George

Welcome George

Thank you Jade and Steph for trusting us to look after him.  I hope we have as many great times in him as you did.

George had a bit of a birthday present after we picked him up - oil change, gearbox - put in new filters, got the muffler repaired, flushed the radiator and put in some anti freeze.  He likes the new juice and is a very happy van - ready for action.  Going to make a few modifications to the bed today - Tony and I are a bit heavier than Jade and Steph!!!

Coollongatta

Went for a drive today - thanks for the borrow of the car Rosita - headed out towards Tweed Heads and had a bit of a play on the beach - very fine clean sand.

Then carried on up towards the border and of course had to have a photo taken of the two borders.

Had a very nice relaxing day.

First snake

Saw this beauty on the road on the way to get fish and chips from Taffys

Farewell Brisbane Backpackers Resort

Left the backpackers today (Saturday, just in case this dosent get posted in time, its hard to believe this is only our 5^th day here).  Still haven’t got a vehicle but starting to gather a whole heap of information – like beware of vehicles damaged in the floods – hmm hadn’t taken that one into account in NZ.  Got the bus to Herston? And walked down hill with our packs (and of course you all know that what goes down at some stage goes back up) to Slap n Tickle, which despite its name is actually a car yard that fits out vans for backpackers – except they didn’t have any and judging by the yard I think we have written that one off our list. 

So back to Roma St station (everything leaves from Roma St!!!!!) and chilled for a couple of hours in the food court.  A great place to see allsorts of people, AND they have McDonalds AND it tastes just the same as it does in NZ – funny that. 

 

Caught up with Paul T this afternoon out at Sunnybank and then headed out to stay a couple of days with Rosita and family at Tellebudgera. - Yay thanks family

Still no spiders, snakes FLIES or vehicle

But we sure as hell covered a few km looking!!!!

First blog from Australia

Well we survived our first day, even though it took 4 hours to get from Brisbane airport to Brisbane.  Im sure we went up and down from level 2 to 4 about a million times with our back packs on trying to find the best way into town without it costing an arm and a leg.  But holy kangaroos when we finally stepped out of the airport I just wanted to be back inside again – 31 degrees with humidity of 85% made for a very hot sticky day.

 

Found the free bus to DFO and chilled out with a cup of coffee, the people at the Coffee Club were great then found a really awesome bus driver and went to Toombul and then to town.  Got there by one oclock and spent the next few hours getting bank accts, tax numbers and all that stuff sorted. 

 

Turned up at Brisbane Backpackers at 4pm – not cheap though, but found an awesome deal for dinner – two for one Tuesday.  Then we had to go find a supermarket to top Tony up J

Top bunks for us old farts – omg im sure the last time I slept on the top bunk was like 50 years ago and as I realised last night there is a knack to getting down the ladder – tough when youre not as agile as you were at 5.

Caught the shuttle into Brisbane early the next morning and spent the day cruising around central Brisbane.  Worked out the buses and trains – sort of, will have to keep you posted on that one.  Saw where the floods had damaged the restaurants along the water front.  Spent a bit of time checking out the exchange rates – how they have dropped in the 2 days we have been here.  Walked down to Southbank and back – an awesome walk, really pretty – ended up at the Law faculty at Queensland University of Technology – really not sure how that happened but got out eventually.  Had a squiz at the old Government House, amazing big rooms which Im sure could tell a few stories. 

Havent seen any spiders, snakes, kangaroos or koalas – have seen quite a few skinks and a couple of water dragons.  And NO flies.

This ones for Marcie :)

Tomorrow is going to be a day at Fortitude Valley, checking out vehicles – fingers crossed.

OMG only two more sleeps

and whats scarier is only one of those is in our own wee home.  So many lasts (for now) have happened in the past few days and we have finally run out of days.

Actually managed to get everything in the pack with way less than the allowed weight limit of 23kgs - thank goodness I didnt have a bigger pack cos man 17kgs is plenty heavy enough.  So what is not packed now is staying here - but woohoo look out australia shops cos what I didnt fit/forgot will definetely need to be purchased - hmm honey what was our budget again!!

My next message will be from Oz and cant really say when that will be as I guess I will have to suss out the internet cafe scene.

Thank you everyone for making our last few days special - take care and see you when we see you :)

Sucky bags are my friends

as can be seen by the evidence below

hmmm i wonder if it works the same for weight loss!!!!!

The only problem though is that although everything fits in my pack it weighs a ton - well not quite but just under the allowed 23kgs.

Going to miss this

Before takeoff

Ok well 5 more sleeps and the adventure begins