Home For Christmas………………..

As many of you that we have traveled with will already know we made changes to our flights in June to be able to fly home and surprise our family and friends for Christmas. We had decided that it would be a nice surprise for everyone but also a much nicer time for us to return to the UK rather than the planned mid-Jan.

Liam was also unaware, until he arrived in the USA that we would be returning on the same flight as him, landing in the UK 21^st Dec.

So the travelling was over and our bags were packed for the last time. We were a little concerned about the weight of our bags as we had emptied clothes and filled the bags with lots of Christmas presents but we came in under the weight limit.

It was a strange feeling to be finishing such a long trip and waiting in the airport for the final flight home but we were both excited to be seeing family and friends and surprising them just before Christmas.

We had left the UK on 31^st Jan and flown with Virgin. The stickers from the flight with the date were still on our passport covers and now another Virgin sticker was placed next to this with our return date 20^th Dec (landing 21^st Dec).

The nine hour flight gave us plenty of time to reflect on what has been the most incredible year and will most likely never be topped….

Starting in Kenya and ending in the USA we visited Tanzania, South Africa, India, China, Hong Kong, Thailand, Laos, Malaysia, Vietnam, Cambodia, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand.

We have covered in excess of 45,000 air miles and countless miles over land and sea in almost all vehicles imaginable.

All of the countries were so different but all had something we loved from landscapes to food and people there wasn’t a country which stands above the rest.

We met many new people as well as catching up with those who have moved to far flung countries but the highlight was meeting the real people of the countries we visited who could not have been more welcoming and accommodating. Many of the people we met had very little material wealth and many lived in poor conditions but most were happy and proud people who were excited to show us their country, culture and traditions. No trip of this kind would be complete without the odd annoying tout, con man, thief etc. but this also makes for fun and varied travel.

Aside from the local people we encountered the trip would not have been the same without many of the great fellow travellers we met and the stories we shared. Hopefully some of those people will be reading this blog so a big thank-you to all those we met especially the “Gappers” and “Strayer’s”. We know many of you are still travelling, spread out across the world and we hope your travels remain safe and fun until you return.

One nice thing about meeting all of these people is of course the opportunity to visit them in their home countries. Those of you in Ireland, Netherlands, Germany, Denmark be prepared we are planning lots of small trips in 2012!

So back to the story of our return…..

We arrived weary but excited to Gatwick at 11am on 21^st Dec and were soon coming out of arrivals to the familiar face of Ian (Emma’s Step Dad) who was the only person “in” on our surprise return home. It was very surreal to have landed in the UK and it felt as it had done many times in the year that we had just landed in the next destination. As you can see Matt wasted no time in having his first Costa in some time!

We were whisked back to Emma’s for a quick turnaround and were soon off surprising our families. We had two little nieces to meet and a wedding video to watch – Incredible how much can happen in a year.

Christmas and New Year have now been and gone and we have caught up with most of our friends and family. We both agree that we made the right decision to come home just before Christmas and have lots to do preparing for work and a new year – 2012!

Thank-you to everyone who followed the blog, whilst it took a lot of time to put together it was nice to see that people were following along and commenting but this is officially the last blog (for this trip!)

 

Love Emma & Matt

xxx

 

Las Vegas, Grand Canyon, Las Vegas…

The journey from LA to Vegas was uneventful and one of the shortest of the trip at only three hours. We arrived to a sunny Vegas mid-afternoon and checked into our hotel for the next four nights – Excalibur.

Positioned near the end of the strip and adjoining the Luxor hotel, Excalibur is modelled on a King Arthur themed castle. As with all the Vegas hotels the outside of the hotel looked vast and impressive and the inside was equally huge with it own restaurants, casino’s, bars, nightclubs, spa, shopping mall and huge arena for shows.

After the most drawn-out checking in at the hotel we dropped off our bags and soon headed out for a walk on the strip to take a look at the incredible hotels surrounding ours. New York, New York was right over the road via our drawbridge and MGM Grand was opposite. It soon got dark and on came the lights giving us the first glimpse of the Vegas seen in pictures.

After passing many of the big hotels we neared the middle of the strip and stopped to watch the fountains at the Bellagio.

We found a nice Mexican restaurant for dinner before returning to the Excalibur and the casino! Liam was soon into the swing of things on the tables and Matt joined him (briefly) for a game of blackjack. Matt doesn’t like gambling although when last in Vegas he was too young to gamble so decided that he needed to gamble something to complete the trip to Vegas. Matt soon retired having very quickly lost 20 dollars!

Our first full day in Vegas was spent wandering in and out of the many hotels, casinos and shopping centres including the incredible Venetian shopping centre.

We had purchased a pass which gave us access to three attractions from a selection of the most popular. We had chose the New York, New York roller coaster, Shark Reef Aquarium and the Bodies exhibition. The roller coaster was first up and on the initial ascent gave some great views of the strip before the stomach lurch!

The sheer scale of everything in Vegas is what makes the place so interesting and many miles can be clocked up without even leaving your hotel. We had purchased an all day buffet and returned to the hotel early evening to take full advantage.

Vegas is well know for its shows and has heaps of different shows running each night. Most of the hotels feature at least one theatre and the MGM grand is well know for having plenty. One of the longest standing shows is the Paris Crazy Horse Cabaret at the MGM grand. We booked some good seats for the evening showing on a table at the front of the theatre. Matt had been before and recommended the show which also turned out to be one of the most reasonable on offer!

The weather was sunny the first day but we awoke to an overcast day the following morning. We decided to hold-off on the stratosphere until the weather cleared and so headed off to the Luxor and Mandalay Bay hotels to the Aquarium and Bodies exhibition. Both of the attractions were impressive, but the bodies exhibition was certainly the most interesting and disturbing. Bodies is an exhibition of real bodies, preserved in different forms to show everything including skeletal structure, muscle groups, heart, lungs etc. The real “healthy lungs” and “smokers lungs” comparison was interesting and the large bin for cigarettes was filling fast!

We finished the day with a night out taking in the Coyote Ugly Bar, an Irish Pub and Nightclub – all within our hotel!

The best way to get an overview of Vegas and the surrounding areas is a trip up the Stratosphere. At 1,149 feet high it gives an impressive view.

The following morning it was time to leave Vegas and head to the Grand Canyon via the Hoover Dam. The Hoover Dam is only 35 miles outside Vegas which was lucky as the hire car seemed to be experiencing some problems with its gearbox and loosing power.

We reached the dam and after some searching found the road leading directly to it – amazingly the signs were non-existent as the road is still fairly recent.

The views from the top of the dam looking down the dam and across lake Meade are impressive and we stopped at another vantage point on the drive out which overlooks a larger part of the lake.

We decided that it would be best to return to Vegas and the hire centre at the airport to exchange the car before heading off on the long drive to the Grand Canyon. We managed to exchange the car for a nice Ford Explorer and were soon heading back down the road past the Hoover Dam and towards the town of Tusayan, our base for exploring the Grand Canyon.

The weather soon closed in and the although the road was easy going, the dark and rain made for hard concentrating. When we reached the town before Tusayan it was snowing and the temperature had dropped considerably. We reached Tusayan fine and the roads had been cleared of any snow which there was.

Tusayan is a small town serving the southern rim of the Grand Canyon. A collection of Hotels and restaurants it is convenient and only a few miles drive to the southern rim. When Matt was last here he devoured a 24 ounce steak at the steakhouse and had been looking forward to round two. Unfortunately as the area is now out-of-season we were informed on check-in that many of the restaurants (including the steakhouse) had closed for the season. To add to the disappointment the hotel we chose for dinner served us with some poor food, on plastic plates and with plastic disposable cups for drinks!

Aside from the food the area was nice and the following morning was overcast but dry with some warnings of possible snow. We set off into the park and soon reached the tourist information centre and first viewing point of the Grand Canyon.

As you can see by the way we were dressed it was chilly but we were thankful that it wasn’t raining and although overcast (and not great for pictures) the views were still spectacular.

We drove along the south rim road and stopped off at most of the viewing points along the way. We reached the end and turned around just as the weather cleared for a brief spell before returning to overcast.

The day flew by and we were soon tucking into dinner at an other drab restaurant with virtually no customers, terrible service and a guy with a guitar playing monotone in the corner.

The two weeks had been flying by and we were on our way back to Vegas already for the final night before Liam left for the UK. On the way back to Vegas we stopped again at the Hoover Dam as it was a lovely day. Matt had previously visited the Dam with his Dad and had seen the construction of the bypass road which would take traffic over the gorge without crossing the top of the dam. The bridge is now complete and has a walkway alongside with a good views of the whole of the dam which wasn’t possible before.

We had booked ourselves two rooms at the Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino for the last night in Vegas. Checking in at the hotel was the first of two very nice surprises over the next couple of days.

The hotel was starting to get busy for the Christmas period and as we had Liam’s room booked for only one night and we also had a room booked for one night before upgrading to a slightly better room –  we were both given upgrades for the one night to a suite room.

Planet Hollywood, as with most Vegas hotels has heaps of different room types and so a suite didn’t mean much – initially. The assistant told us that although we were on the same floor that we were at opposite ends and Liam should take the south elevator whilst we took the North – an indication of the sheer scale of these hotels.

We set off towards our respective rooms and were soon wondering along the corridor counting off numbers. We soon reached the end of the corridor a little confused until we spotted a plaque to the right and two huge double doors in front of us – this is when we got excited!

The suite which we had been upgraded to was a “Panorama Suite” with 1400sq ft of space and huge windows overlooking the strip with full view of the Paris and Bellagio hotels. At $600 a night this was quite an upgrade from our $60 booking!

As you can see from the pictures  below the room was vast with lounge areas, dining room, full wet bar, guest toilet and huge bath overlooking the view.

To finish the evening in style we booked in at the famous chain Bennihana, a Japanese Habatchi restaurant with performing chefs at each table. Incredible steak and seafood was cooked at the table with some cool tricks from the chef and a nice way to finish the two weeks we had spent with Liam in the USA.

The second nice surprise was when we returned the hire vehicle. We had swapped the vehicle due to the gearbox issues and therefore had been told to visit the main customer service desk when we returned to seek some compensation for the hassle.

