not great but this wasn't that back.
The cooking was slightly more problematic than the tent set up until on e of the Germans admitted he was a chief and everyone promptly handed responsibility over. All the food was provided and for dinner we had a very respectable steak with potato salad and salad. However The light quickly faded and the wind rose so it took a little longer than expected. The rest of the evening descended into what you'd expect, mainly drinking. In Auz they have a very cheap wine called Goon, now wine is a loose term as it contains fish products and eggs. Yes that's right! But when in Rome, so we all polished off a few boxes. During the evening I was walking thought the centre of the camp site (all 5 groups of 11 camped together) when Carrie-Anne rushes past and Anna falls at my feet. On closer inspection I noticed a dingo appear from under our 4x4 which the girls had been sitting with their back too. Going to sleep was very easy as the ocean overrides all other sounds and is very therapeutic.
Hello all again, back to Steven. I shall take you through day 2 on Fraser Island, our only full day on the Island. After an extremely uncomfortable nights sleep (sleeping on hard sand with no mats is quite painful to say the least!) we awoke early and began the cleaning of our pots and pans we used the previous night. We had the best cleaning appliances ever, the sea and sand! Breakfast was scrambled eggs / omelet which was prepared by Anna and Carrie-Anne for the whole group. (Anna: it turns out cooking scrambled eggs for 11 people in one big pot and only one heat setting is not easy!!)
After breakfast we packed up the van, leaving our tents set up and headed to Indians Head with Anna driving. We were about half an hour into our journey when we came up against our first little obstacle of the day which was a large amount of rocks which covered the beach which we had to drive over to continue our journey. After a long debate we decided to go for it rather than take the other turning towards Happy Valley which we thought took us inland and drove over the rocks, much easier than we had expected it to be but a lot of fun in the process (Anna, as she was driving, wasn't having fun and was quite scared about rolling the van!). When we got passed the rocks we found out the other turning which we decided not to take would not have taken us inland, but bypassed the rocks altogether. After this little ordeal we carried on towards Indians Head and passed Eli Creek (which I will explain about later) and the Maheno shipwreck which we stopped at and had a load of pictures taken by it. The shipwreck is amazing and its a surprisingly big boat. The boat had been sold to Japan and while they were towing it back a cyclone hit breaking the tow cable and it got washed up onto Fraser Island. The wreck was also used as target practise in the second world war by the Australian Air Force.
After the wreck we carried on towards Indians Head. We arrived there around lunch time and walked up to the top of the headlands which had amazing views over the sand dunes which were inland as well as the beaches both sides of the headland and views out over the sea. On a calm day you are meant to be able to see Sharks, Dolphins and Manta Rays from the top of Indians Head but the sea was very rough so unfortunately we didn't get to add to the vast list of wildlife we had seen on our trip so far. We spent a while taking in the views and the sunshine (yes sunshine, crazy isn't it after our 2 weeks of pretty much not seeing the sun at all!!!!!) before walking back down to our vans via a different track and some more amazing views over some rocks and rock pools which had the most amazing bluey turquoise coloured water!!
Once back to the vans we had some lunch before setting off the way we had come back to Eli Creek with Carrie-Anne driving. Eli Creek is a little creek which you can float down looking out for some of the fresh water eels which inhabit it. The creek is in a lovely setting with crystal clear waters which leads out into the sea. Tom and I were the only ones to go in as the water was absolutely freezing! We were both pretty desperate to see an eel and were lucky enough to see two, the first of which was about a meter long and only about 2 foot away from us! Once we had floated down to the bottom and had a little bit of a wash (it was so refreshing to have some clean water when there are no showers in the camp site!) we headed back towards camp, this time taking the bypass and not having to manoeuvre through the rocks again.
Once back in camp we had the opportunity to relax while other members of our group made dinner which was chicken stir fry and must say very nice. We ended the evening in our group playing a couple of drinking games and getting a bit merry and once again it was back off to bed in our uncomfortable tents.
