Our Big Lap Around Australia

In the map below you will find the stops for our trip around Australia. Each pin is a different stop and (after I've written it) will contain a mini-blog about the stop along with some images. If you're having trouble finding the pins on the map, then you can click on this icon in the top left corner of the map

This will give you a list of the places, which you can click on to read more about.
I will also post them on the blog below as I add them to the map.

Let me know what you think in the comments.

Patrick. 

The purple icons are the stops on our trip away from Melbourne and the orange ones are our stops on the way back.

Table Of Contents

• Victoria: 1st Time
• Orbost
• New South Wales: 1st Time
• Eden
• Depot Beach
• Bungonia
• Bathurst
• Gulgong
• Branxton
• Myall Lakes
• Diamond Head
• Hat Head
• Iluka
• Queensland: 1st Time
• Bribie Island: 2nd Time
• Toogoom
• Agnes Water
• Great Keppel Island
• Yeppoon: 1st Time
• Emerald
• Barcaldine
• Winton
• Julia Creek
• Mount Isa
• Northern Territory
• Tablelands
• Wauchope
• Alice Springs
• Uluru
• Queensland: 2nd Time
• Normanton
• Georgetown
• Millaa Millaa
• Crystal Creek
• Airlie Beach
• Whitsundays
• Hydeaway Bay
• Cape Hillsborough
• Cape Palmerston
• Yeppoon: 2nd Time
• Boyne Island
• Heron Island
• 1770
• Noosa
• Bribie Island: 2nd Time
• New South Wales: 2nd Time
• Evans Head
• Forster
• Mittagong
• Australian Capital Territory
• Canberra
• Victoria: 2nd Time
• Benalla

This thing took a lot of coding, I hope you enjoy it😉.

Victoria: 1st Time:

Woods Point Swimming Hole, Orbost, VIC: 

First stop, a campsite on the Snowy River. We spent 3 nights at this free camsite near Orbost(The only downside to free campgrounds is the rowdy locals😉). On the way there, we stopped in Rosedale for morning tea and then picked up some supplies in Orbost. We had our first night in the new caravan there and learnt how to set up everything, at least we think we set up everything, there are a lot of things to do when you set up a caravan😕😕. During our 3 nights there, we had toasty fires, rode around on our bikes and went for walks around the beautiful national park.

New South Wales: 1st Time

Eden Gateway Holiday Park, Eden, NSW:

We weren’t originally planning to stop in a holiday park so soon, but there wasn’t a lot of variety in the area so we had to stay at a powered site. If you’re going to be all posh and stay at a caravan park, you might as well go all out and get a site with an en-suite. Eden is a lovely little town on the southern coast of NSW, with a very interesting history in whaling.

  The killer whales in the area used to help whalers catch southern right and other baleen whales. After the orca pack caught the whales ‘Old Tom’ would swim round to the whaling station and alert the whalers of his pack’s catch. Killer whales have never been recorded helping people like this anywhere else in the world. For more information visit http://www.killersofeden.com/. Even though the whaling days are long gone, there’s a very informative and interesting killer whale museum in town, which we visited during our time there. While in Eden there was lots of things to do; we rode our bikes on the boardwalk around a lake, we had lunch at the pinnacles, a rock formation shaped like … you guessed it, pinnacles. We also visited the wharf in town, there we ate some fish and chips, explored the marine discovery centre and bought some delicious fresh mussels, that dad cooked. (They were yummy! 😋). 

Depot Beach Campground, Depot Beach, NSW:

Next up, an unpowered site, in the trees, by the beach, with whales. What more could you ask for?                                                                           

  We stayed at Depot Beach for 5 nights. As well as having a beautiful campground, the beach was very close and very beautiful. We could walk for ages on the stunning wave-cut platforms on each side of the beach. They were also good vantage points for whale spotting. While we were there, we saw two whales, the first one we just saw a glimpse of but the second one spent half an hour flapping its tail across the bay. After three nights at the camp, we started to get restless, so Mum booked a swimming with seals trip.          

  These six words pretty much sum up that experience ‘Seals were beautiful, water was cold’. We drove to a town called Narooma, which was where our boat left from. Us kids put on two 3mm wetsuits and Mum and Dad had 7mm ones. We got wetsuited up, waited a while for some other people, then we headed off. I decided that I would jump into the water first, because someone has to do it, right? The water wasn’t warm. (The understatement of the century). For the first few seconds it’s fine and then BOOM! You’re freezing! After a while the wetsuit warms up but the unprotected areas of your body; face, hands and feet; are freezing.
  Seals are my favourite animal so it was very cool* to see them in person. On our boat trip back from the seal trip we also encountered some dolphins that followed our boat around for a while. We were all very tired after that day. After the seals trip we were done with Depot Beach, we’re on the road again!

*I’m so funny

Bungonia Campground, Bungonia, NSW:

We only had one night to break up the drive in this national park campground, so there isn’t anything to write about, I just thought I should write something.

Barcoos Farmstays, Bathurst, NSW:

We had three nights at a farm in Bathurst. Elaine, the old lady looking after the farm, was lovely and we got to help out with the farm activities every morning. These included feeding the alpacas, the lambs and the chooks, doing tricks with the big pig, the sheep named Paddy and the donkey named Eeyore and hugging cows. 
  On our second day there we got to spend time with ponies. First, we rode in a CHARIOT (or you know, something like that) pulled by a pony named Coco. Emily and I got to steer the chariot around the farm, but a large percentage of that was us telling Coco to stop eating grass. 
  On our last day in Bathurst we drove into town to check out the Farmers’ Market (and the rest of town). We had received a special request from Elaine asking for 15 jars of tomato relish from the people from Cowra. We were on the lookout, asking all the people with relish if they were from Cowra. When we found them, they only had 11 jars left, so we bought 10 for her and kept one for us (because if you want 15 jars of something, it’s got to be superior). We also bought some yummy bread, cheese, olives and fennel and garlic salami. 

 After giving Elaine her relish and having one more night, we set off, bound for Gulgong.

Gulgong Tourist Park, Gulgong, NSW:

Gulgong, the town that used to be on the ten dollar note along with Henry Lawson (about whom they have a museum in the town). We stayed in a tourist park there for three nights. At the park they had some very posh toilets and we all had lovely showers (I think when you’re camping/caravanning a nice hot shower becomes even nicer😉). 
  Not too far from Gulgong there was an ancient place sacred to the Wiradjuri people, where their ancestors had made handprints by putting ochre into their mouths, placing their hand in front of their faces and blowing, creating a handprint on the rock walls.
  There was also a very nice playground in Gulgong, where we ate lunch and played several times.

  Nothing else interesting happened in Gulgong so I’m going to leave it right here.

