TravelStream™ news feed for member tylerv on TravelPod's free travel blogs service http://www.travelpod.com/syndication/rss/tylerv en-us Copyright ©2009 TravelPod.com Sun, 02 Mar 2008 22:41:43 -0500 http://www.travelpod.com http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1204428600/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1204428600/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1204428600/tpod.html Sun, 02 Mar 2008 22:41:43 -0500 Australia indeed

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Mission Beach, Australia

We had finally had enough of Townsville and left pretty early on the leap year day. We made a few stops on the way to Mission Beach. Stopped in Ingham and used the internet and wandered around town. I was on the internet a good 3 hours and was able to watch Rob and Big on Mtv.com, it was amazing. How I miss Rob and Big. I bought a few books from the library. We were in a fruit market and I accidentally destroyed a whole bunch of bananas, before walking out in shame. The sun came out for a while but we were in the car. I bought some barramundi from a shop in some small town, cost $6.80 for a fillet (probably the most I've spent on food since Sydney). It was good though, tasted a lot like walleye, everyone I've met has told me to try it so I did.

Finally made it to Mission Beach and walked up and down the beach, saw a whole bunch of jellyfish near the stinger enclosure. Made some pasta in a bathroom because it was too windy to cook it outside. I read quite a bit of my new books, haven't yet finished "The beginners guide to winning the noble prize". It takes too much concentration to read. At night at MB there were hundreds of cane toads everywhere. Max crushed a few, I had more compassion and left them alone. Got cold in the car at night, actually had to use my sleeping bad for once.

Next morning the sun was out and I soaked it in as much as I could. By 3pm the sun was gone, but I managed to get some nice tannage. After lunch we headed to the stinger enclosure, Max tried out his snorkle and mask that he looted from the boat wreck. We played a little football and headed back to the camping spot for the night.

By morning it was pouring out and we had to seek shelter because rain was seeping into the car. We parked under an abandoned gas station and waited out the storm. Eventually we left, even though it was still raining pretty hard. We tried to get out, but the road was blocked by a flooded river. Once again we had to cross a fast moving, dangerous river. Other cars were doing it so we did as well. Max was freaking out, "I can't take this pressure", so I had to drive. We made it without too much trouble though. Water comes up though the floor in the back seats, so thats lovely, but we survived and headed to Cairns.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1202521260/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1202521260/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1202521260/tpod.html Thu, 28 Feb 2008 23:57:56 -0500 Australia indeed

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Rainbow Beach, Australia

The place we stayed was called Pippies and they guide us on our tour, its a pretty sweet deal. This was part of the package deal so we got 2 days at the hostel, one before the Fraser Island trip and a day after.

Here is a review of Pippies that I found on the internet, "Pippies has all the quaint charm of a flea-ridden crack den. The price we paid would be fair if we were given the narcotics to match the aura. If the damp sheets and cement and bubble gum-smeared walls failed to help you sleep, the prospect of a thousand parasites gorging on your flesh certainly did. We paid 60 dollars for a double room (translation, mattress), that didn't even contain a bin never mind any furniture. It was the worst hostel we have stayed in in oz (and we've been to airlie beach), the only plus side is the fact that many more horrors are concealed as they refuse to put up any kind of lights. Plus the staff are totally inept and dozy."

I really liked the place though, me and Max were in the Hollywood room. Some poor people got stuck in a room that had a room and tent walls so you could here everyone outside. Our room was nice though.

After we checked in, we went down to the beach and hung out there for a while. I talked to some Dutch guys and they let me us their surfboard for a while. At first I was getting destroyed by massive waves until I discovered that I can ride littler waves much, much, much easier. And I actually did get up on some of the waves and rode them for 10-15 seconds at a time. SUCCESS!

At around 4pm everyone that was giong to Fraser gathered and we discussed what needed to be done to keep us stay on the island. We watched some absolutely retarded videos about safety and whatnot. One video was about dingos and how to act around them. You're supposed to cross your arms and back away slowly. It was so stupid.