I shall now pass you over to Anna who will take you through our third and final day on Fraser Island. Ok, so next morning all up very early as it was so hot in the tents. Had a cereal for breakie which was so nice to have a fluid other than water!! Although did have to spend ages rinsing the bowl before to make sure it was not cereal a al sea water! We then set off for the day a little too early while the tide was still quite high and so had to make a few speedy dashes to miss the incoming waves! We decided to go back to Lake Mackenzie as it was really beautiful there and this day it was also nice and sunny. We had just over an hour there relaxing and feeling slightly cleaner before heading back down to catch our barge back to rainbow beach. The last part of the journey was over sand that is only accessible at low tide and had loads of hidden pot holes in making it quite hard to navigate our way round. We made it back only to discover that we had to clean out the car of all sand as well as the tents, cutlery, ice boxes and even the crates that carried out stuff in - all not very amused as all were just looking forward to getting back for a shower! They did a full check of our car and luckily we all drove OK and so did not have to pay for any damages. Turns out those cars can withstand quite a lot!! We also would have to pay for any lost cups, plates and cutlery and miraculously we managed to not lose anything which was pretty amazing and most of the time using all the stuff was in the dark!!!
All returned to the hostel for our much needed shower. Was so nice to be free of sand! All pretty shattered and had an early night (Carrie-Anne and I made a very unrespectable 7.30pm!). Needless to say Thomas Carrie-Anne and I were up at 7 the next morning for our free pancakes.
We then caught our greyhound to Hervey Bay where we staying the night before heading up to Rockhampton - the beef capital of Australia.
So I guess that is all for now folks, Happy Easter, have a really great weekend. We are being cheapskates and buying our Easter eggs on Tuesday when the prices get cut. All will miss not being at home – especially for the roasts – I think we've forgotten what they taste like its been so long!!
love CAST
Steve enjoying his wetsuit even more!
Carrie-Anne enjoying her wetsuit.
Anna supporting her mother!
Us at Sunny Bondi Beach
The harbour on the way out to Mutton island
Steve relaxing at Taronga Zoo
Thursday 2nd April 2009 - Brisbane
Bet you didn't think another blog was coming so soon after the last one! We just thought we should treat our avid readers. So Thomas here again to begin with. Last time our party had arrived in Surfers Paradise, turns out that it's really not a surfers paradise according to the Auzzie's we know. ALthough the waves are massive everyone is constantly dragged down the beach. WE contented ourselves the first day by going to the beach and chilling out for a while. We were just happy to be back in the sun after a few days of rain. Nothing much happened until the evening when we ran into a person from Uni and spent the night swapping stories, drinks and going for an absolutly amazing curry. (Something we've all missed since coming away)
Wednesday we got up and went to catch the Greyhound up to Brisbane. Another beautiful day presented itself and we we're a little peeved that we would be stuck on a bus. Unfortunatly our bus ended up 4.5 hours delayed. Yes thats right! So we had to hang around and entertain ourselves in the transit centre for what felt like a lifetime.
Finally made it to Brisbane where we got picked up by the Auzzie's we met around europe. They own a Pizza takeaway place which you can imagine we had to sample straight away! They're putting us up for a couple of days and it's so nice to have a house to chill out in rather than a hostel for a change. And also FREE INTERNET! So we had pizza and a few drink last night and then tonight we're heading to a gig in Brisbane centre. We awoke this morning to more monsoon rain, totally unbelievable.
So thats the quick update for the last few days. We'll keep in contact a little more regularly than the last week or so. But take care.
Love CAST
Monday 30th March 2009 - Surfers Paradise
Hello Thomas checking in with you today. Sorry we've been out of contact for so long. But in store for you are a few funny stories and some rather unbelievable weather. When we last met, our departure from Port Macquarie was imminent and we were bound for Coffs Harbour. Needless to say we arrived safely and spend the first day taking stock. Coffs is a lovely and beautiful place with Russell Crowe living close by in his mansion. We got to the hostel in the evening and proceeded all to have $5 (less than 2pound) pizza which turned out to be unbelievably good.