Drovers Camp, Branxton, NSW:

Drover’s Camp was 4 kilometres down the road from Branxton, a little town in the Hunter Valley, where we stayed 4 nights on an old guy named Neil’s farm. There was no power, but as we were able to park in a sunny spot and able to light campfires, we were fine. Campfires are great because you can cook on them, heat water on them and keep warm, and we were able to collect wood from his 4-hectare piece of land. 
  We had lots of fun riding our bikes around the farm and we discovered lots of interesting places on our rides. One evening I rode up a hill and sat watching the sun set over the valley. It was very Beautiful 
   Branxton wasn’t a very big or interesting town, so we headed to a much busier town called Singleton. In Singleton we bought some groceries, ate some pies and visited the World’s Biggest Sundial. There was a big chart next to the sundial telling you how many hours to give or take from the time that the it was showing, but as we visited around the middle of the year, the time that the sundial was showing was correct. 
   On our last day, Neil took us to see his mini-pig Charlene. Neil got her from some renters whose landlord had decided they didn’t want a pig in the house anymore. The pig was very cute, she had rough hair and she was very hungry.

After some very fun days at this farm we were on the move once more, bound for Myall Lakes.   

Myall Shores Caravan Park, Myall Lakes, NSW:

At Myall Lakes, we stayed in a beautiful, powered site among the tea trees, the only problem with that is all the water was brown from the tannin. It tasted pretty bad and Dad reckoned they just pumped it out of the surrounding lakes. 
While at the van park we visited lots of interesting places in the area, as well as having lots of fun riding our bikes in and around the park. We had lunch with our grandmother (who had decided to follow us up the east coast of Australia) in Tea Gardens. After having some snags in Tea Gardens, we went for a walk on the shore and around the rock pools. 
  On the way back to the caravan park, we stopped at Dark Point. We were blown away by the spectacular towering sand dunes. We hiked up one tall dune and there were even more behind it, the ocean peeked through little gaps between the sand mountains. Our photos (which you can see in the map) don’t show off the dunes’ grandiosity. Dark Point also has significance to the Worimi people, artefacts and relics can be found in the area. 
  We finished off our Tea Gardens trip with a short ride on the car ferry to cross the lake.
Nan came and visited us at the caravan park one day, we went for a walk around the back of the park along the edge of the lake. The lake was glasslike and the sun shimmered off it like glitter. We also found some huge seed pods and grass trees’ (a.k.a. xanthorrhoea) seed pods, which only grow after fires. After our walk, we had some soup for lunch and Nan headed back to her accommodation.

  And with that, we were done with Myall Lakes and on our way to Diamond Head Campground.

Diamond Head Campground, Diamond Head, NSW:

In Diamond Head, we stayed in an unpowered campground by the sea. Nan was staying in a nearby town and I stayed with her for a couple of nights.  
We went for some lovely (and one not so lovely) walks on the beach and said hello to the very tame kangaroos around the campsite. 
  Also, while we were there, I got my first ever tick, not like a ✔️, but the blood-sucking kind. When it was full up with my blood, it just kind of fell off, never to be seen again. We then went to the pharmacy and bought tick killer and tweezer (just in case we encounter any more).

  After that, we were done with Diamond Head and on our way to Hat Head (Why so many heads?).

House in Hat Head, NSW:

As Nan had joined us, we decided to stay in a house with enough space for all of us. We parked the van in the yard and spent a few nights in Hat Head.
  There was not much going on in Hat Head, there was a caravan park, a general store ran by a grouchy old lady, a church and a post office, nonetheless, we had an amazing time there.
  There was a great beach where we went boogie boarding almost every day, we saw whales and watched some beautiful sunsets. We also started fishing there. Dad and I popped into the nearest big town and bought everything we thought we’d need to go fishing. Later that day, we chucked our lines in, and next thing I knew, I’d caught a flathead. Unfortunately, it was too small to keep and we chucked it back in. After that quick first catch, I thought that fishing must be easy, how wrong I was… (more on our fishing adventures in later posts)

  After a lovely week of rest and relaxation, we were off to another house stop, in Iluka.

House in Iluka, NSW:

Iluka was our last stop in NSW. On the way there we passed through Coffs Harbour and stopped at the Big…

(Trivia Time: Q: Which big thing is located in Coffs Harbour?   

                     A: The Big Banana.)  

Banana. We took some photos in front of it, which you can view in the Iluka post on the map.

We stayed at this small town for a week. We visited a bluff and walked up to the lookout. Where we watched the waves crash onto a rock platform where two guys were catching huge fish. While we were there, we tried fishing again. The first place we tried was off a beach, but the wind was blowing strongly into shore, meaning we couldn’t cast far out and when we did manage to get a good cast, it came right back. A bit later in our stay, we tried fishing off a jetty, after catching many bream that were too small, I finally caught one that was big enough and I got very excited. We only caught one, but as it was my first fish big enough for eating, we had to keep it.

Emily and Dad went out together a few days later and caught another big one, so we had fish and chips on our last day.

And, with our border passes printed, we set off for the Queensland border and to Bribie Island.                       

Queensland: 1st Time

House on Bribie Island, QLD:

“Woohoo! We’re across the border” I shouted, as we drove away from the border and into Queensland. As Brisbane and some surrounding areas had just been declared hotspots, we stayed clear of that area
  Bribie Island is very close to the mainland with a short bridge connecting it. We stayed for a week, at a holiday rental close to the beach.
  We went boogie-boarding, fishing (unsuccessfully) and Dad learnt how to drive a boat.
  As we planned to charter a yacht in the Whitsunday Islands, Mum wanted Dad and I to get as much prior experience as we could, so Dad decided to get a boat license (not necessary for yachting in the Whitsundays, but definitely helpful). First off, Dad had to do a theory test on the computer, and with my help, we managed to get 96% (it was a 50-question test, so only 2 wrong). After completing the test, Dad just had to wait for the physical part, which was a few days later.
   Well, Dad wanted to make sure that he aced the test, (and also, we wanted to have a bit of fun) so we hired a little tinny and went fishing in the water between Bribie and the mainland, known as the Pumicestone Passage. We didn’t catch anything, but it was lots of fun.

  Thanks to my help, Dad passed the tests and became a boater, (is that the right word?) and our time on Bribie was over, and we were on the road to Toogoom. 

House in Toogoom, QLD:

Toogoom was our last stop before Nan left us. It was another beautiful spot on the East coast and is only a 15-minute drive to Hervey Bay, near Fraser Island. There was an amazing view of the ocean and the drastic tides, as the first 700 metres of the shore are very flat. As a result of this, the water moves from the edge of the beach to just less than a kilometre out.
  As Hervey Bay is one of the best spots in Australia to spot whales, we had to go on one of the whale watching tours. In fact, the whale watching companies guarantee you will see whales. The trip we booked had the opportunity to swim with whales (depending on the whales’ behaviour).
  Unfortunately, we didn’t get to swim with the whales, but we did get to see lots of them breaching and tail slapping. They were absolutely magnificent! 🐋
  Also, in Hervey Bay there was an amazing playground. It had a huge rope climbing frame which you had to climb up to get to some super long slides. There was also a multi-directional swing that went super high too.
  Of course, there was also some fishing involved. There was some water equipment for us to use and one of the things was a kayak. Dad and I tried paddling out with our rods (we used our paddles to paddle, not our fishing rods, we used them for fishing.) We were too big for the boat but we did manage to catch a whiting (but it was too small).

