We'd heard Airlie Beach was crowded and overrun with backpackers so took a chance and headed to Conway Beach instead, which is 30 km or so south of Airlie Beach. It's a tiny fishing village with a handful of houses and a caravan park that also doubles as the local store, restaurant and fish n chip shop. The seemingly only reason people visit is to fish but the caravan park owners have been clever and made the park into a kids paradise. There's a water park and water slide, jumping pillows, a miniature train, hire bikes and even 4 square courts painted on the roads. And to our kids' amazement, they were the only kids in the park so had all this to themselves! Toby had success fishing with a feed of whiting and I spent two days beside the pool reading so a great time was had by all!

We did venture into Airlie Beach for a few hours (there were at least 10 foul looking bars on the main street and approx 300 18-24 yr olds lying around the lagoon!), found a book exchange to restock for the kids and quickly headed back to our peaceful hideaway. Gemma managed to dive into the pool and swim under water straight into the other side, only to hit her face on the edge so she left Conway Beach with a very fat lip!

For our 4 night stay in Townsville, we put up the van in our friend Louise's driveway and camped in suburbia. Her friend from Melbourne Peter, was also visiting and we all had a great 4 days. Louise has a dog named Gus who especially enjoyed a house full of playmates!

We went to the aquarium twice as it was so good and visited their turtle hospital. We also caught the car ferry across to Magnetic Island and had a wonderful day. Gemma was really not keen to get on another boat but thankfully the Kwells worked and it was a calm ride so she no longer hates boats quite so much! We visited some beautiful beaches but unfortunately the stingers are still around so no swimming but we consoled ourselves with wine and a lovely lunch at Horseshoe Bay and a wade inside the stinger net.

Neve and Lachie had a great time at the sunset drumming which we followed up with fish n chips on the Strand and Gemma especially enjoyed swimming at the amazing pool in nearby Thuringowa. The favourite part for Toby and I was the last night when Peter cooked us all a Balinese feast which was just heavenly (oh and the prawns and bugs on the first night were pretty good too!)

We had originally planned to head further north but had a bit of a re-think and decided to give ourselves more time back down south where the kids can swim in the beaches. When we were at 1770 we'd looked into visiting Heron Island for a night but it had been booked out, however we've had better luck this time and they have a 3 night deal on, so much to Neve's excitement and Gemma's dread, that's our next destination!

We had a long drive today and are staying at a free camp outside of St Lawrence. It's really lovely, next to a large wetland. We went for a walk before dinner and saw brolgas, whistling ducks, rajah shelducks and magpie geese. There are about 20-30 other vans here but it's so quiet and spread out and as I type at 8.30 (with kids and Toby fast asleep), all I can hear are owls, frogs and insects!