In our group there were 2 four wheel drive vehicles for 22 people. We were seperated into 2 groups of 11. I knew right away that we had a good group. Max and I both had to pay $80 for insurance and a food levy. Between the 11 of us, we went shopping and bought $210 worth of food for the trip. The other group was way over budget. Then everyone bought boxes and boxes of wine (goon in Australia). Between the 11 of us, there was at least 40 litres of wine. So there was fun to be had.

The next day we woke up early and packed up all the gear. The vehicles have fold down seats in the back so you face other people. God it was cramped. All of the gear was strapped to the top of the car with a big net. We were so top heavy, its a miracle we never tipped over. We left Pippies around 11pm and headed on our way.

Fraser Island is a huge sand island, the largest in the world I believe. 75 miles of beaches on the Eastern half. Only 4wd vehicles are allowed because there are no paved roads.

Around noon we got on a barge on the mainland that took us to Fraser Island. We drove all the way down the beach to the other end of the island. The roads got pretty bad at some points but it was fun to get knocked around a little bit. I figure its part of the experience. Some people got bumped so hard taht they hit there head on the ceiling of the truck. A few times I fell of the seat into someones lap.

The weather couldn't have been more perfect on the trip. Sunny most of the time.

The first night we cooked pasta as a group and drank tons of wine. It was one of the British guys birthdays and he got completely destroyed. The night ended with him falling onto a tent and snapping all the polls. A few of us wandered down to the beach and talked for a while. Dingos were running around past us, but they didn't do any harm.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1202346900/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1202346900/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1202346900/tpod.html Thu, 28 Feb 2008 23:52:13 -0500 Australia indeed

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Gympie, Australia

We left Kilkivan and the kangaroo sanctuary a little early because it was pouring rain and we were worried about getting stuck again like last time. We had to drive through an overflowing creek which came up over the wheels. But we made it out, the car seemed to be working fine. We made it in to Gympie and bummed around town for a while and used the internet for a while. We ate a whole chicken in the mall.

We left there and were going to head to Rainbow Beach to start our Fraser Island trip, however our car went completely to hell. We were going up a hill and we had a green light but an idiot in front of us did go on the green light and we had to stop. Our engine just smoked and couldn't move from that light, I absolutely gunned it and it still wouldn't move. Finally got it moving and we drove about another km down the road at about 20 km per hour on the highway in search of a mechanic. Finally our car just died. Transmission completely shot. It was pouring rain so we had to walk to an info booth and get some help. There was a nice old lady that helped us get a tow truck and find a mechanic. I was quite angry at life at that moment.

So we got a tow at about 4 o'clock so our mechanic (Rod) told us the bad news taht we needed a new transmission and it was giong to cost about $700. Not good. The plan was for him to order a new transmission and he would put it in tomorrow and we could head on our way. There was absolutely nothing for us to do. We ended up sneaking into the movie 3:10 to Yuma and not getting back until late. Rod felt bad for us so he let us sleep in his garage. Such luxery.

It absoletly poured the next day and we stayed at the library all day until our car was fixed. We payed $683.84 to fix the car. He warned us that there was still a hitch in the car and I was worried taht it was giong to happen again. But as soon as we drove it, it was glorious. We could drive up hills, we can stop and go, it felt so good to have a working car, it was totally worth all the money we spent to fix it.

With our wonderful new car we headed back to the coast and spent the night at Tin Can Bay about 30kms from Rainbow Beach. We made spagetti on our little grill and it worked quite well. We found a car park and slept in the car.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1204257000/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1204257000/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1204257000/tpod.html Thu, 28 Feb 2008 23:45:19 -0500 Australia indeed

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Townsville, Australia

We arrived in Townsville at around 5pm which is the exact time that everything in town closes. We scoped out town and checked out a few of the sights before parking along the ocean and calling it a day.