We returned the car and the assistant printed us a receipt from his hand-held device which showed $166.00 and listed four days rental. Looking at the receipt it looked like they had confused the swap of the car and charged us an additional rental for the time we had the new vehicle on top of our initial rental. Reaching the desk we began on the course that they had tried to charge us extra and we had already had issues with collecting the car from their incompetent team in LA. The man here looked over our initial rental agreement and voucher from the broker which showed a total rental of around $850.00. After a few taps and some strange looks the customer service assistant gave us a view of his screen and explained that their must have been an error when we collected the car initially or when we swapped it as we had only been charged $166.00!!

The man handed us back our documents and did offer for him to look into why we had been charged too little but we said it was fine and he said “have a nice day then”. A nice little saving on the car hire and the $166.00 even included a tank of fuel!

So we had arrived at the airport – At this point its time to read the next blog……….

Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, San Francisco, Los Angeles…

Air Pacific is the kind of airline which openly celebrates the acquisition of a single new aircraft to its fleet – even when the “new” aircraft is second-hand from Singapore Airlines. The “new” aeroplane was purchased (as quoted from their website) “to replace one of our vintage B767 aircraft “ – One of two planes flying the NZ – Fiji route.

Its concerning when an airline operates an old fleet and even more so when it openly describes some of its current operational fleet as “vintage”. Matt had done a little research into the airline which would be carrying us from NZ to Fiji and onto LA. A total fleet of twelve planes, only a handful of “heavy” aircraft and some horrendous reviews. We had tried numerous times to book onto a direct flight with Air New Zealand but to no avail.

It was therefore a pleasant surprise to have OK planes, smooth flights, good service and exit seats with plenty of leg-room for our flight to LA!

Our next battle was to overcome the jet lag caused from a difference of being thirteen hours ahead of the UK and now eight hours behind the UK. We had planned this section of our trip to have a couple of days to relax before meeting Liam on the 5^th.

We spent a couple of days in a hotel near to the airport and in a slightly dodgy area of LA. When Matt had booked the hotel he didn’t realise that although this was classed as an “airport hotel” and had a free shuttle to and from the airport, it was actually a few miles away. The area we were located in sat between Inglewood and Compton – hence we were very much the ethnic minority here.

The next couple of days were filled with hap-hazard sleeping interspersed with Starbucks & TGI Fridays. It was soon time to venture to the airport and collect our hire car before greeting Liam.

Matt always books car hire through the same broker who cover all excess insurances and always include young drivers fees in the total costs. As Matt has previously had issues with communication between the broker and rental partner, we printed a confirmation e-mail that confirmed the young driver fee would be included in the rental costs. We had thought that we were well prepared but certainly weren’t well prepared for the team at Dollar rentals – most likely the most inept group of people we have come across all year.

Three hours later, a trip to the airport and back and lots of different (and equally useless) assistants we were in our Jeep heading to arrivals.

Liam flew in with Virgin Atlantic and had a good flight, arriving at three pm. We were waiting at arrivals when a couple of photographers started taking pictures and requesting autographs from a man off the Virgin flight. Matt said he recognised the man to which Emma replied “I know who your thinking of, the guy off the King’s Speech, but its not him”. It turned out it was Colin Firth from the Kings Speech!

After collecting Liam we headed off north towards our stop for the night at Santa Barbara. This would get us 100 miles out of LA and heading in the direction we would be driving the following day.

We arrived to a stunning street in Mediterranean style, lined with quality stores and restaurants, all lit with Christmas lights. It became even more apparent the next day that Santa Barbara is a wealthy area and a great place to live. It would have been good to spend an extra day here wondering along the stores and beach-front however all the schedule allowed time for was a nice morning stroll along the beach front and pier.

We planned to take the scenic route number one road, from Santa Barbara to San Francisco which hugs the coast for over 400 miles before reaching San Francisco. The drive was long but rewarding and we stopped regularly at view points.

The most crazy aspect of car hire for under 25’s in the USA is the young driver fee. Our rental would cost £300.00 for 15 days with an additional £300.00 in young driver fees. In addition to this only Matt could be a named driver as although only one “young person” is able to drive the car at any one time, the fee is attached to the driver and not the vehicle!

We arrived in San Francisco early evening and settled into our hotel for the next few days, nicely located only five minutes walk from Union Square.

Our first day in San Francisco was spent getting our bearings of the city which was fairly easy given the grid layout and compact nature. We spent the afternoon on a trip to the well-know prison of Alcatraz.

The audio tour was free and really well laid out with some informative sections spoken by ex guards and inmates.

It was easy to see the torment for inmates whom could see the city so close and at times even hear the laughter and music from down town events. Although the distance would be a manageable swim for most, the extreme currents and frigid waters prevented escape. It was possible to see the fast currents even from the dock and boat.

The evenings in San Francisco were lovely with all the festivities of Union Square. It had been recommended to visit the “Cheesecake Factory” at Macy’s Department Store, which features over thirty different cheesecakes alongside an already huge dinner menu.

Macy’s is a famous department store at the heart of the city in Union Square. The store front was nicely decorated and the view from the restaurant balcony overlooking Union Square added to the incredible cheesecake!

No trip to San Francisco would be complete without cycling the Golden Gate Bridge. The next morning gave us blue skies and the perfect opportunity for a days bike hire.

Our first stop was on the opposite side of the city in the huge Golden Gate Park.

A few miles on, winding around the coast and beaches and we arrived at the first end of the bridge.

Here we took the necessary pictures before starting off across the bridge. As we set off Emma was struggling with her gears and complaining that they weren’t working properly. A quick look (luckily moments before total destruction) showed that the bundgy strap that had been holding Matt’s jumper was now embedded in the gears and wheels, dangerously close to destroying the gears.

It took a few minutes to fix but luckily the issue was caught before too much bending occurred!

The bridge was fairly busy with tourists and serious cyclists alike but Liam managed to catch a shot of us cycling along.

The bridge was surprisingly long when cycling across and with picture stops it took us a little while to cross to the other side where the views back to San Francisco were stunning but a little hazy. The image below also shows the relation of Alcatraz to the city.

We managed to catch a nice picture of the city from the ferry ride back across the bay.

When we returned to the waterfront another protest had started in the city and the tram could only take us to the bottom of the main street. Police were everywhere and it was cool to see the “cops” in their gear, especially the mounted officers. Emma liked the look of the horses but when she tried to stroke one it did try to bite her – the officer had warned her that it was grumpy. We chatted to her and she told us the protest was another of the “we are the 99%” style protests but this time only a handful of homeless people. San Francisco is home to the most homeless people we have ever seen, all over the city and all trying different methods to part you with money.

Our last day in San Francisco was spent exploring the streets and browsing the stores. It was strange to see everyone in the “Christmas Spirit” and doing all their shopping as this would be our first Christmas away from home. It was a nice relaxing way to finish our busy few days in such a nice city. In the evening we rode the famous tram up the hills from one side of the city to the other, clinging to the side like a local!

Driving back to Los Angeles down the main highway was much faster but still a long drive and obviously very boring in comparison to the scenic route. We arrived back in LA in good time and checked into our hotel in Hollywood Hills only a short walk to Hollywood Boulevard and in the shadows of the famous Hollywood sign.

We learned only a day later that the intersection only a minutes walk from our hotel and through which we had driven that day had been the scene of a violent outburst by a gunman. The gunman had split from his girlfriend and went on a rampage at an intersection firing at cars and passers-by. He killed a famous music producer and injured many before being killed by police. Incredibly the scene must have been cleared quickly and returned to normal by the time we had arrived back in LA in the afternoon.

LA has been mostly described to us by other travellers as dirty and over-rated. Its a sprawling city spread out with no real centre and the description given to us would be one we agree with.

The walk of fame was very disappointing, especially considering how well know it is.

We saw some interesting places over the next few days and obviously took a drive closer to the Hollywood sign – on a wet day.

The old area in down-town LA was nice with Mexican Markets, the oldest building in LA and the stunning grand rail station.

Liam took a nice picture outside the Chinese Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard of the foot and hand prints of famous stars.

LA was really interesting as we have both read heaps of Michael Connelly books which are all set in LA. The Bradbury Centre, Sunset Boulevard, The Down-town Courthouse and many other areas and buildings all feature in the books and it was good to see some of them in real-life.

The two days in LA was plenty and we are all looking forward to the bright lights of Vegas!

 

Love Emma & Matt

xxx

 

 

 

Rotorua, Taupo, National Park, Auckland, Paihia, Auckland….

Rotorua is well known for its adventure sports and….smell of rotten eggs! The whole area is surrounded by geothermal activity and hot mud pools steam constantly throughout the parks and surrounding country giving off a sulphuric smell much like rotten eggs. The image below shows one such pool just outside Rotorua.

We mentioned in the last blog that we may take on the white water rafting in Rotorua. The bus journey south is designed to allow passengers to stop for the morning in Rotorua for white water rafting before continuing south towards the National Park.

The rafting in Rotorua is half the price of the south island and features the largest commercially rafted waterfall in the world – a 7 metre drop. This sealed the deal and was sure to provide some adrenalin.

Kaitiaki Rafting would be taking us down the river and with the translation from Maori meaning “Guardianship, Caretaker, Master” we were assured that we would be in safe hands. In order to preserve traditions and respect the Kaituna River, our guide started with a Maori prayer, always a reassuring start!

Following the rafting we purchased a picture disk so we can show you the stages of our river adventure.

The images below show the first and smaller three metre waterfall.

A little further down the river and we approached the seven metre waterfall. Our boat hung back and the other two boats went first meaning we had to ensure a longer wait watching to see how they survived the descent. Luckily we couldn’t see that people from both boats had fallen out.

One of the Irish guys we travelled with for some time had rafted the same river just a couple of weeks before. At the top of the big waterfall the boat went sideways and one girl actually fell out, evening up the boat for the others but meaning she took the full force of the water herself with the very real possibility of the boat landing on her!

The photos below show each stage of the descent and at one point we are totally submerged.

Can you see the relief on our faces?

With the rafting over and all of us surviving with no injuries we drove south toward Taupo, stopping briefly to admire the incredible amount of water flowing through the Huka Falls.

