fair dinkum. bonzer. ripper. ya flamin gallah.

11th December
A long long drive down to Rockhampton. No particular reason for staying here other than to break up the journey. It's actually the steak capital of Australia, which can only mean one thing - Steak for me for dinner (and tomato and pasta for Joey). Went to see james bond in the evening - Casino Royale. Pretty good and a fair debut for Daniel Craig. But really, why does he pout so much?


12th December
Another mammoth drive in order to get to Hervey bay - access point to Fraser Island, the largest sand island in the world. Except we didn't get that far. We ended up in the world's crappiest little camp site near a town called Bagara. How crap? No fresh water, you had to mop the showers after you were done, and the toilets were closed for cleaning between 8 and 10am - checkout being at 10. But we were there for a reason. By 6:30pm we were at the Queensland Parks & Wildlife Services office at Mon Repos beach next door. Why? To watch giant turtles lay eggs on the beach. Quite selfishly, the turtles didn't arrive til about 9:30 (some people kept asking what time they were due - fools) and we didn't get home til about 1am, but it was pretty cool. Our turtle laid her eggs below the tide mark so we had to help move the nest further up shore. Not something you do every day...


13th December
Due to tight deadlines, we could either spend two days on a Fraser Island trip or two days relaxing in Queensland's sunshine coast. Decision? Drop the big island and save bucks by going to the beachey bit instead. Drove to the delightful if slightly pretentious town of Noosa Heads. Ambled around town. This was the first civilisation we'd seen for a while so we were sad to crack on down, but the whole of that coast is similar. Our campsite was just outside maroochydoor. Can you believe that the sites had en-suite bathrooms? What a novelty! Can you believe that they hadn't been decorated since the 70's? They were clean, but finished in a tropical yellow that i've not seen in a bog for a long time... Didn't seem to put joey off her pot routine though!


14th December
Crikey! Isn't she a beauty! The sunshine coast is the home of the late (Sir) Steve Irwin's zoo - Australia Zoo! And we had a ripper day mate! The place is still adorned with pictures and films of him in action. Still a legend... Watched croc feeding (in the crocoseum), hand fed 'roos and ephelants (particularly cool), saw snakes and koalas and possums and many many more... Crocs rule. There is a tribute to Steve-o being put together and the main road is called Steve Irwin Way.

After all the zoo action we checked out mooloolooba beach. Looked nice...

Later that evening... I took my book to the out-house (as you do) for a bit of me-time and who should I see sitting behind the pot, but a bloody great spider. I don't like them. Irrational I know, and this chap was only 2 inches across. At the zoo we'd been tought how crocs and snakes were our friends. Nobody said anything about spiders though, and this little fellow meant business. I referred to andy pipkin's law - they're only trouble if they're bigger than the soul of your shoe. This guy was not bigger than my shoe, however he was behind a toilet. Pipkin's rule should be amended to - they're only trouble if they're bigger than the soul of your shoe or you can't get your foot to him (ie behind the pan). Time to bring in the big guns. Joey... She gave me a giant can of Rid insect spray. Now, after my day at the zoo, I should've been picking the little guy up and releasing him outside. Animals are my friend and all that. But, I also read a story in the local rag about how the Sydney Funnel Web is making a death march north into queensland, so it was either him or me. Well, him or me-and-a-giant-can-of-spider-neutraliser. One of us was going to get the toilet to ourselves. Man versus arachnid. Two legs versus eight. Giant brain versus tiny brain (you choose which way round). Venomous poisonous bite versus slightly sour breath. Fifteen stone versus a few grams. Ding-ding. Round one. I hit him with a long spray and he hid behind the pipes. Nice defensive move. At this point I wasn't sure whether he'd gone to his underground lair to call up his buddies. But I wasn't scared. I had Rid. A 100% owned and operated Aussie company. He stuck his head out and I zapped him again. This went on for a few minutes. He was a worthy opponent. Eventually he pushed his luck and found himself in no mans land. My crushing flip-flop came down. All over. Hill wins by knock-out. After the glory of victory came the bitterness of guilt. I felt really bad. I've learnt my lesson. If I find myself in a similar situation with a deadly killer, i'll call joey in...


