Girl Sensible - Around The World

Check out the sunset on the plane flying here...pretty!

After clearing Bio hazard at Auckland airport I was hit with the 15 degree reduction in temperature since Cairns :-(

When my parents had arrived on their flight we all headed to their friends north of Auckland. That was a much nicer welcome to New Zealand after the smelly motel the night before, cosy bed with electric blanket :-) Thanks Anne

We then headed south in the rain to the bubbling springs of Rotoroa. Pretty much as expected..... lots of steam and the smell of rotten eggs. We carried on South and ended up basing ourselves in Lake taupo for a couple of nights. This was stunning........

We drove to the Tongariro National Park and took in the sights, the weather was gorgeous. Still snow on the mountains

I toyed with the idea of doing a skydive but on my own I knew I would loose my bottle.
We then headed down to Wellington and spent the afternoon at the viewpoint taking in the view and watching the planes coming in over the cook straight. I had heard terrible stories of how rough the water in this straight could be, but the day we got on the ferry it was sunny skys and light wind. Lucky me, no seasickness today :-)

Our trip up the east coast took 2 full weeks winding our way from Brisbane to Cairns.

We firstly headed for Noosa for our first night. The annual triathalon was being held that weekend and it was rammed.... no late entries allowed (phew!) so we headed up the coast. We couldn't find anywhere to stay in the delightfully named Gympie so we took a random road that lead us to the coast. We ended up in a place called Tin Can Bay. This sounded shite but when we woke up in the morning we were right next to the water..... pretty nice in the end

We then drove up through rainbow beach which was a little disappointing (probably because I have the pleasure of seeing the coloured sands of Alum Bay any time!!!) and arrived in Hervey Bay to hear that we were a week to late to see the Whales on their way South :-(
We only stuck around here for one night and then headed north to arrive near Rockhampton to see the turtles....... too early, :-( that's mother nature for you!

Anyhow next stop Airlie beach.... wicked, after a long drive through the bush, sugar cane coal mining we arrive for the main event of the East coast, we stayed here for 4 nights.
There is no beach to speak of here, it's all about the Whitsunday islands and the barrier reef so on our other day we headed north to Bowen and a really nice beach at Horseshoe Bay

Next day was a full day snorkelling the reef and in true flashpacker style a helicopter trip to see it properly.....Well worth the money, it was incredible seeing it from the air, just like I had imagined and you can't see that from a boat, it has to be done :-)

It was an amazing day out and finished with a sunset over the harbour :-)

We were due to go to the Whitsunday's the next day but it was raining. We extended another day and we were so glad we did. To fit as much as we could the chosen mode of transport was seaplane to Whitehaven beach (god I love flashpacking!) It was raining but it soon cheered up for champagne on the beach in total seclusion :-)

After an overnighter in Mission beach we went straight to Cairns for 3 nights. We took a much small boat out to the reef from here, it cost more than the last one but was again well worth doing. I saw so much more fish and coral, sadly I only saw a turtle from a distance! (I have been in search of these since Borneo!)

The weather wasn't great for the remainder of the time so we took in the sights around Cairns and I managed to do some Christmas shopping (no busy West Quay for me :-)!).

We spent another night up in the Northern Queensland rainforest in a cabin, in the smallest town (Daintree) I have ever seen! We drove up to Cape Tribulation, I didn't see any crock's but maybe that's a good thing :-)

I made the most of the humidity, swimming in the pool until I turned pruney!

I finally saw loads of Kangaroo's on my last day and was treated to hearing one of the local on the phone.... fair dinkum! Well I've seen and heard a fair bit of Oz......

New Zealand here we come :-)

Note to self: Update blog more often!

Sydney was brilliant. The weather was fab the entire time for the first time in weeks :-)

I loved this city, although it seemed minature to what I imagined. The harbour bridge and the opera house were really nice but I thought they would be bigger for some reason. The city had plenty of open space, parks, cool new and old buildings side by side, a great atmostphere and plenty of bars and restaurants.

The1st day, Dad and I could find a petrol station before returning the hire car so we thought we may as well drive the harbour bridge seeing as we had a car, that we fun and made me realise I didn't need to do the bridge climb Iafter Kinabalu it was just too small!)
We did the usual tourist thing down by the harbour, opera house etc, went to the Imax theatre, took in the views by walking down through the botanical gardens. How many joggers are there in Sydney? I wonder what they all did for a living, they were there at all time of the day, I would have been embarassed doing sit ups in the botanical gardens amoung the tourists but there was testosterone everywhere. Anyhow check out the view:

The next day we caught a train to Bondi and bus to the beach, i was so much more impressed with Bondi beach than I thought I would be, the water was really clear (although freezing!) and the beach wasn't packed.

We then walked along the coast to Coogee beach. We caught the bus back to the city, the bus drivers here are the most helpful and friendly I think you will find anywhere in the world. It seems they will even divert off the route for you as long as everyone else is ok with it and show you exactly where to go next, no worries :-)

Just back in the city in time to catch the Manly ferry, we sat on the beach for the afternoon and I managed a healthy dose of shopping, picking up another bikini. We hung around here for dinner so that we could catch the ferry back to the city at sunset. It was a really good trip and finished off a really nice day.

Onwards and northwards... flying to Brisbane.