With bright sunshine beckoning us the next morning we set off for the beach and to have a look around muttonbird island where the afor mentioned bird all nest underground. The island has a magnifiscant view over the pacific ocean and is connect to the mainland via the harbour. From here we could see some of the other nature reserve islands which are collectivly called the solitary islands. Having taken in our bit of wildlife and exploration for the day we settled on the beach and I got everyone playing the classic left right game with a tennis ball in the sea. (For those not in the know, the LR game consists of throwing a tennis ball to someone and shouting left or right. At which point the receiver has to catch the ball with the opposite hand. This leads to a lot of fun and anger when you get it wrong or drop the ball. I didn't say it was an intelligent game!). After sunning ourselves we went to play a good old fashioned game of doubles tennis. I had been badgering the others for a while about this (for those who don't know I coach tennis sometimes and love playing) and finally they caved. The teams where Browley and Hisper (you should be able to work out the teams from that). We managed a full set with every game I think going to deuce bar one. CA and Anna for their “i'm no good” and “honestly u'll be better with no partner” played expertly and everyone had great fun. Steve even snuck in a few aces! Our extremely strenuous day ended with cards as usual.
Thursday morning started with a kayaking trip along the river running through the town. It was pretty easy paddling and absolutely loads of fish in the river. Anna even caught a glimpse of a string ray. The afternoon passed with little note. Anna and I took a walk along a deserted beach and then went to the yaught club for a few drinks, chatting and some dessert. We had quite possibly the best carrot cake i've ever tasted. Whilst talking I spotted a jumping sting ray which was managing to jump 4 or 5 feet out of the water. CA and steve spent the afternoon by the pool and sleeping. The evening however was much more entertaining and a little stressful. I had been going on since NZ that my hair needed cutting however I was not really prepared to pay for it. In step hairdressers Cooper and Browne with only two nail scissors! I know what your thinking what had I let my self in for. I think I was more worried about the “cut” than the bungee jumping. I spent the first 10 minutes checking constantly checking the mirror I was given as the girls set to work. In the end the result was better than I could ever have expected. CA now believes that she has a career in the hairdressing industry!
Next day we left for Byron Bay. Apparently it doesn't rain in Auz, oh no, it just monsoons. We found this out in the evening of our first night in Byron and to be honest the noise scared the life out of me.
Hey Carrie-Anne here. So we arrived in Byron Bay – the first day comprised of looking around Byron itself and preparing ourselves for the meat feast that evening, which was the friday hostel free bbq. And we were not disappointed! Given that it was free I had THREE sausages and a burger. Steve and tom carried on the evening with a visit to cheeky monkeys ( the near by bar/club), but the free sangria, got the better of me and anna and we headed to bed. The next day, we had the first of a two day surf lesson. We got picked up by a very over-enthusiastic sun-aged ozzie surfer...who tried to convince us that this was the best day ever to go surfing! Despite the rain. :-( Anyway, we arrived and squeezed ourselves into our ultra tight wetsuits. We got a quick briefing on the sand on how to stand up on our boards when on a wave. Then we headed straight out. The waves were a good size to learn on and we all managed to stand up and ride a wave. Despite it pouring with rain for about half an hour.
That night Anna and I decided to redeem ourselves from going to bed early the night before and headed out into Byron for the evening.
The following day we were picked up for our second surfing lesson, which involved trying to turn the surf board. Steve managed to get stung by the only jelly fish in the whole of Byron Bay on his hand. About half way through the lesson I saw Anna, Tom & Steve stop and stare in the waist high water and point to a fin circling near by. After a few nervous seconds we realised it was two dolphins which then circled and swam around us for a few minutes. All in all the surfing was lots of fun.
That night were we all quite tired and sore from surfing so watched a film and headed to bed early. Today we have arrived in Surfers Paradise with the plan on visiting a large water theme park but the weather has been pretty bad for the last three days so we may have to make alternative arrangements.
