down the East Coast

As we headed down the coast we drove through Tablelands and Wooroonooran National Park, which was beautiful and filled with lakes and waterfalls.  We saw Lake Eachan; Millaa Millaa falls, Zillie Falls and Ellinjaa Falls.  We saw some wild turkeys, which was kinda strange, when I think of animals in the rain forest the last thing I would imagine is a turkey but they are all over the place.  We also saw signs for Tree Kangaroos and regular Roos but will still didn't manage to see any. We used our new camping stove and it worked a treat.  After we ate we walked aback to organize ourselves for the night and in about 2 minutes the picnic area we were in was absolutely filled with frogs!  It was crazy, they were everywhere.  Our first night with the tent...we decided to sleep in the car because it was raining.  Sleeping in the car in a hot humid place like Cairns was painful, it was so warm, not recommended.  The next day we arrived in Townsville and headed to the Barrier Reef Aquarium, which was very cool.  We also go to see their feeding time so it was cool to see what all the different creatures eat.  We basically spent the rest of our time in Townsville trying to get internet so Mark could submit a work application.  We needed to be online at 12pm UK time which was 10pm in Townsville.  You would think it would be easy to find internet at 10pm but it was surprisingly difficult!  We ended up in a place that officially shuts at 5pm, but once you are inside you can stay inside for as long as you want.  So we were lucky to find that and Mark was able to submit his application on time, it's his first step towards working in Canada - yay!

We were trying to avoiding driving at night because of all the wildlife, but we couldn't avoid it tonight so we figured we would just drive slow and be careful (I was actually driving) every other car was blowing by me, I was going 65 in a 100 zone...and I hit a bloody kangaroo!  The first roo I saw I hit with the rental car that we had had for only 2 days! Ahhhhhh typical!  I was upset about hitting it, but it was fine, it just popped up and kinda stood there for a bit, probably in shock, then hopped back into the bushes.  Our car, on the other hand, was not so lucky.  The bumper was cracked at the side and had a sizeable dent in the middle.  We were pretty tired at it was quite late so we had another night in the car.

The next day we went to Airlie beach and spent the afternoon in the beautiful lagoon pool there.  It's in the same position as Cairns - no swimming b/c of the jellyfish.  Also there was showers at the pool so after 2 nights in the car we were happy to get cleaned up.  More bad luck with the car in Airlie - $60 parking ticket!  I was half debating fighting it b/c the sign that it was no stopping was well beyond where you actually stop, but we figured it may be hard to get back to a court date in Airlie so we decided not to pay it for now and see what happens.

We finally found a caravan park to sleep in in St. Helen's, so we enjoyed our first night in the tent, was pretty good, and even better, we were now going on 2 days in a row with a shower...hello!

We nipped into Sarina Beach and attempted to see the Capricorn Caves but they were closed, but they did have a big roo out front so we were able to get a close up look - finally! Driving down the Capricorn coast we were still along the Great Barrier Reef.  The GBR is actually massive, it would cover 80% of the UK.  We didn't see a comparison with Canada but I imagine it would cover a big chuck of Ontario. As we drove further along the Capricorn Coast we did we tourist drives and that type of thing, very beautiful.

We stopped in Rockhampton (Rocky), famous for it's beef. It has 2 million cows in 250 Kms - Mark didn't think it was so exciting but I was amazed by this fact!  so we figured; when in Rocky...and we stopped for an awesome steak dinner at the Criterion Hotel (Bush Inn).  Queen Elizabeth was a guest there once upon a time so we figured if it's good enough for Lizzie it's good enough for us. Rockhampton is also one of Queensland's oldest cities, established in 1855. We stayed in Rocky at the 'Country Club' caravan park - classy!  We discovered after we got there that it's basically the wife beating capital of Aus, so we were defo sleeping with the lock on the tent that night!

We arrived in Bundaburg and decided to book a tour with the turtle rookery.  Our tour was at 7pm, all the tours start at night, that is when the turtles come ashore to lay their eggs.  The tour took people out in groups but it depended on the turtles, so if there were no turtles we could have been waiting a long time.  We were lucky and the turtles came in early.  The group was a little too large, but it was still an amazing experience.  We were standing on a huge beach in a crazy wind storm with lightening crashing the sky in the distance and these turtles were making their way onto the beach.  The turtles moved much faster on land than I expected but it was still awkward for them so make it over this sand ledge that they needed to climb to get the eggs to a safer spot.  The turtle that we were watching was a Loggerhead, 30-35 years old.  She will only lay eggs about every 3-5 years, she laid about 250 eggs,  but only 1 in 1000 turtles survive to adulthood.  The mamma turtle would have been born in that area as well, they always come back to lay their eggs along the same beaches that they were born.  It is the temperature of the sand that determines the sex of the baby turtles.  Cold sand for boys and hot sand makes girls, medium temperature sand makes a mixture of both.  It was such a cool experience seeing the turtles come ashore - felt like we were watching something really special.  As soon as we left the beach there was crazy monsoon rain, so we drove to a place called 'Gin-Gin' that claimed to be Australia's friendliest town, and kipped in the car.

Also wanted to mention that the ginger beer they make in Bundaberg is so good!  Defo try that if you are ever in the area.