Agnes Water and Lady Musgrave Island

Hello everyone!

Yesterday morning we woke up and found ourselves a library where we could blog for free. Afterwards we went shopping, needed some food for the upcoming days and also went by the chemist to buy some Kwell (so I wouldn't get seasick today). Of course we had to get some beer as well and top off the diesel in our campervan.

We had put everything in the fridge and started driving off to the town of 1770. Not a long drive from Agnes Water (about 5-10 minutes) and it wasn't a very big town either. We did see the Captain Cook monument, and booked a cruise to Lady Musgrave Island.

Back to Agnes Water for some lunch, some really really big cheap lunch. We both ordered the calamari but we got a lot more than we had anticipated. It was delicious though, so we didn't mind of course!

After arriving back at the caravan park we parked our campervan again and went out to sea. Our caravan park is literally next to the beach, it's not more than 20 meters away. And the water was a lot warmer than in Adelaide, I couldn't believe it. The waves were also a lot bigger, we went under quite a few times. Too bad we didn't have body boards with us, it would've been a great ride along the waves.

We started barbecuing when night had already set in (they don't know about daylight saving time here apparently..), which was around 6 pm. Cooked up everything we had bought in the stores and ate a very small part of it since we were still full of our big lunch.

This morning we had to get up really early, there was a bus who would bring us to the cruise, and it came by our caravan park at 8 am. It brought us to the town of 1770 where we boarded the cruise to Lady Musgrave Island. It was a very rough and long ride, high waves and constant shaking but the Kwell pills worked wonders (for me at least, some other passengers weren't so lucky..).
We arrived at a pontoon, a floating platform within the lagoon, where we got off and were handed our snorkel equipment. We snorkelled around for an hour or so trying to see as much of the Great Barrier Reef there before lunch was served. We had a fantastic buffet lunch (better than I had expected) and afterwards it was my time to put on a wetsuit because I had signed up for diving as well!

I was having doubts though, since I had been snorkelling around for an hour already and thought I had seen about everything of the reef that we could find there, but I was wrong. I'm glad I went through with it, because it was simply amazing. The fish weren't scared of you at all and came really close. You could also see the reef from up close.

In the meantime John went on a semi-submarine boat, which had a large compartment below which you could go into and see through the bottom of the boat. After we were both done we met up again and took the small boat towards the island itself.

It was a weird island, which reminded me of the island Jack Sparrow got dropped off multiple times. Couldn't find any of the rum though, but the island really looked like it was untouched by humans. This wasn't the case of course, because you could even go camping there in some seasons (when the turtles aren't laying eggs, or the eggs aren't hatching).

Still an amazing experience and I'm glad we went there. Well worth the long journey by boat, and I sincerely dislike boats.. The trip back seemed to go a lot smoother, probably because we were carried along by the waves this time. We also had some more room in the bus back to the caravan park and now it's dark already and not even 7 o clock yet, but time for some barbecued goodies. Tomorrow we'll be going to Elisabeth, see you there!

Jeremy (written on 17-03-2012)

P.S. Fixed the camera again, but still without internet, so again, you will receive news from a few days back.

Adelaide to Agnes Water.

Good evening everyone!

It's been a while since we blogged because internet on this side of Australia is awful and because we got distracted by a tv... Yes, a tv! We have a television in our new camper. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

On Tuesday (March 13) we went out to Cleland National Park with Mary-anne, Alana and Isaac. You may have already seen the pictures of that adventure! It took some time to get there by car (for our Dutch standards) but the ride was through the mountains and the views were amazing.Once we got there we entered the park where they had all sorts of Australian animals which had big open areas to walk around in. The difference with a regular zoo was that you could actually walk in some of these areas yourself, amongst the animals and of course feed them as well.

We had seen lots of things, fed some of them and encountered some fashionable birds with great haircuts and some funny looking emu's which looked a bit different from the regular ones, before we went back.

After dropping off Alana and Isaac we went straight to Mary-anne and Mikes place where Mike was waiting for us after a hard day working. We had a great barbecued dinner and then listened to some music while talking about anything before going to bed early. We had to wake up early to pack our bags and such, but most importantly to say goodbye to Mary-anne who had to go to work.

