1-14 thru 1-24-11

We made it to Sydney without any problems and is was great to be back to our sort-of "home base".  We took the train from the airport and made it to our camp…we were blown away when the lady said they were fully booked!  Crap this is not going to be good if we can't find a spot…luckily we got the tent spot of someone who did not show up in time. We were on a corner spot and right across from the camp kitchen and bathroom it was a prime location for our last week in Australia!

We had three days before we took the train into the Blue Mountains  so we went downtown and checked out other neighborhoods and the ins and outs of the Sydney harbor.  We walked through the Rocks neighborhood that reminded us of Portland's pearl district and stumbled onto a weekend market that was fun to ramble through.  We spent a few hours looking at all the goods and drooling over all the food venders and settled on an Irish Bar to have a pint and eat some food.  After a few beers and some French fries we headed toward Darling Harbor which is a long walk but we found cute neighborhoods and amazing condo's to live in after we made our millions!  Darling Harbor was full of people; there were tons of water front cafes and restaurants along with museums and kids type amusement including a huge ship museum, a wild life center, aquarium, and a large casino across the harbor.  This is the place to be if you had small children with you, after dodging our fair share of prames (strollers) and wandering kids we decided we were in the mood for something less chaotic. We went back to camp and chilled by the pool.

It was finally Blue Mountain day, we boarded the first train to the mountains early in the morning and kicked back for the 2 hour smooth ride.  We had thrown the last of our granola in the yogurt container which swelled up over night and provided a nutritious but weird textured breakfast.  When we got off the train at the Blue Mountains we saw a town and no mountains.  Strange…we found a booth that we could sign up for a bus tour that would drop us off at various points of interest in the town including some trails that are in the Blue Mts.  After a short bus ride through town we got dropped off at the start of a trail head, the trail walked along the ridge of the mountains so no climbing necessary!  The weather was perfect and the mountains were so beautiful, they were more like deep canyons with big vertical walls covered with eucalyptus trees.  Not the traditional mountains we are used to but they were gorgeous nun the less with a blue haze as far as the eye could see.  The walk along the ridge offered many great views of cliffs, and waterfalls and really cool red parrots all over.  We stopped and ate an apple at honeymoon point and reflected on our wedded bliss, but grew a bit sad that our trip was coming to an end at the end of the week.  At the end of the trail we came to the famed three sisters (distant relatives of the three in Bend) this is where we ran into the hordes of tourists because most people did not want to walk the trail and opted to get dropped off right at the sisters.  Wanting a break from the heat we found a complex with a food court and multiple gift shops.  We found some coozies, kangaroo socks, and I got a pair of shorts.  Some of the souvenirs were a bit much like the pouch that was made out of kangaroo balls, and the back scratcher made out of the paw of a kangaroo! Poor kangas :( After the shopping we hoped back on the bus and had it drop us off in a different neighborhood that had more shops, it took us about 5min to see that we were not interested in any of the shops so we walked back to the train station and waited 10 min for the train to arrive to take us back home.  We are glad we spent only the day there and not a night or two because we saw it all in a few hours.  Really fun place but more set up for the older tourist.

Back at camp we spent our last days at the pool reading and sunbathing, Paul even taught me how to dive into the deep end! I was feeling good about my dives until a little squirt about 10 asked if I was a teenager! REALLY kid, I don't look that young! Feeling less than womanly I resumed my lessons and the little squirt made herself assistant coach, soon her demonstrations turned into a "see what I can do" game, she was a sweet kid but I had to pull out all the stops to one up her and in the end it was drinking a beer! Sweet victory! As we were leaving the pool she asked where our camp was I lied and pointed to the opposite side of the camp, I did not want a shadow for my last days in Sydney.

Another day we decided we had better get to Bondi beach baby!  This is the famous beach in Sydney and a little father out than Manly (my favorite) it is one of the "places to be on New Year’s” and just about every other day.  Bondi is its own community that seemed like a mini city, to get to the beach we had to cram into a bus and drive past a huge mall that was about 4 blocks in size (I secretly wanted to go through the mall they had so many great stores, oh shopping how I have missed you!) A grassy park separated the beach from the board walk area, there was so much traffic both pedestrians and vehicles, but I was beautiful and understood why it is so popular.  After lounging we walked around the beach on a path Paul told me that I could get him to live in a sunny place (no snow) for a year or two as long as he could replace skiing with surfing or beach volleyball and now that it's in print my plotting may begin!

Our last great memories of the Sydney camp were: pizza, the French couple’s food, the Denmark family, nocturnal animals and crazy birds.  A pizza joint opened up under a canopy tent at the ranger station that made wood oven pizzas for way too much money.  When we checked in we got a coupon for it, and since we love pizza we gave them a try, this was a mistake since all we thought about was having the pizza every night for dinner, it was that good!  We also met a French couple that let us try their kangaroo steaks, it was really good dark meat, I think it was a good cut of meat and had a great marinade. We also chatted with a couple from Denmark traveling with a 5yr old and a 2y old, we idolized them since they were up before us and stayed out later than us with their kids every day.  We hope that when we start a family we will continue to travel just like they did.  And oh the nights, hearing the possums knocking over the garbage lids and cook stoves, fighting with one another, and running right by our tent then stopping right at our door to stare at us then squeal and run off once I notice and jumped three feet off my sleeping bag, also the bandicoot running around , big lizards blocking our hiking path and who knows what else running around in those woods.  Another great time was hearing and watching the birds that knock the baby magpies out of the nest and pretends to be the baby (although its huge, twice as big as an adult magpie) and makes ma and pa magpie look for food nonstop to feed it. This bird makes the most awful loud squawk constantly and there were a couple in the camp that was always hungry! Oh Australia we will miss you!



USA here we come!

01-11 thur 13-11 Magnetic Island

It was time to turn in the car so we hit the road early and headed toward the Townsville airport.  The drive was nice and we passed some small towns along the way, we were making good time when we hit road construction and had to wait half an hour at a stop.  This put us a little behind schedule but we still made it to the airport before 11am and turned in the car, we found a bus from the airport that would take us to the ferry terminal.  Along most of the road every 10-20 miles there were huge rope bridge crossings spanning the 4 lane highway for the tree kangaroos, we hope to see one making its way across but never did.

Once on the ferry the ride was a quick 20min, and we were picked up by Ian, the owner of our hostel,  in an old pea green Rolls Royce, boy  did we feel special!  Our hostel was a quick 5min drive from the ferry terminal, we were located right across the street from the ocean and away from the resorts on the other side of the island, it was such a great spot.  Our safari tent was wonderful, it had a large queen bed with very comfortable mattress and a fan so we could get some circulation at night, but the best part is we had the safari tent area to ourselves, and there was only a few other people there but we never really saw them.  

We lounged by the pool and went to a small local grocery store, and a bottle shop to treat ourselves to some Gin and Tonics, we borrowed the Pixar movie Cars to watch in the open air lounge area and enjoyed the movie, our G&T's, and watching all of the lizards and gecko's climb on the walls.  We slept well with the fan on, it is amazing how much more comfortable the humidity can be when you get that thick air circulating.

The next day we decided to explore the island so we walked down the road to check out a place that rock wallaby's lived, another family arrived just before us and brought some fruit reins and peels so we walked up on quite a few the wallaby's eating! They were super cute and the mom's had babies in their pouches so once the mom stopped hopping around the baby would poke it's head out to see what was going on, it was so so so cute! We watched them for a good 30mins before we walked back to the hostel to catch the bus to the start of the Fort's trial head.

