Bella Casa Noosa

... good foot tapping session before walking back to the camper. This is where the fun starts (well I say fun but Nic wasn't so impressed. I woke up panicking we were going to get fined for parking there ($3,500), so I insisted we moved, and drove up the Bruce highway to try to find somewhere, we spent a couple of hours in the middle of the night looking, eventually we found a truck stop at a service station and got to bed again about 3 in the morning, yay!

... not to mention a couple of strolls along Hastings Street to go shopping. We managed to chat to lots of other travellers and a day or two before we left another Crossroads Cruiser pulled in alongside us so it was interesting to see the changes they had made.  Steve picked up loads of tips and we chatted to people about lovely places to see. So our next stop will be Rainbow Beach right at the north of Sunshine Beach.

... kinds: the smaller freshwater or "freshie" crocs and the larger (or MUCH larger) saltwater or "saltie" crocs, as well as 5 or 6 American Alligators. we went to the 2 pm Wildlife Warriors Show at the Crocoseum which is the main crowd draw in the Zoo to watch the live croc feeding Steve Irwin was so famous for. the star of the show happened to be none other than Monty, the Zoo's very first crocodile and he was quite impressive. besides ...

... Gold Coast. the men's final heat was intense--everybody was getting amazing rides. the lead was passed back and forth between Jensen and Constable throughout the duration of the 30 min heat, but in the end Jensen prevailed with an unbelievable 9.6 ride helping him clench the win. Wach placed 3rd and Roach in 4th. this past wednesday, legend aussie noserider Dane Wilson won the Stand-up Paddle Competition, making due with the smaller waves to edge out fellow australian James ...

... Tasmanian Devil. This is a weird looking thing, but it looks nothing like the cartoon character or, as Lorna pointed out, the chocolate bar! We then had a walk past where they were feeding elephants, but it didn't compare to how we had fed elephants in Thailand whilst sat on their backs! In the centre of the zoo is the "Crocoseum" where they do some educational shows with some animals. We did find it really good that there was always loads of staff around ...

... on s'est dit que même si c'était épuisant il fallait voir ce que ça donnait afin de pouvoir se faire notre propre idée. De plus, en Nouvelle Zélande nous étions partis faire du canoe pendant 5 jours en mer avec pas assez de bouffe (on ne pensait pas avoir autant d'espace de rangement) et on était confiant que du canoe sur une rivière serait une partie de rigolade. Nous sommes allés faire les courses le jour avant le départ et cette fois-ci, on a fait en sorte d'avoir plein ...

... wombats going for walks around the park. There are animal shows and feedings all day long, opportunites to get photos with animals and a strong conservation message throughout the park. So, way-to-go Steve: he obviously has left a global legacy. After a whole day of zoo-glory, we went back to Brisbane (which took a ridiculous 2 hours, thanks to the typical Aussie train station schedales that NEVER follow what is acutally posted at train ...

CRIKEY! We stopped off in Australia Zoo on our way down to Brisbane. Pretty good place. We got a show in at the crocoseum which was great. They brought out some snakes, birds and croc's. The had all the birds really well trained so that they could get them to turn over on the grass and fly amongst the crowd and come straight back to the rangers. They were all pretty impressive looking as well, really colourful Macaws. The zoo keepers all showed the enthusiasm which ...

... fish', and this place even offered 'grilled'.

Fair play to the guidebook, the fish & chips were absolutely first class. I'll spare you the details, but a picture speaks a thousand words!



After that we went back to ...

... shore... trying to mind all the kids that had suddenly turned up. I swear some people have no brains... we purposefully kept far away from the swimming flags so as not to hit anyone and all these parents kept putting their little ones right in our path! Once it got too crowded in the water we decided to make sand sculptures (I made a crab) and then I buried Donovan up to his knees in the hole he had made.... What is it with guys and digging ...