The next day we did some shopping, bought some souvineers, and got our bearing in the biggest city in northern Queensland. We had previously thought about taking a trip to Magnetic Island of the coast of Townsville, but the weather was not very nice and it wasn't going to be much better the next few days. We snuck into Reef HQ which is a huge reef exhibit much like underwater world in the Mall of America. Hung out there for a few hours, it was cool to learn a little bit about the fish and coral. Saw some sharks and I was able to get a picture of a leopard shark that I swam with in Byron Bay so that was cool. In Airlie Beach I bought a package to learn how to SCUBA dive and get certified in SCUBA. Its on the Great Barrier Reef and it should be amazing. This was a good warm up.

I ate 1 and half pizzas for dinner and we snuck into another movie. We were trying to get into Rambo, but there was at least 8 people guarding the place. It was like the President was in the movie. Finally we saw an opening and we got into There Will Be Blood, which turned out to be a pretty good movie. Long, 2 and a half hours. Didn't get out of there until midnight. We parked in a bad spot and had mosquitoes bugging us all night, until we moved to a more open spot.

Next day we got up early, ate our normal breakfast of peanut butter and apricot jelly sandwhiches and went to the Billabong Sanctuary 17km south of town. We almost ran out of gas on the way, but filled up with $70 worth at $1.23 a liter, which is just under $5 a gallon, that is also the cheapest gas we have found so far. At the sanctuary Max was able to sneak into it, I wasn't because I was seen and forced into a conversation thereby ruining any chances. Any possible fence jumping would have led us into crocadile territory and mean certain death. After a while Max came back, so we both payed to get into the place. It was worth it though, Kangaroos everywhere, ducks, swans, turtles, my first red kangaroo, and I got to hold a crocadile, a few pythons, and a koala. All of which were pretty cool. After that we headed to the information center and took showers and made pasta (for like the 8th day in a row). When we got back to town at around 4 we decided to climb a massive rock face that dominates Townsville. It was quite tiring and took us over an hour to climb, but had an amazing view. On the way down it started pouring so we ran for a while. Pretty much ruined our showers. Its been rainy, but its still insanely hot with the humidity. As soon as we finished the climb we headed back to the theaters and snuck into Meet the Spartans, which was the most retarded movie that I've ever seen. Had I paid to get in, I would have demanded I get my money back. Slept back by the ocean again. Max woke up at around 4 in the morning to swat some mosquitoes, he was waving the flashlight when a cop pulled up and shined a spotlight into the car, but they didn't bust us, so no worries. I slept amazing.

Random fact, Australians use zed instead of z.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1204083240/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1204083240/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1204083240/tpod.html Thu, 28 Feb 2008 22:49:52 -0500 Australia indeed

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Airlie Beach, Australia

When we got back from the the yacht trip it was around 4pm and scorching hot. Headed down to the lagoon and took a quick swim. The water was about the temperature of bathwater so it wasn't even that refreshing. At about 5:30 we headed back to Koala's and used the showers and cleaned up after 3 days without.

The majority of the people from our trip met at 6:30 and took a bus to a bar and restuarant called Reefo's way outside of town. It was pretty fun, we had $3.90 meals and a few pitchers of beer, played some pool, discussed our differing cultures. Didn't leave there until about 11pm when we finally got a ride with some random guy working there. Max left to go write in his diary. The rest of us, John and Rob from Ireland, Veronica from Germany, Mariah from Holland, and Ingrid from France went to another bar named Beaches where I met Dave who had been on our Noosa canoe trip. Good catching up with him. That closed at around midnight and we headed to Moroccos for some Kareoke, I didn't sing but it was fun listening to others suck. Then we went to Mama Africas where there was a D.J. and had some fun there until 3 in the morning.

Got back to the car and we went back to the Coles parking lot where we slept until 8 when the sun heated up the car to an unbearable level.