We stopped before Taupo at a river which is warmed from geothermal water meeting the cold water of the river, creating a nice hot-tub temperature. The river was interesting until our guide told us that we could paddle and swim but not submerge our face as the river carried meningitis which could be contracted through the nasal system!

Taupo is best know for its huge lake, the largest in New Zealand. If you look on a map of New Zealand you can quickly realise the scale. The lake actually isn’t as good as others in New Zealand for cruises and exploring, mostly due to its vast size. We would be breaking the journey in Taupo for one night before heading off early towards the National Park.

Two pieces of bad news awaited us in the morning. Our planned stop for the night at the highly recommended Blue Duck Lodge, set on a huge farming station near the National Park had been cancelled due to a previous large booking. We would therefore only be able to visit for the day. To add to this the weather wasn’t looking great so the Tongariro Alpine Crossing had been closed for the next two days, the main and only activity in the National Park.

Blue Duck Lodge made for a nice afternoon and most of the group spent it taking a walk into the depths of the vast farming station. Activities on offer here ranged from axe throwing and an eco off road tour to goat shooting. Emma spent much of the afternoon petting the two pet goats not keen on the shooting idea, even though goats in New Zealand are considered pests.

The cancellation at the Blue Duck Lodge meant that we would be spending three nights in the National Park. The accommodation here (very originally named “The Park”) was extremely nice and worked out well, with a three for two offer on accommodation. With two others from the group we secured a “loft room” with an en-suite, fridge and a mezzanine level for two of the beds. Coupled with the fantastic communal and bar areas, good internet and hot tubs it made for a relaxing three days. The alpine crossing unfortunately remained closed until the day we left. We had been really looking forward to making the 20km crossing, rated one of the best one day walks in the world.

We headed back the next day towards Auckland, spending a night in Rotorua in between. On this occasion we would have only one night in Auckland before our extra pass north to the Bay of Islands and Cape Reinga.

When the bus arrived in Auckland some of the roads were closed and we had to take a extended route to reach the hostel. Upon walking into the town centre the reason for the diversions became apparent. On a sunny, warm day with clear blue skies the city was holding its annual “Santa Parade” and carnival. Thousands of people lined the streets and around 150 floats came though making for some free afternoon entertainment.

Our base for the two nights north of Auckland was Paihia, the “gateway” to the Bay of Islands. En-route to Paihia we stopped to see an ancient Kauri tree.

The Kauri three is a huge tree with takes over a thousand years to mature. The timber from the tree is resistant to rot and therefore ideal for the manufacture of boats. Many years ago these trees provided big business for the loggers in New Zealand with the wood fetching a hefty price at the boat yards in Europe. The species is now few and far between and is in the (extremely lengthy) process of being re-planted. The trees are huge and this specimen was 16 metres in circumference.

The Stray pass included a glass-bottomed boat tour of a marine reserve. The first marine reserve in the world and therefore the longest protected area of sea in existence, it is now studied by students and scientists from all over the world. The waters were clear and we saw lots of fish and eagle rays. Unfortunately we missed the Orca by a week!

Cape Reinga is the most northern tip of New Zealand and very important to the Maori as the area where their spirits depart for their true homeland.

Having spent a night in Paihia we were collected early by the “Dune Rider” bus which would take us to the Cape and some other interesting areas along the way.

As with many similar “Capes” and “Points” a lighthouse was present and completed the scenery.

The bus journeyed back towards Paihia along the eastern shoreline and we stopped at the huge sand-dunes before taking to ninety mile beach. Here we could take a spot of sand boarding.

Sand dunes are extremely hard to walk up and we found this out the hard way. Initially looking average size once at the top they seemed quite high! Emma was first to make the descent on a body board. We both did the descent twice which was great fun but got the heart racing and calf’s burning for the walk up.

The bus was a whole spectrum of ages and one elderly couple had been struggling a little with the height of the stairs into the bus. Matt had helped them on a couple of occasions make the leap onto the first step. We would estimate that they were in their early seventies.

It was therefore a little surprising when the man joined the queue for body boards at the back of the bus and made the ascent to the top of the dunes (surprisingly well!). He showed top form on the descent, strutting along as if it was a breeze!

Ready to drive onto the ninety mile beach we loaded everything back onto the bus, apart from ourselves. The weather had been particularly dry for the last few weeks and the sand therefore loose and deep. Our driver wanted the best possible speed to hit the sandy area of the riverbed and so we walked closer to the beach and waited. The bus got stuck on the final section and had to be towed out using the rival companies bus!

We finished a nice day at a famous fish & chip restaurant overlooking a small harbour.

Along with another couple from the bus we had booked a dolphin “encounter” and swim for the following day. The weather looked overcast but was warm enough and heading out into the bays surrounding the islands we quickly found dolphins.

The bottle nose dolphins here are the largest in the world and up to 4 metres long / 400kg – Very large looking to swim with. In no time we had changed and were in the waters swimming alongside these majestic creatures.

The images below were taken by the professional photographer on the boat. They had the right camera to capture the dolphins as they jumped in and out of the wake behind the boat.

Topping off the incredible morning we spotted and followed a humpback whale with her calf!

We had been experiencing some trouble with our card for the last few days. Our bank in England was blaming the block on the merchant in New Zealand whom in turn were blaming our bank. The most frustrating aspect was that the bank kept telling us their was no blocks they had put onto the card. Many long phone-calls followed before the bank “found” something which may have caused the block – It didn’t work.

Returning to Auckland we were down to our last six dollars in cash. We had withdrawn the balance from our pre-paid cards and these would take three days to re-credit. It was then that we realised that Emma had two cards from the same account, not one from each of her accounts. We soon realised that she had made a mistake in Singapore when a new card was brought out and had cut-up one of her working cards! The reaming card had a new pin issued which was either lost or never arrived.

On the verge of making a transfer using the western union we tried Matt’s card one more time and amazingly it worked!

We now have all cards topped up, ready for the USA and are awaiting our flight to LA on Saturday.

One of our friends from Overton, Liam, is flying to meet us for a two week road trip on the west coast.

Love Emma & Matt

xxx

Rangitata, Kaikoura, Wellington, Rotorua, Auckland, Ha Hei, Raglan, Maketu…

Farms in England don’t make money, its common knowledge. Here in NZ things are very different and farming in recent years has been big business so much so that farmers here have swapped the land-rover for a helicopter making lighter work of the vast distances.

Travelling north from Mount Cook where we ended our last blog we headed towards Rangitata on our journey north towards Christchuch & Kaikoura before crossing to the North Island. The end of our last blog may have been a little confusing due to an error made in the final line naming “Queenstown” as our direction of travel – This would see us travelling back south and not the intended North, Apologies for any confusion!

Rangitata has no shops and not many people, just a lot of animals. Our accommodation for the night would be a rafting centre and working farm miles from anywhere. At the town before our driver hopped off to catch an afternoon rafting with some of the bus and on jumped the owner of the rafting centre, this would give the rafters some more time as we were running late.

As we have quickly learned licences and insurance don’t mean much here and although the temporary driver held the correct license he did warn us to “hold on as I haven’t driven anything this big for a long time”.

His driving seemed fine, if a little jerky, and he was soon chatting to us about the area and his farm. One girl on the bus helps her parents run a farm in The Netherlands with a grand total of 70 cows. The driver told her thing may seem a little less hands on here as he has 35,000 sheep, 15,000 cows and 5,000 deer – apparently just a small farm!

Our accommodation for the night was lovely and within no time one of the girls mentioned monopoly to which Matt couldn’t resist. Emma went off for a walk around the fields whilst Matt quickly became engrossed in a game of Monopoly “New Zealand Edition” against two Germans, one Dutch and one English girls. Four hours later and from a bad start Matt had bartered well and won the game.

We set off reasonably early in the morning heading first to Christchurch to drop off at the airport and collect new passengers before continuing to Kaikoura for the night stop. We had actually covered this section of the route before but had to again to reach the connection with the North Island.

Soon after leaving Rangitata we stopped off at the “Church of the Good Shepard” with views over the incredibly blue lake.

Matt took the above picture looking from inside the church and the cross stood at the altar, a stunning location for the little church.

The church and monument beside it commemorate the strong ties between the local people of McKenzie country and the sheep dog, going back many years. Without the dogs it would be impossible for them to move sheep quickly over such vast areas of land.

We carried onto Christchurch and through to Kaikoura. On our previous visit to Kaikoura we had been to the local fisherman’s house to eat crayfish and drink home-made wine. The afternoon fishing activity had received good feedback and we decided to give it a go. A total of eight people from the bus signed up and we were all looking forward to a good afternoon fishing and then eating what we had caught. The skipper came to pick us up from the hotel and dropped us to his garden where we had previously visited. It was only then (once we were stuck out-of-town in his garden) that he told us we would have to split into two groups as the boat could only hold four at-a-time. We got put into the second group and were told it would be an hour or so before he would return and we could switch over.

Two and a half hours later we decided (with no sign of the boat on the horizon) that the enthusiasm for fishing was gone and the day was drawing on. The skippers assistant drove us back to town and Emma managed to get her first proper haircut of the year!

A quiz at the hotel bar made the evening a fun one and we came third place winning a $15 bar tab.

As we had spent a fair amount of time in the South Island we needed to travel the Northern section without getting off the bus for longer than the allowed time in each destination. Therefore the next day we were up again and heading back to Picton to catch the early afternoon ferry to Wellington.

It was another lovely day and we left port from a berth alongside the Holland America cruise ship Volendam.

The ferry took three hours and was unusually smooth – the route is notoriously rough. A call out from the kitchen announced all cakes, slices and savouries in the cabinet had been reduced to one dollar. Matt took off running to the canteen and returned with some nice cakes for a total of five dollars. Most of the group had brought cakes only minutes before for the full price of five dollars each!

We stopped in Wellington and Rotorua for one night on our way north towards Auckland. We arrived in Auckland on a lovely day and spent the afternoon walking the waterfront, gazing at some incredible yachts. Auckland hosts over 135,000 private yachts and some of the finest in the world are manufactured and moored here. Many super yachts had been moved here for the world cup and were still here awaiting the next destination!