Mike dropped us off at the airport where, after having some trouble with the passports, we checked in and left for Brisbane. We couldn't take the guitar along so we gave it to Mike to pass to anyone who wants it (Isaac?).

The flight was short and once we arrived in Brisbane it took us no time at all to collect our bags. We took a cab to the rental company where we were going to pick up our next campervan. Once we got there we learned that they had no Britz campervans left so they gave us a Maui instead. We asked about the difference between these cars and the main one was that Maui has a TV.

We didn't mind that change, and after a careful inspection we found the bed (leather cushions) to be a bit more spacious and the fridge a bit better designed (it closes automatically so it will never open during driving). On top of this all, it's a lot more quiet on the road and handles a bit better. We were quite satisfied with this ‘upgrade' and left quickly for Noosa Heads.

In Noosa Heads we quite soon realised it was made for the rich. There were mansions everywhere, shops with big names on them, restaurants with a lot of fancy stuff on the menu and cars worth more than certain houses. There was quite some youth there and everyone had surf boards.

We ended up asking the local police where we could camp for the night and they suggested a camp site near the water or the national park where we could ‘wild camp' for one night (they said the worst that could happen was them knocking on the window next morning telling us: don't do that again). We chose the camp site though, because we needed electricity to charge our battery.

The next morning we left quite early (they don't know about daylight savings time here..) and we drove towards Gimpy. Somewhere along the way we stopped for lunch and contemplated about how we could get the most out of the few days we had here. We wanted to see the Great Barrier Reef and Fraser Island at least and decided that it would be best to swing by Elizabeth on the way back and head out towards the Great Barrier Reef first. This meant we had some driving ahead of us. We drove all the way up to Agnes Water but had a quick meet up with Mary-Anne van Rooij first.

It was nice meeting her and we got lucky that we did so because she will be leaving for Yepoon tomorrow. The last 30 minutes of our journey today were in complete darkness but we safely arrived and found a very nice camp site (had to run over some frogs on the way though..).
No internet here though so you'll not get this story immediately (written on 15-3-2012).

Jeremy

P.S. Our camera just died on us, it's probably the extreme humidity here. We have a backup but it's not so good..

Family gathering and Moana Beach

Good morning everyone!

On sunday a lot of the Haines, de Wit and Buchold families came over for Lunch at Maryanne and Mikes place. There was: Tante Trees, Mary-anne and Mike, Hank and Jenny, Alana and Ken, Eleanor and Isaac and us. Bert showed up later with his limousine as well. It was very nice to meet everyone and we had a great lunch and lots of fun.

The next day was a holiday in Adelaide (The Adelaide races), so everyone was free from work. We went to Moana Beach with everyone. After a couple of minutes of searching everyone we found a place to 'set up camp' on the beach.

We first went for a swim with the body boards and tried to catch some waves. It wasn't as easy as it looked but I finally managed to get it under control. Even little Eleanor got to surf on the waves (with a little help of course).

After the refreshing swim we went back to our towels and had another great lunch. It was time for some cricket afterwards and since I had never done this before I had no idea what to do. They explained me a bit of the rules and it was lots of fun. At some point we had made the sand so uneven that we couldn't play anymore so we went further towards the sea. The ball bounced a lot better there but it also rolled off into sea a couple of times. It was extremely hot as well so we decided to leave cricket for what it was and take another dive into the sea.

Bringing the body boards along again we ran in and found out the waves had gotten a bit higher. We swum further into sea to catch the bigger ones all the way back to the beach untill we noticed some black fins sticking out of the water. Upon a closer look we found out they were dolphins swimming just off the beach. There were 3 or 4 there and we got a great look of them before we were swept away by another big wave.

We got to see the dolphins once more when swimming back before we got caught by another wave but then we continued body boarding untill we got tired. Back to our little spot on the beach, packed everything in and went for icecream after saying farewell to Hank and Jenny. After the icecream it was time to say goodbye to Alana, Ken, Eleanor and Isaac as well and then we went to Tante Trees' house and said goodbye to her there.