Hungout at the lagoon and got some more sun, I'm beyond getting sunburnt and my tan is quite nice at the moment. Max bought a digjerdu. I'm gonna get one as well but I'm waiting for a better price in Cairns, hopefully. At night we made Kangaroo sausages that were horrible. Max was so sure that they would be amazing. I took one bite and that was enough for me. Kangaroos have no fat in them so the meat was extremely mushy and gross. Because Max was so convinced they would be amazing he ate all seven and consequently felt like crap the next day. I was still exhausted from the night before and went to bed at around 8.

Next day we left for Townsville.


My camera is a peice of crap, the screen is broken.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1203834480/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1203834480/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1203834480/tpod.html Mon, 25 Feb 2008 19:54:26 -0500 Australia indeed

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Whitsunday Island, Australia

We arrived at the harbour at about 8 and got signed in to our trip. We received wetsuits, masks, fins, and snorkles from the boat company. There was 28 people on our ship, including 4 crew. The yacht was probably about 70 feet long and 20 feet wide, so it was a little cramped for everyone. The weather could not have been more perfect, not one cloud for the entire trip.

The first day we set out at around 10am and made our way past the Shitsundays (thats were Denman Island is) and headed to the nicer islands. There was no waves and no wind so we couldn't put up the sails and cruise, we had to use the motor the entire time. The boat with just the motor is quite slow, with the sails its supposed to be one of the fastest ships in Australia. It won a number of races in the late 1980's and early 1990's before it became a overnight sailing yacht.

The first place we stopped was a secluded cove off of South Molle Island near Hook Island. We snorkeled for an hour or two and saw so many fish and corals. The water was a little murky but you could still see about 5 meters in every direction. There were corals of every shape and color, it was exactly what you would see on the Discovery Channel. The place we snorkeled wasn't part of the Great Barrier Reef, it was on the fringe, but it was still amazing. Thousands and thousands of fish were everywhere. There was also a huge fish (like the size of a great shepard) that the crew was feeding and we were able to pet it and stuff. Also saw a stingray. After snorkeling we were able to do a free 30 minute Scuba dive. I was a little worried because I wasn't sure I would be able to breath properly and pop my ears when I needed to, but everything went really well and I loved it. The air from the tank is awesome, it tastes really good. I dove down only about 5-6 meters, but it was cool to get right along side the coral and check out each individual animal. Definetly want to Scuba some more.

Around 4pm that day we left the cove and drove around the islands for a while. We parked in a sheltered bay and were taken to the beach on a dingy by the crew. Being the only Americans, Max and I were the only ones who wanted to play football, so we ended up playing soccer for a few hours. Our team dominated another boat named Siska that we saw on several occasions during the trip. I got kicked in the foot and it has now become infected and swollen, but I'll live. The meals on the boat were quite good. Simple breakfasts, salads and sandwhiches for lunch, and steaks and hotdogs for dinner. There was plenty and I was happy about having real food for a change. At night we played games with the crew. There was this stupid game that I figured out the solution in about 5 minutes were it took others up to an hour to figure out. Played some drinking games, had a good time. There was a guy that pulled a jackass like stunt by sucking a condom through his nose and pulling it out his mouth. Everyone laughed so hard. Sleeping on the boat wasn't so bad, better than sleeping in the car. Except I was near the bathroom and it stunk really bad because it kept getting clogged. The crew had to take buckets of shit and piss out of the bathroom because it kept overflowing and going everywhere. Maybe a little cramped, but other than that and the stink, sleeping was nice.

The next day we woke up early and sailed to another snorkel spot and did more of the same. The coral at this location was much nicer and more colorful. Fish everywhere again, absolutely amazing. After that we headed to another sheltered spot and loaded in the dingies and went to the beach. On the way we saw huge laugerhead turtles in the water. The captain of our ship pointed somewhere and said there was a beach monkey that had a white face over on a rock somewhere. I thought that was the stupidest thing I had ever heard but Max totally believed him. We made it to the whithaven beach after a little walk. It was voted one of the best beaches in the world. White sand and blue water, doesn't get much better than that. I didn't bring my stinger suit so I didn't go in the water too much, but it was still nice on the beach. The captain also told us that the sand could be used to clean our teeth, just rub the sand in your teeth she said and your teeth will sparkle white, which Max tried, confirming the fact that he is the most gullable person in the world.

