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TOUR II

Sydney - Port Macquarie - Coffs Harbour - Byron Bay - Surfers Paradise - Brisbane - Noosa Heads - Rainbow Beach - Fraser Island - Dingo - Airlie Beach - Town of 1770 and Agnes Water - Byron Bay - Nimbin - Sydney

8/11/02

Before our journey could start, everything went wrong: Joelle had to write her exam with a hangover (don't ask why), I was quite ill and the car didn't want to start! I was really thinking about to stay!

After picking up Joelle we left Sydney in the afternoon on the way to Port Macquarie. There we stayed again in a really nice Caravan Park where we got a luxury suite. Joelle and Martin as the parents in the king size bed and Erik and me as the children in the kids beds. "We are family!!"

9/11/02

No tape, no cd player and annoying radio - but we got help for the next 4500km. We bought an adapter for my Discman and the journey could go ahead, with music!

If you wanna go somewhere in Australia, it takes you ages!! It is even not like in Germany, that you may drive two hours to the next interesting place, in Australia it takes you at least 5 hours! So we were sitting in the car quite a lot. But for luck we could talk about everything. hehehe like "When do you say we had sex and when do you say we slept together?" and that's just one example.. hehehe

Our first thing to see was the Big Banana in Coffs Harbour. Along the East Coast there are a few different fruits in a very big size, so that you can see from far away where is a rest area or petrol station. And here is  the Big Banana:

Erik, Martin and Joelle

In the late afternoon we arrived in Byron Bay and found a great accomodation. The Belongil Beach House. For luck the dorms were full and again we got the suite. Kitchen, TV, extra sleeping room etc. Before sunset we went to the beautiful beach. Suddenly Martin screamed and why  you can see on the next picture:

10/11/02

This was definetely not my day: in the morning Joelle, Martin and Erik played volley ball what I really hate because of bad experience at school and later they booked a surf course and as a sailing person I don't go surfing! So I took the car to have a look at the surrounding area and took pictures of the three surfers. Unfortunately I only have good pictures of Joelle. (I'm sorry - but maybe she was the best? hehehe)

here she is:

the surrounding area

Martin and Erik went out for dinner to eat a perfect Australian steak and Joelle and me cooked in our suite. Afterwards we met in a cafe and since this meeting, I am pregnant with a Koala! The whole trip we looked for the baby and gave it eucalyptus sweets etc. Don't ask why, I just had a big belly from beer and food and Martin decided that I am pregnant and I didn't have a clue who could be the father so he thought it was a Koala. Nonsense, but we had a good laugh..

11/11/02

In Germany started carnival and I guess it's quite freezing. But we moved on with ca. 30 degrees a three hours drive up the Gold Coast. First stop we had in Surfers Paradise and unfortunately only the name sounds good. Skyscraper of hotels everywhere.. so we just bought sunglasses and had a coffee before we drove to Brisbane. Brisbane is a small and nice town, but to be honest, I expected more. In 1988 there was the Down Under EXPO so there is a really nice suburban called South Bank with a artificial beach and lake. This night we didn't get any accommodation in a hostel and so we had to sleep in a caravan park. But this was no compare to the luxury suite in Port Macquarie! Cockroaches, disgusting matrices etc. To get asleep easier this night,  we went out that night... We had good fun in a backpacker bar!

12/11/02

With a little hangover we wanted to make sightseeing in Brisbane, but nobody really wanted to. It was hot and humid, and so we were just lying at the "beach" and then went shopping. Books, backpacks, shoes... etc. For dinner we had a BBQ with a nice guy from New Zealand or also called "a Kiwi". This night Martin and I slept outside the caravan because it was just disgusting. Unfortunately I don't have any good pictures from Brisbane. There was nothing to take pictures from.