Our North Island “loop” began in Auckland and the first stop was Ha Hei, famous for its “hot water beach”. We walked the track from the small village along the stunning beach to the equally stunning cathedral cove. We had been spoilt with clear blue skies for the last few days.

On our return to our accommodation just behind the beach Matt donned his “togs” and went for a (very quick) dip in the ocean which was nice and cold!

After a good feed we jumped onto the bus and headed to “hot water beach” to catch the low-tide at 8pm. The beach sits (as does much of the North Island) on geothermal activity and boiling springs are found just beneath the sand of the beach at low-tide.

It tricky to explain but the basic idea is that you dig a hole, it fills with hot water and some sea water and you sit in it like a hot-tub! Matt quickly set-about digging his first hole.

It soon became apparent that we were digging in the wrong place and we gave up, moving to sit in one of the already “established” holes from another group.

The shallow holes were all centred on a single spring which was pumping out boiling hot water. Once mixed with the other water lapping in from the sea, it was a nice temperature to sit in. Emma paddled her feet whilst Matt jumped in for the full experience. Matt and some of the girls also jumped out for a swim in the sea a couple of times, soon returning to the warmth of the beach.

Raglan was the next stop on our route and we arrived early afternoon. A “surfers paradise” surrounded by good beaches our accommodation was perched on the hill with good views.

We opted for the sunset cruise which turned out to be a good choice, if a little cold.

One of the highlights of the Stray route in the North Island is the Maouri cultural evening in Maketu. We left Raglan early to allow us time to stop at the famous Waitomo Caves before heading the Cultural Evening.

The Waitomo area has around 370 different caves of varying sizes with some the size of a cathedral inside and others requiring a 150 metre descent by rope to gain access.

We opted for a “wet” option climbing, scrambling, tubing and swimming through a 1km long cave network. There was eight of us from the group and we had great fun in the cave at times crawling through tiny spaces, with no lights on hoping for the end to come into sight!

The highlight of the cave was tubing down the river with the lights off with the whole ceiling of the cave covered in glow-worms. Unfortunately cameras were banned in the cave and their images were not good enough to warrant the hefty cost to buy them.

Heading north from Waitomo towards Maketu we were praying for the bus to get us there without breaking down. The majority of the people we had met on the bus had quickly learned that this wasn’t an organised company in any aspect of their service. Our current driver had only been given two weeks training on the route before they cut the training short and started her on a trip as they were desperate for drivers. To top off the matter they gave her a bus which had no microphone or radio and a large water leak. We had been filling the bus with 5-6 litres of water every couple of hours to keep it running and no replacement bus or repair was in sight!

We made it to Maketu without any issues and settled into our roles and accommodation for the night – the males were now referred to as “warriors” and we had elected the oldest male to represent the group as chief. Our driver had warned us before entering the area that this was still a working tribe who take their heritage and traditions seriously and therefore we should remain serious during their welcoming rituals. We ate dinner and then the tribal chief addressed us all again regarding what we would see and experience for the evening and what was expected of us in return. He made us fully aware that breaking the tribal rules would see the whole group expelled and back on the bus (with a full refund).

The next stage was for us to assemble in the “hangi” or traditional meeting house and for a challenge to be laid down by the warriors of their tribe to the chief of our Stray Bus tribe! An elaborate and violent dance followed with a leaf laid down in front of our chief. If our chief took the leaf whilst holding eye contact and a serious face then it would show we were not scared and we had been welcomed into the tribe. If on the other hand he stepped over the leaf or didn’t pick it up then he would show weakness and disrespect and be attacked!

Our chief took the right decision and soon we were separated into two groups with the males learning the “Haka” and the girls learning the “Poi”. Once we had learned our respective dances we performed them to each other and received some other performances from the tribe.

 

We hunkered down for the night in the large open plan room but not before utilising the very “traditional” wifi internet access!

The night was great if a little oversold – The ”Traditional Maouri Meeting House” turned out to be a newly constructed building with all mod-cons. The “Traditional Hangi Meal” has to be cooked in a full commercial kitchen as health & safety prevents the use of the Maouri oven dug into the ground.

The next stop will be the Tongariro National Park where we hope to walk the Alpine Crossing. We will also hopefully stop en-route in Rotorua to take on some white water rafting!

Love Emma & Matt

xxx

Invercargill, Milford Sound, Wanaka, Dunedin, Queenstown, Mt Cook….

Invercargill is one of the depressing, old industrial towns on the south of New Zealand. During the bus journey south our new driver played us a film called “The Fastest Indian”. The man at the centre of the film, Burt Munro lived in Invercargill and is famous for his daring land speed attempts. Burt spent a lot of time modifying an old 1920 Indian motorcycle and set a number of records in NZ. He reached 68 and was diagnosed with heart disease and decided to mortgage his house and travel to the salt flats in America to attempt a record.

In 1967, at the age of 68 and riding a motorcycle which was 47 years old he set a new speed record for a motorcycle under 1000cc – achieving over 190mph. Incredibly his record still stands today!

The majority of our group headed through Invercargill to the main overnight stop of Stewart Island. The weather was terrible and at $220 dollars for the ferry we didn’t think it would be worth it just for an afternoon. Instead we stayed in Invercargill and splashed out on a nice dinner at one of the Speight’s Ale Houses near our hostel.

One of the highlights of a trip to NZ is Milford Sound. Milford was actually incorrectly named as a sound when it is really a fiord and was carved out by a glacier in the last ice-age but the name stuck. The main (and only) thing to do here is to take a cruise of the fiord which is just what we did.

The drive to Milford is as much part of the attraction, winding down the huge valley and through a 1.2km long tunnel.

Our cruise took us the length of the fiord, to the sea and back for an hour and a half. It had been raining heavily the days before we arrived and many waterfalls had appeared, carrying the run-off from the mountains.

Our group was very lucky to have had such great weather as the days before (and after) were not so nice. Our stop for the evening was the historic “Gunns Camp”. The camp is set 15km from the main road and is surrounded by mountains and countryside in every direction. The nights accommodation was small timber sheds with two rooms and a communal room in the middle with three people in each room. Although the beds were questionable in their ability to hold an adult without breaking, the large wood-burner made for a cosy nights sleep!

The drive back to Queenstown was again one of the most scenic we have seen. At Gunns Camp the weather had been poor but this soon improved into another day of blue skies.

On our way back to Queenstown we stopped in Te Anau for a couple of short walks alongside the huge lake.

The drive into Queenstown itself was incredible and we wound our way around the base of the mountains, with the huge lake to our left, arriving back into Queenstown early evening.

Our hostel for the night had some nice free bikes and we spent a couple of hours riding through the park, around the lake and the centre of Queenstown before heading out to meet some of friends for drinks.

Matt had been experiencing some toothache for the last few days and had booked into a dentist for our return to Queenstown. We also had car hire booked for the next four days so we could spend some time exploring by ourselves.

We headed for the dentist with Matt expecting a hefty bill for a filling or similar and were pleasantly surprised. Matt often gets blocked sinuses and the dentist explained that as there were no signs of any decay or cavities it was most likely that the sinus canal running along the top of the jawline had become blocked. This canal also has some of the tooth’s nerves running though it and the pressure causes a feeling like dull toothache. The dentist was very nice and Matt talked to him for a while about his boat which he and his family had spent the last year cruising the world on!

A light $65 later and we were on our way to the car hire depot. Matt celebrated his first uneventful trip to the dentist with a large Starbucks including sugary syrup!

Hertz was the rental centre and we bagged a nice top-spec Mazda for the next few days. Our first days driving would take us back over the Crown Range towards Wanaka and Makarora. Although we had already driven this road with the bus we wanted to drive it for ourselves and spend some more time exploring here. On our first trip over we had stopped for photos at some of the larger look-outs but the best spots we couldn’t stop at as the bus was too large.

The Crown Range is the highest sealed road in New Zealand and often the weather closes the route to cars but we were rewarded with great weather.

At the bottom of the range is the Cardrona Hotel, famous for its many appearances in beer adverts. In the days-gone-by the landlord would serve you one pint if you were about to drive the range and two if you had just driven down!

We drove back to Makarora before turning around and spending the night in Wanaka.

We set off the next morning for the city of Dunedin on the opposite side of the country. The drive took us past the rafting river and the “Roaring Meg” white water, and through the town of cromwell in the pictures below.

When we stopped at the bench overlooking Cromwell a rustling caught our attention. A baby rabbit popped out and was intent on staying close to Emma. Emma struggled to leave without taking the rabbit with her!

Dunedin is a city with Scottish heritage and is well known for the Speight’s Brewery, Cadbury’s Factory and the steepest street in the world.

We checked into our accommodation and headed out to the Speight’s Brewery Tour. The Brewery was interesting and still fully working after many years. The equipment all looks old but is still used to make the good beers they produce.

The best part of the tour was the last thirty minutes. During the last section you can pour your own drinks (in unlimited amounts) at the Brewery’s bar!

The following day in Dunedin we went on a tour of the Cadbury’s factory. This was the second factory established by Cadbury’s and is still running at more capacity than ever. We watched many of the processes from start to finish which was interesting and even got some shots of liquid chocolate! They had already begun making Easter eggs for next year and incredibly the people of NZ eat on average 10 eggs each over a ten week period around Easter, with the factory producing 45 million eggs for NZ!!

Matt was eager to drive up Baldwin Street “the steepest street in the world” so after the tour we drove across town to the street. Looking up the street from the bottom of the street doesn’t look steep so we parked up and walked the hill first. At 1:2.86 its much stepper than it looked and we sat at the top for a while to admire just how steep it really is. A Kiwi guy who must have been mid-sixties had just finished a run up the street and we got chatting to him. It turns out he knows a lot about the street as he runs up and down 30 times a day! He holds a world record for having run up the street 180,000 times over the past fifteen years. He also told us stories about the various tourists whom have come unstuck on the hill (quite literally). One horrific story he told us was that of a young couple who when drunk decided it would be a good idea to ride down the hill in a large wheelie bin. They hit a parked car and trailer at the bottom and the girl was killed, the guy seriously injured. They hit the car so hard that they pushed in 28 metres and police calculated that they would have been going close to 100km when they hit it – that gives you an idea how steep it is!

