Australia: Girraween National Park

Our first stop outside Brisbane was at Girraween National Park. Immediately we were delighted we’d listened to Steph. There were just a couple of cars in the car park, and not a rental car in sight! The park is full of granite rocks, some in very interesting formations. We went for a walk up to The Pyramids, which ended in a very steep climb right up the so called pyramid, the kind of steepness we had to zig-zag up! At the top we met a man who told us we were supposed to have walked around the pyramid and come up a less steep route… It was spectacular up there though, we could see for miles. We went back down (the proper route this time) and took a detour to see a huge granite arch that had formed naturally by erosion of the stone. We finished the visit off by having lunch watching some kangaroos grazing close by. A great place to visit!

Australia: Crikey! Brisbane

Bright and early on Monday morning we made our way to Australia Zoo, the late Steve Irwin’s legacy. We had a fun day wandering around seeing all the Aussie animals. You could feed the kangaroos or have your picture taken with various different animals that the keepers brought out around the park during the day. Steve Irwin seems to be still alive and well there as there are pictures of him and videos of him everywhere you go.

From there we made the short trip on down to Brisbane and found our Aussie mate Steph’s house. We met Steph in 2006 when we went paddling in Uganda! We’d kept in touch enough to know she was still in Brisbane and thankfully she was happy to have us to stay for a few days. We all ended up staying up a lot later than usual each night catching up on the last couple of years and talking about more recent things!

While we were there we spent one day seeing around the city. It turned out to be Melbourne Cup Day and we were surprised to see lots of people getting dressed up in their finery to celebrate the race so far away from the track. It is a big night out across the country apparently. Steph didn’t really know much about it though! I think she has much more interest in paddling than horses, or night’s out for that matter! That night she treated us to some authentic Asian cuisine, which turned out to be really tasty. It was also fun making real spring rolls by hand. I might need a bit more practice at that!

The next day we went to the Wet’n’Wild Theme Park, in the rain… There were fabulous slides there which we stuck for as long as we could before giving in to the cold. It’s worth a trip, but maybe when the weather is a bit better! Back in the warm car again we drove over to see the famous Gold Coast. We stopped at Surfers Paradise, which wasn’t looking so much like a paradise due to the rain. It seemed much more like a beach with lots of high rise hotels and apartments overlooking it. We decided that having seen it now, we could leave and not have to go back again!

That night Steph continued her culinary education by treating us to something properly Australian, kangaroo steaks. These apparently had to be eaten quite rare, so while Seán was looking around for a defibrillator to get it going again, I tucked in. They were pretty rare to be fair to Seán though! Quite a strong gamey taste to it though.

Our trip in Australia had so far been quite different to New Zealand. We only had the Lonely Planet to guide us and were following the same route as all the other tourists. Steph changed our trip around by telling us about all the places she likes to go that were anywhere near our intended route, for which we were very grateful. And so, with her notes in hand, we set off south again, only this time going inland and off the beaten tourist trail.

Australia: Fraser Island

Our next stop was at the adjoining towns of Agnes Water and Town of 1770 where we walked along yet more spectacular beaches. That night we made it to Hervey Bay, the jumping off point for trips to Fraser Island. It was a pleasant change to leave the car parked the next day, finally staying in one spot for more than one night. We had a meeting in the afternoon with the group we were to travel to Fraser Island with to give us a bit of insight into driving on the sand island as we were going on a self driving trip. It turned out that there were two more Irish couples in our group, a pair of English girls and a pair of German girls. Luckily we all got on ok making our three days together on the island much more enjoyable.

On Friday morning our group gathered again and we were sent forth in our jeep to get the ferry to the island. Danielle was first to take the wheel and bravely reversed onto the ferry last so we were first onto the island. The first stop on our itinerary was Lake McKenzie which had beautiful clear fresh water with a hint of sunscreen! We went for a swim there and had lunch before heading on across the island to the beach. Driving up the beach we saw the Maheno Shipwreck and The Pinnacles (a sand formation) before arriving at our campsite for the night at Dundubara. That night we had a barbeque dinner and went for a walk on the beach in the dark to celebrate Halloween. Just one dingo went past, making us jump!

