Brisbane December 6th - 8th Our original plan was to make a stop at another national park before we got to Brisbane, but the rain was so torrential on the way north that we decided it wasn't worth it as there's no way we'd have been able to get out of the van to do any walking anyway. Damn you weather. Got to Brisbane alright and stayed in the closest campsite to the CBD. A huge storm greeted us on our first night - always seemed to rain just as we were about ...

Byron Bay December 3rd - 5th Stayed at Broken Head camping ground which was about ten minute's drive out of Byron Bay and had the best facilities we'd had so far. Distance out of the town centre also meant there were no deadlegs, hippies or 'schoolies' around who all seem to dominate the town centre. Lots of people in the local supermarket with no shoes on - scummers! Byron Bay is supposed to be very arty and a bit cultural, but looks like an excuse fo...

Dumaresque Dam, Gibraltar National Park December 1st / 2nd Next stop was slightly inland off the coast at Dumaresque Dam. Looked nice in the guidebook photos, less impressive in torrential rain and perpetual dark cloud cover, but it was free - hurrah. Stopped at Dorrigo National Park on the way to see the 'impressive sky walk' which had literally zero visibility given the heavy cloud. We parked right next to the Dam and had a walk round an edge of i...

Myall Lakes, South West Rocks and Arakoon November 27th - 30th Picked up our Camperman campervan and started the drive north to Cairns for the next 3 weeks of our Aussie trip. Very thankful that we paid a bit more cash for a bit more space as I think we'd have killed each other otherwise! Looking at most of the other campervans on the road (Wicked, Jucy and Autobahn) they all looked absolutely tiny and you clearly couldn't even stand up in them - unlucky fellow...

Had a great flight over with Cathay Pacific and thankfully our wooden chopstick pressies and cleaned hiking boots made it through customs OK after a bit of scrutiny from the po-faced airport staff. Stayed with Arthur, a friend of Sarah's family, in a northern suburb of Sydney called Northwood for our first few days. House was lovely and overlooked a mini-harbour which people commute into Sydney from. Arthur was unbelievably accommodating and we had our own...