  We had whale of a time in Toogoom, but we were done there and on our way to 1770 (sorry about the dad joke, I just needed a different way to finish the post).

1770 Southern Cross Travellers Retreat, Agnes Water, QLD:

We had lots of fun surfing and sailing at this stop. We were actually staying in Agnes Water, but we had spent quite a bit of time in the nearby town of 1770.
  We had been surfing a couple of times before our lesson there, but we still had lots of fun catching some waves. From the beach. The surf didn’t look great from the beach, but once we got in it was great. I couldn’t catch many waves at first, after a bit of practice I was catching every wave all the way in! Our instructor was really helpful too, so I'm sure that played a part.
  Mum was still fixated on making sure we knew as much about sailing as possible for our Whitsundays trip, so she made us go out on a sailing lesson. ⛵
  The lesson was on a small racing catamaran in the estuary where a few other boats were parked up. Dad, the lesson guy and I took turns in steering, controlling the sheets (the ropes connected to the sails) and sitting on the side of the boat watching the other two doing stuff.
  When the lesson was nearly done and we were heading back to the shore, our teacher/instructor took control of everything and started flying a hull, (that means lifting one of the catamarans two hulls completely out of the water) we went really fast and I was extremely scared that we were going to tip over. Mum even managed to get some footage of us doing it.

From Agnes Water, we were headed for The Keppel Islands and some lovely beach relaxation.

Great Keppel Island Hideaway, The Keppels, QLD:

We booked a special 4-night deal at Great Keppel Island Hideaway. It included boat transfers there and back, accommodation in a family room, unlimited use of the water sports equipment, a breakfast and a massage.
  We parked our car and caravan in Yeppoon and caught the boat out to Great Keppel Island. The beach was absolutely beautiful. The water was also lovely (if slightly cold). Our accom wasn’t as good as the beach, but you can’t have everything 😉.
  On our first full day there, we claimed our included-in-the-price breakfast of waffles for me and Em and bacon and eggs for Mum and Dad, and set off on a walk to Long beach, which we thought would be quick and easy. After at least an hour of walking and sweating we finally arrived at Long beach. The sand and water were beautiful there but as there was no snorkelling, we walked just around the corner to Monkey beach where we stayed for a few hours. The coral and fish weren't as abundant and colourful as some places in the Philippines, but it was still cool as we got to see an eel.
  The next day, we had recovered from our long walk and we were ready for a slightly shorter walk to Shelving beach, where we played and snorkeled for the day
  On our last full day, we just relaxed on the beach for most of the day. In the afternoon we went over to some rocks on the end of the beach to see if the fish were biting (they weren’t).
  Our boat didn’t leave the island until 3 o’clock, so Dad and I had time to paddle our kayaks around to Shelving beach and had a swim.

“Farewell Keppel!” I say as our boat motors away from the tropical paradise. 

NRMA Capricon Yeppoon Holiday Park, Yeppoon, QLD: 

We had two nights in a caravan park near Yeppoon. We didn’t do much, but we did have lots of fun on the waterslide in the park. We whooshed down the slide until we couldn’t whoosh anymore.

We stocked up on some supplies and that was us done in Yeppoon.

Emerald Tourist Park, Emerald, QLD:

Emerald was just a one-night stopover. We played in the local park for a bit and we were off again the next day.

Barcaldine Tourist Park, Barcaldine, QLD:

Barcaldine (or Barcy, if you’re a local) was another one-night stopover, but the town had an interesting history, so I’ve got something to write about now.
  In the early 1890’s, shearers from all over weren’t happy with their working conditions and so they started a strike against pastoral workers, who proposed a drop in their wage (which was already at 1£ per hundred sheep shorn). The strike leaders were arrested in Barcaldine, thereby finishing the strike. It is believed but historians that these events eventually led to the formation of the Australian Labour Party, who had their first meetings under a ghost gum, now known as the Tree of Knowledge (which we visited while in Barcy).

  We said good-bye to the birthplace of the ALP and hello to Winton, the Dinosaur Capital of Australia.

Oondooroo Station, Winton, QLD:

During our three-night stay at a cattle station near Winton, we learnt lots about the town and its surrounding area’s prehistoric environment.
  On our first full day in Winton, we visited the Australian Age of Dinosaurs Museum which isn’t far out of town. We were toured through the laboratory, where they ready the dinosaur bones for viewing. Did you know that dinosaur fossils aren’t made of bone, over millions of years the bone gets absorbs the surrounding rock and minerals and eventually gets completely replaced by the rock?
  Next up was a movie about Winton’s dinosaur history and some more bones. We also learnt about two dinosaurs that were found fossilized next to each other, one was a giant herbivore and the other a small carnivore, they (I did not spell that right the first time, I used autocorrect) believe that the herbivore became stuck in some mud, the carnivore thought he’d have a go, the herbivore kills the carnivore with its tail, but eventually dies where it became stuck. Another person thought that it might have been a Romeo and Juliet story.
  The last thing we did was walk through the Dinosaur Canyon, a series of displays of dinosaurs (not real ones, this isn’t Jurassic Park) representing different prehistoric events. After visiting those three exhibits, we headed back to our caravan.

  We decided not to visit the dinosaur stampede as it was too far out of town and Dad had a lot of driving as it is. So we just had a day of chilling (well not really, it was pretty hot) before setting off for Julia Creek, our 20^th stop in the van. 

 Julia Creek Caravan Park, Julia Creek, QLD:

We stayed in Julia Creek for two nights, during which we had an artesian bath and spent lots of time in the local swimming pool. This was because a) the caravan park gave you unlimited visits to it, b) it was nice and cool and c) there was a small waterpark connected.
In the evening of the day of our arrival, we had an artesian bath. It was just like a normal bath except it had a nice view and it was filled with water from the Great Artesian Basin. We soaked up the artesianess for an about an hour before having dinner.
We also checked out the information centre, which had stuff about Julia Creek’s history and lifestyle. There were also some things about dunnarts, a small mouselike creature, that was thought to be extinct until recently.

Mount Isa was up next, and after that, the NT.

Sunset Top Tourist Park, Mount Isa, QLD 

We stayed at the Isa and the next three stops on our trip twice, as, in the NT and Outback Queensland there wasn’t anywhere else to stop😂. We stayed for two nights both times we were there.
1^st Time: We didn’t do much on either of our stays in Mount Isa. During our first time there, we were going to visit the museum, but when we got to the booking place, the prices were crazy expensive, instead we bought a super cool prehistoric dinosaur map.
  In the evening, we drove up to a lookout in the middle of the town to watch the sunset, and the chimneys from the mines that surrounded Isa.
From our first stay in Isa, we were headed for the NT and Barkly Homestead.
2^nd Time: On our second visit to Mount Isa, we didn’t do anything at all because it was raining pretty much the whole time we were there.