We got back to Mary-anne and Mikes place and had a great Thai supper before heading off to bed. It had been a long and warm day so we were ready for some rest.

Jeremy

Keyneton and Adelaide

Hello everyone!

A bit of a long story today since we didn't write up a story yesterday.

We woke up yesterday after a good night of sleep (queen size beds!) . Bert had already driven the schoolbus around and was now ready to take us on to a fishing trip. We drove to Swan Reach on the Murray River.

We had to cross the river by ferry to get bait first, and then took the ferry back to start our actual fishing. 10 Minutes in and I had a bite already! With some help of reeling it in we had caught our first fish of the day. I had never fished before but it was quite fun and I soon got the hang of it. We caught about 7 fish in total, but the bigger ones slipped free every time.

Soon it was time to head back again, the school needed Bert to drive the bus again and we stayed in, watch the surroundings and uploaded some photos. Early evening Bert was back and we had a great dinner again (T-bone steak). We ended up in front of the television watching some comedy film before we one by one went off to bed.

The next morning we had a barbecued English breakfast before saying goodbye to Les and Bert. They left us with a nice tip for driving to Adelaide, which we followed. We got to see some nice parts of the Barossa Valley before taking the brand new freeway towards Adelaide.

After about a 1 hour drive we reached Mary-anne and Mike's house, Redwood Park. They were waiting for us outside already and we quickly found a spot to park the huge campervan and head inside.

They have a lovely (new) home right next to a park with 2 palm trees in the garden! After a bit of chit chat and coffee and tea we went into the city to look around. We parked right next to the Torrens river and walked on foot from there.

We crossed the river and went into the centre of the city. Followed King Williams road untill we noticed a living Gargoyle standing outside the entrance of the Town Hall. Curious as to what was going on we went inside and ended up getting a drink on the balcony of the Town Hall which was being used for the Fringe festival. There was even live music playing there and the gargoyle followed us up stairs.

After some good laughs and a nice drink we went out again looking for a place to eat. We went into a place called Mekong Thai. We had a great dinner there, quite spicy and hot! When we finished up we went back towards the car. We walked past a part of the Fringe festival near the Adelaide theater and we heard some great music and saw the long queue.

We decided to keep on going to the car and drive back home. Having some coffee and tea and Irish whiskey before going to bed. Tomorrow we'll continue in Adelaide, and we'll see you then!

Jeremy

Robe to Keyneton

Good morning!

We left the camp site early and planned to stop a few times on the way before arriving in Keyneton. Initially we wanted to go to the beach but we found a spot to have breakfast first. Took some time untill we reached the southern point of the Coorong National Park. We found a picnic site there to have breakfast.

There was no access to the beach here so we drove on towards Murray Bridge to have a nice relaxing stop along the waterside there. The weather was incredible and I might´ve gotten a sunburn there but it was worth it.

We had a fantastic lunch at a restaurant there while looking outside to the boats on the river that came by. Afterwards we drove off, taking half of the tourist route around Murray Bridge and then went on towards Keyneton.

We had some stops along the way before finally arriving at Keyneton. Here we met Les, Bert wasn´t home yet. Les made us an incredibly good meal and I learned what Bundy and coke was. A little later Bert came home and I got to meet him.

We had a great sleep in huge beds and now we´re going off fishing with Bert! See you tomorrow.

Jeremy

Hike to the Pinnacle and Robe

Hello everyone!

We did not have any internet for the last 2 days, except at some local cafe, which closed up quite early so we couldn't blog in the evening like we usually do.

Instead we'll blog about the last 2 days now:

We started out by getting a coffee and a tea at the local cafe where we uploaded the last set of pictures before heading off to the Wonderland Car Park. Why it's called Wonderland? I don't have a clue. We parked our campervan there and started our long hike towards the top of the mountain: The Pinnacle.

The brochures said it was a 3,6 km walk with about a 400 meter climb into the mountains. It would take the average person around 2,5 hours. Ignoring the difficulty sign (hard) we went up anyway, only to discover that it was actually further than the brochure had said.

