With a mere week left, we drove towards the east coast like we were being chased by a pack of wild kangaroos. It's actually a bit hard to speed in Australia, as every kilometer or two (literally) they have road signs with cute sayings like, "the higher the speed….the bigger the mess." It makes you feel a little guilty about speeding.
We arrived at the coast a bit after dark, found a caravan park to set up our tent, get a load of laundry through the machine, hung it up and got back to our tent just in time to watch the sky open up and start raining harder than I have experienced in a while. So hard, in fact, that we didn't dare leave our tent to get the laundry. It took us two days and much rotating in the car to get everything dry after that.
The biggest reason in my mind to spend time on the East Coast of Australia is the Great Barrier Reef. It's kind of a big deal. But where to start? The thing is HUGE. The kind of huge you can see from outer space. The city of Cairns is where most people go to first to book tours - and by most people I mean backpackers. Exactly the people I try to avoid. Maybe that seems unfair, since I am, by definition, a backpacker. I'm willing to accept this title merely due to the fact that almost everyday I pick up a very large backpack and walk around with it. But that is where the similarities stop. At the end of the day I'm pretty worn out, so I try to get to bed by 9:30pm (feel a little like my mom here), I don't like loud noises (I have been known to say things like, "why do those kids have to make all that racket?!"), and I have a very hard time sharing a kitchen with young men who generally only cook ramen noodles, and when they do, they find a way to sprinkle dry noodles all over the counter tops and stove. Almost as if they were expecting their mother to come along after them with a washcloth, smile and muss up their hair, prodding them to be a little cleaner next time.
We arrived at the coast a bit after dark, found a caravan park to set up our tent, get a load of laundry through the machine, hung it up and got back to our tent just in time to watch the sky open up and start raining harder than I have experienced in a while. So hard, in fact, that we didn't dare leave our tent to get the laundry. It took us two days and much rotating in the car to get everything dry after that.
The biggest reason in my mind to spend time on the East Coast of Australia is the Great Barrier Reef. It's kind of a big deal. But where to start? The thing is HUGE. The kind of huge you can see from outer space. The city of Cairns is where most people go to first to book tours - and by most people I mean backpackers. Exactly the people I try to avoid. Maybe that seems unfair, since I am, by definition, a backpacker. I'm willing to accept this title merely due to the fact that almost everyday I pick up a very large backpack and walk around with it. But that is where the similarities stop. At the end of the day I'm pretty worn out, so I try to get to bed by 9:30pm (feel a little like my mom here), I don't like loud noises (I have been known to say things like, "why do those kids have to make all that racket?!"), and I have a very hard time sharing a kitchen with young men who generally only cook ramen noodles, and when they do, they find a way to sprinkle dry noodles all over the counter tops and stove. Almost as if they were expecting their mother to come along after them with a washcloth, smile and muss up their hair, prodding them to be a little cleaner next time.
swirly white sands and sharks.
Needless to say, we avoided Cairns, and instead headed south to the Whitsunday Islands. The Whitsundays are inside of the Great Barrier Reef National Park, but don't actually make up the reef itself. The actual reef is really far out to sea and even more expensive to get to. By this point we were pinching pennies everywhere we could, having spent quite a lot of money already in Australia with Kangaroo Island, Uluru park and ridiculously expensive gas. After walking around Airlie Beach (the jumping off point for the islands) for half a day sizing up all the deals, we settled on a snorkeling cruise that let us visit two different islands and snorkel in two places. Sweet. Another thing of note about me, is that I have a mildly irrational fear of sharks. Part of this fear is contrived, due to the fact that I get such a good reaction out of Steph everytime I mention it, but truly, part of it is real. I don't know why, but when I get any distance out into the ocean I find that I'm looking around for a dorsal fin. But I agreed, upon making this reservation, that my fear was in fact, irrational, and I shouldn't let that keep me from plunging into the great wide ocean with the rest of the shark bait (fellow snorkelers).
The first place we stopped on the cruise was Whitehaven Beach, home of the 'white swirly sands' that will most certainly be the first thing you see if you do a quick google search of Whitsunday Islands. There we donned 'stinger suits', aka giant black leotards that protected us against jellyfish, and headed out for the water. It was beautiful, and from an observation deck you could pick out several stingrays in the water (we were told to do the 'stingray shuffle' to avoid being stung). So as Steph and I walked towards the water, I prepared myself to push the thoughts of sharks out of my head, shuffle my feet, and enjoy the wonderful weather. At ten feet away from the water, I was almost in the right mindset, until I noticed a bit of splashing. Clearly, as it just so happened, a small shark washed up onto the beach just in front of us, and was splashing around trying to get back into the water. Of course. After he swam away, I walked along the beach in shin deep water, keeping an eye out. The shark followed us. In fact, it followed us at least 25 feet along the coast, until it found a crab it the water that it attacked with gusto, then swam away. Sigh. Though I did go the rest of the day without a shark sighting, my fear remains intact.
The first place we stopped on the cruise was Whitehaven Beach, home of the 'white swirly sands' that will most certainly be the first thing you see if you do a quick google search of Whitsunday Islands. There we donned 'stinger suits', aka giant black leotards that protected us against jellyfish, and headed out for the water. It was beautiful, and from an observation deck you could pick out several stingrays in the water (we were told to do the 'stingray shuffle' to avoid being stung). So as Steph and I walked towards the water, I prepared myself to push the thoughts of sharks out of my head, shuffle my feet, and enjoy the wonderful weather. At ten feet away from the water, I was almost in the right mindset, until I noticed a bit of splashing. Clearly, as it just so happened, a small shark washed up onto the beach just in front of us, and was splashing around trying to get back into the water. Of course. After he swam away, I walked along the beach in shin deep water, keeping an eye out. The shark followed us. In fact, it followed us at least 25 feet along the coast, until it found a crab it the water that it attacked with gusto, then swam away. Sigh. Though I did go the rest of the day without a shark sighting, my fear remains intact.
Nothing makes you feel better like a little family time.
After the Whitsundays we hopscotched our way down to Brisbane, where I have an aunt, Rena, and two cousins, Robert and Elise. Unfortunately Robert was out of town, but I got to spend time with Rena and Elise, and soak up a little bit of family time. There's nothing like sitting around having dinner with family to take away some of the homesickness.
After three luxurious (happy coincidence ended in us having a two bedroom luxury apartment all to ourselves) days outside of Brisbane, we were on our way to New Zealand. Funny, I'm finishing up this post while on our flight to Argentina. Hard to keep up sometimes.
-EC
ps. I should mention, when we turned in our car, aka Bare-bones Sally, we had put about 11,500 km on her. Nice work.
After three luxurious (happy coincidence ended in us having a two bedroom luxury apartment all to ourselves) days outside of Brisbane, we were on our way to New Zealand. Funny, I'm finishing up this post while on our flight to Argentina. Hard to keep up sometimes.
-EC
ps. I should mention, when we turned in our car, aka Bare-bones Sally, we had put about 11,500 km on her. Nice work.
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