The Fort's hike takes you up to a hill that had an army fort and hidden artillery back in WWII to fight off the Japanese, but the main reason for us going on this hike was to spot wild Koala's!  The trail was nice and did not have debris on it so I felt safe knowing if we were around a snake we would probably see it before we were up on it, but then I read a sign to the side of the trail that said "Stay on the trail, death adders are in this area", crap…when I read up on all the snakes in Aussie it said that most will feel your vibration and slither away to hide but the death adder keeps his ground and will not slink away. Oh how the Aussie wildlife keeps you alert and scared! The hike was pretty with gum and eucalyptus trees all around even though my eyes were on the trail 99% of the time which was good thing because someone had written with sticks “Koala” with an arrow pointing to the left of the trail. As we looked up we did see 1 koala sleeping in a ball and he did not even wake up as we were taking pictures and whispering in excitement.  We would have walked right past this Koala if someone had not let us know to look they are very hard to see!  We started our climb and a little further up the trail heard this snorting pig noise and we knew a koala was close, we stopped and looked around for a while and finally we saw a mama and a baby way up in a tree! We were so lucky they made that noise or else we would have walked right by them, the baby was trying to feed and the mom was falling asleep on the job.  We tried to get some pictures but both of their faces were behind branches and they don't move around much. We continued on the hike and looked at the old war ruins and climbed one of the standing towers to look at the great views.  On our way back down we saw that the mom and baby koala had still not moved, but we waited about 10min and the baby moved and climbed to a higher branch and then settled in to sleep facing us, we are so glad we waited and got some awesome photos!

Back at the hostel we met a new guest Edo from Israel.  He was overweight, super nerdy, and arrogant, we figured he will live with his mother for the rest of his life!  He was a nice kid but was a freaken expert on everything, Paul and I bit our tongues quite  a bit during our conversations since with these types of people it's all you can do.  It was still fun to talk to him about Israel and his military service, his job was to pick who was recruited into each job for their military service, interesting…

On our last day at magnetic island we rented stinger suites, snorkel gear and walked across the street to a reef Ian told us about.  We could not find the reef and my mask was not working so we took the bus to horseshoe bay on the other side of the island and hiked to B bay. The hike was not far and I was on the lookout for snakes, then the trail turned into a waterfall trail and we were not sure if we should continue or if this was normal, we decided to turn around.  Heading back we ran into a local walking in flip flops who asked us why we turned around and we told him that the trail was flooded, he told us we did not have much farther to go and this beach was the best on the island. He also asked if we had walking sticks, (we did not) he said he uses his to get snakes off the trail, but he only see's about 4 a year so we should be fine without one.  We decided to follow this crazy local in flip flops to the beach, he was right, we were just about there and it was beautiful. Once we arrived this local also informed us it was a nudist beach, yes he was a nudist, and if you ask me he needed to hit the gym before strutting his stuff. He was respectful though and walked and swam in the ocean on the other side from where we were. Paul snorkeled again without much luck, and since the guy said once you leave the bay's there are large tiger sharks (yikes!)  he stayed in the bay.  After that we enjoyed relaxing and soaking up the sun.
The next day we boarded the ferry to head back to the mainland.  It was hard to leave relaxing magnetic island, but we were excited to fly back to Sydney and see what the Blue Mountains were all about.

01-10-11

We had such a great night’s sleep and woke up to a beautiful morning, over breakfast we had to decide if we should drive the 3hrs to Townsville and stay the night there so we could drop the car off at the airport by 10:30m, or stay at Mission Beach.  There was a lot of activities to do a Mission and pretty much nothing to do in Townsville, so we decided to stay at Mission and get up early enough to make it to the airport.  We found out that the beach had a net in the ocean to keep the stingers out so we went to go swim in the ocean and hang out on the beach without stinger suites on!
The beach was so pretty, golden sand, Palm tree's, beautiful clear blue ocean and Dunk Island off in the distance, we thought we found paradise!  We decided to take our fist dip in the ocean without stinger suites since Sydney, and as we waded in we were shocked by how warm the water was, we knew it was the tropics but we felt like we were in a bath! With the heat and humidity outside the water was not refreshing at all, so we walked along the beach and watched some skydivers land just ahead of us. On parts of the beach there were thousands of little balls that were so soft to walk on, it was from the crabs digging there holes in the sand and rolling out the extra, it looked and felt really cool.  We took one last dip in the very warm water and then headed back to the pool hoping it would be cooler and offer us some relief from the heat.
The pool was everything we hoped it would be; we spent the rest of the afternoon sun tanning, swimming and reading.   At 3pm we took a free tour offered by the hostel to spot some wallaby's and possibly a Cassowary, we were thinking it would involve some sort of hiking but once in the van the gal told us it was a driving tour.  It was just Paul and I on the tour so the gal showed us some more of the town and took us to the spot where the wallaby' s come out of the tree's and on to this field, at first we only saw a few, but just at tree line in the shade we spotted a lot more lying around.  They were so cute, we even saw a grey kangaroo laying in someone's yard like it was a dog or a cat!  As we were driving to a second spot that wallaby's frequent Paul and I noticed a Cassowary in someone’s front lawn! Holy crap we could not believe it! We had the driver pull in front of the house trying to get the best angle for a picture; the Cassowary was an adolescent not too big (probably 6 feet tall) and just starting to grow the plate on his head.  He kept walking behind some bushes and would be totally hidden from view then pop out eating a different tree in the yard. Finally after waiting for him to emerge we got a great pic of him from the side and watched him walk along the street like he owned the place.  We felt so lucky to see one in the wild even if it was in a person's front yard.  We were told they are rare to see and even locals only see a few each year.  This silly little tour turned out to be a big jackpot for us, and the hostel owner was pleased to see us so excited when we came back she even came over to hear the story.  After the tour we had a nice dinner and played some cards a bit sad to leave Mission beach in the morning but excited to spot some Koala's on Magnetic Island.

01-09-11

It was a rough night for us, there were dogs that barked all night, some nocturnal critters that kept jumping on things and making them crash to the ground, and a neighbor who was up all night talking loud on his cell phone.  It was one of those nights that make you just want to cry.  At 4:50am the alarm went off, but it was still way to dark to see anything so we rested for another 20min for dawn to arrive before we went to the river.  It was a nice morning with a beautiful sunrise and we were hoping that after a sleepless night we would at least be able to see the shy platypus, and hopefully a tree kangaroo too.  
We went under the bridge a waited a few minutes before we went back down the trail to Paul's spot, at his spot we saw a shadow under the water close to the other side of the bank from us, at first we thought it was another turtle, but once it swam closer to us we could see it was a platypus! He was so cute, just a little guy swimming then he surfaced and continued to swim downstream.  It was hard to get a picture of him because he swam pretty fast and the lighting was not the best. Most of our still shots turned out blurry, so we tried to get video, but once we switched to video we stepped on a branch and the little guy dove under water and could not find him again. They are such shy little guys.  It sucks that we did not get good footage but we were so excited to have seen one in the wild it was defiantly worth getting up extremely early.