  After our second time in Mount Isa, we were on our way to Normanton, in the Gulf of Carpentaria.

Northern Territory 

Barkly Homestead, Tablelands, NT:

Barkly Homestead, the first and last pub in the Northern Territory (that’s what it said on Dad’s beer stubbie, but it’s true). It’s a 3-hour drive from the nearest town on the QLD side and a 2-hour drive to the nearest one in the NT. So practically in the middle of nowhere. There’s accom and caravan sites there. It was slightly expensive, but as I said, practically the middle of nowhere.
As there wasn’t anything to do in Barkly Homestead, it’s just a one-nighter.
Both times we were there, we set our van up, had a swim in the pool and had dinner.

From our first stop in Barkly, we were headed to the Devils Marbles and from our second stop we were going to Mount Isa and QLD.

Devils Marbles Hotel, Wauchope, NT:

On the drive from the homestead to Devils Marbles, we passed through two towns! Threeways (where if you're going south, you're going to Adelaide or Alice springs, if you're going North, you're going to Darwin and if you're going west, you're headed for Queensland, see image on map for more details) and Tennant Creek, where we filled up to get us to Devils Marbles Hotel, where we would be staying the night. 

1st Time: When the sun was setting, we drove out to the Devils Marbles, a series of spherical rocks that look to be extremely precariously balanced on top of each other. We walked around a bit in the cool evening, before going back to our van. From the Marbles, we were off to Alice Springs.

2nd Time: We didn’t leave the caravan site on our second time there, as we had learnt the stayed-hooked-up-to-the-van trick. So early the next morning, we were driving off to Barkly Homestead. 

G'day Mate Tourist Park, Alice Springs, NT:

1^st Time: Alice Springs is about 5 degrees cooler than the surrounding desert, so it was a welcome relief, although it was still pretty hot, that’s just what the NT is.

  While we were in Alice, the Red Centre Nats was going on. If you don’t know what this is, don’t worry, we didn’t either. Basically, anyone owning a noisy, fancy car with a souped-up engine, heads to the Red Centre of Australia to compete in different competitions and parade their loudmobiles around town. It’s a very big deal in Alice Springs and so we had to check it out. We got a few photos of the cars, so you can check them out too.

  Alice Springs is situated between the West and East Macdonnell ranges, in fact there was actually a place called The Gap.

  On our second day there, we checked out the East ranges. We saw some rock art at Emily Gap, walked around sacred Corroboree Rock, visited an old ghost gum tree and Dad and I walked along the ridge of a gorge.

  The next day, we went to the West Macdonnell Ranges. Dad and I walked along another scenic walk over a gorge and we swam in a freezing waterhole at Ormiston Gorge🥶.

   On our last day in Alice, Dad decided that he was going to cut my hair. He thought he’d done it perfectly; I wasn’t so sure.

From there we were on our way to the to the Heart of Australia … Uluru!

2^nd Time: On our second time in Alice, we only stayed for 3 nights.

  We went to the Desert Park on our first day there. It’s similar to Healesville Sanctuary, just 10 times cooler (sorry Healesville). There was so much to do there so I’ll just talk about the highlights. The park was divided in to 3 desert habitats; Desert rivers, woodland and sand country. We first saw the Birds of Prey show in the woodland area, there was one that could hover mid-air, one that could use rocks to break emu eggs and a sbd (silent but deadly) owl. We got to see songbirds getting fed and our favourite… The Nocturnal House, inside we saw cute wallabies, bilbies, dunnarts and hopping mice. We also saw snakes, lizards and some spiders.

  Later that day, we came back to the Desert Park to see Parrtjima, an aboriginal light festival. There was sculptures and artwork lit up everywhere and there were stories behind all of it. We didn’t do anything else in Alice Springs and so we were headed for the Marbles.

P.S. Because there's lots of photos for this post I can't put them all here, so if you want you can go to this link (https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1O-tIr963O-1sM0RABBlRqZlSjJnJLFWp?usp=sharing) to see them.

Ayers Rock Resort, Uluru, NT:

Uluru! The red, dusty heart of Australia, and we were there!

  As it was a fair drive from Alice Springs, we left the caravan and stayed in an apartment at the Ayers Rock Resort for four nights. We couldn’t see Uluru from our accom (as the places with those views are extremely pricey), but we got to see it close up when we went for walks around the base. The first good view we got of it was on the day we arrived, when we drove out to the sunset viewing platform to watch it change colours. That was pretty cool, but not as cool as what happened the next day.

  On our first proper day there went for some awesome walks around the rock, during which we saw ancient sacred places (some of which are still being used today by aboriginal people to perform traditional ceremonies) with some interesting rock art. We also visited a cool waterhole tucked away in a nook called Kantju Gorge. After a wonderful day of soaking up Uluru, we were on our way to see possibly the prettiest thing on our whole trip around Australia… The Field of Light, an art installation containing more than 50,000 light bulbs all glowing different colours! A bus took us from the resort to the location, where we got to see Uluru changing colours again, unlimited juice and soft drink for us kids, wine and beer for Mum and Dad, some lovely bush canapes and finally, the beautiful lights coming on.

  After we’d got a few amazing photos from our vantage point, on the top of a sand dune, we were able to walk down through the light installation getting some more amazing photos as we walked around. Unfortunately, we only had 40 minutes to explore and they flew by very quickly.

  Since we’d spent most of our time so far around Uluru, the next day we drove off to Kata Tjuta (also known as The Olgas) We all walked up to the first lookout, but Dad and I carried on to the second, which was cool, shaded and had a pretty nice view. We trekked back to the carpark, in the hot and then we left Kata Tjuta.

  On our last day at the rock we drove around to the further away side of it to do some more walks. We learnt some stories about the formation of the cracks and crevices on the face of Uluru and then … we left Uluru in our dust (literally). 

Once again there's alot of photos, you can check them out here. 

Queensland: 2nd Time 

Normanton Tourist Park, Normanton, QLD

We originally planned to have three nights in Normanton (more on that in a sec) but due to the sweltering 24o minimums we only stayed two.

As well as unbearable daytime temps the caravan park was filled with tiny ants with the scientific name Trichomyrmex Destructor, a species known for chewing through cables, tyres and all manner of other things. Within about two hours of arriving at the park we had ants running up the stabiliser legs of our van, we realised within a few hours and sprayed the legs with insect repellent surface spray, but by then it was too late, we had an ant filled caravan.

Turns out there was a sign in the laundry warning you about the ants, but obviously we hadn’t visited there in the first few hours of our stay, the sign did say that spray cleaner kills them, so at least we now had a weapon to fight them with.

For the rest of the day we battled … every time it looked like we were making progress we’d find something else covered in them and what’s worse our air-con was broken so we had to do this all in 40o. After a hard day we had a swim in the pool, which was very nice and cool.

