It's been too long folks. Now, where did I leave you? Oh yeah, Brisbane.

As intended, we visited the late Mr Irwin's Australian Zoo. The zoo is about 50 or so kilometres from Brisbane and Ian kindly suggested we use his car for the journey. The zoo itself was initially a reptile park before its development meaning the vast majority of creatures were of the slippery, scaly variety. As you can imagine, the place was filled with 'gators, crocs, snakes (... ruddy great snakes!). Over recent years, they've added most of the native Australian animals as well as elephants and tigers. Lauren would have given Usain Bolt a run for his money when she realised she could personally feed a heffelump and mercifully, the queues were quite short.

Before we outstayed our welcome with Ian, Selena and James, we departed for Noosa. Unfortunately, Cyclone Ulai was winding its way toward the Queensland coast and the weather took a turn for the worse, much to the delight of the resident surfers. As we were heading northward, surfing conditions deteriorate shortly after Noosa on account of the Great Barrier Reef so we decided in our infinite wisdom it was time for a surf lesson. Huge waves with unerring regularity pounded the Noosa beach and gave even the most-ardent wave-rider a run for his money, and we were about to get battered. Jenson Button (or his clone) took the 2 hour surf lesson and ran through the theory and the basics on the beach but even he struggled to get out into the waves. Nevertheless, we both managed to stand on the boards and ride a few waves into shore so we left content, if slightly bruised.

During our stay in Noosa, we booked ourselves on a 3 day-2 night Trailblazer tour of Fraser Island. Fraser Island is situated a short hop from the mainland and is 120kms of sandbar created by longshore drift. You can't hope to navigate this giant sandpit of an island without the use of a 4x4. Our guide made use of a 4x4 tour bus to escort us around the island. Driving up and down the 75 mile beach, we spotted shipwrecks, creeks and even dingoes on our first afternoon. Dingoes on Fraser Island are 100% pure breed but are dwindling in numbers on account of culling and malnourishment. It's hard not to feel sorry for the dogs and the circumstances they find themselves in. I also managed to lose a beloved flip-flop in the sand dunes somewhere - I am good.

Other notable sites we visited on the island included Lake Boomanjin which was exceptionally clean but stained with tannin and gave you the impression you were swimming in blood. Lake Birrabeen is beautiful and the ultra white beach and clear water is akin to a tropical island. Then there's Lake Wabby, surrounded on 3 sides by eucalyptus rain forest, the other side is a giant sand dune that's subsuming 3m of the lake every year and contains catfish and turtles - no crocs or so we were told.

We left Fraser Island early Wednesday afternoon and were keen to get back to Noosa Heads before 5pm in time for our Greyhound bus trip to Airlie Beach. We needn't worry as we returned in good time but were made to wait a couple of hours by a bus driven by the booner of the century. Mr. Bus Driver unkindly informed us there was no point heading to Airlie Beach because, and I quote, "There's nothing there!" implying entirely that the cyclone had caused Airlie and the Whitsundays to be evacuated and power still hadn't returned - it didn't seem to matter to him that we needed to head northward anyway and we'd already paid $320 and it certainly didn't occur to him to assist with some helpful advice and guidance. We jumped on the bus in the slim hope that we could find somewhere close by or that power might be restored over the course of the next few days. As it turns out and with Rob's help (cheers boy!), we discovered that the driver was seriously misinformed and Airlie was back up and running as early as Monday (2 days before). We didn't have to put with the idiot for the entire 16 hour bus journey (guess what Lauren did for 90% of it ... yep, you guessed it) and the second driver seemed to know what he was talking about.

So, here we are in Airlie Beach. The hostel is really good value and we're in the process of booking our diving trips to the reef (probably for Monday and Tuesday). In the next few days, we have it in mind to head out to the Whitsundays, hire some bikes and cycle the coast and I most certainly intend to peel off the outer-most layer of skin to stop the mossie bites from itching so much! :-)

Love and that. xxx