Sunshine Coast - Saturday 24 February onwards

Saturday 24 February:

We caught the ferry back to Cleveland. We really enjoyed our time on NSI apart from the terrible rain and my phone getting ruined. However, it would have been so much better if we had a 4WD. You can get anywhere on the island in one of those bad boys. Still, even if you have a camper van half as good as Gert, you should still go. We headed into Brisbane as we had to take Gert in for a safety check. She wasn't ill or anything, just a rule that Wicked told us we must do. Getting to the wicked garage was stressful. Not because of the traffic but because the photocopied map they had given us had been photocopied about a million times so was unreadable. We got there eventually (having seen the Gabba cricket ground more times than I care to mention, and from all angles) and everything with the van was fine. After the check they handed us a complimentary cheap, chilled bottled of plonk - Jackpot! After leaving Brisbane we stopped off at Caboolture - where the first caravan site was too expensive, the second looked like a gypsy site but the third was just fine. We also heard that the QE2 was pass the campsite at around 8.00pm to 9.30pm but we were too busy playing Shithead and missed it - doh!

Sunday 25 February:

As soon as we left the campsite we headed for Bribie Island because it looked good on the map and was a short distance east of Caboolture. The island is 38km long and approximately 7km wide. It also has only five small towns on the southern tip. We headed straight for the beach. We didn't stay very long on the beach because we were both pining for nice calm sea which we could both swim in. We headed for a place south of Bribie Island called Deception Bay. It took us ages to find the bay because, as usual, the signposts disappeared and now we know why it's called Deception Bay. Because the deception is that this place is absolutely rubbish and it shouldn't even be appearing on any map. We eventually found the bay, walked up to the water and noticed that hundreds of jelly fish had been washed up so we turned round, walked back to Gert and then drove to Redcliffe.

The first point of call was the boozer. As soon as we walked onto the outside seating area two Aussie guys said to us that you can spot a tourist from a mile off. I told them it was because of Carl's cowboy hat and I was right. We had a chat with them over a couple of beers and they went through the map and told us where we should go and where we should definitely not go. Deception Bay was one of the places we should definitely not go to so we didn't tell them that we had already seen the wonderful sights. We had a look around Redcliffe for a bit. It would have been a lovely place to spend some time but the people looked really strange so we drove back to Cleveland where we had originally caught the ferry to NSI and found a decent campsite and the geckos thought so too. They were plastered all over the walls. When we walked past them Carl pointed out to one of them so I looked round and the greedy thing had a moth's face stuck in its mouth and the moth's wings were flapping wildly. I told Carl that I really didn't appreciate seeing that sort of this and then we had a session of bickering.

Carl: How do you think they survive and what do you think they eat?
Abi: I know exactly what they eat but I don't need to be reminded of it thank you!

Two days later Carl told me that the moth had got away because we startled the gecko.

Monday 26 February:

Once paying for the night we took the dreaded drive back into Brisbane to sort out our reg and this was the reason we had stayed around this area. Carl wanted assurance. More assurance than the man had originally gave over the telephone on Saturday. So we reached the Wicked garage and the man said "don't worry the van's still registered. Just say you're tourists and the police will let you drive on". This is exactly what he had said over the telephone so as far as I could tell this last couple of days had been a complete waste of time. I had picked up a leaflet a couple of days earlier for a place called Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary so we headed there. It was still in the suburbs of Brisbane in a tiny place called Fig Tree Pocket. It was fantastic and such a great experience. I was in my element because I have become so obsessed with koalas and I got to cuddle one. They are really soft and spongy and they really do cling on. The koala didn't look straight into the camera but when I looked down to look at him he'd look at me so his nose was touching my face. I think he wanted to leave with me but I didn't have a big enough bag to fit him in. Carl was getting a bit bored because there were koalas everywhere and he wanted to see the big boy's stuff so we saw a few crocs and snakes and we even held a baby crocodile.

