Cairns is the final, wistful stop on our Australian journey. It is with a bit of a tug to the heart that we finish up a mesmerizing 4 weeks of adventure. We are feeling so mentally settled and comfortable that it is hard to imagine jumping back into Southeast Asia. But both our itineraries and wallets tell us that it is time to move on, and so we indulged in 2 more final activities whilst in Cairns for 4 nights - 1 more reef trip, and 1 koala cuddle! After breez...

This is a land of extremes, and thanks to the wonders of aviation, we flew from the deep desert of the Outback to the lush, tropical coast of northern Queensland in only 2 hours. This environment of our latest and almost final stop in Australia is indicative of most of our onward travel, so....steamy it is! We picked up our rental car at Cairns airport and drove the Captain Cook Highway up to the town of Port Douglas for a 4 night stay. Port Douglas has a bit of...

Vanessa and Troy are champions - they shared the driving across the desert on a loooong journey from Yulara to Alice Springs via King's Canyon, safely from the crack of dawn to just before sundown. This is a huge feat! We all vigilantly scanned the landscape from the car wary of wildlife, and we did in fact have 2 crazy sightings; a HUGE camel that ran across the road several hundred metres in front of us, and a dingo! We were dumbfounded about encountering both ...

A few years ago we travelled to Iceland and discovered an otherworldly landscape that mesmerized us. And it was here in the Northern Territory, deep in the heart of Australia, that we were once again overcome and captivated by this same sense of magic, and beauty. The most brilliant shades of colour, the widest skies of stars, and the opportunity to experience the space and stories of this Aboriginal land was truly a gift. The desert still has plenty of scorchin...

Arriving into downtown Sydney via the train crossing over the famous harbour bridge, the first glimpses prove that it is simply stunning. The opera house sits majestically on the sparkling water, and there is an exciting air of activity of ferries, sailboats, and cruise ships. We squealed a bit (well, one of us did), and jumped off the train on the north side of the harbour to take a leisurely walk back over the bridge. The opera house is beautiful and unique fro...