It was about 6am by time we were done viewing and we drove to curtain fig and walked along the main road trying to spot a tree kangaroo, this is where Damien suggested we go to see one. We must have used up all of our luck for the day on our platypus sighting as we did not see any tree Kangaroos, but it is such a pretty area that it was a nice morning walk regardless.  We returned to our hostel and ate some breckie and showered before we rolled up the tent, we contemplated staying another night since the place was so nice, but as far as activities go we had done much of what Yungaburra had to offer and the day trips you could take were on the way to our next destination.

We said our good bye's and hit the open road, first on our list was Wallaa Wallaa falls the most photographed falls in Aussie they say.  Coming from Oregon we have seen our fair share of waterfalls and they are always beautiful but we never get that excited or linger very long, and with Wallaa Wallaa falls we felt the same but it was slightly more exciting because it was surrounded by rain forest and exotic flowers, very pretty setting.  We found that there were two other falls along this drive and decided that since we were there we might as well complete the drive and see the other two.  I don't even remember the other falls names, they were not as pretty as Wallaa Wallaa so did a quick look and left.  

We hit the road again heading to Paronella Park dodging big dark thunderstorms all around when we spotted a park that Damien told us about that had a cool rainforest walk to a waterfall so we stopped to eat our lunch and check out the hike.  I was wearing a sundress but put on my boots so no more leaches would suck my blood and snakes could not bite through my boots,  Paul was brave(or just really hot) and kept his teva's on and shirt off.  The walk started off ok, but as we started to climb there was more and more debris on the trail that snakes could be hiding in, and the bush was so thick around us that it was hard to see in past 3 feet so any sort of rustle in the bush made us jump. We crossed a steam and right after the steam the trail became very bad, there were trees laying on the trail, branches ready to fall off any second, and the humidity was making the air thicker with every step.  We saw some dropping with seeds in it on the trail and were convinced it was Cassowary (they have ancient stomach that lets the seeds pass through them unharmed and they then scatter the seeds throughout the forest and help the forest grow if the Cassowary becomes extinct the forest will change dramatically in Queensland).  Paul really want s to see a Cassowary but I'm not sure I want to run into one on this trail, we also saw some holes that had been dun iin the ground but could not tell if it was Cassowary or wild pigs or who knows what other crazy animal it could have been.  Soon after crawling over and through a bunch of insect infested trees across the trail it was too much, and feeling vulnerable and soaking wet from humidity we made our way back to the car.  Luckily our only wild encounter was Paul walking through a spider web that had a HUGE spider on it and was sitting on his head, he moved the fastest I have ever seen with arms waiving around the air and making cuts that would have the NFL trying to draft him as a running back. One advantage of the spider being so big was I was able to see him fall to the ground in the blur that was Paul, that and I was pretty sure I felt the ground vibrated when the spider hit it!

Getting the last of the web out of Paul's hair he discovered that a leach had found him as well, but he caught it before it could start feasting on his foot.  We had made it to the car right when the thunder started to rumble and the rain came pouring down, and we were grateful to have A/C in the car.  The drive to Paronella was cool we were leaving the rain forest and heading into sugar cane fields, banana groves, and tea fields, but before we left the bush we saw a few places that had a small rope latter high across the road, this was for tree kangaroos to cross, how cool! The rain was hit and miss for most of the drive, but when we pulled into Paronella Park it started to down pour so we went to the covered cafe, got a snack and waited for the rain to pass. The staff was running around with umbrellas helping guests get to and from their cars in the downpour.

The story of the park is about a man from Spain came and fell in love with Queensland and wanted to build a castle, along with the castle he built a gravity fed irrigation system and the first hydro electric dam in Aussie to power his place.  It was much more that I was expecting (Paul did not care to stop, but he ended up being impressed too) the old building looked so cool with stone building surrounded by jungle and it gave the feeling that we were in the jungle book.  The grounds and walking paths that he made were so beautiful with plants I had never seen before, there were little streams and he even made a mud spa, it is not in use now but we did go into it and saw tiny minky bats that now live there! It was a beautiful place and full of history and we were glad we stopped.  Once done with the tour we were exhausted so we drove to straight to mission beach our next overnight stop.

Mission beach brought us back into the tropical rain forest and once we turned off the main hwy toward mission beach we started seeing signs about Cassowary crossings every few hundred feet.  Our Aussie book told us Mission Beach is home to a Cassowary conservation park and they have taken the Cassowary on as the official town mascot (there are large statues of the bird everywhere) so we slowed down and kept our eyes peeled.  We did not see any birds but the town was the perfect beach town.  We loved it, but we since it was still raining and there were puddles everywhere we were looking for cabins to stay in for the night, and every place had cabins were out of our budget so we found a hostel with a private room for half the cost of a cabin. Absolute Backpackers was a very nice big white hostel with a large dining/common area in the middle of the bottom floor, a nice private room for us and there was not too many people staying there.  We had A/C in our room, and there was a nice swimming pool too, we made some dinner and fell asleep quickly.

01-08-11

We were so excited to pick up our rental car and see more than the main highway and train tacks have showed us.  Again our final destination is only 4 hours down the coast but we drove in land for a little over an hour to our first spot Yungaburra for exploration.  The drive was so cool, we drove through farms of sugar cane with large mountains in the background and over a pass with huge tropical forests all around, we loved the drive, neither of us have spent time in this type of tropical environment, it is hard to put into words but the landscape has a certain draw to it even though the inhabitants scares the bejebers out of me. We climbed for about 40mins over a mountain that gave us incredible views of Cairns and the surrounding valleys and Paul spotted a sign for Cathedral fig off to the right so we went to see the hype over this tree.
We parked the car and walked about 20 yards when this towering tree came into view, this tree is large on the scale of the Redwoods and Sequoias, but these figs have roots that grown down all over the place.  The fig strangles the host tree and eventually kills it but has so many shoots that the tree is basically thousands of roots that can grow hundreds of feet in the air. It was such a cool site to see!
Yungaburra was only 15min down the road, and once we pulled into town we were surprised by its charming feel (we expected some kind of bush like town) it was very small but did cater to travelers with the streets  lined by cafe then B&B then cafe then Hotel, etc...  We spotted a sign for Curtin fig right past the platypus viewing deck, so decided to check it out, the curtain fig is the same kind of fig as Cathedral but its roots grew down like a curtain, it was equally impressive in size, but we both like cathedral fig better (I'm sure which ever a person see's first is their favorite since the initial shock sticks with you).  
Back in town we went to the information center to see about accommodations, and ask about the best time to see the platypus (around 5am or 7pm) the guy also showed us the way to very a close lake that we could swim in since they don't have croc's in Yungaburra because it is to cold (it is hardly cold but we are very high above sea level and it is noticeably cooler than Cairns).  Skeptical over the man's no croc statement we made our way to the first lake, there were 30-40 people there swimming (so i guess it's true)  and a lot of others bbq’ing and hanging out.  There was no sort of beach so we drove to the second lake that had a rain forest walk.
The lake was crowded as well but was also really pretty, surrounded by the thick tropical rain forest and mini fig trees that in a hundred years would be massive like the ones we had visited earlier.  We put on our sunscreen and started walking, about 5min into our walk it started to rain pretty hard.  We found a spot on the trail that had large trees that provided shelter from the rain and waited about 10min till the rain let up to carry on down the trail (life in the rain forest I suppose).  We spotted lots of beautiful butterflies and vines that were braided like ropes and stretched from one tree to the next, we were also on the lookout for pythons and tree kangaroo's however the only wild life we saw was the leech that attached himself to my heel and was having a feast, and I never set foot in the water!  After the leech I did have a minor beak down I felt violated from all of the bugs just using me for my blood, and Paul once again not even getting a mosquito bite.  Once we completed our hike Paul took a dip in the lake then we headed back to find some lodging for the night.