Our intention was to visit Australia Zoo (the Irwin family home) but because I'd spent too long cooing over the koalas that was no longer possible. We took the tourist drive around the Glass House Mountains which took ages and the views were of... mountains and then we visited Ettamogah Pub which was just off the Bruce Highway. 'This is the most photographed Pub in the world. Built in 1989, it is a true replica of the Ken Maynard cartoon series made famous in the Australian and New Zealand Post Magazines. The pub's quirky shape and caricature appearance makes it a must to visit. The pub's internal features are an eclectic display of everything Australian. A visit to the Ettamogah Pub is a visit to an Australian icon.' I didn't copy that off a website. Honestly.

It was now getting late and all the campsites were shut so we couldn't get in anywhere. We did however learn what the white italic i with a tree means. It only took us 3 weeks but it does mean that you are welcome to camp for free. Of course there aren't any facilities apart from the most disgusting toilets I have ever visited but it was a place to stay for the night and it was in Landsborough which we knew pretty well by now because of the tourist drive.

Tuesday 27 February:

We didn't sleep at all last night because although this place is free to camp, it's also a car park for the road workers so they were coming and going all through the night and not being quiet about it either. We visited the information centre and asked this kind lady where we could take a shower. She told us to head for the dog racing showground and we could take a shower there. We pulled up and took a very quick shower because it felt like we weren't meant to be there and I think they were setting up for the day.

After feeling clean we headed for - crikey, look at the snappers on that - Australia Zoo. Home to the Irwin family. My camera had run out of battery last night but the kind lady behind the information desk let me charge it up. We sat in the crocaseum where we watched the birds of prey show and also the crocodile show which were both great. The crocs at the zoo are the very same crocs Steve rescued in his documentaries and some he even grew up with. Steve also trained the croc trainers who work at the zoo. There were so many crocs and alligators and they were all huge. We also accidentally caught the camel presentation and the lady explained that one of the camels was rescued by Terri and Steve when it was a baby and at the time they had nowhere to keep the baby camel so they kept it in the back yard with the pet dogs. The camel grew up with the children so now when someone walks up to the fence it runs to you and is ready to greet you. And I had another koala cuddle.

After the zoo we drove to Noosa Heads which was back on the coast and booked into Noosa River Caravan Park where we were in the company of four Wicked vans. We had seen one of the vans at the zoo and the people had wrote 'our van is better than yours' on the back window which I didn't find funny because even though Gert is a bit of an old banger she's still reliable. Carl went on his run and later said that it would only take about 20 minutes to walk into the centre of town which is what we did. It took 35 minutes. We stopped for a drink at a bar with a terrace. Here, if you ordered steak, you cooked it yourself and garnished it yourself as well. We caught a taxi back after we had some dinner. Everything shut early which wasn't fair.

Wednesday 28 February:

We booked another night in this caravan park and in the evening got talking to a Canadian couple around the camp kitchen who were lovely and really funny. At about 10:30pm a security guard turned up to shut down the kitchen area for the night. We tried to hide from him but he spotted us with his car headlights cowering behind the barbeque. After a bit of negotiation we were allowed to remain within a couple of metres of the kitchen area (the only lit up bit of the whole beech) so we sat on the sand drinking and chatting until about 12am. A late night for us.

Thursday 1 March:

Today we drove to Gympie. We went straight to the information centre were we got chatting to the information man who was so sweet. He was elderly and English. It sounded like he was originally from Cornwall and he kept us chatting for ages. He sat in a little box on the main street with everybody passing him by so I think he enjoyed having the company. He was really helpful and gave us a list of places we should visit. He even pointed us in the direction of an Optus shop so I could get another mobile phone. The V3 phone seemed to bring bad luck so I chose a trendy Nokia which Carl thinks he's going to be using back in the UK.

From here we drove back to the coast to a tiny place called Tin Can Bay. We only stopped at this place because our nice information friend recommended it to us and he was right. We stopped off at the bay and the lady in the cafe said that every morning a dolphin called Mystique comes into the bay to be fed (see pictures) so we decided to stay over night at Tin Can Bay Caravan Park and then went for a swim near Rainbow Beach. I couldn't stay in for too long though because the waves were so powerful and big they kept pushing me under. I decided I would like to live longer than 29 years of age so I lay down to dry off on the sand in the middle of a 4WD track. Oops.