After talking to the guy for some time and getting him to take a picture of us we ventured down and drove back up which was fun and not as bad as we thought it would have been!

We spent the evening in Dunedin before heading back to Queenstown the next day. The drive between the two was another impressive drive through green hills, blue lakes and white-topped mountains.

The Dutch guy, English Girl and two Irish Guys were all still in Queenstown when we got back and we had arranged a night out starting at the Ice Bar. We managed to get tickets for $1 which was a bonus and it was a fun experience dressing up in winter coats and gloves/boots and drinking everything out of ice glasses, from an ice bar at -5 degrees! As you are only allowed a 45 minute session we were soon in the cowboy bar, a completely different experience with cowboy hats for all, seats which are saddles and a bucking bronco!

We were up early to make the drive to Mount Cook. The drive was again spectacular and clear blue skies greeted us on our arrival. The picture below shows the view from our room.

Most of the group had opted for an afternoon tour on the glacier lake. The lake is one of only three in the world in which you can see ice-bergs up-close. The water here was two degrees and although it looked nice when our driver told us to see if we could keep our hand in the water for ten seconds any ideas of swimming soon departed!

The tour of the lake and its ice-bergs was interesting and the blue skies finished of the views. You can see on one of the images below an iceberg which has freshly risen and is still blue – it actually appeared whilst we were on the bus to the lake.

Tomorrow we head north to Rangitata and then onwards towards Queenstown. Soon we will be on the North Island!

Love Emma & Matt

xxx

 

 

 

Abel Tasman, Franz Josef, Makarora, Wanaka, Queenstown ….

Abel Tasman was a Dutch explorer and the first to land on New Zealand. The area which his ship came ashore was the northern corner of coastline now devoted to the Abel Tasman National Park.

Having spent a few days in Nelson planning our walk and equipping our Dutch friend with correct shoes we were actually very well prepared in comparison to the rest of the group whom on arrival were given a few minutes stop at the main water-taxi & kayak company to plan their stay.

The I-site had given us an outline plan to walk a 45km section over three days. The main consideration for the track is the tidal crossings which can only be crossed at low-tide. Taking these crossings into consideration meant only a 1.5hour walk for the first day. The huts along the track are equipped with bunks, toilets, water and a log burner, meaning all food and cooking equipment must be carried. We spent a good few hours in Nelson during which Matt made lots of phone calls to water-taxi and national park offices to firm up his feeling that we could walk the section in two days. This would cut the need to carry so much food and save money on the expensive overnight huts.

After a good sleep in the tiny village of Marahau we stored our big bags and set-off for the water-taxi. The water taxi would take us two hours along the track where we would begin our walk. As much of the park can only be accessed by water the taxi operation is well organised. We got into the boat and were then driven to the jetty and reversed into the water. Within minutes we were under-way.

We made a number of stops in the various bays along the way to drop-off and collect passengers. One of the bays we stopped in was the bay we would soon be crossing. The sheer volume of water which would be moved for low-tide was incredible. The pictures below show the crossing left-right across the back of the boat and the hut which we would be aiming for, marked with the orange marker.

We were dropped off and began our walk along the track. Luckily whilst delving into our options for the walk somebody mentioned a little-advertised option of having the bulk of our equipment dropped off at our night-stop by the boat – for free!

With day bags of water, food and coats it was nice not to have to carry the rest of the kit.

It took us just over an hour to reach the tidal crossing where we stopped for some lunch. We were a couple of hours early which meant a fair wait until low-tide.

The water drained fairly fast and the resulting expanse of land was a great sight. Initially we believed that we would be able to walk right across without getting wet but we soon realized that we would be wading up-to our knees.

The first days walking was 20km long and followed the coastal track back towards the village of Marahau at the beginning of the track. The track was fairly hilly in places and we crossed numerous bridges, rivers, waterfalls and beaches with some great scenery.

At around 6pm we arrived at our stop for the night, the Bark Bay Hut. Matt went hunting for our luggage, soon joined by Emma. The big bag we had left for the boat to drop off wasn’t in its correct place and was nowhere to be seen. Eventually we located another group on the beach who had misplaced it amongst their similar looking bags from the same company. We were glad to find this bag as it contained our sleeping bags, food and cooking gear!

A few other walkers were staying in the hut and we got dinner going whilst chopping wood and firing the log-burner for the evening. All of us were tired and as there was no lighting in the hut we all got an early nights sleep ready for the next days walking.

We started off along the track early the next morning for a 25km walk back to Marahau. It was a hilly days walking with some more tidal crossings but all went well and we arrived back in Marahau for a nice big meal.

Stray is the only company which stops directly in the National Park which is convenient for walks however not much else can be found there and no food shops are located in the village. We did manage to find a nice cafe and spent the next day relaxing and catching-up at the cafe.

Two of group we travelled with for our GAP tour of Vietnam actually live very close to Marahau in the main town. They run a motel and had offered us a room which would have been nice if we had our own transport! We kept in contact with them and agreed to meet the next day. Bret drives one of the water taxi’s in the park and had dropped by at our hostel to say hi the evening before which was a nice surprise. We met Bret & Jane at the cafe for a nice drink and catch-up. It is strange to think that a few months before we were travelling with these people for two weeks in Vietnam.

Time flies and it was time to catch the bus south again towards Greymouth. The drive took us through an area known as the “Pancake Rocks”. The formations of the rocks here was worth the stop and like nothing we have seen before.

Greymouth is an industrial town on the west coast and it shows immediately upon arrival. Arriving on a Sunday the town was deserted and only a few dodgy-looking locals roamed the car-free streets. It was the only stop where the driver wanted to stay with the bus whilst we checked-in and asked us to remove everything overnight, a little unnerving but understandable once you take a look at the local characters!

Our accommodation for the night was fairly poor but Matt took full advantage of the $12 all-you-can-eat pizza offer.

The west coast is renowned as the most scenic driving area of New Zealand and therefore one of the best in the world. Although the bus was good and we stopped regularly for photo’s we wished at times that we had our own vehicle and were driving it ourselves. Luckily we left Greymouth the next morning for the famous Franz Josef Glacier.

Unfortunately Emma had been experiencing pain in her lower leg/ankle following the Abel Tasman walk. We soon worked-out that this was some kind of shin splint and that only resting the leg would allow it to heal.

It was therefore a shame that the main (and only) activity in Franz Josef is the glacier day walk. Matt decided he would still go with the rest of the group but decided against it after checking the weather reports which signalled a nasty day. The main sticking point was that the front section of the glacier had recently been covered by a large rock-slide and therefore the ½ day option wouldn’t get past this section to the clean ice above. The full days option meant spending 6 hours + on the glacier in possibly wet conditions.

We decided to save the $180 for Matt to walk and spent the afternoon the the local hot-pools in the 40 degree waters!

The group returned late afternoon and the weather had luckily held-out for them although they were all fairly zapped.

As it was Halloween we sent the evening in the bar and many of the group made an impressive effort at the fancy-dress competition from all the charity-store clothing they brought in Greymouth.

We decided that we would allow Emma’s leg to rest and would hire a car in Queenstown to re-drive the West Coast and walk the glacier.

Driving again we were not far away from the Adrenalin capital of the world, Queenstown, with only one night stop at Makarora first. Makarora is a small town on the west coast, nestled between the hills in a stunning valley with a large river at its centre. With no real activities to do here we took a short walk down to the riverbed, past the many lambs ending at the riverbank covered in driftwood.

The drive from Makarora to Queenstown was to be the best yet and we were also rewarded with clear blue skies. The drive took us past the Fox Glacier where we stopped at the terminal face briefly where amazingly it was raining so the camera stayed inside! We stopped off at the “blue pools” an area of glacial rivers and bridges.

Areas of the West-coast are abundant in Whitebait, the worlds most expensive fish per kg (a little deceptive as a kg is a large amount!). In New Zealand a popular way to cook these fish is mixed with egg and made into a “patty” like a burger. We managed to find a stop for this along the road where we all got a free sample, which was very tasty, and therefore we also all purchased full patties.

The dog took a liking to Emma’s scratching and when she tried to stop jumped up at her for more attention where he remained for some time!

Our lunch-stop for the day was the up-market town of Wanaka with its clear blue lake and nice boats. The snow-capped mountains in the backdrop made the scenery here even more spectacular.

The group made a stop outside Queenstown at the original AJ Hackett bridge bungy jump. The founder of the business was the pioneer of bungy jumping and it was incredible to watch the short film on its origins and development. We had no intention of jumping so headed for the viewing platform adorned with cameras from the “jumpers”, three of the girls from the bus. At 47 metres it was small by bungy standards but still impressive!

With the adrenalin still pumping for those who jumped we started the short but stunning drive into Queenstown alongside the lake.

The bus makes a compulsory two-night stop-over in Queenstown to give everyone enough time to explore, party and take on the adrenalin fuelled activities. As a Mecca for backpackers we thought it would also be a trashy, cheap town and thankfully we were proven very wrong. Queenstown is actually one of the most expensive (and beautiful) towns in NZ. The location alongside the lake and surrounded by snow-capped mountains coupled with the ski-fields nearby and endless nice restaurants & bars makes for a popular wealthy playground. Many plush houses hug the base of the hills overlooking the town.

We spent our first afternoon taking a short cruise on the lake. The previous evenings snowfall covering the hills and mountains added to the scenery.

In the centre of the image below is one of the top scenic golf courses in the world.

Queenstown is home to the famous “Ferg Burger” restaurant/takeaway. It wasn’t long before Matt and the guys were itching to try out these huge burgers and Matt chose “The Big Stuff” almost the biggest on the menu. The owners have proudly displayed an official letter from a doctor regarding a dislocated jaw that his patient suffered whilst trying to eat a burger here! Matt just about managed to get his mouth around it enough to eat it!

We had a great night out with two Irish guys and a Welsh girl from the bus and agreed to meet the following day to take on the luge run.

At the back of the town is a cable car taking you to a hill-top with restaurant, downhill cycle tracks and a luge (aside from great views).

