The long road south continues....

HERVEY BAY/FRASER ISLAND

...and so we arrived, after a full day driving (fortunately mishap free) in Hervey Bay, the base for our extremely frivulous treat of a trip to nearby Fraser Island. However, in order to pull our treat off, we needed to try and find a tour operater offering a day trip out to the island that we could actually afford, not an easy task with our meagre budget. Sucess, we thought as we walked away from our carefully chosen ticket booth with a trip for only $50 each. Our baked beans on toast and cheap wine that evening never tasted better and even the mid-night security guard moving us on from our beach side sleeping spot in our pyjamas couldn't dampen our spirits.

Now $50 can buy you a lot these days in Australia, except it seems, where booking a trip to Fraser Isalnd is concerned, or it could be that when it comes to booking organised tours, we walk around with MUG written on our foreheads (I refer you back to Ha Long Bay, Vietnam). Fraser Island is the world's largest sand island, 4x4's zoom across it's endless stretch of beaches, it's home to more species of wildlife and birds than you can imagine, it's covered by tropical rainforests and it hosts some of the best snorkelling in the country...or so we've heard. Our 'tour' escorted us from the mainland to a plastic 5 star holiday resort on the wrong side of the island. No problem we thought, we'll make our own way to the other side and enquired about transport to get us there. Hmmm, after enquiring it appeared that it would be impossible to actually leave the resort until the ferry came at 5pm, "but please feel free to make use of our facilities". Once again, we find ourselves swindled and all the many attractions and reasons for visiting Fraser were out of our reach. So close, yet so far, oh well, lets have a beer.

TO BRISBANE

North of Brisbane is the Sunshine Coast consisting of 5 or 6 small, upmarket beach towns, all with vast stretches of golden sand and good surf and we took in as many as time would allow en route to the city. The best of which was Noosa, exactly as you'd imagine an ozzy beach to be. Volley ball, surfers, Volkswagen combi vans and the token bronzed life guard showing off his pecs and his speedo's. Unfortunatley we couldn't hang around long here, but it wasn't a problem, the trip had started to take the form of a fully fledged beach hop, something jelly fish had made impossile in the north. It's fair to say that we were truly loving the life in the van and Dan's tan was taking a route never before trodden, i.e not red, but golden brown like a Morrison's extra tasty chicken, (hair still ginger though).

After a few beach stopovers we made it to the state capital, home of Castlemaine XXXX, The 'Gabba and the first test of the 2006 Ashes - Brisbane. Picking out Brits abroad is never more easy than when our nations sports teams are on tour, thousands were gathered in the city centre with their union jack endorsed clothing, pink skin, beer bellies, tatoos and of course, socks and sandals. Don't they make you proud? Seriously though, the atmosphere was fantastic. We didn't just have the cricket crowd, but also the rugby crowd (thats the game with the funny shaped ball) in anticiaption for the tri-nations match which was played the evening of our arrival.

Not surprisingly, we weren't allowed access to the 'Gabba for our usual stadium tour, but our camping spot for the night was only a stones throw from the 45,000 capacity SunCorp stadium where the rugby was played and from the volume of the crowd noise we could hear, we didn't need to buy a paper the next morning to know Britain had lost.

Brisbane is a great city, if a little mish-mashed and difficult to navigate, something made more difficult when you're trying to wheel a campervan around, but we enjoyed a proper city break over the few days we were there. Like a lot of towns in Australia, Brisbane has a man made beach and lagoon set beside the river offering a surreal experience of swimming and sunbathing in full view of the skyscrapers of the city...and all for free.

ALONG THE GOLD COAST

Surfers Paradise was never a place that we wanted to visit, but curiousity got the better of us and Australias No.1 holiday destination deserved a peak. If you want bright lights, loud dance music, commercialism, high rise apartments which block the beach from sunlight, school leavers causing mayhem on the streets, endless streams of casinos, plastic food, over priced beer and wacky party cruises, this place is for you. We stayed 2 hours.

We headed further south as fast as the van could take us and were rewarded by finding the fantastic surf town on the New South Wales border, Tweed Heads. This is more like it. We bbq'd on the beach, enjoyed a few drinks, slept by the sea with not a camping restriction in sight, swam at 6am and ate breakfast watching the many surfers catching the early morning breakers, fair dinkum mate.

INTO NEW SOUTH WALES

One piece of equipment we had not utilised during our time in the van was beginning to call out to us and was indeed staring at us daily in reflection of its neglect. It's time to get out the fishing rod. It appears to us that fishing rods are standard issue to all Australians and we felt it our rightful duty to join them in plundering the ocean for our tea, afterall, they make it look so easy. So, upon arrival in the small town of Mylestom, with bait in hand, we headed to the estuary, which we'd been told was a good spot for beginners. Now, lj doesn't want to blow her own trumpet, but over the course of the afternoon she showed the boy Raw what fishing was all about. The competition was tense, many fish had either been maimed or killed, upon the last cast Raw vs Drury was tied at 3 fish a piece. Lj took the rod, swung back and let the line fly, the last chance for victory, could she take it? Oh yes, what a whopper! Mylestom estuary had rarely seen an angling match of this magnitude and both players were drained, it was like Rocky IV with fish.

THE ROAD TO SYDNEY

Our final stint took us through the sublime Byron Bay which we loved, Nambucca Heads, Port Macquarie, a KFC family feast and the biggest and scariest thunderstorm we'd ever witnessed, but we made it. The last 4 weeks in our little van have been truly memorable, another real achievement for us. The trip just gets better and better, and what better place to drive into than 'the greatest place in the world' - Sydney. We arrived On Thursday night, tired, dirty & smelly but straight into the warm bussom of Kerryn & Pete.

Our life just keeps on making us smile from ear to ear every single day.

Will update again as soon as we can.

All our love

Danny & Laurajayne xxx