The next day, we left our ants to their own devices and drove off to Karumba, on the Gulf of Carpentaria. We stayed there all day and had dinner at a beachfront restaurant there. The main (when I say main, I mean only) tourist attraction in Karumba is the ‘Les Wilson Barramundi Discovery Centre’. Where they breed Barramundi and have an exhibit about it. We learnt the life cycle of the barra, where they live, their predators and prey and also there was a bit about the town of Karumba itself. We also got photo at the photo booth of us catching barra.

We had a bit of time to burn before dinner, so we went to the local swimming pool and chilled there for a few hours.

We ordered the seafood basket at the restaurant, it was $100 but it was worth every cent; there was oysters, prawns, crab, barra, Moreton Bay bug and calamari. Best seafood in the world!!! After stuffing ourselves, we drove back to the ants.

The next day, we were off (but not before grabbing a shot with a huge crocodile statue (supposedly a croc was actually found that big. 

Goldfields Van Park, Georgetown, QLD:

During the drive between Normanton and Georgetown, we came across something we didn’t think existed; a part of the A1 with only one lane, so when we passed other cars, we had to go off the tarmac.

  We just had one night in Georgetown, which was fortunate as it was just as hot as the last place we stayed.

  The next morning, we were off early and on our way to the Atherton Tablelands, and 25-degree daytime temps 😌. (ahhhhh!)

Millaa Millaa Caravan Park, Millaa, Millaa, QLD: 

There was an incredible difference between our surroundings at the start of our car trip and end of our car trip, during the drive between Georgetown and Millaa Millaa, at the start it was all red dust and by the end there was rolling green hills (see photos).

  The Atherton Tablelands are known for their waterfalls, so the next day, we drove out and visited a few, we were also going to visit the Mungalli Creek Dairy, which apparently has the best cheesecake in the world, but as it was very busy, we decided we’d come again tomorrow.

  Later that day, Em and Dad went for a swim in the Millaa Millaa Waterfall (I stayed out and kept Mum company).

  After a cool night at the caravan park, we drove out to the Dairy to get ourselves some cheesecake Unfortunately, it wasn’t the best cheesecake in the world, (Dad’s is better) but it was still pretty yum. We drove out to do another walk, but when we arrived, Mum realised that she’d left her handbag at the Dairy so we went back and we were done for the day.

  The next day was Sunday, so when got to Malanda (a place we’d decided to visit) there was markets on. We had a nice browse through them, but only ended up buying a lettuce. We saw the Malanda Falls and went for a walk around them and we went and saw the Curtain Fig, a fig that looks like a curtain.

  Finally, we had a swim in Lake Eacham, one of the beautiful and not too cold Crater Lakes.

  That was our stay in the Atherton Tablelands, I hope you enjoyed reading about it. Next stop, Big Crystal Creek Campground.

Big Crystal Creek Campground, Crystal Creek, QLD:

We were in the waterhole as soon as our van was set-up, because the water was nice and cool and we were staying in an unpowered campground (so no aircon), not that it was too hot there.

  The next day, we went to another little waterhole and waterfall in Little Crystal Creek, this one was much colder than the one back at the campsite so we couldn’t stay in for long.

  Big Crystal Creek is an hour’s drive from the nearest town, so other than swimming in the water, we didn’t do much while we were here. The two nights flew past and then we were driving to Airlie Beach, the stop before our yacht charter!

Seabreeze Tourist Park, Airlie Beach, QLD: 

  We stayed in a caravan park in Airlie Beach for three nights, we were very excited because our next stop was on a boat, for 7 days!

  What I have neglected to mention for the last two posts is ants, remember those annoying things from Normanton. We thought we’d dealt with them in Normanton, but while we were staying here, we noticed a few still in our van and upon closer inspection, there was still quite an amount of them. We’d absolutely had it with those ants, so we contacted a pest control business. They said that we should set off a bomb in our van, (obviously not a real exploding bomb, but an insect killing one) which we did when we left the van for our boat, but first a bit more about our time in Airlie.

  On our first day, we drove down to the marina to check it out. Dad had to pay the charter company and we wanted to see if our boat, Dream On, was there. Unfortunately, someone was currently out chartering it, so we couldn’t see it then.

  It's not really safe to swim in the ocean at Airlie Beach because of Crocodiles and Tropical Stingers, so a lagoon has been made in the middle of the town to swim in instead. On our second day in Airlie, we visited it for a swim and relax (and ice-creams).

  That was it, we were done with Airlie and, after setting off our ant bomb, we were off to the yacht!! 🤩

Whitsundays, QLD:

Night 1, Airlie Beach Marina:

“WE! ARE! ON! A! YACHT!” I shouted before Mum told me to be quiet. I was very excited, can you tell? I may have even been as excited as my sister; whose birthday was during the yacht trip. 

The Whitsundays are one of two places in the world where people with absolutely no qualifications can charter a yacht by themselves.

To get a chance to unpack all our belongings and to settle in to the boat, we had a night in the boat at the Marina. That night happened to be the Queens Birthday in Queensland, so there was some fireworks going off near the Marina (we told my sister that they were for her birthday in a few days’ time😉)

Night 2, Nara Inlet:

 We were up and ready for our briefing early the morning of our departure. It took about two hours, but it wasn’t as informative as it could’ve been since it was the person who was giving it to us first time. We had just left our briefing dude and were putting up our sails when one of the supports popped out of place, we had to radio our charter company and they sent our briefing dude back out in his little tender. We managed to pop it back in and we were on our way.

  We had both our sails up for most our journey, as the wind was coming from the South-East. When we came around North Molle Island we had to turn into the wind to get to Nara Inlet. The journey was a bit rocky but nothing over the top. We arrived in the inlet around 4, so we had to radio in to tell them about our late arrival (they want you to be at your destination by 3 o’clock). But… our adventures in Nara didn’t end there.

  As there weren’t any moorings in Nara Inlet, we had to anchor our boat, which we did wrong twice before getting it right, unfortunately we did it wrong in the middle of the night. At about 12 midnight, Mum came into my room to wake me up and get me to anchor the boat.

“Why can’t you do it?” I said and rolled over,

“Come on Pat” Mum replied,

“Oh fine” and I clambered out of bed to reset the anchor.

  3 hours later, I was out of bed again and putting the anchor down for the third (and thankfully final) time. 

Night 3 & 4, Butterfly Bay:

After the stress of the anchor moving at night, Mum and Dad hadn’t slept very well, so we didn’t put up the sails, we just motored around. We were able to grab a mooring here so that we didn’t need to worry about anything through the night. The only downside was that the mooring buoy kept banging into the side of the boat all night, fortunately we all slept well, maybe not Emily, as her birthday was the next day.

  It was Emily’s Birthday and she was super excited. We decided that we were going to stay another night in Butterfly Bay, but we didn’t want to just laze around on Emily’s Birthday. After a yummy English breakfast, with hash browns, sausages, bacon, eggs, beans and toast, we went around to Blue Pearl Bay on the west side of Hayman Island for lunch and a snorkel.

