Since our last post we have been having a break from travelling for a few weeks.  In this time we have sold our caravan ready for our trip to New Zealand at the end of next month.  We have been camping out in the grounds of Mick and Veronica’s house.  They kindly offered us their bed but we declined and put up the tent.  We has been ok, slightly cold on a couple of nights, but Veronica gave Phil a beanie to wear at night to keep warm.

We have been helping round the house, Bob helping Mick do some jobs and Phil doing the cooking for the family – which she has enjoyed especially using Veronica’s thermomix.  For those who have not heard of the thermomix – it is a great device which is like a mixer/chopper/cooker all in one.  Very expensive to buy but great to use.  We keep on joking to Veronica that I will take it home with us when we leave – watch this space!!!

We celebrated Bob’s birthday (25th July for those who forgot!) by going to the opera at Jimbour station.  It had been raining for the few days before the event and we were hoping for sunshine as it was an outside event.  The sun shone and we had a great day.  The opera was Fledermous as part of the Queensland Music Festival.  It was a great day enjoyed by us and Mick and Veronica.  The shine shone and the picnic was great and we even had a dance at the end of the day!

The following day we headed off again for a small trip going north this time.  It was pouring with rain when left and we packed up the tent and the car (and had to swap the car for the ute very kindly lent to us by Mick ,as Phil had packed so much stuff!) and headed off.  Our first port of call was Hervey Bay.  We had read that the whales comes into the bay between July and November so we headed in that direction hoping.  We were disappointed – because although the information say that they come into the bay you can only see the whales by going on a boat trip.  So again no whales for us. We stayed here one night, had a lovely walk along the beach, found a geo cache and then headed north.

Our second day took us to Bunderberg.  A huge town with smoke pouring for an industrial factory.  This was a very important factory – Bunderberg Rum factory.  We had a great tour here.  The amount of rum they make is overwhelming, and the fumes are too!!!  The sugar factory is next door where the produce the molasses for the rum and we were shown the whole process.  After the tour we had a rum tasting – they now make rum flavoured using old barrels holding port/brandy/red wine etc so brings a different flavour to the rum.  An interesting visit and well worth doing the guided tour.  We stayed that night just outside Bundaberg at Sharon Gorge Nature Park – a free camp but with facilities. It was slightly noisy being by the road but for one night to was fine.

We moved on in the morning and headed towards Rockhampton.  We hadn’t quite appreciated how big Rockhampton was going to be.  It was just like most cities in Australia, they had everything you need but not much character.  We filled up on supplies and headed east out to Emu Park on the tourist drive.  Emu Park is a lovely, quite upmarket little town.  Right on the sea.  Here we visited the singing ship, which was erected in 1970 in honour of Captain James Cook.  The ship sails in made from old organ pipes and when it is windy it makes a singing noise – slightly eerie but a nice looking ship.  Phil found another geo cache From there we headed down to Kimba Beach where we stayed for a couple of days.  We did check out Yeppoon which is a nice seaside town with the gifty type shops along the front.

From Yeppoon through Mackay along the roads you will see the sugar cane.  It is the biggest producer of sugar in Australia.  Through Mackay and along the coast to Cape Hillsborough.  Veronica’s dad Rob had recommended coming here.  The park is a little run down but you are right on the sea front.  You can hear the waves when you are lying in bed.  The kangaroos come onto the beach in the morning at first light.  Phil went down to have a look but there were about 50 people and only about 5 kangaroos – not really too surprising!  The weather is warm and the breeze has dropped slightly.    We took a walk to the lookout points, very steep climb but the views are worth it.  There were four lookout points and one was turtle lookout – but as usual no animals for us today.  We did find a geocache on our way round which was very pleasing.  In the evening we joined the other campers for a sausage sizzle and to watch the ‘Thin Green line’.  It was a film made by a ranger about other rangers all over the world and what they have to put up with in their job – ie poachers and even being killed in their duties… etc.  It was very interesting and well made.

We headed north again – we really were not sure where we would end up today.  We headed for Airlie Beach and their Saturday morning market.  It is their Reef Weekend so there were live bands playing in the main street, a display of classic cars and in the afternoon there was a parade through the town.  All very nice and a relaxing place to be.  We were up very early on Sunday morning for a fishing charter with Reef Deal.  They picked us up at 6.30am and we were on the water by 7am.  We headed out and everything was ready for us – reels and bait.  We both had a really good morning catching Sweet Lips, Big Eyed Bream, Golden Trevally, Cobia and the cream of the catch a huge mackerel. Although we were unable to take a picture to show we did see some whales one of whom showed us how large their tails are as it sounded…. utterly brilliant!!