We found "On the Wallaby" a hostel really close to the platypus viewing and we figured we’d check it out. The place was really cool and Damien the manager told us we could set up a tent in the back yard for $10 cheaper than any of the motor camps, he also told us to go past the viewing platform and under the bridge for the best chances of seeing a platypus.  We booked a spot and grabbed our torches and headed to the river, we went to the spot Damien told us to and waited….waited….and waited…. once it was completely dark we left disappointed and agreed to get up at 4:50am (just before sunrise)  and walk back down to see if we had better luck.  We did see hundreds of fruit bats and lots of frogs on the way back, and a large snake that was dead thank goodness (just seeing it gave us the creeps) we could not tell what kind it was because most of it was flat.  Damien asked us if we spotted a platypus and we sadly said “no”.

We spent the rest of the night playing cribbage and listening  to a compilation of artists singing cover songs that some radio station in Australia had put together anytime an artist came for and interview, it was great.  We really liked it so Damien said he would transfer some on to our hard drive. He was such a cool guy and we loved the place with its big living quarters and clean facilities on the bottom floor of the hostel, we went to bed contemplating spending one more night but would see in the morning.

01-05-11 thru 01-07-11

We arrived in Cairns after about as much sleep you can have in a Greyhound, it was 6:30am and we were hungry, luckily we found a McDonald's not far from the bus station. Over brekky we took in Cairns, it is beautiful city, right on the ocean with a beautiful esplanade with shops, restaurants, flowers growing and swimming lagoons.  The lagoons were a necessity, already at 6:30am it was warm and the humidity was at 100%.  After brekky we took a cab to our motor camp since the thought of any physical activity in the humidity seemed horrible. The cab ride was cheap and the motor camp was great, we had reserved a tent site however since they had basic cabins with AC available for a $20 upgrade we jumped at the opportunity.   
Our cabin was so nice, a queen bed, a small couch, a.c., t.v,  and a mini fridge we totally scored.  We napped for a few hours then walked from the motor camp to the esplanade, it was a 30min easy walk along the ocean with crazy birds running around and our first crocodile warning signs.  We never did see a croc in Cairns, but we did see other cool marine animals like a mud skipper and weld,  while the tide was out.  We walked through art galleries that showed aboriginal art work which we have found a great love for, and filtered through many cute cafe's.  A high light of our days consisted of 50 cent soft serve McDonald's ice cream cones, and gorgeous views of the ocean and tropical rain forest that merged with it.

One morning we woke up early around 6am to take a rainforest hike, and try to beat some of the heat and humidity, silly us we were in the wet tropics and it is that way 24-7.  The walk had us go over a muddy river that as we were looking at a local asked if we saw or heard a croc, we said “no” and she told us that there is one around and to not get to close to the edge of the water. Shitt'n croc's can really make you walk faster!  Our walk left the river and headed through a beautiful park then for the bush and started to climb. We came to several signs that warned of Cassowary's in this forest and that they may be curious and could possibly attack, the signs then went on to explain that if a Cassowary attacks you should try and put a back pack in front of you since they kick high and drag their massive claw down your middle. How lovely, crocks, cassowary's and pythons everywhere, now I’m a little out of shape but the main reason my heart was beating so fast and my breathing was heavy was not from hiking but  was due to all of the dangers we might encounter.  Of course we made it to the top of the lookout no problem, I was relieved but Paul really wanted to see a cassowary in the wild.  Off the main trail was another trail that was a loop and was longer so we decided to check it out,  not long after we left the main trail the grass got waste high and it looked like the last time trail maintenance came through was years ago, we heard some rustling in the bushes and it was something big. After a short while the grass was too long and had too many places for snakes to hide and I'm convinced a Cassowary was stalking us so we turned around.  We really feel out of our element hiking here, we do not have gators and Paul does not have boots so bush wacking is a little sketchy.  We arrived back at our cabin by about 9am both soaked with sweat and ready to be out of the already hot day.
Since we had so much down time around Cairns we planned out the next phase of our trip. We would rent a car and drive the inland route to Townsville and catch a ferry to Magnetic Island, stay for 3 day's then fly back to Sydney. Townsville is only 4 hours away but we planned on taking 3 days to get there since we there are a few sights to see along the way and we wanted to get back into the bush.
On our last night in Cairns we went out to dinner, I really wanted to try Barramundi fish and Paul also wanted some good sea food (other than fish n chips).  We settled on a restaurant and were both extremely pleased with our meals, Paul got the catch of the day which the waiter told us was salmon, but it was a white fish (?, whatever dude) it was good, but we  both thought the Barramundi was the best.

01-04-11

We slept really hard since we were so tired from the night before, but we were a little stiff getting up, sleeping on a deck with no pad might have been the culprit.  Our snorkel was at 6am and not for very long since we were heading back to Airlie beach. Paul jumped in, I stayed in the zodiac since I was not awake quite yet, and I took some pics of the reef, Paul snorkeling and fish that I could see from the surface.  After about 20-30min everyone was back on the boat for our two hour ride back, I fell asleep on the way and Paul enjoyed the views as we sailed away.
Once we docked a manager met the boat and offered us a line of BS and $50 to do laundry at the marina for our now infested clothes, luckily we had very little of our things with us, however all of my bites started to appear. Most of us were just mad about the fact that they knew the bugs were there and still let us go back out.  Paul and I spent the next two hours washing and drying our clothes, then once the main load was done we changed and washed the outfits we were wearing off the boat. For our stuff we could not wash we put them in a black plastic garbage bag and let it bake in the sun.  As we were washing we watched them load up another group of people on the same boat and prepare to sail away, bed bugs still intact.  We were fortunate that our Greyhound bus did not leave until 8:30pm, so after two hours of washing we walked back to the sailing company to get our packs out of storage and to ask for some money back.  Paul had to write out a statement as to why we should get some money back and they would pass it on the boat’s owner, it was up to them if they wanted to give any money back.  
After picking up our supplies we got some lunch and relaxed the rest of the afternoon looking at the beautiful bay and counting my bug bites. Soon enough the bus came and it was on to Cairns and our next adventure.

