Author: sigormley

Australia Day & Zoo!

What better way to celebrate Australia Day with the Australians than to go to Australia Zoo! As signs proclaim everywhere around the zoo, it’s the home of the crocodile hunter, the late Steve Irwin. The title is well earned, going by the number of crocs there, and the fact that each one has a bit of background explaining where and when each was caught by Steve. The zoo definitely has a different feel to other zoos, it’s all about getting close and experiencing the animals, so that you learn to love them and hopefully help protect them too. Each of the keepers exudes the same enthusiasm and love for the animals, and it’s good to know that the animals come first too.
The first animals we see are huge tortoises, they used to have one originally caught by Charles Darwin, that lived to 175 years old! Around the corner were three elephants waiting to be fed by the crowd, including us. With my piece of carrot swapped for elephant snot, we moved on to the Crocoseum, a huge arena with snake, bird and crocodile shows, all done by those enthusiastic keepers!
To round off Australia day, we ended up having a barbie with some Aussies in our campsite next to the beach whilst watching fireworks off in the distance, now I don’t think it gets more Australian than that!

Ngungun

Our whistlestop tour of Brisbane was completed with a trip to Mount Coot-tha, offering views over the city and beyond, and more importantly a road all the way to the top. Next stop was the Glasshouse Mountains, a set of 9 or so steep peaks sticking up from the otherwise flat plain. Most of the peaks require mountain climbing experiene to attempt, which left us with Mount Ngungun, described as “easy” by the guide. Well, if that’s easy I’m glad we didn’t attempt the others as we still ended up on all fours during our ascent, but the views more than made up for it!

Brissie

The best way to start off the day in a new city is to have coffee with a local and Jon the Pom (Si’s Mum’s self-named friend) was full of useful facts and tips to send us on our way. It feels very strange to be in a city again but luckily Brisbane seems quite laid back and not at all as hectic as Sydney. Our day was spent with a brief forray into the museum followed by a long walk along the river.
Si ‘the thrill seeker’ Gormley is as we speak climbing the Story bridge (I’ll let him tell you the story!). I left him to it, not because I’m a big chicken but because I wasn’t wearing the right shoes – what a shame! For my slightly more tame adventure I hopped on the river cat for a sunset cruise. I must have timed it just right as the many bends in the river made it feel as though there were at least two sunsets, one on each side of the river, and for once, even I, was snap happy.
Bridge climb update – as Caroline “wrong shoes” McFadyen has said, I’ve just done the Story Bridge twilight climb, in lieu of the Sydney Harbour Bridge climb, which was just too hard to book! The bridge is actually more Australian than the Sydney bridge, built by the same man, but of Australian materials, so I reckon it’s more of an Aussie adventure (it’s named after a civil servant called Story, not exciting but I thought I’d put your mind at rest…). After being decked out in jumpsuit and harnessed into what was essentially a belt with no hope of holding me up if I did fall, we began the climb. The first section underneath the road showed how much the bridge could rattle and shake, not exactly inspiring confidence, but as soon as we were above the road it was all fine. Views from the top stretched as far as New South Wales and the Great Dividing Range – either it was an exceptionally good view, or Brisbane isn’t far north. The sun set behind the Brisbane skyscrapers, turning the sky orange then crimson before dusk, when the night became the realm of the flying foxes which gave the cityscape an almost prehistoric touch. With that, it was time to climb down, just as it was getting too dark. I’ve now climbed 33% of the climbable bridges in the world…

15000 glowing bums

Mount Tamberine is home to a species of glow worm, which we did think about trying to find in the wild last night, but the lure of the camp fire was just too great. It’s a good job that we didn’t, as people fumbling around in the dark and shining torches trying to see them have caused numbers to decrease. So, taking the easy, and environmentally sound option we visited the glow worm caves of a local winery. Inside there were about 15000 glowing bottoms of a fly larvae, each trying to catch a fly or two. After up to 12 months feeding as a larvae, the fly has about a week to mate and lay eggs – that’s some preparation.
From a tourist perspective, the pitch black cave was peppered with tiny green dots, and as eyes adjusted it was like the night sky, which is a good thing as that’s what attracts the flies!
Photos weren’t allowed, so the true to life representation from the leaflet is attached, and I’ll leave you with the glow worm ditty:
I wish I was a glow-worm
a glow-worm’s never glum
‘cos how can you be grumpy
when the sun shines out your bum!

Sitting around the camp fire

There’s few things better than camping next to an open fire. Beyond proving my manly instincts to create a fire, and the smoke keeping insects at bay, nothing beats having your legs slowly toasted as the embers burn.
Simply put, it’s not so bad to be returning to camping after our wee escape yesterday. We’ve edged slightly north in the Queensland hinterland to Mount Tamberine, and have been surprised at just how cool it is, given that we’re closer to the tropics than before. The rainforests are still there, as are the numerous waterfalls, with one even hinting that the elusive platypus were to be found nearby, although we settled for spotting a koala dozing up a tree.
Anyway, the embers are smouldering now, and the moon is poking out between the clouds, time to get to bed!

Rain, forest, retreat!

