Fraser Island

We took a two day one night trip over to Fraser Island from Hervey Bay. The island is accessible by 4X4 and only by ferry. When we arrived it was raining and we headed through the Central Station (an old logging station) out to the main beach. We drove up the beach and as we did the showers stopped and the sun came out for the first time in a week. We had good timing. We saw the wreck of the Maheno, an old passenger vessel that washed ashore on Fraser Island and drove up the 75 mile long beach to the north end. There were very few people there and we spend the majority of our time out of sight of any other people.

At the north end of the island we waded in the champaign pools and relaxed on the beach for the afternoon. For the evening we drove back down the beach and camped out for the night. We cooked dinner and camped right on the beach with no one in sight as far as you could see in both directions. The stars were the most stunning I have seen anywhere...including out at sea.

We spend the next day exploring the rain forests and inland lakes on the islands interior trails. The inland lakes boasted white sand beaches and clear blue water. It looked more like a beach in the caribbean than an inland lake. We relaxed at the lakes and went on nearly every trail on the island before leaving on the last ferry.

We are back in Hervey Bay now for the day...catching the overnight train to the Whitsundays for a couple days of sailing.....

Byron Bay

We arrived in Byron Bay around 8pm during a heavy downpour only to find that there was no room left in the inn so to speak at the hostel we had booked. After a brief canvas of the lodging options we were able to secure a two bedroom apartment from a surly Frenchman named Gerard. We took advantage of the full size kitchen and fixed a proper hot dinner and followed that with some much needed ice cream. The winds and rain picked up overnight and by morning the weather had blown out.

We woke up to a beautiful sunny day and headed out to the beach to enjoy the beautiful weather. We lounged on the beach, enjoyed pints at the cafe, and explored town until it was time to catch our bus up to Brisbane at 8pm.

Byron Bay is full of surfers and young travelers, needless to say..the place is quite full on a Valentines Day weekend.

Sydney

After an early morning flight from Melbourne, we arrived in Sydney around 8am. We headed over to the hostel to drop off our bags and begin exploring the city. We headed down to the
Harbor and caught the first train over to the Taronga Zoo. We spend several hours at the Zoo and even caught a seal show at the end. After the Zoo we took the ferry back over and took a tour of the Sydney Opera House. The project began with a budget of 7 million and ended up costing around 109 million to complete.

After the Opera House we headed back to the Hostel to get settled and moved into our room. We were able to make it back up town in time to catch the sunset from the Sky Tower. We enjoyed dinner afterwords in the rotating restaurant on the top floor.

The next day we got an early start heading to the Australian National Maritime Museum and Wildlife World before lunch. We spend the afternoon taking a cruise around the harbor and exploring the Sydney Aquarium.

We spent our last rainy day in Sydney getting caught up on rest and visiting a few last sights. We revisited the Australian National Maritime Museum and caught an afternoon film at the IMAX about the Wild Coast of Africa.

We have now begun our treck up the East Coast. We caught a 7am train out of Sydney bound for Byron Bay.

Great Ocean Road

The Great Ocean Road...hard to believe there is more to the tour than standing on the very beach that Keanu Reeves and Patrick Swayze stood on at the end of the film "Point Break''....Bells Beach... This was actually our first stop on the tour...couldn't save the best for last.

We actually begun the tour from Melbourne, amongst the worst bush fires in Australian history. The fires affected suburban areas of the city itself so the effect was easily felt among everyone we encountered on our tour.We passed through Geelong (Second largest city in Victoria) and stopped in at an Aboriginal Cultural Center there. It was our first encounter with Aboriginal people that we were able to interact with. The Aboriginal people experienced a history similar to that of Native Americans in the United States ( I am starting to think it was worse). Needless to say they is a large amount of the population that is understandably self-separated from western society. It was good to have a chance to actually speak with an Aboriginal person, as it seems that every Australian (White - European decent) has a different opinion about the "situation".

We drove up the coast to the "Twelve Apostles" where we hopped into a helicopter for a birds eye view of this natural wonder. The video and photos of our flight are amazing and will be posted to this page...see above...

We also visited an arch just up the coast called "London Bridge" and were surprised to learn that a second arch existed before 1995 and had fallen while people were out on the section that is now separated from the land. Fortunately no one was hurt during the collapse...but they did just finish filming a BMW commercial on the arch and had 12 BMW's parked on the part that collapsed the week before. Good thing for Bavarian Motor Werks that they didn't film the commercial one week later.

