South Pacific Noosa

... br><br>After a short break in Dubai we caught the flight to Brisbane. First delay saw us sat on the tarmac for an hour due to a fire warning system error on the plane. Apparently they spray the baggage hold to disinfect the luggage and it messed with the fire detection apparatus.<br><br>15 hours later we arrived in Brisbane. Another short delay as lots of aircraft using the ...

... I was happy with in other countries was of no use here. Much more efficient is to call at local tourist offices, which provide great source of information - during the trip we collected a huge pile of leaflets and brochures. We didn't see many popular wildlife animals, only some possums, an orange snake climbing up a tree, a koala and a few kangaroos, perhaps not the right season or just bad luck. Anyway, overall it was a great trip...

... the downpour of rain in the evening to cool us down, although sprinting to dinner without any rainproof gear was a challenge all made worthwhile with Kim's first experience of Morton Bay Bugs.. now that is a meaty shellfish. The next day welcomed the arrival of Sally, Hassle and Emma - friendships spanning over 14 years and not having see them for most of those years.. A reunion called for ...

... they have loads of trails and i park up the bike and head in to do the coastal walk. The signs say that you may see Koalas up the eucalyptus trees so i keep my eyes peeled. The walk is lovely and I make it to Dolphin Point, about a 1km walk, there are surfers everywhere and one passes me every 5 seconds, carrying a board on to a beach to catch some waves. I sit and watch them for a bit then head back - my legs are knackered from ...

... and a larger Ginger Factory--both operational-- are located. it also happened to be the annual Ginger Festival so we decided to give it a try in spite of the looming black storm clouds in the distance. as we walked around the gardens behind the factory i learned just how many different ginger plants there are! about 20 minutes into our visit the heavens opened up just like they had promised to, and so Mary and i were stuck inside the ...

... Irwin mais nous ne nous sommes pas arretés vu que nous avions pas mal de kilomètres a faire dans les jours à venir...Quoi qu'il en soit il semblerait que ce zoo soit l'une des attractions à ne pas manquer alors nous y ferons peut etre un saut une fois de retour dans les environs. Nous nous sommes également arretés à Noosa, une station balnéaire pour riche avec un grand parc ou il n'est pas impossible de voir des koalas en pleine nature. On a bien tenté d'en ...

... It was a house in a residential area, converted into a hostel. So there were strict rules... near enough lights out at 10 if you didn't go out! But it was a nice small, easy place to meet people- and that's what I wanted. Sometimes some of these big massive chain hostels are actually harder to meet people in... and a bit more daunting. So yeh, it was cool for a change. I just monged about, read my book ...

... we started to realise how many backpackers there are treavewlling up the east coast as we phoned about 5 hostels and all were fully booked, lucklily we ended up at a holiday park which had some dorms and it urned out to be really nice with a pool and right next to the beach, they even laid on a free bbq. We were only in port macquire a couple of days so we did a really cool walk along loads of beaches and ended up at a rainforest which you could walk around and just ...

... the accelerator in low 4 wheel drive. Fine we thought and got andrew to drive through it with our car screaming in protest at the speed! So we then headed for the champagne pools which were at the end of this next beach where we had to walk along a boardwalk from the car park, to these massive rock pools where the waves crash into them on a regular basis. Unfortunately, just as we got there, a girl from one of the other cars in our group came past us crying ...

... over 2 hours flew by, so in no time at all we had to point our little boat back towards the rental office. <br><br> <br><br>It was a shame because we were really enjoying ourselves!<br><br> <br><br>As we got within 100 metres, a bunch of jetskiers ...