Steaks and potatoes for dinner, and more of the same at night, stayed up until about 3 am. We got in a fight with a boat that was parked near us. Some big Irish guys on our boat were going crazy and getting mad. Irish people have the funniest accents, I laughed everything they spoke basically. More goon.

Next morning we headed to another sheltered bay and did some more snorkeling. The coral was worse here, but there was a sweat shipwreck to explore. About a week ago when we were stranded in Bundaberg, a sailing ship filled with backpackers got pinned up against the rocks in bad weather and crashed. We were exploring the wreck and going in and out of the ship. It was quite cool. Max was searching around the ship for goods that got washed out of the boat during the storm. He found a snorkle and mask, a pair of shorts (which i still think is gross), and a wallet and cell phone. He found the wallet in a some dress or something that was covered in sand on the bottom. There was $70 in it and credit card and identification and stuff. Anyway, when we got back to shore he facebooked the guy and got in touch with him. He had been on the ship that crashed and was amazed that anyone found his wallet. Max got to keep the $70 and gave the wallet to a friend of the guy who was in Airlie Beach.

We sailed back to land, it was so hot, the sun was just destroying us.

It was a pretty sweet trip.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1203574620/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1203574620/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1203574620/tpod.html Mon, 25 Feb 2008 00:27:09 -0500 Australia indeed

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Airlie Beach, Queensland, Australia

We arrived late on the 19th and slept in some parking lot. No mosquitoes and a breeze so it was great.

The next day we headed into town and did some shopping and planning. We had now made it to jellyfish territory so instead of swimming in the ocean there is a giant lagoon that we swam at. Later, we met up with Allie again who was working at Koala's hostel for accomadation and food. She has a few cool roomates, B.J. from Italy, and Ellie from Germany. Anywho, Max and I used her shower, first shower in 6 days. Made some hotdogs in her kitchen. Took everyone to the grocery store.

During the day we tried to set up a deepsea fishing trip but after a few hours of trying we discovered that it was cancelled for the next day. Instead we booked a trip out to our own island (details follow).

At night BJ, Allie, Max, and I went to a toga party at a bar nearby. It was pretty insane.

The following day we woke up early and headed to Shutes Harbour to hope on our boat to our Island. We chose Denman Island because it was small and would give us a "Survivor-like" experience. We packed up our gear and headed to the island. The boatman dropped us off and we had a whole island in the Whitsundays to ourselfs. The beach was made entirely out of coral, no sand at all. We arrived at high tide and there was about 6 inches of beach. But by low tide the water had dropped at least 8 meters exposing some nice beach. The company that dropped us off gave us stinger suits (to prevent jellyfish stings) and snorkels. Because of all the rain there was dirty freshwater around the island which made snorkeling quite bad. It was still fun though, to have a whole tropical island to yourself.

Early in the afternoon the next day we got back to Airlie and went to the lagoon and hung out with the crew. B.J. left on the bus to Sydney. We ended up cooking Chinese food again. At night we went to a karoake bar but we were the only ones there, so it wasn't a whole lot of fun. There was an extra bed in Allies room so I slept there with 5 other girls. Max slept in the car outside of Koala hostel and was woken up by a groundskeeper at 6am and told to move on. He threatened to have him arrested if he didn't leave. I woke up at 7am to go find Max so we could get on our yacht trip but he wasn't there. I panicked a little bit but we eventually found each other and headed to the Apollo Maxi for our 3day/2 night cruise in the Whitsunday Islands.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1203229860/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1203229860/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1203229860/tpod.html Thu, 21 Feb 2008 00:15:11 -0500 Australia indeed

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Rockhampton, Australia

On the 15th we gave up on Bundaberg and left with much resentment to the city. There was actually a speck of sun so we drove 20 minutes to the town of Bagara and layed out and ate some food. The sun quickly left and so did we. Headed north to the town of Rockhampton where Allie caught a bus. We snuck into another movie to pass the time because it was still raining, Dan in Real Life.