01-03-11

After a few hours of sleep on the hard deck with just our beach towels we woke up to a beautiful day with flat water and partly cloudy skies, it is hard to stay in a bad mood even with only a couple hours of sleep when you are in such a beautiful place.  We were  fortunate that all the other guests felt the same way, it was a terrible situation but we all made the best of it and looked forward to our day on Whitehaven beach and our second snorkel spot.  The captain made a direct line for Whitehaven beach and after a couple hours of sailing we pulled into a beautiful bay, dropped anchor beside 10 or 12 other boats and scooted to shore on the snorkeling dingy.  Once assembled on shore we set out on a nature hike through the island jungle and up to a lookout at the top of the island.  We saw several huge spiders bigger than a typical adults opened hand and a few significantly smaller about the size of Shabree's outstretched hand, we also passed a small eco tour group that was experimenting with eating the green ants that are so common everywhere here.  They seemed to approve of the taste but I think our whole group was glad to walk quickly by and miss participating.  The lookout had amazing views of the white sand beach which we learned was 98% pure silica (apparently they made the Hubbell telescope lens out of the sand).  We also had a good view of the bay and some of the other islands including a much smaller island just off shore that Jai informed us had the largest concentration of Death Adders in the world, as he put it "good island to stay away from".   Once we had all soaked in the view it was down to the beach.  Being that we were still in deadly stinger territory the hot beach was almost too much as anytime a cool off was in order it involved pulling on a full body black neoprene suit that was wet from previous swims, had been sitting in the 32 deg C (90 F) sun and of course had collected a fair amount of sand in all the wrong places, no fun.  The beach did have small lemon sharks swimming around and we were able to see a few rays so it was well worth it.  We beach bummed for a couple of hours before being rounded up to head back to the boat for some afternoon snorkeling.  
Our boat consisted of 21 people 1. Crazy Captain - skinny guy with a thin creepy mustache and a thick accent from who knows where, an asshole to Jai and had all kinds of lies for us guests on bed bugs; seemed to think our toxic cabin smelled fine even though he hadn't been down there and thought he could convince us of the same; liked to brag to us about his personal beautiful sail boat that he did only high end tours for "exclusive clients" on, yeah right that’s why he was stuck on a boat with 21 tourists and 25 million bed bugs, business must have been booming for him.  2. Jai (deck hand) a young kid at 24, great fun and very helpful he wants to learn as much about the boats and then head to the Caribbean and captain or work on boats there.  Jai was on his second back to back and had to go directly back out as soon as we returned.   3. Kitty, our cook/hostess - she was a nice gal, really knew her way around a boat and she did help Jai now and again with getting the sails set-up and keeping things organized. 4. Dotar, Kass, Mom, and aunt Hazel.  Dotar, mom and Hazel are from Israel and Kass, Dotar’s girlfriend is from Melbourne.  We had a great time chatting with them, mom told Shabree, "you should not live away from your mom" in her very thick accent, don’t think she liked having Dotar so far away in Australia. Hazel spoke English perfectly and she even lived in San Diego for a few years.  Kass works at Adidas in Melbourne and she and Dotar have been together for four years.  It was interesting to hear them talk about Israel and to reminisce with travelers that are actually more hated than Americans, they were talking about their flight over and how they had to fly for like 30 hours when a direct path over the middle east could get them there in 10 or 15.   5. Brian, a goofy guy who grew up in Chicago, but has lived in Austria for the last 45 years.  He just got divorced after 25 yrs and decided to clear his mind on a world trip, but 10 days before he left he told us he had fallen in love with a woman so he is excited to get back and see where it goes. 6. Paul and his French girlfriend, he is originally from Australia but has lived in France for the last 7 years, he speaks French like a native, we had fun listening to them speak. Paul is now living in Spain, he works for the European Union and analyzes data about environmental issues, his girlfriend is from Paris and now lives in London, she loves London but they wished they could live in the same place. Paul is taking her around Australia to meet his family and friends.  These two were very chill and a lot of fun to talk with. 7. A couple from Taiwan, they did not speak English well so they kept to themselves, but they were goofy and always laughing, and yes, taking pictures. 8.  The 4 Swiss beach volleyball players that spoke French/German, they were very nice and extremely goofy, and one of them is living in Aussie right now for his work. 9. Two girls from Germany, they kept to themselves. 10. Another two girls from Germany who were super cute and are nannies in Wagga Wagger.
Once the whole gang was on the boat and lunch was served we headed out again. The second dive spot for the day was really cool, we were dropped off from the boat and had to swim to the reef, it felt strange not leaving from the beach and being in "open water.  The swim was through clear water with a sandy bottom 40-50 feet below, as we swam towards shore the reefs started to appear along with the fish.  There were amazing little stand alone reefs and more intense interconnected networks as you got closer to the island and the fish were everywhere, schools of them.   I was having major problems with my mask and snorkel, water kept getting in and then my contacts started to shrivel in my eyes. When I was heading to the beach to adjust again I saw something that was big and gray swim by really fast. I thought “oh god it's a shark”, I got Paul's attention and told him I might have saw a shark, he laughed and told me I did not see one.  I saw that no one else was frantically leaving the water so I decided to keep on exploring. Soon my mask leaked for the last time and I swam to the zodiac Jai was in watching us in.  In the boat I saw that gray thing again, it was a very large fish, I don't remember the name but he was big and fast, these are the some of the same fish you could hear and see eating the reef when snorkeling.  A lot of other fish were appearing around the boat, I saw two small squid and when we were getting closer they changed color to look intimidating.  With the really clear water I saw more on the zodiac then I could see through my mask. Once Paul and the rest of the boys came back on board and we had a nice dinner everyone started to get ready to go to bed early to sleep since the previous night no one got any.  Paul and I slept under a big yellow tarp on the front of the boat with towels and our cloths for blankets.  We could see big tropical thunderstorms around but luckily non passed up and thank goodness for warm weather.  

01-02-11

We were so glad we booked our cabin since it rained hard most of the night, and it was still raining as we walked to the bus station.  We droped our packs off at the sailing office for storage and walked to the Marina with the very small bags they provided us to bring on the boat.  It sprinkled on us most of the walk, but we heard that once at sea the weather usually gets better, we waited at Gloria's cafe on the dock for a crew member to take us on board.  Soon Kitty came up and did a role call and asked who the couples/families were as she would put us together for the sleeping accommodations.  There were 17 guest and 3 crew members on the SV Whithaven, the boat was big but once we all sat down on the back covered deck it seemed to be much smaller, and I thought how are we going to be on this boat for two days and two nights.  Captain Dieter gave us a run down on the boat and our itinerary for the trip, once he was done talking we set out of the harbor and Kitty showed everyone to their accommodations.  Paul and I were the last one's called and to our delight we had a private room at the very front of the boat, we totally scored! The room was small and nice but it had a very strong smell, we thought they must have put on some wood varnish.  We dropped our bags and went on the deck, we had 3 hrs before we made it to Blue Bird or Blue Bell  Bay our first snorkel site. 

The rain stopped once we were about an hour into our journey, the blue sky was beautiful with green island dotting the horizon, I love the tropics!  We were close to our first snorkel spot and Jay, the kid that did everything on the boat, took around an insurance form that we all had to sign, it stated that there are dangerous jelly fish in the water and we enter at our own risk, and if we get stung we incur all cost of getting helicoptered and hospital ect. also we had to list a next of kin and a phone number to let them know if we died. I was aware of the jellies and knew we had to be put on stinger suites (thin wetsuites) before we were allowed into the water, but the form made me think for a second if I was being stupid. Then Jay told us there it is rare to see the jellies around the islands, only two people had ever died in the Whitsundays and that we'd be ok, I also saw other boats with snorkelers already in the water so I figured I would try it.

Stinger suites, fins, water noodle for  me, and snorkels we loaded on a zodiac and Jay drove us to the beach.  We walked into the water and Paul held my hand as we left the land and floated our way along the surface, it was not long before the coral started to appear and a dory fish swam right to my googles to have a look, then like they appeared out of no where were thousands of fish! When I saw my first parrot fish I got excited they are so colorful and have these funny beak mouths, we could hear them eat the coral or something on the coral it was a faint scratching sound.  We also saw what we called clams in the reef all you could see was the s shaped opening that would close when you swam over them. At one point swimming Jay threw some fish food in the water right above us, in half a second the fish were there eating away and we were right in the middle of it I could not even see Paul the fish were so thick, it was really cool.  We saw so many fish and different types of coral it was amazing, every inch had new life and new colors and shapes of corral, it was so exciting to see all and just below the surface!