  The snorkelling at Blue Pearl Bay wasn’t amazing but the Birthday lunch was… Mum had made sushi rolls and they were worthy of a birthday lunch. We then hoisted up the sails and breezed around to Butterfly Bay, well not quite, we did get the boat very tippy as the wind quickly changed directions. We didn’t tip it, but it did give us quite a scare. Some of the moorings in Butterfly are more protected and we managed to grab one of those, that was the best sleep we had on the whole trip.

 Night 5, Cateran Bay, Border Island:

We had a lovely two nights in Butterfly Bay, but now we were motoring through the very choppy open ocean between Hook Island (where Butterfly and Nara were) and Border Island, where we’d be spending the night. Border was a very small island with only place, named Cateran Bay for mooring and anchoring. I haven’t told you about an important piece of equipment that we were towing behind us the whole trip… a tender, a small inflatable boat with a small engine for getting you into shore (as you can’t motor a 39-foot yacht with 2 metres of stuff underneath into shore and just jump off). I got to drive our tender and I even managed to start it with the pull-cord starter thingy.

  There was meant to be good snorkelling at Cateran Bay, so we went for one soon after we arrived, there wasn’t much to see where we went then, but on the other side of the bay where we visited the next day it was pretty nice, and we saw a huge cone snail slithering along the sea floor.

  After our first snorkel, I drove Em and Dad into shore and we went for a walk up the hills of the Island. We saw an old rock cairn and the beautiful views of the other side of the island.

Our night in Cateran was surprisingly comfortable for where it was, so we had a decent sleep and we were ready for our next stop.

Night 6, Tongue Inlet:

We had a good go at tacking (which for you non-sailors, is zig-zagging at 45^o angles to the wind to get where you’re going, as you can’t sail straight into it) on the way to Tongue Inlet, as the swell was nice and calm. After a while, Mum and Dad got tired of zig-zagging, so we just motored the short distance to our destination. We grabbed a mooring and motored in on our tender to a small beach with access to the iconic Whitsunday photo of Whitehaven Beach and Hill Inlet (Check out the photos to see what I mean).

  For our whole yacht trip, we had been fishing off the back of the boat while we moved, I haven’t mentioned it yet because we didn’t catch (don’t get excited, Tongue Inlet wasn’t our lucky place, but my casting skills have definitely improved, unfortunately my catching skills haven’t. I’ll put a few action shots in the images.

  The next morning, before we set off, we went over to a small beach named Betty’s Beach to have a swim in Hill Inlet. The sand was amazing, it’s almost pure silica and it’s cool in more way’s than one, it felt good as well. We didn’t stay in the water for long because there were lots of stingrays enjoying the water with us.

  That was our only stop on Whitsunday, then we were headed back to Hook because of the wind conditions.

 Night 7 & 8, Stonehaven:

Next up, we were sailing around the top of Whitsunday Island, we had lunch moored in the passage between Hook and Whitsunday and the sailed up the East side of Hook Island to Stonehaven. We tried to get into Stonehaven early, so we could get a mooring. After grabbing one, we just relaxed for the rest of the day.

  We had such a nice sleep at Stonehaven that we decided we would stay there for our last night, but we didn’t want to do nothing for our last full day, so we went a round to Langford Island for a snorkel. We saw some pretty clams and a few pretty fish but that was about it, we then went back to Stonehaven and watched the beautiful sunset.

The next day we were headed back to the harbour for the end of our trip.

 End, Airlie Beach Marina:

On our way back from the islands, we didn’t stay in Airlie Beach, but the trip there is worth talking about; so here it is.

  We were ready to go early in the morning, as it was almost 30km back to the marina. After a bit of discussion, we agreed that we could put up both the sails (the girls got a bit scared with both of them up), as the wind wasn’t too strong and neither were the waves. 

  We were making good time, travelling at a speed of up 6 knots (which was almost 12 km/h, fast for a yacht), when we looked out the side of our boat… and saw a few dolphins/porpoises, we weren’t sure. They followed our boat for a while, playing in the wake, before swimming off. We had to use the radio quite a bit on our way back to keep the charter company updated and at about 11 o’clock, we arrived at the marina and said goodbye to our yacht and the Whitsunday Islands.

Hydeaway Bay Caravan Park, Hydeaway Bay, QLD 

We unloaded all our stuff from the boat, returned our rented gear and then… we left the marina.

  We stayed three nights in an average caravan park in Hydeaway Bay (wrongly called Hideaway on Google). On the day we arrived, we went out for some pub grub in nearby Dingo Beach, the we had a good night’s sleep (well, at least until the rosellas started 😐😉).

  The next day, we drove up to Bowen to check out the action there. We visited the Sunday markets and were going to have a swim and snorkel, but the water was too murky and we didn’t want to get eaten by crocodiles😂.  We also had a play in a small waterpark and saw a big mango.

  On our last day, we went for a drive around the local area and had a swim at the Cape Gloucester Resort swimming pool (we didn’t sneak in, it’s open to all customers at the bar).

  That was everything we did in Hydeaway Bay, and from there, we were off to Cape Hillsborough.

Cape Hillsborough Nature Tourist Park, Cape Hillsborough, QLD:

We stayed at Cape Hillsborough Nature Tourist park for two nights, so we didn’t do too much while we were there. The caravan park was nice, but the best part was the waterslides, which were very fun.  On the day we arrived, at low tide, we decided to walk out to an island which can only be accessed then. Unfortunately, we hadn’t gone prepared for all the rocks, so we walked on the sand instead, but soon the sand turned to mud and it was up to our knees. We walked back and washed the mud off our legs.

  Apparently, there are kangaroos on the beach at Cape Hillsborough, but you have to get up at 5 o’clock. As the lady at reception was explaining this to Dad, he said “Sorry, did  you say 5 o’clock?”

“Yes”, replied the person at reception

“Well then you can stop right there, because I’m not getting up that early” and that was the end of that.

  On our first full day at the Cape, we went for a quick look at the beach in the morning and later, we drove to the mangrove boardwalk to have a look at the wildlife, it was very pretty. We saw big lizards, birds, an aboriginal shell midden, and Mum got an amazing shot of one of the many butterflies.

Next, we were driving to another cape, Cape Palmerston.

Cape Palmerston Holiday Park, Cape Palmerston, QLD:

Cape Palmerston was another two-night stop. It was right on the beach, just like the last stop. The beach was very flat, so the water came right up to the vegetation and then almost a kilometre out. They have blue-green algae in the water around there, so we weren’t able to get in for a swim.

  We went for a walk on the beach on the day we arrived, but we got a bit lost on the way, so we didn’t stay for too long.

  We just chilled for the rest of our time in Cape Palmerston, we did go out one night to see if we could see any fireflies, but we couldn’t.

From Cape Palmerston, we were headed to Yeppoon, for the second time.

Discovery Parks - Coolwaters, Yeppoon, QLD: 

We stayed in a caravan park very close to where we stayed last time in Yeppoon, we had 5 nights here.