I bought a book at the mall, "The Beginneering Guide to Winning the Nobel Prize", and used that to pass the time a little bit. One day we went spelunking because that is not an activity that requires sun. We went to the capricorn caves and hung out there for a while. After that we headed to the gym and worked out. Went to another movie, saw the whole movie Juno.

One night we slept by some hospital. It had stopped raining so we had the windows open. By about 2:30 we both woke up just surrounded by mosquitoes. So we quick closed the windows and killed all the mosquitoes in the car. But they didn't stop coming in. From 2:30 to 5:30 we swatted and swatted and it never ended. By 5:30 it was light out and we had to leave the car. We later found out that our front driver side door does not close properly. After about 6am we went back to sleep. It was a horrible experience. By that point we were so fed up with the rain and mosquitoes we decided that we were giong to drive to Ayers Rock out in central Australia, some 2000kms away. After some research we figured out that it would be impossible and our car would probably not make it.

We had been going to Libraries and these info booths that are found all over the place. Everytime we would go there they would tell us some depressing news about flooding and rain. The people that work there are volunteers, old, and generally worthless. Half the time they never knew what they were talking about. At the library I checked the road conditions and I found that the roads had just opened between here and Airlie Beach, so we left in a hurry. We drove in the dark for about 6 hours before we finally made it, but it was worth it to be out of Rockhampton. And more importantly the weather looked nice.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1203046200/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1203046200/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1203046200/tpod.html Tue, 19 Feb 2008 00:31:23 -0500 Australia indeed

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Bundaberg, Australia

The drive to Bundaberg was insane. The recent flooding was coming over the road and we had to drive our car through streams that were coming over the road. We drove through about 15 of them. At one water was coming over the hood of the car, which was pretty scary. But we made it to Bundaberg and met up with Allie's three friends she had met in Australia. I think they felt sorry for us sleeping in our car in flood conditions (also our car leaks in several places) and let us stay in their cabin at a caravan park. There wasn't a whole lot to do so we visited a rum factory, a beer factory, and a brewed pop factory in a matter of hours. One of the girls cooked chicken wings for us and other authentic Hong Kong food. I have to admit that it was not the best food I've had in a while though.

It rained the entire day. From taking my clothes out of the car and bring them into the cabin I got completely soaked. It was insane how much it was raining. We had all bought tickets to go to a turtle rockery and watch baby turtle hatch and waddle down to the beach. I was really really looking forward to it, but when it started getting dark I could see no possible way we could drive the 10km to the beach without drowning. So we decided to skip it (and good thing too because it had been cancelled without us knowing). The cabin at least had cable and it was dry. Max slept on the sofa and I slept on a mat on the floor. Our car was leaking really bad. I was so thankful that we were in the cabin.

The next day it was still raining. We all slept in til about 11 and ate lunch and got ready to go into town. The only thing that seemed of any interest were some mystery craters about 20km out of town. There are supposedly the rements of a meteor. So we drove out there and were about to see them when we realized it costed $6 each to get into the place. There was no way it was worth $6 to see some rock, so I left the gift shop and started sneaking around the place. There was a 5 foot wall between me and the craters so being 6 feet tall I just stuck my head over and took some pictures. Max took it a step farther and walked around the fence, past a sign that said no trespassing, and walked a few feet into the place. Everyone was ready to go, so I started honking the horn telling Max to hurry up, but being the idiot that he is, he kept going. I drove up to him and he finally hopped in the car. We started driving away when a guy flagged us down. He apparently was the owner and he had seen Max sneaking around behind the no trespassing zone. He treatened to call the police and have us arrested if Max did not pay. So, Max had to go in and pay. He took my camera and got good pictures, but there was no way that place was worth $6.