The luge is a downhill race-track with tight bends and banks which you navigate (and race) on a small kart with a single brake. We had to take a ski-lift to the top to begin the descent before doing the same again, six times. It was great fun and fast with the potential for a nasty injury if you try to tackle it too fast.

On the second run down there was an almighty bang and Matt looked back to see that Emma had driven straight into the fence, head-on. Luckily she had managed to brake enough not to make it a serious crash!

Queenstown is undoubtedly the most incredible location for any town/city we have seen and it clear to see why the wealthy and backpackers alike flock here. The permanent population is 13,000 and the nightly tourism population can reach over 15,000!

Our trip will take us tomorrow south towards Invercargill & Stewart Island before heading to Milford Sounds & back to Queenstown.

 

We hope everyone at home is well!

Love Emma & Matt

xxx

Christchurch, Kaikoura, Picton, Nelson….

We had planned to load our last blog whilst waiting for our flight at Brisbane airport. Brisbane turned out to be the only airport we could imagine which would have a total WIFI ban, hence the reason our last blog was delayed!

Our Air New Zealand flight was good and only three hours in duration. We landed in Christchurch at 1am and were glad to have pre-booked an airport pick-up.

Christchurch was a difficult city to find accommodation in as many of the hostels had been destroyed by the earthquake earlier in the year. We booked into Haka Lodge which is brand new and built after the earthquake. It turned out to be a great choice and one of the top places we have stayed. With only 16 rooms it has a homely feel and the big log burner completed the cosy living room.

Our first day in Christchurch was spent re-arming ourselves for cold weather. We headed to a Kathmandu outlet and both managed to get micro-fleeces which would fit under our raincoats.

As we had only visited the outer reaches of the city at this point, there was little evidence of earthquake damage.

We also managed to help out a little West Highland Terrier who although seemed very excited to have broken free, didn’t have much road sense! He followed us for some time before we decided that he may injure himself. He was more than happy for Emma to carry him around until we found a council office. They were well prepared and had collars/leads on hand. He was soon tied up outside and awaiting the arrival of the local pound officer.

The manager of our hostel ran us through the city centre map, showing us the off-limits sections. The whole of the central CBD is still off-limits and has a cordon fence around. She mentioned that we could get an idea of the destruction by taking a 2 hour walk, skirting the outer cordon.

After a short walk we reached the first cordon fence.

We had just passed the site of a main, local church. The site had been levelled and all that remained was the roof of the spire.

The whole place seemed very eerie. There was literally nobody around and as we followed the perimeter the damage only got worse. It was sad to see the city totally destroyed and turned into a ghost town. One of the most odd aspects was that no work was being done to repair the damage. We later found out that the insurance companies are yet to pay out and are awaiting confirmation that after-shocks have ceased.

Big hotels such as Copthorne and Crowne Plaza lay semi-destroyed in the centre of town and the big cathedral looked beyond repair.

After three days in Christchurch the time came to join the Stray Bus for the first time. Our pass would take us to all the main places in the North & South Islands and we have an extra pass to take us North from Auckland to the Bay of Islands.

We met the bus near the airport and were soon on the road heading for the small town of Kaikoura with our driver “trouble”. He would later become true to his nickname.

The 24 seater bus was fairly full and the bus was mostly Dutch, Germans & English.

The drive to Kaikoura was stunning as the road weaved through tunnels and around the coastline.

We stopped off at a lookout point before we reached the town. It was a nice day and the view of the small town nestled between the sea and white-peaked mountains incredible.

The bus drove on into town and we stopped at a seal colony.

We setted into our accommodation before heading out with some of the group for three-hour walk along the coastline and over the headland. The views here were equally impressive and it was a nice sunny afternoon.

One of the guys in the group had taken-up the offer of fishing for the afternoon with a local fisherman. It was a reasonable price at 75 dollars each and possibly the main draw was the unlimited home-brewed wine on-board. Our driver took the rest of the group early evening to the fisherman’s house for a free wine tasting. The guy from the fishing had clearly taken full-advantage of the wine which was strong at 23%! The fishing trip had taken the whole afternoon and they had caught some good sized fish.

Local fishermen catch a fair amount of Crayfish due to the value and they had managed to hook out some good sized examples. A few crayfish went on the BBQ and we got stuck-in pulling them apart to eat.

The evening was spent at the hotel watching Australia vs Wales. One very vocal, very drunk, local man was shouting expletives at the Australian team. His taunts included the desire to stab Australian players should he have the chance! We moved into the other room which was bigger and busier with the rest of the group. One of the guys from our group joined us shortly after and reported that the drunk man had, whilst shouting at the screen, fallen from his bar stool and was now on the floor of the bar, bleeding but still swearing!

Our next destination was the small town of Picton. At the top of the South Island its main purpose is to serve the outgoing and incoming ferries from the North Island. The town was very nice with some impressive boats in the harbour and again incredible surroundings.

We were spending two nights here and would be here for the Rugby final

On our first day, four of us took a nice walk along a track running alongside the sea channel into port. It was a hilly three-hour walk but we were rewarded with views over the sea at the end of the track (complete with All Blacks flag) and good views back towards the town.

New Zealand has a hundreds of walks, or as the New Zealander’s call them “tramps”. The top multi-day walks are the “9 Great Walks”, mostly taking between 3-5 days. One such walk is the Queen Charlotte Track.

Most of the group headed down to the I-Site tourist information centre in town to work out the best way to spend a day walking a section of the track. As New Zealand relies heavily on tourism and outdoor activities are the main draw, their information centres are excellent. It took only a matter of minutes before we were all booked on for a 15km walk the following day.

It was an overcast day but dry which was a bonus. We first caught a water-taxi for an hour and a half along the coastline to our starting point for the track. The 15km walk would take us along what is regarded as the most diverse and interesting section of the track. Scenery en-route was good and the jetty in the bay where we arrived made for a good picture.

A quick toilet stop and we were soon on our way up the hilly track. Other passengers on the boat had rented mountain bikes to ride the track and one couple had their own bikes with them. The couple with their own bikes seemed suited for the terrain whereas the couple with rental bikes seemed they had taken on more than they could manage! The track was steep and extremely slippery due to the clay base.

We stormed off ahead of the bikes and were soon at the first lookout point with no bikes to be seen. Our group comprised of four English, two German and one Dutch.

The walk was steep in places but manageable and when the track broke free of the trees we got good views of the coastline.

At the end of the section of track was Fernaux Lodge. The Lodge has a big restaurant and is surrounded by luxury holiday cabins. Only accessible by boat, the area was stunning and a number of boats were moored in the small harbour for the evening. A roaring fire greeted us and we removed our muddy boots and were soon tucking into a good pub lunch.

Our accommodation in Picton featured a big hot-tub and soon after arriving back Matt & Jos (the Dutch guy) took full advantage of the 40 degree water before we headed out to catch the Rugby final.

It was this evening that we realised just how quiet NZ can be. We headed out to get to the pub fairly early, presuming that the place would be packed, only to find it virtually empty! Picton has a similar population to Overton and the same amount of pubs yet on a Rugby final night it was quieter than a normal night in Overton. The pub filled fairly quickly and after the win, emptied just as fast! We searched around town for any “happening” places but none were found. We all had a good night but it was a shame we weren’t in one of the cities as the atmosphere was reportedly great.

The following morning the bus arrived from Wellington and would be travelling along the Northern coast of the South Island to Abel Tasman National Park. The bus was over an hour late, just one of the many traits of our driver “trouble”. As soon as the bus arrived it was clear that there was a problem with numbers and quite obviously not enough seats. Trouble went ahead with boarding as if nothing was amiss. All of our group had booked on so we had no problem but many people hadn’t booked themselves onto this leg but were trying to travel anyway. The solution was quickly found by trouble – three people sat in the aisle with bags every-where. It was like being back in Asia.

We had decided not to take the bus all the way to the National Park but to stop for a few days in the town of Nelson. The English girl & Dutch guy also got off the bus here for a few days but we had to say good-bye to the German girls as they were on a tight schedule for their trip.

The plan in stopping in Nelson was to prepare for a multi-day walk along the famous Abel Tasman Coastal Path in the National Park. A fair amount of planning is required to book accommodation huts and water taxi’s. We also persuaded the Dutch guy to invest in some walking boots and socks as his lightweight trainers were at the end of their life!

One of the days we were here was sunny and warm so we headed off to “The Centre of New Zealand” – a hill overlooking Nelson which is the geographical centre of New Zealand. Views from here were great, overlooking the town and ocean to one-side and the valley to the other.

On our return to town we walked through the Botanical Gardens.

We have our walk planned for the National Park and tomorrow we will be catching the bus again. Thankfully a new driver will arrive to replace “trouble”!

Love Emma & Matt

xxxx

Whitsundays, Hervey Bay, Fraser Island, Hervey Bay, Noosa Heads, Brisbane…

The initial weather reports for our Whitsundays cruise had been questionable and showed a 50% chance of rain. On departure day we awoke to clear blue skies and the check-in staff advised us that weather reports were now showing great weather for the whole weekend.

We checked in and strolled along the already bustling beach towards the marina. The marina was the nicest we have seen and was brimming with sparking yachts and motorboats. Posh cafés and the offices of luxurious boat manufacturers surrounded the bright blue waters of the marina.

Whitsundays Sailing Adventures is the largest of the boat operators around the Whitsunday Islands and specialises in sleek sailing catamarans. The company also operates one of the only motor-powered catamarans in the area. We chose to sail on “Powerplay” due to its speed advantage and not having to rely on wind direction, giving the opportunity to tailor the itinerary to the group and visit more places in the same time-frame. A major factor in our decision (after much searching) was the reduced capacity of 18 guests compared to 25+ on other vessels.

The boat had three types of available accommodation with shared doubles in convertible beds around the living areas, shared doubles with two double beds and private cabins. The price difference was small and we struck a good deal, saving almost 300 dollars between us so we splashed out on the private cabin.

The boat was staffed by a crew of four: A skipper, first mate and two hosts. At 11 am we boarded the boat and settled down before a pre-departure briefing. The skipper advised us that we had chosen the right boat for the weekend as although the weather was good, wind speeds were reaching triple the normal 10 knots and pushing almost 30 knots. This meant the seas on the outgoing crossing to the islands would be rough and having the motor power would make things smoother than the sailing boats.