I’m sure something is trying to tell us not to go inland, the last two attempts have ended up with heavy rain, and us scurrying back to the coast. So, with a spring in our step after our relaxing day yesterday (Caroline wasn’t happy until she went to the doctor who said her thumb was fine), we made for the hills to Springbook National Park, site of many waterfalls and rainforest.
The Purlingbrook Falls were all you could ask of falling water, including a walkway going behind the falls (look for the blue dot on the picture), which were so tall that the fall was spray by the time it reached the bottom. A short walk further on promised water pools, and just as we reached about as far as you could get from the car park, the heavens opened, rainforest style. Within 30 seconds we were soaked through, but the fun kind of soaked where the rain is warm. After the 5km squelch back, we were changed into nice dry clothes, but noticed there weren’t any campsites nearby, not that the thought of camping in such rain again was that appealing, so a with Caroline haggling the price down, we retreated to a mountain chalet complete with spa pool. Bliss doesn’t begin to describe the comfort in comparison to the van, although I’m sure just the sofa would have sufficed…

Chillaxing is dangerous!

No I’m not talking about some dangerous new sport you’ve never heard of, I’m talking about chilling out and relaxing – it’s bad for you! We spent today chillaxing by the pool at our campsite. It all started off well, we had the pool to ourselves and so Si thought we should try out the pool slide, after all there was nothing to say it was just for kids! The first few slides were fine, perhaps even fun but then just as I was about to sit down for another go, I slipped and foolishly put my hand out to save myself. The result? One very sore, very bruised, very swollen thumb! 🙁
Despite the fact that I had just demonstrated the perils of the slide, Si carried on enjoying it for the rest of the day, running up the hill like an excited kid with a big grin on his face to go down the slide over and over again. (Si – I had my share of scraped elbows and banged knees due to tight corners and a shallow pool, me thinks the slide was built for smaller kids than I, but there was too much fun to be had!)

Getting all fruity

Well, it turned out to be a little wet for us to climb Mount Warning (i.e. we’re scared of a bit of mud), so instead we ended up in Tropical Fruit World. As we were repeatedly told, they grow over 500 varieties of tropical fruit (I didn’t know there were that many types of any fruit), and after a quick tour via tractor, boat and minature steam train, we were treated to a fruit tasting show by the fastest talking human alive. Suffice it to say, most of the valuable information has now been forgotten, but Papaya (also incorrectly known as Paw Paw) is very good for you in so many ways, grapefruit interferes with many medicines, white sapota is a good relaxant, and black sapota tastes a bit like chocolate.There’s also Jakfruit, the largest tree born fruit with an unusual taste of bananas, chewing gum and cream. Overall the message was eat more fruit, and with a conveniently positioned fruit store just outside, we stocked up.
The Captain Cook memorial at Point Danger marks the boundary between New South Wales and Queensland, and at the moment a different timezone However, it’s not that easy to work it out, with just a line in the ground with QLD and NSW on each side, and people frantically adjusting clocks as they walk over it.
Point Danger is also an excellent viewpoint to see the tourist mecca that is the Gold Coast, a sprawl of high rises and theme parks with a touch of Vegas style that Tweed Heads marks the start of. We’re already looking forward to booking a few nights in a hotel to soak it all up, not that we’re tired of camping!

Moobar!

It’s the little rest stops that make the journey, and with signs proclaiming “udderly fantastic coffee” at the Moo Moo Cafe, there just isn’t a reason to not stop. So we emptied our bladders (udders?), had a coffee and sat next to cows wandering through banana plantations, which I think is actually an experiment to make banana milkshake.
Moobar is in the Tweed Valley, and whilst there are some similarities to the original – green hills, trees, river – that’s as far as it goes, as I don’t remember seeing banana trees near Peebles! The centre point of the valley is Mount Warning, named along with Point Danger by Captain Cook when he ran aground, I think I would have named them Point Stupidrocks and Mount Dammit.
Mount Warning is a huge volcanic plug, and can be climbed by walking 9km through rainforest (yes, with leeches, I’m a sucker for punishment), with a scramble to the top. Unfortunately/fortunately we arrived a little too late to do it today, but there’s always tomorrow!
Finally, the tropical Sesame Street that is our trip was brought to you today by the bite of a huge ant to Simon, and the sighting of a tiny (think 5p coin) green frog.

Go East!

The Pet shop boys told us to Go West but we thought we’d do the opposite and Go East. To the most Easterly point on mainland Australia in fact. Never mind good old Captain Cook, it feels a bit like we’re following in good old Cat’s footsteps (how come she seems to do everything first? – Captain Cat has a bit of a ring to it don’t you think?)
Looking at our rough schedule we had pencilled in about 3 days for Byron bay but after 3 hours we’d had enough. I’m sure once upon a time it was a chilled out, alternative haven but today it was just a hot, sweaty bustle of people and noise and traffic. Most of which, I have to say was fellow campervanners! The only thing to hint at it’s aspiring alternativeness these days is the aroma of incense everywhere you go. Like I say we headed off pretty quickly and have settled for the night in a very quiet, chilled out town called Brunswick Heads – maybe we’re getting old!
P.S. No that is not some trendy belt Si is sporting in the pic, it is in fact a bum bag!! Hee hee, Si’s got a bum bag…. (I did promise I wouldn’t tease too much when he threatened not to carry anything for me- but I couldn’t resist! Sorry Si 🙂