Hi Thomas again. Just to say I hope my family enjoy skiing next week and Jack you don't get too bored at home (although you do have the PS2). Also a shout out to Jane who is in the lovely sunny town of Swanage this week (standard weather for Swanage I hasten to add). Jane please inform Mr Gascoine when you next see him that I still haven't forgot his degrading comments about the glorious town your currently in!
Anyway Thanks for tuning in and hope everyone is well.
Love CAST
Tuesday 24th March 2009 - more sydney and Port Macquarie
So Anna here, "finally" as the boys would say.
Anwyay so back to sydney. We went for our tour around Sydney Opera house, well me thomas and steve did. Carrie-Anne decided not to in the end as the really mean lady at the reception wouldnt accept her very slightly different card to ours for the student discount!! We were really lucky as only one of the 5 theatres was being used for rehersals and so we were allowed to go in all the other 4. Apparently sometimes there are rehersals and shows on so that on the tour you are lucky if you see two of the theatres. There are a couple of smaller theatres on the lower level which are used mainly for plays and single performers. The Main orchestra hall and opera theatre as on the top level under the crazy structure you can see from the outside. The orchestra hall is amazing. Its all wooden inside with a really tall ceiling. The roof has the same shape as the inside of an accoustic guitar to get the best sound. The opera hall was less impressive as it is just a massive theatre with nothing particularly unique about it. Apparently when it was build they originally intended to have the opera in the orchestra hall and theatre in the now opera hall. But the opera singers voices got distorted in there and so they had to change theatres. It was also interesting to find out that it was a competition to design the opera house and the judge didnt like the shortlisted ones and so picked the final design out of the reject pile. Also they started builing it BEFORE they even knew if the wave like structures were possible and it took them 4 years to work out how to do it - sensible!!! (Engineers...usless ;-) lol!) There are also over 100,000 tiles covering the whole structure. Afterwards we spent the afternoon in the botanical gardens which are really pretty and surprisingly quiet in the middle of sydney. Although, after seeing the spiders at the zoo, Carrie-Anne and I were getting a little paranoid when anything crawled on us which the boys found highly amusing.
The following day we thought we'd make the most of the nice weather and head yet again to the beach. We decided to try out a different one and this time went to Coogee beach just south of Bondi. It is actually a very pretty little beach. Smaller than the other 2 we went too but less rough so swimming is much nicer. The bay has rocks either side and on one of the sides there is a natural pool formed by the rocks. It was so nice in there, as it was like a mill pond and was like swimmin in a swimming pool. Again though there are not many shops or cafes nearby so is pretty quite. Expected the beachs to be abit more like the ones around europe with lots of little cafes and bars just off the beach where you can get a cold drink or icecream and playing music. Also no people walking up the beach selling corn on the cob :-(!
In the evening we decided to venture out to kings cross - 'the' place to go out supposedly. It is very busy as you would expect so had a nice vib but personly found the area a bit tacky. Inbetween all the bars were loads and loads of fast food places, strip clubs and prostitutes. Also because of the food there was an awful lot of litter too. We went to one bar and then finished in an irish pub. After a few drinks thomas and i decided that it would be a good idea to stop and have a pizza on the way home - at 3am!! had a mexican pizza with REALLY hot jalapinos which probably served us right!
We spent our last day in sydney wandering round the shops and harbour and getting ourselves sorted for leaving. We all really loved Sydney as a city although all looking forward to getting somewhere a little less expensive! We were catching the Greyhound bus up to Port Macquarie which took 6.5hours and so had an early start. So I'll now pass you over to Carrie-Anne to let you know about our stay in PM.
The greyhound took about 5 hours which got us to MP. We thought we where being picked up by the camp site we were staying at but ended up having to walk with our backpacks in the sweltering heat!
The first day consisted of getting settled in and sitting by the pool (its a hard life)!.