The seas were fairly rough but not terrible and Matt was the first to venture out onto the forward nets, with the waves smashing up underneath. Soon a few others followed to enjoy the waves and the view. The picture below shows the forward area in calm seas – had we tried to use our camera on the outward crossing we would no longer be posting pictures!

Over the next two days we relaxed on the boat during the day, hopping off to snorkel often and eating great food. Food was plentiful and both nights a BBQ finished off the day nicely.

Each evening the fore-deck spa was filled with nice hot water for a relaxing dip whilst watching the sunset.

The most famous spot on the Whitsunday Islands is Whitehaven Beach. The beach here is made from almost 100% silica sand and is like a white powder. The beach is tucked inside Hill Inlet and we walked to the top of the hill for a view of the white sands and swirling blue waters below.

The view was incredible and we were all eager for a swim so we walked back down and spent a couple of hours at the beach. The water in the inlet is extremely shallow and we could wade across huge sections. Small sharks and stingrays were swimming around only metres from us.

We returned to Airlie Beach around mid-day on the third day. We collected the camper and had been expecting a call during the morning from the hire company regarding the air conditioning. This was the second time they didn’t call back so we rang them to check the status of the repair booking. The previous operator had not completed the booking with the repair shop and estimates were one to two days before repair. Eventually a repair was booked for 4pm in Mackay, a few hours south and along the route we would take back towards Hervey Bay.

On the road the temperature was hot and we were relieved that we wouldn’t be driving too far before a repair to the a/c. The a/c was only blocked and the garage blasted away the blockage and within ten minutes we were back on the road.

When Matt made another call to the hire company to check the status of compensation for the issue and also our previous battery and water tank issue he was put through to a new operator. The new operator calculated a refund based on the reported time of breakdown until the time repaired. What he couldn’t see from their system was that the 3.5 days hire he refunded us was mostly due to the fact a repair couldn’t be made whilst we were sailing!

Obviously Matt reminded them how hot the weather over the weekend had been and added sufficient leverage with their poor call-back systems. In total a nice four days of hire were refunded.

We were now on our way back to Hervey Bay and stopped for the evening at a free camp-site alongside a river.

Our next day was another big drive to reach Hervey Bay. We had booked a Fraser Island tour for the following day and would be staying another night with Timmy’s parents. Again we were made very welcome and Deb cooked us an awesome spaghetti bolognese!

Fraser Island is one of the top sights in Australia and a very interesting island in its make-up and history.

• The island is the largest sand-island in the world and all the vegetation has a adapted to grow in sand.
• In Places the sand is 500m deep giving the largest sand-dunes in the world.
• The sand here is silica sand formed in tiny balls creating spaces between where fresh water from underground springs can seep. This creates what is “technically” the largest body of fresh water in the world.
• There are 27 snakes which could kill you on the island and 1-7 of the top 10 most deadly.
• The island hosts the “Fraser Funnelweb” spider, the most poisonous.  There is a venomous spider for each square metre of the island.
• Rainforest only covers a third of the island but still covers an area the size of wales.
• 100 lakes are found on the island.

We had chosen to take a two day guided tour rather than a self-drive 4wd hire primarily due to the cost. For two people to hire a small Suzuki 4wd for three days with two nights hostel accommodation would have cost us 1100 dollars minimum. The other issue is the useless insurance offered which doesn’t cover you for single vehicle accidents or under-body damage – virtually the only type of accident on the island!

Our vehicle for the trip was a 4wd bus with 14 seats. The smaller vehicle would mean that there was more flexibility for the group and the itinerary. Some of the buses used by other operators are off-road coaches with 40+ seats.

We had a good group for the trip with a group of eight Taiwanese, a German couple and three English people who live in Southampton! The drive from Hervey Bay would take us down to the bottom of Fraser Island where we would catch the short ferry from Rainbow Beach across to the start of the 75 mile-long beach covering the east coast of the island.

The tricky part is boarding the ferry. Currents in the channel are strong and the ferry lands against the beach and uses its engines to keep it there – there is no set landing point. We would be boarding right from the beach which was deep, dry sand giving a good chance we would get stuck. We needed to hold on tight and be prepared to zoom onto the boat at the first opportunity which we managed without a problem. Our guide had seen countless vehicles in the sea over the years, all having miss-judged the boarding of the ferry.

Fraser islands 75 mile-long beach provides the main “highway” for the island and at times becomes very busy. One of the main accident spots is along this beach which gives a false sense of security with its smooth looking surface. It is only once cars reach speeds of 60-70mph on the smooth sand that the problems begin. The cars are travelling too fast to see the wash-outs from inland streams which run into the sea and in most cases hit them at full speed. These vary in depth but are fairly deep – we slowed the bus down to only a few mph at each one and it was still a fair bump!

Matt took the picture below whilst he was sat in the front seat.

Once on the beach the temperature soon increased and it became apparent that the air-conditioning was beginning to struggle. The driver had noted this earlier in the journey and we had been waiting to see how it would cope as the day warmed up. The bus was getting hot and with no opening windows in the passenger section the driver called the company who offered to meet us later with a replacement bus.

Minutes later we were flying down the beach towards the Maheno shipwreck site when the rear tyre blew. This didn’t really cause an issue as we were due to stop for lunch shortly so the driver made the repair whilst we enjoyed lunch on the beach.

Lunch was lovely and within thirty minutes we were packed up and had the spare-wheel fitted ready to go. Our next stop was the famous shipwreck of the Maheno.

Built in Scotland and commissioned only six months prior to the Titanic, Lloyds of London described it as the finest ship afloat. The Maheno was built as a first-class only passenger vessel, carrying passengers around the globe.

The Maheno quickly set the record for the fastest Atlantic crossing and held this record for the next thirty-nine years. It was during the Maiden Voyage of the Titanic when the owners of the ship had pressured the captain to try and better this record that the fatal decision was made to turn trough an ice-field and save time.

The history of the Maheno was fascinating and she had served as a vessel carrying troops throughout world wars and was later re-fitted completely before succumbing to the great depression and lack of first-class passengers.

Japan was slowly buying all the scrap metal in the world to turn into war machinery and vessels and the Maheno was sold to them for a bargain price. It was whilst the ship was being towed to Japan that it was hit by a violent storm and subsequently broke free from the tow-ship. Unable to re-secure the ship in the bad weather the tow ship retreated and the Maheno was left to wash-up onto the beach on the east-coast of Fraser Island. What can be seen today is only a mere fraction of the front section, the rest being buried in the sand off the beach.

Our next stop was the lookout point of Indian Head. Overlooking the ocean, 75 mile beach and the sand dunes to the west, the view was spectacular. We spotted stingray, small sharks and a turtle in the clear waters below.

The girl from Southampton didn’t want to make the walk to the top of Indian Head due to the possibly slippery rocks. When the driver quizzed her on this she revealed that she was pregnant. The driver wasn’t overly impressed that he hadn’t been told prior to the trip as the sections inland tomorrow would be very bumpy and she was already becoming sick from the movements.

We re-traced out steps and drove back down 75 mile-beach towards the clear waters of Eli Creek, the largest fresh-water spring on the island.

We swam in the cold but refreshing water for an hour before our replacement bus arrived.

The day was quickly drawing to an end and we began the journey back down the 75-mile beach to our overnight camp.

Our driver had been explaining about the Dingo’s which are found on Fraser Island. These are actually pure Asian Wolf and the only wolves in the world which have not been exposed to cross breeding with other wolves or domestic dogs. The Dingo’s grow to 86cm high at the shoulder which is twice the height of a German Shepard. Their jaws are similar to a snake and can open to 185 degrees with a bite five times more powerful than a pitbull terrier.

The Dingo has been decreasing in numbers as they come into contact with humans and develop a lack of fear for them. Once this occurs the dingo’s become dangerous and have to be culled.

At one point their was 5000 dingo’s on Fraser Island – now there are 300.

The main thing our driver was making us aware of is that they are around and can be dangerous. If you turn and run their instinct is to chase you. Many adults and small children have been mauled and killed by dingo’s.

As we were driving down the beach we saw a few dingo’s who were hanging around the fisherman on the shoreline. The only dingo’s we could expect to see were the young ones who are solitary for around two years before joining a pack. These young wolves are scavengers and often roam around camp-sites and fisherman hoping to sneak some food.

As we drew nearer the dingo’s were on our left, along the shoreline. A young boy of around 10 was walking on the right of the bus and saw us coming past. As many young children do he thought it would be fun to try and race the bus and broke into a run. Instantly we saw the dingo raise its head and make chase after the boy.

Luckily for the boy the driver saw this quickly and we floored the bus to try and push the dingo away. With some impressive gear changing we managed to (just!) get between the dingo and the boy. Had we not been around and the boy had still run along the beach, the dingo would have attacked him.

We used the bus to push the dingo right off the beach before the driver reminded us not to run away from dingo’s as this is what would happen!

We arrived at our camp for the evening. The company has a deal with a university which has a small eco-campus comprised of small huts around a central shower/toilet block and kitchen/eating building. The rooms they have here are on permanent allocation in return for the students receiving free transport from the company for their studies of the island. A good deal as we got to stay in great accommodation away from the main, busy resorts which other operators use.

The day ended with an incredible BBQ of burgers and steaks with lots of salads and potato.

We had been slightly inconvenienced by changing the bus so to compensate the driver had asked the driver of the replacement bus to fill a cooler with wine and beer for us – all on the house!

One of the guys from Southampton initiated a game of Ring of Fire – a drinking game using cards. After a few rounds we headed to bed but only after the Taiwanese girls had become extremely wobbly and the guy from Southampton had played badly so was forced to drink huge amounts of cheap boxed wine which the Aussies call Goon!

We had a late start the next day as the driver was making calls to the office. He explained to us that the girl and two guys from Southampton would be leaving us as she wasn’t feeling great and the driver wasn’t comfortable with her coming on the bumpy roads a second day. A car was sent to meet them and we could head off. It would be good for us as we could now make a crossing back straight to Hervey Bay rather than Rainbow Beach – we would have four extra hours to explore and could see more – or so we thought.