The next morning we raced against the tide to make it along the beach as far as Indian Head. While we waited for the falling tide we watched the sea from the top of the headland and saw a dolphin surfing in the waves. We also went on to the Champagne Pools. Unfortunately we stopped a bit short of our destination at a spot where we saw other people, assuming that was where we were looking for. After an hour or two Seán and one of the girls went wandering and found the actual champagne pools; pools with a wall around them that the waves can crash over, creating a bubble effect in the still pool water. We had a little time to enjoy the bubbles before heading back to the jeep.

We were taking turns to drive the jeep, so I had a go on the way back down the beach on quite a nice surface as the tide had just gone out. We later had quite a scary trip (cut short by a good deal of complaints from the other passengers) when one of the youngest members of our group took the wheel. She clearly had decided that the best way to go was to put her boot down and race along. That would have been fine if it wasn’t for little streams going across the beach at random that we could easily crash the jeep in!

With a change of driver or two, we arrived at Eli Creek, a little stream that you can walk up and float down, which we did before playing our own version of net-less net ball in the shallow water. That night we stayed in K’Gari Aboriginal Camp and after dinner sat around a campfire with some other groups that were staying there also, listening to a digiridoo being played by our aborigine host. It was passed around among the men to try, but apparently women cannot touch real digiridoos due to legend saying they will get pregnant, among other nasty things!

On our last day on the island we went for a long walk over the Hammerstone Sandblow to get to Lake Wabby. When we were only half way there we were questioning the sense of this trip – it was incredibly hot and we were walking across what really felt like a little part of the desert! A quick swim in the lake was refreshing enough to make us tackle the return trip. We had our last lunch at Lake McKenzie again before catching the ferry back to the mainland again. Seán and I were anxious to get moving south again so that evening we got back in our rental car and went as far as Mooloolaba that night.

Australia: Moving South from Cairns

On Saturday morning we got a rental car and hit the road again. We had been hoping to get a camper but would have had to wait until the following Wednesday to get one. Apparently it was busy season for campers! We drove through the Atherton Tablelands where there were beautiful views of the countryside and coast below us. We stopped at Lake Eacham for lunch before going along the waterfall trail to Millaa Millaa Falls, Zillie Falls and Ellinjaa Falls – I wonder who named them all!

That night we got as far as Mission Beach and stayed in a lovely hostel called the Treehouse. They were having a group barbeque that night so we joined in. A good tasty meal for just $5 so we were happy! The following morning we tried some sea kayaking. Unfortunately we could only hire sit-on-tops but we made do and spent a lovely hour floating on the South Pacific.

We wanted to keep moving south so we drove on to Bowen that day, arriving in the renowned Airlie Beach the next morning. Having looked into going on a tour of the Whitsundays we finally decided not to. It seemed that we would be spending 2/3 days on a boat just to see some islands and go snorkelling, which we had already done. So, after a quick swim in the lagoon in Airlie Beach and lunch we moved on towards Mackay.

On the way there we took a detour inland to the Finch Hatton Gorge, which turned out to be really worthwhile. Watched by cheeky cookaburras we walked through the forest to the cascades, a pretty waterfall, and on to the wheel of fire! It was a nice pool where we decided to go swimming. The water turned out to be really freezing, but after the initial shock it was wonderfully refreshing. The best bit was we had it all to ourselves, having finally managed to leave the busloads of tourists along the coast!

Ever moving onwards, the next day we made it to Rockhampton and had lunch after a walk through the Kershaw Gardens before continuing to Gladstone where we found a “fun and fitness” course. It was pretty tough – a running track with about 14 stops along the way with different exercises to do like sit ups, push ups, chin ups and lovely things like that! It did make our run much more interesting, and challenging, that evening! We tried it again the next morning before hitting the road.

Australia: Around Cairns

We had a stop over in Brisbane on our way from Auckland to Cairns, which proved to be a little exciting. As there was very little time between the flights all the connecting passengers were told by the airline to stay together. We were rushed through immigration and customs and raced to pick up our bags, where we waited for 10 precious minutes for a family who had taken their time going through duty free! When they sauntered in we were told to group together and get taxis to the other terminal as (having waited so long) we now didn’t have time to get the connecting train! We decided the airline could be responsible for the fare. After all that excitement we had a pleasant flight on to Cairns. On that trip I was sitting beside a nice man called Kevin who kindly gave us a lift to our hostel.

