The return of Australia – Week nine

14^th May at 20^th Can

Bundaberg to Bowen

After updating our first job in a long time, we spent the beginning of this week preparing for an epic road by road. The plan was always to finish the east coast at the beginning of June. This meant that we had two weeks to get to Cape tribulation, two hours after Cairns. In honor of spending your service and before a long trip, we treat our truck to a washing. It was nice to look at the truck and think, Wow, you are quite decent. Now the truck shone like a expensive truck should. So, with the truck cleaned inside and outside, we started on Wednesday with the following stops in mind:

• 1770 city
• Rockhampton
• Mackay
• Airlie Beach (Whitsundays)
• Ring
• Townsville
• Cairn
• Cape tribulation

This week we only managed to Bowen, but that was 810 km and nine hours of driving! Exhausting to say at least.

1770/rockhampton city

Our first stop was just an hour and a half by Bundaberg car. The 1770 city is one of the first places, Captain Cook stopped to reach the ground on his excursion along the east coast. Interestingly, it is the only city in the world with a number for a name. It was not worth seeing it, so we made lunch and decided to go directly to Rockhampton. For those who have never heard of Rockhampton (I neither), it is the capital of Australia’s flesh. It would be a mistake not to eat a steak and look at the rodeo, right? Another two and a half hours later, we cross the Tropic of Capricorn in Rockhampton. This is one of the three imaginary lines that cross the world you learn in school. I think this indicates the southernmost point in the earth where the sun still appears directly at noon. If that is not right, please give me a lesson! Apart from that, mark the beginning of the tropics. There are no longer the four seasons as we know them, it is only wet and dry. Now there are salt water crocodiles!We drove directly to the Great Western Hotel. Not only could you eat a great steak and drink its own great western lager, but you could get out of your back to see the guys cling to crazy bulls for eight seconds.We intended to get to Rockhampton on Friday, so luckily the rodeo was also underway on Wednesday and, best of all, it was free! Most customers and audience wore cowboy hats, shirts in blue jeans and spurs boots. The music that accompanies Rodeo was also brilliant with classics like Cotton Eyed Joe and She makes my tractor look sexy. I am being deadly.[easy-image-collage id=2009]I honestly had one of the best nights in a long time. Disappointingly, an energy cut sent everything from Rockhampton to the dark and sent us to our free camp to spend the night. I regret not having been able to obtain any photo of the rodeo, since there were no signs of photography everywhere!

Mackay

Our next stop was a four -hour trip through dry, brown and desolate lands. It is not the outback, but this was the Australia I had imagined. There was nothing notable between Rockhampton and Mackay, so we simply come out the music and settled on the road. Mackay is probably not somewhere that a tourist normally stops to visit. It is a couple more hours to Airlie Beach; Where the Whitsunday Islands are located and most would lead. The wind had collected significantly when we arrived in Mackay, so we spent the afternoon seeing comets surfers go up and down the coast.The next morning was more exciting. Just above the Cape Hillsborough National Park, where you can see dawn and kangaroos for breakfast on the beach. It sounds perfect. We woke up at 5 am and arrive at the beach just in time for the sun to make its appearance on the horizon. Except that the sun could not be seen, there was only one gray blanket of clouds. Eventually made it clear, but I expected something a little more dramatic. I did not expect this beach to be so popular, especially at this time. There were already about twenty people on the beach grouped. We vigin to find some wallabies and two oriental gray kangaroos. I guess it was quite unique, but it wasn’t what I thought it would be. While tourist brochures and social networks paint an image of an empty beach and kangaroos in abundance, it does not show the currents of people who push their selfies sticks on the faces of the kangaroos. Not only that, due to the high influx of tourists (I, including, I know), the Wallabies and Canangaros are now fed with the dishes placed on the beach behind the yellow. The two kangaro were raised by hand by the caravan park, so if you are looking for a wild life ‘wild’ experience, this is not approaching. I still enjoyed the experience, since it is not something you see every day, but it is a shame that tourism has previously expelled most wild animals there.

Airlie Beach/Whitsunday Islands

We arrived at Airlie Beach late in the afternoon, so we didn’t have too much time to look around. I was quiet, very quiet, for a Friday night in what is supposed to be a party city. He felt like ‘vacation’ and every time we have that feeling we need to remind us that we are not on vacation. Unfortunately, there are no beers for us.[easy-image-collage id=2012]The next morning we woke up early for our excursion to the Whitsunday Islands aboard Lady Enid; A real navigation boat. You can read everything about the trip here.Back in the camp, enough travelers snuggled around the huge flat screen TV in the open air to watch the royal wedding. Yes, I admit that we saw a little and, as with most people, what I have left in my mind is the speech of Bishop Michael Curry. It is not traditional at all, but it is great to see at a real wedding; If not only for the awkward faces of the royal family.

Ring

On the last day of this week he spent seeing the sunset in Bowen. However, before arriving there, we took a detour from the road to visit Hideaway Bay. We were simply because of the images we had seen with palm trees pointing horizontally to the ocean. We spent some hours driving on this remote part of the coast of Queensland (also along the dirt roads) and we could not find what we were looking for. In an event, we cool in Dingo Beach and have lunch with a view to the turquoise waters. The color of the sea was so nice that I had to send the drone for the first time in a few weeks!Next, we stopped at the big handle next to the road for a mango sorbet. It was horrible, enough. However, it seems that this year there are so few job opportunities and the city was quite calm. The backpackers we saw were fishing from the dock. One of the city’s city claims is that the movie ‘Australia’ was filmed here. I remember watching that movie at the University in 2008 with some friends. We all fall asleep, so I think that summarizes the movie. However, I will see it again to see if, ten years later, I have changed my mind about it. The tourist brochure showed Australia set in all his glory, so it was not fantastic to discover that the site was actually only a brown field in the middle of the city. The type of field that the circus would be established. We left the city to the beaches of the north where the 11^th The best Australian beach is. The beaches were a great mind and some of the only ones on the east coast, where you can see dawn and sunset!We cook tea in the small cliffs before accommodating ourselves to get the best sunset we have seen so far! It was beautiful. Much better than watching television.[easy-image-collage id=2013]

Next week …

We take the road to Townsville and finally Cairns. We are very close to the end of our journey from the east coast.