15th December
Went back to Mooloolooba beach to relax for the day. Nice lunch and more sunbathing and reading and sunbathing and relaxing. Well, that was jo. I just arsed around in the sea. Then we hit the highway and found us some more civilisation - Brisbane. Queensland's state capital. Despite the general improvement in weather as we've headed south (less humid), when we got in to Brisbane (or as the locals call it brizzie or briz-o) it poured down. We had dinner outside the camp kitchen under the veranda watching the thunder and lightning through the palm trees. The trees were shaking a little too much for the verocity of the storm (an earlier severe weather warning had been cancelled), so we were a little confused. It turned out that a possum (cat like tree dweller) was eyeing up our dinner from his palm tree base, moving between trees with a dexterity last seen in joey's gymnastics class eighteen years ago. It was the first wild wildlife we've seen that can't kill us. We've still yet to see a wild 'roo. Roadkill doesn't count...


16th December
Finally, some big smoke. Got the bus in to brizzie from the campsite. Excellent transport infrastructure. Busways. Bus only roads. No traffic lights. No pedestrians. No delays. Dirt cheap too. Brisbane is a nice town. Old buildings and new buildings. Old shops and new shops. And shops and more shops. And shops. Mrs. H hasn't shopped since LA (Auckland wasn't memorable for it's shopping unless you wanted to buy a boat). So she did what comes naturally. She browsed. After a couple of hours I checked in at the creche and watched some ashes action. Day three of the perth test. Not too clever. When jo collected me I think my mood was worse than when I went in. My mood must have been pretty bad, as joey has acquired a significant amount of contempt for ricky "punter" ponting. If he's on the radio I have to switch him off. Arrogant chap.

After the shopping/cricket session we ambled round the city's south bank, the arty bit, and hopped on the ferry back up the river.

Brisbane. Nice place.


17th December
From the sunshine coast to brisbane and then the gold coast. Australia's number 1 domestic tourist destination. In particular Surfers Paradise. Strange name for a place. A bit presumptious really. What would a surfer consider paradise? Waves for a start. Check. Surf shops. Check. Chicks. Check. Food and drink. Check. So far so good. But there's more to Surfers than that. Incredibly expensive property (including the worlds tallest residential tower at 80 storeys). Millions of tourists. Thousands of drunk tourists. Hundreds of drunk tourists acting like pillocks. Sunburn (mainly on said pillocks).

After examining Surfers, we moved on down the gold coast and set up camp in the more pleasant burleigh heads. Enough cafes and shops and pristine beaches to entertain us. Not too much to entice the pillocks.

Since we've been away we've seen many things which we have described as surreal. Rock formations, mountains, fjords, parks, glaciers, even people. But this takes first place. We're in burleigh heads on south east queensland's gold coast. We're in a caravan park near a beautiful beach and it's 25-30 degrees. Towering over the campsite, and in particular our neighbour's caravan, is a 12 foot inflatable glow in the dark santa. If this wasn't freaky enough, all of the campers have their own nativity play scenes and gaudy lights. Plus there's christmas carols being sung on the beach. It can't be christmas. It's too warm. Where's the snow? Where are the thick winter coats? Why are people on the beach wearing reindeer ears? Why is there a giant inflatable santa hovering near our van? One large gust of wind and santa could knock our van out of the park...


Joey's musings:- following on from Matt's very descriptive description of our daily events, I will just give a brief synopsis of our last few days!

1. Another night with blow up santa in Burleigh Heads.
2. Byron Bay.....well, what can I say, Matt and I were the only people with no dreads, good personal hygeine and both hands free from carrying either a set of bongo's or digeredoo's.....you could almost smell the lentils - in fact there was no almost about it, you actually could smell the lentils in the camp amenities if you know what I mean!! As we settled down for the night to the sound of drumming circles, we pondered on how unalternative the masses were whilst trying to be alternative in the hope of "finding themselves!". What philistines we are!
3. Day 2 in Byron - as we awoke to the smell of joss sticks and the sight of tie die bikini's hanging in the warm morning sun we got our gear together and made our way to the local dive shop for a spot on snorkelling at the Julian Rocks Marine Park....TBC.

Lots of love,

Joey xxxx