Landed in Brisbane late at night and slept in the departures lounge (to save one night's money) with a load of Koreans who were due out on the early morning flight. Next morning we booked into a hostel above The Elephant & Wheelbarrow (genuine English pub) and met Mark from Wicked Camper Vans who we had been chatting to on e-mail since Mexico. Despite us being unable to transfer a deposit he had sprayed up the van as per our suggestions (Ozzie touring car on one side and racebike on the other) and we were ready to go save for extracting a large amount of cash from one cashier in a bank and handing it to the bloke at the back of the queue who then deposited it back into his account two minutes later with the same cashier.

A couple we bumped into in Fiji (going the other way around) told us about a book that listed all the campsites in Australia - including all the free ones! We immediately put it to good use and stayed at a couple of freebies on the way North. Our decision as to whether we would do the inland route up and the coastal way back South was influenced by proper rain just starting to hit north of Brisbane and we sodded off inland. The locals had been waiting for 7 years for proper rain and were promptly rewarded with mega floods just a day behind us. We continued inland complaining bitterly about Queensland The Sunshine State and Jon with a massive headcold.

We stopped off at a National Park Carnarvon Gorge and had a very pleasant wander up this beautiful valley just recovering from a huge flood back in February. Saw loads of wildlife and aborogini graffiti - vandals!!!

Then drove northwards forever (3 days) across miles and miles of single tarmac road (diving off every 10 miles or so to avoid getting hit by a 50 metre 4 tralier roadtrain) and arrived at the Unadara lava tubes. These tubes were phenomeal - basically the lava follows a dry riverbed and the top and the sides harden and when the volcano runs out of juice the tube empties out and you're left with "tunnels" over 80 miles long about 15 to 25 in diametre. The occasional rook collapse allows us to enter and wander along in awe (and in the dark - with bats, spiders, snakes etc).

After this we turn in eastwards and start to head towards Cairns at the realistic top of the east coast - any higher and you need 4WD, a resistance to badly corrugated gravel roads and a high boredom threshold. The scenery is almost like being on a big hamster wheel after awhile. Another crest in the road and its like - F*** Me! Red soil and another 10,000 Eucalyptus trees!!