13/11/02

This day was a really hectic day. We drove to Rainbow Beach with a stop in Noosa Heads where we  had a short lunch break. Really pity, beause this was a lovely town with a nice beach and the best ice cream in the world ;o) We arrived really late in Rainbow Beach so we've been quite afraid that we can't go on Fraser Island the next day. But we were at the right time at the meeting with our group for the next three days. First of all we had to watch a video about the rules and danger on Fraser Island. Dingos, Sand, Dingos.. blablabla.. Then we met our group and I think everyone felt well about the people. We had to plan and to buy our food and drinks for the next three days. BBQ on the first day, Spaghetti on the second etc. We did it quite well!! We had to get up early the next morning, so everyone just went to bed early (I guess so??)

14/11/01

For all people who don't know what is Fraser Island: it is a gigantic sandbar measuring 120km by 15km, created by thousands of years of longshore drift. It's composed almost entirely of sand, but it also preserves a remarkable variety of landscapes from sand dunes to tropical rainforests and the most beautiful freshwater lakes I've ever seen. A network of sandy tracks crisscrosses the island. So it's possible only with a 4WD.

After we packed our jeep, got all instructions how to drive, we moved on to Fraser Island. You have to take a ferry to get there and from one second to the other, there is sand, sand, sand...

the three groups waiting for the ferry to Fraser Island

sometimes we got stucked in the sand and so everyone had to push!

This day we saw Lake Boomanyin, Central Station to get drinking water and last but not least arrived at one of the most wonderful places I' ve ever seen: Lake McKenzie! No words, just look and think of it's fresh water and around 20 degrees!

Martin, Richard, Chris, Shilow

For luck we got a camp site next to the lake so we could stay there the rest of the day. But this camp site is for families to relax so we couldn't make the party we wanted to. But after BBQ we played cards or better called a drinking game and the name after a while was: "Let's go Shilow pissed!" Shilow doesn't drink that much normally, so she get pissed very quickly. Thanks, we all had a great laugh! Afterwards we all went to the beach so we could go ahead with the party.  Some continued playing cards, the other went for a swim with clothes and other slept like dead! ;o) This night we didn't get much sleep, but Joelle, Phil and me slept at the beach and the sunrise was amazing!

Chris, Richard, Lorraine, Kate, Anna, Shilow and in the back Phil, Erik and our car!

party at the beach and our pissed Shilow sleeping like dead.

15/11/02

After breakfast we head on to Cathedral Station to get cigarettes for our nightswimmers. They didn't swim with clothes only, no, they also swam with cigarettes.. ;o)There we saw our first dingo very close to us.

    these signs you can find everywhere

Next stop we had at Rainbow Grove with amazing dunes:

Everyone who was on Fraser Island has this picture, so than I:

In the late afternoon we arrived at Indian Head, a camping area with nothing else than sand.. Around an half an hour walk from this place, you can find the champgne pools. on the way to the champagne pools, it looks like snow!

ready for a swim?

Because the sharks can't get in there, this is the only possibilty to swim in the sea and I think I don't need to explain where the name "the champagne pools" stems from, eh??

After a great swim, the girls built up the tents and the men cooked. We were a great team! This night everyone was still tired from the last night and so we just hang around and drank some wine. Before dinner the ranger came to us and explained us again, how to behave in case a dingo will come. That's no joke, there was nothing than sand, so we also had to go to the loo behin the sand dunes. He told us to go in groups of three and only one can go to the toilet and the other two have to stand around, arms crossed and watching out for dingoes. If one is coming, the one has to stop immediately! and get up, eye contact and standing back to back and cry for help! We were all laughing, but the moment we saw them we changed our mind...

16/11/02

At 4.30 am we got up again to watch the sunrise and turtles. It was quite early, but definitely worth to see it:

sunrise at Indian Head

To wake up we had a swim in the champagne pool again and then packed our stuff to go ahead to Eli Creek, the largest stream on the east coast. Here we took our group photo, withoutt Erik!!

Shilow, Anna, Lorriane, Phil, me, Kate, Martin, Richard, Joelle and Chris

Isn't that romantic???