Yesterday consisted of walking along the river front, which ran into the beach. Where we saw a huge sting ray jump out of the water TWICE! The sea at the beach was quite wavy and so we watched a few talented surfers do some 360's on the waves. It was a bit too hot to stay on the beach so we ended up back at the pool. During the afternoon Steve and I walked down to a nearby koala hospital where we saw a number of injured and old koalas on the mend. We also got to see them feed and sleep (which is mainly all they do).
Last night we took advantage of the camp site BBQ, and had a meat fest.
Today we are waiting for the Greyhound to take us 3 hours up the coast to Coffs Habour.
Wednesday 18th March 2009 - Sydney (AUZ and Sun!)
Thomas here just for a change. I'm begining to think that the girls are playing Steve and I because everytime we mention blog they conviently have to do something very important.
Anyway enough of the domestics. We left you last time as Steve and I were going to depart for the Super 14 game. A little aprehensive i add given the last match the Crusaders played finished 6 - 0. Thats right more like a football score. However we were in for a treat as the game ended 23 - 23. Lots of tries, chances and misses. Whats also pretty funny about super 14 is they have pre-match entertainment. This consisted of 2 guys jumping 40 ft in the air on motorbikes! Fairly hair raising stuff. This was then followed by the "crusaders" mascots who come in on horse back wielding swords. Great fun.
Well the next day was travel to sydney where i think we might be staying in the worst hostel ever. But that hasn't kept us down it just means we devise ways to escape from the hostel. Saying that we have met a lot of ppl. (Its BASE hostel for those who want to know. Don't go there). But sydney is great sunny, lively and ipressive down by the harbour.
Our first full day down under was spent, thats right, going to the beach. It was 28C and there was no way the girls where going anywhere else! We caught the ferry from down by the harbour across to Manly beach. The ferry goes out next to the harbour bridge which is huge and quite a structure. But i was looking forward to crusing past the Sydney Opera House. Amazing building which is even more impressive in the flesh (so to speak). Concidering that the opera house was designed and built in 1959 it is unbelievable. When on the ferry you literally go right past it. Manly beach was nice much like any other beach really. Steve and i raced around in the sea throwing the ball to each other and trying to cope with the strong currents whilst the girls worked on their tan.
The evening bought a few suprised as we entered a trivia quiz (we wern't actually that bad) accompanied by a few people we met. But the problem was that each round took an hour. Only 10 question per round and it was happy hour so we spend a lot of time drinking. I especially felt worse for wear in the morning so we decided to check out Bondi beach.
For those who haven't been to Bondi it's nothing special just a nice beach really with really good surf. We had some good fish and chips for dinner which everyone enjoyed, including me at the time but again I ended up feeling a bit worse for wear from them!
Hi all, Steven here now. Once again it falls to Tom and I to keep you up to date with whats going on down under. The girls are currently walking around Darling Harbour doing goodness knows what. Anyway today the 4 of us went to Taronga Zoo. We took the ferry over to the zoo and paid to get in. Tom, Anna and I all got student tickets but the woman on the desk wouldn't accept Carrie-Annes student card so she had to pay full price, much to her disgust! It brings back memories of the Colloseum for those of you who know that story.
Some of the highlights of the day were (for me anyway) the echidnas which for those of you who don't know are best described as hedgehog like with big snouts. Also seeing the wombats and tapiers was great! Unfortunately one of the animals Tom and I most wanted to see, the Platypus, enclosure was closed so we couldn't see then which we were a bit disappointed with. We went to see a seal show which was really good, watching all the seals do all sorts of tricks. The zoo entertained us for a good 5 hours and if you're thinking of an animal theres a good chance we saw it today!
We are planning to have a tour of the opera house tomorrow and possibly walk over the harbour bridge (across, not up it because its a little on the expensive side for us budgeters!).
Thats all for now. We have found a $2 an hour internet place so hopefully more blogs to come. But if not, we are heading to Port Stephens on Sunday where another blog will definately be on its way!
Love CAST.