After a long snorkel we headed back to the boat for some hot tea and cookies, people started to chat with one another and we sailed on to Sid Bay our anchor for the night. Our captain chose Sid Bay because it was  a very safe place to anchor since it was surrounded by a few islands and reefs, there was a storm moving inland from the ocean.  We saw lots of lightening but heard no thunder, the lightening really lit up the sky and it seemed weird to be on a boat watching the storm.  We anchored and waited for dinner, we ate late around 9:30 or 10pm but it was good chicken curry.  We had a glass of wine and visited with a girl from Paris who is living in London and here on vacation with her Australian boyfriend who lives in Spain now. Soon we were all tired from snorkeling and being in the sun, we all retired to bed.  

Our room still smelled strong even with the roof windows open but we figured it would air out so I fell asleep, I not sure how long I was asleep before Paul woke me up (I don't think it was long) he said he could not sleep and the fumes were giving him a head ache. He also figured whatever these fumes were it was probably not a really healthy environment to sleep in.  Once I was awake I knew what he meant the smell was strong and we had no air flow coming in.  Next Kitty came in and apologized for waking us but she needed to get some sheets under our bed since some people had to sleep on the deck because they had bugs in there room. Say what?!?!? Now we wanted to get the heck out of our toxic smelling room which made sense that it was fumes to kill the bugs and there was possible bugs still in it! Once arriving on deck we saw we were not the only ones with a problem 15 people were sprawled out under the covered part of the deck sleeping or trying to sleep on small pads with blankets or towels for covers.  The captain was in a bivvy sack / hammock thing hanging above the table and seemed to be sleeping right through all the commotion and the other two crew members were on top of the roof where we were not allowed to go.  We tried several locations to sleep with most spots already taken and after going between getting sprinkled on on the front deck or finding bugs in our blankets on the lower cabin we grabbed two beach towels and pillows and spent the last few hours of the night on the front deck praying for the thunder storms all around to miss us.

01-01-11

Holy crap it's 2011 and our trip will last 23 more days!  We ran into town to check in with our sail boat company for tomorrows trip, and went to a second had book store for a new book.  We moved into a cabin for the night, so our tent would be dry when we packed it (even thought eh days have been dry and nice it has rained hard every night). We spent the evening packing and relaxing in the air condition cabin. Not a bad way to start 2011.

12-31-10

We were up early and were really "out of it" we had to check in and told the lady we took spot 54 she let us stay as long as we did not plug into the power. We showered and headed into town, I had a waxing appointment at 10:30am and had to find the place, along with finding some brekkie.  We found a McDonald's, fueled up and walked around checking things out.  The town was really pretty, thick rainforest on one side and beautiful blue ocean and clear bays, but we had to share with thousands of tourists for new years! Around the bays where large signs waring of the dangerous box jellyfish, and the had liters of vinegar attached, apparently if you get stung you need to poor the vinegar over the affected area then go get help, otherwise you might stop breathing and die. Lovely! 

After my appointment we picked up groceries and caught the bus back to camp, all I wanted to do was take a nap but the tent was so hot, we put on our swimmers and went to the pool.  The pool was the perfect temperature and felt so good to get in and cool off.  It was very relaxing hanging out by the pool in this kind of humidity there is not much you want to do without water being around.  

We took another shower, made some dinner and headed back into town for the 9pm firework show we heard about from lots of people.  It is lame but we could not stay up for the midnight show, if we had gotten any sleep the night before we would have.  In town we picked up a bottle of champagne and headed toward the beach, it was 8pm and the beach was pretty full already with families and little kids running round with sparklers, we found a good spot and opened our bubbly.  

At 10pm with no fireworks and no more bubbly we headed back to the camp, I was falling asleep on Paul's shoulder and both of us were not in the mood to deal with a bunch of young drunks. We were asleep so fast that we hardly noticed everyone partying around us.  At midnight I heard a loud boom from the fireworks and people say happy new year, two seconds later I was back in a very sound sleep.

12-30-10

Check out time was 10am so we had our breakfast and packed again, our flight left at 4:15pm and the train to the airport took 20min so it would be a long day either sitting at the airport or walking around with our packs on.  Paul asked the hostel if we could leave our packs with them and pick them up around1pm, to our surprise they would keep our packs and we could use all the facilities until 6pm that night! Perfect, it was the best weather we had in Brisbane, the sky was blue with no rain clouds in sight and the air was very hot and humid so we decided to lay out by the hostel pool.  The pool was not crowded and with the sun so intense Paul loved jumping in to cool off, while I soaked it up and read my book. When it got close to our departure time we took a shower, ate some lunch and walked 5min to the train station.  When we walked up the steps to the station I was already drenched with sweat when a lady asked if we were going to the airport, we said yes, then she started saying something about a friend of hers that either she could not find or was going there then she said "look I'm a teacher by trade I can show identification that I am and I can give you a ride to the airport". We quickly said no thank you! This lady was up to some scam, her story changed and it was very akward, hopefully she did not convince some other backpackers tot get into her car/torture chamber and rob them.

Our flight was very quick and when the doors opened for us to walk down the steps and to the airport the humidity about knocked us backward! There were dark looking storm clouds over the horizon broken up by palm trees everywhere, we walked through the thick air and were excited to be in the tropics! After picking up our packs we waited a bit over an hour for our Greyhound to come.  While waiting we over heard workers on their smoke break talk about all the flooding they are having around Queensland, it is the rainy season but they have gotten the most rain they've seen in 70yrs.  I thought, "oh goodness we have come right into the crazy weather", uhg look out for crock's in the puddles!

The bus ride went by fast, the road was fine (we flew over most of the flooding) and we arrived at Airlie beach around 9pm. As we got our packs from under the bus and it started to down pour! We ran under the bus stop but it was crowded by others from our bus and people waiting for a very late bus to take them south toward Brisbane.  We sat and waited and watched the amount of rain that was coming out of the sky, we were shocked and we lived in Portland so we know a thing or two about rain. There was a quick break so we ran to the bathroom a few yards away, inside there was tinny pink lizard/geckos on the walls, so cute! The rain started again and kept coming, soon the parking lot was turning in to a swimming pool.  We talked to a kid at the bus stop who told us where all the hostels were located, we had a tent spot reserved but we did not know the way and really didn't feel like setting up at tent in a tropical storm.  

After 30 minutes of hanging out at the bus shelter rain let up and we set out to see if we could find a dry place to stay for the night.  Airlie beach was crazy, there were bars connected to all the hostel and lots of young kids partying it up. Four hostels on the main drag were booked which was frustrating because we were tired but a relief since it was loud and a few groups of drunk guys walked past us like they were looking for a fight starring us down! WTF! Good thing I had all of our knives handy just in case of emergency! Ugh, at this point it was 11pm all the places were full and we were waiting for this guy to come and tell us if the last hostel was full or not. While waiting two girls asked us if we were staying at the place or not, we told them we were trying and were waiting for they guy to come and let us know, they seemed to want to tell us something but left, a few minutes later they showed back up and said they had an extra bed in their dorm room, it was just them and there friend. How sweet, we told them we would wait for the guy and if he did not have a spot for us we would give them a call.  The stupid guy never showed, and while the offer was nice of the girls we didn't want to get into drama with the hostile or crash the girls party so we said F-it lets go to the motor park.  A guy who told us his hostel was full did tell us we needed to take a cab out to our motor camp and told us the name, so we got a cab and headed to our new home for a few days.