Anxious to start seeing Australia we booked ourselves onto a tour out to the Great Barrier Reef for the next day, which saw us boarding our cruiser at 7.30am. During the day we went snorkelling in two different spots. First we stopped at Michaelmas Cay and enjoyed snorkelling close to the beach. The coral and fish were beautiful and this time when I saw a manta ray I didn’t scream and swim away as fast as I could! Sean saw a black tipped shark which could have caused that reaction from me had I seen it though! Our second stop was somewhere with no land in sight and decent waves. I found it easier to dive with my snorkel than keep breathing just under the surface! It was already hitting us how many Irish there are in Australia, especially in the touristy areas of the East Coast, as half the boats passengers seemed to be Irish. We had avoided Irish tourists for most of trip so far, so it was coming as a shock to be surrounded by so many Irish accents again.


Our next trip from Cairns was up to Kuranda on a gondola over the rainforest. En route the gondola stopped to let us have a quick walk through some of the rainforest and also to see Barron Falls, a lovely waterfall that would be amazing if it hadn’t been so dry at the time! In Kuranda we walked through the markets reminding ourselves of excess baggage charges before getting the train back down to Cairns again. The train trip was more fun than the gondola as we went through the forest and could see much more than just treetops!

Our last week in New Zealand!

We got back from Samoa in the small hours of a Tuesday morning and so missed the Team Latte paddle that morning, but we did make breakfast with the group before going into the Backpackers Car Market once more. It was time to sell our van. We had put it on a website, Trade Me, before going to Samoa but nothing had come of that. We booked the van in for the following Friday morning, as the market was quite busy at the time. While we were in town we took a look at the other vehicles on sale there and were amazed at the prices. Having seen that we quickly decided to up our asking price a bit!

That night we went to Greg’s house for a barbeque and met his new housemates – two German girls and one Irish guy. The three Irish started talking to each other so quickly Greg was left smiling in the corner for a while, not having a clue what we were saying to each other. I think we haven’t lost our accents at all!

On Friday morning we brought our scrubbed up van to the Backpackers Car Market again, arriving about 10am. By noon several people had looked at it and one couple sent it for a mechanical check. At 4pm the results were in and they agreed to buy it. Easy!


Selling the van so easily meant we were free to go to Taupo on Saturday without any worries. Ron and Carolanne were kind enough to lend us their spare car so we drove down and found everyone in the back garden around the hangi. A hangi is the traditional Maori way of cooking and the lads in Taupo had decided to try doing one specially for our going away party.

Here’s my simple explanation of a hangi: first you dig a big hole, light a big fire in it and heat stones (or in this case some big lumps of steel) on top. When the fire has died down and the stones are hot you put the food on top of them, wrapped in tin foil and sacking. The food is then buried in the soil you dug out of the hole and left smoking for the afternoon. This was the guys’ first attempt at it and there wasn’t a bit of Maori blood in any of them, so they were pretty pleased when it all turned out to be edible and quite nicely cooked. It was a great way to finish up our time in Taupo and we’re really grateful to all at 16 Rahui Street for having put that effort in and hosting a great party.





A few more Irish friends (Barry, Eibhlin and AnneMarie) were in Taupo that weekend too, so we met up with them and they were able to come to the party so it was a great weekend.

When we got back up to Auckland we had to pack up the two polo boats that we were shipping home, along with all the things we’d decided to put in them (which turned out to be quite a lot). Thankfully everything fitted and we were just about able to carry the package out to the truck that picked them up. Then we squeezed our remaining things into a bag for the trip home.

On our second last night in New Zealand we had a big Oosterdijk family dinner with Mammy and Daddy, Dave and Nic, Uncle Steve and Auntie Pauline and Uncle Denis and Auntie Anita. The following morning we made it out for our last Team Latte paddle and breakfast. That night, after dinner with Ron and Carolanne, we went to Andy’s house for the night as it’s near the airport.

Waiting for our taxi the next morning we saw a white rabbit hopping up the street, strange! After a bit of re-arranging of our luggage at the airport to meet the weight restrictions, we were off to Australia to start the trip home.

Samoa

Our years visa was about to expire, but we weren’t quite finished with New Zealand yet, so we set off to Samoa for a week with the plan of returning to New Zealand as regular tourists while we sold our remaining bits and pieces and packed up. Carolanne gave us a lift to the airport and we hopped on our plane to Samoa without any trouble. We’d been warned that the plane would be laden with tinfoil wrapped KFC meals, which are considered a great delicacy in Samoa. We were quite disappointed when we didn’t see any KFC, but we did see several bundles of McDonalds instead. Half way to Samoa there was a great rustling on the plane as they all tucked into their McDonalds meals, hopefully not too cold at that stage!

