And we're off! We packed up the car with our worldly goods, namely our backpacks, tent, airbed, camp chairs, gas cooker and cooking utensils and hit the road to find some sunshine in Queensland. We'd decided just to shoot right through New South Wales and check out that out on the way back down, when it'll be warmer. We drove for about 7 hours, had a quick look in Port Macquarie then checked into a motel in Coffs Harbour. Even though we were in Oz it felt very American checking into our $68 a night motel! We were surprised for how nice it was for being so cheap! We hit the road early again the next morning and drove for another 6/7 hours. We had a little rest & chilled in the sun in Byron Bay; your typical Ozzie surfer town, crossed the border in QLD, drove through Surfers Paradise, the Gold Coast (looks like Miami!) and Brisbane then parked up at a rest stop, which was actually more like a proper campsite, and slept in the car for the night. The weather was definitely heating up. It felt good to be back on the road again!

Next morning it was onto to Hervey Bay, but first we did a detour into Tin Cay Bay. I'd read wild dolphins came right into the marina around 7/8 in the morning so we were hoping for a sighting. Our luck was in, the sun was shining and two dolphins had come into the marina for their breakie! I bought some fish and got into the water and handfed Patch, the female dolphin, such an awesome experience! She was so gentle and gave my hand a nudge to tell me she wanted some more then started making some noises which I was told meant she was blowing me kisses……..aw! That totally made my day.

We travelled onto Hervey Bay and finally got to pitch our new home, our 6 man tent! We booked 2 nights at a lovely campsite that looked right onto the beach, got out the bikini and boardies and BBQ'd Ozzie style! The main reason for coming to Hervey Bay was to go on a whale watching tour, so we booked onto one for the following day. The whales migrate here between August and November as the water is warmer and Hervey is one of the best places in Oz to spot them. Thank you Hervey you did not disappoint, our day whale spotting was absolutely amazing! Two young whales came right up to our boat and played about for ages. It was such an amazing sight, we could have literally reached out and touched them, definitely a once in a lifetime experience that we'll never forget. By the end of the day we'd spotted six different pods, some huge males were breaching out of the water and doing tail slaps. Absolutely gorgeous animals. I could have spent days going on cruise after cruise just watching them play around in the waters.

It was a funny day we met two Scottish couples, one on the cruise who were from Dundee and the other from Paisley who were parked up in their camper in the same campsite us. It's a rare occurrence when you meet anyone from Scotland never mind four people in the same day! We then met our first ever Possum, he was a cute little guy and Dean handfed him some mandarins. Don't think he was too impressed when we ran out so he scuttled off back up his tree. The day ended with a good old storm, a bit of a difference in weather from when I was running along the beach in the sunshine at half 6 in the morning! Our beloved tent had a little bit of a leak and we're thinking, oh god we're going to have to sleep in the car, but it all turned out well and after the tent got used to the rain the leak stopped and we fell asleep sleep listening to the sounds of the waves crashing onto the sand.

Lots of Love

Chelle & Dean xxx