Our camp was a ways out of town so we were grateful not to walk it with our heavy packs, the lady said she would leave us our spot number in a blue box infront of reception, she did not.  We decided to walk around and set our tent up in the driest spot we could find even if it was a powered site.  After about 10min we found a spot that was not dry but it was not flooded, it was also one of the highest spots in the camp, there were sand bags stacked on some of the camp roads which made us a little uneasy incase of potential flooding.  5min after setting up the tent the down poor came back.  We were both overly tired and hot so we could not fall asleep and when the rain would start again it was so loud!  It was a long night but we did manage to stay dry.

12-29-10

The bed was comfortable but it took me awhile to fall asleep, it was not the drunk kids that ket me up it was the thought of a taipan under my bed but I was to scared to look so it freaked me out for a good hour before I fell asleep. This was our last day in Brisbane and we needed to make a plan for the next week at least, so we woke up at 7am and like old people we were the only ones up so early. Over breakfast we surfed the net for our next adventure heading north up the coast.  Six hours and a lot of money later we have our plan.  Fly from Brisbane to Mackay, take a 2hr bus from Mackay to Airlie beach, stay till the 2nd at a motor camp then hop on a sail boat for 2 days and 2 nights around the whitsunday islands come back the 4th! Then on the 5th take a long bus ride from Airlie beach to Cairns and stay at a motor camp in Cairns for 3 days. This is what we have for now, we are crossing our fingers that the weather gets better.  

Since this planning took up most of our day and energy we went for a walk around the river and soaked up all that brisbane had to offer. On our way back we found Paul a pair of nice sunglasses, he lost his other pair about time, they needed to be thrown away several months ago since he could hardly see through all the scratches.

12-28-10

We woke up early to get packed have some breakfast and get to the flamenco cafe. We needed to find a place to stay for the night and I wanted to go to Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary to see Koala's up close and to hug one! Paul found us a hostel to stay in, we called and they had availability for shared rooms and private rooms so we thought we would try a shared room since it was cheaper and we could tough it out for a night or two. It was great we found a place to stay, however it was a few blocks from the train station, so we had to walk back the way we came the previous day, at least we knew the way! I was rested so I could keep up with Paul and our walk took half the time, but the rain came back and hit us again.  We found our hostel which was located on hostel row, there were six hostels in a row and they all seemed to be over flowing with 18 yr olds dressing in awful 80's clothes.  Our's was no better, we followed the loud music to reception and got the low down on the place, it was clean, but also overrun with 18yr olds acting like fools. Thank goodness Paul could read my mind and we booked a private room! This was the largest hostel I have ever stayed in, 3 floors of rooms, a pool, bar, cafe, ect. the kitchen was large but with so many people it was hard to find space.  Our room was nice and the bed was comfortable, we threw our bags in the room, ate some lunch, and then set out to find the bus that would take us to the Koala's.

We waited at the bus stop about 10min after the bus should have arrived, finally another  bus stopped and the driver told us that it was a public holiday (funny i thought that was yesterday) and our bus was leaving from another street (just one over) he did not tell us the time so we moved with a quickness.  We found our knew bus and hopped on, the ride was very jerky I think our driver was very distracted or he just liked to slam on the brakes a lot.

We arrived at Lone Pine around 3pm, I was a little stressed because they close at 5pm but our bus comes at 4:30pm and I wanted to make sure we saw everything.  Following the path in we spotted big lizards just laying on the rocks, and scrub turkeys (they are everywhere) walking around like they owned the place, and just ahead was the Koala's!  They kept the Koala's out in the open, they were not behind glass or cages, there was a wall about waist high to keep guests backhand trees under little canopies in the middle and the Koala's in them! They had a few different area's the kindergarden with super little and super cute babies, a retirement home for the more mature Koala's, the bachelor pad, and the family area! We walked up to a little amphitheater at the end of a Koala presentation and the keeper was going to grab a Koala so people could pet him on the back.  I quickly knocked a few kids out of he way and drug Paul behind me to the front, only one family was standing in my way, no problem they would only be a minute…the minute never ended, the stupid dad had to take the picture of each on of his family members petting the Koala, but each picture they were all petting him at the same time so he held up the line taking 5 of the same freak'n picture. I had enough so I joined the family and started petting the Koala, he was not happy and said excuse me but I ignored him and pulled Paul in to give the Koala a pet too, the guy is lucky he didn't get chin checked blocking me out when there is a Koala to pet.  

Feeling so lucky to have pet a Koala we headed toward the Kangaroo enclosure.  It was a large field that we entered through a gate, I thought it was a bit excessive to keep the roo's in, but as I turned I saw a Emu to close for comfort, great all I needed was to have giant birds walking around the field as well. It is always exciting to see an animal close up and in your personal space (excluding snakes, grizzly bears and for me any kind of birds) we all know what a Kangaroo looks like but to have them all around you is really cool. These were gray roe's medium sized, that when they stood up tall on their hind legs they quickly get tall and intimidating.  Some people were feeding them some food you could buy and the roe's ate it right out of there hands.  We did not have food but Paul tricked a young roo into letting us get close by feeding him the grass that he pulled from the ground. This little one let us pet him for a while and liked when Paul scathed behind his ears he was so cute! There was a couple different kinds of Kangaroo's so we walked to see the other ones, that were actually separated from us visitors.  They were the red kangaroo's which are the largest, they can stand up to 6.5 feet tall and can jump very high and pack a strong kick with those hind legs, these kanga's live in the hottest part of the outback and can live without much water. They had a wall with kangaroo heights on it so you could see how a person's height measured up to all the Kanga's and wallaby's, I was only taller than two wallabies the Kanga's owned me. Walking around the field we came by some smaller wallabies that were dark and had some yellow markings, they were shy compared to the grey kanga's and while we could get close they did not let you pet them, they hopped off which was fun to watch.  In the field area was an enclosure that was open just waist high to keep us out, it was home to two wombats, the wombats were larger than I expected them to be and were built like a brick s@$% house! They had signs posted letting people know not to lean over and pet them since they will bite and by the looks of it they would probably bite your fingers off. They had the cutest sleepy looking faces!

Out of the Kangaroo field we watched more Koala's, saw some two fresh water crocks "freshies" and three lizards including the largest one in Aussie. I would have taken a ton of pictures, but the battery died and we were both very upset since not everyday we could get so close to these exotic animals.  We moved fast through the lizards, they are cool to see but they just sun themselves on rocks most of the day so there is no need to linger.  We came across a high fenced off area with dense foliage it was home to the Cassowary, these birds look like they could be dinosaurs, they are shorter than an ostrich have black feathers a bright blue neck, bright red and yellow gobbler thing and a large plate that stands straight up from there head at least six inches high, but there feet are disproportionally large and they have been known to attach with there feet!  They are crazy looking, I could not imagine running into one of those in the wild, birds are freaky.

Next we made our way to the platypus building, this is what Paul was most excited to see and we entered the dark building and looked for the goofy looking thing.  It was set up like an aquarium most of the viewing showed under water but we could not see it. Finally something caught my eye hiding behind a log, all we could see was a small tail and little feet.  We waited for him to move from behind the log after about 5min he dove down so we could see him. He was much smaller and stubbier than either of us thought and he was so cute.  He swam around for a bit and Paul got the last two pics out of our battery but since it was out of juice we could not get the primo shots we had wanted. He was still fun to watch, and the strangest animal I have ever seen. 