Martin and I

It started raining and I think after three wonderful days, it was time to go! So we went back and had a great party in our backpacker!

17/11/02

Again, or  better  like always, we got up early. Washed our clothes and Joelle's film... and drove then to Dingo, Namoi Hills Cattle Station anywhere in the outback.

the farm

18/11/02

This day was a really good one! At 7.30 we started our 1,5h drive in the middle of the forest to get our didgeridoo, I mean the hollow tree!

Randy, an aboriginal guy helped us to find a tree, hollowed out by termites.

Then we had to drag the bark of the tree and according to Brian: " you get bigger brusts from dragging":

Next step was to draw our didgeridoo. In the top it means the air going through, in the middle an animal, and in the bottom it means the music coming out.

And here you can see the result from all of us:

After this really nice day, we were all sitting togehther and drank a few beers with the couple Brian and Jules who helped us the whole day. And from this time on we know how you know who is Mr. Right. The story about Brian and Jules (both araound 50 years old) is, that Jules came 4 years ago to Australia to build her own didgeridoo. So she met Brian and fell in love with him. She told us the story really slow, so we asked always questions like: and when did you come together, or when did you know he is the man for your life and she said: "the moment he showed me his didgeridoo!!!" Since this time, sex is called to show someone his didgeridoo! ;o)

19/11/02

Befor we left the Cattle Station we went horse riding between 6 and 7 in the morning! Was nice, but little bit boring. After breakfast we drove to our next adventure: Airlie Beach. Wow! It's situated in paradise. The water turquoise blue and the sand just white!! For Dinner we met some guys from Fraser Island again and spent a nice night with them.

20/11/02

Before our sailing trip started we wrote postcards and hang around in Airlie Beach. At 4pm the journey started and we could go on board. Our boat is a a fast and big one; have a look: Samurai:

But it just looks comfy outside. Inside we had to sleep with two people in a single bed!! But Joelle and me changed in sleeping on deck! We all got a little bit sick and so nobody really liked alcohol at this night. Some stayed on board and other went out to a pub, but more to have a better toilet than on board! ;o)

21/11/02

The next day we started at 5.30 in the morning to reach again an amazing place: Whiteheaven Beach:

we couldn't swim there without stinger suit because of the sharks and jelly fishes, but just to look at was amazing!

After hanging around on the beach we moved on to a  reef, where the most guys on board tried to Scuba diving for their first time. The reef was dead, but still a few fishes around. Not too bad..

22/11/02

In the morning we could dive again and then went on sailing home for 3 hours.

nice skipper, eh?

Antje, Laura, Erik and Sam

Back in Airlie Beach we met all people from Fraser Island again and had a great great party!!!

23/11/02

This day and the next two we spent most of the time in the car, driving in direction to Sydney. Near Rockhampton we stopped at a Heritage Village. There we could see how  life was in former times in Australia. Joelle and I had great time imaging how to live there, so we played a litlle bit theatre..

this school was used until 1997!!

my new car! ;o)

This night we stopped in Town of 1770/Agnes Water. A really small but lovely town - and the best hostel! There we met Harri who showed us the area and the pub where we could get something to eat.

sunset in 1770

Joelle, Martin, Erik, Harri

24/11/02

The next day we had to move on to Byron Bay. There we met again Kate and Lorraine, two guys from Fraser Island and had a funny night . For my german friends: we played "Flaschendrehen", so it was really funnny!

25/11/02

This was one of the strangest days in my life. We went to Nimbin, a hippie village 70km from Byron Bay. There you can buy the very popular cookies... I just say: I should have better not tried it... ;o)

here you can buy the famous cookies!

yeah, three weeks, 5000km ... it was a really nice trip! Although we had litlle arguments because we had a different view of the way to travel, I think we did it well! Thanks to you guys!

To all people I met on my trip I wanna say thanks for all the great time we spent together, especially on Fraser Island! If anyone wants to add or write something or has great pictures to add on this page, just let me know!

Anyway, have a great time! See ya'!!