En route to the island we had crossed over the date line, so even though we had left New Zealand on Monday 6th October, we arrived in Samoa on Sunday 5th. Similarly on our way back to New Zealand Monday 13th October 2008 didn’t exist for us at all!

When we arrived we took a bus from the airport to our hotel in Apia and rushed out to get some dinner before all the restaurants closed (maybe we should have followed the lead of all the McDonalds munching locals!) We had to wake up a taxi driver asleep on his back seat to get us home again.

The following day we decided to see around the capital city, Apia. We walked into the town via the Maketi Fou (Food Market) and Flea Market before going on to the coast where we looked at various monuments and the government buildings. That afternoon we went snorkelling in Palolo Deep Marine Reserve. As it was quite near high tide we didn’t get to see much of the “deep” part but it was good fun swimming with multicoloured fish through the coral.

On Tuesday morning we were up early to go on a tour around Upolo Island. We were the only people on the tour and had a driver and tour guide just to ourselves. It was a really interesting day, helped a bit by the comfort of an air conditioned van as we drove around. We stopped at several places including their rugby stadium, a few waterfalls and beaches. Our favourite was swimming in the Piula Cave Pool. It is a fresh water pool near the beach, which is partly uncovered but also goes about 10 metres into a cave. The water was crystal clear and we had no trouble seeing fish in the water with us even inside the cave.

We also got some coconut education on the tour. Firstly we drank the juice of young coconuts, which is much sweeter than the mature coconuts we get at home. We also had a demonstration on how to make coconut cream. They take a mature coconut and rasp it out and squeeze the shavings to get the cream out. It is very tasty!

After a quick visit to see some turtles we were home again. We arranged to go to a Fia Fia buffet dinner that night. A Fia Fia involves traditional fire dancing. It was quite a show, and we were the only non-nationals there. Because of that they put us up at the front right in the middle and gave us a special mention during the show!

We had been told by a few people that Savaii was by far the nicer of the two islands of Samoa so on Wednesday morning we got a ferry across, hoping to get a hire car to drive around the island for a couple of days. When we arrived we discovered there were no rental cars to be had so we decided to think about what to do over lunch. The taxi drivers were quite insistent and pestered us quite a lot. We had been told that Tanu Beach Fales was a great place to stay. When we came out of the restaurant after lunch we spotted a Tanu Beach Fales van so hailed that and got a lift to the accommodation with him, much to the disgust of the taxi driver that was trying to adopt us.

The van driver turned out to be a son of the owner and he called ahead to get a fale prepared for us. Open fales are thatched huts with no walls used for shade during the day, which can have walls of woven reeds attached for sleeping. Our fale was right on the beach and we made the most of it, going swimming and relaxing in the shade.

On Thursday morning a group of 12 people staying at Tanu Beach Fales set off with Grace, a daughter of the owner, for a tour of Savaii Island. We paid just $90 for this tour but as the day went on the number of $2 or $5 we had to fork out for various “attractions” built up! Anyway, en route we saw the Canopy Rainforest Walkway, which was a fun walk up a big tree house really to see above the rainforest. That was followed by paying $2 to look over a cliff at the side of the road… lover’s leap. The Alofaaga Blowholes were fun, as a local man put on a display for us, throwing coconut husks into the holes just before they blew, sending the husks high into the air, while he ran away from the water! We went for a refreshing swim at the Afu Aau Waterfall and later we swam with the turtles at Saloalepai.

That night and the next morning we were given the excuse of staying in bed by a big thunderstorm. Unfortunately it didn’t remove the humidity for long. In any case we had to go back to Upolo Island for our flight home. We were flying out on Sunday evening, but that day the entire island shut down to celebrate White Sunday. The only place we found open for lunch was McDonalds! We made our way to the Papaseea Sliding Rocks where we entertained ourselves for a while in the pools of the river. Seán tried sliding down the rocks, but after looking at how shallow it was and listening to his shouts, I passed!

After a nice relaxing week off it was time to fly back to Auckland and sort out our things before starting the trip home.