We passed some more Koala's and beautiful birds including my favorite laughing Kookaburra's, it was so funny because the one in the cage started making calls and soon we noticed there were several wild ones that had flown in and were talking back to him!  We watched some dingos, and made our way to the tasmanian devils. Again every animal I think is going to be small is larger than I expected, and this is true with the devils as well. They  had large heads and bodies like small pigs, we watched them as they were being feed some mince (raw ground meat) they were going crazy over it and wrestling with eachother. 

We saw everything the park had to offer except the Echidna ( it is nocturnal and can only be seen early morning or late night) but Paul did see it sleeping in a hollow log. All we could make out was it's spiny outline, but it was better than nothing.  We did make a quick pass through the snake house, I felt it was important to know what snake was what. I was nuts looking at the worlds #1 and #2 most venomous land snakes and lucky for us they live in the Queensland state.  The Taipan and the King brown, yuck they gave me the hibie jeebyz's. 

It was a full day and we came back to the hostel and grabbed a few beers and watched all the awkward kids try and impress one another, while we felt like the old couple in the corner that they were making fun of!  The hostel was really quiet during the day and it seemed half of the place did not wake up until 2pm, seems quite a few of the kids especially in this hostel are here to party hard and not quite as interested in the sights.

12-27-10

5:00am wake up call the train was arriving a few minutes ahead of schedule.  Some point late in the night Paul and I found a configuration that worked for us both, Paul curled up and slept on the floor, and I on the seats. Now I started on the floor but could not find a comfortable spot and Paul could not sleep on the seats so we switched and to both our surprise got maybe 2-4 somewhat decent hours of sleep.  

Brisbane greeted us with clouds, sprinkles and air so thick it felt like a steam room, but since it was so early we were not sure what the weather would bring.  We found an information booth in the station and asked about directions to our hotel, the guy gave Paul a map but said our hotel was not on it but pointed off the map to an invisible area that the hotel was in (how helpful) asking next about transportation to the invisible place he said he did not know and we should ask the guy in the ticket booth. We asked the ticket booth guy and he said he did not know, maybe the bus to the cultural center would get us close, but we could check upstairs with the guys on the bus plat form. Lugging our heavy bags up some stairs to the bus platform we were shocked to see no busses and no people. We sat there for a few and starred at the reader board that said next bus 20min. Ugh…I  asked to see the map the guy gave us and after a few minuets not only do I see the street our hotel is on but our hotel is shown and marked on the map right above the invisible area he told us to go to. Now knowing the route we decided to walk.  I forgot how tired I was and how heavy my pack was, I tried to keep up with Paul but my legs wanted to go there own pace.  The slow walk was pretty, Brisbane has a large river flowing through it with many bridges connecting each side (similar to Portland, but the bridges don't lift for barges, and some are for pedestrians only) We walked over a cool bridge and saw how high and brown the river was, (Tropical cyclone Tamie has been bringing heavy rain to most of Queensland) lots of trees bases were under water and some buildings along the river path had sand bags by the doors in case it got any higher.  I kept scanning the river for crocks, we were so close to the rivers edge on the foot path I knew one of those sneaky guys was waiting!  The city was dead and very peaceful and we were able to walk the couple of mile to the hotel on all bridges and footpaths, it was a very modern feeling city with lots of pedestrian access lined with cafes, performing art centers, and museums, there was even a city beach/swimming pool along the river walk.  It took us about an hour walk to the hotel, and the last 5min it started to down pour on us! 

We walked into the hotel around 7am dripping wet, we could not check in till maybe 10am, so we stored our large packs and took the computer to find a coffee shop/bakery to get something to eat.  The desk clerk at the hotel told us that it was a national holiday (they are recognized boxing day on Monday since it fell on a Sunday) so we might have some difficulty finding a place. He was right, the area we were in was shut down, most places were closed until the 4th on Jan. and Subway did not open until 9am! Very hungry and tired I could feel a melt down coming on so we popped into a bakery and ordered ham and cheese croissants and shared  an apricot danish.  We ate the danish while we waited on the croissants it was so good and could not wait for the main course.  The bakery did not have seating so we took the croissants across the way to Flamco coffee, our coffees were really good and they guy said we could link on to his internet for free! Things were looking up, until I took a bite of the croissant, something tasted bad, I was not sure if it was the ham or cheese or both so we scrapped the grossness off and enjoyed our plain croissants! 

At 10am we went back to the hotel and were relieved to find our room was ready and they upgraded us to a larger room with a small kitchen! Thank goodness I was struggling keeping my eye's open at the coffee shop and could not wait to sleep in my first bed in about 3 months! The rest of the day could not have been more perfect, it consisted of me not leaving the bed all day, just a quick trip to the store for some dinner then back to bed! Outside monsoon rain fell all day which made being incredibly lazy doing nothing but sleeping, eating and watching tv in our hotel room even more perfect.

12-26-10

Boxing day(still not quite sure why they call it that), and our last in Sydney.  We woke up to rain, and were forced to pack a very wet tent.  With our packs loaded and very heavy we made our way to the central train station.  We checked our large packs in early and since our train did not leave until 4:12pm we had a few hours to kill.  We took the train back to Circular Quay and headed up Pitt St. to check things out.  Pitt street is one of the busy shopping streets that is lined with one shop after another, there were lots of people out and about because it was boxing day, but soon the road access ended.  At the road end everything was brick pavers and several blocks of huge mall. Walking in the mall was probably the most people I have ever seen at once! It looked like popular movie openings everywhere with long lines out of all the designers stores to catch the sales and it was afternoon these people still had not gotten in. Shocked we tried to maneuver our way through the crowd, it would have been an awesome few blocks to window shop since it is only pedestrian traffic and cafe's in the middle that sell booze, but since there were easily 5 million people out I lost my patience very quick.   We cut over to the next block , there were still people but it was no where near the mess of Pitt St.

We decided to head back to the central platform and just wait out the last hour at the train station to get away from the boxing day crowds.  The train station provided some good people watching and the hour flew by, so we hopped on the train ready for a change of scene.  Our car was about half full when we left Sydney, but they said it was a full train so we would be making a few stops along the way.  About our 4th stop we picked up a couple, I'm not sure where they were from but I think they were Aussie, the girl had two Louie Vuitton purses and they looked real however her look turned cheap quick with all of her over the top fake diamond jewelry.  They sat on the other side of the train and 3 rows back at first and after the next stop they were moved right across from us and she kept saying something about moving to first class.  Soon two train cops came over and with the train equivalent to a flight attendant they were talking to the couple. Paul over heard that they had booked train tickets but the missed the date and thought they could just jump on and sit in the same seats, when the person who booked the correct date showed up they made up some story that the train made a mistake.  It took atlas an hour or two to figure out and they were lectured several times by the train attendant.  However, the train attendant got to the bottom of it and they had to pay for new tickets, unfortunately they remained right across from us and annoyed the hell out of me!

The lights on the train turned off around 10pm, we thought we would sleep well since we had so much more room than on a plane, however this was not the case, it was a long 11 hour train ride and we were both exhausted and stiff when we rolled into Brisbane at 5:30am.