After that we headed to an art gallary and I painted a self portrait of myself, which was horrible. Max and I each ate an entire chicken. We called someone who told us that again the turtle rockery was closed because of flooding within the park. We all played card games which was fun but by 9pm I was ready to see some turtles, which was the main reason that I came to Bundaberg. We decided that we were going to sneak into the turtle place and find the turtles ourselves. We brought Allie and Portia with us and headed to the park at 9:30. It was still pouring so I wore only my swimming trunks because anything else would get wet anyway. We snuck into the park and walked for about 10 minutes down the road, through a turtle info center, and onto the beach. It was so winding and scary. We walked up and down the beach looking at turtle nesting boxes but didn't find anything. I was expecting to see hundreds, if not thousands, of baby turtles and we couldn't find anything. We headed back, dejected. As we walked along the road a car pulled up and flashed its headlights on us. Instantly, Max and I jumped into the ditch and layed motionless. Whoever was in the car got out and started walking around. Max swore he saw a dog. After about 5 minutes they hopped back in the car and drove away. About 5 minutes later we were walking along the road that had overflown because of a creek. There was maybe a foot of water on the road, so we certainly weren't very discrete plowing through the water and we saw another pair of headlights. I instantly dived into the ditch which was full of disgusting swamp water. We waited there for a few minutes until that car left and we sprinted the final few minutes back up to the car. It was a complete failure of a mission.

Woke up the next morning and packed up the car to leave. The road to the next town we wanted to visit (the town of 1770) was blocked because of flooding, but hopefully we can make it.

Turtle watching was once again cancelled today. We found out that the road was still blocked and now we couldn't even go any farther because the town of Mackay had recieved 2 feet of rain in 6 hours and was completely flooded. So we were stranded. Still raining, we snuck into 3 movies at the Bundaberg theature. Jumper, 27 dresses, and Definetly Maybe, all good flicks. They were supposed to cost $12.70 each, rediculous indeed. Slept in the movie theather parkng lot, all 3 of us in the car. We bought a tarp to keep the rain out of the car which worked quite well at directing wind into the car and keeping us cool.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1202786160/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1202786160/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/tylerv/australia_2008/1202786160/tpod.html Wed, 13 Feb 2008 22:30:10 -0500 Australia indeed

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Rainbow Beach, Australia

I fell asleep on the couch in the lounge at Pippies from the night before and got blamed for making a huge mess and being noisy. They tried to charge me when Max checked out of the room, but fortunetly Max was the only one who paid for the key deposit so we didn't get charged. We hung around the hostel after checking out and didn't do a whole lot. It was pouring. At 3pm we were supposed to go dolphin kayaking where you get to kayak with 200+ dolphins, which would have been sweet but it was cancelled. We hung around the hostel because our kayaking trip was rescheduled for 8 am the next day.

At dusk me, max, lisa, allie, and sho climbed up to a sandblow, which is a huge stretch of sand that leads down to the ocean. It wasn't amazing, but we had nothing better to do. Watched some movies and made a big dinner at the hostel. Max and I had our car parked in the hostel parking lot still and we planned on sleeping there overnight and getting up early for the dolphin kayaking. No one at the hostel cares about the place at all. The girl that checked us out of the hostel watched movies with us all night. Allie had an extra bed in her room so she said I could sleep there and I was going to but there was a whole room right next door that was open so I got a double bed to myself. Max slept in the car. haha

It poured all night, 8 inches according to the weather report. Once again our dolphin kayaking had been cancelled so we decided to screw it and leave Rainbow Beach, but we first got our refund. I was kind of glad we didn't do the kayaking because I was tired and had already seen a dolphin up close.

Before we left we were talking to Allie, who is also travelling up the east coast, and decided that we had room to take her along as well. So the three of us headed to Bundaberg where we were to meet 3 of Allie's friends who were all from Hong Kong as well.

On a side note, a Canadian guy who went to Fraser Island with all of us had been up drinking the previous night and missed his bus to Airlie Beach and therefore missed his 3 day yacht cruise in the Whitsundays.
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