Matt was riding up-front with the driver as we left and headed onto the inland roads. The first big hill we hit hard to gather momentum and the engine turbo blew. A loud hiss signalled another breakdown! Matt and the driver spent some time investigating before we limped back to the big resort to await a solution.

With our second bus broken and their first vehicle in for an a/c repair the company had to send out two Land Cruiser 4wd vehicles, which took a couple of hours.

We had already met our new driver Simon as he had dropped off our replacement bus the day before. We were soon charging down the inland roads towards the famous spot of Lake McKenzie.

A crystal clear lake made from fresh-water filtered through the sand of the island. A Magnificent way to end our trip.

We were soon back on the main-land and at Timmy’s Parents recounting our “Fraser Experience” with a cup of tea.

We spent a night here before saying goodbye to begin our journey south to Noosa Heads. We had never met Timmy’s parents before but they made us so welcome and comfortable in their home which is always nice when you are travelling.

We stopped in Noosa Heads on a nice camp-site for three nights to relax and prepare for New Zealand.

One day we hired a boat to spend a few hours exploring the inland waterways around the big houses.

Our final drive took us to Brisbane where we handed back the camper. It was sad to leave the camper as we had got so used to having all our clothes accessible and not packed in bags and had enjoyed driving and sleeping in it.

We will be flying to Christchurch, our first stop in New Zealand!

Love Emma & Matt

xxx

Coff’s Harbour, Byron Bay, Brisbane, Noosa Heads, Hervey Bay, Agnes Waters, Airlie Beach….

We left Port Macquarie and headed north towards the town of Coff’s Harbour, another small town similar to Port Macquarie. We decided to stop here to break-up the journey to Byron Bay and we found a nice, free camp-site overlooking the harbour.

As the sun was setting we walked up the headland with the bay on one side and the harbour on the other.

In our last blog we mentioned about the camper van we had hired. At the time we didn’t have great pictures but below are some images of the inside cooking, eating and sleeping area.

Our next coastal destination was the “hippy town” of Byron Bay. The town is a mecca for backpackers and has long served as a stop-over and lounging location on the east coast route. We wanted to stop here for a few days due to the abundance of café’s and free wifi which would allow us to catch-up on some planning.

We expected much more of a party atmosphere here but it seems with the strength of the Australian Dollar that numbers travelling has dropped and those still travelling are choosing to drink at their camp-sites / the beach to save on costs. Speaking to a few local people here it is apparent the change of numbers in the last year and many businesses are closing as a result.

We checked into a camp-site and spent the next two days catching up with some forward planning and booking for Australia & New Zealand. We did visit the Sunday markets which was the largest collection of Hippies we had ever seen – Vegan & Vegetarian food stalls replaced the normal burger stand and stalls held all sorts of bizarre goods, all organically produced, locally, by a dread-locked seller wearing home-made, non-sweatshop produced clothing. To top off the offering psychics, mediums, tarot card readers and alternative medicines filled the gaps.

On the morning of our second-day in Byron Bay we headed off on a coastal walk, ending at the largest lighthouse on the east coast of Australia. It was a lovely morning with clear, blue skies and the walk took us along the coast and beaches where we spotted whales and dolphins. One section was covered by walking along the beach and dolphins were skimming through the surf only 10-15 metres from the beach.

The view from the top and the lighthouse itself were spectacular and we stopped for a while for a drink at the “lighthouse café” to admire the views.

A couple of days in Byron Bay was plenty and we were soon driving again, now headed for Brisbane and another confusing section of toll roads and bridges!

On the recommendation of our friends Alan & Nicky we skirted Brisbane and headed straight for the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary, the oldest and largest in the world. Since the posting of Alan’s “koala cuddle” on Facebook Emma had been determined to hold a Koala before leaving Australia.

We managed to avoid the worst of the toll roads and crossed only one small toll bridge and within no-time were hand feeding Kangaroos at the sanctuary.

We got to see lots of Koalas up-close and Emma got her Koala cuddle. The Koala has now entered Emma’s “future zoo list” list of “must-have cute animals” alongside the common Wombat.

As we have seen many cities on our travels, and all share many of the same features we decided to save on time and skip Brisbane unless we have time on the return journey. We headed straight for Noosa Heads, a wealthy Australian “playground” a few hours north of Brisbane.

Arriving late in Noosa we did the normal drive around to assess the parking and possible fines situation before deciding that the town was actually quite lapsed with their parking/overnight camping regulations and settled down in a car-park for the night. Handily a 24hr McDonald’s was next door to provide us with coffee and toilets!

Alan had warned us that this was an extremely wealthy area and it was apparent immediately. The area was lovely and the houses/boats/cars incredible. The town had a really nice feel and we spent the morning walking on the beach and cruising the river on the ferry.

The picture below is a typical house/boat combination, backing onto the Noosa River.

The beach was lovely but still very busy due to the school holidays in the New South Wales region.

In the afternoon we started the drive north towards Hervey Bay where we would be parking up at Timmy’s parents house. In anticipation of parking outside their house and making the place look messy we stopped off at a jet-wash to give the camper a once-over. The jet wash ran on a 2.5 minute cycle, costing two dollars a time. We managed to give the whole outside of the camper a good wash in 7.5 minutes, impressive for a vehicle this size!

Soon after leaving Noosa and before joining the main highway Matt spotted one of the small brown signs representing a “lookout/viewing pint”. The track leading to it soon turned dusty and we cursed having just washed the camper. Experience has told us that these viewing points are usually worth the detour so we pushed on, winding uphill for a good few kms before reaching the summit. The view was the best we have seen in Australia and as you can see for the pictures below certainly worth the short detour.

We arrived in Hervey Bay early evening and were quickly made to feel at-home by Timmy’s mum Deb, who promptly made up a cup of tea, apologising for the fact that it was Australian tea and not English. Sarah has informed them that PG Tips is the best available and far superior to Australian teas, although we didn’t notice a difference.

Within a couple of hours we met the rest of the family: Steve (Timmy’s dad), Erin & Amy (the sisters). It was great to be made so welcome at their house and they cooked us a lovely dinner before we settled back into the camper for the night which we parked on the grass at the front of the house.

Hervey Bay is the gateway to Fraser Island and we decided to travel North first and return to visit Fraser before dropping the camper in Brisbane. We took to the road again in the morning for a fair drive to the small towns of 1770 and Agnes Waters. The town of 1770 was named after the year which Captain Cook first landed on mainland Australia.

We had again followed a recommendation from Alan & Nicky to stop here, having seen their pictures from the hugely popular “Scooteroo”. Scooteroo has put these quiet little towns “on the map” as far as backpackers are concerned and has become the third most reviewed and recommended attraction on the east coast.

Scooteroo is a motorcycle tour company using Harley Davidson-styled motorcycles with large chopper style handlebars. Although the bikes are actually lightweight replicas with small engines, at a quick glance they still look the part. In addition to this they dress you with a flamed leather jacket and transfer tattoos turning the group into a miniature hell’s angels for three hour tour.

We booked the tour for the afternoon and spent the morning exploring and getting Matt’s hair cut.

The tour began at 3pm and we were soon covered with tattoos and leather.

Our group was twenty strong which was a good size group as some groups can be 50+, stretching 2km along the road – Not surprising that the local police have been paying them close attention!

No license or experience is necessary to ride in the tour so a pre ride practice is necessary to ensure everyone’s capability to twist a throttle and operate the one brake. Incredibly one girl managed to fall of within the first two metres and one girl was so bad that they wouldn’t allow her to ride as she couldn’t balance the bike for more than a few metres!

We were both fine and soon we were all out on the open road, on a glorious evening, spotting kangaroos along the deserted roads.

 

The bikes had 80km top speeds on the clock – plenty fast enough for a small bike which has very well-worn brakes! The guides were safe but fairly lenient and much of time we road them at full throttle, off the speedometer. Certain sections allowed overtaking and no sooner had we entered the first one, Emma gunned it and overtook all the guys, ending up next to Matt at the front.

Worryingly Emma loved the ride and certainly had no confidence issues, she even suited the “bad biker” image!

Along the roadside a professional photographer was waiting to snap shots of us riding along.

We stopped off near the end of the ride to eat wedges at a café overlooking the harbour. This is one of the two places in Australia where the sun can be seen setting over the water until it disappears. We sat and watched the sunset before riding back to base.

Agnes Waters has a bush-camp for campers and motor-homes which offers cost-effective (and legal) overnight parking for only 5 dollar per person. We parked here for the night and awoke early the next day as we had been told it was possible to avoid paying if you left before the ranger arrived! Just as we had packed up and started the engine – in drove the ranger.

Today we had a long 800km drive to Airlie Beach the gateway to the Whitsunday islands. We soon drained fuel and the situation was getting increasingly worrying as fuel stations here a sparse. It was difficult to judge whether to turn back or continue in the hope of finding fuel. Matt took a wrong turn which cost us fuel and before long we were parked in a very small village asking around for the nearest fuel station. A little old lady who seemed to have never left the village sent us to the nearest station, estimating it was 25-30km away. We really thought we were going to run-out of fuel before reaching the station but amazingly we made it just as the vehicle was loosing power.

Filled up and cruising north we decided for the first time that the heat was too much for the windows alone so we put the A/C on. In a few minutes a puddle formed in the passenger foot-well signalling a problem!

We ran the rest of the journey without A/C, reaching Airlie Beach early evening, tired and having filled-up the fuel tank three times.

We parked at the convenient x-base backpackers where we could also park the van cheaply for the next three days as we would be sailing and booked an A/C repair for our return.

The Whitsunday’s is a group of 100 islands forming part of the inner great barrier reef and a top destination in Australia due to its pure silica beaches, snorkelling/diving reefs and light-blue waters.

We have booked onto a boat for two days and three nights called “Powerplay”, described as “the most powerful cruising catamaran sailing the Whitsundays”. It would be more impressive if it wasn’t also one of the only power catamarans in the area – the others are all sailing catamarans! The boat looks lovely and we are looking forward to a few care-free days of cruising, eating and swimming with no driving.

Love Emma & Matt

xxx