  Emily and I had never been in caves, so we were pretty excited when Mum and Dad said we were going to visit the Capricorn Caves, not far from Yeppoon. We weren’t doing proper hands and knees caving, but we got to experience near perfect acoustics (whatever that is) and cave darkness, where your eyes cannot adjust to the darkness and so you can’t see anything. We also saw some ferns that are unique to the Capricorn Caves.

  After our caving expedition, we played on the waterslides in the caravan park for pretty much the rest of the day.

  We decided that we hadn’t seen enough of Great Keppel Island last time we were here, so Mum booked a snorkelling/sightseeing trip to parts of the island that we hadn’t visited before. 

  We stopped at 8 places on the boat trip. First up, the abandoned underwater observatory. It has now become home to a variety of coral and fish; it was quite deep so we weren’t able to see everything on the seafloor. Next, we came in to a beach and struggled up a steep sand dune to see some amazing views from the top. We then drove up a saltwater river, that can only be accessed at high tide, the blue water and mangroves looked perfect together, and we got some amazing photos.

  Our boatman zoomed around to the North side of the island for our second snorkelling spot, we saw a little turtle with one of its back legs missing, the coral and fish were about the same as the other places we’d snorkelled in this area. We were starting to get a bit hungry, so we stopped at Halfway island for lunch. After Halfway, we jumped in for a swim in a rock cave that was filled with water. 

  Our last two stops were at another beach, where Emily and I were allowed to jump off the back of the boat and have a swim around and our last one was another snorkelling stop at Monkey Beach, and after that we motored back to Yeppoon.

  On our last day, we had a swim in the Yeppoon Lagoon, and after that day, we were going to have a night near Gladstone, and then 3 nights on beautiful Heron Island (more about that soon).

Boyne Island Caravan Park, Boyne Island, QLD:

We stayed in a little caravan park on Boyne Island for a night either side of our stay at Heron. Both stays were very uneventful, so I’m not ging to write anything else.

Heron Island Resort, Heron Island, QLD:

Wow! What a beautiful place, I actually don’t know where to start.

  First, we got the two-hour ferry from Gladstone to the Island. The first thing we noticed was the birds (but not herons, there aren’t actually any herons on Heron Island), there were thousands of Black Noddys, Buff-banded Rails and Eastern-reef Egrets. The accommodation was pretty nice, but the beaches were even nicer.

  One of the big reasons we wanted to visit Heron Island was the turtles; it was the beginning of their nesting season, so we hoped to see some laying eggs on the beach (we did see some, but I’ve got other things to write about first).

  Buffet breakfast was included in the price, but we had to pay for lunch and dinner, the solution? Eat enough at breakfast to get you through till dinner. Well, we had a few snacks that we’d snuck in from the mainland and the dinners were pretty substantial, so we were ok.

  We figured that if we were on a tropical island, we should enjoy it, so we went on a snorkel trip each of the three mornings that we were there. We saw a loggerhead turtle (which are pretty rare), a few green turtles, a Maori wrasse, a spotted eagle ray, tons of fish and some average coral.

  Emily and I also went to junior rangers, where we learnt about some of the marine life  around Heron Island, specifically, TURTLES!

  On our last evening, we went for a walk on the beach after dinner. As we were walking along, Dad spotted a dark blob up ahead that he thought might be a turtle, after looking at it for a while longer he thought it was just a rock, but then it started moving again and then we knew, IT WAS A TURTLE, and she was going to lay her eggs.

  You're supposed to stay more than 10 metres away from turtles when they are coming in to lay their eggs, as that’s when they’re most skittish. After they’ve begun digging the pit for the eggs, you can get much closer to watch them, we stayed there for about an hour before heading back to our accom.

  The following morning, Mum had become hooked on turtle action, so she set out at 5 o’clock to see what she could see. She was able to see another turtle covering up its hole after laying, when she got back and woke us all up, we wanted to go and see it too. When we arrived, she was just finishing up, so we went back and had our breakfast.

  Our 3-night stay on Heron Island was absolutely, completely, amazingly perfect and we would recommend it to anyone (when the borders open up 😉), after a quick night on Boyne Island, we were headed to 1770. 

Captain Cook Holiday Park & House, 1770, QLD:

We’d enjoyed 1770/Agnes Water so much last time, that we had to come back. We stayed in caravan park near the beach for three nights, and then a house in Agnes Water, also near the beach, (pretty much all places in that area are near the beach).

  The access to the nearest beach was on a 4wd track, and as it was too hot and too far to walk, Dad got his 4wd mode on and we went for a ride (Mum didn’t come 😉). There were some big bumps, a huge puddle and at one point the car was tilted at an angle of about 45^o. The beach was nice, and Emily and I enjoyed the waves for a bit.

  Enjoying the waves was actually pretty much all we did, as the they were so good here. We did most of that at the main patrolled beach in Agnes Water. Which on one day, we hired surfboards for two hours and played

  By then, we’d decided that we wanted to be back home in Melbourne by mid-December, so we decided to put our van up for sale. On our last day at the Caravan Park, we tidied up our van and took some photos. When we posted the ads, we said that we were headed south from in 1770 and if you're on our route, we can deliver. We got a few enquiries within hours, but the real buyer came a bit later (more on us selling the van in later posts).

  The house that we were staying in had two bedrooms plus a bed in the living room, we stayed here for 4 nights. While we were here Emily started to get really itchy feet, at first, we didn’t know why, but after we found out that they were sandflies, we figured she must have got eaten while we were out at Heron Island. We bought her some Calamine cream, but they stayed itchy for weeks.

After a lovely week of waves, surfing and relaxation, we were driving to Noosa.

Noosa Caravan Park, Noosa, QLD: 

We originally only planned to stay in Noosa for three nights, but due to some car problems we had to stay six.

After the short drive from 1770, we settled in to our van and the went out for a boogie board on one of Noosa’s beaches, the waves weren’t very big, so we didn’t stay for too long, on the way back, we stopped for some yummy fish and chips.

Our car had been making inconsistent bad noises when Dad used the clutch, so we got it checked up at a mechanic. Unfortunately, we needed a new one (a clutch, of course, not a new car). After Dad got a bit confused with all the mechanics that he’d been calling and booking two different clutch replacements, we sorted it out (well kind of, it was Thursday and it couldn’t be done until Monday).

We contacted the insurance company to see what they would cover, and they were amazing. They paid for all our accom, a hire car, and a taxi to go and get the hire car. It was just a small Subaru, but it was much better than nothing, and we were now able to visit beaches for a swim.

As well as all of this, someone who wanted to buy our van was coming up to check it out, so we had to tidy it up for inspection. He seemed pretty serious, and later in the day, after the inspection he said he wanted to buy it!

There are quite a few certificates that you need to get if you want to sell a caravan in Queensland, unlike in Victoria. We needed to get a gas one, a brake/light one and one to say that the van was what we said it was.