Kangaroo Island

Up and out the door early to catch the first ferry to Kangaroo Island our of Port Jarvis. You may remember Port Jarvis made the news a few years back when a dead whale was devoured by great white sharks off its coast for several days a few years ago. There are some famous pictures of a local standing on top of the whale while the sharks were slowly eating there way through it. We had the privilege of riding with the very man who captained the reporter out to take that famous picture. (See Below)

Kangaroo Island is the 3rd largest Island in Australia with a population of about 4000 people. We headed out to Pennington Bay for a bit of a swim before getting our tour of the island started. We headed out to a few rocks named the "Remarkable Rocks". They resemble "The Baths" in the British Virgin Islands, but these rocks are perched high atop a cliff and have a fantastic view of the southern ocean. We visited several beaches that hold a few of the remaining Australian and New Zealand Seals. You can get very close to the seals and we were able to get some amazing pictures of them. We finished up our visit with a sand boarding in a place called the "Little Sahara".

Adelaide

After arriving on the Ghan from Alice springs, we didn't have very long in Adelaide....an afternoon and evening on the front end of our trip to Kangaroo Island and an evening on the back end. We spend our afternoon looking through the city market in Adelaide. It is the Australian version of a farmers market. We stocked up on some fresh fruit for our trip to Kangaroo Island and headed down to the beach. We found the only Mexican restaurant in town and enjoyed Sangria and a great view of the beach. We needed a chance to cool down from our days spent in the scorching outback heat.

The Ghan

This morning Jim and Maria rode on the legendary Ghan - a train that travels from the southern part of the continent in Adelaide all the way up to the farthest point of the Northern Territory of Darwin (many of you may have heard of this from the movie Australia) and back. We started the journey from Alice Springs yesterday at noon and will arrive back in Adelaide today around 1pm. The train is the way to go...this is now Maria's 3rd excursion on a train in Australia and it is a great way to see the land as I am learning how vast and expansive the Australian is. The Northern Territory where we just left has only 1% of Australia's population. It's hard to comprehend until you actually drive 9 hours on a paved highway with much or less the same scenery and look on a map to find that you have gone about 1 inch. This was our experience for the last 2 days when we took a tour of Ayers Rock (Uluru), Kings Canyon, and Kata Kjuta from Alice Springs.

Maria and Jim Explore the Outback

The first day we drove 6 hours starting at 5am out to Kings Canyon, stopping on the way to get my first glimpse of some kangaroos and a camel. The temperature for the day was 41degrees C, so about 100-110 F, so needless to say we only did a 1 hr. hike of the Canyon before returning to the van to enjoy some refreshing AC. From there we made a 4 hour drive to our camp site outside of Ayers Rock. That night we enjoyed a traditional Australian BBQ with kangaroo steaks - a great way to spend the night in the outback after a memorable sunset over Kata Kjuta (huge clumps of rocks rising over 500m in height in the middle of the desert). The next day was filled with the sunrise over Ayers Rock, a 2 hr. base walk of the rock, another 1 hr. hike of Kata Kjuta, and a million curse words at the billions of flies that flocked to piss off all the tourists. If Jim and I had not each invested in a fly net the day before, we would have been absolutely more miserable - at one time you could have 75-100 flies all over your back, arms, and face. That fly net was undoubtely the best $9 I have ever spent - for my emotional, physical, and mental safety! ha. Upon arrival at our hostel, our first priority was icing down a 6 pack and ordering a pizza to celebrate our accomplishment of seeing, exploring, and surviving the harsh outback

Jim Baker and Maria Powell meet up in Alice Springs, Australia

Today Maria Powell and Jim Baker met up in Alice Springs, Australia for a month long trek across the country.

We will be postings update, photos, and using the SPOT messenger to track our travels across Australia by satellite. Our travels will take us to Adelaide, Kangaroo Island, Melbourne, Sydney, Bryon Bay, Brisbane, Maryborough, Hervy Bay, Fraser Island, Properpine, Airlie Beach, Sailing around the Whitsundays, and Cairns. If any of you have any suggestions for us or know anyone we should meet, please drop us an email

More to come after a visit to Ayers Rock tomorrow.....