Anyway, we started our walk with quite a fast pace but it was incredibly hot and we soon got exhausted. The average time up was 2,5 hours, so we figured it would be around 30 - 45 minutes to reach halfway up the mountain. This of course wasn't the case. After about 45 minutes or so we ran into some people on their way down which said we were nearly halfway. We were not pleased... But we continued anyway and at some point reached a sign saying it was only 700 meters more.

We went into a narrow passageway called Silent Street. This was the last part of the hike and someone at the top assured us it was only 5 more minutes. Being very thankful to this wonderful news we reached the Pinnacle where we took some pictures and ate the last half of apple pie that Henny gave us. Best meal ever! We had some drinks aswell before going back down.

This was considerably easier, so we decided to take the 'Grand Canyon' route as well. This had some incredible views as well, and we climbed a bit off route as well. We also spotted a droptail lizard on the path which we luckily got a picture of before it ran away.

After walking for a total of 3 hours we got back to the car park and drove back to our camp site. When we got really close we noticed a mob of kangaroos on the recreation area next to our camp site. We got out of the car and took some photos until we came too close and John told me to back off before I made the kangaroos mad.

The next morning we drove off immediately towards Kingston SE. We had checked the night before and it was a 5 hour drive but when we arrived only 3,5 hours had gone by. The sun was shining bright though, so we wanted to go swimming in the sea. Too bad though, there were no waves at all at Kingston, so we headed a bit more south to Robe.

Here we bought some bathers and then went to the camp site nearest to the beach. After uploading some of the photos we went to the actual beach itself and even went swimming in the (cold) sea. After some sunbathing we headed back to the campsite where the sun is slowly dissapearing behind the horizon. Tomorrow we'll go to the beach again before driving off to meet Bert!

Jeremy

Halls Gap

The weather in Victoria was improving so we decided to go back to the original plan and see the Grampians. We had entertained the idea of going to Kangaroo Island, but it is a very expensive ferry crossing for just one day on the island and we had no guarantee that our (big) campervan could fit on the ferry.

From Nangwarry to the Grampians turned aout to be a pretty nice drive. We stopped at a lot of places along the way - taking our time. When we got to Halls Gap we booked for two nights.

We had no access to the Vodafone network so the blog is late. Sorry. We have found a good wifi connection at the cafe across the road - where we are sitting now..

The plan is to get to Keyneton by thursday evening.

See you,

John.

Mt. Gambier

Hello everyone,

Today was a great day, beautiful weather. We started off by getting a great breakfast, bacon and eggs on toast. Then Henny drove us off in her car to Mt. Gambier. We picked up Anne and Karen there and then went to a seafood tasting which they had planned on going to already. As many great snacks as you liked, and even free icecream! Fantastic morning to say the least.

Afterwards we met up at Karen's house where we got to meet Karen's family. We had coffee and tea there and talked a bit before heading off to see the sinkholes of Mt. Gambier. Our first stop was Umpherston sinkhole. We walked to the bottom of it, while Anne and Henny waited up top, and took some pictures of us.

The second stop was Engelbrecht cave. This was a sinkhole as well, with connecting caves. We got a tour down into the caves and learned a lot about the geology about Mt. Gambier, which was quite fascinating. There are sinkholes everywhere under the city, which have not been explored yet. When we got back up, Anne and Henny were waiting for us again and we drove off to our next stop, the Blue Lake.

Once we got near we could see parts of the lake from the car already, but to get the best view we stopped next to the road and took a walk through a tunnel under the road. Here we found the best view of the lake, which was quite blue, but according to Anne and Henny it had been much more blue in the past.

We drove past Valley Lake as well and got a bit thirsty after seeing so much water, so we went to a pub in town. Had some nice 'apple juice' and then dropped off Anne at home and went to see Sandra and Tessa. They had a lovely home and it was great meeting them as well. Afterwards we went back to, as Henny calls it, Nangas and had some simple but nice dinner.

Made some plans for the rest of the week, we'll probably go for Halls Gap tomorrow and go towards Bert on Wednesday or Thursday. Bedtime for now though, see you tomorrow!

Jeremy