On the Sunday, we hopped in our new hire car and went for a drive. We drove south to Maroochydore, where we stopped by the Sunday Markets. We bought a housewarming rug to give to my Aunty and Uncle, who had just moved to Bribie Island (our next stop), and some German berry doughnuts.

From the markets, we went to see some waterfall near Buderim, but by then it had started raining, so we didn’t stay long.

We returned the hire car the next day, and two uneventful days later, we were towing the van for the last time, to Bribie Island (where the buyer was).

Apartment on Bribie Island, QLD:

During our three nights on Bribie, we sorted out selling our van, and seeing my 5-year-old cousin, and my aunty and uncle, who had moved to Queensland to escape from Victoria a few months ago (they also wanted to buy a house there anyway).

  On the drive from Noosa, before heading to Bribie, we stopped in Caboolture to get our caravan checked by a mechanic, who said it was what a 2015 van should be. We took the van to the Island and parked it up.

  Our little cousin was very excited to see us, and we were very excited to see her. we said hello to them at their new house, then we all went to the beach for a swim.

  The following morning, we met up with our Aunty and Uncle at a park on the beach, we played in it for a while before going to the Bribie Island Seaside Museum, where we learnt about Bribie’s history (which, btw, is very interesting). It was used by the military in WWII as a base of operation, to detect submarines and sight enemy planes, you can still see the remains of some of the bunkers along the northern beaches.

  I forgot to mention before that we were staying in an apartment, which was where we chilled with our relatives for the rest of the day.

  The next day, we went to another park, with a big rope climbing frame. When we’d had enough of that, we went for a walk along the beach.

  While all this was happening, Mum and Dad were checking their bank accounts for the money for the van, as the buyer was using a finance company, and we didn’t want to give them it until the money was there. That evening, just before we went to bed, the money came through!

  We went to my Aunty and Uncle’s, where our van was parked, to wait for the buyer. Unfortunately, he was an hour, and after he finally arrived and we’d got the new number plates put on and got the van hooked up to his car, we said goodbye to our caravan and our Aunty, Uncle and Cousin.

 New South Wales: 2nd Time

House in Evans Head, NSW:

Dad enjoyed the drive from Bribie to Evans Head, as it’s much easier without the caravan. Evans Head was our first stop on our way South in NSW. The end of our trip was coming closer!

But there’s still a few stops until it’s over, so now I’ll talk about our next one; Evans Head (the home of Evans Head Removals 🤣).

Evans Head is a small town on the beach. We stayed there for three nights.

On our first night, we drove up to a lookout with amazing views over the water, which we went for a paddle in later on.

The waves here were great for surfing as they broke really far out. So, we spent ages boarding in the surf. As the beach was only patrolled on the weekend, that was when we did most of our swimming, we went for swim on another day, but while we were in Mum spotted a shark! We got out of the water very quickly after that and just dug some holes on the shoreline.

That was us pretty much done in Evans Head and we were driving, without the van, to Forster (I am very excited about posting this blog now, as at the time of writing, I’m in Forster and I’ve been behind for a while).

Apartment in Forster, NSW:

We stayed in Forster for 7 nights, during which we went fishing, boating, boarding and relaxing.

  The day we arrived in Forster was Mum’s birthday. We celebrated it with some delicious oysters (the lake around Forster has amazing oysters), prawn pasta and a yummy sponge cake with berries.

  As well as having amazing oysters, the nearby lake also has some great fishing, so the next day we hired a boat and set off to catch some dinner. I caught three fish, two bream and one whiting, they were too small unfortunately, so we chucked them back in. 

  There’s a ton of beaches around Forster, enough to visit a different one every day we were there, if a wrote paragraph about each, I’d be here all day, so here’s a brief bit about each one; One Mile Beach was had huge shore breakers, so they weren’t great for boogie-boarding; Cellito Beach was absolutely pristine (no wonder Daryl Braithwaite filmed the music video for The Horses here) we lounged around here for a few hours; Elizabeth Beach had great waves for boarding and was patrolled as well; The Tanks is a natural rock wall that provides a calm spot for swimming; The last one we visited was the Tuncurry (the town on the other side of the lake) Rock Pool, it wasn’t really a rock pool, just a little beach off the lake.

  That was pretty much all we did during our time in Forster, we may or may not have a eaten a few dozen more oysters, but that was it.

Cabin at Mittagong Caravan Park, Mittagong, NSW:

A caravan park cabin in Mittagong was just a one-night stopover between Forster and, our next destination … Canberra.

Mittagong is filled with old sandstone houses, so we thought it would be worth a walk. We stopped by the lake and saw some baby ducks.

The next morning, we were up early and super excited as neither of us kids had been to the ACT before.

Australian Capital Territory

Apartment in Ibis Styles, Canberra, ACT:

We stayed in the nation’s capital for five nights. The hotel we were staying in wasn’t exactly five stars, in fact, I would probably give it a two-star rating. The apartment was smelly, there was broken glass in the hallways, at least the beds were nice. Anyway, I’m not here to tell you about the quality of our hotel room, I’m here to tell you about experience in the big city.

  On our first day in the ACT, we visited two museums; the National Museum of Australia and the Museum of Australian Democracy (a.k.a Old Parliament House).

  In the National Museum, we visited the permanent galleries, one was about landmarks all around Australia and another was about the Indigenous Peoples of Australia. We also walked through the Endeavour exhibition, where we learnt about Captain Cook’s journey up the east coast of Australia, from the perspectives of the Europeans on the ship and also the Indigenous people.

  In the afternoon, we visited Old Parliament House/MoAD. We got to sit in the house of Representatives and in the Senate. We had a super informative guide who told us about the history of the building.

  The next day, we visited New Parliament House, it’s waaaaay bigger than Old Parliament, so we weren’t able to see all of it. We did get to see the House of Representatives

  Next up, was the Australian War Memorial. It’s a very big museum with information about every war in Australian history. There was a big section on WW1 and big section on WW2 and decent sized chunk on the other minor wars. I could’ve stayed there for hours reading everything there was to read, but the rest of the family got bored after a while, so we whizzed through the last quarter of the museum.

  On our last day in Canberra, we went to the National Gallery. There was an exhibition about women artists through the ages and some soup cans by Andy Warhol (they made us all hungry so then we had to go back for lunch 😉).

  That was our stay in the ACT, from there, we were headed to Benalla; our last stop 😢😢.

 Victoria: 2nd Time

Benalla Tourist Park, Benalla, VIC:

Benalla was the 50^th and final stop on our Australian Adventure, it was just a one-night stopover between Canberra and Home, so we didn’t do anything there. After a sleepless night in a caravan park cabin, we were on the road to Melbourne.

We were all happy to be back, but we were also a bit sad that our 6-month trip had finally come to an end.

 

I just want to say a big Thank You to all you guys for reading and enjoying my family’s travels along with me (from the safety of your own homes). That’s all for this year, but who knows after international borders are lifted 😉.

 

Thank you,

Patrick