Capricorn

Monday 23 April, Coolum Beach


In the morning we drove up to Noosa Heads, one of the main tourist centres of the Sunshine Coast, with popular surf beaches around the headland. We took a walk in the Palm Grove and along the Coastal Walk, watched the surfers. We walked around the city, saw lots of elegant shops without many shoppers, went up to a lookout, then drove along the lagoon.

Surfers waiting for the right wave at Noosa Heads
A jó hullámra várnak a szörfölők Noosa Head-nél

At noon we met Jodi's parents (Jodi is the partner of our son), who live in the next place to the South of Noosa Heads, Weyba Downs  - or Peregian Beach according to the new official nomenclature, which sounds much more like the Sunshine Coast. Whatever the name, their house and garden looks down to Lake Weyba, a wonderful quiet, peaceful place, and only 3 kms by bike from the beach. We had a lovely lunch with Sue and Peter and their friend Carol, and a nice walk around the garden and to the lake. 

Lunch with Sue, Peter and Carol on the verandah
Ebéd Jodi szüleivel

This was enough activity for a day, we went back to the caravan park and allowed ourselves a free afternoon and evening. I even had a dip in the ocean, but the surf was very strong, did not dare to go further than knee-deep in. The weather was nice and hot, but very humid.


Tuesday 24 April, Town of 1770


This was a travelling day, we drove about 400 km up North. Sugar-cane fields dominated the landscape all day. We stopped in Childers for a little walk around the historic city centre, had lunch and a bit of rest. In the afternoon we went through Bundaberg, the "rum capital" of Australia, but did not stop. By 5 pm we arrived at the Town of 1770 and made camp at an "absolute beachfront" campground recommended by our daughter - it was a good choice, a very nice place. The weather was again very nice, warm but not too hot, and less humid than the day before.

Historic streetscape in Childers
Childers utcakép

Wednesday-Thursday 25-26 April, Town of 1770


This place was so nice, we decided to stay for 2 more days. The "town" got its name from a historical event: on 24 May 1770 lieutenant James Cook landed at this place. Surprisingly, there is no historic township, no old houses, only a few modern holiday houses, a few caravan parks, eateries and a small shopping centre at the nearby Agnes Water. There is also a secluded bay and little port, and a nice, very well maintained park along the beach. The only historical monument is the Cook memorial with a plaque remembering the big event.  

The Cook memorial

We enjoyed doing very little for a few days, morning and evening walks along the beach, a few swims in the calm and warm water of the bay, relaxing, cooking and reading. 

Dinner preparations at the beach
Készül a vacsora a szabadban

Unfortunately the weather has changed by the last day, it was cloudy and much cooler but still much better than in Sydney...


Friday 27 April, Rockhampton


Today we continued our trip North, but only a short jump, about 200 km. On the way we stopped at Calliope River historic village. This is like a skanzen, a number of old houses and buildings, furniture, tools, etc. collected and transferred from the region and presented to the public. There is a railway station with old carriages, a railway museum, with lots of old tools, signs and equipment, a hotel, church, school and fire station. We spent almost 2 hours going through most of the buildings and sites.

Old farmhouse in Calliope River histroic village
Régi farmház Callioe River skanzen-ben

We stopped for the evening in Rockhampton at the Riverside Caravan park, at the Fitzroy river, just across the city centre. We went to the city for a walk to check out any changes since 1991 when we first came through here on our way up to Cairns. The same nice old buildings - the Post Office and the Customs House - are still here, but the pedestrian mall was handed back to car traffic and parking. 

The Customs House in Rockhampton
A Vámház Rockhampton-ban

Our caravan seems to work very well, it is comfortable and we feel very much at home in it. In the evenings so far we always had good internet connection, which is good on one hand, as we could keep in touch with our family by email and skype, but it also meant that we did not have much time for anything else. We brought a lot of recorded films and documentaries (thanks to Sebastian...), but so far we have not touched it. 


Tomorrow we continue to the North, across the Tropic of Capricorn.


See our itinerary on the Google Map at the following link:
http://g.co/maps/wcwv8


Ezen a héten két napot a Sunshine Coast-on, hármat az 1770 nevű kis településen töltöttünk pihenéssel és kikapcsolódással, közben meg tovább utaztunk észak felé és ma elértük a Baktérítőt Rockhampton városban. Noosa mellett meglátogattuk Marci partnerének, Jodi-nak a szüleit akiket még nem ismertünk. Útközben megálltunk több kisebb városkában (Childers, Calliope River), ahol itt már történelmi érdekességnek számító százéves épületeket láttunk.
Továbbra is nagyon élvezzük a lakókocsinkat, minden nagyon jól működik, kényelmes és minden igényünket kielégít. Az utazás, létfenntartás és kapcsolat-tartás (internet, email, skype...) teljesen kitölti a napjainkat, alig marad időnk olvasni, film-nézésről nem is beszélve.      
Az útvonalunk a következő Google Map-on látható:
http://g.co/maps/wcwv8

Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast

On the morning of Thursday 19 Apr Queensland, the "Sunshine State", welcomed us with blue skies and bright sunshine, a nice change after 4 days of pouring rain. We drove into Brisbane, and easily found our way to the caravan park, thanks to the new navigation system on my iPhone. We picked the closest caravan park to the city, and it was a good choice.
We spent two nice days in Brisbane, taking full advantage of the very generous public transport ticketing system: with the bus ticket to the city we could enjoy 2 hours of "free" travel on the ferry along the river. This is the most enjoyable form of sight-seeing, we went all along downstream and back on Thursday, then upstream on Friday. We walked around the city-centre, and spent most of the time on the South Bank cultural and entertainment area. We visited the museum and the art gallery, listened to a free folk concert at the Riverside Centre, I had a plunge in the free city Beach pool on the South Bank, and another free jazz concert on Friday night. Brisbane was very impressive, well organised and well managed, better than Sydney, clean, no graffiti, no homeless people on the streets - hard to believe...

Brisbane CBD from the river
Brisbane városközpont a folyó felől

Két napot Brisbane-ben töltöttünk, ami nagyon kellemes volt. Letáboroztunk egy kempingben és busszal mentünk várost nézni, és hála az itteni jegyrendszernek, két órát hajókázhattunk a Brisbane folyón a városi kompon. Ez a legkellemesebb módja a városnézésnek itt, mert a folyó körbeveszi a városközpontot, és cikk-cakkban végighalad a többi városrészeken. Ezt mindkét nap kiélveztük, egyszer lefelé, egyszer fölfelé. Aztán sétáltunk a belvárosban, és a folyó déli partján egy elég új fejlesztésű (a 88-as vilégkiállítás területét építették át a 90-es években) szabadidő- és kulturális központban, megnéztük a múzeumot és a képtárt, fürödtem a szabad strandon. Megállapítottuk, hogy ha nincs is olyan nevezetessége mint a Sydney Öböl, Harbour Bridge és Operaház, ez a város sokkal jobban van szervezve és menedzselve mint Sydney. 
Saturday we continued Northbound, but only to the Glasshouse Mountains, in the Sunshine Coast hinterland. These are interesting volcanic formations, 4-5 steep rock domes raising from a flat surface. We left the caravan at the info centre car park, and went around with the car to a few lookup points, taking in the view. Again we had a beautiful clear sunny day, so we could take plenty of nice photos and videos. In the afternoon we took a walk in the Mary Cairncross Park, a well preserved subtropical rainforest, a bit further North of the Glasshouse Mountains. 

The Glasshouse Mountains

In the rainforest

Then we spent the night at the Maleny Showground, where a music festival was going on. There was music playing until 3am, but we had a reasonably good night sleep nevertheless.
A szombati napot a Glasshouse Mountains környékén töltöttük. A viszonylag lapos terepből hirtelen emelkedik ki vagy 4-5 kúp alakú párszáz m magas kopár hegycsúcs, régi vulkánok megmaradt, lepusztult magja. Aztán meg egy épen megmaradt "igazi" eső-erdőben (rainforest) tettünk egy kis sétát, az is nagyon érdekes volt. Jó sokat fényképeztünk és filmeztünk. Este egy kisvárosi "showground" (kb. vásártér, de itt több annál) parkolójában álltunk meg éjszakára ahol szabad kempingezni. Ráadásul egy zenei fesztivál is zajlott itt éppen, de szerencsére elég messze voltunk az akció színterétől, elég nyugodt éjszakánk volt.

Today, Sunday 22 April, our first stop was at Kondalilla Falls near Flaxton, where we did a nice walk to the falls and back with a few hundred stairs for a bit of morning exercise. Then we came down to the coast through Nambour to Coolum Beach, into a beachfront caravan park. The weather is overcast but quite warm. We went down to look at the beach, where a helicopter rescue operation was going on just then, fortunately successful.

Coolum Beach - a successful rescue operation
Sikeres életmentés a hullámokból Coolum Beach-en

Ma délelőtt megnéztük a Kondalilla vízesést, amihez vagy kétszáz mátert kellett le- aztán meg felmászni, jó reggeli torna volt. Aztán lejöttünk a Sunshine Coast-ra, egy tengerparti kempingben szálltunk meg. Kinéztünk a partra, ahol éppen egy életmentó akció zajlott, szerencsére sikeresen...

We plan to stay here for at least another day, to look around the Sunshine Coast and have a rest, before we continue further North.
Our itinerary is now recorded on a Google Map, check the following link:
http://g.co/maps/wcwv8

Az útvonalunk követhető egy Google Map lapon, itt:

http://g.co/maps/wcwv8 

Along the NSW coast

Despite all the preparations, leaving home is never easy... We switched on the fridge in the caravan 2 days earlier, to cool it down before we load it - but on Sunday morning it was warmer than before. After a bit of searching on the internet, we found the likely cause of the problem: the van was parked on a slope and apparently the fridge only works on level ground. It would have been nice if someone told us. First lesson learned...


It was almost 10 am on Sunday 15 Apr by the time we finished packing and left Engadine. We had an easy and uneventful ride out of Sydney and up North on the M3 freeway. By midday we were up above Raymond Terrace where we had lunch break at a nice rest area. And the fridge was working! what a relief... The weather was nice and sunny, the traffic not too bad.


We spent the first night at Seal Rocks caravan park. We had a nice walk along the beach and the "centre" before dinner, it was overcast but still nice and warm. I planned to have a plunge in the sea in the morning and to take some photos...


Then it started to rain during the night, and continued all day Monday with a few short breaks... We packed and hitched up the van in pouring rain, which is not much fun, but we have practiced it a few more times since... 


Not much to say about Monday. Driving in the rain for about 6 hours, lots of roadworks, but no major delays. Lunch break at Kempsey in a nice park, fortunately just during a break in the rain as well. By evening we reached Emerald Beach and spent the night in a nice caravan park. In the morning the rain stopped, and we hade a nice walk along the beach and headland, meeting the local fauna - lots of Eastern grey kangaroos, birds, and a few leeches on our feet...

Morning exercise at Emerald Beach
Reggeli torna kenguruéknál

Tuesday was less rainy, partly because we left the coast and headed inland to Nimbin, a "hippi" town from the 1970s. Interesting experience. The hippis are still there, they grew old but there is a younger generation as well. We spent the afternoon walking around town, doing some shopping, visiting a few art galleries and watching a range of colourful characters. 

In the Hemp Embassy, Nimbin
A marijuana legalizálásáért harcolnak Nimbin-ben

Today - Wednesday 18 Apr - we came down to the coast again, to Ballina and headed to Byron Bay, sometimes in frightfully heavy rain. By the time we got there, the rain has almost stopped, so we did the same, got out and walked around the centre and the beach. We had lunch at a beach-side restaurant, then cafe in an other. After lunch we continued towards Tweed Heads, and stopped at a free camping site along the old Pacific Highway, Stott Island nature reserve beside the Tweed river. It is a nice place, although a bit muddy now after so much rain. It will do for one night. 


Then tomorrow we bid farewell to NSW and continue up to Queensland.

Preparations...

Welcome to our big Australian Adventure! 

Kate and I (Peter) are planning to travel around Australia, and we are going to share our experiences in this blog with anyone interested in following us. Most of our potential followers will be Hungarians, but there may be some from different backgrounds, so we thought it may be more practical to write in English which is more likely understood by everybody - hopefully this is not causing much difficulties to anyone... However, we might include some comments in Hungarian as well...

Üdv mindenkinek! 
Ebben a blog-ban fogunk beszámolni az Ausztrália körüli utunk élményeiről. Nem tudom, hányan fogják olvasni, valószínűleg a legtöbb követőnk magyar lesz, de akadhatnak érdeklődők máshonnan is. Ezért úgy gondoltuk, hogy inkább angolul írjuk a beszámolót, remélve, hogy ez a mindenki (vagy majdnem mindenki) számára érthető nyelv. De néha azért majd beiktatunk egy-egy rövid összefoglalót magyarul is...

This has been a long standing dream of ours. Preparations started more than a year ago, with selecting the appropriate gear for the trip. Our first idea was to buy a motorhome, but then we realised that it would not take us to all the destinations that we want to visit. So we decided that a 4x4 car and an off-road caravan is a better option. It took a long time to search and evaluate the various options. Finally, after long deliberations, we selected and ordered a caravan, and bought a used 4WD. We picked up our caravan, an off-road ECO-Tourer single-bed, in Melbourne and brought it home in January 2012.

Our new vehicle and caravan on the way home from Melbourne
Ezzel az autóval és lakókocsival fogunk utazni a következő 6 hónapban

Since then we have spent a lot of time making our future home as comfortable as possible and our car as fit for all conditions as possible. Now we are almost ready to depart, only the last-minute preparations remain.

We plan to leave Sydney on Sunday, 15 April, heading North roughly along the coast to Queensland up to Cairns. The rest is too far to think about now...